Jeroen J.-W. Tiggelman

Journal direction

jtiggelm@casema.nl — Mon, 21 Dec 2009 12:41:20 GMT

I just noticed that the last couple of entries were marked "friends only" for no good reason. I think I opted to hide entries that touched on "work" to keep this a purely "life" blog, but there is no reason to go overboard with that and not even show how I am doing generally. So that is fixed now.

Technically, I have four on-line journals at the moment, none of them very active. I think I may use this one to write some more about how I look at the world in future. Then again.. I find that journals never develop in expected ways, so.. we'll see.

Update

jtiggelm@casema.nl — Fri, 11 Dec 2009 20:03:15 GMT

To summarize the last couple of quarters: Q2 was indeed a bit more relaxed, but Q3 wasn't. My administration still isn't caught up, and it probably will be quite a bit longer before it is. I am looking to ensure that next year will be a bit less busy than this year was.

One major trend worth highlighting is that I seem to be shifting substantially into the direction of being more open about myself. It would probably be true to say that my privacy concerns are taking more of a backseat now. I am not sure if that is necessarily a good thing, but my sense is that we are going to move into a network society more and more whether I like it or not, anyway.

Over the last few quarters I have also developed an impression of generation Y being rather self-absorbed.

Mini-update

jtiggelm@casema.nl — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 10:49:30 GMT

The previous couple of months work had been claiming too much of my time, but that is normalizing again now. I guess the preceding period can be characterized as "work hard, play hard" to the max. I seem to be playing more than I used to now.. in part with the Wii we acquired after I found that it was pretty much fun. For some reason I seem to be doing fitness exercises now, too, which is a bit of a novelty..

My music lessons are progressing to satisfaction. I am also feeling settled in a bit more. I still have an administrative backlog that may take a couple more quarters to clear up. But overall I am doing fine, I just should get a little more sleep on average over the next couple of months..

Djembe

jtiggelm@casema.nl — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 05:15:33 GMT

I decided to take djembe lessons.

A couple of months ago I tried my hand at getting some sort of sound out of the drum and that seemed to work pretty well. So I decided this was something I might want to pursue, as it has been a long time since I had any notable hobby, let alone a musical one. I was actually serious enough about it to get my own drum.

Last weekend I attended a workshop. I spent the last two days figuring out my requirements for a teacher and matching them against the available options. In the end I preferred the harder route of joining a more serious one over the 'let all join in' approach for the immediate. One of the drawbacks is that it is actually not so easy to form a new group of beginners. However, I expect to be starting next week or so, even if the location has not been settled on as of yet.

Big Five

jtiggelm@casema.nl — Wed, 25 Jul 2007 06:05:08 GMT

I'm a O76-C79-E27-A8-N11 Big Five!!

New community

jtiggelm@casema.nl — Tue, 31 Jan 2006 23:16:13 GMT

As you may remember I have been rather interested in the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI), and involved in communities for it on LJ, though I have not found the time to really expand on the subject as much as I would have liked, as illustrated by this entry. I may come to focus on it more in the newly founded rationals community that I will be co-moderating.

jtiggelm@casema.nl — Sun, 17 Oct 2004 10:46:46 GMT

There's not so much I want to record from June. The second weekend I had some visitors on Saturday, which went kind-of strange. I resolved I did not like all-too-dominant people around. The weekend after was mainly spent with my brother's birthday and Father's Day. I also started around this time to spend rather a lot of time on a particular forum, which kind-of pushes LJ even further out of the picture than it already was for me.

My father had a farewell party at the school he had worked for a long time, since he just retired. I went to Apenheul (a zoo in Apeldoorn) with some people in mid-July, where I had not been since 1979. Also, I found someone else to have loooooooooooong email conversations with; and since I prefer these communications, LJ disappeared even further out of the picture.

Around this time we had a photographer over at the company where I work. It would turn out later that the Dutch magazine Intermediair had chosen us as the most innovative ICT company in the country this year. (We had already been in the top 5 for several years running.)

In mid-August I was asked to accompany a friend who wanted to go to a meeting which it had turned out was being organized by a bunch of evangelical christians, although they were just advertising it as a theme evening about Wicca. This did not feel right, as people actually interested in that theme might turn up expecting something quite different. And indeed we found a slightly agitated American woman who came to us when we arrived and warned us that these were really evangelicals. The meeting was kind of funny to have seen once, though this false advertising annoyed me to almost no end. As for information, these people did not even know the word "Gardnerian". But never mind about that. In the end we had done a good deed, I think, by being there for this actually interested lady, and had had a fun evening as well. So in the end, it seems the evangelicals actually helped spread the word. ;)-< :)-<

Then another friend came over from the UK and stayed here for a week, which was fun. We generally stayed in the vicinity, but also made it to a.o. Amsterdam. ;) There was also a family dinner around this time. I got invited to orkut, but turned down the offer as I already can't really keep up with LJ. ;)

I met with the other owners of the building and we decided not to collectively renovate the windows at the back of the building. We deciced that individual action was allowed, and the conditoins under which it was. I was not overjoyed with this result, but I am not unhappy with it either.

At the beginning of September I had a bit of a falling-out with the organizers of the Amsterdam meetings, though this has not had any direct consequences. This may actually have been safeguarded by a nice afternoon with a bunch of the other, quieter, people in a forest in mid-September. I did not actually pause to analyze this too deeply. Regarding meetings, BTW, I went to Utrecht a couple of times over the last few months as well, and I have started attending "Alkmaar" recently. All of this together is a bit too much, we'll see how I reprioritize later on. ;)

As for music I "discovered" Loreena McKennitt and Tori Amos around this time. I also found I could actually listen to "chants" etc. better than I had expected. I got also quite convinced that Omnia is really crap, as I had already thought was the case after hearing them live last year (which is why I had not been in a hurry to investigate them ;)). As for Tori, of course I had heard her before, but I hadn't paid that much true attention. Now, though, I was singing the praises of Kari Rueslatten to someone, and also explained that she sounded a bit like Tori in places, and especially on "Mesmerized", resulting in our swapping some sample songs.. (and chalk up another fan for Kari as well :-)).

I did not read so many books, though I managed some Graham Hancock and some more reading on Buddhism, including the Dhammapada. However, some of the time I normally spend on this was taken by thinking about the development process at work, which I want to restructure a bit. I don't otherwise normally think about these things in my free time a lot, but over the last month or so at least, I actually did.

At work I have been in far more meetings recently, partly due to several projects spannign departments. Also, the last few weeks have been punctuated by phone/webcasts, which are unfortunately broadcast from some EST zone, i.e., taking up most of the evening. *yaaaaaaaawn*

As for family, I am a bit worried about my brother, who doesn't seem to be doing very well, but otherwise I don't think there is anything that needs to be said at this time.

Finally, I have recently had a request to start updating in Dutch. I don't exlude the possibility that I will do so, but I think the main entries are likely to be mostly English for some time to come. Of course, comments can be made in either language, and I may well reply in whatever language gets picked. ;)

And that summarizes the past 4+ months adequately, I think... insofar I actually want to publicize them on the internet, that is. ;) :)

A busy period and a short holiday

jtiggelm@casema.nl — Sun, 30 May 2004 12:36:56 GMT

The previous true update was from the end of February. March saw some other attempts to revive the LJ, but so far none of that has really panned out. I may well return to the Personality project when I find the time, but I am not sure when that may be.

The first week of March I was not all that busy and started some of the initiatives mentioned above. At the end of that week I started planning the May holiday I just returned from. Someone inquired whether I would consider giving Dutch lessons IRL (as well as in several Yahoo! groups) but afterwards never returned to the subject.

The week after I was exchanging MSN accounts with a few people, which marked the start of a period of more chat sessions. I reached the Appendix of "What the Buddha taught" and wrote a little piece about the previous weeks' Amsterdam gathering for the MM website.

Later that month I had an encounter with a car whilst on my bike, and I finished the abovementioned book and started on one about neurology. I happened to find the URL about high IQ featured in the Personality project (which was probably a trigger). The company I work for had a change of CEO, complete with farewell party. The fourth of April I had difficulty going back home from Amsterdam, because of a bomb alert at Amsterdam Centraal. In the end I got home around 5:30am instead of 1:30. The evening before had been very enjoyable, though.

In the second week of April the DHK mailinglist blew up never to be heard of again. On April 10th I played in the Dutch Shogi Championships and did pretty well. The week after I went to a double birthday party in the family. On the next Monday there was the annual meeting of the owners of the apartment building, and since we had some importants matters to discuss we planned another one in June. On April 24th several things about the house were done.

Around this time the pressure at work increased a hell of a lot, because of illness (not mine) and an approaching deadline. By the time my holiday arrived I really needed it.

On May Day I celebrated it together with some people in a park in Amsterdam. We had quite a good picknick. I actually stayed over in Amsterdam with a friend, because I wanted to be there the next day too: a friend from Northern Ireland was in The Netherlands again. So we went shopping the next day and had fun until after dinner, at which point I was going to another meeting also in Amsterdam. (Yes, I know--I was doing rather a lot of things in my free time as well.)

On Wednesday evening we had a small company trip, in which we made a tour of some lakes around Leiden. The next Saturday I expected some people to come and visit here, but that event was cancelled at the last minute, and I ended up thinking and writing up some thoughts. Sunday was Mother's Day here, so I went where you would expect me to go--not that I don't go there several times a week anyway. ;)

May 14th I finished at a reasonable time at work, determined not to pay attention to anything until June 1st. That appears to have worked. That Saturday was my mother's birthday.

On Wednesday I left for the UK. I took the train through the Channel Tunnel again, and was picked up from Ashford International by a friend. I stayed three nights in a hotel in Sandling (near Maidstone) in Kent. I visited Rochester (castle, Charles Dickens centre), Dover Castle, the medieval town of Favesham, Aylesford (The Friars), Upnor Castle, Gillingham (Gillingham Reach, Royal Engineers museum).

Of these I liked Upnor best, though Dover is very impressive. This castle is best known for the raid the Dutch made up the Medway in 1667, in which they captured the flagship of the British navy and a large number of other important English ships were destroyed. Only at Upnor were the Dutch forced to retreat. The historical details were quite interesting. I gathered that morale among the English troops was not very high, also because of severe monetary problems on the side of the English ruler, etc.

On Saturday I made it to Stonehenge (which is really a number of stones in a field that the hordes of tourists are not allowed to approach closely at all, and so makes hardly any impression at all), and to Bath (Roman baths, Jane Austen Centre, Assembly Rooms, etc.) before going to Emsworth (near Portsmouth) where I stayed the next two nights. On Sunday I just had a quiet day near Emsworth.. walked around that little town and played some Scrabble (in English!) and such. :-)

The last three nights I stayed at Wrotham Heath (near Seven Oaks, Kent) and visited Hever Castle (home of Ann Boleyn) and Gardens, Leeds Castle (near Maidstone), Maidstone (Mote Park), Bodiam Castle (in Sussex), the Yalding Organic Gardens and Ightham Mote. I finally picked up some souvenirs before returning to Ashford to take the Eurostar back to Brussel, etc. It was a very pleasant week. For the last few days I have been relaxing mostly.

Also, I finished the neurology book a few weeks ago; on the way to England I was reading "The Tibetan book of living and dying" by Sogyal Rinpoche. I did not like the first part much, but the second seems to be better. While in England I read an English history book (the title eludes me at the moment), which was very enjoyable and I started on Penrose's "The Emperor's New Mind", of which the first few chapters seem very simple to me [though obviously that is because the subjects treated there were part of my maths and cs education already].

Personality

jtiggelm@casema.nl — Sat, 27 Mar 2004 01:43:48 GMT

(For now, this is just a collection of links I may want to reconsider.)

The INTJ's Achilles heel
What prevents them from becoming chronically bogged down
On grudges

Type trees (1)
Type trees (2)

Talking out problems

Mahdi & The Math Gene
Devlin & IQ

PTypes link

Type distribution within the group

Enneagram nonsense
SQ/EQ nonsense

High IQ

More elaborate memes also have their place

jtiggelm@casema.nl — Wed, 03 Mar 2004 22:18:48 GMT

Not to refer to other people's protected entries, the result to Beliefnet's Belief-O-Matic quiz is repeated here:
1. Unitarian Universalism (100%)
2. Liberal Quakers (90%)
3. Mahayana Buddhism (83%)
4. Mainline to Liberal Christian Protestants (81%)
5. New Age (81%)
6. Neo-Pagan (80%)
7. Taoism (78%)
8. Theravada Buddhism (77%)
9. New Thought (69%)
10. Christian Science (Church of Christ, Scientist) (68%)
11. Scientology (64%)
12. Secular Humanism (63%)
13. Reform Judaism (60%)
14. Orthodox Quaker (58%)
15. Bahá'í Faith (56%)
16. Hinduism (53%)
17. Jainism (52%)
18. Sikhism (49%)
19. Nontheist (46%)
20. Mainline to Conservative Christian/Protestant (38%)
21. Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (Mormons) (37%)
22. Orthodox Judaism (32%)
23. Islam (30%)
24. Seventh Day Adventist (28%)
25. Eastern Orthodox (18%)
26. Roman Catholic (18%)
27. Jehovah's Witness (17%)

beyond sanctum

jtiggelm@casema.nl — Sun, 29 Feb 2004 11:02:53 GMT

in these vanities' halls
is danced the belle's ball
who is you and
who is I
remind me
of love and eternal tranquility

Lemmings asylum

jtiggelm@casema.nl — Sat, 28 Feb 2004 20:00:26 GMT

As indicated in this entry I am not much given to doing quizes. This entry may serve as a repository for the odd result.

Lemminged from kemeticgirl:

You are the Justice card. Justice preserves the
harmony of the world. Working with opposite
forces, Justice does not seek to criticize or
condemn but rather to accept. The idea behind
the card justice is that opposite forces are
complementary; you could not have good without
evil or light without darkness. Justice's
position is to make sure that if a thing is out
of balance, the weight of its energy is
realigned with its opposite force. This card is
also a card of humour, for it is in pointing
out contrary positions that humour is often
found. The attitude that is found in the
humourous person, being able to shift
perspective and flow with an instinct, is
important in the maintenance of good balance.
Image from The Blue Moon Tarot Deck.
Which Tarot Card Are You?
brought to you by Quizilla

This one is probably from last May or thereabouts:

You are a Mutual Person
Sweet and submissive or Hard and Dominant?
brought to you by Quizilla

I also cleaned up my old collections for dead links, etc.:

The Lemming Type

My female alter ego

At Watership Down

Last month's summary

jtiggelm@casema.nl — Sat, 28 Feb 2004 18:39:29 GMT

Well, I have to say I don't usually get around to writing too many LJ entries these days. As for the entries to link to other journals I tentatively referred to in the previous entry, I think I wil have one for Jungian temperament (largely dealing with ntpersonality and idealists posts), but probably no others for the near future.

I am still active on several mailing lists dealing with the Dutch language. In fact, their number is growing. The last addition has been a group currently called DUTCH-ENGLISH-SPANISH. It is not particularly different from PracticingDutch or LearningDutch so far. I wonder whether a multitude of these fora is really useful. It seems everyone might learn a little more if there was just one bigger group. Reading back in my Sent folder, I see I was also asked after GoneDutch late in January, but I haven't bothered to check it out. I was also invited to this initiative recently, but I am not sure..

I went on a search for someone to carry out some repairs and improvements on my house. The first person I approached did not quite make the right impression on me, though, so it took a little longer to find someone than might have been envisioned. An acquaintance now seems to want to do the work, but he is rather busy, so that might happen anywhere in the next month, I guess.

On January 25th I went to the birthday of one of my nephews. It turned out that the intention had been that his brother's birthday would also be celebrated that day, but since no one had bothered to tell me (or my parents), not that much came of it. My parents went back two weeks later, but I was otherwise occupied at that time, so I went the week after that.

The week after, I noticed that my ISP was indicating wholly ridiculous statistics about my bandwidth usage in the service center. It took me a month to actually get them to acknoweldge that they had a problem. They haven't fixed it yet. I hope this problem is not more pervasive. Some customers might want to check their usage, since there is an upgrade going on, which implies an opportunity to downgrade and decrease costs. I could probably downgrade and not notice too much of it, though I am not sure yet if I will, because.. well, fortunately the little bit of money is not that important to me.

That Sunday I went to my aunt for her birthday, which turned out to be quite a small gathering, which was quite good to actually get to talk to each other for a while. On Monday I was at my parents' for their 38-year anniversary.

On Wednesday a friend who was going to spend a few days in The Hague arrived, so I picked her up at Schiphol Airport. After finding the hotel in The Hague I showed her around the city center a bit, starting with the government buildings. On Thursday we had a look at Madurodam (a collection of scale models of many important buildinds from around the country) and went to the Mauritshuis museum (primarily paintings, including, e.g., Rembrandt's "De anatomieles van Dr. Tulp"). On Friday I showed her around Delft and on Saturday we went to the Haags Gemeentemuseum. We certainly had a lot of fun before she went back to the airport on Sunday to catch a plane home. I then went to have dinner with my parents.

The next week was very busy, but I enjoyed my Valentine's present. The day after, I went over to my brother's for my other nephew's birthday. He liked the game I had bought him a lot, and so did my brother and I. ;) My brother and I might have gone on to play shogi, but he hadn't told me either he wanted to play again or that he was unsure where his set was, so I didn't bring one. Oh well. I was actually still there around 17:30 when my mother called, who had actually expected me to show up for dinner (slight miscommunication), after which I took the bus and the train and the bike and went there.. It was not a very great night. :|

The next week my acquaintance had a look at possible improvements on the house, and another fitter paid a visit to check up on the central heating system. At work I spend most of the time on a peer code review. That weekend I decided not to do too much, because I was pretty tired. I did read a small Buddhist book around this time.

Last week was fairly uneventful. I started reading another Buddhist book ("What the Buddha taught") and answered a flurry of email on some of the mailinglists I read, mostly. I also planned to go to the Dutch Shogi Championship today, but yesterday I was told that the event was being moved to another date: due to the bad weather (we had quite a bit of snow etc. around here), the organization was afraid that it would be hard for people to be in Woerden on time. So I answered some email and did some other small things today, mostly, instead.

One of my email correspondents seems to have gone missing. Not only have I seen no reply for a while, but there must have been a phone number change, too. Hmmm.. Another acquaintance specifically let me know about a new telephone number (in connection with harassment :().

One day last week I had rather a backache; maybe I am too careful with painkillers, but anyway, the dosage didn't work, and I didn't sleep much that night. Since, things have been okay again, though today I happen to have a sore upper spine/shoulder blade. I should probably make sure I get enough rest..

As to the immediate future, I am looking forward to a quiet Sunday, and a very busy week..

Another busy period

jtiggelm@casema.nl — Sat, 24 Jan 2004 13:36:25 GMT

St. Nicholas day was enjoyable. I celebrated it both on the evening of December 5th with my parents, and during the weekend at my brother's. Among other things I got a calendar for the new year, a nice scarf and a "Galileo" thermometer (i.e., one with bulbs with colored fluids which start sinking at different temperatures).

The next weekend, of course, was the time of my birthday. I actually managed to get the enlarged photos up on the walls. :) I only entertained the family, I didn't feel like throwing a party for my friends and acquaintances much; partly because I didn't care for the previous edition too much. A British friend I correspond with a lot now gave me the Concise Oxford English dictionary, but also wrote a very nice story for me. :)

At work we had a Christmas lunch the 23rd and we also got some presents. Look here for the idea behind the mathematical plank puzzles and the URL where you can see the "River Crossing" game itself. It made me wonder, since I had written a reply in the general company discussion database giving that reference the week before or so.. :)

I spend Christmas mostly with my parents, and I went there on New Year's Eve as well. I declined an invitation to come to Amsterdam and celebrate it there.

For the new year, I made no specific resolutions. But perhaps this is the time to mark that the monthly role playing event seems to be really dead now. For a large part, because I decided not to invest time in keeping it alive any more, I am sure. I had been doing that for quite a while now.

As for reading, I finished a book on gnosticism, which I found quite interesting. I am going to be reading some books on Buddhism soon now. The one I want to start with has been ordered but will probably arrive in a week's time or so. Another has already arrived.

Also, I made some changes to my web comic reading. At this time I am mostly interested in Megatokyo and Queen of Wands. (Every now and then I scrap some that have gone stale and add a new one or two.)

I will probably make an entry or two in my LJ to link to other journals. I write far more in communities and threads in other journals than in my own. Some of those entries are actually kind-of memorable to me.

Last weekend I went to a friend's birthday party. I tried to get hold of a particular CD I had in mind about two weeks before, but failed. It turned out it was not distributed here. I had actually figured out I liked it over the Christmas vacation, when I finally got around to playing a few CD-Rs I had gotten about a year earlier, and found I liked them. I will still try to get hold of a copy for myself.. Meanwhile, I settled for Flowing Tears' "Serpentine", after wrecking my brains whatever I had given last year (since it is from 2002). I think that was the fourth CD she got from me.. (and I am quite sure that her husband got four from me as well..). Oh well. :)

On Sunday, I went to Amsterdam to see how a new kind of gathering would go (superseding other monthly Amsterdam engagements). That turned out pretty well, too.

This week we had a salary round. The company seems to be doing quite okay, fortunately. Also, I got some recognition for my 'new' function. :-)

This weekend I am mostly cleaning etc., and tomorrow I am going to my brother's for the birthday of one of my nephews. Next weekend is probably going to be occupied with the birthday of another nephew plus the wedding anniversary of my parents. The week after that I will have a British visitor. I am looking forward to that. :-)

December again...

jtiggelm@casema.nl — Tue, 02 Dec 2003 22:07:44 GMT

I realize my posting frequency could still be described as "abysmal". Here is another short update.

Let's see.. I had a small celebration during the last week of October, because the company is doing pretty well. I then got invited to a Hallowe'en party or two, but declined, because my energy level was not too good. A birthday party on Saturday I had been invited to got cancelled. I went to Amsterdam on Sunday but did not stay very long.

I put some thought into my trip to the UK. Add comparatively many and long private emails and some very busy time at work, and you'll see why there is very little to tell about the next few weeks until my vacation.

My journey on Monday November 17th was sort-of okay, though it was annoying that I had a three-and-a-half hour delay on the way to Brussels; I eventually arrived in London two hours later than I had planned. I had a brief look around the Thames before travelling on to Guildford, where I found my hotel.

Tuesday I spent together with an internet friend who lives in the vicinity there. This was mostly a quiet day, which suited me fine, since I had been fairly tired.

On Wednesday I got picked up by another friend who drove me to Chawton (where Jane Austen used to live), which was very nice, and further into Hampshire to Portchester (where we picknicked and investigated the castle) and Portsmouth. I have to say this was really a fantastic day.

On Thursday I ended up doing some small things in and around Guildford, such as looking at the cathedral.

On Friday I really got to see some parts of London as friend #2 showed me some of the sights, such as Westminister Abbey, told me about the subway system, walked with me through St. James's park, helped me with some shopping and was an all around wonderful companion. After she got her train back home, I found myself some dinner in London before heading back to Guildford.

On Saturday I returned to London and spent more than three hours at the tower, had a walk through the city, took the subway, saw the 'posh' shopping area around Regent Street, walked back to and through St. James's and on to Tate Gallery, where I examined the Turner expositions.

Sunday was mostly a travel day, though I returned to Tate Gallery because there was still more to be seen before checking in for the Eurostar back. I was home around 21:15.

I kept mostly quiet during the few days after, before returning to work. The rest of the week was mostly catching up (both at work and privately). I did pick out some fotographs for enlargements to be used as wall decorations (finally).

On Saturday evening I went to a film evening in Amsterdam (which was good fun, though the movie wasn't so great). On Sunday I had dinner with my parents.

Also, the shogi evenings have become a bit more interesting again lately (more--and more interesting--games; and a player that had been absent for a long time returned).

We are now heading towards St. Nicholas' Eve again.

Recent events

jtiggelm@casema.nl — Tue, 28 Oct 2003 23:07:59 GMT

I realize it has been more than six weeks since the last update. Not that I haven't been posting (actually, I posted several dozen messages to communities and other people's private journals), but... well, not about me.

The weekend of September 20th was mostly taken by a birthday party in Amsterdam. I went there around noon, and was occupied with this until after noon the other day. Around 2:30pm, I tried to get some rest. ;)

The week thereafter a plan came up to go to the UK for a couple of days sometime in the near future. That plan is now slowly taking shape; I have already reserved a week.

The next event I had to deal with was a sudden declaration of love coming completely out of left field. Not that much of a problem in itself (or at least not for me..), but some ensuing harassment was less savoury. Oh well.

The above also occupied part of the weekend, which was furthermore fairly quiet. I wrote some lengthy private emails, which I have been doing notably more again lately.

The first Wednesday of October a role play evening got cancelled for lack of a Game Master, which has led me to investigating whether I could play that role.

That Friday was taken by a company trip I had organized, which turned out quite successful. On Saturday I spent some time present-hunting for that evening's birthday party. On Sunday I went to another Amsterdam gathering, which I unexpectedly got to host, too; that turned out to be quite an enjoyable night as well.

The latter event also gave rise to the idea of a film evening, which I suspect will occur soonish as well, and furthermore increased my number of correspondents by two.

During the next week I got an unexpected email from the friend to whose birthday party I had just been. He had just gotten married.

The last few weekends have been rather quiet. I have been shopping and going to my parents, keeping quiet a little and emailing rather a lot. Add in some hours of chat, too, uncharacteristic as that is for me.

Also, my LJ seems to have been gathering a little more interest again over the past week, and yesterday a former correspondent reappeared.

I am writing some poems again. Chances are updates may be a little more frequent in the near future.

As to music, I seem to be returning to metal rather, though I have not found many new releases and in fact bought very little lately. The new Moonspell at least was a pleasant surprise. They may not quite be back to the "Irreligious"(1996) level, but it's pretty good and I picked it up--which I can't say of any of the releases in between yet. (I have not heard everything, but what I have heard wasn't very interesting IMO.)

New picture

jtiggelm@casema.nl — Sat, 13 Sep 2003 21:32:04 GMT

Well, I recall I said I would try to replace the previous user picture before it was two years old. As you have seen, that didn't actually happen. It would in fact still have been on here, if I hadn't been surprised by a fairly nice picture in the company newsletter I had actually forgotten was shot when I handed out the table tennis trophies for our competition. But I was, and I decided it was decent enough to cut a user picture from, so... enjoy! :-)

für immerdar

jtiggelm@casema.nl — Sun, 17 Aug 2003 20:10:40 GMT

i am here and
i will be there
what more can i possibly say
just ask me
with all my presence of mind

reach

jtiggelm@casema.nl — Sun, 17 Aug 2003 19:51:19 GMT

there is no connection
but in the mind
this framework of support
i see
in the end
will you be there
for me

the circus

jtiggelm@casema.nl — Sun, 17 Aug 2003 19:43:39 GMT

today is kind of quiet
my familiar surroundings
feel like alien
as i reflect
upon the disconnection
i experienced
in that strange world

Mini-vacation

jtiggelm@casema.nl — Sun, 17 Aug 2003 10:40:39 GMT

I am back from a week's vacation. I went camping at a festival. It was quite a novel experience for me. Basically, I found myself in another world (which I am inclined to describe as a 'circus world'). I wouldn't have thought of going there if I hadn't been invited by an ENFP friend.

There have been many impressions, quite a few of which I still need to process. It was really a very busy time, while I slept far too little. I guess that it would be good for me to learn to deal with this kind of environment a bit better, although I think that I will never become the kind of extraverted personality that really belongs there, and I really shouldn't try.

Anyway, I have been outdoors for nearly a week, and I have certainly been away from normal proceedings, and that has been good for me. I may be going away for another week in a month's time or so, although if so, I will try to find a somewhat quieter outing..

Update

jtiggelm@casema.nl — Thu, 10 Jul 2003 06:50:03 GMT

Well, another month has gone. As noted in one of the replies to the Metamorphosis thread, I am not wearing contact lenses at this time. The plan is not to wear them for the next month or so. I have to say, though, that after a week or so not wearing them I see no great difference, so maybe there is no problem after all. I'll get back to that, I am sure. ;-)

So far no good replacement for the user picture has occurred, but for those who'd like to see some of me with the new look (though it still includes glasses at the moment for the reason already stated), there are some pictures from an Amsterdam get-together from last Sunday.

Links removed since the pictures are not available on the 'net at this time

I noted they look kind-of similar and so the multiplicity is kind-of redundant, but since they have all been put on the web anyway.. what the hell.. ;-)

The plan is still to get a better picture as a new user icon.

What happened of gret note for the last month? Nothing much, actually. My home is still lsowly improving, this time with a new linen-cupboard that is now stnading but I still have to start using. I have basically been working hard and playing some too.

Metamorphosis

jtiggelm@casema.nl — Sat, 07 Jun 2003 21:35:49 GMT

Soooo... last Sunday was another evening in Amsterdam, and this time I wasn't walking quite straight afterwards. Which probably makes it my "worst" night ever. ;) ;) I had fun, though.

On Tuesday I got the contacts. I have to say that it took me 30 minutes just to put in the first lens for the first time. The second took only 15 minutes. All in all, it took me an our at the store. I walked into another shop to get a usable mirror immediately afterwards (having realized I didn't have one).

So, that Tuesday I had the lenses in for four hours, to be increased by two additional hours per day, up to a max. of 14. I have an appointment after two weeks to check how things are going.

Putting them in has gone down to about 7 minutes by now. Taking them out takes some 5 minutes as well. Overall, I have to say that my vision is slightly less accurate than with glasses indeed. On the up side, I have an entirely unimpaired field of vision now.

After putting them in, my eyes often water, and yesterday morning I had trouble on the way to work, because I was inclined to close my eyes (which is not so great in traffic). I hypothesize that I reacted in a certain way to directly adverse sunlight with glasses, that with contact lenses I don't. So maybe I want a pair of regular sunglasses, as well..

One time one lens fell out when I was rubbing my eyes, and Thursday afternoon I was under the impression that my vision was faltering at the end of the day when I was looking along with someone else at a laptop screen. But otherwise, no complaints..

I furthermore had my hair cut short, and did away with the moustache and beard. So that kind of mandates that I have a more recent picture taken one of these days, doesn't it? ;) :)

Contacts etc.

jtiggelm@casema.nl — Fri, 30 May 2003 05:56:51 GMT

I went to my mother's that Thursday, and Sunday too... though my brother had already left when I arrived [and in fact my parents were bringing him to the train station at that time].

The following week seems uneventful now, though it may be that that is so because it was primarily filled with work. I am not thinking about that now. I indeed took off another week (this week).

On Saturday I did some shopping, including looking for contacts lenses. The optometrist told me that they were never really as good an alternative, but that especially with my rather large cylindric (toric) corrections they were quite a bad idea, since they don't stay at the same place of the eyeball, really. Regardless, he did check what my eyesight is these days, which isn't that much different from 90 months ago. I can try lenses for a month for free, provided I come in for a check after two weeks. I am waiting for a phone call.

Otherwise I haven't been as busy this period as the previous one. Oh sure, I am still busy cleaning things up, and I've also started on a few work-related books. I am also reading some other books I started a long time ago. But I am spending quite a bit of time just relaxing, too.

Other than that I went to a Utrecht meeting this Monday evening, and I went to Amsterdam for a very nice day with a friend this Tuesday. We met around quarter past one in a shop near Central Station advertising itself as a 'new age shop' [where she picked up some incense and a few other odds and ends upon arrival]. We then went shopping. I am not a big fan of shopping, but don't hate it either. One thing is for sure, when you can do whatever shopping you'd have wanted to do anyway in company, that makes things a lot nicer. We ended up looking for new glasses.

Of course we went for a drink too, and dinner afterwards. The evening program consisted of some pool (which I don't think I ever played before) and some jam sessions, where she wanted to (and got) onto stage to sing. Well, evening program.. meanwhile it was rather in the middle of the night, but that was okay. Next, there was a small private party, and after that it was time for feeding cats. We managed to skip the entire night.

The rest of that day didn't contain anything more noteworty than some sunburn, but was pleasant enough, too. Sometimes you're relaxed, sometimes you're not. Back in the train I was rather tired, and for some reason rather melancholic. I didn't really analyze that. For that matter, when I am more tired, my emotions fluctuate much more rapidly. Strange ups and downs both occurred. But no matter.. home, I made dinner and went to bed early.

Furthermore, I unsubscribed from a bunch of mailing lists (including WW and WH). There are now only eight left, and I may be dropping more of them, while I don't seem very interesting in adding any at this time. I may be comparatively "moving off the internet".

Yesterday, I kep quiet all morning, did some cleaning, and went to my parents.. which unfortunately ended up in a bad row.. I wanted to get rid of some lingering traces of anger with some random chat afterwards, but that didn't work. I woke up with a painful back, it being quite oversensitive after too much sun. My mood could be better than it is right now.

Life goes on..

jtiggelm@casema.nl — Tue, 13 May 2003 19:36:07 GMT

Saturday brought a very enjoyable edition of an annual event. Mother's Day was successful as well. At work I am more or less getting caught up now. Yesterday brought a very interesting shogi match. Thursday is my mother's birthday. Maybe I'll have some unplanned time this weekend. ;-)

Anyway, I'll be off for another week around Ascension, so that should give me the ability to finish some more things that need my attention, and to relax a little more again. :-)