A warning for all people who want to see our house: do it fast!!!! We are already destroying our new house: Yesterday at lunchtime I decided to check our e-mail. So I took my laptop and walked to my working room. Just when I walked into the hallway, the laptop slipped out of my hands and dropped on the floor. Immediately I looked down to see whether my laptop was damaged, but I noticed something worse: the laptop had hit the floor with its edge and had damaged our brand-new floor!

After the basic installation of MuLinux earlier this week, I have been looking around and expanding the system during the last days. The whole thing is mature and really well though out, with lots of user-friendly scripts and help files. The core of the system is the setup script. This script is used to create configurations, and to configure modules. In the configuration is specified which modules are loaded and with what parameters.

Yesterday morning I found the official invitation for the company christmas dinner on my desk, the dinner was going to take place the same day. Fortunately we already new about the dinner for one week… After work, I first went to our office in Torrefarrera to receive the traditional christmas box, this year with a lot of alcohol and chocolate. Then quickly home to change clothes. Since this was my first Christmas dinner, I didn’t know the dress code.

Tomorrow is the birthday of BasiqAir, the cheapest way to get from Barcelona to Amsterdam. To celebrate this, they have lowered their prices on December 17–19. Of course I took the opportunity to book some flights, and checked if the advertised action really exist. So yesterday I checked the possibility to visit Holland during Christmas. The cheapest flight for two persons was €409. Today, the same flight only costs €169. Clickety click… booked!

One month ago we moved to our new house. Since then, things have settled down, but one thing still is missing: our working room still serves as a storage room, with my old computer packed into boxes. Until that moment we both use my (even older) Toshiba Satellite Pro 400 CDT. This computer is not really fast, but in the mean time I have gotten used to it. It’s really comfortable working on the sofa, but to connect to internet I have to move to the floor of the hallway.

Yesterday I finally had time to put the pictures of our house (made with the camera of Coen) on this site. You can find them in the Image Gallery. [Update 31.07.2003]: I changed the link since I changed the location of my photo’s

During the day, I always wear my cellphone. Always. Except last Saturday. We left in the morning to Alpicat to visit Maria José’s parents, and I didn’t think about my phone. When we came back home at 20:00 hours, I had two messages on my voicemail; one of my sister and one of my mother. Their message: I have become an uncle!!!!! My sister’s son is called Sven, weighed 3,5 kilos and is 52 centimetres long.

Barely 2 weeks after we moved into our new house, Hotel Rosell had its first guests: Coen and Duh Nieze. They are spending a week of holiday in Catalunya (a good choice) and were in our house this weekend. We showed them around in the city (but we didn’t visit the Seu Vella), and explored the local culinary specialities (without eating snails) and nightlife. Because Coen proudly wrote in the guestbook of Jong Nederland Harmelen about the beer we took outside on the terras, we sent them to the pyrenees, where for sure it’s impossible to sit outside to drink a beer.

We’re now living in our new house for one week now, and things have settled down a bit. The first days were a little bit chaotic. We found out that we didn’t have hot water, so we had to improvise a bit with taking showers and washing the dishes. Our dishwasher still isn’t working, because the hole in the closet where the tubes and the power cable of the dishwasher go through has been made in the wrong location.

Yipee!!! Yesterday we moved in to our new house. At the moment we still need a bit of improvisation, since most of our stuff is still in the boxes. The next month we are going to unpack everything little by little. Furthermore there are still some things left to buy. But at least we are living in our own house!!!!!

Yes!! If everything went right, this afternoon the heaters will be connected and the floor will be finished. That means that our house is ready enough for us to move in. Last week, Marie José already moved some stuff, and tomorrow I will finish this. When she comes home from Austria on Sunday, we will start a new phase in our life together. Of course we will send out our new address to everybody, but I haven’t had the time to do so this week.

Until a few weeks ago, my biggest fans received automatically new items on this site by e-mail. At this moment my provider blocked e-mail access from this site to prevent abuse, so I am not able to send out my famous ‘News Updates’. I had the same problem with the Fimcap web site, but since we pay for that site, the problem was solved a lot faster. Besides this problem, also the banners bother me.

The first half of this week, I have been on my first business trip in my new function. I had to do an installation for a client in Holland. We successfully finished phase 1 of this installation. There are still some problems to be solved, but I am sure that we will fix these.

Yes, I’m an egoist! I have created a Wishlist at Amazon for all the people far away who cannot resist giving me a present. Actually, I haven’t got the slightest idea why I did it, because I don’t expect anybody to use it. But again, you never now, right? I guess I’m just being egoistic.

I don’t think I have to explain the current political situation in the Netherlands to you, since even here in Catalunya it has been on the news. The only comment I would like to make is that all of this is happening right after the first elections I didn’t participate. A coincidence??? I don’t think so… Anyway, I decided to try to vote on the next occasion in January. I found out that I have to register in Den Haag, which I did today.

Last weekend we spend almost completely working in our house, from early in the morning until it was too dark to work (we haven’t got light everywhere yet…). And I can honestly say that we’re fed up with it! I have spoken to people who told me that they like to work in their house to relax a little bit after working in the office, but I rather have a beer in a bar to relax.

Guess we’re just plain busy at the moment… Anyway, it’s about time that I give you all an update about life in Lleida. Last weekend we had a good excuse not to work in our house: Marcel and Rebecca were in town and we spend the weekend with them sightseeing. We had a great time, but afterwards felt a little bit guilty about the time we could have worked in our house.

My sister and Terry made some pictures during their visit. I put a copy of the images they made in Lleida on my gallery. If you would like to see more about their trip, just go to their website. [Update 31.07.2003]: I updated the link to the photo’s after changing the location of the photo gallery.

I guess some people are missing their weekly update about my life. Not that nothing happened in my life the last couple of weeks, but I just didn’t feel like writing. For all people addicted to news about me, here is an update. First of all our house. The planning was that the kitchen should have been placed two weeks ago. But unfortunately the worker hasn’t finished the prepatory work (electricity, water, floor, ceiling,…) yet.

The tent is washed, the car is washed, the candy and lemonade has been bought and our packs are packed. We are ready to go!!! So the next three weeks no updates or e-mails from me, but instead of that, some people will have an increased risk of meeting me in person… Tomorrow we will leave early in the morning and drive up to Nouan-le-fuzelier, where we will meet my parents on a camping.

I’ve kept my promise and found my old scanner again. As a result, the image gallery is updated with some pictures taken from February to June. The quality is not too good (understatement!), but what else can you expect from a 12 euro second-hand scanner. Those people interested in better quality pictures will have to drop by to see them over here 😉.

I just found a nice picture of my office and decided to put a copy of it on my web site, so everybody can see how it is to work in Catalunya—yes, the tourist office is paying me for this kind of messages… 😉 Notice that this is not a very typical office, most companies don’t have this luxury. Soon I hope to find some time to gear up my scanner and show you some more pictures.

The last two weeks of August and the first week of September, Maria José and I hope to have holidays. If everything goes well, by that time there won’t be a lot of work left in our house, so we probably will take our little tent and leave the country. Were we will be going? Surprise, surprise… Holland!!! We expect to stay there about 10–12 days. Most of the time we will be in the house of my parents in Harmelen, but we also plan to spend some days camping on one of the beautiful campgrounds of the NTKC.

It has been a long time ago since I last updated my Geek Code. So I set to work, and here it is: —-BEGIN GEEK CODE BLOCK—- Version: 3.1 GB/IT d+(–) s++:- a C+++$ UBLAVHIOS>$ P+>++ L++>+++$ E W+++ N++ o K–? w !O- M+ V PS+ PE- Y+ PGP+ !t- 5? !X- R tv- b++ DI++ D- G++ e++ h– r++ y z —-END GEEK CODE BLOCK—-

Last weekend I had a few moments that I was realising what a great life I live. These moments were not really special, but just small things which I appreciated a lot. The first moment was Saturday at lunch time. We had spend the morning searching for furniture and just decided to buy the furniture we have seen two weeks ago. Heading for this shop, we stopped for lunch. That morning we prepared our ‘bammetjes’ but instead we went to a restaurant at the beach.

La Seu Vella is the most important monument of Lleida. It is situated in the middle of the city, on top of a high rock, and as a result you can see it from far away. La Seu Vella consists of an old cathedral and an old fortress. Yesterday the cathedral served as the perfect housing for a baroque opera. ‘Los elementos’ was written by Antoni Lliteres (I also never heard about him) in 1704.

So far, things are going well. The worker has done a nice job; he removed one wall, and moved two doors to another position. In the mean time we (or better: mostly MJ) have removed one wardrobe in the hallway and are working hard on removing the paint from the doors and the door posts. Now it is time to start building up again. We are still hoping to move in shortly after the holidays, but this depends mainly on the moment our furniture is going to arrive.

Just after writing that the weather is alright over here, the sky became grey (or better: black), it started raining a little bit, it started raining hard, small pieces of ice were coming down, and eventually really big pieces of ice were coming down. I’ve never seen anything like this before. The stones were up to 5 cm big, destroying everything.

Just a short message for the people who weren’t present yesterday at Jong Nederland Harmelen when I phoned: Yes, the weather is nice over here!

Although 2 months ago we started working in our new office, the office has been inaugurated officially yesterday. The last week a lot of people have been working very hard to make everything spick ’n’ span. A new gate, small white stones around every plant in the garden, repair the basket ball net, finish the kitchen in our guesthouse. Inside we cleaned everything and I supplied the two vacant desks with brand new HP e-pc’s and Samsung TFT screens.

After some months of preparations, yesterday the big work finally started. OK, we already did some small things, but yesterday the worker we hired for the big works started. And he started well! In one day he removed the wall between a bed room and the salon, giving us a bigger living room. Besides this, he is going to close one door, move two doors, lower the ceiling of the kitchen and the bathroom and install the kitchen and the bathroom.

The last month I have been working in ICG’s international department. We are a software company, mainly focussed on Spain, but we also sell in Portugal, Mexico, Uruguay, Holland, Sweden, Austalia, Canada and the U.K. One of the things I have been involved with, is to make sure that all product information will be available on our web site in English. And as of today the English web site is available.

Once again I had problems with my e-mail account. It appeared that a lot of messages I have sent the last month(s) have not actually been sent! Or better: they never arrived. When sending they were accepted by the SMTP-server, but there they have been deleted. The problem is that I am using some forwarded e-mail addresses like mail@jeroensangers.com and jeroen.sangers@fimcap.org. Mail send to these addresses are being forwarded to another mailbox, to which I connect with my mail program.

Sant Joan is an important saint over here. At least important enough to have a free day on June 24th. Combine this with the general strike last Thursday, and the result is that half of the country moves for five days to the beach. Instead of the beach, MJ and I decided to move with our tent to a camping in the pre-pyrenees, next to a lake near Tremp. As a result, this weekend we have done absolutely NOTHING.

The summer has yet to start, and the temperature has risen up to 37 degrees. I’m so happy that last weekend the temperature was a lot more comfortable. Last weekend my parents visited me for the first time since I left Holland, and of course I wanted to show them around in Lleida. We had a wonderful time together. We showed them the city, the place I work, the house we’re going to live in, the place we’re living right now.

The biggest pieces of old furniture are now removed from our future house, the kitchen and the bathroom have been chosen, the measures have been taken… This week it’s really going to start. First all windows will be replaced and when that’s finished the workers start removing a wall, making a new ceiling and changing the position of some doors. From then on we can start building our own little house, and with a little bit of luck we can live there after summer.

I have been working now for four days in the international departement, and so far everything goes really well. The first two days, my colleague explained me all the ins and outs of FrontRetail, one of ICG’s applications. And now I am working hard on the Dutch translation of this application. Must be easy for me, not? Indeed, not! Translating is a lot more difficult than I expected. Partly because the structure of the two languages is different, partly because I started with a badly translated version, partly because some words have more meanings, but most of all because my lack of knowledge of accounting.

I have been working a little bit more than six months now for Ricomack. During this time I have got to know Ricomack and the mother company ICG. I also have been able to transform myself from AIX/UNIX oriented into a generalist, since I have been working with Windows 2000, Windows XP, RedHat Linux, routers, networking, Point-Of-Sale systems, printers, the ICG software, … I have to say that I really like my work, although sometimes the work is not exactly what I like to do (like repairing 10 year old PC’s).

That’s it, it is over now. The Aplec del Caragol has finished. The aplec is a big feast with ’eating snails’ as a central theme. But in fact it is a lot more. It is about eating, drinking, culture, meeting old friends, music, … On the applec groups of people (collas) spent one weekend together on the festival terrain. There are about 120 collas, with each 50–100 members. Members pay an amount of money, for which they can eat and drink during the whole weekend.

This week we are in the middle of two major parties in Lleida. Last weekend we celebrated the ‘Festa Major’, because the patron of Lleida, St. Anastasi has it’s day on May 11th. There were plenty of activities organised through the whole weekend. For MJ and I, the weekend was even more special, because we had some visitors from Holland to join us: Berry and Manon. On Friday night we started calmly.

One thing I noticed over here is that there is more paperwork. Maybe I only have this impression because I am an immigrant, but I think that in general people use more forms and official papers. I am living in Catalunya for half a year now (yes, time flies) and today I received a notice that my request for a residence card is honoured. can you imagine: 6 months for reading a request, finding out that I’m from the EU and approving it!

Today is a special day. Not only because Barcelona is playing against Madrid, but also because today is Sant Jordi (you know, they guy who killed the dragon). In Catalunya this day is celebrated by giving each other presents. The boys give a rose to the girls, and in return they receive a book. For me this looks like a good deal, since the average book costs four times the price of a rose.

Sunday I wanted to write about the calçots. But after the calçots, I was too tired to write. And the days after I was luckily enough to have to work out of town, so I missed my 30 minutes of internet before lunch. Anyway, three days ago was the day we had calçots; after all, it is the season for calçots. The week before we (or better MJ) was arranging all the things and inviting our friends.

Easter time is always a good period to have a short vacation. Usually the weather is getting better, and after the first busy months of the year, I really need a break. This year was no exception, especially with the work we have for our new house. Therefore we decided to book a flight and rest. We didn’t have to think long for our destination; we were looking for a beautiful country with nice weather and nice people.

I was so busy writing about chocolate, that I completely forgot to tell the most important event of this easter. WARNING: There is an highly increased chance of meeting me in Harmelen during easter!!

It is almost easter, and easter is a wonderful time for chocolate lovers like me. I always eat a lot of these small chocolate easter eggs. Also here in Lleida they know the tradition of chocolate. Besides the traditional eggs, small sculptures are very popular. The most popular at this moment is Harry Potter, completely with a castle. But the biggest sculpture is the one of Prats. Prats is local patisseria and chocolate maker, who creates every year a life size statue of a famous Catalan person out of chocolate.

I have to admit it: the main reason to move to the south is the weather! And last week I got what I wanted. The sky was clear blue and the temperature went up far into the twenties. On Thursday the thermometer reached even up to 31°C!!! And did I take profit of it? Well… not really. When I finish work, the sun has long gone. And we have to use the weekends to visit shops, because it is about time that we select our new kitchen, bathroom and floor.

Yesterday was the day of Saint Joseph. Normally I wouldn’t have noticed this, but the fact is that my girlfriend is called MJ; and thus is named after Saint Joseph. Here in Spain, people celebrate their saint as a second birthday, with a nice meal and presents from their family and friends. Unfortunately, a lot of people name their children after the saint of the day the baby was born, thus denying their child an extra wonderfull day with presents and attention!

Yesterday I was talking with my father. He was standing outside a barn at 5°C, I was outside on the balcony with 21°C. Even though the weather here was better, my father was the one in the best situation, and I really wished that I could be there too. Today my father turned 65, and therefore my sister and my mother had organised a surprise party in this barn. Everybody was there, his family, his friends, the neighbours… everybody except for his son.

This weekend I planned to do a lot of thing with my little computer. Work on the Fimcap site, install freeBSD, find myself a new internet provider… But when I woke up this morning I realised that I would have to change my plans. You simply can’t spend the day behind the computer when the sky is blue, the first trees blossom in beautiful pink and it’s 18 degrees outside!

Due to problems at my provider, I am not able to send e-mail at this moment. However, I am still able to read mail sent to me (they only have problems with their SMTP server). At this moment I am looking for other providers, and maybe I am going to have to pay for an account. Because you can’t complain about the things you get for free, isn’t it? On the long term I will be running my own mail server over xDSL, but to accomplish that I first need to finish our new house.

Life is hard when you’re getting old. I just turned 31 last Saturday, and I already feel like I am over 90. The last two day I’ve spent in bed; leaving it only to go to the toillet. It has been a long time ago since I was so ill. Anyway, at this moment I am feeling better again, and am able to go to work.

Yes, yes, I’m becoming an old man… 31 years old today! The typical way of celebrating something over here is eating and drinking. So tonight some friends will come over for supper. I don’t know yet what to prepare, but I still have a lot of time to think about that. And after that we will go for a drink in Lleida. Not a bad way to celebrate your birthday, is it?

Normally when we visit Holland, time seems to fly. That is why we decided to go on Thursday evening. The other reason was the wedding of Ton & Mirjam on Friday. Due to a little delay we arrived in Harmelen at 1:00 at night. Of course we had to spend some time chatting with my parents, so we went to bed quite late. I planned to arrange some things and go shopping on Friday morning, but as usual it was impossible to get out of bed early enough.

First of all for all the people who have asked me the last weeks: Yes, they do celebrate carnival over here! Of course a little bit different than in Holland, but they definitely do celebrate carnival. This weekend Roberto, our Italian friend, was visiting us. He choose a nice weekend to do so, as stated above. He finished his exams on Friday, had a party at night and went directly over to Lleida.

One of the nicest features of having your own web site is playing ‘detective’. Every day the web server produces a huge amount of data; every single page you request and every single picture on that page is recorded in the log files. I use these log files to see who visited me, when did I receive those visitors, what kind of computers do they use, which pages are the most popular, … But the most interesting is to know how they got onto my site.

For the first time since I moved from Holland I have added pictures to my site. Today I finally took the time to dig up my old scanner (yes BJ, the one I bought from you) and connect it to my laptop. You will find some pictures from the place I am living and from a visit to Barcelona in September last year.

Oops, already a week without any notice! Yes, it’s about time that I write something new on my site. So I decided to write about the princess. Not the one of this weekend, but the one which I really missed last weekend. As you might remember I made a small trip to Holland last weekend (exactly 24 hours and 10 minutes). O Saturday evening we went to the reception of the prince, organised by CV de Kwakbollen.

Fimcap? You stopped the youthwork when you left Holland, didn´t you? No, I didn’t! I am still involved in Fimcap as a member of the working group for e-media. At this moment we are preparing the launch of version 2 of the Fimcap web site. On February 1st the world can finally see what I have been working on all these hours the last year. And the address? www.fimcap.org. Go have a look after next week!

I just noticed that I haven’t written for a while about my job. And since quite some of the visitors of this site are ex-colleagues from MultiSystems/Avalix/Aino, I think that it is appropriate to write some words about my job. The company I work for consists of three companies: ICG, a company which produces software for shops and small companies, Ricomack, a company which has a shop and delivers technical support, and finally CST consultants.

No, I am not going to be the new secretary of Fimcap, but I was present at the unofficial training course. Wim from Chiro was this weekend in Catalunya to talk with Carme, the former secretary. And of course, if you come all the way from Belgium, you have to see something of the country. On Friday evening he was shown the wild nightlife of St. Feliu de Llobregat (A.K.A. the town of the single women).

Until yesterday, we had two cars at home: the Pajero, used by the parents of MJ, and the Opel, used by MJ and her sister and recently also by me. Yesterday, the brother of MJ received his new car (a brand-new Peugeot 307) and so his old car is also available. This car, a white Fiat Punto, is also property of the family, and for the moment MJ and I are going to use it.

For those of you interested in my personal collection of airplane tickets, hereby a short overview: The next ticket I have is for January 26th, returning the 27th. The reason for this visit is only the price. For 50 Euro’s I cannot stay in Alpicat! The next visit to Holland will be from February 21st until the 24th. Again very cheap!

I know that in Holland the big parties are over, but here there is one more event left: the Three Kings. (By the way, for those who are interested: yes, I had a great X-mas with a lot of presents and I really enjoyed celebrating the new year in Holland. In fact, I liked it soo much that I didn’t take the time to write about it.) Back to the kings.