Live aus Köln

Hallo Welt!!

Heute ein Bericht aus Köln, aber nicht so, wie ich gehofft hatte. Das Wise Guys Konzert gestern hat leider ausfallen mussen weil der Clemens krank war. Zum Glück gabs Abends ins MTC noch PayTV, da haben wir dann mal ganz kräftig gefeiert. Aber schade wars. Das Nachhol Konzert ist am nächsten Sonntag aber schon wieder nach Köln zu reisen kann ich nicht machen. Leider.

Lets talk in English, I don´t know who might be reading this. The Wise Guys concert yesterday couln´t take place because Clemens was ill. Really a pity.

I arrived in Köln at 12.50, walked down the stairs and there I met Dän, Sari, Ferenc und Eddi (four Wise Guys, only Clemens wasn´t there). What a coincidence, don´t you think? I smiled and said "Bis gleich!" and then Dän said the concert couldn´t take place, because Clemens was ill. I thought he was making a joke, but he was serious. He said "Du bist von Holland angereist gekommen, oder?" So he had recognised me :) "Es tut mir wirklich leid..." Well, it´s true, when one of them is ill, he´s ill.... can´t help it. Pity, but ´we´ Wise Guys Fans will just say *cheng cheng* and move on. Things like this happen..

But, I still had a nice time in Cologne. I met a lot of people I know from the net, and it was very nice to see them again. In the evening there was a PayTV concert. PayTV is a band from Hamburg. (They are the Rockhousebrothers) We had a really great time with them.

Today I have got plenty of time to do things before my train leaves again. But it´s so damn cold outside!!! I´ve already visited the Dom Church again. Pretty, but not very warm inside as well. I´ve had a hot cup of tea and went shopping afterwards. I visited the Mediamarkt, and bought an old Wise Guys album (Alles im Grünen Bereich), because I don´t have the original. And it was only 10 euros. Then I bought some postcards and I searched for a shop to buy Blendi toothpaste. The kids at work were asking for it last week haha. I found a DM, and found the Blendi.

After the shopping I was cold and the internet cafe had finally openend, so now I´m sitting here, checking messages and writing things in Guestbooks, Forums and my blog :D I want to make a walk afterwards, in the Altstadt and by the Rhein. And then I think, it´s time to go home.

And then, I can talk Dutch again. Though, I must say *stolz bin*, my German was pretty ok this weekend. I think I´m learning :D *YEAH!!!*

New pictures, or: Martins creations

Sorry for those who don't know our home and don't know what it looked like, I didn't make pictures from "before". Here are some pictures the way it looks like now, I promised my mom to put them online today, so here they are.

First of all, the closets in the guest room look like this now. The dark brown doors of the old closet have been plastered with nice fake wood-plastic and together with the new closet it looks a lot prettier. (a picture with the dark brown doors can be found here)

Next, Martin has built himself a little bedside table, because he's always been using some old boxes as a bedside table (among them an antique Word Perfect box) ;)

By the way, you can enlarge all the pictures by clicking on them. I'm only putting the small versions here, because there are quite a few pictures.

In the computer room, Martin has built cd shelves, next to our bookcase. First, all these cd's were on the shelves in the bookcase, which left less space for books. Now, we can put all our books in the bookcase. You can reach the light button through the cd shelves now :)

There are two more things to do now. First, we are going to put a nice shelve above the bed in the guestroom, and second we have to reorganise and put everything in the right place...... It will still take some more days....see for yourself:

Well mom, what do you think?

PHP....

We're still tidying up. Martin has been very busy the past few days. It's going to be so pretty and tidy when this all is finished! Right now Martin is building cd-shelves upstairs (pictures are coming soon!!). In the mean time I'm trying to learn some PHP principles. I want to renew my website, get a new design, and I want to use PHP as well. I want to get rid of my terrible frameset, that's for sure. I've tried to write some simple scripts this afternoon, by using an online tutorial, and I was amazed of what I could make. That was chapter one of the tutorial.
Chapter two says: "Thus far, the scripts we've discussed have been pretty dumb." OK... thanks a lot. But, I'm not giving up yet. Right now I'm struggling through chapter two, but I still don't understand much of it... :/
I think I'm going to help Martin upstairs... maybe he can help me out with chapter two later on today... ;)

The result

The Ikea closet is ready to be packed! Details: The left closet is the old rickety one from Martins grandmother, the right one is the new Ikea closet. They are standing against the wall between the guestroom and our bedroom. Now we need to reorganise things, fill the closets and put things on the attic (the ladder has been shortened as well!! so we can easily reach our attic now). We are planning to make some more shelves in the old closet as well. And, we are planning to put a shelve above the bed in the guestroom, with a little bedside lamp. Our guestroom will be cosier and tidier as ever before!
The ladder belonged to Martins grandparents. Because they moved into a smaller place, we could have this ladder. In return we invited them over for dinner today. We had a really nice time together. Oma asked opa if they had more ladders to give to us, because they liked the dinner so much :P

edit: I made the drawers and put the shelves in the closet. The other things are Martins work. Sorry, had to mention it, for I don´t want it to look like he build the whole closet by himself *ggg*

Remember my "tidy up stories"?

Well, and this is what it looks like now:


*SCREAM!!!!!*

Sometimes you need to make a big mess first. And then tidy up properly.
Look, Martin is busy with building another IKEA thing. I'll let him do the big work, and he's doing fine ;) I offered him my help, but he didn't need me so far. And he's also cooking dinner tonight ;) ! Oh I love him ^.^



to be continued...

I'm not as dumb as I thought - part II

The results:
Left = before, right = after
WITHIN 1 HOUR! I'm brilliant ;)


Ever since we've got McDull as a pet, his cage is standing on top of two big speakers, which by the way are not connected to a stereo. We thought it was time for a new table for him, so we bought this thing at Ikea.
I wonder what Martin will say when he gets home :D Juhu, I've built this thing by myself :) *lach*

I'm not as dumb as I thought

Heyhey! I'm not as dumb as I thought! (see "Technical understanding of a ...")
I managed to print labels today *JUHU* *gggggg* :D 163 labels, to be precise. For the volleybalclubs annual meeting invitations *proud*
And now I'm going to try to build a little table/case/cupboard -what's it called?- We bought it at Ikea last night. Let's see if I can manage on my own..... ;)
*listen to pfeffercd*
[sing]
:D

Corine on stage :)

I was on stage last night in the theater! It was soooo much fun!! Ok, I wasn't alone, let me tell you the story from the beginning.
As some of you know, Martin sings in a choir (the Evergreenkoor '80). Some months ago the choir received an email from Pater Moeskroen. Pater Moeskroen is touring through the dutch theaters with a show called "ZEE" (sea). In this show they are sailors, sailing the seas. They use many, many (!) different instruments and sing a variety of songs. With six songs they need the accompaniment of a choir, and in every town they search a local choir to perform with them. They only needed women, because the choir in the show should represent a "fishwife-choir"

Little note in between: Only Martin is singing in this choir, not me. But I'm quite familiair with the people, and doing some work for their website as well, so I was allowed to join in this project :D which I'm very thankfull for.

In the past weeks we had two repetitions, and yesterday night we could also practise with the band shortly. The best thing of the night were our costumes *harhar* *g* Let me show you some pictures.

Us with the six band members

During the show

More pictures can be found at www.evergreenkoor80.nl

It was really cool to be backstage, see the band soundchecking from in the wings, etc. etc. A great experience! To be on the stage with them was also great. There were about 270 people (and 30 empty chairs) in the theater, among them Martin and his mother, sister and my parents. Martins mother didn't know we were in the show, so it was a big surprise for her to see the women of the choir including me appearing on stage.
Backstage we had a lot of fun as well, we could hear the sound through a big speaker and watch the show on a 10x10cm black and white tv ;)

Tip for my Dutch friends and relatives:
Deze show is echt ontzettend leuk. Ookal heb ik hem alleen van backstage meegemaakt, de mensen in de zaal waren allemaal erg enthousiast. De verscheidenheid aan instrumenten, waarmee ze elk mogelijk geluid kunnen nabootsen, mooie liedjes, grappige stukjes visserslatijn. Een echte aanrader om heen te gaan in de Nederlandse theaters! Leuk als kadootje, een geweldig avondje uit!! Weer eens heel wat anders, maar echt leeeeeuuuuuk!! Dusss, go and see it!
Ze komen nog in Veldhoven, Gouda, Den Haag, Amersfoort, IJsselstein, Nijverdal. Daar heb ik overal wel kennissen of familie in de buurt wonen dus als die dat allemaal lezen hier... Tourdata op de site van Pater Moeskroen. Misschien ga ik zelf ook nog wel een keer... eerst maar eens even de hele DVD kijken die we gekocht hebben :)

Technical understanding of a .....

Happy New Year to all of you!!!

I have to declare: I've got the technical understanding of a wooden kitchendoor.

But! I did manage to get my car washed in the carwash ;P well, hey, there's a first time for everything, right? *lol* It's really great, normally we wash our car 'manually' *hehe* but we are so busy this week, and our Ferrari ;) _really_ needed some cleaning. So I entered the carwash, bought a 'ticket' and the machine cleaned my car. It seems so simple. It was, but I just didn't know how it worked and had to ask *g*

I received a great email today, with the golden tipp to protect my guestbook at corine.located.nl against automatic spam. Together with Martin I managed to change the PHP code in such a way it will probably be impossible for automatic spammers to spam my GB.
Here it counts: I have the technical understanding of a wooden kitchendoor. I really know almost nothing about PHP. Nevertheless, I _do_ manage to make my website in HTML, with CSS ;D I do it all by myself.
But I can't figure out exactly how our videorecorder works... so Martin missed the final part of our favorite tv-series.. because I didn't record it, when I thought I did.
Martin wants to buy a harddisk recorder this year, maybe that's easier? ;)
He also had to explain to me how the new electric heater works in our computerroom. That thing only got 1 button, and I still can't figure it out. Poor me... Today I couldn't even start a DVD at work, that tv is really too old. And the kiddies were so wanting to see "Dribbel". But, my collegue pressed 1 button (why didn't _I_ find that button??) and then it worked.

My goals for 2006, concerning technical understanding:

Make my website from using frames to being frameless

Get a little understanding of PHP, and other...

Delegate other technical things to Martin ;)

This post is really silly ;) sorry for that.

Happy New Year

Holiday: Tidy up DAY 3

Oh ja, I told you I had three days to tidy up right? I almost forgot... I didn't do anything today *hehe* Well, I did quite a lot of things, but the pictures from yesterday are very much how it looks like today ;)

So what did I do today? Well, I listened to Léon, der kleine Löwe and I've been working on my top secret project *lalala*, I went to the supermarket, cleaned McDulls cage. Checked all the websites I like and made dinner for three, while Dennis was coming over for dinner.

There is one thing that's positive, what the tidying up concerns: Martin brought a saw to shorten the ladder. I wonder if we will shorten it in 2005 or in 2006. My guess: 2006.

Jetzt schaue ich Scheibenwischer - Gala auf der ARD. Es soll die Wise Guys geben, aber bis jetzt ist es nur langweiliges Geschwätz.... naja, was solls. Hack ich halt Holz.

Guten Rutsch! :D

Holiday: Tidy up DAY 2

This room seems ok, doesn't it? It's our guest room, and the only thing you shouldn't mention are the boxes on top of the closet on the right, and the shelves with boxes behind the fleece blankets ;) Some of these boxes needs to be put on the attic, the ones on the shelves will just stay there, I guess. I will probably put some shelves on the left wall later, for I need more book space! On the left the yellow spread covers Martins old bed. There are two mattresses on top of it, one of them can be put on the floor so right now we have quite a comfortable guest room for two guests.

So, maybe you're thinking I've finished tidying up already, but that's not completely true. The computerroom is still a mess. Most things here need to be put on the attic, but we can't reach it so easily yet. So.... maybe I'll give it a try today, but I guess it's safer to do this with Martin together. Our attic can be reached through a small trapdoor in our bedroom. It's too small for a folding ladder. But, since last week we got a ladder which we intend to put on the attic, in a way we can let it slide down whenever we need to get up there. The only problem is the fact this ladder is about 30 cm too long, so it can't make the angle it needs to make, to get up the attic. So we need to shorten it before we can use it in the way we want to.

This story is really interesting, isn't it? I'm wondering who will read it *g*

Holiday: Tidy up DAY 1

I'm free this week!!!!! On the one hand, this week has many planned activities, such as the visitings at both christmas days. On Sunday we celebrated christmas with my family, on Monday with Martins family. Ordinary maybe, but fun, and the food was great. Then I'll have a "girlsday" on Friday, with four friends. We don't know what we'll be doing that day exactly, but it will probably look like this: eating chocolate, cookies and candy, watching a movie none of our boyfriends/husbands ever wants to see, cook together, and all together with a lot of chatting.
By the way, I'm still doubting whether I shall bring my WG-DVD collection... *dumtidum* I wonder if they'd appreciate it ;)

New Years Eve also has to be celebrated of course, so that leaves three free days without any planned activities. I could sleep long and do nothing all day, enjoying my holiday every minute, but that would leave me with an unsatisfying feeling. The point is, actually I should really tidy up the mess it is upstairs in the computer room and the guest room... So I decided to spend my days sleeping pretty long AND tidying up the rooms. Maybe you are wondering why there is such a mess. Well, that's quite simple, we moved into this house two years ago, and some boxes just still needs to be unpacked.... other things just need to be sorted out.

Results of Day 1:

Reduced my schoolpapers (reports, assignments) from 6 files to 3 files: 2 boxes of paper now waiting to be picked up by the paper-recycling-people.

Refound some old hobby-tinkerthings: packed in a bag and will be given to my cousins next Saturday

Filled 1 big rubbish bag with rubbish and threw it in the garbage can

Shocking fact:
I noticed most of the boxes that still needs to be unpacked or sorted out, belong to Martin....

Martin????????? when will you have a holiday???

X-mas

Just want to show you something I made this week with the kids at work:


Isn't it cute?
Merry Christmas to you :)

My 2005

Your 2005 Song Is

Hollaback Girl by Gwen Stefani "This shit is bananas B-A-N-A-N-A-S)" For you, 2005 was the Best Year Ever.

What Hit Song of 2005 Are You?

What??? I don't even like this song!! It's one of the most stupid songs of 2005! How can it be my 2005 Song? Stupid test ;)

But, 2005 might just be my best year ever. I had a lot of fun during this year. I just had to live it this way, I needed to feel happy and experience new things. Meeting a lot of German Wise Guys Fans probably was the highlight of this year, and part of my 'unwritten and slowly-through-the-year-defined goal' for 2005, which by the way, can best be described as "Gib jedem Tag die Chance, der schönste deines Lebens zu werden" (Nochmals danke an lena für diesen Spruch!!!)

OK, das hier ist mal wieder einer von meinen Denglisch Posts... sorry for that.. :P

Anyway, this year was no shit at all, and bananas are also not part of the 2005 summary. Maybe I should find another test with a correct anwser ;)

A lot a Pottah!

Potter Marathon Weekend! Yeaaaah!!! ;) We started yesterday, watching Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone. Well, "we" isn't exactly true, for I had to play volleybal so I missed only this part. But Martin watched it with his mom and his sister. This morning at 10am we were awake and ready to watch Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. And at 1.30pm Harry Potter and the prisoner of Azkaban was scheduled.

:D

Martin and I had seen the movies before, but his mom and sister didn't. But luckely they liked it. We had dinner together in an Egyptian restaurant here in the city center, it's a restaurant we've been many times before. We choose the same food every time, but it's just good :) And after dinner we went to the cinema to see Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. Good movie it was ;)

By the way, Dutch translations can be very funny. I've read the Potter books in English, and during the movies I hardly read the subtitles actually... but isn't it silly that in Dutch Cedric Diggory is called Carlo Kannewasser? I mean: why translate/change the names so radicaly?? In Dutch Hermione Granger is called Hermelien Griffel, but that sounds quite alike. Question to my German readers: You've got all movies dubbed into German, but at least you've got the same names, haven't you? Or are the names changed into something German as well?

Going to sleep now, dreaming of "Alohamora" and "Expecto Patronus" and so on. Hopefully I won't get scary nightmares cause dark and difficult times lie ahead.... ;)

In the mood for x-mas

We're in the mood for x-mas! So we searched for our x-mas tree in the attic and all the other x-mas decorations. Let the pictures speak for themselves :P




Merry Christmas!!!

Present mood: Just greeeeaat!!

I'm happy, confused as well (is it really true?), I feel valued, I feel loved! Still can't believe it's for real!!!

I was already preparing for January, the unemployment... I've spent the last months searching for new vacancies, most of the time unsuccessfully, I've been turned down in two interviews. In my mind I was already saying good bye to the kids at work and my dear colleagues. I wasn't looking forward to our x-mas celebration at work, for it would be my final day there as well.

BUT.........................

I CAN STAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Finally (!!!) the board of directors realises they can't cut back in the primary proces of treatment of these kids. Without me there would be a huge problem, actually. Finally they gave their approval for this, and they've made me and my collegues very, very happy.

And that, together with the smile that's been on my face since last Sunday's Wise Guys concert, is making this week the best week of the year :D

[sigh] :D

Now please give me my contract, so I can sign it, and so I can see it's not a joke...

Kurzbericht Wise Guys in Wesel 04.12.05

Hach, wie geil war das? Suuuuuupergeil! *g*
Ich werde heute anfangen ein Konzertbericht zu schreiben (für corine.located.nl, also, mit Details. Jetzt schon ein paar Bilder und ein paar kleine Berichte.


@Purzl: Es hat super geklappt! Däns Reaktion wenn ich ihm die Vla gegeben habe: "GEIL!!" (I still don´t quite understand this.... german people and vla.... weird experience haha) Und dann hat er mich geknuddelt :D
Oh ja, Flyli, was machst du da eigentlich? Möchtest du auch Vla haben?? *laaach*


@Flyli: Hehe, du hast gelachen!!! Kompliment! ;) *lol* Ich schicke dir das große (original) Bild von uns dreien per Mail.


@Anke, Mareike und Flyli: Ich fands super euch (wieder) zu treffen. Ich hab wirklich gaaanz viel Spaß gehabt und fands super das wir aufgestanden sind bei "Ruf doch mal an". Glücklicherweise hattet ihr dieselbe Gedanke wie ich auf dem Moment :D

Nach nur 5 Stunden Schlaf musste ich schon wieder arbeiten. Sinterklaas feiern mit die Kinder auf meine Arbeit.... toll..... Na, es war lustig und die Kinder waren total süß. Und jetzt bin ich schon wieder zu Hause *juhu*

Aryan wants his picture here

Yesterday we had a lot of things to do. First we helped Martins grandparents move into their new home. We found out old people have a lot of things. I think I unpacked about 6 (!!) boxes full with only cups and glasses. But, we had a lot of fun, and many family members were helping. The men were transporting boxes from the old house to the new house, the women were unpacking everything in the new house and cleaning up. What a great allocation of tasks ;) In between the unpacking and cleaning I had a lot of fun with Martins cousin Sarah.
Notice my great Zwarte Pietencap! For my German readers, who are probably not familiar with Sinterklaas, click here and read all about this Dutch celebration.

In the evening we celebrated Sinterklaas with friends. Celebrating Sinterklaas means presents with funny poems and a lot of candy. Actually it was just a normal average Sinterklaas evening like we have every year, but I had to write something about it in my blog, for Aryan insisted on having his picture in my blog.

Well, so here it is. Ladies and gentlemen, let me introduce to you: Ataryan, the craziest person on earth, he came over to the Netherlands with his wife Marga, all the way from South Africa, and was celebrating Sinterklaas with us:


Oh... I hope I didn't scare you with this picture, dear readers.
Let me give you another picture where Aryan looks a bit sweeter. This is Aryan after he got a present from Sinterklaas. He got a yellow rubber Ducky, and he was sooooo happy with it!



If you want to know more about Aryan, you can check his website. But I forgot the URL... *hehe* so Aryan will have to post that himself when he leaves his comment here.

@Aryan: happy now? ;)
@Aryan and Marga: We'll miss you both! Have a good trip home!