The commercial feast of Valentine.

Dear Bloggers,



Happy Valentine's day daddy, that is what my kids are yelling to me this morning. Yeah right another "happy"day. I slowly wake up out of my half sleep mode, the weather is nice and it is snowing a bit.
Ah Valentine's Day. The first thing that comes to mind is a heart shaped box of cheap chocolates that should be directly applied ones hips. And then there is that sweet little cupid. He's an over weight angel aiming a bow and arrow at you to inspirer you to fall blissfully in love. I mean let's face it. Cupid's arrow is a weapon that literally and metaphorically could be the death of you. But all jokes aside. Do you even know why we actually celebrate Valentine's Day? I didn't think so.

In ancient Rome the date February 14th was a holiday to honor, the Roman Goddess of women and marriage. The next day was celebrated as the pagan Roman Feast of Lupercalia. During this time in Roman history young adults were strictly segregated by sex.

No surprise, it was 269 AD. Eventually they needed to give their hormones a chance to flourish. So it was customary on the eve of the feast of Lupercalia for young men and woman to be partnered for the feast by the men picking the girls names from a jar. Sometimes the pairing lasted for a year and with the young couples falling romantically in love and eventually marring. It was all very sexist in a provocative way. It sounds like a non commercial dating bureau in the ancient days.

Unfortunately this didn't last for long. This euphoric ritual of hormonal teenage partnering would come to an abrupt end during the tyrannical rule of Emperor Claudius II, also known as Claudius the cruel. Emperor Claudius had Rome fighting in many bloody and unpopular battles and was having grave difficulty recruiting soldiers to sustain his military forces. In his warped mind Claudius believed the reason he couldn't get soldiers was due to women. He convinced himself that the men's love of his family, wife or girlfriend prevented them from leaving there side and joining the military. It had nothing to do with the little matter that they didn't want to die a savage death for an Emperor they despised.

Fun loving Emperor Claudius proceeded to cancel all pending and future marriages and engagements in Rome. Claudius then made it a crime punishable by death to associate with Christians.

The legend says, no doubt a bit is polished up if it is not entirely fictional, has it that Valentine was stricken with the unbearable belief that many young souls would be destined to be sinners. So Valentine, a roman priest, married young lovers against Claudius' decree in secrecy. He was of course apprehended and condemned to death for his deeds. He suffered martyrdom on the 14th day of February, in either 269 AD or 270 AD. Nobody really knows what yearly exactly but they know the date was February 14th now known as Valentine's Day.



SO WHAT IS ST. VALENTINE NOW IN OUR PRESENT TIME?

The Netherlands, duh! What you may not know for some unknown reason is that Valentine's day was not very famous during my childhood and still isn't. First signs of this feast was seen in the late fifties, as our country was still very pro American due to the help after the second world war. Although the thought was good it never became very populair. Also the roaring seventies did not bring the turn around. In the late eighties it finally was picked up by the commercial stations.In the nineties the internet was being spread into all living rooms and Holland was having a bit of money to spend. So Valentines day was getting a bit of character and the retail business was happy with their success.Until in 2009 the recession broke out and evryone was sitting on his or her money again, Valentine was scratched of the calendar again. The reputation of the greedy is really showing and the retailers keep on pushing it, especcially in the flower business. But the cheap population of our country compares the prizes with last week. If you are to expensive you can forget it.

Oh the Dutch are wonderful people as long it is for free or they can make profit out of it. They just about have their hands in everything good and pleasurable. The romantic patron saint of lovers who's feast day has become so commercialized it actually makes Christmas seem well, less commercial by comparison. In any event Board and any shopwindow you see the signs, if it didn't see the Euro signs next to it. That is the trouble if your Dutch, romance is beautiful but it has to be affordable.



The Old Sailor,

If your dreams get crazy

Dear Blogger,

As the weather is wet and moisty, my body is not my friend as everything is being sore again. I am using since a long time my painkillers again. I am not much of a dreamer but last night I woke up and had this weird dream about working a dull office job. As I am still unemployed and they give me advise to do an office job and I am really scared to end up in a job that would kill the happines in me. To give you an impression of what was happening in my dream, I wrote the following story. It is not that I do not respect people that work in offices or call centres but it scares the crap out of me if I needed to stay all day in between of these four walls, time for the story so sit back and relax.

I'm all at sea ", if only for a day


The city provides a sad sight. The rain drizzles down. People with umbrellas raised high above their heads, they can walk as fast as they can to get into their heated homes or buildings. The facades give a gray, sad impression in this miserable rain. The busy traffic, what the weather does not decrease roars past me. The wheels of the cars splash through the rain puddles. Deeply wrapped in my long raincoat I walk through the streets. It is a new day and a new job.

I do not look forward to do this job. Slowly I slander towards the building. Too soon, against my will, I stand before the cold gray office building. Workatmosphere immediately faces you when you get inside. It feels like a cold shower above my head is turned on. I walk into the large concrete staircase, which brings me to my department. My new boss of me looks at his watch. For the first time in my life I am late on the job. Then he walks away disapprovingly. I sigh and put my sodden raincoat to dry on the heater. With a thud I sit down in my black office chair that protested against my weight. I press the button of the computer "power" on it. The screen I enter with a blow because otherwise it does not work.

I grab from my pen tray one of my gnawed pencils. I slander, armed with pencil and sharpener to the bin. When I arrive at the bin I am grinding a nice sharp point on my pencil. Then I walk back over the dusty, especially gray office carpet in my office. I lean back in my big chair. My colleagues are busy with their work. Yes, I work at a large call center. The men and women here are busy with some stencils to boost up their sales. You hear the tapping of keyboards. Somewhere in the distance a cell phone goes off. Nervously they talk to each other because using a mobile device is punishable by dismissal. I look gloomily out of the window.

I see another large gray officebuilding. There will be almost the same things going on as here at least that is what I think. Tapping of keyboards. Ringing telephones. Busy chattering people. Rustling papers. No, I have nothing to complain I have a beautiful view here. But wherever you look, everywhere you see the same gray office buildings. With my mouse I move the white arrow on the screen, double click. My mails are opened. Big huge letters let me know that I have five unread messages in my inbox. I click bored on one of the mails. My eyes fly over the lines. 'What's wrong with you''' asks a voice I tear my eyes from the screen, and I look blurred at my colleague. Abruptly I pull up my shoulders. ,, Let's go and have a break! The customer must be happy at the end of the day but we as call agents need occasionally a bite to eat.''

Oh, yes that's right, I should now take better care of myself.” Duty calls again and yes I should be happy with this job because there is not much work in this area. I sigh and rise to start again at my new job for the coming hours. I frog on the concrete stairs and I hang my wet raincoat back on the heating. Get inside and go hunting for new customers. After one day of answering calls from both nice and happy customers and badly mannered persons and completely numb from all the new things that I need to learn.

I walk with appropriate step down the concrete stairs. The smell of exhaust fumes hits my nostrils and the rain falls relentlessly. Slowly I walk to the bus stop, and it had it's best time. The windows were smashed, and the bench is stained with chewing gum and graffiti. On the roof is sitting a set of thick gray citypigeons nestled deep into their warm plumage. The bus is coming and stops at the shabby bus stop. I step into the bus. Despite the weather it is actually very quiet in the bus. I sit down in the nearest chair. I still think to myself why I'm not the one driving. The heater is on and the temperature is comfortable.

A radio plays softly the following melody. I'm all at sea. Where no one can bother me. Forgot my roots. If only for a day. Just me and my thoughts. Sailing far away. I listen to the lyrics of the song. In my head I translate it. I am in the middle of the sea Where no one troubles me and I forget about my heritage, If only for one day. Just me and my thoughts sailing far away there. Yeah, that was my life and I also occasionally dream away from the worries of daily life. It seems that time never stands still, and now the creeping hands of the clock move so slowly. Weird. Actually, we have much more to enjoy life and should not be so buried in our work.

The whole bus ride are my thoughts on it. Is that why I am never bored and that I live mostly on the bright side. I also look at work as a past time for many, as an escape from the loneliness and a number of other social contacts. It's such a shame that you need to spend so much of your free time on it. I am happier with a half time job then a full-time job although it is financially no glory. Anyway I am again building up my life though I have no illusions that I will be happy in an office job. But for the welfare authority, I do my best and I hope for a better future as a bus driver.

The Old Sailor,

French for beginners

Dear Bloggers,



Today is one of these days that you think "I wish it was summertime again". Outside the rain is drizzling down mixed with snow. A nasty combination of cold and wet is forcing me to stay indoors. It makes me dream away about better days that the sun was out, and it makes me realize that it is the perfect time to make plans for the coming holidays.

As an old sailor I have travelled the world and I saw many beautiful places on my journey's. I have a lot of ideas of where to go and also where not to go. My memories are flashing back to a few years ago. I was in a not to good position financially and we had a hard time to survive. A good friend of mine Erik suggested to visit his farmhouse in France.

I answered that it was a nice idea and tried to crawl back with the fact that my French was not to good. No problem he said, the younger generation will speak some English. I expressed the idea to my wife and after a discussion about the costs she agreed with me and we should not turn down this offer. We saved some money for fuel and started on this new challenge, in the early morning we drove off to “la douce France”. When we prepaired ourself for the trip my not very detailed map could not find the village of Reithouse.(pronounce as Rétouzje) I picked up the phone and called Erik to give me some more detailed directions and now the adventure could begin. A GPS system was still extremely expensive at least it was for us. As soon as we had crossed the borders of Belgium and Luxembourg and ended up on the highway in France.

We drove Southbound and past the cities of Metz, Nancy and Dijon from this point we had to follow the signs towards Lons le Saunier. Especially the last part we were stunned by the picturesk scenes where we drove through. The beautiful mountain scenery of the French Jura is impressive, and this is where Reithouse is situated. My wife and I had something were have we seen this before? Just a couple of kilomtres later we realized that the tour the France is passing through this area. I must admit that the picturesk scenes are live even better. When we arrived in Reithouse the sun had hidden itself behind the mountains and it was getting dark and we were all pretty tired of the long journey.

We entered the house and fired up the stove in the kitchen, the nice smell of burning wood was filling the room. We shoved the kids into bed and sat down at the kitchen table. In a few minutes it was nice and warm, it was time to enjoy the holiday and I opened a bottle of wine. Now it was time to relax. Eventhough it is very quiet in the small village of Reithouse our kids got up at six o'clock in the morning, I stumbled to the kitchen to make some tea and coffee.

After having some coffee and some crackers, we drove to the town of Orgelet to buy some fresh baked bread and of course croissants at the boulangerie. We also bought some other basic things at the local shops. Back at the house we had a great breakfast. (you should call it a breakslow as we really enjoyed it.) I the entrance hall of the house we found some leaflets about the surroundings and after breakfast we drove to Lac de Vouglans a huge lake with a dam that is providing most of the area with electrical power. We had a late lunch at one of the lovely beaches of this lake and this is only 15 minutes away from the house.

The scenery is overwhelming the mountains are covered with pinetrees and there are some beautiful waterfalls on extreme heights. On the lake you can also do a lot of watersports as they thought about safety they have divided the lake in sections for speedlevels. Far in the afternoon we got back to the house and my wife started preparing our diner. Together with the kids I explored the garden and they started playing with a ball, I layed back in a lawnchair with a book.

Before I realized it I had a conversation with Claude the neighbour that keeps an eye on the house and keeps the garden in shape. This conversation was brilliant as Claude does not speak much English and my French is as poor as his English. We were both surprised how well we understood eachother. We talked about all kinds of things the weather and of course this lovely little village. Eventhough we talked with hands and feet we had a nice chitchat and a good laugh. As one of the other neighbors joined in who did speak English I did get some nice tips about the wine and cheese of the Franche Comté in the area. And who know better than the locals about the area if you have a look on the website you will find also some nice tips.

We have done to many things to mention but we really enjoyed our stay. The house is as picturesk as the surroundings and I felt like living in a fairytalebook. Although our budget was not that big but this was one of the best holidays we had. We will absolutely go again as we only explored half of what we wanted to see. And believe me when I say that it is a small peace of paradise if you live in this stressfull world.


The Old Sailor,

How to get a job?

Dear Bloggers,


Guess what? Yes, I had a talk to a jobcoach this week, but I left the building with the feeling that nobody is waiting for a 42 year old person. It made me think again of starting a small business from home. For me the first question is what is it that I am going to sell? And second thing is a part of it should go to a project in a third world country. What I found most interesting about my way of thinking so far is that it makes you ask yourself the question, "Are you working on your business, or in it?" Anyone who is self-employed can tell you they are probably working in their business.

This is especially true for freelance workers, contractors, or anyone with their own brick and mortar business who does all of the work. When will I take off on my own? That is a good question I just need a good product to sell and my wife needs to back me up. I am thinking of how much happier I would be by working for myself. Grant it, I am very happy. I don't experience any of the stress or the long commute. I once did, however, I basically have traded one job for another, except now I have much more freedom in terms of time and choosing who to work with.

Now I am working on freedom from doing all of the work. I rather work on my business instead of in it. When you become self-employed, you also take on multiple roles. You become the project manager, the technician, marketer, and any other task that is needed to keep your business going. Many self-employed individuals actually find themselves working more hours than they had at a previous job. The only difference is that you can devide your hours better.

Like myself, what used to be your passion becomes your downfall. I used to really enjoy web developing but now I view it as a chore. I used to enjoy reading about programming and learning new techniques. I'd make websites for fun and learning. The passion is gone.

I know I lost the desire for my work because my body totally gave up on me and I must admit that I had a hard time to get myself back in the saddle. And even I changed my lifestyle, my rythm one thing will never change I'll guess I will do it all on my own. Outsourcing is not an option for me due to the fact that I am just not able to give the work to someone else. My passion now lies in affiliate marketing and network marketing. Both are exciting and both will create hopefully residual streams of income. Best of all, there will be clients to answer to.

My goal is to actually move away from the labor and create revenue streams that allow me to be free to do the things I want. If you are finding yourself in the same boat, maybe it is time to start already now before you get unemployed. I think it is the right time to start as the economy is slowly crawling up again.

The Old Sailor,

.

Aardbeving Haiti geef nu giro 555 van de samenwerkende hulporganisaties

Let's give the people of Haiti a new start to build up there lives again, The help organisations joined together let us do the same.

Help Haiti now

Dear Bloggers,


Help Haiti now

With updates on an increasingly unimaginable death toll in Haiti coming in hourly, it is time to do something about it. That is why I choose to write a blog for the poorest people in the western hemosphere and I hope that other bloggers will either copy this story or make their own story on it. We are just making it easier for you to find ways to help.

Of course, donations to charitable organizations are desperately needed – but if you can find it in your heart to open your pocketbook even a little wider, there are many ways to give more and get a little good feeling in return.

So, if you’re a reader – keep tweeting, keep texting, and buying! If you’re a blogger – keep posting (and add a banner to a charity – like this one for the Dutch Giro 555 Programme – to your site)!

Novib
Nederlandse Rode Kruis
ICCO & Kerk in Actie
Cordaid Mensen in Nood
Tear
Terre des Hommes
UNICEF Nederland
Save The Children
World Vision

The least we all can do is spread awareness and give what we can to the people of Haiti at this devastating time.
If you want to donate from a country outside of the Netherlands use the following steps.

Begunstigde : SHO - Help slachtoffers aardbeving Haiti, Mauritskade 9, 2514 HD the Hague, the Netherlands.


Bank: ING bank NV, Financial Plaza, Amsterdam, the Netherlands Swiftcode bank: INGBNL2A

Accountnumber for European countries: IBAN nr: NL08INGB0000000555 (7times the number 0)

Countries outside the European Community (outside europe): accountnumber 555.


The Old Sailor,

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Geachte Bloggers,

Help Haiti nu

Met updates ieder uur over een onvoorstelbaar hoog dodental in Haïti, is het tijd om er iets aan te doen. Daarom heb ik ervoor gekozen om een blog te schrijven voor de armste mensen op het westelijk halfrond en ik hoop dat andere bloggers ofwel dit verhaal zullen kopiëren of ze schrijven hun eigen verhaal. Ik hoop dat het net daardoor het makkelijker voor u wordt om een manier te vinden om te helpen.

Natuurlijk zijn donaties aan charitatieve organisaties hard nodig? maar als je het kan vinden in je hart om je portemonnee te openen zelfs een beetje wijder dan anders, er zijn vele manieren om iets meer te geven en een beetje goed gevoel voor terug te krijgen.

Dus, ben je een lezer? twitter verslaafd, ga twitteren en blijf sms'en, en kopen (voor het goede doel natuurlijk) Als u een blogger bent? blijf dan hierover posten (en voeg een banner toe aan uw site voor een goed doel. Zoals deze voor de Nederlandse Giro 555-Actie)!

Novib
Nederlandse Rode Kruis
ICCO & Kerk in Actie
Cordaid Mensen in Nood
Tear
Terre des Hommes
Unicef Nederland
Save The Children
World Vision

Het minste wat we allemaal kunnen doen is onszelf beter bewust te maken en te geven wat we kunnen om de bevolking van Haïti te helpen in deze verwoestende tijd.
Wilt u doneren vanuit een land buiten Nederland volg dan de volgende stappen.


Begunstigde : SHO - Help slachtoffers aardbeving Haiti, Mauritskade 9, 2514 HD the Hague, the Netherlands.

Bank: ING bank NV, Financial Plaza, Amsterdam, the Netherlands Swiftcode bank: INGBNL2A


Accountnumber for European countries: IBAN nr: NL08INGB0000000555 (7times the number 0)

Countries outside the European Community (outside europe): accountnumber 555.

The Old Sailor,
 ..._ _ _ ......_ _ _ ......_ _ _ ......_ _ _ ......_ _ _ ......_ _ _ ......_ _ _ ......_ _ _ ......_ _ _ ......_ _ _ ...

Extreme winter weather

Dear Bloggers,

Snowstorm hits also North of Netherlands it all started yesterday, warnings on the local radio to stay indoors if you do not need to go out.
At this moment it finally stopped snowing and the wind is slowly calming down, severe weather conditions and busses stopped running.

It is still winter and it reminds me of my childhood, the weatherforecast is predicting a snowstorm.
When I was a young bloke in 1979 we had similair kind of weather only difference was that it had been raining the day before and this iced up the roads, on top of that it started snowing and the wind was gusting which resulted in snowdunes with a height of more then three metres.

KNMI initially expected that the inconvenience to the south would be limited, but gradually the sky was closing, while the hard east wind was very unpleasant. In the far south the rainfall started around noon as rain. A few hours later, the first major rainfall in the river area, but as rain and occasional snow flakes. The average temperature was 1 to 2 degrees celcius. But slowly it turned into glazed frost.

In the early evening light snow began to fall (barely in the Southern Netherlands), subject to the windshield. Around midnight the snow line slowly pulled the precipitation zone northward. The wind caused already some snow drift.
In the North of the Netherlands it started snowing from 04h, followed by some freezing rain and glazed frost
The ice lasted all day in the north. Initially this was remaining to ice zone north of the Top of Noord-Holland to Meppel. The rainfall amounts were not small. The northern front moved southward in the evening with snow and increasing winds from a storm to East North East. The big snow storm started.
14-15 February 1979: the polarbear is on the loose.

The snow area spread to the south. The wind increased in the north as far said to stormy with highs severe storm. In the meantime raged north unprecedented heavy snow storms. The oven on the snow and ice fields could find no foothold, except behind trees, farms, in villages, etc.

When there was daylight again, it revealed the seriousness of the situation. Even then it had to snow dunes formed to 1.5 meters, so many ways (even motorways) were blocked. Many people could no longer reach their jobs, why not buses, cars were snowing in. Schools closed. It is impossible to get a good picture of it? That day was staying out a painful issue. Vision was ranging from 50 to 5 meter and was sometimes cut by the sharp snow drifting


snow was really drifting and blowing snow in your face and that at a temperature of -5 degrees and a wind at stormforce at least . Blizzard is a barbaric word, which does not seem excessive.

The snow dunes were locally blown to incredible heights. Especially in Northern-Friesland and Groningen were heights of 4 to 6 meters pretty normal. Many villages became isolated totally and some alone standing farms had snow blown up until the roof. All highways in the north were closed, there was even a ban to drive.

In some places, there was an emergency: telephone lines were damaged and power lines broke through the heavy ice load and severe storms. Crisis centers were established in local bars. Snow removal had hardly any meaning.

Soldiers came to help to re-open roads and villages from isolation to get new deliveries into the local shop. Among the people ruled by the common struggle against the white enemy a great togetherness, except in the local grocery store, where many crowded to get some food to misplaced fears of scarcity. The small bakery on the corner, who was always to expensive if they compared it to the big supermarkets in the city, the baker was suddenly anybodys friend. The local grocers kept a hard regime as we had been three days isolated from the rest of the world. Regular customers had some priveleges.

Some houses were that far snowed in that they came out with only the chimney above the giant dunes of snow.

Some hard facts of the snow storm in northern Netherlands:
Duration: 90 hours snow drift
Precipitation: estimated 15 to 30 mm
Snow Dune Height: 3-6 meter
Average temp.: -5 -6 Degrees Celsius
Windgusts: 100 km / h

At this moment large parts of Europe suffer from the winter weather. In parts of Great Britain public life is quiet because the roads are impassable. Many schools are closed.

In Southern France is the city of Arles due to the snow without power, also in a part of Holland there was a power failure for several hours. Heavy trucks may not drive because of the iced and slippery highways.

The Czech border has been closed to freight traffic because the roads are too slippery.

Germany expects a lot of problems this weekend due to drifting snow in the Northern part several people have been stuck in their cars on the highway as they snowed in due to a traffic jam caused by truck that slipped of the road. Gymnasiums are closed as a precaution because they might collapse due to the weight of the snow.

German households are also advised to have food, medicine and drinking water in stock for the snow storm that would come that is what the BBC reports.

The Germans also expect heavy snowfall today that could lead to local outages and public transportation will seriously disrupt.

The National weatherstation just tells that the weather alarm will not be changed and people in the North are advised to stay indoors, as outside temperatures are fierce and roads are being difficult to drive on. Busses have started up again although there is a lot of disruption due to the icy road conditions.

The Old Sailor,