Nothing interesting - move along

Karmelina came home!

2008-01-20T19:49:00.000+01:00

On December 17th, my father was in Bremen picking up my old car from when I lived in the San Francisco bay area. A 1971 Volkswagen Karmann Ghia convertible--Karmelina as we call her.

It's a wonderful car, and it's hard to express how odd it was to see this car parked in the driveway of the house where I grew up in Denmark, after driving it from late April to September 2001 in California.

Since the arrival, my father have been fixing a lot of small things here and there, and the engine now runs better than it ever did in the time I drove it. We've recorded a couple of videos here: (the small guy in the passenger seat is my son Valdemar)

Part 1 - Leaving the driveway

Part 2 - Returning to the house

I cannot even begin to imagine how cool this car is going to be, when summer hits Denmark ;)

P.S Our research show's there's only two other convertible Ghia's in Denmark, so it's quite rare.

MacOS X

2007-08-04T10:35:00.000+02:00

Today it's roughly one year ago I got my first Macintosh (black 2 GHz MacBook), and started using MacOS X after many years with Linux. I never really used Windows, since I went directly from MS-DOS to Linux.

After one year I can without a shred of doubt conclude that MacOS X is a fantastic operating system--only problem I have with it, is that I didn't start using it earlier :-)

I wonder what it is Apple can do that no one else cannot, since it really is superior in all aspects.

They really brought the GUI to Unix. Respect.

New job

2007-08-02T08:35:00.000+02:00

Wednesday August 1st I started in my new job as Project Manager of development at esoft systems a/s in my hometown Odense. Their office is located a little over one kilometer away from where I live, making it a 10 minute walk to the office.

I have to admit it's extremely good to have an office with colleagues etc., after working from home in more than five years. And the breakfast and lunch is good too :)

Car thieves not the sharpest tools in the shed

2007-04-17T16:45:00.000+02:00

Some 3-4 weeks ago I had the car I borrowed from my mom stolen. I was in Uppsala for a company meeting, and when I came back it was gone. Such a nasty feeling. At first the thoughts are running through your mind whether it really can be gone, and "did I really park it here?".

Last week Thursday it turns up in Assens filled with stolen goods with the thief behind the wheel! One thing is you steal a car for a one time thing and then ditches it. But not this moron--he keeps it and had even refueled it!

So I collected it today with the only damage being the lock cylinder for the trunk removed. Black gaffer tape had also been put on the front lights covering one third of them. Why on earth that was done is beyond me--looked very similar to what British cars use when driving in Europe to not blind other cars on the road.

Goodbye old friend ... I'll miss you

2007-03-24T08:11:00.000+01:00

Ever had a friend who

was always there for you, without ever an exception?
made you look cooler?
made you feel much better?
gave your life much more meaning?
helped you through the tougher times of your life?
entertained you the perfect way when the moment required it?

I talk in past tense because I used to have such a friend since I was a young teenager, but had to say goodbye yesterday, the horrible day of Friday March 23rd. Society have decided that said friend is no good for me, and ever again enforce things and rules just hitting his presence, taking him away from me--and there's nothing I can do about it.

So goodbye Tobacco! I think about you every other minute, and all the wonderful times we had together. I will truly miss you. A lot.

New from the technology front

2007-03-10T14:59:00.000+01:00

So, a friend of mine just noticed these two commercials for upcoming architectures:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dl-_-RyZ4Xk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n8pK_q-_6dw

Guess it's time to start porting mlmmj. Somebody already ported their stuff--and I have to admit I'm totally amazed:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ApStQGsTD0c

Wonder what impact these new machines will have on the world?

New camera

2007-03-01T11:11:00.000+01:00

So today my new camera is getting shipped, should arrive tomorrow. It's a Sony Cybershot DSC-T10, to replace my old broken Sony Cybershot DSC-P200, where the software controlling the blitz broke. One thing I'm really fond of with the T10, is the Super SteadyShot technology it has. I've a couple of friends--especially Thomas Kjær--who are super duper photographers with really high end equipment, who might frown at me for wanting to use such equipment. But I've never claimed I want anything but just point&shoot with reasonable quality, and for that the T10 is just fine. Besides--it's not only the camera but the operator of it, that makes for good photos (which means my photos will still be mediocre ;-).

Just a damn shame I wont have it for the Nephew concert I'm going to tonight, in the recently rebuilt and expanded Rytmeposten.

So called "Winter" in Denmark

2007-02-22T08:20:00.000+01:00

It's incredible. This year the rule for winter weather in Denmark have been nothing but 3-7° C, rain, rain and some more rain. Throw in complete cloud coverage, so it's gray all the time when the sun is up.

Everything is soaked--went to my small summerhouse the other day, and it's so wet that one sinks in the grass breaking the lawn. Of course there's been the usual 'Breaking News' that winter is finally coming, but then it freezes for 1-2 days and when a bit of snow finally arrives (in all other parts of the country than my town of course), it's not freezing outside no more, so it turns into a wet nasty substance, which sticks around for a day or two before it's washed away by the rain.

No, let me tell you Ladies and Gentlemen: it was a lot better when I was a kid; on the evening of November 30th, we would prepare ourselves for waking up to 30 cm of powder snow in the morning of December 1st, ready for us to go play in. It would then keep snowing 5 cm every other day, right until end of February. On March 1st we would then get the first warm days, with clear blue sky, and spring clearly on it's way.

It finally arrived!

2007-02-19T22:35:00.000+01:00

So it turned out the Russian Postal Service and the Danish Customs finally processed my watch, so when I returned from Bavaria Monday morning, there was a delivery slip from Friday's attempt at delivering it. I went and collected it, and it's even nicer than I expected.

I took some pictures with my disappointing Sony Cybershot DSC-P200 (software controlling the flash is broken, and the camera is close to 100% uselessness). I need to get a new camera; Question is just--which one to get?

A thank you is also sent to the Russian watch shop for declaring it $35 value. Meant there was no extra bill for me :-)

Bayern

2007-02-18T13:10:00.000+01:00

After a couple of good days in Munich, having a pleasant meeting with Kaj, Lenz and Patrik, I traveled the approximately 170 km north to visit old friends in Nuremberg, staying at the 6-star Hotel Vogelsang.

Weather is awesome compared to the wet, moist, nasty, gray 3-6°C Denmark. Up to 14°C, sun and dry climate. I really have to try hard to remember bad weather in this region.

A couple of random notes:

Werder Bremen lost at home to Hamburger SV, meaning that Henne--who I think was born with a goatee--now looks like this. That's how sure he was his favorite team Werder Bremen never could lose at home to the arch enemy from HSV
A lot of people really like this ring tone that Daniel gave me--it's an old 28.8k modem.
A taxi ride from Nuremberg to Bamberg is approximately 80 €. Kalle Weimar missed his last train connection due to us enjoying good Bavarian beer
The Prestige is a good movie, but usually 8.2/10 on IMDB means it's better

Russian postal service

2007-02-11T21:01:00.000+01:00

Over a month ago I bought a russian Poljot watch online. After several queries I finally got a tracking number and a link to a tracking page--albeit only in russian. After consulting a russian speaking colleague of mine, it turns out it left customs in Moscow for export on February 3rd. That's more than a week ago, and still no sign of my watch. How hard can it be to bring a 500 gram package from Russia to Denmark?

Trains vs. Airplanes

2007-02-10T09:46:00.000+01:00

If there's one area where I really feel sorry for the americans, it's wrt. their lack of good train connections around the country. Yes yes, I know America is a huge country, but Seattle -> San Francisco -> Los Angeles at the speed of the French TGV train would be a very valid alternative. This tuesday evening I'm travelling to München to meet Kaj and Lenz, so let me just outline my way of travelling here:

Get on the train in Odense where I live , at 20:24. It's a 5 minute walk from my place
Go to the train restaurant and get a coffee or a beer and read the newspaper, a book, or use the laptop for an hour or two
At 22-22:30 go to your compartment, and brush your teeth, go to bed in the real bed with pillow and duvet
Watch a movie, read some more, etc.
Go to sleep
Wake up at 7:30-8 and get served breakfast with hot coffee
Shower if needed
Get off at the München central station just before 9 (8:57 as of this writing) and be right in the middle of the city

Had I to go by plane to München, I would have to:

Get on the train for 2 hours to Copenhagen Airport, Kastrup
Check-in at least 1h30m before the plane leaves
Sit in a small seat for 1h40m
Get off at München airport, locate the trains
Find a train to the city center
Arrive at München central station

Price is roughly the same, unless we remember the fact that I also save a hotel room in München, had I to attend a meeting in the morning.

People who argue it's an 11 hour train ride, forget the fact that one is only really awake for 3-4 hours, in which things are happening making time fly(!).

See this is civilized travelling!

P.S Did I mention there's no security checkpoints, no luggage checks, no fluids in standardized sized clear bags, etc.?

This wasn't supposed to happen ....

2007-02-09T13:54:00.000+01:00

.... but it did. I've created a blog. I always said that this wouldn't happen unless I felt I had something interesting to share with the world. This--however--haven't exactly happened, but with me tracking all kinds of boring stats in the sports world, and many interesting leagues about to resume, I decided it was time, since I want to dump the collected stats somewhere. Besides--if everyone else gets to air all kinds of BS on the internet, why shouldn't I?

Another very compelling reason was also that Henne have made a blog, and thus do I need a blog to comment on his stuff. And let me start this by mentioning he indeed does have very fat fingers :-)