HPNY 2008

To all a happy new years eve, and hopefully we get to see a fireworks display like this:

Lessons learned in 2007

Nearly done with the year, let me reflect on some of the trends of this year, and the lessons I should have learned from these.

Everybody cheats, deal with it
It's been a fantastic year to cheat your way to a victory. You could do some fancy blood doping and win the Tour de France, take some steroids and smack away several hundred home runs, or just bet on the games you're refereeing. You could freakin' video tape your opponents signals to predict which plays they're gonna run, for crying out loud.

Everybody then becomes all high and mighty about keeping the sport pure and leveling the playing field, but c'mon... The Mitchell Report mentioned so many major league baseball players, the only people not mentioned were the ice cream vendor and the third base umpire. If you actually took away all the cyclists from the Tour de France that were completely clean, only ten or so guys would run. That doesn't make good TV - remember the Indianapolis Formula 1 GP a couple of years back? And speaking of F1, you can't tell me that every single team doesn't have their eyes on every single new fancy detail on their opponents' cars. To single out McLaren is just slightly hypocritical.

In effect, the playing field is level. Everybody is cheating. It's just that the playing field is a little dirtier and seedier than the media wants the public to strife for. But if everybody gets off their moral high horse, things will be a little closer to the actual practice. Basically you cannot hide behind morals and the rulebook to be lazy.

Of course the way to fuel the moral outcry, is to point out the excesses and the tragedies. The Benoit slayings are a key argument against drugs and steroids. That even one of the most seemingly level-headed and most respected individuals in an industry can succumb to the temptation: less pain, more strength, more success. The Rapid Wolverine cheated his way around and apparently paid the price with his sanity and eventually the lives of himself and his family.

And have these warnings helped? I doubt it. Wellness programs or not, professional wrestlers will still use additional help to heal, to perform, to one-up the competition. That's the way the cookie crumbles. The public wants people to perform at superhuman levels, at their convenience. And sometimes that requires a little outside help. That's what we - the public, the fans - inherently expect from our heroes. To expect them to do so without cheating, is to be extremely naive, or at least to be extremely unrealistic in what you require for your entertainment.

Or you could take a page out of rugby union's book, which to my estimation is about as honorable a sport as you can get.

You cannot delegate responsibilities
There are lots of people who have good ideas and/or good intentions, whether it be at work, in social circles or somewhere else. Organizing a party, passing a new law or legislation, working on a project, or even just doing a proposal. Now if the task at hand is small, and can be handled by yourself, then you are in complete control of its progress, and only have yourself to blame if it doesn't work out the way you envisioned.

However most tasks are actually quite large and elaborate, and require more people to help to bring your idea to life. That means that all these ideas need to be explained, worked out, communicated... and that's where most tasks break down. Implementation suffers, schedules are not kept to and eventually the entire idea fails to meet its goals.

Of course many things cannot be thought of upfront. Requirements and directions tend to change, unforeseen incidents and accidents happen. People in general are not very good at all at seeing into the future, so every idea is naturally flawed. Unfortunately, this knowledge makes people lean towards two tendencies:

• laziness; because not every single effect is recognized up front, people will use this as an excuse to not think about anything at all. people expect that everything will be alright in the end, because there's always someone else who will help out, play the hero, take responsiblity. People offload responsibility of implementing their ideas on someone else. And that's not the way. As I understood from a PM course, you cannot delegate responsibility. You can only delegate a task, or move into another role which doesn't have this responsibility.
  
• lack of commitment; it's a classic problem. You can't think about everything and anything that can happen, so you just let it up to the gods how things go, the laissez-faire. You'll take things in stride, and tackle problems as it may. You trust your ability to solve problems and feel confident about overcoming adversity. In fact, you trust that everybody simply understands the spirit of your ideas and acts accordingly. Unfortunately, to the outside world that looks a lot like indifference. And if things do go wrong, it's negligence.

So what is the way to go? There can be no good idea without implementation. Everyone who forgets the last part, should own up to their flaws, and proceed with mitigation. Make sure that everybody understands that.

Of course, I'm fully aware this very sentence is actually contradictory to my point.

Being happy is the hardest choice
I went to London and to Chicago; I'm learning to speak (slowly) a handful of languages; I partied with cheerleaders; I crunk and I salsa; I worked overtime when I deemed it necessary. I spent truckloads of money on racing, seminars, parties, clothes, video games even. I have the Italian car. I stay put, when everybody else and their uncle say the logical thing is for me to go. I've been picked up in at least four different languages.

I have completely and utterly done whatever I think I should do. Regardless of what other people think I should. I have not stopped for anyone, did not let myself get led by other people's likes and wants. And that is not taken lightly. By neither side. I've been told I don't seem like a consultant. I've been told I don't act as a close friend. Unfortunately for me, those are statements that I cannot rebuff. The very act confirms the premise.

Doing what I think I should do is not as much making me happy, as it makes me confident that I'm doing the best thing in my circumstances. It's the feeling that I haven't been constrained, or held back; and that if I have been, that I only have myself to blame for it. No one else.

I'm confident some of my choices and actions are not meant to improve my happiness, or that of someone else. In fact the things that are in my personal life right now and those that aren't, are the direct result of one single inclination I have: (I'm paraphrasing a quote from House now)
"I see the world as it is. I see the world as it could be. What I don't see, is what everybody else sees, the giant gaping chasm in between. I'm not happy unless things are just right. Which means... I'll never be happy."

Happy Holidays

Just a shout-out to all readers. To all I wish you good times, and I hope to see, speak, hear from you in due time.

A special Christmas story

Hard choices

The hardest choice people can make is a choice that makes them happy. That sounds counter-intuitive, but this rings true. Especially when you're given the choice of christmas gifts by your employer.

Essentially your choice boils down to:

• a gift
• an experience
• or a good cause

You could be materialistic and go for the first, or you would be the kind of person who already has everything, and go for something intangible, or failing that, you could improve your karma by making a donation to a cause of your choosing.

You see that there's a hierarchy in this? All things considering if you wanted to do the most good the donation is the only choice. But will it make you happy? You could be indifferent, or even satisfied, but happy?

Best / funniest quotes I've heard in 2007

You can't win an occupation.
- Friendly advice to U.S. President Bush

You can be your own person, treat people with respect, be very demanding but demanding in a way that doesn't trample on people. And you don't have to give up your faith to win in the NFL.
- Tony Dungy, head coach of the Indianapolis Colts

An insult is just someone who hates you making a noise to indicate their hatred. (...) Criticism is someone trying to help you, by telling you something about yourself that you were a little too comfortable not knowing
- David Wong

How do the words 'jet pack' and 'ninja' even get typed into a script about a cyborg that weighs over a ton? Modern screenplay-writing software should detect something like that and pop up a little paperclip that asks you if you've lost your fucking mind, then erases your hard drive.
- Rod Hilton on RoboCop 3

Waking up to the light

I used to think waking up could be done in one of either two ways.

1. on a weekend, whenever you feel like it
2. during the week, harshly with a loud, obnoxious alarm bell; or a drum band; or a bucket of water

With the Wake-up Light there seems to be a third option: subtly, silently and ever so peacefully, no matter what day of the week.

It's works quite different from your normal alarm clock, in that it slowly lights up about half and hour before the time you set the alarm to. This slowly increasing light supposedly triggers your body to prepare itself for waking up.

Then at the time you provide, instead of a loud beep, you get the sound of crickets, or a wavefront moving on to the beach. Even the token alarm beep is decidedly friendly.

It definitely takes some time getting used to it. I woke up far earlier than usual the first couple of times I used it, although this effect seems to diminish the more time I spend with it. I'm not sure I'm waking up with more energy than with my old clock, that's a bit too early to tell.

But for damn sure... if I can go clubbing on a Monday night, sleep for three hours, and go to workthe next morning at (about) the same time as usual, without even a bat of an eyelid, then I highly recommend a wake-up light.

Best in Television for 2007

Television is still a big thing, although this year, more than most, it was more diversion and background (and occasionally a waking up moment) rather than the centerpiece of the day. Back when I was a kid, entire days were defined by whichever programme was on that afternoon or night. It could be the network premiere / rerun of a major motion picture, a cartoon series, or a football match. Now only a few things on telly catch my eye.

Number One is House, simply the best kick ass dialogue on television, for the third year running. And what's even more impressive is that it got even better in subsequent seasons: more biting snaps, more clever insults, more insane putbacks. They amped up the sexual tension, deepened the characters, and made the show almost the only must-see TV every week...

...the only programme coming close is Heroes. Already a cult net fave thanks to NBC.com by the time I got to it, Heroes was the most impressive first-year storyline for a drama series. And soon I will learn the ways of the Japanese, that's how awesome Hiro is.

Which brings me to a sidenote... it is not strange that television is getting creamed by internet thanks to the wonders of the downloadable episode. Now if we were just able to consistently spawn my IP address to match the US, I could actually use that feature, and save time. I could actually watch the shows whenever I want to. Instead of when some jerk in the network office thinks I should. Case in point: I hardly ever watch Game Kings, a TMF video game show, even though its own about five times a week. However Gametrailers.com shows GameHead and GameOne, and I watch those all the time.

Bones was pretty good still, but for some reason - once they messed up with the scheduling from Sundays to sometime during the week - I didn't follow it as thoroughly anymore... Same thing happened to My Name Is Earl.

Finally the final television highlight of the week is Top Gear. This year was obviously one of the more exciting ones, with Richard Hammond's brush with death, the Bugatti Veyron, more and more ludicrous challenges, and more laugh aloud jokes from Jeremy Clarkson and co. (line of the year has to be "Have you got pubes yet" to Lewis Hamilton)

Sad, so sad is the television's addiction to celebrity shite. The formula is simple. You put a C-list or at most B-list celebrity in an activity they shouldn't know about (ice skating if you're a singer, singing if you're a skater, ballroom dancer if you are a guy etc.), and then have people text the television network that they are doing badly or well. And the person with the least votes is booted off (not necessarily the worst one). And then they proceed to continue with this formula with ACTUAL, NO-NAME PEOPLE.

Come on guys... if you're going to continue like this, I will turn off the television and move to internet stuffs and DVDs permanently.

State of games in 2007

In the video game industry 2007 was a very important year, with the current generation consoles (360, PS3 and Wii) finally becoming commonplace, and several important titles released (BioShock, Assassin's Creed, Halo 3, Mass Effect, Call of Duty 4)... and yet I've never played as little games as this year. I could even say that amid the growth of the industry, the connection I feel with any games, is limited.

I only got myself one big name title this year, which was C&C3, and that was mainly to be able to finish the Tiberium saga. The game itself is decent, well balanced, but unfortunately a little to heavy for my computer. The acting is corny as always (although Jennifer "Dr. Cameron" Morrison takes the cake for looking both really intense and totally disinterested at the same time), and some plot holes still remain (why have the GDI reverted back from hover vehicles?). Still it was the highest profile title of the bunch, and the story is at least going forward again. Next year, bring on Kane's Wrath!

Surprisingly I played a lot of Rugby 08 this year, especially in the wake of the World Cup. Also I picked up Indycar Racing for a bargain, which I found pretty enjoyable, despite it wreaking havoc on my joypad (only left turns...). And I had the Brain Training sequel, which didn't really work out as well as I hoped.

In a sense, not having the latest gaming consoles distanced me from the game hype (Madden 08, Halo, Rock Band), although I have never before watched so much net-based videogame shows as this year. I still keep track of current issues, and it even got me started on the business side of things. The business is interesting, from the producing to marketing, the trade shows, the industry analysts, the mergers and acquisitions, and maybe, just maybe I should apply there. It would be a nice, big next career step.

Best (and worst) in music of 2007

Let me tell you what I liked and didn't like about the music in 2007...

• Jumping (Jeckyll & Hyde; DJ Porny); I couldn't understand this craze, more often than not because it made me realize how old I am. This was nothing short of insipid. Thankfully, the first time I heard of it, was on the eight o'clock news. And you know what happens to hypes that are outed on primetime television... they die pretty soon. Unfortunately you have to go through all kinds of wannabees who want to cash in on the hype for the time being.
  
• Ah, Mika. We thought you were a skinny sumbitch one-hit wonder, with a moderately catchy song (Grace Kelly)... and then you had to spoil it with some seriously crap singles, that you made young girls buy en masse (Relax, Big Girls)... please, go away and let real men rule the airwaves, capisce?
  
• And while we're on the subject of one-hit wonders (well, to put it fairly, two-hits), let's speak of XYP, a band consisting of twenty-something Brits and Dutch singers, catering to a sub-teen audience. Not serious enough to get played regularly on popular radio, but sold more records than most, thanks to the likes of Jetix and Cartoon Network... and within the space of nine months they got popular, scored a number one hit single... and broke up again. Ah, XYP, we hardly knew ye. At least Iris was kind of cute (call me!).
• Finally, even if you sing utter and total, unintelligible rubbish... if it sounded halfway decent and upbeat, you have your own clothing line, and you're dating a two-time FHM Babe of the year, you could still sell... well... tens of thousands... I'm talking about you, Jantje Smit.
  

Band du jour: Delain;
The gothic rock band genre is growing on me, and Delain is this year's best new proponent of that (while Within Temptation is going international). Coming close is The Fray, who show - through intelligent lyrics, and insightful songs - that there's still some good stuff coming around (rather than that skinny rock singers crap).
Honorable mention: Rooney, Maroon 5 (back again), Van Velzen

The 2007 MVP: Nelly Furtado;
This is really strange. Three years ago miss Furtado managed to release the commercial turd known as Forca, just because the freakin' European Championships were held where here ancestors used to live... and then she hooked up with Timbaland, grew a set of tits, sex appeal, and apparently a proper songwriter, because practically every single of her latest album Loose was a hit in 2007. That's a remarkable reversal of fortune. Maybe in that sense, the MVP award should actually go to Timbaland.
Honorable mention: Rihanna, Timbaland, The Fray

Top singles of 2007:

1. The Fray - Over my head
2. Nelly Furtado - Why do all good things come to an end
   
3. The Fray - How to save a life
4. Timbaland presents One Republic - Apologize
5. Nelly Furtado ft. Juanes - Te busque
6. John Mayer - Dreaming with a broken heart
7. The Nightwatchman - The road I must travel
8. Timbaland ft. Keri Hilson - The way I are
9. Delain - Frozen
10. Michael Buble - Everything
    

Top dance tracks of 2007

1. Mason vs. Princess Superstar - Perfect Exceeder
2. Ida Corr - Let me think about it
3. Pakito - Are you ready
   
4. September - Cry for you
5. John Marks - Insanity
   

I was looking for that

Some months ago I caught the middle part of a movie that had Ethan Hawke and some French chick talking in long, drawn out dialogues. With long, I mean loooooooong. One scene would last about ten minutes, walking around on the street, just bantering. Then the scene moved indoors, some cafe in Paris, and would CONTINUE.

Now you might think, this is a bad thing for a movie, but I actually managed to stick around for the scene, and in fact through nearly the rest. And it made me thinking... what movie is this?

I never got around to ask or check the name of the movie, and I even couldn't come up with Ethan Hawke at the time. But finally I got all the answers together, and I finally found what I was looking for... Before Sunset, by director Richard Linklater.

Why the movie is so captivating, is because of its premise. The idea that it is possible to meet your soulmate, and that you can, even for only a short amount of time, be together. And in fact get together again later on (Before Sunset is the follow-up to Before Sunrise, which is where the two characters first meet)...

So here's my vote for most impressive movie seen this year... and I didn't even see it completely... and it's not even a movie released this year... Before Sunset.

(No, Transformers is not my most impressive movie this year. It was fun, it had quite a few laughs. Megan Fox is grrrreat. And it had almost nothing to do with Transformers.)

Funny story I heard today

An experienced IT woman and a junior IT woman are in a conversation. The junior can't seem to get to grips what a 'driver' is.

The experienced one explains: "You want to know what a 'driver' means for a computer system? Picture this, you want to wear red pumps. You have to have a red purse with your outfit to wear red pumps, right? Now your pumps are your applications, and your purse is your driver."

Caught by surprise

What if... you were living with someone, in a single home, for quite a few years. You have children together, you started a family. You've endured some tough times together, but also enjoyed each other's greatest triumphs. You care for one another.

Now imagine one person ending it suddenly. Without warning. Maybe with reason, but often not a very clear one.

Now... WHATCHA GONNA DO, WHEN HULKAMANIA RUNS WILD ON YOU?!

Apparently, not a lot.

Common problems

Every consultancy encounters the same challenges, how to staff people, how to sell, how to get one up on the competition and so on. It doesn't really matter if you're Big Blue or one of the continental firms. (Okay... Size does matter somewhat, but generally there isn't really something that separates one firm from the other.)

So really jumping ship and moving on is just that. Not much else.

There is however one fundamental weakness in consulting firms that would be great if someone actually managed to beat it. Every consulting firm is great in starting things, in having a great idea and acting on it. Unfortunately no firm is good at seeing things through, or deal with (unforeseen) circumstances on any consistent basis.

So if you're a firm who can actually do that and prove it to me, give me a call.

Top Tip: Collegehumor.com

Just an example of the kind of stuff you find on this humor site:

Top Three YouTube Laughing Babies

Because Sis won't blog: the Top Three Laughing Babies!

Number 3: A puppet show was never this funny, when I was a kid.


Number 2: The best reason to get a Wii isn't Super Mario Galaxy!


Number 1: This is where the abbreviation ROTFLMAO comes from.

Magic Numbers of Social Networks

25 - suppose you never invite anyone to be a friend on your social network (hyves, facebook, linkedin), but you always accept any invitations from people whose names you recognize. Then this is the number of invitations that you need to accept to reach critical mass and a significant increase in membership. (you'd go from 10 to 25 invitations in about six months, but from 25 to 50 in about four weeks)

199 - number of "friends" you have on your social network, before you realize about 192 of them are sad, and you move on to a new social network and start over.

[guys... I do seem to have a plaxo account, but I simply don't remember how to log in!]

Top Tip: Clock Suckers

The Truth Will Set You Free

Willem Holleeder is Holland's resident media-mobster, and he is on trial for racketeering, conspiracy to murder, embezzlement and probably a bunch of other charges that we don't know about.

The attorneys are trying to get him convicted and put him behind bars for twelve years. Apparently he is due for some leniency, because the media already found him guilty before the fact...

So wait... no matter what you did... murder, child pornography, rape, bank robbery, grand theft auto... if mass media says you did it, your sentence gets less?? Que??

Frame of reference

Did someone forget to get me a memo that up is down, angry is sad, sad is happy, inside is outside? Things I thought I read or understood, are completely different, and it's making for some hefty discussions.

Obviously my frame of reference is different from anyone else's, and nobody actually has mine, but at least I thought we shared some overlap. In fact there's none. Worst thing is, people get really anxious and agitated if you don't get them the first time...

Rather than being the source of conflict, let me be the bigger man and do this: You explain me how you see your point of view, and I will listen. I will respond, reflect and feedback in a way that I can hold grasp of, but which is as neutral and inoffensive as possible.

What do I do now?

There are three kinds of people. One kind makes things up as they go. These people are independent, a little crazy, eccentric, a little unreliable at times. A second kind follows instructions. These guys and girls need scripts, carefully defined boundaries. They need to be told what to say, what to do, how to do it. The third kind of people creates those instructions.

With the screenwriters out on strike in Hollywood, many television shows are running out of things to say. That's because most actors are people of the second kind. Excellent at following instructions, not too good at the improvisation.

There's two ways around this, me thinks. Either replace the dear old actors with people of the first kind (people who can actually think on their feet), or let television-watching fans take over the screenwriting for now. Fan fiction would never have it so good.

Show of respect

Look... I'm not the guy's biggest fan, by far. In fact I think he's rather overrated. But he's got a lot of credit in the Dutch pop music industry, so much that TMF got him an own bloody award to hand out...

(If you didn't know whom I'm talking about, it's Marco Borsato.)

But it is a great gesture of respect if you (all the nominees for the Borsato award) surprise the man with a tribute performance of one of his own popular songs. I like it. That kind of respect deserves to be recognized. It's what few people actually are eligible for, and even fewer actually get this well.

Rhetorical question

"In a market where nothing's assured
In which one day things are looking up
and in the next everything falls apart
Hurricanes batter drilling platforms
Multinationals cut back jobs
Companies move work overseas to lower-wage countries
Or take over their competition
Information services suddenly become high-price commodities
Energy and oil gets taken hostage for top dollar
The dollar isn't worth a (Euro) dime anymore
Do you dare invest your money in a market where this all happens?"

Stock Market

Coming soon to a theater near you

How you can tell a failure

Dolphins-Giants was supposed to be a nice introduction to the NFL for the European continent. A showcase that displayed why the NFL Europe was bush league, and why that league deserved to be disbanded.

Now I didn't have tickets, but I can pretty much follow everything from a distance with si.com and nfl.com, and here's what I noticed:

• both quarterbacks threw a combined 25 completions; that's damned little considering a decent NFL quarterback can throw that on his own. Manning had 59 yards passing. Cleo Lemon 149. Not exactly an offensive output you should be proud of.
  
• I saw an in-game picture during the first quarter that had some Miami players mugging Eli... and the turf was stuck in their helmets. That pitch must have looked sloppy.
• One knock not against the NFL, but to the English fans... what the hell did Martin Johnson do to you then?
  

So all in all, I might have been luckier not to have gone to the game anyway.

Evaluation Time

A man who's doing more for others past his specific duties and responsibilities, does it well and does so without regard for himself, is a hero. People are inherently so selfish that a person who gives himself up wholly for the greater good immediately stands out... and gets taken advantage of. At some point all heroes will evaluate for themselves what it means to be a hero. If it is still worth it. If you still believe your own hype. Sometimes it means you give up, or you may decide to press on, whatever the outcome.

You just have to be unafraid to make that choice.

The HHG: World Series

World Series 2007: Colorado Rockies vs. Boston Red Sox... who'd have thunk it? Not me. It took me six seasons to get a Rockies team good enough to make the World Series, and that was in a video game. And the Sox are little by little building their own dynasty over the remains of a once potent curse.

Heart: Kinda feeling it for the Rockies. The only team I enjoy more is from Seattle, and they gave away their good players a long time ago. So I now make do with the Todd Heltons, Matt Hollidays and Jeff Francisses of this world. They're due for some success too, after season after season of crap.

Head: How long can it last? The Rox won an unprecedented 21 out of the last 22, and swept two division winners to reach the World Series. Even if they are swept in the Series, they will still have a statistically impressive last month and a half... and I'm actually counting on statistics to put Colorado back in its place. More numbers? Boston's payroll is over $ 140 million, which includes Manny Ramirez, David Ortiz, JD Drew, Curt Schilling, Josh Beckett and a certain Japanese pitcher nicknamed Dice-K (for whom the Sox paid $ 50 million just to talk to him). Colorado's payroll is $ 54 million.

Gut: Can the Red Sox do it all again? On paper they've got more of the marquee players, while the Rockies are hitting and fielding their way into the limelight. I know the Rockies can do it (I certainly played enough seasons of video game ball to prove it), but in the real world I don't see a Cinderella story coming up... the ship will right itself and the Red Sox will win, taking away just enough of the attention away from Tom Brady and the New England Patriots for them to quietly reach an unbeaten season... oops spoiled it.

BOKKE BOKKE BOKKE

Some observations about the Rugby World Cup final:

• Once you get to this stage, teams are too close to one another to just give away many tries. So if a rugby newcomer expects a spectacular scorefest, he will likely be disappointed.
  
• If FIFA just gets off its ass, they should start implementing some of the stuff rugby union has been doing for years. To start with, kill the clock for ANY on pitch injury treatment. I'm actually torn about automatic qualifications for the best teams, but then again it's always good TV.
• Wow. South African women are absolutely stunning. That, or the Koninklijke Marechaussee is doing well to send any mingers back. Or they're giving away Springboks jerseys to the nicest women, regardless where they come from (because a lot of Dutch were in favour of the Springboks too).
  
• My HHG lifetime score: 8-2
  

Friends in far away places

The perk of working in a global company is that you get to meet, work with and build relationships with people from other countries. That's incredibly useful since they offer you a fresh perspective on who you are and what you do, and in turn give greater insight into the society as a whole.

For example I've been told by Americans that Dutch people seem to have a tight and stable circle of friends built up, more or less when they enter the working life, and that it's quite a trying exercise to be friends with a Dutchman for a foreigner. Dutch teens might have gone off to college, or moved to a different city, but since everything in the Netherlands is roughly within one to two hours drive, Dutch people can still keep track of whomever they like to, without getting on a plane.

In the US it is far more likely that when a teen moves out to college, he or she's gonna be really, really far away. Forget about driving over in two hours. Sometimes there will be half a continent in between. Once an American moves to a different city, he has to build up his circle almost from scratch.

Size of country matters to the nature of relationships people in that country have. Because the Dutch relatively speaking have their friends within arms' length, friends in the Netherlands are more likely to have older - perhaps longer-lasting - relationships. Because of these older relationships, a Dutch circle of friends does not change much. Few people move away, few people join. For an American it seems less welcoming.

The Americans however are far more likely to completely build up completely new relationships as they move to new cities or states. Americans are more likely than Dutch to open up to new people, or at least build up a new friendship not based on lifetime or shared experiences, but more on shared interests and proximity. For a Dutch person that seems fake. How can anyone build up a tight relationship out of thin air, in just a short time frame, while Dutch people often take years to develop the same kind of trust?

Of course this does not take into account individual tendencies: Some Dutch travel lots, and invite more contact in this respect. Some Americans prefer to stick at home (perhaps they don't have the means to) and grow root. Some people are naturally open to others, others are more closed. The nature of one's profession allows one to be mobile and dynamic or not. But the nature of a person's relationships in any society will be influenced by the size of the country he lives in.

The HHG: Rugby World Cup Final

Think about it. One month ago England got absolutely creamed by the Springboks, and nobody gave a second thought about their chances: zero, zilch and none. Now they're about to face off in the final and things look distinctly different.

The Heart says: after seeing the English fight through the knockout stages against the Aussies and the French, and actually joining the celebrations after that seminal, legendary quarter final, it's hard not to root for them. England went through on sheer determination, will power, grit, and true heart...

The Head says: ...however it is foolish to bet against a 36 point to nothing trouncing... it is foolish to bet on a team that has pretty much survived on the mistakes of others... it is foolish to place all your money on Jonny's boots, who only seems to score when the game is idle... and it is foolish to bet against Percy Montgomery, who has the look of a tournament MVP...

The Gut says: and thus we've got to go with South Africa to win the Rugby World Cup... unless England can actually use the momentum they have to force the Springboks into submission. It's gonna be closer, and there's going to be a lot of kicking, but in the end, the underdog will have to cave.

Catfight!

More video game crossover fan movies... and it's a doozy.

Seven random remarks about London

1. London... it's quite like Amsterdam, but with more cleavage.
   
2. Much like in Amsterdam, you're more likely to meet someone who doesn't speak the native language than someone who does. So here I am - a Dutchman - in London, and I can pretty much recognize people speaking Spanish, or Italian, or Russian, even Japanese if push comes to shove. But then there's this strange language I can't immediately bring home... lots of guttural sounds... wait dammit... it's Dutch!
3. Say you're a white male in your fifties, and you're waiting in an airline lounge for boarding. You're wearing a school girls' uniform, and a pigtail wig; you're bringing slippers, a bag, a laptop with Hello Kitty embroidered on. Of course, if you don't want to get strip-searched, this is the way to do it. Nobody's touching you. In fact, nobody will even speak to you.
   
4. You truly get more play if there's no one around to witness it... not to mention light... picture a baseball stadium, playing a night game, and suddenly the floodlights shut down... you can easily get to third base...
   
5. A beer is just a beer is just a beer... except when you're over in a pub where a beer is a London's Pride, or a Guinness, or a Foster's, or a Budweiser...
6. If you love your country, love your country. But there has to be sportsmanship as well.
7. If my female co-workers dressed like the women in London do when they go to the office on Fridays, I wouldn't be able to get any work done. Neither would any red-blooded heterosexual male. Also no one would volunteer to take Fridays off. Just doesn't make sense.
   

The Power Potion

Only the great sports tournaments can bring people together in bars and clubs, which is really the second best place you can be, bar actually being in the stadium, no matter what Philips and Samsung say about their television sets. There's nothing like being slap bang in the middle of a racuous crowd, drinking pints and pints of beer, and riding the waves of reactions like a true-born surfer.

Case in point, last night's Rugby World Cup quarter final between France and New Zealand. The tournament hosts versus the tournament favorites and number one ranked team in the world. Picture a bar where the sides are evenly split across the room. Imagine hearing Allez les Bleus, and the Haka all at the same time. For every try, score, penalty and tackle the crowd cheers ferociously.

The biggest pop of the night came when Sebastien Chabal came on for France, which changed the momentum of the match fully in French favour. Now, even if you've never watched a game of rugby before in your whole life, you will recognize Chabal. The guy is huge, scary, intimidating. The commentators herald his coming as unleashing the monster on a hapless New Zealand team. Chabal carries a big black beard and long dark manes, which make him look like Asterix and Obelix. And he is just as strong as them. As soon as he came on, three All Blacks went off with injuries. I can see why France doesn't put him in from the start, it just wouldn't be fair.

France thus went on to upset the All Blacks, and move on to the semi finals of the World Cup, where they face the English. Last night, the French got decent support from the English crowd, who probably didn't want to face New Zealand... I'm pretty sure that will change next Saturday.

Transformers: How Rude!

An Oldie but Goodie...


"Who the f*ck is this Autobot?" ROTFLMAO

It's funny because it's true...

Can I try this out first?

Every once in a while someone will promote a product that supposedly changes your life completely. You see these things on infomercials, tellsell videos and the like: a duster that spins on its own; a magnetic pendant; an abdominal cruncher...

What I would like to know, is how did some cheap-ass infomercial become the bringer of the Messiah? What do these guys know that big money grabbing corporations don't already know? Why don't cleaning services around the world use this duster-on-an-electric-toothbrush?

And then there's the Wake Up Light... supposedly this is supposed to help people wake up better and more naturally... then why hasn't the civilized world collectively chucked away their old alarm clocks? I wanna try it out first I think.

Times sure have changed

Contemporary WMDs are quite hard to find apparently. Maybe they're too small to be seen. Back in the day WMDs were deadly, terrifying, large, yet completely portable. Just look at films like 300, or Gladiator to see the pain one soldier could inflict on another. Or alternatively, check out Discovery Channel's Ten Most Deadliest Martial Arts Weapons.

Natural Tendency

People sometimes have the greatest ideas and the noblest of intentions. Then you run into trouble, lack of money, or people with conflicting interests, killing the idea.

The natural tendency for people is to think that uttering a great idea and making it public is enough to make it work. People with great ideas know full well how to start an idea, but lack the effort, commitment, knowledge and overview to see it through and implement it successfully. Environmental issues for example. Generally improving the environment is a good thing, but apart from Al Gore telling us all about it in his Keynote slide show, he doesn't give a bloody clue how to go about actually improving it. Millions of managers rely on their "team" to go out and about, winging it and get the job done, all under the guise of pragmatism.

Pragmatism is too often used as an excuse to forget about important things, to defer responsibility, and to place a lot of stress on the boys and girls actually making it happen.

I'm all for flexibility and being able to cope with problems, expected or not. Those are good traits to have. But not if people heading the group actually have no idea what they're doing. The people with the ideas must also have a plan, or grab an able person to work it out.
Relying on the effort and responsibility of others, is naive.

Nine typical themes in language courses

With Japanese, Chinese, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, Italian, French and German audio language courses under my belt, I get an appreciation for people who devise and script these courses. I also noticed some odd similarities that keep popping up in each course, no matter the language.

1. A man and a woman book a room in a hotel, but they have different last names. Considering they meet and greet each other just one or two lessons earlier, and that they do not have any big conversations in between, you'll have to assume that they are not boyfriend and girlfriend. Could they be committing adultery? Or are they just enjoying a nooner?
2. When going out to dinner, the woman always eats a mixed salad as an appetizer. Why doesn't she get a nice chorizo? She's not anorexic is she? The man always has a soup, which is always too cold. When they "complain" about this, the people speak slowly, rationally and do not shout. (Yes, I always complain in this way...) Also everybody drinks a red wine. Nobody drinks bitter lemon, or Sprite.
   
3. People in language courses always go to a bar. No matter how many drinks you order, it always costs under ten euros. Probably because at this point you haven't learned any numbers over ten yet.
   
4. People always shop for fruit, souvenirs, a short sleeve shirt, and a packet of aspirin. People in language courses never buy stuff like CDs, a newspaper, sun glasses, tanning oil, box of tissues, condoms, KY jelly... you know... stuff you'd actually buy on vacation.
5. There are no children in language courses. Everybody you speak to is an adult. In fact, people over 65 do not exist in language courses. Everyone sounds like they're 24.
   
6. In any course, whatever location you are asking for, you're always only ten minutes away, and it's only down the street and to the right.
7. No language course has people dealing with the police, justice... or any kind of authority for that matter.
8. Except for one instance in the Japanese course, everybody has a job in an office setting. No one is a farmer. No one is a construction worker. Yes, there are desk clerks, waiters, shop assistants, but that's about as unambitious as it gets.
9. Every language course tells you four different ways to greet someone and three more to say your name, but none of them give you any clue how to tell someone to sod off.

Me, Jealous; You, Jane?

It has to be a great feeling for parents to see their children succeed and prosper. Even more when they receive high praise and are lauded for their performance in whatever field they accomplish. In sports a coach is more than happy when one of his players achieves something great. A teacher too should be over the moon when one of his pupils becomes a star.

But for some reason this doesn't really work in business, especially if the environment is competitive. Suddenly the guy you brought in, trained and groomed as your replacement, becomes bigger than you could ever imagine, and surpasses you.

I hope I can be as virtuous as Aeschylus put it: "It is in the character of very few men to honor without envy a friend who has prospered."

Five fundamental differences between US and European Sports

Sports in the United States is big, brash, loud and above all extremely rich. Contrast this with sports on the European continent and you'll notice a truckload of differences, so much so that it's easy to understand why European sports will not take off in the States, while American sports will never be accepted fully here. Here are five reasons why:

1. Americans cannot handle viewing a sport, unless it's divided in byte-sized chunks. That's why NBA games are divided in quarters, Indycar races are interrupted by yellow flags, NFL moves along play by play, and baseball goes from out to out. Sports with longer, uninterrupted flows of play, like soccer and rugby don't appeal as much to the average American viewer. Likewise a European sportsfan can't stand the continuous breaks, which he would always chalk up to unnecessary commercials...
   
2. In Europe debating the referee's calls is a given, but to an American it's outrageous, and always exciting. In Europe referees control the contest in the calmest way possible; in the USA referees can get mad, make wild, excessive gestures and send the coach off the field.
3. Unless it's an international contest, very few European sports events open with the national anthems. In the States every sports event starts with the Star Spangled Banner... even your backyard touch football game.
4. A commentator in the United States is always supported by a sidekick, the color man, who keeps the viewers, listeners, fans entertained with useless facts, side stories, rumours and general mockery of the best paid player on the team. Nowadays washed-up has-been athletes provide in-game real-time analysis on the events. That's three people employed by the network. In Europe sports commentators during the game are practically always alone, and frankly - apart from Jack van Gelder - extremely bland and boring. Analysis is something you do during half-time or after the game. The network only employs one guy to do the talking, and he often doesn't even get to go to the game at all.
   
5. Aah, statistics. The American loves them, because it allows otherwise menial athletes to achieve feats of epic proportions, thanks to a mathmetical coincidence. For a country that's only been around for slightly over two centuries, it's a quick way to fill up a person's history and trivia sections in wikipedia. Stats also improve viewership when a record is broken or a milestone is reached, so statistics have commercial benefits as well.
   Fans in Europe... are less enthused about mindless numbers.
   

Addendum to P990 review

A while back I had something to say about the Sony Ericsson P990, but I didn't mention that my WLAN went missing for about six months. So I was forced to drain my account with a GPRS, or I could not use the mobile internet at all...

Until I came across this gem... "turn off the power safe feature of the WLAN".

And now my WLAN is back?! I can internet at no extra cost again!

This officially drowns the P990 in my book. If you build a feature with an economy mode that negates the feature DON'T BUILD THE DAMN ECONOMY MODE.

Change of venue

Getting bored is as much a choice as it is a condition, but there are ways to stimulate boredom easily. Going out to the same location or bar or café each and every week is the one that does it for me. I like a change of venue every once in a while.

Coming back to places I've been to - also a change of venue - can sometimes surprise you in a good way. Back in the college days me and my friends have been going to this live music bar on a fairly regular basis. It was quite good for a while, but it got boring (not too mention too expensive for a student budget).

So I have not gone there for a number of years, until recently. It was a nice change of pace, and it was good. To tell you the truth, I might actually fit better there now, than a couple of years ago...

So all in all, change is good. Even if you're changing back.

We just can't get a break

Ok, so car manufacturers are finally getting the hang of making engines that run on bio-engineered fuel, home electricity and so on. And now we find out that actually growing the damned stuff is costing us farmland, and burns acres worth of trees. This is just unfortunate: we trade one terrible thing (CO2) for another (no more Amazon).

I completely agree

This site is supposed to be a light-hearted humour website, but once in a while they post an article that hits truer than anything that I can come up with. And believe me, I tried.

It's quite a long article (as in you have to spend about five minutes reading it), but I'll just give you the Cliff Notes:

• thanks to our electronic tools, airplanes and interweb people in current society are less able to effectively communicate face-to-face. There are less opportunities to meet new people in person, because everything is so damned conveniently near your home.
• not being able to meet in person, reduces the communication channels to e-mail, text messaging and so on. That's stuff that one could easily misinterpret.
• the people we meet in our MSN, Hyves etc. share common interests. In retrospect this means these people are already alike, and you won't find out anything new. That doesn't breed opportunities for conversation. (here is also where you'll find the showstealing lines of the night:

"I've been insulted lots, but I've been criticized very little. And don't ever confuse the two. An insult is just someone who hates you making a noise to indicate their hatred. (...) Criticism is someone trying to help you, by telling you something about yourself that you were a little too comfortable not knowing. Tragically, there are now a whole lot of people who never have those conversations. The interventions, the brutal honesty, the, "you know, everybody's pissed off because of what you said last night, but nobody wants to say anything because they're afraid of you," sort of conversations. Those horrible, awkward, wrenchingly uncomfortable sessions that you can only have with someone who sees right to the center of you.")

• the very notion that we have MORE control over what we do, when we do it, and whom we do it with, is killing for the social capacity of man. Mankind's social skills are grown through unpredictability, through dealing with people who are unlike you, and you do it face to face, with total fear of repercussions.
  

... ah, just read the article.

Moving the speed trap forward

I've noticed that once highway speed traps get reported in on the radio, their location seems to backward opposed to the flow of traffic. Now I've been told this is to discourage people from speeding all the way to the speed trap, then slow down and then get up to high speed again.

Why is it not the other way around? If those traps were to go forward, a driver would never be able to tell if he was about to approach the trap or not. And in practice this behaviour is not any different from the current situation.

Square Pegs In Round Holes

Trying to uproot something completely local, and move it overseas trying to make it popular over there is not that straightforward. Phenomena like Formula One, Madonna concerts, McDonalds are blissfully similar and recognizable wherever you go, and they each become that way seamlessly. Considering these you take for granted the effort that it takes to become a globally accepted occurance. Doing something truly global in a manner that appeals to people of every nation, is very, very hard.

ChampCar for example is a very Americanized version of the open-wheel formulas we've grown accustomed to in Europe. Now if one would try to bring this back to the old world, you'll encounter some peculiar things:

• In the US you have to be thankful to your sponsors... every single one of them. "So thanks to the Sony Ericsson Toys 'R' Us Swatch EA Sports Shell Peugeot British Airways Nintendo SKW Racing Team I'm finally able to buy that engine upgrade."
• In another country you can sing the national anthem like you want it, even if it's so off-key, the Naked Gun series would be ashamed to air it.
• Europeans need their sports flowing and long-running, with a few highlights in between. Americans need their sport in short, manageable pieces, and they want to cram in as many meaningless high spots as possible. That's why the American ChampCars have the yellow flag rule, which serves to bring fields back together, if the leaders moved too far away from the field; to have ample opportunity for commercials; and for no other discernible reason than a pebble near the entrance of the pit area.
• Preceding every race with a Christian sermon is kind of presumptuous in a non-US country.

Luckily some things remain universal, whichever side of the Atlantic you're on:

• Bad commentators will still rattle over their mistakes, pretending they never made them.
• Women in tight, skin-hugging clothing are good.
• The roar of a V8 engine still rules.

All about the girls

It's sad to see the end of a good thing. The Admirals were for all intents and purposes a small team in a sport that's hardly followed in the Netherlands, apart from a small, rabid fanbase. And it's for this group of people, the team decided to bid farewell one last time.

(Well... the team... just one of the popular star players and the head coach made the trip overseas, so you can't really speak of the team at all.)

When it all comes down to it, it's truly all about the girls. By far the most popular sights at the scene were the members of the Admirals Dance Team, who performed one last time at the venue. And by far the biggest pop of the night was for the popular cheerleaders' manager. And at times it was a pretty emotional experience.

The night also displayed who the Admirals as an organization were most grateful to. The party was not just for the team and front office people (yes don't forget about them),
and not just for the fans. The organization paid tribute to a group of young women, who quite rightly took center stage, and danced the night away.

The Near End Of Wikipedia

It wasn't so long ago that Wikipedia was actually a nice source of information. You could find out about particular sciences, countries, history, companies, organizations, even people and you could reasonably trust what was written about each. Why? A number of subject matter experts (SME) would discuss what the text of a particular subject should convey, and come to a conclusion, being the final text available on the interweb.

However lately Wikipedia vandalism is actually making headlines:

• companies changing their corporate histories to hide their failures, or scandals
• people changing their own biographies to tell the story they want to tell, or change biographies of other's to insult them
• pictures and pages getting added, deleted, changed, just because people don't like the layout of the set
  

I guess by now the number of pages on Wikipedia has already passed critical mass, so that SMEs cannot feasibly keep track of everything, and prevent people from intentionally changing the information on the site for their own gain, instead of for the greater good: a wider, deeper distribution of knowledge, for free. The longer this keeps up, people will be less inclined to share information in the first place, undermining the very basis of Wikipedia.

Google Maps: Absolutely brilliant

Careful now, I'm going to sing the praises of Google Maps, so if you're a G-Hater you might want to turn away now, and come back another day.

Since this summer Google Maps is really becoming a fantastic tool to use, to the point where I don't actually need to have Google Earth anymore. I've learned to use several important skills that help me immensely find my way around town, even when I'm not a native.

• Of course the Google Maps find function has always been there, but I've learned to use it to find great places to eat, shop for gadgets, music, clothes and going out. Just zoom in on the area where you expect to be, search on e.g. "restaurant", and you'll find all the good stuff in the general vicinity. Furthermore, you get all the reviews and homepage links you want. And that's just the start.
  
• You can also immediately click to determine the best way to get there, simply by inserting your point of departure. Maps will google the best route for you... and if you don't like the route you can drag waypoints inbetween!

Sometimes people can be happy with so little...

How language shapes cultures, personalities

After getting introduced to a bunch of different language audiobooks, it's far easier to recognise why people in certain countries act in a certain way and how these differ between countries. A language organizes the collective mindset of a society, emphasizes particular aspects while deemphasizing others.

For example:

• the Chinese/Japanese languages stress the subjects, placing more importance on the topics and the content. Generally people speaking these languages do not have to bother with conjugation, or word gender. Why would you change a word if it already expresses what you want to say? This is quite unlike the Mediterranean (Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, French) and Germanic languages (Dutch, German) which stress the flow of a sentence more, and utilize conjugations and genders in order to do so.
• in fact, for Asian cultures the subject is the most important, in such a way that the action (verb) that the subject does, is implied. It's not what you do, it's who you're talking about that is easiest to mention.
• For English, Dutch and German it's seemingly more important to speak about conditions and states of a subject. The adjective comes before the noun or subject.

What this means is that the nature of your conversations, the basis for humor, and thus the foundation of relating to a particular culture, change drastically from tongue to tongue. It means that in some languages small-talk is feasible, while in others it will not be, thus impacting the manner of creating relationships. It means that some languages are better suited to describe certain abstract topics, theories.

I am only able to order a beer in ten different languages.

Freakin' spies

Having neighbours comes with the territory. There's only a limited amount of space left that's actually appealing and affordable to live in, which more or less forces people to go to places with similar interests and life expectancies.

However neighbours also have a natural ability to be nosy. Precisely because of the similar interests and expectancies, going against the grain immediately brings your actions to attention. Try getting a shiny new car for example. Or hang a satellite dish. Or start wearing designer clothes. Or bring a different woman home every single night.

Anything different from the grain is notable, and is something to take advantage of, or something that threatens you. I would like people to be more subtle and positive about this, but I guess even I will lash out when some guy is bringing his goats onto my balcony.

The requirements mindset

Requirements are a means to an end; a way to instill confidence in the user that you've understood him, his concerns, and what to do to resolve them. These become concrete triggers and handle bars to manage in a business IT environment.

A professional should be able to clearly communicate what to do, either for himself or towards others. Requirements are helpful in doing so, by providing a mindset of prioritization and categorization. Whether you're a functional analyst, a technical architect, a consultant, a manager, or a programmer, being able to do requirements well allows you to understand what you do. A particular role, a particular person might be better suited to establish a set of requirements (e.g. a business consultant and business requirements; an architect and system requirements) than another, but the understanding is necessary to identify gaps, and to be able to get requirements as a whole to a proper level of detail.

Requirements will change. The further along you get, the tougher and the more expensive those changes become. This is no excuse to have bad requirements or not pay attention to them. Having good requirements change allows you to mitigate risks, have a clear view of impact, and establish confidence, control and a framework for change to the user.

Requirements are never written in isolation. They must be agreed upon/signed-off, and better still, be co-authored with the user and the stakeholders. Also requirements can be well-written on their own, but still be bad when regarding all the requirements.

Brasserie Park

Brasserie Park is a restaurant and party hall housed in a refurbished farm building on the edge of Park de Houtkamp near Leiden, and... a residential block. From the outside it looks quite vintage (as in old-fashioned), but once inside the hip and happening come flying toward you in a nice tight young blonde package. The furnishing's nice and post modern, which doesn't really fit the surroundings, but who's counting? There are large tables for big groups, a lounge area if you just feel like tapas and vino, and proper tables for small parties. The menu's great, and contains various exclusive dishes, which go above and beyond the standard grand cafe deals you would usually expect. A fine wine card accompanies the proceedings. Add to this timely service, and a very surprisingly decent price line, and I wholeheartedly recommend Brasserie Park in Leiderdorp for another visit.

Consultancies should learn from the NFL

Here are two quotes from people in the NFL, that also ring true in my neck of the woods...

You can be your own person, treat people with respect, be very demanding but demanding in a way that doesn't trample on people. And you don't have to give up your faith to win in the NFL.
-- Cam Cameron, sharing his opinions about Tony Dungy's book Quiet Strength

"If we don't do something about rookie salaries pretty soon, the salary cap will be meaningless. [Indianapolis defensive end] Dwight Freeney got $30 million in guarantees after leading the league in sacks over the past five years. [Cleveland rookie tackle] Joe Thomas got $23 million in guarantees for breathing.''
-- Anonymous, but wise, NFL general manager.

re: Peter King, SI.com

Sleepy tired

You could have sleepless nights about a lot of things. Someone you just met, but can't get out of your head. A contract you desperately want signed. A test result. A promotion you want. You sleep badly, and then you feel tired all day.

So here are some tips to stay energetic as much as possible.

Good luck!

Too bad I'm into Pumas now

Marketing is a tough business nowadays. You have to be really subtle and not lay it on too thick. The intention is to convince people to give their hard earned money to you, not tell people that they should.

One of the masters in marketing is Nike. Here is a link that showed exactly why.

(Of course, now that I'm not wearing Nike's anymore, my argument is a bit skewed... but still.)

Catfight! Catfight!

Relationships between women tend to be friendly, indifferent or downright hostile... Forget indifferent... Women are either a girl's best friend, or they are devil incarnate. Every so often you will hear a woman say that she gets along better with guys.

So for all women who can't stand the majority of females around her, there's this game.

Cutting loose

Sometimes you need space, and just want to clear out, get away. There are many ways you can do so. Going on vacation to a far away country. Stay in house. Turn off your phone. Change your identity. Block your relationships.

Each way has a motive behind it. It depends if you need space temporarily, or long term. If you want to go back to your old life when you come back, or if you want a desperate change. If you are disruptive and fickle in nature, or if you're harmonious and just don't want to trouble anyone else.

What is your motive to take a leave of absence?

More Personal Investments

I generally stick to the idea that - like stocks - every relationship requires personal investment. You spend time, effort, attention, perhaps a little bit of money, and that allows the relationship to blossom.

It hurts when an investment doesn't pan out, especially a significantly big investment. Even more so if the payoff you expected was important to you. And yet even more when that same payoff was almost reached and then cruelly taken away at the last possible moment.

Of course you will try to protect your investment, reduce risk, provide more incentives. Sometimes it helps, but like the DOW, there really are no guarantees. Results in the past, do not in any way predict anything about the future.

Comparing friendships and relationships to stock symbols is far fetched, but the comparison rings true. Does it help? Does it make you feel better? Unlikely. It helps to deal with human emotion by taking the emotion out of the equation, and being all business-like. Question is, would you want to?

Being Pretty Sells Games

Looks and attractiveness go a long way today. It's sad to see, but more true than you might admit. Actually, I will admit that when given the choice, all basic conditions have been met and all other factors being the same, I will choose superficial beauty and image over actual depth and longetivity.

Case in point: Assassin's Creed, a video game coming out on all the major gaming platforms, but also a game that by its very setting (medieval times, during the crusades) won't appeal to me, despite looking great and being free-form, and having all these subtle cues and immersive atmosphere... until I find out who the game's producer is...



Definitely, I would not even have considered giving this game a second thought, if it weren't for this pretty face. I'm not saying Jade's actually convinced me upfront to fork over my cash in November when Assassin's Creed is released, but she's got a far better shot than say Grand Theft Auto IV, Crysis or Rock Band.

Quiet For The Storm

Ever get the feeling that something's coming up real soon, a potentially big moment, milestone or event that could change your course in life quickly and severely, but in the mean time there's nothing to do? You're just waiting, keeping yourself busy, without really being very productive.

That time is here now.

Probably the best thing to do is take a long trip far away, and doing something else. At least when you come back, regardless of the outcome, you're doing your thing. Otherwise you leave after, and have to deal with the results then and there.

The anticipation is killing. The tension makes people do moves, that are at best ill-advised.

It truly is the quiet before the storm.

Observations from a self-learner course

I've got this Spanish-English course here, a set of audio CDs that basically keeps repeating the same conversations over and over again until you get the hang of it. For me repetition is a good way of learning stuff, especially if I'm doing other things at the side (like in this case, driving). Focus is a funny thing. I focus better when I'm not focusing at all.

Anyway, I just realized the absurd background of my course. It's about two business people going to a seminar in Spain, and asking for their rental car, their flight, their itinerary etc. The guy person asks for all the transport stuff, but the woman colleague is all over the sleeping arrangements. She wants one room for the both of them, a kingsize double bed, for several nights. In fact she corrects the poor hotel desk clerk for messing up the original reservation. The man and the woman have different surnames, so I guess they are not related.

Which leads me to believe:

• these two colleagues are bumping uglies at the seminar
• they made reservations separately not to draw any suspicion, and then changed the reservations afterwards

It's either that, or I truly don't understand a word of Spanish, and I'm imagining things.

Can you name 'em all?

I got to Kung Fu (obviously), Mario, SMB3, Digdug, Street Fighter 2, Street Fighter Alpha (I think), Mega Man, Mega Man 2, Donkey Kong, Gradius, Karateka, Pacman, Urban Champion, Dragonball Z, Track & Field... and then I got stumped... Which are the others?

I told you so... sort of

The following is one of Nostradamus' Quatrains in his work The Prophecies (Century III, Quatrain 70)

La Grande Bretagne comprise l'Angleterre
Viendra par eaux si fort inondre
La ligue neufue d'Ausonne fera guerre
Que contre eux il se viendront bander

The great Britain including England
Will come to be flooded very high by waters
The new League of Ausonia will make war,
So that they will come to strive against them.

Yes, Britain is flooded nowadays, and they are somewhat involved in a war... coincidence?

How To Mess Up a Perfectly Good Car

A Volkswagen Golf is quite a milestone in automotive history. Especially the GTI has become one of the most deceptively quick cars on the road, ever. They made the Golf nice with each new generation, tacking on more and more expensive stuff, while keeping the main characteristic alive... a solid, well-driving car with decent speed and maneuverability.

And then Volkswagen messed it up.

The Golf Plus is the biggest atrocity in the entire line. Driven by misguided market demand, the people at VW decided they needed a people carrier in the series. Probably to cater the boring market segment. As such, they made the Plus higher than a normal Golf, squished the front, and then afterwards gave it a good coat of dull to finish it off.

The drive is terrible. You can't make a bloody left turn without nearly tipping over. The car is so high, the center of gravity has moved up to your neck. And the Plus has all the aerodynamism of a brick wall.

It does seat four to five adults comfortably, so that's a plus. But then again, I wouldn't splash out for one if it were my own money.

I'm glad I'm getting rid of this one.

Road Rules when I'm driving

As I'll be getting new wheels in the very near future, let me reiterate the basic rules for anyone hitching a ride when we're going out...

• If you puke in the car, you're cleaning it immediately... by licking it up. This also goes if you pee or shit your pants.
  
• Only the driver decides who gets added to the ride if need be.
  
• Only the driver decides what that person must do in exchange for the ride.
• Nobody touches the windscreen, the climate control, the radio unless you're the driver or instructed to by the same.
• In case of discussion the driver is always correct. If you still disagree, you can find your own transportation.
• Any of these rules can be strongly adhered to or bypassed at the driver's discretion.
  

Toxicology reports

• I think it's absolutely fantastic that German tv stations ARD and ZDF quit the Tour de France as soon as one single cyclist got caught with doping. It takes quite some balls to walk away from obviously a lot of commercial income to stand up for ethics, and sportsmanship.
  
• Another tox-report eagerly awaited... Benoit did have some kind of steroids in him, but apparently our friendly neighbourhood CSI couldn't determine if these were present at the killings of his wife and son. Thus we'll never know what happened that faithful weekend. Of course everybody's going to spin it in their favour, so WWE will do a hatchet job on Benoit, FOX will turn it back yet again to steroids and the evils of pro wrestling, ex-workers of the industry will spout their personal grievances, company men will sing their praises, and the fans... well... will move on.

I knew I'm stupid, but I am dumb as well

Nope, I am not the smartest guy around, but I could more or less hide that fact behind a facade quite well. Now however even computer games are rubbing it in, that frankly my IQ is not as high as I would like it to be...

We cannot win

I am (along with my colleagues) trying to get a survey running for some time, because we should try to find out what our co-workers think about their jobs. Problem is, so are a lot of other intra-company teams, like HR, the internal telephone service, the lease car service, the management, the facilities department, the finance department, the tea lady and the guys writing marketing articles in the local news flash magazine.

We found ourselves in a position, that we didn't know when it's a good time to ask someone about his job? Right now is no good, since everybody is on vacation, two months ago was no good because everyone was getting three surveys a week, and two months from now everybody will be revving up for the new fiscal year...

Maybe we'll just wing it...

Eighties Denied

The eighties and nineties were the time of my youth. It was all A-Team, Knight Rider, Michael Jackson, Ruud Gullit, Top Gun, Berlin Wall, teen angst, toys and cartoons. Most of what we had back then was crap, but it was what we had, and it is what we nostalgically come back to. How else can you explain the scores of people going to Transformers The Movie, or going to Eighties parties etc.

Some of the things that were cool when you were a kid, are quite embarrassing to admit right now. Some of those actually are best left in the past (certain hairstyles, tube socks). Other things are actually worth quite a lot of money (He-Man action figures, mint condition). Some of those things you might be even proud to say you're still a fan of.

And that's what's been bugging me. Let's say you like Hulk Hogan, or gabber music, but everybody around you found that to be an insipid pastime, and basically ridiculed you for it. Or even worse, they dismissed it as a fad or a phase, and you would grow out of it in time. What would they say if you still like now, what you did back then? (HA!) And have you been fighting for your "right to like", or did you stay quiet until the movie comes out and it suddenly became hip and happening again?

I would say to today's youth that there's enough things in the world people will try to discourage you from. But it's not you who has to stop. The detractors must sell the alternative, or otherwise leave the fad be. You are the only one who can determine what you're supposed to like. Nostalgia will hide the deficiencies of the past anyway, so you might as well work with it, as the years go by.

That's why I don't do jumpstyle, but will let others go right ahead.

Personal Investment

Sometimes things just end. Shows get pulled, companies go bankrupt, wars are lost, people get dead. We are forced to deal with each instance in the best way possible. Often this is directly linked to how much we've invested in someone or something.

For example, I invested a lot of time into pro wrestling. I know and follow the characters, the storylines and am quite up to date with what's going on at each show. These people are real people with their own set of problems and demons. Sometimes one of them just doesn't make it and dies. Sometimes it's unfortunate, other times is downright tragic. It is always however a point of note. Bear in mind, other than being a fan, I have little to no interaction with any wrestler.

Now the other day a message arrived in my inbox, informing me one of my old colleagues from several years ago died. I know the name, probably spoke to him once or twice, and I've likely seen him at a reunion a couple of weeks ago. But I've never worked with him before, and come to think of it, it's rather hard for me to picture his face. So my most immediate reaction was... a shrug.

The difference here is personal investment. I have very little invested in a relationship with this guy, even though objectively he is closer to me than any athlete across the Atlantic. If I invest little, the loss is limited. If I think I can weather the loss of investment, I don't feel bad or worse.

It's a real shitty attitude I realize. But unfortunately it's one that hits closer to home than most people will admit.

Transform And Roll Out (Spoiler)

It's a very Zen-like moment when you hear the voice of Optimus Prime utter the opening monologue. Instantly you're taken back to a time when the world was a clear place. When Autobots were good, Decepticons were evil, every sentient being had a right to exist, and Sky Channel carried the single best cartoon of the eighties.

You hope the live action movie doesn't impact that romantic idea, and still you want it to be upgraded to 2007 standards. With all the CGI, professional soundtrack, Hollywood summer blockbuster production values, vast media exposure and multi-thread merchandise (toys, comics, video game) you can shake a stick at. And thankfully Transformers The Movie does exactly that.

I'm not going to reiterate the movie's plot, and instead we'll just focus on what made the movie great in the theater: the first encounter with Optimus, the interaction between Sam, Mikaela (and Bumblebee), actually the first encounter with Mikaela, the Camaro 2008, the Deceps Blackout, Barricade, and Starscream, Prime kicking ass and taking Bonecrusher's head, Megatron ripping Jazz in two.

You have to appreciate the humour in the movie, which is solid gold. Anthony Anderson doing the Matrix brings the funny. Bumblebee being better at picking up Megan Fox than Shia Leboeuf is just too much. And the Witwicky mother trying to be the understanding parent for an insecure teenager, simply hilarious.

There are some flaws though. The action scenes are MTV-style, as in much too fast to actually see what's going on. The movie moves intermittently from day to night even within the same scene, making it seem like either the scene in real-time would take really, really long, or the director couldn't get the actors to finish their grimaces in time. And like most cult franchises to movie adaptations, the hook of the original had to be Hollywood-ized to make it more tenable to the average movie-goer. Yes, Transformers is definitely a good movie to go to, even for someone who doesn't know TF from the past, but the Autobots and Decepticons don't get nearly enough screentime or dialogue to flesh out their characters, which is the point of the franchise anyway.

The problem is that for all the good things in the movie, it didn't need to be a Transformers movie. Apart from the names, the premise and some of the leitmotifs, anything in the movie could easily have been Go-Bots, or G.I. Joe. Or even the Ghostbusters.

• Will go to the movie again: no, probably not. Can't get the same reaction from the crowd on a post-premiere viewing.
• Will buy the DVD: absolutely. Day it comes out.
• Would go see a sequel: depends if they're gonna focus more on the Transformers themselves next time.

Sore Losers

Apparently Sebastien Bourdais, he of three-time Champ Car World Series champion fame, wasn't too happy how Dutchman Robert Doornbos earned his first victory in ChampCars this past weekend.

Little bit scared of competition are you now Sebastien?

Of course, I would be too, if some upstart rookie from Formula One's nether regions jumped the Atlantic and then proceeded to kick my butt. Especially if I had an inkling of hope I could actually make it Formula One...

But our French friend is not the sore loser here... it's the other Dutch Formula One racers, Jos Verstappen and Christian Albers. They were too proud to race in the States, they'd rather stay at home nursing the kids (Verstappen) or race for 20th place on the grid (Albers). Maybe just as well that the Spyker experiment is not gonna last too much longer.

More Brain Training

Dr. Kawashima must be doing well for Nintendo: the game he inspired and gave his name to, Brain Age, was the killer app for the Nintendo DS, sold millions worldwide, and helped create a new gaming genre from the ground up.

Brain Age 2, or More Brain Training is the sequel to this title, and serves to cash in on the success of the DS and the edutainment/training game genre. It is delightfully similar to the original, making you feel instantly at home. All the controls are still there, the styling hasn't changed, and the sound is what you'd expect. And then of course you throw yourself into the training proper:

• you start off with a rock, paper, scissors game that takes quite a while to get used to. Especially if you've all been growing up to win rock, paper, scissors, it's strange to have to lose when Kawashima asks you to; it takes so much time, I was 68 when the game ended.
  
• then you can start doing some small exercises. Now after one day only three exercises are open to you: a maths exercise requiring you to fill in the missing operator, a spelling exercise where you have to form words from jumbled up letters, and a musical exercise, that asks you to tap the right chords to a song in time to the music. Another opens very soon, another maths exercise that requires you to give back correct change at a cash register, and one where you have to identify words spoken to you from the DS. I've not opened up any more exercises yet, but these are already challenging.

Compared to the original the exercises seem a little harder. It was terrible to see that I couldn't really do the jumbled letters test well, but maybe that's just a matter of recognition. The listening exercise is really, really hard, but that may be a technical limitation. The DS speakers are simply not that good.

Then again the original's exercises (the house occupants' one for example) proved to be no challenge at all after a while, were stale or boring (100 maths formulae, or the memory game) or were seriously flawed (the reading aloud one). So these are somewhat of an improvement.

Of course, we have to hold off on the final verdict until I've gone through the entire game, but for now, let's call it a 30 Euro luxury, instead of a necessity.

World Crashing Down Around You

So you're a world champion, idolized by many, regarded as the very best of your kind. You are a hero figure, a fighter, a warrior, a well-respected fan favorite.

And then one day you don't show up for work. Actually you call-in with a family emergency, and you go home. Next thing we know, you're found dead in your home, along with wife and son. The investigation is treated as double murder/suicide, which is confirmed by all the authoritative sources. And then the world comes crashing down on you...

Only you know what happened this past weekend. It doesn't stop everyone else to try to cope with your death. Speculation if rife, drawing conclusions is done plenty. How did you come this far? Some see it as an opportunity to mock pro wrestling, or to point out the character flaws, the lifestyle and the addictions that many personalities have in that industry. Others don't want to accept this harsh reality as a given, and either wallow in tears for the loss of a dear idol, or murder the person after the fact, just to make sense of it all.

Details and conclusive facts won't be available for some time. Could be days, could be months. In the meantime people will do everything mentioned above just to make sense - mainly to themselves - of what is obviously a tragic, unexpected and disastrous turn of events. People won't wait for the truth. They can't. They'd go crazy.

As a colleague of mine displayed recently: the truth is how people see themselves, not what the truth actually is.

- Chris Benoit 1967-2007

Two Months Later This Still Deserves A Mention

Geeky? Maybe. Looks like this guy has too much time on his hands? I guess so. But it is the best homage to the Matrix, John Woo, video games, feminism seen so far.

The Nintendo Generation

Slowly approaching 30 and already I'm berating younger, more junior colleagues. I could say stuff like "Kids today...", or "In my day...", and I would be right. I could ridicule them for jumping, and I would still be right.

It's not just an age thing though, the entire mentality of my generation opposed to the one coming out of school the past two years is completely wack. These guys want everything, from their cars and their pay, to their career choices, houses, sports and television to be fed to them on a silver platter. And they want it now. As if they're pushing buttons and stuff is supposed to happen to them, just like that.

Thing is, with the internet, MSN, hyves, youtube and the like people hear about the latest information and the greatest success stories faster than ever before. And people tell you exactly how to emulate it. Next, people get frustrated because the trick only worked once, and it did not work for them. And then they up and leave.

People are much too used to experiencing immediate cause and effect, with a remote controller or a gamepad, and they expect everything else in life to work the same.

Welcome to the Nintendo Generation.

Crash and burn

What's with these guys lately? NBA baller J.R. Smith gets thrown out of his vehicle in a wicked car crash, that actually killed his passenger. Baseball pitcher Josh Hancock gets himself killed in a motorcycle accident. Last year Pittsburgh Quarterback Ben Roethlisberger was involved in a motorcycle accident as well. And now fellow NFL player Lavar Arrington suffered the same fate.

What's with these guys? Even if you are a big superstar on the road, in traffic you are just the same as everyone else. Okay... maybe you got the bigger cars or the faster ones, but they wreck totally just the same.

Then again since when did their off-game activities become national news? Normal accidents, with just as much impact are not even a sidenote in the local newspaper, but when one of these guys gets himself wrapped around a telephone pole, they get frontpage billing.

Learning from past mistakes

When the space shuttle Columbia disintegrated, careful analysis after the fact showed that part of the shielding was damaged during takeoff. This was not picked up upon until it was too late. Now with the current mission the bright guys and girls at NASA are more alert to damage sustained during takeoff.

About a week ago there was this newsbite that basically said the shuttle was damaged. Then later on the news said the damage sustained was minor. Just a little thermal blanket. Still considering the cost of one shuttle, and the fact they won't make any more, it's better to be safe then sorry.

Do you think astronauts applaud when they land safely?

Unwanted attention

Humility is a great virtue, one that saves you a lot of trouble, and can still bring you a lot of good things if you're really, really good. (Unfortunately, if you show great humility, but aren't good at all, then you - rightfully - don't get anything.) Coupled with a well-developed skill like social awareness humility can become a strong weapon to build your career on.

Here's a real-life example. You could try to do a group picture shoot, and keep to the side and let others take the front. Suddenly Mr. Photographer might just switch the point of view around and shoot the group from the side... where you just happen to be front and center.

Of course, your positive attitude brings out the best in the picture. How's that for exposure?

Where was Don McMillan when I needed him?

Nuff said.

How Many Bad Gambles Can You Have

Dutch television agents are probably the worst gamblers in the world. These are the guys who buy television shows (usually American) to fill their programming with. You would think that they would be able to discern good shows from bad ones, but unfortunately they keep missing the mark.

It gets worse: when they start advertising shows heavily as the big hit series from the U.S.A. and then find out the show was cancelled even before the show hits the Dutch airwaves, how stupid would you feel? It happened to:

• The Nine
• Daybreak
• The Class
• Summerland
• Out Of Practice

Now apparently good shows the Dutch can't pay for. So much that they get dumb and start programming it at around 23:55 on a Thursday or Friday night. This happened to:

• The Sopranos
• The West Wing
• The Agency
• My Name Is Earl

And of course you keep rerunning the same old shows over and over again, like:

• Friends (ENOUGH ALREADY)
• The A-Team
• Will & Grace
• ER
  

If you know a series is gonna cost a lot of money, why would you spend it so unwisely? And if you wanna gamble, why do it this way? Why do you programme a television evening like a novice poker player plays a hand?

The Heart, The Head, The Gut: NBA Finals 2007

One more final to go before we head into the summer, and it's a doozy... Tim Duncan and the San Antonio Spurs versus LeBron James and the Cleveland Cavaliers.

The Heart says: Cavs win. Simply because the Spurs are rather bland, not really colourful (literally). Okay I give them Eva Longoria, but other than that there's nothing really fun about the Spurs. They're decent but boring, opposed to Cleveland's new found pizzazz in LeBron James. It's good to see if the NBA finally has its new superstar, after Michael Jordan, and winning the NBA title this year will definitely usher in that era. James has certainly brought the franchise back from their weak period starting in the mid-nineties, when the Cavs themselves were a boring team.

The Head says: Spurs win. On the grand stage of world basketball the Spurs have a collection of players that's simply impressive. Manu Ginobili, Tony Parker, Bruce Bowen, Michael Finley, and of course the indomitable Tim Duncan. The Spurs have experience on their side, having been to the NBA Finals three times already since 1998 and winning each trip. The Cavaliers have nothing to show, except for some regular season wins over San Antonio, and the rush of having beaten the Detroit Pistons for four straight in the Eastern Conference finals.

The Gut says: Spurs win. Two years ago I simmed a couple of NBA seasons in EA Sports NBA 06 (playing the Lakers mind you), and for the 2006/2007 season I couldn't beat the Spurs in the West playoffs. I was blown out. The Spurs would go on to reach the NBA Finals... against the Cleveland Cavaliers. That means a computer game called this match-up two years before it actually happened! Mind you the Spurs won that simulated series as well, 4-2.

Wink

It's getting really scary now... I don't even have to say anything, just a wink and a nod, and I'm in.

It would be really useful if it was for a club, or a fancy restaurant, or a championship game final, or even a bloody plane ride. But NOOO... just your regular neighbourhood hospital...

The Heart, the Head, the Gut: NHL Stanley Cup Finals 2007

The Stanley Cup final is coming Monday, and this time it sees the Anaheim Ducks face the Ottawa Senators. Either one could win their first Stanley Cup. Supposedly its going to be an exciting series. And like the last couple of finals, it pits a Canadian team against a southern US, non-traditional-hockey territory team.

The Head says: on the one side you've got a Ducks team, that - while powerful - is not very effective in front of goal. Teemu Selanne has always been a feared scorer, and in fact many different Ducks managed to score, but it's not exactly a tale of riches to say the least. On the other side you've got the Senators, who've got Jason Spezza, Dan Alfredsson, Dany Heatley who pretty much make up half Ottawa's entire goals production these playoffs on their own. If the Ducks defense, Scott Niedermayer and Chris Pronger, can stop this line, and the Ducks can get production from all of their offensive lines, they will win. It would suit the last two finals as well, when the Southern U.S. team (Carolina, Tampa Bay) would beat the Canadian team (Edmonton, Calgary). Purely from an observer point of view, the Ducks have the better and more experienced goalie (Giguere over Ottawa's Emery), although the difference isn't all that great. Even so... Ducks win.

The Heart says: I've been playing EA Sports NHL for a while now, and two players that always got roster spots in my teams, were Mike Fisher and Mike Comrie. Lo and behold, both play for Ottawa this season.
In addition I found it a travesty to see the Stanley Cup in the hands of regions where hockey is not really appreciated. After all these years it's about time that a Canadian team brought the Cup back north of the border. Senators win.

The Gut says: Difficult, difficult... which one has the better story? Either one would win their first Cup, so that can't be it. Media has been calling attention to Daniel Alfredsson being the first European-born captain in the Stanley Cup finals, so maybe I'll swing that way. Ducks have home-ice advantage though, and there's still that losing streak that Canadian teams have at the moment... it would be nice if the Senators would bring back the Cup to Canada, after two previous failed attempts.
Senators in seven.