joopythepoopy

I've got my camera !!

After carefull deliberation, visiting lots of comparing websites and so on, I bought it this morning.
The rest of the day was a total waste with my driving to Veghel and trying to get to Vlissingen from there, but not being able to make it, calling my client to reschedule and now back at the office and about to run again, coz T. has to go home and R. is disappeared.
Aargh.
A. we need you !!

Just kidding.
Not really.
How you're doing?

Champagne

We've had 2 bottles lying in the fridge for ages now and I so hope we will open one this afternoon/evening when R. has had his job interview!

Update couple of hrs later;
The interview went well but they will let him know in 2 days whether a 3rd interview is needed.

Judo

M. had to be at the gym at 9 this morning for his first judo exam.
There were about 30 kids, ranging in age from 4 till 7 I guess, who had to perform several throws and movements, all starting with a greeting and then a roll forward and backwards. The little ones almost made me pee my pants.
Doing the roll they stood on their heads. And the teachers were so nice.
"Just a little bit further, that's it. You are doing great."
One of the little kids hit his toe, started to cry and ended his exam cuddled up next to the teacher.
M. was a bit nervous.
He had to "fight"with a boy he had never met before but did OK.
In the end everybody got their yellow slip and a Sponge Bob icecream (with 2 parents on each kid and at least 1 brother or sister filling a 70 m2 sportsroom, some refreshment was no luxury)

Proud and relieved we went to do the shopping, where C. decided she couldn't hold it any longer and p'd in the shop.
Now that she's getting zindelijk, we use about 1 toilet roll per toilet (got 2 in the house) per day.
Not kidding you.
And she is doing it all by herself.
Last night she went to the toilet 3 times and climbed into bed again all on her own.
Good for her!

Speaking of last night.
With the weather being this hot, everybody sleeps with their windows/doors open.
Last night about 1 or so a couple decided to have some open-air sex.
It woke me up!
For a startled moment i thought something was wrong with C. (who's sleeping in the room next to us) but soon realized the moaning and groaning ment something else.
It was really annoying.
After about 10 minutes I decided i had heard enough and just when I was about to ask if they could speed it up a bit, someone was clearly done or at least got quiet.
Today is a bit cloudy and less humid outside, so I reckon we can all do our sex-ing indoors !

For a moment it looked like we had found

the most original farewell present for A. ever; lice

R. thought he had seen lice on T.'s head, rushed over to the pharmacy, I warned the school and on closer inspection it turned out to be just dirt.
A whole lot of dirt but nevertheless dirt.

We mailed and phoned the Hema again but only got the answer back that they couldnt stop the production process just for our sake and they would do their utmost to have it delivered yesterday.
Not.
Shittertheshitshit.

We went out for dinner at Lux and although I had the very nice antipasti vari as usual, something went wrong and I got terrible cramps. I could make it till home (and think not to many ppl even noticed) but sat on the toilet for about half an hr and almost fainted with cold sweat pouring from my face.

Do I draw a nice picture or what?

Anyway, A. came home from Den Haag at 3.30 and those rotten birds kept me awake till 4.30.
Then at 5 T. came down asking if we were going to be here (he was very upset yesterday evening coz we had to have a "strange" babysitter) for the rest of the night, yes T. thank you very much. At 5.30 C. had lost her speen, at 6.00 both M. and T. came down asking if it was allowed to watch TV. NOOO !
At 6.30 I gave in to them and fell asleep till 7.30

So, been to the doctors and came back with 45 new sachets Movicolon and then brought A. to Schiphol.
15 minutes on our way, there was some item about chocolates on the radio which reminded her she left the bonbons in the fridge.
Vvrroomm turn around, back home, and off we went again.
Got to Schiphol alright, checked in, had a drink and then it was time to say goodbye.
Everybody was containing themselves very well and although C. had a siplip, we could persuade her to come with us when she understood A. was coming back.
Next yr is a different story but we are just not going to think about that one.

On the way home called Kamera Express coz I've finally made up my mind and chosen this Nikon SLR camera.
Turns out I have chosen a model that is out of sale! Damn.
I can go for the D70s now but that one is about 200 Euri more. And only for a slightly bigger LCD display and an updated menu.
So, anybody any suggestions?

General update on the robbery and other stuff

So. J. worked all evening yesterday (thank you very muts) to get my new (and very hip-looking) laptop ready for which I am eternally thankful.
Unfortunately insurance won't pay for it coz there are no signs of a burglary.
Right.

Some homeless punk found (amongst papers of 2 other families) some of our papers in a trash bin and handed them over to the police. (When R. went to the station to pick it up, he said the police know all these ppl by name and they were walking in all the time at the police station, to have a coffee, sit in an airconditioned room for a while and leave again when they were cool again !)
He renewed his drivers license (which wasn't found obviously) and that alone took him more than 2 hrs at the city hall. All in all we've got everything that was stolen back/new again.

He also got another job interview at Pink/Getronics and now it is more promising than ever.
His former boss (guess that helps) told him he definitely wants him on his team but coming Monday he has to have another interview with someone he will be working with (and whom his boss wants him to replace, which she is not told yet, so there you go for political skills to get a job!) Fingers crossed, if all goes well he can start August 1.

Today is A.'s last day.
I called United Airlines yesterday coz there was a bit of a panic.
I thought I booked thro Ebookers, but A. said I hadn't given her her e-ticket yet.
And ebookers couldn't find her at all in their system.
O God I though, I have to get back to the house now and tell her she's not going home this Friday.
But I knew for sure everything was arranged, I just couldn't find the confirmation anywhere.
United Airlines however forwarded her itinerary and confirmed she was on board so pff that's settled.
I also mailed the Hema coz I ordered something that has to arrive for her today or else we have to send it to her and that would be such a bummer. Let's not get into details coz it still might arrive today and then everything is OK, but still...

Cirque du Soleil II

Yesterday T. and I went to Dralion with 9 prospects and 1 client and his wife.
As ever, it was a fantastic show and we all had a great night.
On Purpose, we didn't explore any commercial activities while we were there. We just said we will call you one of these days to see how we could get to know you better and present our activities to you and have had several very nice thankyou-mails back.

The funny thing was, the Grand Chapiteau was placed on the parking place of Ahoy and in Ahoy itself there was a band playing called System of a down which had a slightly different public.
Younger, dressed in black and primarily drunk.

Today we had to be at the Nenijto at 8.30 where both A. and I were accompanying different toddlers groups. M. was in mine, which was fun but it was a very nice (and sunny) morning anyway.
The kids did 12 "sports" like carrying water on a juk (have no idea how to translate that one), throwing balls in Pluto's mouth, longjump, croquet etc.
Everybody got an ice cream and a specially folded balloon (boys choose swords, girls a heart, life can be simple when you are 5 yrs old!) so we have some very tired boys at home now.

But the biggest news is : C. is p-ing on the toilet !!
Hooray !!!
On the other hand I found 2 turds randomly placed in the kitchen and hallway the last couple of days so we are not there yet but Rome wasn't build in 1 day either.
Deep !!

We've been robbed

Yesterday evening, R. was out in the car (parked almost in front of the door btw) working on the sound system. I was upstairs testing LFF and apparently someone came in (R. left the door open coz he was going in and out for stuff), took my laptop and R.'s wallet and left.
Nobody saw a thing.

At about 10 I wanted R. to help me out with some stuff on the pc upstairs and needed a letter that was in my laptop-suitcase.
Was ja.

First we thought A. might have taken it to the office to do things there but when we called her on her cellphone, she was upstairs (no we don't have that big a house, but sometimes you just don't know where everybody is going).
And the thing was, after dinner and the kids had been brought to bed, i sort of cleaned the living room coz C. our cleaning lady was coming today. So I knew for sure where my laptop was.

Called the police. Someone had to go down to the station because R.'s driving licence was in his wallet and the car-papers (kentekenbewijzen, verzekeringspapieren en keuringsrapporten) ook.
First they advised us to park the car in a garage so that they could't take off the license plates, put them on another car, cause lots of trouble and have us sent the bills for it. And then they said that, a drivers licence being a valid ID, they could cause a lot of trouble with that too.

So. R. went down, was back around 12 and that's it.

Unbelievable isn't it.
Goes to prove, you really cannot leave your front (or backyard door) open for 1 minute. Literally.

Summertimes and the living ain't easy at all

All of a sudden it's about 30 degrees out here and where have I been today?
Inside.
Testing.
Doing laundry.
Ironing.

Bringing and picking up M. who wanted to play at Lucas's.

Buying presents for Saida's new baby who was born Wednesday and whom we're going to visit tomorrow.
In de Bas buying groceries.

And last but not least inside the car helping R. out with the radio.
Yes.
We do have a radio but now he's making a whole new wire system and implementing new boxes.
* sigh*

So at about 4 I had my first opportunity to put out my pants and sit in the sun.
R.'s remark of the day; Beware of any planes crashing into the house coz with those legs you're giving off light signals.
Nice.

I wish I could have some extra internal memory too

Coz it made our computer superfast.
Don't know what's happening here.
Then again, we only had 96K and if you reckon you can get up to 1Gb !!!
I'd like to think that of my total of 1 Gig, with 39 yrs of life-experience now and about 20 yrs of schooling I am at least at 512kb.

Jeez, this is a lame post !

Happy Birthday to me

And to Helana, Marcel, Joaquin and if I have left out someone; happy Birthday to you too!

So R. bought me a lipstick, extremely nice body foam and an eye liner. (that's when you get when you ask a man for a mascara ;)

And thanks to all the people who congratulated me allready on this blog thing or on the phone this morning!!

What else is up?
A. and I have been to a chocolate workshop yesterday evening. R. and I noticed our bonbons were disappearing rapidly, once she got them in sight (Just kidding A. !) and as I like to 'finish' the aupair year with something that you can experience/do/learn from we found the perfect thing to do.
And it wasn't even that difficult. Ofcourse some things were already prepared, but still...
For pictures see A.'s blog (sometimes I wonder why i even write about stuff coz she's much better at it and has nice pics )

Something totally different;
I wouldn't mind if -as a sort of birthday present- the last prisoner who escaped a few days back, was captured and if the Puma on the loose (out here in the Netherlands, ppl! what the f is going on here, or is this Puma trained to find former rapists and thus a specially trained AIVD device? Sorry got carried away) handed himself in.

Got to go know.
Tea is ready and I am going to get me one of those big chuncky bonbons.

Cirque du Soleil

To attract more prospects T. and I are doing a lottery with free tickets to win for the Cirque du Soleil.

It's amazing! I think we've got almost 300 people responding sofar.
The funny thing is, we did the same lottery over a yr ago when they were playing in Antwerp and had a real hard time finding ppl. Apparently Antwerp sounds too far off, although it is only 1hrs drive from Rotterdam.

Anywho, I'll be seeing the show (which is absolutely great, ask A !) for the 3rd time now!.
Been with M. to Amsterdam, with A. to Antwerp and now again but this time in Rotterdam.
If you ever get the chance to see them, go over. Lot of money, I know, but definitely worth it.

Afterparty

So, the 3 of them are in the tub now and everybody's gone home.

The first 15 minutes were the most difficult ones, but frankly it wasn't very hard.
Somewhere during chapter 3 of het boevenverhaal we let go of the story coz they all wanted to play with M. 's new toys and half an hour before the parents came to pick them all up we also picked up the story line for the last chapter.
Very glad btw that the sun was shining and we could do some things outside coz 11 kids (C. included; she wouldn't go to bed) in our living room is about 8 kids too much.

How do you know what you really want?

I usually know where I am going although I too have moments of doubt.
Thing is, you often just don't take the time and let your life being run by everyday's madness.

Try answering these questions:

• When do you have moments of flow (moments that you are totally absorbed by what you are doing, not keeping track of time. In what kind of work could you be doing those activities?)
• Which people make you jealous (Jealousy is not an asset to be proud of but it does say something about your deepest desires. What exactly makes you jealous? The status, minding your own business/doing your own thing, the adventure)
• What would you do with 20 billion (take your time and describe as precisely as possible what you are going to do. Don't stop at buy another house and another car, give something to family and charity)
• Laying on your deathbed, how do you want to look back at your life (would you like to have worked harder? Don't try to limit yourself to; I would have liked to see more of my relatives/children/friends -although that can be very meaningfully in itself. There must be things you would have like to have achieved, that added something to society)
• Talk to someone who doesn't have any interest in your choices (i.e. not your partner or friends)

Good luck !

Relieved

Spoke to P. this morning. Most of my minor and bigger issues will be resolved.
Apart from that he has given me administrator's right so I can fill or adjust a lot of things myself.
Will take up more time but at least then I know I've got myself to blame when it's not right.

Looking forward to it again.
I will start to make concept mails tonight at home, using my lookingforfriends mailaccount for anybody i want to send emails to. I think I'll start with Europe first. Eespecially in big cities like London or Paris I've got dozens of adresses allready and roll those out first.
YES! Really looking forward to it again.

Sorry for all the wining and swinging moods, but the sun is shining and I feel a lot better now.

This afternoon A. and I got a meeting at M. & T.'s school. Next week on Wednesday, we accompany the groups at the sport's day.
They have to do all sorts of 'assignments' and 'sports' like running, getting 2 cups of water in a certain time over a certain distance etc.
M. is in my group so that will definitely be a lot of fun too.

Tomorrow it's his birthday and today we have to get over all the equipment and stuff.
Am a bit nervous (the whole feeling of organising a party and being too involved with making sure everybody is having a good time and therefor not enyoing it yourself is coming back) and mustn't forget to buy some stuff (schmink en een koetjes-chocolade reep)
I'll tell you all about it tomorrow evening.

Feeling restless

New clients at the office stay behind, although we've had several opportunities, things bounce off.

LFF is not going where I want it to.
I got M's testresults back this morning (thnx again) and most of what he said I had already said to the programmer but he simply answers that those things are not possible in this program.
I send J. an email (Hi J.) asking him whether I am just expecting too much or ..?
I am going over there tomorrow morning again and they'd better have some good explanations or simply alternatives for what I am asking coz I am not letting it air like this. I still can't test the most crucial part; making contact coz the paying thing is off.
AARRGHHH.

R. still doesn't have a job.
And it is worrying me.

Brain Lateralization Test Results

Right Brain (55.6%) The right hemisphere is the visual, figurative, artistic, and intuitive side of the brain. Left Brain (44.4%) The left hemisphere is the logical, articulate, assertive, and practical side of the brain Left brain dominant individuals are more orderly, literal, articulate, and to the point. They are good at understanding directions and anything that is explicit and logical. They can have trouble comprehending emotions and abstract concepts, they can feel lost when things are not clear, doubting anything that is not stated and proven. Right brain dominant individuals are more visual and intuitive. They are better at summarizing multiple points, picking up on what's not said, visualizing things, and making things up. They can lack attention to detail, directness, organization, and the ability to explain their ideas verbally, leaving them unable to communicate effectively. Overall you appear to have fairly Equal Hemispheres ----------------------------------------- According to Darwinian theory, optimal evolution takes place with random variation and selective retention. The evolution savvy individual will try many different approaches when faced with a problem and select the best of those approaches. Many historical intellectuals have confessed their advantage was simply considering/exploring/trying more approaches than others. The left brain dominant type suffers from limited approaches, narrow-mindedness. The right brain dominant type suffers from too many approaches, scatterbrained. To maintain balanced hemispheres, you need to exercise both variability and selection. Just as a company will have more chance of finding a great candidate by increasing their applicant pool, an individual who considers a wider set of options is more likely to make quality decisions.

Are You Right or Left Brained?(word pair test)
personality tests by similarminds.com

Nothing much

Quiet day.

We traded kids yesterday. The boys went over to T. and we picked up C.

R. went off to some cycle thing today so C. and I did the groceries (as ever trying to avoid the homeless (guessing from the state of his teeth) Somalian beggar who wants to have my shopping cart coin, but this time giving in, mainly due to the fact that Caroline was threatening to cross the street and my cart was about to bump into someone else car and I thought it wiser to let him handle that), had lunch, went into the city (by bike)...wait a minute; I am looking out the window now (the one A. has on her blog) and see a woman with gloves on picking dirt from the street, putting it in a plastic bag and walking back to her house at least 50 mtrs ! O wait, she's still at it. Can't believe my eyes. Our neighborhood is improving by the minute.)
Where was I ?
O ja.
In the centre I went on my highly secret mission (to be revealed in a couple of weeks),
had lunch with C. at Dudok's where she made a scene coz she wanted to have a sip of my diet coke instead of her own fristi. TG there was allready a constant buzz of all the people so I didnot give in although I did feel eyes poking.
For some reason she wanted to put on the same striped shirt as I have on, this morning and I said OK. Forgot all about it ofcourse until we put our coates off in Dudok and I thought; O shit, ppl will be thinking I did this on purpose and like "my little girl to dress as a copy of me".
Pff, the things you have to consider ;)

Didn't do any of the planned testing so tomorrow I am going to sit behind this thing until I have square eyes.

ps; the spell check gave frigid for my fristi. No thank you.
ps2: R. specifically asked me to mention the A/C has been installed. Waarvan akte.

Don't let Fokke & Sukke prevent you from commenting!

Sleep over

Tonight is the first night my little girl is away.
She's staying over at T's and i am loving it.
Hehe.
You thought I was going to say something else didn't you?

Sure I miss her.
I wish I could just snuggle into her room and give her a kiss on her forehead while she's asleep like I normally do, but hey, the girl can also be a handfull and it's nice to have an evening "off".
But I am going to call T. now, just to hear she's OK.

Will we make it?

P. has been ill the last few days and the other programmer has been on holiday the whole week.
Great.
I'm still clinging on to half of June and made an appointment to go over the last details coming Tuesday.

Apparently the paying mechanism will be ready for testing tomorrow, so T. and A. go ahead and test away..
(no worries, I'll re-imburse all costs made)

Time is really flying by. A. is counting down and will be here only a fortnight (ohoo, finally been able to throw that one in).
And in 1 month time we'll be on holiday.
I do desperately long for sunshine but the north of France is not doing significantly better than we are, so ...

Testing testing, 1, 2.

And another day of testing.

I am making progress tho. Only so slowly.

I tried to get an account at 2checkout a few days back. So far we were thinking of making payments possible through credit card and Paypal, but P. asked me to sign up with 2co also but I haven't come very far.
I mean i have an account and a vendor number but now i have to decide whether to make payments possible thru wire or airmail check.
Maybe I should ask A. coz i don't have any experience with either one.
And the wiring costs about 20 dollar per wire! My whole fee schedule is based on smaller amounts!!

P. and I have been thinking about how to attract people to the site and persuade them to register and even pay for contacts.
I think i am going to make a summer deal.
Let's face it; I really need ppl to register in order to make a start and make it interesting for others to follow.
So i have been thinking about this summers deal with for instance 3 months contact info for half price.
I am open to any suggestions, so if want to help me out, pls do so !!

And I originally wanted to place the emailadresses I have sofar in some sort of test database, which could be transferred into a real one with a personal password or so, but P. is very worried ppl may take it the wrong way and think that someone allready signed them up for something they haven't chosen themselves, so.. I'd better not go there.
That does mean, I have to do an immense email action (i have way over a 1000 adresses) with as much personalised mail as possible.

I'll tell P. i am planning to go life half june (15th) but in fact i want to go life the 17th. Not only my birthday, but also a Friday this year, so ppl will have the following weekend to go over it all.
On the one hand I think it's going to be a total disappointment. Nobody i will mail to, will register, let alone pay.
On the other hand, I simply know, coz i collected all my adresses on city/region that there are a lot of aupairs/expats whatever out there, very near to each other, who simply don't know each other yet and ofcourse will be happy to register and pay a small amount for contact info.

Pff.

R. is back to the office to paint.

We've got a new national sport overhere

And it is peeing in bed.

M. used to be the only one to have "an accident" every 2 or 3 weeks or so but in the last week T. joined in. And not only in his own bed, but a few nights ago, he was having a nightmare and was allowed to sleep in R.'s bed (who moved over to the guest room) and wetted that one too.

As if we don't have enought laundry with 3 adults and 3 little kids living here.

And on top of it all; this morning the washing machine (not the laundry one but de vaatwasser) broke down.
Help.
That means going back to the Ice Ages and washing manually.
I think i am going to get us large supplies of anything disposable possible.

Airco

Now we have had this airco standing in our office for about a yr. After the incredibly hot summer of 2003, where T. and I on some days almost fell asleep at 2 am coz it was so warm in our room, we bought 2 airco's. One is a mobile one and we put that one in A.'s room as hers is the sunniest in the house and the other one is this split system thing, where you have to hang one thing outside and the other thing is inside.
With T. being on holiday and summer bound to arrive now for real one of these weeks (please summer please), I asked R. to install the airco in the office.
Now you have to know that all of the stuff I ask him gets done in the end but it can take weeks or months to finish.

Small example: we started the whole "closest in our bedroom and working/ironing/libraryroom -excercise" while A. wasn't even with us and she's been here for almost 10 months now !!

So
1) a hole needed to be drilled to put the hose thru and
2) a shelve needed to be made to put the airco on.

The hole alone (no not home alone) needed 2 days. With ceaseless driving to and from the Gamma to get a bigger drill and a new this and then still another drill and btw a new that.

Yesterday the shelve was made.
But.
Something needed to be made to cover up the hose.
That something needed plastering.
Plaster needs drying time.
Then it needs to be geschuurd.
And then it needs to be painted.
And while he was at it, it might be a good idea to paint those shelves behind me too.

NO.
It's the end of the working week today and we've got our own Ground Zero over at de Beukelsdijk.
He said he'll paint tomorrow.
But I need to test Looking for Friends again this weekend and coming Sunday we have a bbq planned because of Hugo & Esmee's 4th birtday.

ARGHHH!

Something completely different:
to all my readers out there; step forward please.
I have installed a very secret piece of code in my template with which i can track you down.
Relax, relax, I can only see where you are coming from.
It's very cool to see i've got visitors from Japan (thanks M.!) Romania (thanks T!), France (this might be my aunt but I am not sure), Germany (probably a lost soul coz I don't know any Germans) and ....*drum rolls*
Hello Foster City !!
I have a reader in California who has even returned his or hers visit.
Who ever you are, I just wanted to let you know; you made my day !

She's alive

As my mother didn't pick up the phone this morning either (and I tried about every half hour) I went over to her place.

Shows to prove, UPC is a lousy company and their phoning service is crap also.
She just has no connection.
You have all these adds now about internet, tv and phone all thru cable and then you can practically phone for nothing during certain hours.
Well you can sure phone for nothing coz it's simply not working.

De Jantjes

Ha!
My granddad will be 91 somewhere in June and it is not easy finding a present for someone his age.
Combined with Fathers day in 10 days time, I thought I would him a great pleasure with tickets for De Jantjes .

So weeks ago I bought 2 tickets with top places (5th row) and today i made my surprise call.

He declined !!
He's got prostate problems and is worried he has to leave the show every 15 minutes (which as I can tell from experience is possible with him, and not only that but as his sight is not that great I would have to accompany him ofcourse and an average toiletvisit takes him about TEN minutes (I wait till the last second, hurry over, drop my pants, pee, wipe and run again) so...
where was I?
O ja.
He declined.
He really felt bad about it, and I really understood his point of view but now I am stuck with 2 tickets for De Jantjes, a musical I wouldn't have picked out voluntarily .

So I thought; lets surprise my mother and then she can take tante Els.
But i just rang her and she doesn't answer.

Now my mother is not the person to do something unexpectedly.
Correction; to do something.
Sure, she goes out to do the shopping but that's it.
And with her condition my sister and I have been thinking for some yrs now, there might come a time where someone would find her lying on the kitchenfloor.

And she didn't answer the phone yesterday either.
M. wanted to call her (he's very proud of his newly learned Phone manners)
After letting the phone ring for about 3 minutes, he came to the conclusion she was probably not at home, doing the groceries.
Whereas T. suggested she could also be abducted.
So we had a very interesting discussion about being abducted and what happened if your parents didn't pay in order to get you back. And would the abductors cut off your ear or would they starve you to death.

Let's just say; to be continued

We were even worse than the French

With us it was 62% NO !
Of course we did fear it but this is really loud and clear.

What I don't understand is; the Danish and Luxembourg governments are still going ahead with their referendum in July I believe.
What's the point? The whole thing is being blown off for sure now.

For now that is.
I am sure that within 3 or 4 yrs we get another referendum about another/new Constitution and people will give in.

I must say however that despite the outcome the whole Europe discussion was rather learning. I've heard new stuff about governmental structures and power and simply our country that are really interesting.
And I do understand and feel sympathetic towards some of the No arguments.
As well as they probably understand mine.

Ok now.
Back to everyday life.