Between this article and all the comments on it, as well as a number of expat forum posts about life in the Netherlands reaffirming the same and more, I think I’ll hold off on my school plans there. Maybe visiting once a year is good enough, eh?
Monthly Archives: January 2011
What a clusterfuck. I really hope tons of people jump ship when iPhone hits Verizon. AT&T’s service add-on list is the stupidest jumble of confusing crap I ever saw and it pisses me off. Die.
I buy expensive kitchen stuff not because I know the difference but because I want to look cool and have fancy stuff and use what they use on Iron Chef. Does using a $20 ladle make the soup taste any better than when I use the one that came in the 15-piece set costing the same? Who cares, it’s pretty. I’ll use my $150 stainless pot once a month and botch the dish. My mom uses her $20 pot every day on an electric (!) range and delivers a masterpiece. It is what it is.
Now I love my All-Clad, but they are really good about making things that cost 300% more than anything else. The law of diminishing returns is in full force. Here are my favorite things even I can’t bring myself to buy, along with a widely sold similar item for comparison:
 All-Clad Stainless Mesh Splatter Screen - $59.95 |
 OXO Good Grips Splatter Screen with Folding Handle - $19.99 |
 All-Clad Stainless Dbl-Sided Measuring Beaker - $34.95 |
 OXO Steel Double Jigger - |
 All-Clad Stainless Mixing Bowl Set - $89.95 |
 OXO Good Grips 3-Pc Stainless Mixing Bowl Set - $34.99 |
If you buy each piece of the All-Clad mixing bowl set separately, it would cost you $159.85 in total, so $90 for the set is actually a steal!
I’m trying to determine how big of a phone I can tolerate, but it’s hard when I can’t really hold it in my hand. When spatial reasoning fails, make a model.
Smart phone, smart phone, on the wall, which is the smallest of them all?
_
I like to think this was a good use of my time.
My dumbphone is fine and all, but I want a decent unlocked quad-band GSM phone that I can use internationally first and foremost, as well as at home. I am pretty sure I know which one I want (Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 Mini Pro – which is, in fact, represented by the paper phone in the center above; the X1 is to the left, Rich’s Palm Pre is on the right), but I’ll wait until it gets cheaper.
Hey, jerks, Electric Zoo 3-day (THREE DAYS!!) early bird tickets are still for sale, so grab ‘em while they’re hot. It’s in September. I know, far away. And what’s that you say? The lineup’s not even up yet? Who freakin’ cares, it’s a guaranteed phenomenal show every single time. When it gets closer and you realize you don’t like the DJ’s, can’t make it, or are a lameass, EASY: sell the ticket(s). Yes, it costs an arm and a leg, but it’ll cost more than that if you keep waiting. I don’t want to hear ya’ll bitching when you have to pay a billion dollars trying to buy a ticket the day of because you hemmed and hawed for nine freakin’ months. Fool.
Made Event – Buy them there. And check out some of those other shows while you’re at it (I’ll be at Super8 & Tab).
How long before banh mi shows up on the Subway (eat right!) menu?
I heard a man say “pho” like “foe” just last week. I tried to muffle a scream but it still came out.
Rich and I cook about three times a week, more or less. Usually one of us will cook one night and then we take the next day off either eating the leftovers or ordering/eating out. Last week we did the unthinkable and cooked three nights in a row. Or at least tried. Each meal was largely a failure so by Wednesday we both decided neither of us was going near the stove again the rest of the week.
On top of that, though, we both had really vivid, terrible dreams all three of those nights, bad enough to wake us up in the middle of the night a few times. I’ve heard of certain foods giving some people vivid dreams or nightmares, but damn. That’s some bad cooking.
If you go during early March, there’s fares around $470 including fees and taxes. I would jump on this myself but Rich put his foot down about going during summer since he is tired of dealing with the North Sea farting its icy winds on us. I’d say let’s just go in March and summer, but okay, okay, I’ll show some restraint… $470 is so hard to say no to though…
Last night I dreamt my family and I went to Madurodam.
When I go too long without doing lessons, I accidentally write “ich” and “mein” instead of “ik” and “mijn”. I should just learn German because everyone says Dutch sounds ugly anyway.
My proudest moment was when I had a full conversation in Dutch. It went like this, except in Dutch obviously:
Clerk: Hello.
Me: Hello.
Clerk: *rings up purchases* It’ll be €7.10.
Me: *hands over €10 note*
Clerk: Do you have 10 cents?
Me: Yes! *fishes out 10 cents*
Clerk: Thank you. *gives change*
Me: Thank you.
Oh yeah, I’m totally fluent. 
Wrapping the dates of Armin’s ASOT 500 (April 9). Also a good time to visit Keukenhof Gardens and see the tulips.
NONSTOP.
NEWARK (>JFK) to SCHIPHOL.
$606!!!
You know how Ari from Entourage punches the air and flails his arms around when he’s excited for whatever reason? That’s me.
Edit: Now $587. Somebody jump on this.
Here’s one of my favorite passages from How Not to Get Hit by a Bicycle:
I was first smitten at 17, just out of high school and floating around Europe on the cheap. I was zigzagging by rail all over the continent and kept snapping back to Amsterdam. This place just felt right to me. When I went home, I left part of my mind here. Then I went on a 27-year tour of being a grownup. I had work, art, adventures, relationships. But I kept wanting Amsterdam. I took so many little trips here that people began to think I liked travelling. I hate travelling. Finally I ran out of excuses and just moved here. Here I am.
(Emphasis mine.)
The bold part cracks me up. And on the other side of the same coin, I really love traveling, but every time I start planning a trip, I start thinking about how I can swing over to Amsterdam on my way there or back. I have 1,000 destinations on my list of places to go, but at the end of all my planning, it comes down to when I can visit Amsterdam. This last trip to the Netherlands? It was supposed to be a summer Ibiza vacation.
