(written on 25 February 2013)

More food stuff to clear out? Yes indeed, the cheese in the picture above, a cheddar cheese, had been bought because I thought I might make some hamburgers for lunch for when my family was here on Sunday. But of course we had lunch in a cafe and the cheddar was never used. Neither were the hamburgers but those had been put in the freezer almost immediately after the visit. The cheese was nibbled away in little chunks yesterday and today. Fortunately I'm crazy about cheese so I have no problems with this particular type of food surplus.

Nothing much more to report than that I had an email from my Mexican colleague Ana today, pointing me to the rather hilarious video you'll find below...

(written on 25 February 2013)

In two days' time, Daniel will be here, and normally that would mean that I would be spending considerable amounts of time cleaning the house, getting everything ready, buying enough food. Not especially for him, but for anyone who visits me - be it for a couple of hours or for an as yet unspecified period of time, the latter of course being Daniel's case. But with Andy and Colin's recent visit, as well as my family's visit on Sunday, I had already done so many preparations that there really isn't too much to do anymore. I do have an air bed for him to sleep on because I slept on that when my friends from Scotland were here, and the curtain that I bought and hung up to give them some privacy can now be used to separate Daniel's and mine sleeping areas, giving him some privacy. And food? Well, he'll mostly be buying, preparing and eating his own food so I'm not expecting any issues there.

But there is a food issue and it's shown in the picture above; I'm still busy eating food that I bought for my family's visit, such as the cake in the picture above, because I really hate throwing food away. I'd rather over-eat for a couple of days (or weeks for that matter) than tossing perfectly edible food in the bin. Weight wise that does have its repercussions of course since whatever gets eaten too much will show on my scales with ruthless precision. On Saturday morning I weighed 82.8 kilograms - less than a kilogram removed from my target weight. But this morning my weight had jumped up to 85.8. It's frustrating because I was so close to my goal, but I know that with my exercising and dieting, my weight will go back and I will reach my target at some point. When? Well that all depends on how the next couple of weeks with Daniel will go. I'm looking forward to his stay though, no matter what the effect of my weight.

(written on 24 February 2013)

And gone was the nice weather again! The picture was taken early in the morning, while I was on my way to the pool (and on to work after my sixty laps) and it's of some gulls who had managed to open a garbage bag (which gets collected by the city early on Monday mornings) and were having a nice meal, one could presume.

It's a bit of a strange week, and as a matter of fact it's a bit of a busy period in my life, these months. That's not a complaint, because a lot of nice things are happening! There was of course Andy and Colin's visit at the beginning of the month, which was wonderful. Yesterday my family was over, which is also very nice each time. And on Thursday of this week Daniel will arrive for a visit. He stayed over at my place on Amstelkade twice back in 2010, and I saw him and Matt again in London for a Saturday last April, and now he asked if I would mind if he would come over this summer. And even though I warned him that my living situation had changed quite a bit, that I live in a studio now where there is not a huge amount of privacy and that my place is also on quite a noisy street, and that he will be sleeping on an air bed in the living area... it all didn't matter to him. So, I said that, sure, it would be great to see him again and that he'd be very welcome to stay at my place. The thing is... he booked a single flight, so it will be interesting to see if and when he will be England bound again! He will start university in London in September so that will be a bit of a deadline, I suppose - but I look forward to him arriving in Amsterdam on Thursday! Oh, and I also have a holiday booked starting mid July, doing my own little Jubilee tour of the UK with visits to Blackpool, Glasgow and Belfast. As said, it's a busy time right now - but all nice things, so no complaints from me!

(written on 24 February 2013)

The picture of the day should really have been of my sister Joyce getting on board an Amsterdam canal boat. But OK, I shall spare her the embarrassment because getting on board of one of those things was already a huge step for her to take, averse of anything touristy as she is. And admittedly, getting on an Amsterdam canal boat is pretty darn touristy.

I picked up my family from Central Station in the morning. Fortunately the weather wasn't bad at all today so the walk back home was quite pleasant. For some reason we seem to be walking a different route to my apartment every time they visit (I jokingly tell them that I do that on purpose so that they won't find the place by themselves) and today was no exception. My sister Ilse, who lives in Amstelveen, also visited and all of us went for a lunch in Cafe de Jaren, just down the street from where I live, in Nieuwe Doelenstraat. That's unusual because typically we'd have lunch at my place, but it was a nice change from the usual routine. De Jaren does nice lunches. As we walked out, I suggested doing a canal boat ride, much to Joyce's disbelief and horror. But I figured it would also make a nice change from the usual walk through town and so it happened that we walked to the nearest departure location and boarded a boat for a one hour tour on Herengracht, the IJ, and the usual other canals. Turns out it was actually very nice, and - apart from the choppier waters of the IJ behind Central Station that were just a bit too rough for my dad's liking - everyone had a good time!

After dinner at my place it was time to walk back to the station again and from there they took a train to Limburg again. I went home, cleaned up, and sat down in my lazy chair. It was a very nice day, even though I was quite tired at the end of the day. I hope the boat ride wasn't too traumatic for Joyce... 

(written on 24 February 2013)

Tomorrow is Father's Day in the Netherlands and normally that would mean that I would head down to Limburg today for a weekend with my family there. But not this year! This year, the family is going to come to Amsterdam to visit me. That meant that, in the morning I was busy cleaning the house and buying loads of groceries. I have this tendency to overbuy. And I mean, to overbuy badly. It's not unusual for me to still be eating food that I bought for special occasions (such as my family visiting) for weeks after the event takes place. And now as well my fridge is working overtime to keep its contents chilled appropriately. And there is not just food in my fridge, because the chocolates in the picture are on a big plate on the coffee table, also awaiting my family's arrival tomorrow.

In the afternoon I met up with Anthony, Phil and Kevin in Spa Zuiver, the wonderful spa and sauna resort in the southwest of the city, near the Amsterdamse Bos forest area. It's always a great place to go to because of the many different types of saunas they have. My favourite is the very hot Finnish sauna (90+ C) but there are also music sauna (with gentle easy listening music playing softly), a sauna with a real fire place and one with ambient lights. Plus steam rooms, whirlpools, ambient baths, swimming pool, sun beds, a hammam, a restaurant, relax areas and a bar - enough to keep you happily busy and relaxed at the same time for many hours. It was very nice to be at Zuiver and also finally have some time to catch up with what's going on in Anthony's life. He's splitting up - or divorcing rather - with Nick after having been together with him for 17 years. A dramatic step in both their lives so it was good to have a chat about that. Whilst sipping rose in the comfy seats outside of course.

(written on 24 February 2013)

The picture sums it up nicely. The weather today was just horrendous. It was raining badly this morning so after my morning swim I decided not to continue cycling to work but I took a tram from the Museumplein tram stop instead. "Anyone mind if I just stay on this tram all day? With the rain going on relentlessly outside I have no desire to step a foot outside this vehicle anymore..." is what I wrote on Facebook as the tram slowly approached the office. And a couple of hours later, when I took this picture of the Hilton Hotel, just a couple of blocks from the office, it was still pretty bad.

It did clear up later in the day though. The great thing about these days in mid June is that it's bright daylight till well after 10pm every day. That's absolutely wonderful, and I hate the fact that next week we'll have the longest day again and from then days will start getting shorter. But OK, maybe a bit premature to worry about that. The evening was spent at home, further exploring my iPad, its camera and its apps, and sipping some red wine. OK, gulping down some red wine.

(written on 20 February 2013)

The picture was taken on the bridge over Prinsengracht, with Spiegelgracht to the left. More importantly, it was taken early in the morning, at around 7:35. If you had told me four months ago that I would be getting up at 6:20 on most mornings in order to go to the pool before work, I would have declared you, if not insane, then at least of dubious intelligence. But hey, here we are, and I'm indeed cycling through Amsterdam at 7:30 in the morning on the way to my 60 laps in the pool. The most bizarre and unexpected thing is that I love it as well. So much, even, that I miss it when I did not go to the pool for whatever reason. The biggest motivation of course is my weight loss. My weight is now well below 85kgs but it has still not reach my ultimate goal of 82. With Daniel arriving in Amsterdam next week, I hope I will reach that target before then because otherwise I'm not sure when it will happen.

Today, justice finally caught up with this crook in the video below; 'Sir' Allen Stanford was sentenced to 110 years in jail today for fraudulent business practices and setting up Ponzi schemes. I love this, seriously. So incredibly much damage was done to the financial system by greedy bastards in nice suits, and ultimately most of them seem to be getting away with it within their gated communities. It's only when some of these more obvious criminals get busted, such as Stanford, when there is some gratification. Knowing that Stanford will die in jail is very satisfying because far too many people are suffering, and will be suffering for years, for the greedy acts of evil that a**holes like him all over the world have been executing.

(written on 20 February 2013)

The picture shows the flag of Amsterdam. A lot of people wonder what the three crosses in this old flag stand for. Some think it has something to do with the city's perceived liberal attitude towards sexuality, others will tell you that each cross refers to one of the 'plagues' that besieged Amsterdam in its long history (famine, fire and black death for example) but the real answer is that... there is no reason. This are just three St Andrew's crosses and that is the whole story. The picture was taken in front of The Grand Hotel on Oudezijds Voorburgwal, just the next canal from where I live.

The evening was spent watching football. Ehm... yeah... maybe I need to explain that one. The Netherlands were playing Germany in Euro 2012 tonight. Normally I couldn't give a rat's a** about football, and tonight didn't really change that opinion, but world cup and euro matches are sometimes exceptions to the rule. I will watch them if I have nothing much else to do (actually, going to the swimming pool when the Netherlands are playing an important game is awesome because you'll have the pool to yourself) and tonight... I did. Even more so, I watched the game on German TV. And I saw the Netherlands lose against Germany 1-2. And I wasn't sad about it in the slightest. The sooner the orange mania that grips the country at times like these is over, the better.

(written on 20 February 2013)

And there it is! My new iPad! Of course I went to work today, but it wasn't much longer after my return home that I connected it to my computer and let iTunes work its magic. Admittedly, in the beginning it seemed as if iTunes had lost its magic because syncing all apps that I have in iTunes (for my iPod) didn't go as expected. Many apps weren't synced and some other apps were synced only partially, with a progress bar annoyingly stuck on my iPad's icons. Disconnecting and reconnecting the iPad seemed to do the trick though (isn't that the old IT trick anyway?) and at the end of the evening my iPad was synced properly and also immediately completely full. All my music had been synced as well, but maybe that's a bit too much because it's not likely that I will listen music on my iPad. That's where my iPod comes in. Anyway, I'll have to figure that out some time soon. For now I'm extremely pleased with my latest gadget.

(written on 18 February 2013)

It was a wonderful weekend in London, but unfortunately the weather did not really cooperate. It was quite nice on Saturday afternoon during my bike ride, but today was just fairly miserable, with rain coming down steadily. Then again, this is England and not a remote Caribbean island so what is one to expect? There are enough indoor activities to be done here anyway and that is exactly what I did this morning, on the last day of my weekend here, as I went to the British Museum. It is without exception always nice to visit the building and its hypnotising Great Court designed by Sir Norman Foster, but today I did just a bit more than just shelter from the rain under the fantastic roof over the Great Court, I actually went into the museum.

The picture shows a group of people reflected in the glass that protects the Rosetta Stone, quite possibly the museum's most valuable item. The Rosetta Stone was elementary in deciphering the Egyptian Hieroglyphs and allowed us a much better view of Ancient Egypt. It's definitely the item that attracts most attention in the British Museum, as it seems to be having tourists around it all the time, flashing away with their pocket cameras. It makes for a great photo opportunity for me though (sans flash) so I was grateful for that.

An underground train took me back to Piccadilly Circus (and another T-shirt bought in the Superdry super store...) and from there I walked back to Victoria station from where a train took me back to Gatwick Airport... and a subsequent plane took me back to Amsterdam. A wonderful weekend in the British capital was history once more!