Generating coincidence

You are visitor number 1.000.000! This is no joke!
Our coincidence-generator has selected you as potential EXCLUSIVE WINNER for a Mini!
">>> Click Here <<<"

What? Is that seriously meant to lure people into clicking?
Let's analyse that for a minute.

1. "You are visitor number 1.000.000!"
   So you're saying that I'm the millionth visitor on a 12 year old website with 1.420.161 registered users. Not to mention you told me I'm the millionth visitor twice by now... on two different computers.
2. "This is no joke!"
   Oh, it's not? Well I guess I'll click it then.
3. "Our coincidence-generator has..."
   A coincidence generator? What is a coincidence generator? How on earth can you generate coincidence?

I do not doubt that whoever designed that advert is a complete retard. It's ridiculous. But having that kind of poorly designed 'lure-in'-adverts spread across the internet is not what worries me though. What worries me is that, apparently, it's worth the time and effort to put such a monstrosity on-line. The mere fact that they haven't disappeared over the last decade, but instead increased, is proof that apparently they are successful. That, ladies and gentlemen, means there are people out there who believe those adverts.
I know there are thousands of 'hackers' and millions of computer viruses out there. But the knowledge that THOSE kind of people are out there somewhere too, frightens me a lot more.

Enough about that. It's time to pick up where I left last time.
I said I was going to tell you how the motivation thing turned out. Well, it was crap. I got a chessboard from the attic and set up a game, each day I did something useful I made a move at the end of the day. After 3 moves, I started to forget and go to sleep without having made a move. So the board is still there, with 3 moves.
On the bright side, I have started doing useful things. I've spend a few days working on a project, which got sort of cancelled, I've helped my brother and sister with cutting the hedges in the backyard and I've repaired an electric outlet (which was my fault it was broken, actually. But my client insisted on paying me). While doing the latter, I managed to blow up my multimeter. A multimeter is a device capable of measuring multiple things. This specific device was capable of measuring AC voltage, DC voltage, AC current, DC current and electrical resistance. Apparently, it's a bad idea to have it set up to measure resistance and then hook it up on 230 Volts. I of course was aware of it being rather harmful, but I forgot to turn the knob. I won't be uploading pictures, neither have I bothered to open it up yet, but I'm pretty sure the battery inside exploded. You can find pictures of exploded batteries on google, can't you?

Although I do not blog on a scheduled time or date, I've noticed I post a blog every eight days. So if I would continue this tradition, you would find me blogging Saturday next week. But you won't. I won't. Because Saturday next week, I'll be on a local festival called "Rock Werchter". Instead, I'll try to post a blog on Wednesday. It's the day before the festival begins and it's the day I get my results from this year. So you'll find me dreaming about the festival that is about to come and either bragging about how well I did or whining about how bad I did.

I'm looking forward to it. Let's just pray the coincidence generator doesn't generate too much unpleasant coincidences.

Playing chess with yourself

It's time for me to write something new here. I wouldn't want to disappoint all of you who read this (presumably me and my single follower, but who knows, someone might actually read this!).

Today, I woke up at 11 am. My vacation has recently started, a well-earned vacation after weeks of studying. I have the right to wake up this late and do nothing useful all day long.
This brings me to an interesting point.

This time last week, I was complaining to myself about how that one exam I still had on Monday stood in between me and doing all the things I had planned. And I had planned a lot of things!
This is going to be a pretty busy vacation, doing all kinds of things I consider to be fun.
Yet, now that I've had 3 days of vacation already, I haven't even started doing any of those fun things. Why not?
I couldn't wait to do so, yet now that I can I don't. There's no logical explanation for it. I still want to do those things, but whenever I think about beginning I have this "I'll do it tomorrow"-feeling and end up wasting the day. I wonder why. Is it because there's no obligation?
To find that out, I'll try to find a way to force me to do something, I'm thinking of something with a game of chess. I'll let you know how that turns out.

And now for something completely different.
Today, I heard that the bassist of The Eagles Of Death Metal has got cancer. I play bass myself, and The Eagles Of Death Metal are one of my favorite bands, so it sortof came as a shock. Not only because the man has got cancer, but also because I didn't know they had a bassist. Now this bassist I discovered has cancer and that isn't a very nice thing.
(and now some sneaky advertising:) I found out about this trough RMP, a Belgian community website for rock, metal and punk music. It can be found at www.rock-metal-punk.be. If you speak dutch and you're interested, you might as well join this community.

I've recently increased my activity on their forum. I seem to get along with the other users, so that's good I suppose.
I started to become and active member when I posted a question on that forum. Since it's a musical forum, I thought there might be some musicians there to tell me their thoughts about instrument amplifiers. Tell me what they would like to see in an amplifier they buy. Although I did have some feedback from one person, in general it was a disappointment. As on other places where I posted that question, I spent more time argueing against the "you can't pull this off because you're not a big company" sort of 'advice'.
If any musician happens to read this post, feel free to leave me a message to tell me what you think an amplifier should have. Anything you come up with, regardless of required skills or costs, just mention it.
Hey, this is the first I'm blogging about the amplifier I'm going to build? Well, expect a post dedicated to that alone! I'm not going to let you escape from that one.

Now I'm assuming you're interested in this amplifier plan. But fact is, I don't know wether you're interested in it or not. Because you are one of the bazillion people able to read this, for a start, but also because it's very hard to tell wether someone is interested when writing a blog. So please, whoever reads this, give me some feedback. Anything from half-a-book-of-thought-trough-commentary to "duck" will do.

I hope to get some feedback. The subject of my next post will depend on it. Don't think that not commenting will stop me from posting, though. I still have a lot of bullshit to share.

The savage jungle in the middle of the world

Hello.

Normally, I wake up with an interesting radio program. But not today, no, today I woke up with my radio playing unusual music.
Apparently the non-commercialized radio and television are on a strike. They are doing that because the government (or at least the one we had a little while ago, we don't anymore) told them they had to cut costs with a certain amount without decreasing the quality of the radio and television. The unions say that when cutting costs THAT much, it is not possible to maintain the same quality. Which means that today I woke up with music that didn't cost much author rights to play and lame news broadcasts about moronic politicians debating about pointless matters. Needless to say it didn't take long for me to turn off the radio.

Such a great start for such a wonderful day. I had a whole day of programming meaningless exercises ahead of me and weather was, well, simply crap. Too hot to keep windows closed, too rainy to open them. Wonderful.

A few minutes ago, after a day full of annoyance and boredom, I suddenly felt the urge to start a blog. Is it to whine about how bad life is? Is it to give cynical comments at my government? Is it to complain about the noise made by the buttons on a Nintendo GameBoy Color? No it's not.
In fact, I don't think I've started this blog for any reason at all. Just an impulsive act. But now that I've started it, I don't see why I shouldn't continue.

While writing all of the above, I think I came up with a theme for this blog. I'll dig into minds, perspectives, opinions, thoughts and dreams. I'll share knowledge and go on a search for more. I'll try to give you insight into the wilderness of my mind and open it for whatever escapes from yours.

So, dear reader, prepare yourself.
Sharpen your machete, load your rifle, give your jeep a final check-up and put on short trousers and a silly helmet.
We're going on a journey into the Savage jungle in the middle of my, your, THE world.