Your Element Is Fire

Your passion and emotion are as obvious as the brightest flame.
You make sparks fly, and your passion always has the potential to burst out.

You are exciting and creative - and completely unpredictable.
You sometimes exercise control, and sometimes you let yourself go.

Friends describe you as sensitive, spirited, and compulsive.
Bright and blazing with intensity, you seem mysterious and moody to many.

What's Your Element?

Friday was the birthday party of Cora and Rene in Krimpen a/d Ijssel. From one corner of this country (Enschede) to the other corner. Estimated travelling time: 3 hours. Well, make that 4 or 4,5 and you're closer. We were ready for departure in Apeldoorn (we were already that far) when we heard that the train in front of us had had an 'accident' (probably a jumper) and we could not continue our journey. We were advised to travel back to Deventer and go to Amersfoort via Zwolle. As you can see on this map of the train routes, that was not an option. So we went to see if there was a bus to Amersfoort. There was, but the bus being property of Conexxion and having nothing to do with NS problems, I had to pay the full price (€8). The bus took 1 hour and 15 minutes to get to Amersfoort. Fortunately we had a good connection with the train to Rotterdam Alexander from where we took the metro and another bus to get near Cora and Rene's place where we arrived at 23.00 hour. The after party.

The party was nice. We stayed till 03.00 and then went to Sna's place to crash. Next morning slept till 10.00, got up, had a nice breakfast and an episode of Angel and then went in the general direction of home. Since we had planned to go shopping on Saturday we did a bit of the Alexandrium. In the Xenos we got a lot of the stuff we needed, like a new teapot and tea glasses, 'grand foulards' for over the couches and a tablecloth.

Later in the afternoon we had dinner in Deventer in a pizza restaurant that we knew from the time that I spent a lot of weekends with Dennis. After that we had to continue our journey via bus because ProRail was working on the train tracks. Since we had a nice day, it didn't matter much.

Spent the Sunday sleeping in, going to the Praxis and working around the house. I now have a shelf in the toilet, floors in my closets, neatly worked-away modem and stuff. If the bit of the drill hadn't broken we even would've had lamps hanging from the ceiling by now.
At what we thought was 21.30 we found out that summertime had started and that it was in fact 22.30, so we went to bed. I tried to update the time on my phone but apparently forgot to press 'ok' or something. Because this morning the alarm rang at, what my watch told me, was 07.00 instead of 06.00.

Hurried to get dressed and fetch the train. Matthijs even made me breakfast. But when I got down to my bike I noticed it had a flat tire. Darn! So, I left the house an hour later than planned. Of course ProRail had not finished working as planned and I had to take a 'snelbus' to Almelo from Hengelo, which prompt ended up in a traffic jam.
Thus started my week.

Yesterday evening my mom let me borrow her car to drive to Harderwijk to get Matthijs' stuff for upcoming Exodus. Sander is going to pick it up from here this evening, so we thought it wise to let him take Matthijs' stuff as well as mine. But well, Matthijs can't seem to pack lightly and he was not going to manage it all by bike.

My mom's car is much easier to drive than my father's. It's smaller, lighter and it can drive on clutch alone. I even got it safely out of the driveway. :-p I only killed the engine 2 times, one time on the way to Harderwijk and one time on the way back, both times on the same crossroad. But it was quiet on the road and we were not in a hurry, so it didn't pose a problem.

Unfortunately work is a bit hard at the moment. Building a new CMS from scrap, using classes with methods, objects and such... I have about 0.3 experience with that and thinking logically with structures and such is hard for me. Therefore I need Matthijs often, but he is very busy with his study and all sorts of things at the moment. And frankly, I can't expect him to hold my hand with every step. However, it is very frustrating that when I have accomplished something, I get stuck because I don't know what the next step should be. :-s

So, this weekend Exodus. I packed loads of stuff, with only my wardrobe I could dress the whole monstercrew (but that's mainly because it's a small crew). When I'm stuck with work I work a bit on a certain prop. It has to do with coffee, ink, water, tea, fire, paint, sandpaper, a bit of rope and some slats. Can you guess what it is?

This week I redecorated my living room, it now looks like a living room instead of a collection of furniture. And this Saturday, my dad came to Enschede with the trailer to bring my easel a small bookcase and some general stuff. Then we visited Het Goed to pick up a dinner table and three matching chairs and a huge bookcase. I now have a bookcase in my living room that is almost 4 meters wide. I'll have to clean it before putting stuff in it. While my dad was around we also went to the Praxis again to get some self adhesive skirting strips (plakplinten). We only have to do the living room with the strips and then all floors are finished.

After putting stuff into the bookcase the living room is finished, except for putting nice lamps and some plants around the place. At the moment there's only one light bulb haning from the ceiling.
After that we'll move to the study, put in some desks and chairs. This week my internet will be delivered so I can finally work in my own home. That has taken long enough already...

Then the 'tinker-room' or hobby room where I will be making cards, clothes, costumes etc. We still need to put the table in.
In almost all rooms we need to hang up the lamps. The bedroom needs some bedside tables and a chest for the bedding. Then moving all my stuff to Enschede, some nice hangings on the wall and there will finally be time for a house warming. About time after 4 months...

And Matthijs and I need to do something fun again soon. At the moment our contact moments are mostly work-related contact (he is helping me with some coding) or work around my house. And I need to make personal gifts to thank a lot of people for all the help during the moving and such.

Work is going ok. I've been given a huge task, with which Matthijs is helping me, and my contract will be extended for a year this month. They are really happy with me. :-) Unfortunately for us, one of my colleagues is leaving us for a different job elsewhere. He's the other programmer in Amsterdam (we have another in Eindhoven) and with him gone we really need a new programmer. Check www.brevidius.nl for more information.

Pandora has come and gone, for a fully detailed report, see Matthijs' blog. My illness has come and is on it's way out. All that is left is a nose cold and some coughing.

And now I am at work again in Amsterdam. Tonight I will go to Enschede again and hopefully I will have internet in my own house somewhere this week. Which would mean that I could actually start living there for real, instead of going to and fro Matthijs' place for internet and dinner.

I finally have my table and two couches, now all I need is some bookcases and I can start moving my stuff to Enschede.