Meaning “We can’t make it more fun”, which is the slogan of the Belastingdienst (National Tax Agency) here in Holland. Well, they’re not even trying!

Just a few days before I was about to transfer the substantial amount of income tax I still owe them for 2004, I get this letter from them asking me to transfer the same amount as an advance for the income tax over 2005! While this year is not even over yet! And assuming my employment situation etc. will not change, it’s exactly the same not-so-small amount as I’ve been wondering for weeks and weeks, whether I’d want to pay this in July or August to minimze the “pain in my wallet”.

Eventually I decided for August, because in July I’ve already had some expenses for the trip to Sweden, and new bed linen, clothes etc. And now they ask me to pay the same amount again?! Forget it! Oh, they offer me the choice of paying it in 4 monthly instalments, OR if I pay the full amount now, I get a 1% discount. Wooooow…

I wanna move to Timbuktu…

Meaning “We can’t make it more fun”, which is the slogan of the Belastingdienst (National Tax Agency) here in Holland. Well, they’re not even trying!

Just a few days before I was about to transfer the substantial amount of income tax I still owe them for 2004, I get this letter from them asking me to transfer the same amount as an advance for the income tax over 2005! While this year is not even over yet! And assuming my employment situation etc. will not change, it’s exactly the same not-so-small amount as I’ve been wondering for weeks and weeks, whether I’d want to pay this in July or August to minimze the “pain in my wallet”.

Eventually I decided for August, because in July I’ve already had some expenses for the trip to Sweden, and new bed linen, clothes etc. And now they ask me to pay the same amount again?! Forget it! Oh, they offer me the choice of paying it in 4 monthly instalments, OR if I pay the full amount now, I get a 1% discount. Wooooow…

I wanna move to Timbuktu…

Meaning “We can’t make it more fun”, which is the slogan of the Belastingdienst (National Tax Agency) here in Holland. Well, they’re not even trying!

Just a few days before I was about to transfer the substantial amount of income tax I still owe them for 2004, I get this letter from them asking me to transfer the same amount as an advance for the income tax over 2005! While this year is not even over yet! And assuming my employment situation etc. will not change, it’s exactly the same not-so-small amount as I’ve been wondering for weeks and weeks, whether I’d want to pay this in July or August to minimze the “pain in my wallet”.

Eventually I decided for August, because in July I’ve already had some expenses for the trip to Sweden, and new bed linen, clothes etc. And now they ask me to pay the same amount again?! Forget it! Oh, they offer me the choice of paying it in 4 monthly instalments, OR if I pay the full amount now, I get a 1% discount. Wooooow…

I wanna move to Timbuktu…

Indische Zomer

This Saturday, 7 former members of The Obscuri celebrated their dies natalis (anniversary) in The Hague, where this summer, lots of activities are taking place with the theme of the “Indische Zomer”.

So first we went to the Communication Museum, where they had a special exhibit about communication with Indonesia in the early 1900s: besides snail mail (which REALLY was snail mail at the time, as it was first transported by boat and later by plane), they used radio telegraphs, grammophones with spoken messages, and later telephone calls, which still cost a fortune. 12.50 Guilders for a 3 minute call might have been a week’s salary or more at that time?

Also very interesting were the demonstrations of a pre-war telephone exchange (made by L.M. Ericsson!), and a similarly old mail sorting machine. Even though both demonstrations suffered from the dreaded demo virus (things didn’t completely go as they should), we had a lot of fun with it.

Then we crossed the street, to Panorama Mesdag. This is a really awesome cylindrical painting, 14 meter high, 120 m in circumference, which presents a 360 degrees view of the beach of Scheveningen and the city of Den Haag. An amazingly realistic painting…

We ended this Indian Summer day with a sumptuous dinner at Restaurant Jimbaran, which turned out to serve authentic Indonesian food at very reasonable prices.

3Com router Problems again

Argh, after having worked smoothly for a month, my parents’ 3Com 3CRWDR100A-72 modem / router / access point stopped working
Basically, it refuses to connect to the ISP anymore. And it’s not a password problem; the same password does work with the old Thomson modem, which fortunately we didn’t throw away yet…

I tried reentering the connection parameters, resetting the modem to its factory settings, enabling and disabling all kinds of options, but no luck… Ideas anyone???

Free Blijdorp tickets

If anyone living in Holland wants to get 2 free tickets to the Blijdorp Zoo: surf to Robeco Direct and fill out the form.They’ll ask you how you want to invest >25000 Euros, which of course you can fill out in a completely fictitious way: what IF you had EUR 25000 to invest… Same like: what would you do if you were the Queen / Prime Minister / President of the the USA

Then, after a few days, you will receive in the mail 2 free tickets to Blijdorp. You’ll also receive an investment advice, but who says you actually have to DO anything with that?

Sidetracked

Has anyone ever seen a movie based on a book, which was NOT a disappointment?

I just finished the DVD of Villospår (Sidetracked), based on Henning Mankell’s book, but was disappointed especially by the ending, which they changed dramatically. OK, I can imagine that they shortened the story a bit, by leaving out 1 of the 4 murders performed by a serial killer. Even so, the movie is still 2.5 hours long. But to dramatically change the ending? And not for the better. Also, since you already know what’s going to happen, a lot of the suspense is gone, so for crime novels it’s especially awkward. Oh well…

Back home

On Tuesday afternoon, I had to go home again. But not without first having a very tasty lunch at a cafe which almost had a Mediterranean feel to it, probably due to the quiet inner court: Cafe Vanilj.

Even though this vacation was a day longer than last one, it’s never long enough…

Astrid Lindgrens Värld

The day after the wedding, we went to the Astrid Lindgrens Värld theme park, in eastern Sweden, where the brother of one of my friends is working as an actor.

If you’re not sure who Astrid Lindgren is: I’m sure you know Pippi Longstocking (Langkous / Långstrump), the Brothers Lionheart, and maybe Ronja the Robber’s daughter. Well, those are all her creations. THis theme park features all the characters from her books.

M & M = Married

Today, my friends M & M got married in the idyllic Nydala Church, in central Sweden. They looked absolutely marvellous and happy. Congratulations!

Afterwards, they had a fabulous party at Ljunga Park Hotel in Sävsjö. Although saying it was the happiest day of their lives seems a bit pessimistic for the future, I can imagine it was the happiest day of their lives SO FAR…