Another great departed...

Yesterday word got out: Rik Mayall passed away...

Rik Mayall was just 56 years of age and left behind 3 children and a wife.

No more Rick of the "Young Ones", no more Rich of "Filthy, Rich and Catflap", no more cameos in "Blackadder", no more Alan B'Stard of "The New Statesman", no more Fred of the movie "Drop Dead Fred" and no more narrator of the "Grim Tales"... To name but a few!

A great comedian, a great man! Richard will be missed!

More on Rik can be found HERE!

Happy Easter

Everybody's off, hoping for nice weather...

Here's a little sumthing to make you smile!

HAPPY EASTER!!

HBO Go or No Go?

Anyone been trying to watch the season's premiere of "Game Of Thrones" on HBO GO?
And? Saw anything? Or where you one of the many that suffered from the outage that hit HBO-GO?
If one provides a service like this, don't you think that one might have one's business in order...

How many HBO-GO people does it take to screw in a light-bulb? The answer could be: Not too many! Otherwise the light-bulb might POP.

I know this is a weird comparison, but the same thing happened March 31st in the Netherlands at the Tax Department: April 1st is the deadline to hand in your papers for income taxes. As a whole lotta people waited for that deadline (me included), the website of the Tax Department went down! JUST LIKE THAT!

As this is my field of work, I keep wondering if there isn't anyone anymore that has eye for systems vulnerability like overload or load-balancing?

As for season 4 episode 1 of  "Game Of Thrones"...
Honey, we'll be watching it on Channel One on Apple TV. ASAP. 

I just checked: It's here already!!!

Harry Potter

We got one happy kid...

Colin scored maximum on his CITO (test for Middle School) and wants to go to College Hageveld in Heemstede, which is just a couple of miles further ahead.

Ever seen one of those Harry Potter movies? Remember the wizard school he is attending? Hogwart (Zweinstein)? Hageveld is generally compared to that school.

As it is a rather pretentious school, it is normal that there are more applications than there are places for the kids. This means that there usually is a raffle to get admitted.

This year there are just about as much applications as there are places, so he got accepted without the raffle!

ONE HAPPY KID!!!

So now we need to start practice runs (by bike) to get him used to getting to school; he needs to learn the route as he needs to be aware of the distance and the time to get there. And now I hear you: "Isn't there any public transport?" Yes, there is, but when the weather is OK, there is no need to take the bus... Did you get to ride the bus to school when you could walk or ride your bike??? I didn't and it didn't kill me!

Auction!

The Dutch government is transferring the elderly care to the local governments; e.g. the local government needs to provide care for the elderly with a budget that the Dutch government has set...

With this budget, local governments are "buying" care with the care providers. But since the budgets do not suffice, the local governments need to make most of what they got.

The solution they came up with... AUCTION!!!
(read this piece in the Dutch newspaper)

The care provider that is the cheapest can get the contract... That is the way the Dutch done it all along: The VOC mentality... (VOC is the Company that sailed around the world in the golden age to get herbs from India and slaves from Africa)

Welcome to the 21st century care system. 

Word to the wise: If you tend to get old, please stay healthy...

Just a lil sumpthin for tha weekend!

No big post, just something to get you through the weekend SMILING!!!

So SAD!

Ever had a dream of becoming this huge rock star or awesome performer?

THINK AGAIN!!!

It's all nice when you are on national TV or having a big gig... But when you have to earn a living with the money you get from the songs you (co-)wrote...

Read on...