The Spaghetti Code

Back

2005-03-28T08:00:00.000-05:00

I know, it's been a while since I last posted something... Well, as most of you know, I'm back in Holland, the trip is over, finito, and I have to go back to work. The main reason why I didn't post for so long is that I've been working my ass off finding a job and a place to live. When I left Haren I gave up both my house and my job, so I came back to nothing here. But I gotta say, I haven't been unlucky and the hours I spent every day sitting behind the computer looking for jobs and appartments are starting to pay off. I found a part-time job writing application letters, so I'm getting paid to practice for my own application letter writing skills. And even better, I found a little appartment in Amsterdam, only 5 days after I came back! That's nothing short of a miracle, because the waiting lists for housing in Amsterdam are as long as the distance between me and Dana... It takes some people almost 10 years to find a house. I'm very lucky indeed.

And my new appartment, even though it's small, is not your every day house: when I googled my new address I discovered that a member of the Dutch Parliament, a guy from the Green Party, used to live in my appartment. What's good enough for a Parliament member is good enough for me, I'd say.

Besides Amsterdam I also went back to Groningen for a couple of days, only to find out that not much has changed. There's (even) more bikes parked in front of the station, that's the only thing that really shocked me.

Another bike shed like this, but now in front of the station.

Well, besides the house in Haren that is... I can officially declare that the house is dead. It's still there, it's cleaner and more beautiful than ever before (which is not that hard, I admit), but it has no soul anymore. The university only filled up half the house this semester so everybody has their own appartement. Sounds great in theory, but it's horrible, believe me. Only 6 people from the first semester are still there and none of them seemed very happy. The living room is empty, the smell of ashtrays, old beer and raunchy afterparties is gone, and so is the stoner artwork on the wall. The walls are completely empty, emphasizing the loss of its identity even more.

The day I came back to Haren was a beautiful spring day, 19C/66F, sunny and no wind except me. I stepped into the back garden expecting to see drunk people, BBQ-ing, couches and blankets everywhere, and smell fresh ganja and grass. Nothing. Two people behind a computer inside, nobody outside. I stayed for a while, just to talk to everybody I still knew, but the house itself made me sad. The house of 'manjana, manjana' and 'we'll sweep up the ashes in the morning' is no longer there.

R.I.P. Holy M.O.A.H.!

But... I did come up with a great idea while I was there: when we have the big reunion next month in Groningen we should visit the M.O.A.H. and throw a big Surprise Reunion Party there! You know, just get in, sit down at the tables and start drinking... M.O.A.H. will rise again for one night! (Sorry, it's Eastern right now and as a Catholic I guess I'm getting a little carried away...)

OK. That's enough for now. More will follow soon, including pictures of Groningen, Amsterdam and my new appartment. Keep visiting!

Master!

2005-03-09T17:03:00.000-05:00

Finally, one week before I'm heading home, I received news about my final thesis. Good news, thank God! I got an 8 for it, which means that I can call myself Master of Arts (or in Dutch: drs. Wind) from now on! As Cartman would say: "Sweeeet!"

Trip to Chicago

2005-03-02T17:57:00.000-05:00

Accompanied by two lovely ladies, I went to Chicago for two days this week. It was a short but luxurious trip. We got a good hotel deal: for only $35 each we stayed in a *** hotel, in the middle of downtown Chicago, with a pool and exercise room! Both were located on the top floor of the hotel, so we were running, biking and lifting weights while overviewing the skyscrapers of Chicago... Best work-out I ever had!

Here are some pictures of our short but great trip to the Windy City...

The train ride was long and full of delays, but we managed to entertain ourselves with card games, conversations about obsessions, sleeping, eating peanuts and other nasty (but good!) food in the dinette, reading the menu for half an hour (hmm, I guess that was only me..), playing 'very serious' drawing games (see picture) and...

eating poisoned apples...

...and doing imitations of Dana.

The hotel room was awesome, great view, good beds...and ordering a movie cost only $12!!!! (Yes, that last remark was meant to sound very cynical... We ordered Bridget Jones 2, I watched 10 minutes and fell asleep, Dana 15, and Shayna 25, and the next day we found out we payed 12 bucks for (almost) nothing... Only bad thing I can say about that place though...).

Downtown Chicago at Night, @ the Chicago River.

Drinking Long Islands (and acting weird) in a Bar.

Eating the food Chicago is famous for: Hot Dogs! Mine was a foot long (30cm), delicious, and quite hard to eat!

Sears Tower, Highest Skyscraper in the U.S.

On our way back, tired but still in a good mood (thanks to Pepsi and Peanuts).

Dana and Shayna's "Post Anti Valentine's Day" Party, Tower Inn, February 18, 2005

2005-02-27T14:23:00.000-05:00

The Dancefloor

The Beatles meet Led Zep!

Classic Hollywood Moviestars: Shayna and Dana

The 'Afterparty': Dana's brother John and his friend create cold poetry...

Read the Signs

2005-02-27T13:44:00.000-05:00

Most livable city....

in a jail state?

You could live here...

but would you feel safe?

Desert(ed) Love...

2005-02-20T22:10:00.000-05:00

It can get very hot in the desert sometimes...

My Trip to Arizona: The Pictures pt. III

2005-02-20T21:49:00.000-05:00

The weekend of February 5 and 6 Wendy took me to Flagstaff, Sedona and the Grand Canyon. Here's some pictures from that trip... Unfortunately I have no pictures from the bars we visited, cuz I don't have a flash on my camera. Therefore my adventures seem to be limited to the day.. Trust me, I had fun at night too!

View from the Starbucks in Sedona (I'm not kidding!)

Grand Canyon...

More Grand Canyon...

And a last one to finish it off...

My Trip to Arizona: The Pictures pt. II

2005-02-16T01:07:00.000-05:00

The rest of the first week I spent hiking. Climbing rocks and mountains, the sun on your face, skies as blue as the ocean on an Aruba beach, 75/21 degrees... Sometimes I would forget it was actually February.

View from a little hill @ Papayo Park, Phoenix. Now ain't that amazing?

View of the desert from a rock in Papayo Park.

I climbed every single rock in the park and the view was amazing every time...

This was actually the first one I climbed...

I spent two full days in Papago Park. At the end of the second day I stayed a little longer, climbed my favorite rock right before the sun went down and watched the sunset over Phoenix... It was beautiful. The picture sucks, but sunsets are never as good on pictures as they are in real life anyways...

My Trip to Arizona: The Pictures pt. I

2005-02-16T00:00:00.000-05:00

Well, I'm back from Arizona and even though I already miss the great weather, beautiful sights and incredible hiking tracks, I'm very happy to be back with Dana. I came back right before Valentine's Day, a big deal here in the U.S.. Even though it doesn't mean that much to a Dutch guy like me, I celebrated it anyways. How can you be against spending a day with the girl you love, right? Dana skipped class on Monday and we went to see a movie and had 'dinner' at a diner in Ypsi. Unfortunately, she got sick that night and now she's sleeping while I use my time alone to finally upload my Arizona pictures... Are you guys ready?

The pictures are in chronological order. I will write down some stuff about what you see on the pictures, so you will have some idea what I've been doing in Arizona for the last 14 days...

I arrived in Las Vegas on Friday night, January 28th. I spent the night there, didn't sleep, but walked around, in and out casino's and other 'sinful' places.

"What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas", they say...

Early in the morning, 6 a.m., I took a Greyhound bus through the desert, final destination Phoenix. I arrived Saturday afternoon, 4 p.m.. Wendy picked me up, we had dinner at a Chinese restaurant with her cousins. Best Chinese food I ever had! Once we were back at the appartment I crashed and slept for 12 hours straight...

The next day we went to see some cool stuff in the area. In the afternoon we visited a Wild West town, Rawhide:

Yes, I know that most Europeans think that's really cheesy, but I loved it! Plus it was for free, so how can a Dutchman object to that?

..and they had some really funny 'gunfights'...

..an incredible cactus...

...and best of all: 'The Lost Dutchman's Mine'! They gotta rename it now though...

Afterwards, we went to see the highest fountain in the world...

..and Wendy got to sit on a turtle!!

The next day Wendy had to work. I just walked around, getting acclimated to the neighborhood. I enjoyed the sunlight, hadn't seen any for a long time... During my walk I passed several communities especially for retired people. Arizona, just like Florida, is very popular with the elderly. The climate is warm and dry, all year long. And to proof that these communities are really exclusively designed for the elderly, check out this community:

...which was positioned right next to this cemetery:

Yup, the elderly there really don't have to move at all anymore!

That One's For Us!

2005-02-10T01:06:00.000-05:00

We're driving back to Phoenix after our weekend in Flagstaff. All of a sudden we see a guy next to the road signaling us to slow down. Traffic jam ahead.... A pick-up truck fell on its side and it is blocking the whole freeway. It will take a while. In front of us is a car with three teenage boys, obviously hung over from a wild weekend. Even though they look like shit, they stil seem to have some energy left. They're bored and they are trying to find ways to entertain themselves. They throw snowballs at each other, lock each other out of the car and write stuff on the car windows with soap. Since they are our only source of entertainment, we decide to encourage them a little. My friend Wendy reaches underneath the dashboard and pulls out a marker. "Especially for writing on car windows," she says, "people use it to write 'for sale' on 'em and stuff." She gets out of the car and gives the marker to the boys. They seem happy with this new form of distraction and start tagging all over the side windows. Finally, one of the guys starts creating his 'masterpiece' on the back window. His final piece of art turns out to be a very original 'thank you' for our generosity:

Flagstaff & Grand Canyon

2005-02-07T01:56:00.000-05:00

I'm still alive, but like I said: I don't want to spend too much time behind the computer and uploading pictures takes hours here. Therefore: be patient! I took a lot of pictures and I'll put many of them online next week...

I just got back from an exciting weekend in Flagstaff. A lot colder (it's 7000 feet high), but the people we stayed with were very hospitable... We stayed with about 10 people, 2 dogs, 2 cats, a rabbit, and an aquarium full of fish and frogs, so one more Dutch tourist wasn't really a problem... We had a great night out on Friday, playing pool and having some weird conversations with very intoxicated locals. One of them said he was a cousin of Liam Neeson and his uncle was supposed to be the president of Levi's (which he proved by pointing at his Levi's 501. If that's proof than my uncles own Gapstar, Adidas and Nike..)

On Sunday we went to see the Grand Canyon. There is not much more to say about it. Yes, it's f#%kin' big. Yes, it's f#%kin' deep. But you gotta see it and just be overwhelmed. I took a whole bunch of pictures, but I'm afraid they don't really do justice to this miracle of nature... Don't ask me how, but I managed to upload two pictures. Let's say I tried really hard cuz some people got a little impatient and I gotta show you a little preview of the Arizona holiday pictures. Here they are:

A Raven

..and a Beatle in the Canyon

Imagine...

2005-02-03T02:34:00.000-05:00

It's a little hard these days to post pictures because I have to work with a computer from the last century, Windows 98 and a phone connection, and of course I'm way too busy enjoying the great weather (sunny, 75F/21C) but I decided to not stop posting completely during my holiday... I'll fill my blog up with cool pictures and stories as soon as I'm back, but for now I'll try to keep you guys happy with a little bit of info once in a while...

Las Vegas was insane, it deserves its nickname 'Sin City' completely. Phoenix is laid-back, very western and Hispanic influenced and looks beautiful... 'The Valley', which is how the people here call Phoenix and the suburban towns surrounding it, is huge and contains the majority of the people living in Arizona... And it's not called the Valley for nothing: the city is completely surrounded by mountains, everywhere you look, it's beautiful (so yes, it does suck that I cannot show you the pictures yet! But even more impressive to me (and I guess not everybody would agree on that) is the desert... Today I went to a park in the valley (and I'm not talking Dutch, organized trees and fountains, park here) which is kind of like a desert in the middle of the city. It contains beautiful red rocks and lots and lots of cacti... I climbed the rocks for a while and smoked a cigarette on top of the rock, looking over the whole valley. It was amazing: Phoenix to the left, Tempe and Scottsdale (which is where I'm staying) to the right and mountains surrounding the whole metropolitan... It was great, sitting in the middle of a beautiful piece of nature, being surrounded by urban noises and sights which is itself again surrounded by massive mountains and desert... I hope this makes you guys curious enough to see the pictures now! ;)

A little anecdote to lighten up these 'dramatic' impressions of Arizona: Last night I was out at a bar in Tempe and a cute but very drunk Hispanic girl, about 25, stares at me for a while, approaches me, puts her cigarette in our ashtray, looks me straight in the eyes and says" "You are one fuckin' John Lennon lookin' motherfucker!" and walks away. You have to imagine it with a thick Spanish accent to understand why I had fun repeating that the whole night. Nobody could mess with me, the fuckin' John Lennon lookin' motherfucker.

Viva Las Vegas!

2005-01-27T16:09:00.000-05:00

Tomorrow I'll fly to the city of sin: Las Vegas! I'll only be there for a couple of hours, so I'll try to stay out of the casinos and save my money for more useful things. On saturday I'll take the Greyhound bus through the desert of Nevada and meet my friend Wendy in Phoenix! I hope I can update my website with some cool pictures of my own in the next couple of weeks. If not: I'll be back on the 13th of February. Adios, amigos!

White Sox?

2005-01-26T01:11:00.000-05:00

Just because I still cannot believe I'm in the middle of a 'real' winter for the first time in a decade or so, here's some more winter pictures. A baseball field in Ann Arbor. I saw somebody do some 'cross-country skiing' over there the other day, but I didn't have my camera with me then...

For the Dutch: Ik heb begrepen dat jullie winter weer het karakter van een verlengde herfst heeft. Vreemd toch dat het broeikaseffect alleen in Nederland effect schijnt te hebben.... Pluspunt: de Elfstedentocht zal ik in ieder geval niet missen!

PS: I'm probably leaving for Arizona next week. Weather forecast: Sunny, 72F (20 Celcius)!!!!!

Spongebob Gaypants

2005-01-25T02:28:00.000-05:00

Remember this story about Tinky Winky 5 years ago?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/276677.stm

Well, it turns out he's not the only TV character secretly promoting homosexuality and destroying our children's innocent minds! Parents keep your kids away from... Spongebob Squarepants!!!!

http://www.cnn.com/2005/SHOWBIZ/TV/01/20/sponge.bob.reut/

Hirsi Ali was me voor...

2005-01-25T00:59:00.000-05:00

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,144686,00.html

Amp Fiddler @ The Blind Pig, Ann Arbor

2005-01-23T22:04:00.000-05:00

I don't easily pay $15 for a concert of an artist I don't really know that well, but if he played with Prince, George Clinton, P-Funk All-Stars, The Dramatics, Primal Scream and Too $hort (and that's just part of a long impressive list), I'll gladly make an exception. I wasn't disappointed. Amp Fiddler's funk was of the laid-back kind, recalling Stevie Wonder and Sly Stone, but once he would play a solo on his keyboard it would sound like the Mothership was about to land...

When I got home I checked the internet to see when he had worked with George Clinton. It turned out that he was part of the All-Stars for twelve years. Could that mean...? No! Did I see this guy before, 9 years ago, without realizing it? I did a little search on google and... I did! Amp Fiddler was the keyboard player on the 96-97 P-Funk All Stars tour. They performed in de Oosterpoort on December 8th 1996 and I remember I was completely blown away by the amazing keyboard solos of this unknown guy. I never really bothered to find out who he was, I just started collecting Funkadelic and Parliament albums afterwards and until this day I considered myself a P-Funk addict. Nine years later I see him perform again, on the other side of the world, without even realizing who he is. Shame on me.

I know it's a crappy picture, but it's all I got to prove I was there ;)If you're curious how he really looks or you wanna buy his album, go to:

http://www.ampfiddler.com

AZ, Here I Come!

2005-01-23T13:34:00.000-05:00

Hopefully, I'll see this in less than two weeks... ;)

Bingo!

2005-01-19T00:49:00.000-05:00

Since there's nothing new to talk about, here's something that happened a while ago. I wanted to put it on my website for a while, but I kind of forget about it. Here it is:

Wanna know when you're a 'Triple Loser'? When losers who play bingo all think you're a loser because you cannot keep up with them and you lose all the money you invested in bingo cards without ever knowing if they were worth a price or not... It happened to Austin, Dana and me a while ago in Canada. After we dropped off Rafa and Rosemary right across the border, we had to wait a couple of hours before Austin had to catch his plane. We decide to kill time by playing bingo in Windsor, a Canadian paradise for American gamblers (gambling in the US is basically only legal on Indian reservations). Bad idea. We ended up in a game of speed bingo. The numbers were called so fast that we were still looking for the first one when the announcer was already at number three... It took us five rounds to get adjusted to the speed and when we finally caught up, we realized we just entered the last round. Ah well, we had a lot of fun playing, even though our careless attitude was not much appreciated by the serious middle-aged (and up) crowd. Bingo is serious business. It took me only 10 minutes and 6 rounds of Superspeedbingo to realize that...

Austin and me trying to pull serious 'bingo faces'

"I just lost $5 in 5 minutes so it's a little hard to smile"

(pictures "stolen" from Austin's awesome website www.picturetrail.com/austinw )

3 Miserable Failures

2005-01-19T00:26:00.000-05:00

Sorry people, not much exciting going on here right now. I'm working on the conclusion of my final thesis. It's -10 F (-21 Celcius!!) outside, so I can't really leave the house... I probably got some big news coming up soon though! To keep you all happy, here's a little awkward Google joke for ya:

Type "miserable failure" in Google and see what happens...

Jagshemash!

2005-01-13T22:22:00.000-05:00

Mysterious man from Kazachstan sings the Star-Spangled Banner and almost gets lynched by angry American mob. Sounds like a joke? Read this article:

http://www.roanoke.com/news/roanoke/16655.html

You don't know who they are talking about? Too bad, cuz he is the funniest comic character on TV these days: Borat from Kazachstan ("Gwhy you laugh?"). Check out this Borat soundboard:

http://www.audiocomedy.net/soundboards/boratfromalig.shtml

or this amazing fansite:

http://www.boratonline.co.uk/

(Ain't that fun, Jon?)

Dutch Reunion in Detroit, Part 2

2005-01-12T16:02:00.000-05:00

left to right: Rafa La Puta, Rosemary, Justin, Dana, Managa, Austin

Long Island Ice Tea, Baby!

Dana and me @ The Blind Pig

Here's more pictures from the Haren reunion in Detroit. Thanks to Austin! There's more where this is coming from: www.picturetrail.com/austinw

At Home in Michigan: Mount Pleasant

2005-01-11T20:33:00.000-05:00

Mount Pleasant: the name raises high expectations. Piles of Pleasure, Tons of Fun. I decided to go "up North" this weekend and found myself in a place that reminded me of where I'm from. No, I'm not talking about Holland, I'm talking about Frisia. The place where I'm staying, Ypsilanti, is actually much more "Dutch" than Mount Pleasant: it's pretty liberal and you meet just as many crackheads asking for some change as you meet on an average day in the centre of Amsterdam. Mount Pleasant is different. Mount Pleasant is white and straight. Most people dress the same, talk the same, look the same. As in Frisia, being different doesn't seem to be such a good idea here. Liking beer and getting completely shit-faced in a bar would get you more friends. I felt different, but at the same time at home. Maybe it helped that I know some damn good people over there. They made my stay a very 'pleasant' experience. Or was it the 5 (female students) to 1 (male student) ratio? Whatever it was, I'll be back there soon. Hope we'll still be allowed to get into some bars by then. ;)

She's hardly visible (sorry Allie!), but that's my friend Allison in front of her appartment. I'll take better and more pictures next time I'm there, I promise!

God Bless America

2005-01-06T22:16:00.000-05:00

Happy New Year!

2005-01-05T01:39:00.000-05:00

Dana and her roommate Lisa on New Year's Eve. All ready for 2005!

Winter Wonderland: Commerce, MI

2004-12-24T23:13:00.000-05:00

View from Dana's parents house

Pulgini Residence

Dutch Reunion in Detroit

2004-12-21T01:23:00.000-05:00

Yes, we had a blast! Wanna see more?
Check out http://groups.msn.com//TheGroningenPals/usareunion.msnw

A Warm Welcome

2004-12-16T23:19:00.000-05:00

"Nobody stays in the U.S. for 90 days without working," she says.
"But I will," I say.
"Impossible, you have no money."
"I just graduated. I'm here to visit my girlfriend and relax. The last thing I want to do right now is work. I saved some money, I got a tax refund, and my parents gave me money as a graduation present."
"I don't believe you."
"Well, I cannot prove it right now, but it's true."
"So you are leaving in 90 days?"
"Yes, I am flying back on the 13th of March."
"I don't believe you. Show me the ticket."
"I can't, it's an electronic ticket, I have no paper copy."
"I don't believe you, everybody has a paper ticket."

(The woman pulls out a big red envelop from underneath her desk and puts my ticket and passport inside. I realize that I'm in trouble.)

"Go into that office in front of you and wait."

"I don't really see the problem," the man says.
"Me neither," I respond, "but the lady that send me here seemed to think differently."
"What did she say?"
"She just didn't believe anything I said."
"So why are you here?"
"To visit my girlfriend and relax. I just graduated."
"Congratulations."
"Thanks."
"So when is your flight to Detroit leaving?"
"It already left 10 minutes ago."
"Sorry man, but you can go to the second desk on the right after you passed through that door right there. They'll help you out."
"Thanks. So does that mean I'm allowed to go?"
"Yes. One more thing though. It says here that you carry food with you. What kind of food?"
"Dutch candy. Liquorice and chocolat. It's a present for my girlfriend's parents."
"You never met them before?"
"No."
"Hahaha, so you're gonna try to suck up to them, right?"
"Not really, but it's Christmas and I do wanna make a good first impression, you know."
"I understand. Have a good trip and enjoy your stay in Michigan."
"Thank you, sir."