Caliban - Opinion and Righteous Anger

Our photos of Koninginnedag 2007 are up. They're not as good as I'd hoped, but they still capture the atmosphere of the day.

The weather was perhaps the best ever on Koninginnedag, with uninterrupted sunshine for the duration of the day. The temperature was pleasantly warm without ever becoming too hot.

Sarah was the earliest to rise, up and out the door at 07:00 in order to snap up the early morning bargains with Mina along the Apollolaan. I rose soon afterwards, as a disconsolate Eloïse had just awoken and was now wondering where the hell her mother had gone so early in the day without her.

All in all, it was a long, but very gezellige day.

Geoff headed back to California yesterday after an enjoyable visit, affording us 36 hours of respite before Sarah's folks arrive from Providence. That means another early day for yours truly to pick them up from the airport tomorrow.

The car has been repaired and you'd never know it had been damaged. Let's hope the insurance claim is processed smoothly.

The dry, sunny spell that has seen the city picnicking in the park every day for the last month and a half is coming to an end, they say. Sunday will supposedly be our last warm, sunny day for a while and some much needed rain is heading this way. As sad as I'll be to see the return of normal spring weather, Mother Nature will be happy, so there's some consolation to be had.

I've been browsing through the Gemeentearchief's Beeldbank (the municipal archive's image bank) and was delighted to find old photos of the Koningslaan, Oranje Nassaulaan and Prins Hendriklaan.

Amongst the photos are pictures of the original drawings and planning submissions for several of the neighbourhood's most striking and characteristic buildings.

The Free Software Foundation has launched its Play Ogg campaign for a "legally, ethically and technically superior audio alternative to the proprietary MP3 format".

Even though Ogg Vorbis truly is legally, ethically and technically superior to MP3, I doubt this will turn the market for downloadable music upside-down. The superior product often doesn't triumph.

V2000, anyone?

The last few days, our garden lawn has been jumping with frogs. Eloïse and I have great fun every day now, walking around looking for them. We generally find around half a dozen, ranging from thumbnail size babies to good-sized ones that would fit in the palm of your hand.

We don't know where they're coming from, but there must be a water source nearby. Perhaps one of our close neighbours has a pond or perhaps they're coming from further afield. Quite why they camp out in our grass, however, is a mystery at the moment.