New camera!
I did try to shop around, but ended up with my first love after all: bought a Canon Ixus 50, one of the few digital camera's out there that still has a little lens you can look through so you can look at the subject you want to take a picture of instead of the stupid display on the camera. I was so shocked when I first saw people do that: a couple of years ago I was on safari in South Africa with a truck full of people staring at their camera instead of looking out the window where the wildlife was standing at about 2 meters from the vehicle. WTF?

Anyway: I also *love* the design of the Ixus, I was very sad when my old Ixus-APS-camera died, but now I have a gorgeous replacement to take with me on vacation:-)

I still have plenty of time to practise and find all the possibilities, but wanted to show off the first two pictures I made. (Actually first and third, 'cause the second one was out of focus, oops) Close up of the little pig is with macro on.

Why do carrots explode in the microwave? (Don't try this at home;)

As a reward for the answer I made two desktops, since I got the answer in dutch, the first one is a dutch carrotcake-joke. The second is an ode to one of my favorite scenes from Bottom. Enjoy.





Bottom- episode 'Holy' -iirc-
[Eddie has made an exploding carrot]
Richie: Bloo-dy bril-jant, Eddie! Yeah! Hey, got any more?
Eddie: Mais oui, mon brave!
Richie: What?
Eddie: Certainement, mon general!
Richie: Oh Christ, he's gone all Welsh on me again!
[yells in "Welsh"]: HAVE YOU GOT ANY MORE EXPLODING CAR-ROTS?

:-D

ETA: Blogger seems to adjust the size of the picture, it should still be big enough for 1048x768 dimensions.

Confession
Sometimes when I buy a present, I will let the salesperson wrap it for me. Even though I know I will tear the packaging apart at home, I have to let her do it anyway.
I'm cringing inside having to witness the struggle. She thinks it looks smashing. It doesn't. The result is a hideous display of her lack of creativity and an obvious misunderstanding of the 'less-is-more' principle, not to mention the complete ignorance of acceptable colorcombinations. But the whole process makes me feel superior. I'm evil.

Here is the latest creation, admire, mock, enjoy:



The 'pretty' bow, that hurts to look at, is done in advance (there's a box full of them, ready to use), but it still takes her ages to put it all together.

I enjoy unwrapping it at home and redoing it my way:-) (For one thing I didn't use green paper to go with my orange present, what was she thinking?)




FYI: Nicky's hairproject is moved to My IconCorner! (I warned you that was gonna happen;)

Still no personal pictures to publish (I'm waiting for holiday-money to buy a proper digital camera) so I am parking part 2 of the Hair project here. [Picture is moved to My IconCorner 05/12/2006] You can [also] find it new Icons there[...]

Haven't made any personal pictures lately. But today I did finish part 1 of my new pet-project: The CSI Nick's Hair Timeline.

This picture is moved to the icon-corner. 05/13/2006

Told ya it was a blizzard...





I tried to capture it in a movie, but haven't figured my camera out yet. Notice the hopefull people at the busstop (first picture). It's fun betting money on how long they will wait *g*.

More Snow!









No busservice: No work;-)

Snow!









Taken early this morning. This evening there was a huge blizzard (not kidding) and it's not even funny how much snow there is now. Not sure if I will be able to get to work tomorrow...

Fear no more:
now I can get rid of my aggression at home:

Tadaah:



Good teeth, again I impressed the dentist.
Even beneath the over twenty year-old fillings everything is okay:-)

Diner at Mr.Wok for my birthday


Rianne and her starter (I think it was pork with Japanese Soy-sauce)


Jan and his starter: Jumbo Shrimp


I tried sushi...


Waiting for action... (and food)


Spectaculair cooking-style (now why didn't I get these fireworks?)


Mom made her own dessert...


And so did Hans;-)

Good food, good company: we had a great time!

Bye bye old shoes, you served me well.





Sigh. :'-(

A beautiful day
Unexpected snow this morning (that is what happens when you don't pay attention to the weatherreports;) but it didn't have any effect on my journey to The Hague. I had a beautiful sunny view from the train. Well, no too much sun, but a gorgeous cloudy sky, that made me sigh.










I also took a picture of one of my favorite aspects of the tram in The Hague: riding through the grass!

Officialy we celebrate Sinterklaas' birthday on the 5th of december. But since Sunday is a more convenient day to get together, we handed out presents today. (FYI Saint Nick is what we like to call the original Santa Clause. He doesn't just deliver presents, but he writes poetry and occasionally makes surprise-gifts to memorate special events that happened to people in the past year) For the first time in years no-one was travelling the world in december, so we all went to mom's house today to have a party. Here are the pictures.

First some of the surprise gifts before unwrapping:


A waterpipe for Rianne to remind her of the trip she made to in Turkey with Hans;-)



A library full of important dutch writers (Nederbieb) for Gayleen, 'cause she wants to catch up with our literature.



A Big Apple for Hans, since he's planning to finish his study (artificial intelligence) on an internship in New York next May.


And some pictures of the collection of presents Sinterklaas b(r)ought us this year:


We wonder what's under the sheets? From left to right: Gayleen, Jaap, Rianne, Judith and Hans



Tadaah: loads and loads of presents! ('Cause we all behaved so very well this year;-)
Can we start the unwrapping now, mom?


Let the fun begin...


Gayleen reads Saint Nick's poem about dutch literature



Jaap tries to figure out how to use his safari-survival spray (surprisegift to remind him about his trip to Tanzania and Kenya, where the animals came too close to take a good picture (how dissapointing is that?;-)


Gayleen asked for a funky hat, this is the surprise version, inside Sint hid an adorable one.



A suprise cuddly animal for me, filled with lots of presents! (So I got to kill it, woohoo:)



Jaap and Gayleen are looking for a new house, Sint made them a one out of candy.



Rianne got a surprise graduation cap for her succes in university this year.



Mom had a lot of trouble finding a save parkingspot for her regular bike, so she got a foldable easy travel bike, that she can carry with her.


Sint hid the present under the bike.


Hans taking a bite out of the Big Apple, inside was a book 'not for tourists' about New York.


We had a great time: thanks a lot Sinterklaas!

Yesterday I came back from my very satisfying trip to London. I wrote about it in my LiveJournal, here I'll post the pictures of my brand new funky shoes, so you can admire the pretty: