Last thursday I had my last day at the company that brought me to Denmark two years ago, Hello Group. Thanks to them I have a really big network of friends here, obviously an important thing when you’re a foreigner on his own From now on I’ll be working as a freelancer again on the international market of frontend and mobile development. I’d love to do some theater/installation stuff too, but that might be a bit too much to start with. Maybe later.

I also have a new phone number, and I’ll be moving soon, so update your address books accordingly

• Working at Hello is like reliving your teenage years sometimes
• The concept of lillejuleaften (little x-mas eve) is yet another Danish reason to get drunk and misbehave (“de bloemetjes buiten zetten” as we say in Holland)
• The purser on my flight had a rather interesting twitch of explaining the safety procedures: “Stop screaming before you put on the oxygen mask. Seriously, STOP SCREAMING!”
• Flying into Amsterdam Schiphol airport is still one of my favorite approaches of the world. Holland can indeed be pretty!
• I have to agree with my foreign friends that Dutch toilet design is really weird
• Dutch television content hasn’t changed over the last years
• I don’t like Teletubbies
• Holland is flat.. really flat!
• Amsterdam is still a nice city
• But, I miss Copenhagen and consider it as my home

Because cycling on my bike was now becoming slower than plain walking, I cut the knot (dutch saying) and bought a new Stalen Ros (dutch name for bike).

It’s retro and perdy

I parked my old bicycle unlocked at CBS (Fasanvej), if you need a crapy bike!

I’m not very positive about Post Danmark usually (slower than pigeons!), but I have to say that they have something really cool now: døgnposten.

Because I have a normal job, I’m at work every weekday between 9 and 5 (yawn). Of course this is also the time frame in which the postman delivers any packages, causing the packages to return to the post office where I need to collect them on Saturday (closes at 2pm.. so even that is sometimes hard to manage).

With døgnposten I can send my packages to:

Rico Tijsen
ID 51372521
Døgnposten 623
2000 Frederiksberg, Denmark

And they will send an sms (containing a pincode) when I receive a new package after which I can pick it up at whatever time! Just brilliant!

I love to get packages btw.. so keep them coming

Life is all about getting your priorities straight.

Last week I put myself in the choice of either getting a new bike, or a kitchen appliance. The choice between my main means of transportation, and something I don’t REALLY need, but is very welcome anyway.

So, 2 ty-raps, new break pads (189 DKK!), some oil, and a tube later, I ordered the KitchenAid mixer.. Fire-engine red, of course.

I’ve decided to take a break. So tired! I was the only one left from all the way in the beginning (june 2007), so it felt a bit as a betrayal. However, now I have 2-3 evenings per week of extra time which I would like to fill up with some art/theater related things. After this weekend’s seminar (Metropolis), I’m convinced I can put my programming and light/sound design skills to use in instalation art, which I can easily start off on just my computer and some web space.

I made my online video debut today. I’m not telling you where though. Go and find out yourself. The first person to find it gets a cookie!

35 celsius? OMG!

I really like this iPod + Nike Web 2.0 integration. I think it’s pretty cool that you can see your runs online and share with your friends. While I’m really not a good runner, in the three runs I’ve done now, I can see that I went from a pace of 5’17″/km to 4’58″/km over the same distance. Now that it’s getting better weather, I think I’ll raise the frequency a bit. I find it a bit hard to get out of bed earlier in the morning, so I guess I should try to do it in the early evening after work.

Finally, winter has arrived! It has snowed two days already, and this is the forecast for easter:

Crazy weather here!