Elementary school reunion

The last weekend was quite a highlight. We had an elementary school class reunion after 16 years since leaving the school.

It all started quite simple - with a dream I had in March where I was at a class reunion (of course with all the nice girls around :). The day after I contacted 4 people who's contacts I had. The next two months were spent organizing the place, contacting these 4 people and their contacts and their contacts and their contacts and in the end I got to number 29. Which was pretty good result, considering that I haven't heard from 90% of them for at least ten years.

It was interesting to hear what they're all doing now - model, TV star, fireman, accountant, teachers, salesmen, technicians, computer freaks, ...

Well, next year I hope to organize something similar, hopefully with 15 more people, 47 in total who had come and gone during the 8 years of school.

'I missed again!' drawing

This is a drawing I made some 13-14 years ago, and found just yesterday ;-).

10 years after

It's a strange feeling seeing again concerts of the same bands as 10 years ago. This week I went to Majales, a student festival in Prague to see good old Transglobal Underground, Clawfinger and Dog Eat Dog.

I remember seeing Transglobal Underground about 10 years ago at Jeleni Prikop and E.T. Jam festivals. The style of music is similar now, but the crew completely changed from the one then. Also the repertoir completely changed. They still play nice music, but one gets really sentimental about the good old times and songs then.

Slightly different story with Dog Eat Dog, perhaps new rising stars in '97, nonetheless now - after fading out quite a bit since then, - the concert was still a great fun. On the other hand Clawfinger, probably due to getting in their 40ies, played rather like 'retired' ;-) - a song, then 2 minutes break spent talking about nothing, and again and again, playing - sort of - like Metallica 2 years ago in Amsterdam. ;-)) Sad.

This time I was quite impressed with the organization of the festival. Considering it's just a student thing, they did better than many other 'classic' festivals in the Czech Republic!

Lego strikes back :)

Can you recognize who this is :) ?


Check here.

Shopping for Christmas

I have never been a big fan of shopping as some of my (girl)friends. Never went to another country to buy shoes :), never enjoyed spending hours in garment stores, never went to store just to check out what's new and what's fashionable. (The only exception is when I actually go with my girlfriend :).

Perhaps the only thing I always enjoyed to shop for - is food. And books.

And so whenever I do christmas shopping, it's about the first time in that particular year that I actually check out garment and other - wierd - stores (many of which I usually had no clue that they existed before ;-)).

The 2 last weeks before christmas I then inevitably spend scanning - what is available in stores - and unlike other people I usually don't end up buying any presents, but I rather every day come home with bags full of good food, and some new books that I like. But no presents.

Hence I always end up buying actual presents - on the last 2 days before the christmas :). - I usually finish shopping on the morning of the day we give presents (the 24th) :).

And today I am proud to say that also this year - I honour the tradition !!!

Cell phone localization

With our privacy being attacked daily due to the internet or air travel requirements, here's yet another 'cool invention'. Cell phone localization. It's been around for quite a while - restricted only for use by police or secret services, but never as a freely available service to general public.

Now with a series of new telecommunication laws passed recently in several countries in latin america, even this restriction is a past.


Yes, that means - if you want to find out where e.g. your friends are at this very moment, the answer is just two clicks away:

SAT-PHONE Localization system

All you need to do is to enter a cell phone number in the international format: +XXX YYY ZZZZZZ.

I don't know about you, but I think this is quite scary. What do you think about it ?

Excited!

As weird as it sounds to call a (rather flegmatic) person 'excited' ;-)), today I actually AM EXCITED!

The past months I spent hunting for a job. I spent over two and half months only applying for jobs in the UK and Ireland (kinda difficult when you're based in Czech Republic :), without much success and actually not even an interview. It was in the end of october, that I started looking for a job in the Czech Republic. And 4 weeks down the line, I'm finished. The czech experience was exactly the opposite to the UK and Ireland. For every job I applied for, I ended up with an offer. I avoided the mistake (or perhaps more precisely a not-so-well-thought-out step) of taking the first or the second offer I get - as I did the last year.

Last friday I ended up with a kick-ass offer from a czech company. Took 4 days to decide. In the meantime got from a first contact to a second stage with another company. The ONE. After the second interview I knew I really wanted this job, over the kick-ass offer, - this one was uber-kick-ass. But there was one catch.

Actually quite a big one: I needed to turn down the first offer, without knowing the result with the ONE company. - possibly ending up with nothing.

Decided to take the risk, and - suffered quite bad through the last two sleepless nights. :)

In the end, - it paid. I GOT IT.

YEEEEEEEYYYY!!!

Honestly speaking, I think I got the best what I could (while keeping both feet firmly on the ground).

Learnings?
- You need to make it through the swamp, before you reach the land.
- Fairies won't help you from hunger, they're not made out of real flesh.
- The more times you escape fairies, the better chances you get out of the swamp.
- However, escaping the fairies is not your ultimate goal.
;-)