Category Archives: Creativity

Crunchy Toast

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I have had a really bad habit for years, basically because I’m not a morning person at all. I tend to be a night owl just like my dad was, my system starts to wake up at 19.00 in the evening instead of 07.00 in the morning. Countless nights I ended up working on [web design/Flash] projects and not being able to stop, driven by a perfectionist nature and eager to learn the ropes whenever it was software related or web design related… Long nights of spending time on configuring a script, adjusting it so it would work and do what I wanted it to do.

Or like the other day when my ISP decided to upgrade their Linux servers and PHP over the weekend and my blog stopped working the next day. I had no front-end blog and no back-end user interface. Reading into the problem, I found an excellent article about installing MT 4.0 on Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5, which gave me a clue to what to look for in solving the problem. It turned out to be a security breach, one that I’ve created myself installing MT 4.0 the same way I’ve installed all the previous version. Permissions that used to be fine before were no longer working with the latest Linux version and causing problems so I had to change folders around and check permission on cgi scripts etc.

My ISP couldn’t solve my problem, because they don’t have Movable Type know-how so I was forced to solve it myself staying up half the night reading into things and running installation tests, even software upgrades. But I fixed it and I so swear by my own elimination theory based on trial and error because no matter how bad, I always seem to solve the problem: software-wise that is… I’m rather impatient and unlucky in solving problems in my personal life at times but that is just an extremely slow beta version of my elimination theory which I’m still debugging *hehe*…

So because I’m not a morning person I try to stay in bed as long as I possibly can. [I’ve exaggerated in the past but admitting that on here is still a bit embarrassing so I’d better not go into details for now, perhaps in a few years when I’m old enough to start thinking of writing an autobiography because the words ‘shame and shy’ are no longer part of my vocabulary…] And because I’m stretching out the process of getting up, to such an extend that I end up being in a rush, I have no time to eat because I literally have about ten minutes to get to work. So I skip breakfast… Yes bad… I know… Very bad indeed!

But hold your horses: I was about to say that I’ve changed my ways slightly ever since I ended up in hospital… After years of eating hardly any bread, I now have a ‘typical English way’ of celebrating my morning matters, by having two slices of the finest crunchy and crispy toast that I can manage to fix, during my morning half-awake-very-much-resting state. Since I do not like soggy or soft toast it is still quite a challenge because it takes three times three long minutes of toasting the bread and letting it cool off before it gets to the crunchy phase which basically means that these days I cannot allow myself to linger anymore, only over the weekend.

And guess what I did today… Wrong…

I got up at 07.00 *hehe*

8-)

My toast this morning. Not my toaster, I’ve got a 50’s model: muuuuuch nicer!

Tooth Fairy

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The Dutch have a saying that goes: ‘Hij weet van voren niet dat hij van achteren leeft‘ which literally translates to, ‘His front does not know that his back is alive‘. Yes I know… we have some odd sayings *hehe* It means: ‘He doesn’t know whether he’s coming or going ‘ in simple words: one is extremely busy… I have felt like this ever since I had the interview with the recruitment agency Friday the 22nd of February. I have been busy all week designing a print portfolio and a web portfolio both in pdf format. So I’m sorry I’ve neglected you out there!

I thought I could do things the easy way, which was in Photoshop, but of course I found out that the easy way never ever works. [Note to self: girl, you should know by now… tut tut!] When I had the files ready to export to pdf, it wouldn’t change into that crispy pdf format, it was blurred and probably caused by a compression issue. No matter what I did, I couldn’t solve the problem not even with my 18 years of experience, yes that is kind of embarrassing. So after three days of trying, I had to do it my way; the complicated way and rebuild everything in InDesign this time. Thursday afternoon it was ready and online.

Over the weekend I have been busy finishing the web design version. I’m almost done, all it takes is a few more tiny adjustments and then I can put that one online as well. Ready to be send out to potential clients by the recruitment agency. I must say my recruiter is one impressive woman, we’re the same age and she’s got a drive that makes your head spin! I’ve had to call her several times last week to discuss roles so hopefully this will bear some fruit. I might have an interview this week so I need to stay focused on important things like seeing the dentist tomorrow *hehe*

I’ve broken a tiny piece of my tooth over night, don’t ask me how but it happened… I even woke up the moment it happened. So I immediately called this morning and arranged an appointment tomorrow to have it fixed, the dentist fixed it last year but it broke off again. And since I’m very aware of it and constantly ‘playing’ with it, with my tongue -which will be raw by the end of the day- I need to have it done asap. How am I gonna smile my toothpaste commercial smile during an interview if I’m too aware of a dental problem [although tiny…]?

Call it vanity… I call it ‘anything to change my future for the best and get out of my current situation asap‘… After all £45,- is only half the price of the cheapest Botox injection but at least my tooth won’t cause any facial paralysis or a droopy lip. For those who are not aware of things: Botox is something 14 year old girls give each other for their birthday in this country… Yes twisted! But I guess that’s a whole different post one day. I don’t have any wrinkles and I don’t look my age [so I’m told many times] but even if I would, I would embrace it and age gracefully, instead of trying to hide. Who are you fooling after all?

:mrgreen: