waiting impatiently...

Yes folks, it is this time of year.
Sinterklaas is back for a few days. He's here in Holland and is fullu occupied to deliver all kinds of goods and gifts to the children.
His assistants help him out wherever they can. Sinterklaas is ofcourse an old man. He lives for over 300 years now. His helpers are therefore very useful. They are in to all kind of little mischieves, and doing things one is not supposed to do. Their skincolor is black, and the ware rings through their ears.
On december 5th, he will visit my house. Hope my family is there.
I'll serve pepernoten, hot choclatmilk with whipped cream, even have some bishopwine
on the stove. Everyone will get presents. But one present is special it contains a
poet specially written by Sinterklaas for this person only.

starting to play piano..

Anyway, think i can...
To read the notes, to place your hands correctly,
and keeping pace all at the same time isn't easy. But as you know through practice excellence..

away from the doorbel..

Oh boy, have i got trouble with my doorbel. I have bought almost everything available in the market to fix th darn thing.
I've trouble with the bell itself, its electricity transformer and the belsound itself..

I' live here now for 2.5 years and never succeeded in fixing the problem: now I have.
Aways with all the modern stuff. A old hammer on the door with a nail for the sound. That is my solution. No expensive electricity bill for me no more, uhh uhhh. Just hammer on the door: i will asure you, i' ll open the door in recordtime..

My father is dead, and if he was alive, he would become 80 on December 24.
Today he passed away, five years ago. I miss him very much. He was on my mind all day long. Not a happy day.
But i am grateful to have known him so long, and shared our lives for so many days.

Inspite of it all, i fixed my doorbel, painted on my portrait of a blue man (120 x 120 cm), started to design a 'logo' for my art site.. I am exited

the tsar family.

hermitage-02_bg.jpg
Originally uploaded by paulphoto.

Here as if nothing would ever change, the family poses for the camera. Not aware of the downfall that soon would be. Alexander and his family would soon be murdered by the boltsjewists...

romanov's the dynasty...

This weekend on Sunday, we (sjaak and Jurr and me) visited Amsterdam the hermitage. It was great.

Whow, picture this:
you are born in russia, and made tsar. But you don't feel equipped for the job. even stronger, in your opening speech you even declare yourself not fit for the job: what in impact this must have been for a society reigned by emperors for almost 300 years...

The close and tighly knit circles surrounding you and your wife are strongly depending on the fact that a tsar rules the nation. After all the court is depending on you. 90 percent of the nations population is poor and keeps barely alive: on the contary of the court: it was declared to be one of the richest and of the western world.

And there you stand: all alone, with nothing to add to your predessecor, only to copy his way of coveryncy.
and nothing to add. And even your own fysique is not matching the image of your predessecor.You are small he was tall, and ruling an army with iron will. You on the other hand, are hardly capable of controlling all those mighty men.

This exibition is a ode to the romanov family, dynasty that ended with such tragedy. The killing of the tsar Nicolas III and his wife, and three childeren... Go and see it....

some of those days..

Slowly starting, just a cup of coffee, loggin in to the system and read some mail, and than increase the tempo of your workpace. Be able to do what you planned to do..

That would be ideal, Does it happen to you often?

Not to me, today it's manic. Thousand things to do, trying to manage it all. And just when you start practicing your just learned timemanagement thing, all kind of interruptions occur. Get the concept ready for the ads, give me infomation about... Make sure all the flows of invoices is dealt with today, Sorry this realy realy is a rush job.
Whooo, the printingoffice called, your digital document lacs the highresolution pictures. Send a courier fast, the deadline is pressing
Can I just talk to you about a plan i have for the internet?
Please send me the guidelines regarding the forms we use.

O, it s 7.00 p.m already, should get my lunch now...
And instead of that, i'll go home. exhausted. Can't wait for another day at the office...

state of the art

Must admit that autumm is really settling in.
Outside my house tons of leaves are falling from the trees.
This is my second year living in this house and gathering experience with a garden.

The first year I neatly cleaned serveral times all the fallen leaves. A chore that took me more time than i cared for. Besides my carbagebin was filled to the top everytime.
Believe it or not, just when i finished: fresh fallen leaves appeared. Frustrating...

Now my neigbour has bought a 'leaveblower' (he's new to the block) and blew all leaves from his garden. But I didn't clean up any of my leaves, and i am telling you.
The wind will take care of this. I predict the leaves of my garden will spreadout again and he will have to use his blower again. Only solution is a cooperate action
of all neighbours. What do you think: will this happen?

shaking the tree.

Yesterday, a terible thing happened. Theo van Gogh a writer, tvmaker has been murdered.
Not in an accident or something like that, no not at all.
In broad daylight, when children went to school, escorted by their mothers a guy
(26 years old) walke up to him, and shot him. Theo fel down still alive begging mercy for his life, than the murderer stabbed him with a knife, slit Theo's throat, and in addition planted a smaller knife with note attachted to it in Theo's belly.

Amsterdam mourned for the loss of Theo, but just as much for the freedom of speech. Theo was quit contraversiol in his tvmaking, and columms he wrote.
Having a different opnion should never be an excuse for a kill.
So in Holland the general opinion is Enough is enough, no more off it.
We want all our residents to behave and respect the values and norms we have as a Dutch society, tolerance and freedom of speech are just two of those values..

She's here...

Three days

My mother visited me the last three days. Reason for this is we gave her a birthday gift last year. She celebrated her 80st
birthday... We (two sisters and me) gave her a 'chequebook'. Every month she can decide what to do in one weekend.
the only thing certain is who is on duty, so once every two months: i am on..
it gives her the oppetunity to do something she really likes, without us discussing it or pretending not have the time for it.
Cashing in this cheque can mean anything: eat outdoors, visit a theater or film, or do a chore in/about the appartment.

So I had her here for three days over in my house: but it wasn't all that fun, she had dizzyspells up to 6 times in one day.
She had almost panicattacks: the combination of not being all alone for a few days, combined with the fact she was with me, in my house so far for my hometown etc. Lots of thoughts passed through her mind.. I felt burdened with this fact that she had to suffer en endure those attacks. i tried to stay calm: it wasn't easy. Still there were good moments as well:
walking in the forrest, talking and having breakfast again.

balkon

balkon,
originally uploaded by paulphoto.

impression

impression,
originally uploaded by paulphoto.

Picctures taken from within and outside the building

concertgebouw,, the orchestra

foto_splash_1,
originally uploaded by paulphoto.

truly amazing, the concert took three lovely hours
it was mesmarizing to see everybode work together creating a stunning endresult...