The busy day

We decided to spend the day very useful by running as many errands as we could including a few things we were planning a long time ago. To start with the first one: This is a sign at some christian school close by. "God bless exams". But of course he does... I have to laugh every morning we drive past it to work except I always forget to make a photo. Make photo: Check.

The first stop today was the central market for weekly über-fresh groceries. We park above the new bus station which was getting it's sign.

I think even blind people will be able to read this.

Nicole being happy at the market.

At the Central market there is this place, I'm sure I've mentioned it before, where you can buy certain Dutch food items. De Ruyter (chocolate) stuff for example.

Or Bolletje beschuit. Does anybody know how to translate "beschuit" into English please?

And also some other chocolate things. There was more like, ontbijtkoek, speculaas en kaneelstok but I can't photograph everything.

Then it was time to hit the smelly cheese shop where we bought little bits of very nice French cheeses.

On the way out we walked past this old theatre. Central market: Check.

Next stop: Woolworths supermarket. Because like Kona, we also needed banana's.

Woolies: Check.

After having dropped all our shopping off at home and a quite bite for lunch we left again. It had started raining by then which made us add a laundry rack to out shopping list.

We went to check out bird cages because we want to give my inlaws' birds better homes. We saw a few nice ones, a bit pricy but we're ready to fork it out to improve their lives. We didn't buy any yet though. Bird cages: Check.

The fourth stop was at Jaycar where I had a fun driving experience (not!). Thankfully nothing happened but there was potential! More on Jaycar later. Jaycar: Check.

Fifth stop: Ikea. What can I say? It was Saturday early afternoon. Prime time. People come here for a stroll, to relax, you know. Dickheads. Honestly, Nicole is not the fastest of walkers but we were overtaking people left, right and centre! Unreal!

Around 10 check outs open and still line-ups of 4-10 people. We went here to buy the super brush but also the drying rack for our clothes that I mentioned earlier. They didn't have any drying racks that we liked though. Only retarded and useless models. Ikea: Check.

So we added a sixth stop to our list: Big W. Outside of Big W they have a fries-vending-machine. Unreal. It makes you fresh fries it says. Hot fresh fries even. Too bad I couldn't test it because it was out of order. I would have!

At least we got us a laundry rack. Not one like we had in A'dam though, which was a great one from Blokker. This one will just do. I don't know how but we managed to hang almost two laundries on it... Laundry rack: Check.

At Jaycar I bought a bigger heat sink so my power supply can deal with the heat a bit better.

And here it is, the find of the day: The Ikea brush! I already used it for some big-ass dishes from my meatballs and yeah, it works!

Brush: CHECK!

Who are you?

Today I went to the pub with Mark and Luke. Nicole joined later. I was wearing my hoody and my phone was in the pouch. I forgot to take my phone out before taking it off. While I'm pulling it over my head I remembered my phone was in but it seemed to go OK so I thought I could continue. About 0.6 second later my phone fell out and decided to split up 3 ways on the floor. That happened before on a concrete floor and it survived well. This was wood so I wasn't worried.

However, the memory was erased during the fall so my calendar is now empty and all my contacts are gone. According to my phone I don't know any people and I have no appointments or birthdays to remember whatsoever.

And you are?

The brush

I was waiting to cross North Terrace on my way to work right after Nicole dropped me off. It was busy as usual. From here it's only 5 minutes to my work.

I got soup for lunch. Roasted vegetables. The soup nazi is quite popular.

At my work we have this brush to wash the dishes with. I want one. I think it's from Ikea. Must look on Saturday.

Luke likes doughnuts

As I was leaving the house this morning, a flock of white cockies landed in the walnut tree again.

Walking to work I noticed this shop window. I really hope it's not a clothing shop...

Half way the morning I thought it was time for doughnuts again. My colleagues Luke and Mark chipped in as well and I got us a box of 12 doughnuts.

Luke was obviously thrilled.

I walked a small round at lunch time. Mainly because I walked the wrong way looking for a cash machine but never mind that.

The company I work for is called ISS (group). There are two other ISS'. One does security and the other one cleans (or are they called hygiene engineers these days?). The cleaner guys were parked across the road during lunch.

I take the bus home these days. It's quite relaxed I have to say. I leave work just before the rush starts and the stop where I catch the bus is the first stop so the bus is almost empty when it comes meaning good seating possibilities!

It was getting dark on the way home and the lights went on to shine over the palm trees in the park.

The meat balls

I came across one of the freakiest bugs I have seen in my IT career so far today. We were thinking about buying this 3rd party web control. It's a drop down list. You know, like a list of countries. You click the arrow on the side and it folds open a list. Now, I work with 2 screens and was testing this on my right screen, which is the secondary one. The control wouldn't work. Not even the samples from the maker's website. I started looking into this before the weekend and had also emailed the maker to ask what's up with not working on my computer (and 2 other colleagues' computers). He wrote back something about a bug in Internet Explorer and dual screens, not specifying what exactly. Out of sheer desperation I moved my browser window to my left, primary, screen and behold, it bloody worked!

The above picture shows the drop down list in the middle of my 2 screens. When I click it, the list is displayed entirely on the left screen only using half the width of the control. It will NOT show on my right screen. Bizarre.

When I left work I ran into piano-man again. He's cool.

The view behind me as I was waiting for the bus. Nicole can't pick me up anymore because she works a little later than me.

Crossing through the park lands in the bus.

I got off at the shopping centre to buy a block of butter. I also bought to boxes of tissues and 3 pair of socks. Because of the latter we can now postpone washing clothes till the weekend.

I walked home as it was getting dark quickly. This is what people see when they run into me ;-P

The tennis courts close to our house. Unfortunately it's a private club and not open for public. Bastards...

I made meatballs tonight. Big, round giant Dutch meatballs. And as with all super-food we start by melting a big block of butter ;-)

Raw meat "Before" picture. It's about half a kilo of minced meat. I added salt, black pepper, paprika powder, currie powder, 1 egg and fine, dry bread crumbs.

Raw meat "After" picture. 5 lean mean balls of meat.

When you're done rolling, the butter should've almost melted.

Put the balls into the melted, hot butter and brown the outside nicely.

When the outside has been sealed you can add half a litre of water and put the lit on.

The meat balls have to simmer for about 30 minutes so why not crack open some wine?

30 minutes later they are done. Oh, did you notice one is missing in the picture above?

Here it is! In my sandwich. I really need to get some applesauce, maybe tomorrow.

Shiny balls

The coffee gods were good to me today. Or maybe it was because of the email my colleague sent out to everyone after my big coffee machine cleanup extravaganza. Who knows? It was ready to roll and it made me a good cuppa Joe too. Something probably goes very wrong next time...

The morning was miserable. A storm started right after Nic came back from the toilet at 4 AM. We feared mostly for the two cockies outside. We tried to give them shelter but it also increased the surface that the wind can blow on and thus it increases the risk of the cages to be blown over. Anyway, after 4 AM we didn't really sleep much also because a banging sound that reminded us of parts of a roof being ripped off somewhere. On top of that we had to get up at 6:45 because it was Nic's first day at work and they have an early meeting every Monday etc. etc. Whilst leaving the house I heard that banging sound again and went to investigate. It was created by two f&@*!ng lemons bigger than tennis balls banging against the metal plated fence. Beauty. On the way to work we even got some hail. It was all very unpleasant. By lunch time the sun was out again.

After work I walked to the pub again. As I passed the mall's balls I noticed the little lights below it. I've always wanted to see them on but it was never dark enough.

Aren't they pretty? They weren't always there we think. I can't remember seeing them before we arrived this time.

I was desperate for my fix of Magners Irish cider and ordered a bottle of it. It fits exactly one pint. Very exciting when pouring because you can pour it out fast and everybody who doesn't know will think you're gonna spill it hehe. Yes, I know, it's a dark photo. Maybe it will improve when I buy my iPhone... IF I buy one...

Driving through town on our way home. Pretty lights everywhere. It's very nice to have a drink and a meal after work.