Calculus

Some days ago I received a letter from the Dutch social security administration. I think they were testing my abilities in calculus. I failed.

 The letter said:
“In our letter dated February 25th, 2013 we let you know that you have to pay back an amount of €3424.25 to us.
The total you have to pay consists of the following:
For this year you have to pay back €2187.62.
For last year or earlier you have to pay back €52.84.
In total you have to pay back €2673.01.
Please use the transfer order form attached. Amount: €2240.46.”

So, are you better than me in calculus?

Washing instructions

Washing instructions – who ever reads them? Yes, those outrageously large ugly tags attached to your clothes that make you itch and ruin the look. And when you remove them they still make you itch. Unless you cut them off with a piece of fabric. I never read what´s on there. Instead I cut them off and wash all my clothes at 30 degrees and hang to dry. If something looks too fragile and is too dear to my heart I wash it by hand.

Tonight while my baby was asleep I wasn´t. How ironic. I went upstairs to distract myself. The washing machine had just finished a 60 degrees programme with a load of baby stuff. That all went straight into the drying machine. After that I loaded the washing machine with more laundry, removed some dry laundry from the line, played with the cat, and did some more useful stuff. Then I sat at my desk and saw the washing instructions tag from my nursing bra. The bra had done the 60 degrees round together with the baby things and was now almost dry in the dryer.

´Hand wash only´ the tag said. You must be kidding.
´Do not dry clean´. LOL!
´Wash with similar colours.´ So with what colours do you wash a thing that´s light blue with white and pink?
‘Wash inside out.’ ‘Dry flat’. ‘Do not tumble dry’. Ow...

I think I’d better go to bed now. And see what comes out of the dryer in the morning.

Please do yourself a favour

It’s that time of the year (month) again: people post those long status updates about the ‘recent changes to privacy settings on Facebook’. Usually these updates are indeed about some recent changes and sometimes they do contain some useful information. This current flow however makes absolutely no sense to me. First of all, because the changes are at least one year old (they were the inspiration for this post). Second, because they have nothing to do with the reality. I don’t want to rant here, but rather share my knowledge of the subject as I do not find it difficult at all and thus maybe can help other people to find their way to a more ‘private’ Facebook existence.

"Because of some changes that Facebook made, everybody can see our activities on your and my wall." Wrong! You have the control of who can see what on your wall.

"It happens when a Facebook friend of you or me likes or comments on our posts. Automatically all his/her friends will see the post, likes and comments." Again, whether or not friends of friends can see that depends on your own settings.

"I can’t change this settings due to restrictions of Facebook." Honestly, I don’t know what restrictions people are talking about. But you CAN actually change the settings. For that go to your Privacy Settings and choose Custom. Then Edit settings for each option available. If you do not want friends of friends to see your posts, you simply do not choose that option. You can restrict your posts to your friends, a custom made subgroup (an extremely useful feature imho) or to yourself only. You can even exclude certain people from seeing what everyone else is allowed to see. Oh, and don’t forget to uncheck the box Allow subscribers under Account settings. How much further do you want to go?

"But you can do this for me.
- Put your mouse on my name in this post (don’t click when you do that).
- Then put your mouse on Friends (don’t click).
- Go to Settings and click.
- Go to Comments and Likes and click to unmark it."

That people certainly can and should do, but this won’t help you much. This way they only control what they see from you in their Ticker (which they can hide altogether) and their News Feed. It will not help you to become less visible to their friends if your posts are open to Friends of Friends (or the Public). Besides, most of your Facebook friends will probably either miss your status update with this request or be too busy or lazy to actually do all this. But don’t let this stop YOU from doing all of the above because you will have a cleaner and more relevant News Feed as a result.

“When you do this my posts and activities will stay among my Facebook friends and won’t be public to anyone else.” Well, wrong, see all of the above.

There are many ways to make your Facebook account fit your needs in terms of privacy and it’s impossible to describe them all in one post. But please feel free to ask, I’ll be happy to answer any specific questions.

Just one more remark: when we worry about our privacy let’s not forget that Facebook is made for sharing, not for hiding. Use other means for passing your very private messages. Snail mail still works too.

A recent find: Souad Massi - Raoui

New neighbourhood

Now that the boxes are unpacked, and most things have found their place in our new home I finally start paying attention to the neighbourhood. It’s different from where I lived before. It’s a small sleepy village (though in the middle of The Hague). There are signs ‘Attention! Neighbourhood Watch’, but I haven’t been lucky to see them yet. I also wonder what there is to watch. There’s hardly ever anyone on the street and you can leave your bike unlocked in front of your door for days.

The neighbours do not dry colourful saris and head scarves on their balconies. On warm sunny evenings the smells from outside are mainly those of barbeques rather than a mix of Turkish, Antillean and Surinamese spices. And instead of Turkish, Papiamento, Punjab and Hindi neighbours mainly use Dutch, English, German, Spanish or something Asian.

Even though we live very close to the sea, there are no seagulls. In case you didn’t know: seagulls are not interested in fish. They are interested in garbage packed in black plastic bags that they open in search of food spreading the rest of the trash all over the street. People here produce enough trash to fill large green garbage containers. Thus no plastic bags, no seagulls and no street litter.

Yesterday we found an envelope on our doormat. It was plain white with ‘Invitation’ handwritten on it. Wow an invitation! Curious we opened the envelope. It was an invitation from the local... Tree Committee. Yes, the Tree Committee. And we are invited to their second anniversary celebration that will be held at a little square next to our house. What a thrill!

After reading the programme I thought I was losing connection with the reality. During the celebration you can admire the world of wearables made of tree leaves (if I am to believe the picture); discover the secrets of a tree (any tree hugging and talking involved?) and get your... eh... tree climbing diploma from Steven Ibelings, the Dutch tree climbing champion! I read the programme three times to make sure it’s real and not made up by my hormones.

A very different neighbourhood, indeed. Shall I go for the tree climbing diploma?

Unstoppable?

As you can see from the cold deadly silence on this blog there are forces that can keep me from blogging. Apparently apartments move during pregnancy is a very bad combination. Add some extra (administrative) procedures due to childbirth and the visit of my parents and voilà – no time or energy for a blog. Things that bother me most at the moment (in that particular order):

1. Hormones. 
2. Heartburn. 
3. Regularly failing internet connection. 
4. Hormones. 
5. Never ending moving boxes. 
6. Heartburn. 
7. Lack of space. 
8. Hormones. 
9. Total lack of concentration. 
10. Heartburn. 
11. Too many stairs inside the house. 
12. Hormones. 
13. Stress from pressing administrative procedures. 
14. Heartburn. 
15. Hormones.

And the nesting instinct hasn’t even kicked in yet! On the bright side: I can still tie my laces and take care of my toe nails. 

Congratulations! You earned a new title.

Thanks to all who took part in the guessing circus. Starting from last Monday there’s no guessing anymore – it’ll be a girl. Definitely not a cat which is good because for now I think one cat is enough.

If you voted for a girl (11 votes) you can now officially put ‘psychic’ behind your name on your business cards.

If you voted for a boy (7 votes), a cat (4 votes) or The Tree of Life (3 votes) you can still pretend you voted for a girl. No one can check. And then you can put ‘psychic’ behind your name on your business cards.

If you didn’t vote at all you can still pretend you voted for a girl. See above.

Have fun designing your new business cards.

Wrong message

Ladies, keep your men at home! Instead of letting them go to Ukraine for the Euro 2012 and meet half-naked Ukrainian girls give them a draught beer dispenser. The one you can get for free if you let the Nederlandse Energie Maatschappij supply your home with electricity.

That was the message that the NLE was trying to send with their TV-commercials. And this message caused a slight diplomatic unrest between Ukraine and the Netherlands. According to the Ukrainian authorities this is offensive to Ukrainians and sends out the wrong message to people in the Netherlands.

I tried to Google images of ´Ukrainian women´. Julia Timoshenko appears on the top. Yes, that´s what NLE should have talked about. A political prisoner who allegedly was beaten up by the prison guards. That sends the right message.

Or the measles outbreak in Ukraine and the increased risk of contracting measles during the European Football Championships 2012. So do get a vaccine. And while you´re at it also do get vaccination against diphtheria, tetanus, pertussis and polio.

Maybe mentioning the outrageous hotel prices would be less offensive. And the lack of budget airlines. And the fact that you will be charged tree times the price for everything if you don´t speak spotless Ukrainian or Russian.

Oh wait, Ukrainian women are not an issue anymore and the diplomats have something else on their hands: explosions in Dnepropetrovsk. Officially nothing is known about the organisers of the explosions, but the rumours say these maybe protests against the Timoshenko case. The circle is round.

Ukraine is ready for the Euro 2012 and you are welcome. Or sign a contract with the NLEnergie and get your beer dispenser.

PS on a bright note: you didn't forget to guess, did you?