Polmonite

Julia is ill. She had a viral infection that let her have fever and diarrea since last Thursday. After that she got a polmonite (lung infection). Since yesterday she is having antibiotics. She breaths with difficulty and she is weak. I believe things will be fine, eventually.

We did not have much sleep this Christmas.

Weekend

A quiet weekend. Milo was not feeling well, so we did not do much. We played "The colonists of Katan" or whatever the name is in English, and Milo won, without much help I must say. I've installed eMule and I have downloaded some good music:

Nils Petter Molvaer Er
Magoni e Spinetti - Musica Nuda
Dejohnette, Holland, Metheny, Hancock - Parallel realities

What is difficult to me at this moment is to find input for some new good music. Does anybody knows a good website with music recensions?

OTF rome's visit

In September the coreteam of the operational task force united for a mission in Rome. A great mission, in which we completed 42 goals and placed the start for a new global strategy. The fight against mulslim terrorism is losing pace and interest from the media, and a new enemy will be created to avoid weakening of intelligence services: the fight against the new-age terror. We believe people is looking with increased fear to the development of movements against consumption and capitalism. Meditation, Erya and macrobiotics are frightening the common people. Urgent measures are needed - the OTF will save the world again.

Briefing at: brief

Macedonian dinner - suspended

The Macedonian Dinner did not take place due to personal circumstances.

Macedonian Dinner - the proposal

Macedonian Dinner

The Macedonian Dinner will let the spirit of Alexander the Great flow through the air and fill us with contempt and happiness.

Alexander the Great has been educated by Aristoteles to the greek culture, and enjoyed to have dinners in the greek tradition. The macedonian dinner will follow therefore the ancient tradition of the symposium.

The rules of the symposioum are to be found here.

"The symposium is a collective reunion and at the same time a show, exhibition and fun, in which all the senses come stimulate you. There must be a perfect understanding between the convita, the just mixture, not only of wine and water, but also of persons. Disposition of the places is such that everyone can see everyoneelse. Symposium does never have great dimensions"

Ingredients of symposium: wine, crater, cups; music with the flautist, dance.

There will be a crater, and all the convita will be disposed around it. In the crater the ritual of cutting the wine with water will be executed.


Pindaro writes:

"Come quando tra i convitati sboccia la gioia del simposioMescoliamo un secondo cratere di canti ispirati alle Muse …".

Alexander explored the East, and let the structure of the Symposium change, allowing expecially persian influences. Therefore belly dance is an important component of our Macedonian dinner.

Let's now get to our instructions

• Carlos will be "the King", since he is the host
• Nanni will be the master of cerimony and will take care of the different part of the symposium, and their displacement in time
• Anthonis will take care of the wine, "cut it" if necessary and dispense it
• Giuseppe will take care of the food
• Men will cook. Giuseppe will cook the main dish, entree, dessert will be assigned to volunteers. One of the men will have the privilege of not cooking and providing all the drinks
• Clara will take care of getting the belly dance music
• Enith will invent and propose games
• Loes and Melina wash the dishes
• additional ideas and initiatives are welcome. Especially poetry, theather, dance, music are welcome.

Let's Alexander be with us

Macedoninan dinner

On Saturday the 10th a Macedonian Dinner will be given.

The dinner should follow the rules of a Symposium as they were organised during the hellenistic era. I am looking for informations about how to organise it. I seek:

• recepies
• cloaths
• procedure

Vacanze ad Amberloup

La nostra prima settimana di vacanza l'abbiamo passata al Camping Tonny, in Tonny, che e' una frazione di Amberloup, che e' una frazione di Ste Ode, in mezzo alle Ardenne.

Milo e Kyara si sono divertiti tantissimo. Hanno potuto partecipare ai frequenti falo' che si sono tenuti: a Milo piace soprattutto andare nei boschi a raccogliere la legna, mentre Kyara non puo' fare a meno di arrostire salsiccie e marshmellows al fuoco. Hanno giocato tantissimo a carte, a 31, a UNO (lo scopo del gioco e' finire le carte), e guerra.

Ha piovuto molto, ed il campeggio e' diventato una specie di palude fangosa. Abbiamo comprato degli stivali da pescatore per Milo e Kyara, che si sono immedesimati subito nella parte. Sono diventati dei veri campeggiatori dell'avventura.


Julia ha camminato tantissimo per il campeggio. Si e' divertita parecchio nel parco giochi. Le piace soprattutto il dondolo. Ma soprattutto Julia ha mangiato tantissimo, anzi direi troppo!!!!

Good weather

Last days of good weather probably. Time to enjoy them! Yesterday we went shopping and basicly did nothing all day. Today we went with Nanni and Enith to a zoo, specialised in european animals. Afterthat we enjoyed the birthday of Stacey and her father Fer. Basically we spent all day outside, which is very good, and I got even a bit tanned.

Daniele phoned, claiming to have become an half architect, and wanting to move to Rome to become rich and famous.

Vacanze al Genneperpark

Una giornata di vacanza. Loes lavora ed ho portato Julia al nido. Cosi', con Milo e Kyara, abbiamo potuto fare un bel giro nei dintorni. A 2 minuti di bicicletta c'e' il Milieu Educatie Centrum, che organizza escursioni e attivita'. Abbiamo deciso di fare un'escursione all'adiacente Genneper park.

Per prima cosa abbiamo visitato il giardino degli gnomi: si tratta di un piccolo orticello botanico dove le specie selvatiche olandesi vengono conservate e mostrate al pubblico. Gli gnomi l'hanno trasformata in una caccia al tesoro: ad ogni fermata Milo e Kyara hanno dovuto fare dei compiti: dare l'aqua alle piante, fare delle barche di carta, osservare la palude.

Usciti dal giardino degli gnomi, siamo entrati nel parco vero e proprio. Abbiamo osservato i tipi diversi di erba, cercato insetti (e trovato una lumaca enorme), e scandagliato l'acqua dello stagno (temp.18 gradi - temp. esterna 21 gradi). Una giornata interessante.

Prevention campaign

Preventing is better than curing:

http://www.rachelgetsfruity.com/flash.html

Mongolfiere

At the end of July a storm of baloons attacked my house. I counted more than 9, flying towards us. They take off at the terrain of the university of Eindhoven (TU/e) and they try to land at the scout's court. This time there were too many of them, and a couple had to land in strange places. I heard that one landed on Locatellistraat, just two blocks further.



If you want to see the pictures

Visual illusions

From Clara.

If you really have nothing to do..
.-)

http://www.michaelbach.de/ot/mot_mib/index.html

Enrico Rava

I love trumpet. I love trumpet sound, and the way it fits in jazz. And I am happy to have discovered Enrico Rava. He is a great player. I love the way he started, with a lot of experimentation, and then evolved to cooler music. I love his CD dedicated to Chet Baker (another great trumpet player).

Repairing

This weekend I repaired some things at my place. Loes changed Milo's and Kyara's room, so it was very nice to rebuild their computer table. Cutting, sawing, screwing - an easy job. I still have to complete it though.

Julia walks

Julia walks.

It has been a strange process. Lately she was walking getting support from my hand; but that was very annoying, because she was always wanting to walk, and therefore always asking for someone's hand and support. How many walks, with a bended back, together with her!! So, we encouraged her to walk on her own, without support, step-by-step, and in spite of all our attempt, she would not make any step.

Up to yesterday. Yesterday she decided it was time, and, while no one was stimulating her, she stood up and walked. Perfectly, for her age, no stumbling, no break, just walking, all directions.

What a girl!

Stress

I am a bit stressed lately. I guess it has to do with my work, or more precisely with the expectation I had of having a quiter period, now that almost everybody is on holiday. This is happened, and the confrontation between expectation and reality has been hard to take.

How to deal with it? If I lower my expectations I might become happier, but in the other end I might bow too often to the circumstances and forget myself. I really do not know.

North Sea Jazz festival

Fantastic, I have been there, and it was wonderful. The http://www.northseajazz.nl/index.asp was full of interesting artists. I went only on Friday. I wanted to see Brad Meldhau, but he did not show up, unfortunately. Another guy took his place, and he was good, and he tried a lot of variations and combinations on standard themes, but it wasn't the same for me, as for a lot of people as well.

After that I went to the stage of ACT, a german label, I believe. http://www.actmusic.com/. There I saw Lars Danielsson, and he was very good, playing cello and double bass, with a lot of nice electronics. He was accompained by a piano player and a drummer.

John Scofield disappointed me. It did not seem like he was playing something nice. They also put him on a too small stage, it was too crowded and warm, but still; I felt people were clapping their hands only because his big name John Scofield was playing. A pity. Nevertheless he played a very nice version of Georgia, from Ray Charles - a lot of artist played a tribute to Ray.

Cassandra Wilson was far most the best act of the show. Too short, that hour and a quarter. She made us dream with her fantastic voice. Her band was impressive, even though I did not know all the names. Cassandra, sophisticated and simple, deep and powerful. I will surely go to a concert of her, if she will come nearby.

My last act was Dave Holland, playing with Jack Dejohnette, Herbie Hankcock and Chris Potter. Impressive act, but I was then tired, and some people in the audience were sleeping (they were playing difficult music, by the way). Dave has an incredible touch, but the one that surprised me the most was Herbie Hankcock, who was playing very sophisticatedly, quite a contrast with his more commercial music.

I am happy I was there - but in the other hand the complete program is not that good, in my taste. There is a lot of commercial stuff, a lot of pop, a lot of big seller; I will prefer a more explorative festival, and with a higher quality standard. No Jamie Cullum next year, please! No Joss Stone....

Meeting noiosi

Mi sto annoiando enormemente. Sono in un meeting enorme dove non ho nulla da dire e devo solo ascoltare. Che perdita di tempo. Quante volte ci e' successo di trovarci in meetings inutili? Cio' che non ho capito e' se il problema sia tipicamente olandese o tipicamente da grande azienda.

Welcome

Welcome to my Blog.

Giuseppe