Hello blog, here we are again! I’m sorry for being absent for such a long time so you think I’ll have much to tell. Well, te be honest, the fact that I had little to tell was one of the causes of my absence so I have to do my best to get something worthwhile from the little corners of my imagination and memory. Of course, I could tell about my holidays and other stuff people tell each other when they are at work again. Why wouldn’t I? Well, we, that’s to say my wife Janine, our son Menno, our week-end “daughter” Elyanne and our dog Joris went sailing in Friesland, so we didn’t travel far away. It was lots of fun: the adults enjoyed the sailing and the children the playing along beaches and in marinas. We enjoyed all kinds of weather you can imagine: tropical heat, autumn temperatures, strong wind, almost no wind, tropical rain, Dutch rain (steady long term, not sudden showers), mist, clouds, clear sky, you name it, this is Western Europe, man! Now I’m at work again, already since a fortnight. My job is to assess dissertations or theses if you like, at bachelor’s level, and I try to avoid that the students’ stress will infect me, although many are in a hurry, if they get their grading too late (15 September they have to pay new tuition fees. No, they cannot charge it to me when it’s my fault because I left their work in the drawer for too long. I’m at an age at which many are already retired and I always try to keep up the image that I don’t want to retire that early and keep working as long as possible, but I know that’s not true, my true reasons for not retiring are secret and then you know already what I mean.
I’m also almost addicted to photography. Not that I picture everything that comes before my lense, but I like to photograph nice items, especially landscapes and “landscape furniture” such as mills, sailing boats, churches, etc. On my photoblog I discovered that there are as many photographers as kinds of subjects, and every photographer has his/her favourite subject items. My weakness is landscapes and related stuff, also because I cannot find time to be busy with creating the right light conditions, much Photoshopwork, arranging things, waiting long for the right moment, etc. No. Veni vidi vici (aut non successi): I came, I saw and I achieved (or failed). I make too many good pictures to post on my photoblog, which is restricted to only 1 picture per day – a very wise policy of the blog management.
Above I show you some pics that couldn’t be posted on my blog because of this restriction. I also don’t want to become a bit one-sided and show each time either a mill, a house or a sailing boat, so some of them could have a place here. Enjoy!
Like so many other people I’m also bothered about what I read in the newspapers. I recently read the startling news that 90% of all heroine is grown in Af…istan. It has been found that the Nabilat (I don’t want to be found by searching machines on these words but you know what I mean) encourages to grow it, and get much profit from it. I’m sure these opium farmers are faithful Mu…ms and I wonder what they would answer when you would ask them why they grow opium, and if that is OK with the K..an. I know what they would answer me: you are rich, you drive a car, you have a machine for everything in the household and thanks to you the climate is changing so that people in Bangla Desh suffer from floods when the sea level is rising because of melting poles and glaciers. So what’s wrong about a heroin enjoying looser who is, on top of that, a victim of your pagan way of living, no, if you would follow the K..an and become mu…ms like me, there would be no heroin problem; what do I have to do with it, a poor farmer who works hard to earn a living? Thirdly: if I didn’t grow the opium the Nabilat would punish me. Etcetera etcetera.
So many things are relative, and many times I feel I have to choose, take a standpoint, be a MAN! There are many view- and standpoints to choose. In debates you notice that everybody is right and only a few people are completely wrong, but that people who are both right don’t seek to compromise or to find the common basis of their different views, but on the contrary, want to show how different their view is from their opponent’s view, and how wrong he is, and how right their own view is.
So much for today. Next time my latest contribution to the school magazine if I’ve nothing else to report.
I’m also almost addicted to photography. Not that I picture everything that comes before my lense, but I like to photograph nice items, especially landscapes and “landscape furniture” such as mills, sailing boats, churches, etc. On my photoblog I discovered that there are as many photographers as kinds of subjects, and every photographer has his/her favourite subject items. My weakness is landscapes and related stuff, also because I cannot find time to be busy with creating the right light conditions, much Photoshopwork, arranging things, waiting long for the right moment, etc. No. Veni vidi vici (aut non successi): I came, I saw and I achieved (or failed). I make too many good pictures to post on my photoblog, which is restricted to only 1 picture per day – a very wise policy of the blog management.
Above I show you some pics that couldn’t be posted on my blog because of this restriction. I also don’t want to become a bit one-sided and show each time either a mill, a house or a sailing boat, so some of them could have a place here. Enjoy!
Like so many other people I’m also bothered about what I read in the newspapers. I recently read the startling news that 90% of all heroine is grown in Af…istan. It has been found that the Nabilat (I don’t want to be found by searching machines on these words but you know what I mean) encourages to grow it, and get much profit from it. I’m sure these opium farmers are faithful Mu…ms and I wonder what they would answer when you would ask them why they grow opium, and if that is OK with the K..an. I know what they would answer me: you are rich, you drive a car, you have a machine for everything in the household and thanks to you the climate is changing so that people in Bangla Desh suffer from floods when the sea level is rising because of melting poles and glaciers. So what’s wrong about a heroin enjoying looser who is, on top of that, a victim of your pagan way of living, no, if you would follow the K..an and become mu…ms like me, there would be no heroin problem; what do I have to do with it, a poor farmer who works hard to earn a living? Thirdly: if I didn’t grow the opium the Nabilat would punish me. Etcetera etcetera.
So many things are relative, and many times I feel I have to choose, take a standpoint, be a MAN! There are many view- and standpoints to choose. In debates you notice that everybody is right and only a few people are completely wrong, but that people who are both right don’t seek to compromise or to find the common basis of their different views, but on the contrary, want to show how different their view is from their opponent’s view, and how wrong he is, and how right their own view is.
So much for today. Next time my latest contribution to the school magazine if I’ve nothing else to report.
