Tintin

It's a strange thing, our Belgian pride or patriotic feelings (and more precise, the lack of it). I doubt a lot of people in Belgium really feel unified in one way or the other and probably there are lots of historical reasons for that as well.
Stereotypically we only feel "Belgian" (or Belgianese as my American colleagues liked to tease) at large national happenings, such as football matches of our national team (haha) and the death of our royals.


However this good ol' Belgian pride (not to be mistaken with other recent prides) will for sure grow again when the following news will become more and more public. Steven Spielberg, together with Peter Jackson from Lord Of The Rings will make three movies based on the comic-books Tintin, written and drawn by our own Belgian Hergé. They will use the latest techniques in computer animation, which promises to have a lot more soul than all its predecessors...


Being a keen fan of animated movies, I’m more than curious to see the result and of course its effect on Belgium, the Belgians, and the "Belgianese". I doubt if I will feel more Belgian, but every little helps, i guess...

more about this on BBC News

out-of-office

there's music in the office, people are telling jokes, laughing, talking to each other, the general atmosphere is relaxed, stress-levels have gone down, yes it must be: our boss is out-of-office...

messages...

is it not-done to mention on your blog that it's your birthday today? I struggle with these things... the fine line between sharing your feelings/thoughts on life and plain ego-advertising?




or is there a subtle way of communicating these kinds of messages, indicating a certain (i hope healthy) need for attention (which we all need)... any way, i think in the mean time, the message came accross :-)



balancing on this fine line,
for 28 years now,
still yours truly,


kd

Hakuna Matata

Aaaaah a long weekend... how nice!

I’m off to London to meet Audrey from Edinburgh - well, actually she is from New Zealand, but she lives in Edinburgh, where I met her, but now she's moving to Bristol - anyway... we're going to see The Lion King - The Musical which i am really really enthusiastic about, have shop-till-we-drop-sessions, massages in Covent garden (let's see if it's my cup of tea, because massages and me usually don't go hand in hand) and also meet Nic, which is always a pleasure!

so three days of laughter and fun, I’m up for it!

ikea

I think we can say that my generation is a bit the IKEA-generation; when i was a student, practically all the student-flats i knew were little ikea-showrooms on their own, and above all, (besides the mass-consumption) looked cool, practical and cheap.

When getting a bit older as we do, and a bit more picky as well, the need for some more 'individual' furniture is growing, but unfortunately (in my case at least), the available budget isn't.

Now i am not really a DIY-specialist (haha, the very contrary is true), but when i stumbled upon this blog, I really got me inspired to go again to ikea and have a different look at the items...

If you want to discover how ikea can be even more fun, click here!

To give you already an idea, this is a recen Ikea-hack for the bathroom, which i think is great!

Mika

The perfect soundtrack for a (rather) sunny Friday is definitely “Life in Cartoon Motion” by Mika. His unpretentious, feel-good sound and feel brightens up your day and makes it very difficult for me to sit still and not burst out and dance around the desks…

Pop-music as it should be, a bit disco, a bit kitsch, a bit camp, a bit sing-along… and a cute guy to perform it… what can one want more?

DCCD

I suffer a strange disease, something that bugs me already for quiet a while and sometimes I don’t know if I should go mad or feel very lucky or amazed by it… At first I thought I was the only one – but after consulting Dr Google (ah yes, the cheap and allmighty) I found out there’s a whole community sharing my illness… there's even a name for it:

DCCD or Digital Clock Coincidence Disorder

Let me explain: The symptoms are very easy but sometimes very unnerving: Usually when I look at the time on a digital clock, I don’t see random numbers, but logical combinations, such as: 11:11, or 12:12 or 10:10 but also 20:02 or 21:12…It doesn’t happen like once in a while, but every day at least a couple of times…is there anybody else out there sharing this, and what could be the explanation? and what could be the cure?

shrimp

I look like a little shrimp today... that whole sunday-afternoon on my terrace in the sun did the trick i guess...is it summer now already? going to the sea-side? sweaty nights, bbq's on saturday and sunday... craving for a swimming pool (Caroline, time to come back), high spirits, cava, t-shirts and shorts? it sure looks like summer...

and blogging is not a high priority it seems when the sun is shining, days are getting longer and weekends fuller...

feels like i'm 17 again

Last night I managed to travel in time! Or at least meet some of my ghosts-of-the-past all in one small but cosy concert-hall somewhere in the jungle beneath Brussels…

first there was AliasGrey, whom I studied with in Leuven and who was supporting Sioen on this gig; Lenny Vane was there to applaud him, together with Ann who is a good friend of mine and was a co-leader in the children’s summercamp; J. my sister’s ex boyfriend (he still looked good and hadn’t change a bit); my uncle and aunt who I had dinner with; my uncle’s good friend Gitaar whom I also have played music with before; lots of ‘heys’ and ‘hello’s’ from faces I recognised…this one song that bounces in my head is “it feels like I’m 17 again…”

June

I am really blown away by the movie i watched yesterday. “Walk The Line” tells the story of Johnny Cash. But I was not really impressed, or at least not equally impressed with Joachim Phoenix’s performance, as I was with Reece Witherspoon’s characterisation of June Carter. In my humble opinion, she really carried the movie to a higher level and gave depth and warmth to this on-screen June Carter. I had never heard of June Carter before (shame on me) but I learned that she came from a very famous and talented musicians family and from early on had a singing career. Now I would really love to see a movie about her life, or perhaps a musical?

In the mean time spring has entered Antwerp, but unfortunately I haven’t been able to enjoy it much, since I had a bit of a cold these last few days, but hey, the sun shines – who is complaining? Only problem is that, when feeling physically limited (because of the cold) my mind feels restrained and on those moments i would love to thousand things (making music, going out, seeing friends, travel, etc.) but find myself frustrated on the couch... oh well, better days are coming!

more -ing

Huffing
Puffing
Sighing
Staring
Remembering
Thinking
Dreaming
Working

unfortunately some of the –ings for this week :-)


Luckily also

Swimming
Music-making
Party-ing
Visiting
searching
...

-ing

skiing,
gliding,
lifting,
tanning,
drinking,
playing,
enjoying,
living,
sporting,
relaxing,
sleeping,
driving,
talking,
singing,
hopefully-not-falling,
meeting,
looking,
eating,
dancing,
laughing,
sauna-ing,
jaccuuziing,
thinking,
engergizing,
etc-ing




All the -ings
i will be i-ing
next week on
skiing-holiday!















huuuuuuuurraaaaaayy (-ing)
'll be back here again in a week!

Goodbye Mr Humphries

"I'm Free" he used to shout as his catch-phrase in the series 'Are You Being Served' (now back in reruns on Belgian tv). Well, he’s free for good now, John Inman, better known as Mr Humphries is no more.

Although in my opinion, the series has lost its battle against time - just like Mr Humphries now - I really like watching it, and Mr Humphries is definitely one of my favourite characters.

tmh

had dinner with some colleagues yesterday, and besides very funny and cosy,

i had a little too much to drink - so now i have a little tuesday-morning hangover... i wish i was in my sofa watching the gilmore girls...

Grace Kelly

It's fridaymorning! the sun is shining! i was out of bed before my alarm clock (am i getting older?)

so why not start the day, with my favourite tune-of-the-moment!

Enjoy the weekend!

Baba Marta

Today - as you can see - I am wearing a red and white bracelet finished of with a star. Before you all start doubting my undisputed sense of fashion – I will explain this curious item of today’s wardrobe.

When I arrived at the office this morning, after my necessary morning coffee, our Bulgarian colleagues, who are on training here to learn new software, came round with these bracelets. Today, the first of March, in Bulgaria is apparently “Baba Marta”, and wearing this item brings good luck, fortune and health. It is a sign that spring will come soon and winter is over. (read more)

So (I don’t know if they really wish it to each other like this but: ) Happy Baba Marta!

Black

A famous saying goes ‘once you go black, you won’t go back’ and I know for a fact that that is true! I never want to go back again – and if I say black, I mean real dark – darker than dark – or in French “Noir de Noir”.

Now before all your minds go thinking things that would not fit my very decent and honourable image, I am talking here about chocolate, of course!

i was already a real addict and now here at my job, we get free chocolates to go with our coffee (or without coffee). We can choose between milk or dark chocolate. Not very spectacular but I recently discovered a secret stack at the reception desk. A little treasure is hidden there: the Côte d’Or Noir de Noir Mignonnettes… (a wrong delivery from our supplier)

So now i am a secret corporate chocolate eater and I don’t want any other chocolate anymore. After eating the Noir de Noir, even the regular dark chocolate tastes like milk chocolate…


(do you reckon that Côte d'Or - if they would read this, that they might give me some free chocolate now?)

worth it

I just discovered that another of my favourite artists will be performing in Belgium again. Tori Amos will be one of the headliners on the last day of Rock Werchter, one of the best festivals in Europe - or so they say at least...

I have seen Tori Amos now twice, always in more 'intimate' concert halls, both times only Tori on piano alone. So i would really like to see her with band (if at least she comes with a band) or if not, just seeing her again would be great as well :-)

but is she alone worth paying 75 euros? maybe if you throw in Damien Rice, performing that same evening? or maybe i should wait until they announce the other gigs for that night...

and maybe find somebody to go along with me?

ghosts of the past...

These last days a song from my past has nestled itself in my mind... when i was in music academy (sounds like police academy) we used to rehearse "Liverpool Oratorium" written by Paul McCartney.

It's now almost 15 years ago (omg, getting older) since we sang that piece, but I still remember a lot of the music... I had to sing the part of headmaster and i still remember lines like: "walk in single line, out of the classroom, and into the playground..." and then for some odd reason the headmaster went out of the school to the graveyard to wonder about his friends fom the past... oh, glory days...

am i beginning to sound like a granny?

beast

Giving presentations is a bit like acting, I think. In front of an audience, getting your message across, trying to grasp the people’s attention. I think maybe that is why I like doing it so much.

Today I had to present the marketing-issues of my company to our affiliate managers from all around Europe. A mixed audience of engineery-kind-of-sales persons… not really the kind of personality I would consider myself as part of, but as a marketeer/advertising guy you have to be able to empathize with everybody.

Talking about acting, last night I went to see the musical “Beauty and the Beast”. It was the translated version of the international Disney musical… and in that translation were some non-intended hilarious moments (unfortunately only to explain to Dutch-speakers…). But – B&B being one of my favourite disney movies and with my deep passion for musicals and Disney– needless to say that I thoroughly enjoyed it!

And to end, once more, a promise to update this thing more regularly.
There I said it, now remind me enough to do so as well!