Queensday in Groningen

Tired after walking along the traditional street flee market in Groningen. We are having coffee in a pavement on the market in Groningen. We came by train, just for fun, and saw lots of music groups and bands playing on the streets and markets. Queensday in Holland is very special, everybody is on the streets, selling stuff, playing an instrument, eating, having fun. This year is special, because our queen Beatrix celebrates her 25 th anniversary as a queen.

The truth about potatoe chips

I took potatoe's, peeled them and cut them in thin slices. I dried the slices carefully, not to break them. Meanwhile I heated peanutoil in a pan and when hot enough I carefully put the slices potatoe in the oil one by one because they tend to stick together. You have to wait till they are brown, then they are crispy. Kids love to help, Twan helped me with these. When the chips were ready, we wanted to fry more, so I made a dough and we made fried banana balls.

Now an other story. You take a lot of potatoes, don't mind how they look, dehydrate them and grind them to a powder. Then add wheat starch, flavour, sugar, flavour enhancers: monosodium glutamate, disodium inosinate and disodium guanylate, milk proteins, flavourings, onion powder, lactose, colour: paprika extract, garlic powder,lactic acid, rice flour, corn flour, maltodextrin, emulsifier (E471, this means a special food add, allowed bij the EEG) salt and dextrose. This mixture makes a paste. With this paste you make a chips like form, that is fried in vegetable oil. Each one exactly the same, so they fit beautifully in a tube. People will love these fake potatoe chips because off the amount of flavour enhancers that are put into it. In fact people become somewhat addicted to these enhancers. So they are willing to pay almost 2 euro for a tube.

How do trees know when to blossum?

Each year I see that trees and bushes of the same species blossum exactly at the same day in the whole country. Suddenly you see the hawthorn blossum everywhere. On the picture you see the old peartree next to our house. It was totaly neglected when we first came here. We pruned it thorougly the first year and now it blossums beautifull and it carries lots of pears in the fall. He blossums together with all his brother and sister pear trees at the same time. Do they communicate? I think that the native American Indians (and a lot of other native people, like the Australian and African tribes) are right when they say that everything that lives is bound by a great Spirit. Unfortunaly we lost the connextion with this Spirit. We look and listen to old grey men dressed in purple robes. We should listen more to the trees and the great Spirit in our harts. Then we would also know how and when to blossum, together with our brothers and sisters.

My beloved apple with his twin screen

Working with the right tools always is a pleasure. I work a lot on this computer. It's an Apple PowerPC G4 working under OS X. The twin configuration of the two monitors is very comfortable. Working on one monitor with all the menu's on the other is a pleasure. I love this machine. This computer is also the server for the network, it contains another apple and several windows computers and printers.

New haystack

We have not enough land to feed the ponys and horses, so we buy hay to compensate. The hay comes from a nature reserve nearby, "de weerribben", an area where they used to make turf and while making turf they created a beautiful area with a lot of water. This hay comes from grass that doesn't get artificial fertilizer and therefor contains little protein. To much protein is not good for our horses. We got 150 packs stacked in our barn. The hay and everything else in the barn is protected with sails against the owls-shit that pollutes everything. On this picture you can see the owlsnest, an ordinary wooden case.

Fishing eel on the IJsselmeer

A fishing boat from Volendam lies on his anchor, the fishermen working on the fishtrap in a little workingboat. The fishtrap is called "Fuik" in dutch. In the Rightward Model the image of the "Fuik" is used to discribe the way people are formed and how they become trapped in their own life. These fisherman remind me on one of my roots, the little village of Urk, once an island in the Suydersee, now part of the polder Flevoland. My grandmother came from this island. Fishermen they where, sunday in the church, monday at sea. Standing at the helm of a botter, an ancient wooden sailing fishingboat of which a lot again are in good condition, I feel totaly happy. I think its the place that's meant for me, where I realy totaly fit in.

Jack Vance, his latest book

The master of dialogue, Jack Vance. In his books everybody uses a language that is almost juridical. They search very carefull the outlines from what is said. In business transactions there is always a trick that one can discover by carefuly using the language and hearing what is not said. No one ever realy lies, but the unsaid things are the key. Like Rudolph Magnus investing in a project that can't go wrong until the moment when the truth is unveilled. Whith the help of the IPCC database and his bright intelligence he always succeeds but also finds a way to loose all he gained. Brilliant.

This grass tastes shocking good

Life can be hard when you are hungry. Do you eat and get shocked, or do you wait till it's time for your hay. Some can wait, but some can't. Then it's simple, the rules of physics take over and as we all know, these rules are ruthless. Getting shocked doesn't depend on your character or on your good behaviour, it's just a matter of plugging in the power, touching the wire and making shure that you are grounded properly. If these facts are occuring, then the shock is inevitablbe.

Beach volleyball on our own "beach"

Playing volleyball in the sand. The dog is playing with the men offcourse, helping his boss. And when the ball hits the ground on the wrong side he just bites the women in the legs. At least that is what I want him tot do.

Pope dead

A very conservative man, responsable for the forbidding of the use of condoms in Africa and therefor responsable for millions of HIV deaths and HIV orphan children. A churchleader who still forbids woman to participate in the church hierarchie. A man that's upholding a medieval out of date believe that stands in the way of the unfolding and discovery of the true uniqueness of man and his possibilitys. I would say, the pope is dead, let's bury him and his church with him.

The owls nest in our barn

Each year we have a nest of barn-owls in our barn. There's a special wooden nestbox placed in the top of the barn. Here you see the hole in the roof, in dutch called an ulebord, an owls-board. The opening is specialy meant for owls. Each year we find one or two owls-chickens who fell out the nest, or were pushed out by there little brothers and sisters. This one is still very young, it didn't survive. That's life, that's nature.