Last night I dumped my Macbook Pro at the Apple store for keyboard repairs and now face the wonderful challenge of being without a computer once I leave the office for the weekend.

The morning welcomed me with a wonderful example of human stupidity -Somebody managed to tether his/her bike to mine rather than the bicycle rack, effectively tethering me to somebody for a rather uncertain amount of time. This had better be over soon, or crimes will ensue.

Work is suspiciously relaxed today and the BBQ is on its way. A great setting for food, drink and the unavoidable questions that might arise from my somewhat interesting whereabouts as of late.

I'm not really sure why, but the Flash people at work updated the Spang Makandra display at work with an FLV background of wavy grass. As if the 1920x1200 resolution wasn't killer enough, we now have coarse VCD quality grass animating at 10fps.

I eased the pain by watching the demos from ASD and Excess from last weekend. I really ought to get around writing some incensed article explaining my absence at Breakpoint -to my chagrin I had to explain the situation ad nauseam even DURING the damn event.

First experiences in the land of eternal cold (no, not Finland)

Arrived in the Netherlands last Friday and did a Bubble Boy regime in my apartment in order to get used to the climate here. First day at the offices in Amsterdam, recouping stories and experiences with the colleagues here.

It's not just the cold. It's the dryness

'nuff said. The temperature got to me pretty damn good (my thermostat pulled a nice 28 °C and I still had to wear a sweater) but the real problem was the total lack of humidity of the atmosphere. This screwed me over more than anything.

Holland has the pussy version of rain

While a bunch of people at the tram stop scattered like cockroaches at the first sight of rain, I didn't really get the point. It remained a puny drizzle that Suriname puts to shame. Tropical rainstorms are the norm there.

The sky: gray. Also comes in gray and gray

I've been here a scant three days and this is the first day I got to see a hint of blue through the gray clouds. It's not even funny.

In all, not bad. But damn me if I don't want to go back as soon as possible.

Greetings from Limp Ninja and Lemon

Note to non-demosceners: You probably won't get this.

Facet is in the country for a couple of days to seal some business deals here. It's been a while since the lovable Amiga graphician made me feel like I'm the least funny person on the planet. Moreover, it's good to see a familiar face. Who knows, I might catch him so piss-drunk that he can be persuaded to pixel a naked woman on a serpent. With a volcano in the background.

Extended stay

Yes.

Today I got the word from AJ that she could postpone my stay until the 29th, which is awesome. I need to check out my possibilities to travel inlands and get eaten by some underwhelming-looking predator or catch malaria. I'm pretty pleased with this development, since it means I get to witness Independence Day here in Paramaribo too boot.

Today I gave the trainees the whole day to do an assignment, though I warned them I'd expect them to finish sooner. Four out of fourteen pulled it off after six hours. Unfortunately I had to become a serious hard-ass with one of the less-motivated trainees and I am not exactly expecting a lot from this one. It's especially troubling because the potential is definitely there, but a lack of discipline, concentration and maybe even interest make it impossible to focus on the project at hand.

On one hand it is extremely frustrating to see someone fall behind like that. On the other hand it's been made perfectly clear that you can't keep dragging people over the finish line just because they won't run for themselves. It's a pretty unpleasant realization, but we have to remember that only half the crew will pass the whole ordeal…