I have made a weblog! Why? To celebrate the year in which my weblog exists for ten years! 10 years ago, trough a domain name I started my first weblog and write quite some articles. Mostly in Dutch. Now, in 2016, i spend most of my days talking in English, so I imagine it would be quite a good idea to start writing longer stuff (and bullshit) in English.
Usually when I announce something new, what follows is at least a year of radio silence. However, to make sure this page doesn’t stay completely empty, I took liberty of translating some of my older weblog posts to English.
For a while I wanted to change the layout of my longlasting website to a slightly more calm place. In 2014 i completely redesigned my website and it was a very complete but also busy looking website. Lately I wanted it to look a bit more calm, and I think I managed to do so. Here is a screenshot of the old site for comparison:
While heading in for my train home, I scan my card at the scanner to check in. “Have a good journey”, it tells me. “I’ll decide that for my self, okay?”, I mumble on the inside. Then again, the poor scanner can’t be blamed for it. I decide to try to cheer up my grumpy mood and actually turn it into a good journey. And boy, would it become a good journey…
Upon entering the train, I stumble upon a conversation between a guy in his thirties and a quite cute girl who just might be about 20. However, instead of conversation, it could just as easy be called a monologue. Just the first sentence convinced me to pick a seath within a hearing distance:
“So, i’ve been livin’ on the streets for a while, and you just get a lot of new experiences that way.”
– “Are you on drugs?”, the girl asks
“No, nothing never, I hate drugs and never want to have to do anything. Never. Nothing.”
He looks quite dirty and uncivilized. His hair doesn’t really have a model, he seems to be wearing his shoes for at least a few years non-stop, and don’t even get me started on his jacket. I look down, at my own shoes. Hmmm. They could be cleaned as well. Then again, there are road works in my street which means I have to walk through sand every single day and that’s not very good for leather. Let’s wait for another week, then they should be finished. I’ll also give this guy the benefit of the doubt.
The guy continues. “Like I was saying, I live on the street, and ever since the weedcard they introduced (so only people with Dutch nationality could buy weed in shops), all stupid Jerries (Germans) come to me asking for weed. So, if I only have 1 guilder to spend and afterwards I have 20 guilders to eat from, I just have to do that. I’m only as much as an honest person, get it?”
The cute girl clearly isn’t interested in his story and looks at him if she wants to say “Why the hell are you talking to me?”. She looks quite nice, I must admit. Me gusta, even. Long brown hair, foolish eyes (this is not going to be a Muse reference), just a little longer than me and maybe just a little bit too slim for me. I wonder where she’s from. She looks western-European (aka Dutch) in one way, but in another way she looks different. Oh well, who actually cares. All you care about is reading more about the guy. Isn’t it funny how a dirty tramp in his thirties can be more appealing to you than a 20 year old hot girl? See, the world is not as sexualized as some people claim. Well, I have seen her and even just her heavenly blue eyes would draw my attention. Hoever, at the moment she mainly got my attention because of the conversation she unwillingly ended up in.
She keeps gazing at him with her beforementioned blue eyes. He adds something like “Hmh?”. This is where she seems to realize she can’t procrastinate giving a response for any longer. After doubting for a moment, she starts “But can you just-”
“Off course I can’t get a job!”, he interrupts her. “How the hell could I find a job? To get a job, you need to have a house. And to have a house, you need a job. That’s the visual cycle, don’t you get it?”
Once again she keeps staring at him, no clue on what to say. Luckily for her, they get distracted by the arrival of the train at the station of Nijmegen and the announcement that the train changed it’s final stop location because of a fire somewhere close to the rail track.
“Goddamn, stupid fucking cunts! There’s always something with this fucking stupid fuckety-fucktrain! Wilders (right wing extremist politician) is the one to blame it all on! He nationalized the stupid railway company.”
“Don’t you mean privatized?”, She tries to correct him. “Oh shut up about it, it’s all the same stupid stuff”, he says. “When I lived in Weert he already was a hassle to many of us. I hate him. Idiot. Imagine hanging around outside with your friends, and him showing up, only to call the police on us. Stupid cops. Isn’t this supposed to be a free country? I ain’t even allowed to drink a beer or the cops would come. I’m not doing anything illegal, am I? AM I? Well!?”
Just at the moment where he raised his voice to a level where the whole car could easily hear him (which was not really needed as the whole care seemed to be listening already), he was interrupted by an even louder voice announcing the next station. ‘s Hertogenbosch. “The woods of the Duke”. Actually the name of the city is different, because it’s called Den Bosch, which would be just “The woods”. But then again, our elitist railway company seems to have their own opinions about how cities are named. The lady tries to escape from the conversation by asking the conductor at what time the train was going to arrive Arrive in Tilburg.
After the conductor answered and moved on, he managed to get blamed as well: “Well, you know, the board of directors of these big companies are quite okay, it’s the low level employees who refuse to do anything but sit on their lazy asses. They don’t announce anything, don’t help. Nothing. Well, only if they can give you a fine for not having a ticket. They must keep all the money themselves. Anyway, It’s all about communification. That’s what this stupid company fails at. If only for that to be, you could just as well easier take the bus. Only those stupid bus drivers are haters. Fucking haters. And idiots. Fuckers. And, busses are at least 100 times as expensive as the train is. Fuck off with your stupid economic growth and inflation. Hyper inflation. That’s what it is. Everything keeps getting more and more expensive. But Wilders is the one to blame it all on. I already said that.
At this moment I gave him the label “stereotype left-wing weed addicted hippie with no life because of his own stubbornness and nothing else to blame”. I think it fits quite well. I haven’t been able to find a think about him that doesn’t fit this label.
Suddenly I notice the train is coming to a standstill and till this day it hurts to the very bottom of my soul: Tilburg. Not just my station, but also the girl’s. Shortly I doubt staying in the train for one more station just to figure out what he would say to the next person that were to make the mistake of sitting across him. The girl just left, and I decide to do so too. I hop out of my seat, and walk to the exit of the car. I like the next city. Breda, but not enough to go there for a stupid reason like this. Just when i’m about to reach the door to the exit of the car, I hear the sound of a can of beer opening. I turn my head to see him talking to a 1980’s style cellphone “Bummer. I was this close to banging her. Little bitch had a damn nice rack”.
I leave the train with a big smile and I have to put quite some effort in not bursting out in laughter. On the platform I spot the girl, also laughing and also talking to her (pink) iPhone: “like, oh my god!”. I could write another thousand words about exactly those four words, but I won’t. It would ruin the image about a seemingly beautiful girl you should have by now.
This remarkable train ride happened in 2012. I’ve published the original article in 2013, and in that year I also used altered parts of it for an article on the weather. Don’t ask. This article was translated to English on the 19th of February, 2016.
21st of December, 2012. Doomsday. Will we go down together today, or not? That’s the question that has kept our minds occupied since the very beginning of the Mayan Calendar.
In this Liveblog we will keep you up to date till the end of time* on the end of the world. *Disclaimer: If the end of the world doesn’t happen on the 21st of December, 2012, we might stop before the world ends.
Update 20th of December, 2012, 23.50: While in parts of the world it’s already the 21st of December, we still have to wait for about ten minutes here in the Netherlands. For the sake of laziness, we’ll assume the Mayan Calendar used our Dutch GMT+1 Time Zone. If they want us to have a quick and painless ending, chances are we are living our last ten minutes on planet earth. We wish you a pleasant and painless end of the world!
Update 23:51:
If you want to get insurance to help cover the costs of the end of the world? You still can for 9 mire minutes with Dutch insurance company Centraal Beheer Achmea, who came up with an insurance policy which will cover any damage due to total destruction of Planet Earth.
Update 21st of December, 2012, 00:00: Here we are. 21st of December, 2012. Accourding to reliable sources, Planet Earth has not been destroyed yet. This is remarkable, as in New Zealand it’s been Doomsday for 12 hours already. More information will follow shortly.
Update 00.29:
Today’s program has leaked trough Twitter. Time to go to bed soon, as it’s going to be an early day today:
DOOMSDAY 21st of December, 2012
Scheduled program:
05:00: Waking up Earths Civilization with Air Raid
06:00: Arrival of the Mayans
07:00: Arrival of the Extraterrestrials
08:00: Arrival of the president of the G8-Summit
09:00: Arrival of all saints, infadels and torturers
10:00: Anthem of the end of the world: “Highway to Hell”
10:30: Welcoming word by the Pope
11:45: Lunch break with sandwiches
13:00: UN-meeting about the end of the world.
15:00: Moment of silence
15:05: Start of public ceremony
17:00: Start of buffet
18:00: Departure of Mayans
19:00: Fireworks and Football match Brazil – the rest of the World
21:00: Ascension of Archangels, those declared holy and other Angels
22:00: End of ceremony (Bar opened) FREE BEER!
23:30: Handing out of 3D Glasses
24:00: FALL OF PLANET EARTH (including “The Final Countdown”)
After this: End of the world afterparty!
Update 01:23: If you read this, on doomsday, on the internet, on a website which publishes articles like this; you probably are still a virgin. There is some hope and a pickup suggestion! On our forums, user Marble1 claims she’s both female and still a virgin! Use that to your advantage. PS: Rape is not classified under “use that to your advantage”.
Update 08.05:
In Central America, where the Mayans lived, doomsday has arrived as well. As for the Netherlands, everything seems to be fine. The sun is rising, dialy routines, and (this might be the biggest miracle happening today), even the trains are running on time!
Update 09.10: According to the predictions of Nostradamus, the end of times will come if the ‘number of circles’ of the ‘dancing horse’ becomes nine. It should be very clear, without a doubt, that this is about the song Gangnam Style, a Youtube hit video which is about to hit the 1 billion (1 + nine zeroes/circles). Prepare thyselves!
Update 11.00: At this brief moment, it’s 21st of December all across the world. The end of the world is expected any moment now. As soon as planet earth is destroyed, this very spot is the first place you’ll read more about it.
Update 12.10: According to forum user NaturalScience, the world will end somewhere between 12:11 and 12:19. According to him, the milky way, the sun, the moon and planet Earth will be in one straight line. We doubt wether this is true, but as soon as we are all extingt. We will bring you up to date about it.
Update 12.20: RECTIFICATION:
This afternoon t 12:10 we reported that the world would end between 12:11 and 12:19. As for now, this has not happened. Our editors feel the need to correct the prior reports on this. We regret this situation and will take proper measures to prevent this from happening in the future. Our apologies for the inconvenience. In any event of the end of the world still happening, we will bring you up to date about it.
Update 12.25:
Between Haarlem and Voorhout there are no trains because of a collission with a car. According to perhaps reliable sources, this could be the beginning of the end of the world.
Update 13:18:
Local Radio station Webfm has a reporter live at the end of the world. At this moment, he reports that the world has not ended yet.
Update 14.39: Conspiracy website Niburu reports that on images by NASA, if interpreted right, it shows that a “large area of darkness” is heading our way fast. It seems like we will be in the dark for three days. Either that, or it’s a mistake by some nerd behind a computer. We don’t judge.
Update 15.18:
News website news.com.au has published a list with strategical tips for those who survived the apocalype.
Update 16.27: Moments ago, the song Gangnam Style passed 1.000.000.000 views on youtube. We reported about the nine circles of the dancing horse before, but apparently they are no reason to help this piece of rock to it’s end. Isn’t that nice?
Like you all (should) know, i’ve been working hard for many years to achieve world domination. Ruling the world alone is usefull in many ways even if not for the cheesy pickup line “Hey baby, wanna rule the world together?” you could use in bars. But, there are also useful plans! As for a start, i’ll dismantle any currently existing organisations which have anything to do with music licensing rights and replace them by a single governmental body which cares about artists instead of their own pickets. Furthermore, there will be a worldwide ban on cats due to practicing satanism. Only cats without sharp nails and the ability to make any noise whatsoever. But, that requires – rather painful – surgery and even though i’m evil, i’m not curel. So, all cats move to a dome on the moon.
Apart from this, all countries will get new laws and the most important changes in them will be that everyone has the right to receive and posess a rubber duck. Don’t ask.
Apart from all of this, i will look for as many useless laws and rules i can find, just to remove them. Daylight savings time for example. Aren’t we all done with it?
Apart from this ill introduce the conversion to Giant Days. Days will be taking 36 hours instead of 24. A year would count 243 gDays and we will have a leap day once every three years and we’ll call it the Zeroth of August. It will be a paid day off for everyone.
Off course, hell will break loose on 0th of August. But, thanks to shotguns (Did you ever realize how stupid the name “Shot Gun” is? Why didn’t they at least name it “Shoot gun”. But then again, it’s still stupid as pretty much any gun is made for shooting) ‘the power’ (no one knows who they are and what they do, but they’re damn happy they exist) manages to keep order. During carnaval season they are out in public, but only in sounthern parts of the Netherlands.
Furthermore, New York will be renamed back to New Amsterdam, and the dutch town of “America” will be renamed to Schubbekutteveen.
Just because it looks awesome on a street name sign.
Flanders will become part of the Netherlands, and the rest of Belgium will be sank to a recreative lake.
This concludes the first part in my stories about world domination. If more will follow? I don’t have a clue.
As for now… Move along people. Nothing to see here.
This article was translated to English and republished on the 18th of February, 2016.
Alex has – to me- a kind of strange idea taste in music.
Furthermore, Alex is slightly “sturdy” and maybe even “evil”. Evil in the way of “Going for absolute world domination”.
Anyway, apart from that he is – just like me – very good in bashing on stupid stuff. Especially about artists he doesn’t like.
So he made a list of all artists that should eternally burn in hell. While people throw pickaxes at them. While they sit on an electric chair. This is his list:
Kane, Keane, Krezip, Coldplay, Snow Patrol, Nickelback, All hiphop, Beyonce, James Morrison, Rihanna, Jason Mraz, Ilse Delange, Duffy, and many more.
This basically means Alex has a very bad taste in music, and they should lock him up in a room where they only play Krezip, Coldplay and Jason Mraz. On repeat. At 120db.For a year. With pickaxes.
Anyway.
Now it’s my turn to give it a try! I guess more people will like my list.
– K3 and all other horrible music procuded by Studio 100
– Jan Smit
– Beyonce
– Britney Spears
– Paris Hilton
– Miley Cyrus
– Jennifer Lopez
– Wolter kroes
– Harry, Henk, Wouter, Jeroen and all other 1-person artist who have a fan base of 500 incompetent retards
– Hiphop and pretty much anything close to Rap
Addition: Dries Roelvink! Even if only for ruining the name Annelies!
Burn. Hell. Pickaxes. Get it?
Suggestions and/or additions are welcome!
This article was translated to English and republished on the 18th of February, 2016.
I never saw the light
I never saw the light
I waited up all night
But I never saw the light
When we fall in love
We’re just falling
In love with ourselves
We’re spiralling
We’re tumbling down
We’re spiralling
Tied up to the ground
We’re spiralling
More music in the morning
This article was translated to English and republished on the 18th of February, 2016.
Last friday i stumbled across a blogpost by Dutch Radio 3FM Radio DJ Bart Arens who made a post about Superfrog:
I’m not a gamer. It’s a waste of my time. Obviously, i don’t have a console.
Friendly request: Don’t laugh.
The only game that I ever played and finished was the Commodore Amiga platform game Superfrog. Now what did I ask?!
It took me well over 2 weeks to get trough the 28 levels. The joystick was pretty much broken afterwards. Just now, i came across the game again, now as a PC game. I didn’t download it because I know i’ll lose myself in it again.
So. For 12 years I knew no one who knew that game and now i find this weblog. What an amazing game was that. I spent many days playing it when I was younger.
In hindsight, it might have been the most fun game I ever played…
A while ago I found an Amiga emulator, which allowed me to play the game on my computer again. It seemed more difficult than I remembered. I was not able to defeat the evil Witch in the end… Too bad, because the ending cinematic was quite funny
Also, I once made a webcomic. which used graphics based on the game.
For furute plotlines, I did some brainstorming and made some locations, including a radio studio, which is based on the studios of local radio station WebFM in Weurt. Check the picture for how that looked!
This article was translated to English and republished on the 18th of February, 2016.
The OLC is a place in school where you can do your studying in a calm environment, without being disturbed. That’s why there are strict rules about what you are allowed and should do. Things like MSN, and texting are forbidden. Also, your cellphone has to be turned off. Like you can see here:
This article was translated to English and republished on the 18th of February, 2016.
This saturday I went outside to watch the lunar eclipse. It was dark and quite red.
Together with Dennis and Jeffrey I went to the darkest place around. From there we could see everything nice and clear, and i must admit: it was beautiful!
Pics will follow!
This article was translated to English and republished on the 18th of February, 2016.
and all other horrible music procuded by Studio 100
Last friday i stumbled across a blogpost by Dutch Radio 3FM Radio DJ Bart Arens who made a post about Superfrog:
