xsamplex

For a small home improvement project, we decided to buy some lumber: On the spot I decided to afford myself a genuine jigsaw. Since Black & Deckers were out of stock, I was offered the Skil (shown above) jigsaw.

While I’m not really into home improvement (which has most of to do with the fact that my job as a programmer somehow seems to create the myth that I’m a complete dud with power tools), I would say I actually don’t mind doing particular wood piece work. As a kid I used to do wood sawing projects at school. Later on, part of the cirriculum of a particular school, I attented a 4 hour class per week called ‘Algemene technieken’ (which translates into ‘General techniques’). You know, those where the sessions even the smartest of the smartest of the class had to attend, to learn the practical skills of making soup from scratch (cooking), creating candle holders (metal working) and making gazillions of bookstands (wood working). I will (and dare) not to mention which kinds of things we made during sowing lessons.

At that age, I must have predetermined that wood working was not meant for me, because there was a talent for math and other scientific stuff in me, and as I told in the previous paragraph, I ended up to become so a programmer. Quite a difference in life I would have had, if I had actually enjoyed cutting stuff out of wood.

Maybe I just got tired of cutting bookstands. Yeehaw.

Watching the Dutch weather unfold, which seems to hit extraordinary heights with temperatures over 25 degrees for 5 days), I noticed we are in for a hot day too: it’s going to top 34 degrees Celsius tomorrow. A local radiostation advised people to cool it down and stay inside.

Which sounds like a pretty good excuse to do some cleaning up around the house tomorrow, for the visitor from oversea.

My old cell phone’s (Motorola) battery died [not holding its charge], so I ended up getting an LG 4015 instead (“Cha-ching! you have 85 dollars less on your account! Great doing business!”).

It has the capability of showing 65,000 colours, which are 64,999 colours too many. It comes with a quite impressive sounding 40 polyphone music synth. I took the freedom to upload an mp3 sample of what it sounds like (mp3). If it was possible (it isn’t) you could have a complete orchestra playing your favourite tune. And that’s it. Eh. That’s it?

And. It has Java. That’s where the band stopped playing the music and a long silence preluded the flood of curses afterwards. No wonder why the phone has all the basic features, which is in one way good (a phone is a phone) but makes the inner-computer-programmer-self-me cringe the toes: Java, isn’t that bloat??

Coming from a family that typically does not celebrate Father’s Day (maybe I should say that Dutch people generally don’t celebrate Father’s Day), we decided to spend some time preparing the garden for a bunch of veggies and small flowers. Tomatoes and peppers. Over at the Co-Op’s they had plenty of lemongrass stems for sale, so we picked up two (fullgrown) of them. I haven’t had much luck maintaining them but have been able to use some of them as the (traditional) tastemakers for stir-fries. I highly recommend the use of them. Dry or fresh, they make perfect (healthy) alternatives for real lemon juice.

My eyes also fell on a bunch of Japanese Maple trees. They sold for 129.95 a tree, which was a bit expensive. I’ve been thinking of getting my card out and buy them right away, but had to restrain myself from that specific urge. They are truly amazing trees: if you happen to have Japanese Maple seeds, you know where to find me.

As for Father’s day: talking to my dad yesterday when I brought the impending Father’s Day up he heartily congratulated me with my birthday. ‘My birthday, it’s been weeks’, I said. ”Who cares about Father’s Day, then”, he replied. So be it.

When I was young at age, I experienced one of the heaviest allergy attacks: small itchy bumps appeared on my skin. Scratching made matters worse and within an hour my skin was dead-red. Everywhere. My parents quickly determined I suffered an allergy that (in English) we know as hives and I was put on a low-fat diet for over one week. In my case, it was particularly margerine and any fatty stuff that makes the hives appear and go. Since that day, I have been extremely cautious when using margerines and butters: my share of consumption of margerine, oils and others are literally tied to the seasons. During Winters I do not necessarily need to skip fats, but when Summer comes, I should ignore that stuff completely. If not, it’s hives galore. And that itch.

And while Calamine oil does wonders (trust me, it does), there goes nothing above going the low-fat diet route once again. Lets say it this way: you wouldn’t even think of touching my sandwiches.

Am I the only person in the world who thinks that Forza Motorsport is a ridiculous name for a car racing game? It could have been a name for a political party that propagates … car racing, car racing and nationalism!

Since I’m the most senior gamer in the house and since I have read the comments on the Eurogamer board after its review of the game Forza Motorsport (from now on abbreviated to FM), I can only say that, it is a good game.

Having also played Gotham Project 2 (from now on GP2), here are the major differences between the two:

Continue reading →