Whisky... again.

Last Saturday I went to the Whiskykoning again. No surprise there. The owner was in a good mood and since I am a steady customer by now, you tend to get some privileges. He likes steady customers and always has a nice chat about Scotch and other subjects.

I sometimes get a sip of some whisky I am interested in, or one he likes to recommend after me asking about its tastes and smells. This time it was different. The minute I walked in he took a glass from the shelf and poored me an unknown whisky. Heavily caramelized, sherry flavor galore. A really incredible taste. I was very surprised to taste something like that, especially since I had not expected to like it, but I think it was one of the best whiskies I ever tasted.

I was even more surprised to find out that I was sipping a 31 year old Benrinnes from Gordon & MacPhail. The first 20+ whisky I ever tasted and then you taste something like that. Wow!

I expected the price to be soaring around € 250,- but to my surprise it cost "only" € 100...

I had to think hard to choose if I would buy it, but 100 bucks for a bottle of booze is a bit much. Especially since I know myself enough to know that I have to stay away from those prices. If I buy one, I will buy more. So I didn't take that one, but promised myself that bottles like that will only be bought on special occasions, like when I have my birthday or something...

I went home with something else. Another Bruichladdich. This time I bought the Bruichladdich Infinity. A sherry finished blended malt, of three different vintages, all from Bruichladdich. A while ago I bought the 3D3, a heavily peated whisky, from 3 vintages, 3 warehouses and 3 peating levels. They do good things there. I never expected to be much of a blended malt fan, but these couple of bottles might just change that. I always like to babble about ages, and that is not possible with these... Too bad, they rock!

Apart from these things, I saw on the Whiskykoning's site that there is still some room to do a private nosing&tasting session in September. Just might try to get enough people together to do that. If you are interested, leave a note...

Lowlands Block schedule!

Woohoo! The Lowlands Block schedule is released.

This means that I can start planning the festival one month ahead (how nerdy is that). Of course, I have already printed it and marked all things I'd like to see.


For everyday I can see what I am going to see. (horizontal rows are the tents in which the acts are performed).
Unfortunately, CocoRosie plays in the Juliet. The Juliet is a closed theatre tent, which usually has massive lines before you can get in. We have always been able to avoid it. Last year was the first time I missed an act because of that, Joan as Policewoman played there... Too bad.

The schedule of things I am definetely going to see is:

Friday:

• 14.30: Rodrigo Y Gabriela
• 16.30: Editors
• 20.00: Damien Rice
• 21.45: Devendra Banhart

Saturday:

• 16.30: Ojos de Brujo
• 18.15: The View
• 20.00: Jimmy Eat World
• 21.45: Patrick Wolf

Sunday:

• 14.00: Loney, Dear
• 16.30: CocoRosie
• 18:00: Sonic Youth
• 19.45: Arcade Fire
• 21.30: Tool

That is four bands a day, with all kinds of different acts in between that I will partially see. That makes it less than 10 euros per band. Good deal if I may say so. Of course, that is without food, drinks, t-shirts and cds.

There still are some acts that I will try to fit in, between walking from one stage to the other, like Interpol. I would really like to see those guys, but they planned Jimmy Eat World at the same time... probably will leave early to see the most of Interpol.

But, one thing is certain. Unless they cancel, I am going to see CocoRosie. Finally...

Moving around

Last week a friend of mine got the keys to his new place in Den Bosch. So this week I had to go there to check for barbeque possibilities, which there are plenty.

He moves to the Hadewychstraat in Den Bosch. A nice and quiet area just out of the city centre.

It is comparable to one the bottom apartments, quite spacy, lots of storage options and quite a big garden. Since there is no option to get a car near the front door, there is hardly any traffic, some bicycles, but that's it.

We started painting the kitchen and the hallway last monday, and only the hall had to be done again (and probably a third time as well). The previous tennants painted the hall yellow, with some kind of wood-paint. Latex paint does not stick to that very well. The bulk of the work still has to be done, since the living room has the awful yellow layer as well and it has to be white.

Whisky Cabinet

Since my whiksy collection experiences a steady growth of about 2 and sometimes 3 bottles a month, my whisky cabinet is full. Overly so actually, since I have been moving stuff to other cabinets already and I have to put my glasses on top of the cilinders.

So, I bought a secondhand cabinet. Anneke found it on Marktplaats (secondhand internet shop), and was very enthousiastic. As it is with women, they tend to push their will through, and I thought it was quite okay. So I bought that one. Asked for the size first of course. Last wednesday I drove to Zwijndrecht (75 km from here) to pick it up, but it turned out to be a bit bigger than expected, so it didn't even fit in the car. I have a small car.

A good friend of mine is moving at the moment, so he had a very big van available, and we drove to Zwijndrecht again yesterday. It fit in the car (probably 15 times over) and we got it home. Hauled it up two stairs, and then tried the third. WHICH DIDN'T FIT!!!
I live in a third story appartment, and my front door has a very steep staircase just behind it, which made the way up just 1 centimeter too tight.

So, after two drives to Zwijndrecht, hauling a heavy cupboard up two staircases, it just doesn't fit. We had to take it back down, and put it in storage at a friend's place for now. We have two options left:

1. Taking the cupboard apart, painting it in pieces, replace some parts and put back together again, in our house.
2. Sand two sides down (the bottom and top extend a bit, so that's the part that didn't fit) one centimeter, to make sure it fits.

Don't really like the second one, because I don't think the cabinet will survive another trip up the stairs, so we are still having a bit of a dilemma.

How much trouble is necessary for a friggin' piece of secondhand furniture?!

Rate My Life...

Today I was checking the RSS updates that have been done today. I read quite a lot of blogs, not all of them very useful. Today on some blog I found a link to the "Rate my Life Self-help quiz". While I am strongly opposed to self help and all those "American style" psychological nonsense, I found this one quite funny.

I did the quiz and the outcome was this:

This Is My Life, Rated
Life:	7.4
Mind:	7.5
Body:	5.9
Spirit:	6.5
Friends/Family:	4.1
Love:	7.7
Finance:	7.7
Take the Rate My Life Quiz

The strange bar in "Friends/Family" is the only one that I don't understand. The quiz asks you to fill out how many good friends you have, how dependant you can be, how your relation with your next of kin is, etc. The only thing that was not positive, is the relation I have with my granddad, the rest (I think) is very good...

So, if you think your life is better; go on and take the test. It's funny to do, and only takes about 2 minutes. But still... Self-help is bullshit. You don't need medication, support groups, books about enlightenment and that kind of crap. Just solve your problems.

iPod

When I went to the DevDays, three weeks ago, there was the option at almost every company that had a stand there to write down some personalia. The main purpose is, of course, to get names for possible future employees.

Typically Dutch, no one writes down his name if he doesn't get something in return. Usually that was in the form of a lottery. Funny thing was that I won an iPod! Bad thing was that I had left the DevDays when they drew the winners. A collegue informed me that I had won the next day, but I thought that I would never see the gadget. I was wrong.

Yesterday I could pick it up at the post office. I opened it, and to my surprise it was not the cheapest 2 gigabyte version, but the 'Project Red' 8 gig version. Project Red means that for every sold iPod, $10 goes to anti Aids projects in Africa. So I've done some good too :-)

So, yesterday I installed iTunes, because that is a necessary evil. And then, all digital hell broke loose. I never liked Apple software, and this reminded me why.
For some reason, while Windows automatically recognizes the iPod, you still HAVE to download and install Quicktime as well. I don't like Quicktime, I never run Apple's movies anyway.
When you start the program, it all looks nice, but then you start looking at the options. Ah, an iTunes folder, the standard music folder on your hard drive. You still have to manually add files to your music library, which is quite strange in these days.
But, you have to, so I did just that. And what caught my surprise. A few minutes after adding the files, I tried to upload them to my iPod and the 'file' - 'music in library' link was broken.

Apart from the lacking features in iTunes, the interface of the iPod is very very good. Easy to use, fast and flexible. What I find more strange is the mandatory use of iTunes. Apple (among others) have been sueing MicroSoft on every turn about their 'closed standards' (meaning that Microsoft files can only be used by Microsoft software). Now, they do exactly the same, and offer no alternative. Of course, there are some Windows Media Player (my favorite player) plugins, but they cost 15 bucks, and I don't have a creditcard (to protect myself ;-) ).

But, iPods are popular. Everyone has one, now I have one too... For sale. My girlfriend and I both already have an mp3 player, which is a bit more flexible in its use. Especially mine. It is older than digital rights managers, so I don't have to use a program to put music on it, and I can get the files back off the thing later on.

So, if you're interested, email me. It has been used for 5 minutes only, original packaging, headphones and usb cable included.

Another good whisky

Yesterday my good friend Floris came to our place for dinner and a couple of drinks. Since he had tasted the Caol Ila 18 (the grades are a bit off) for the first time last week, he wanted to get himself a bottle, so we met up at the Whisky Koning.

I was a bit late so bought the bottle before I got there and, of course, it took me half an hour to choose from all the goodies that are on display there. Lucky for everyone, I knew I wanted to buy another Caol Ila, so that limited the options somewhat.

Rob, the owner of the shop let me taste the 8 year old Unpeated Caol Ila. A good whisky, but not what I am looking for in a Caol Ila. Not smoky enough, not oily enough. He also poored me a bit of the Hart Brothers 10 year old Caol Ila. That was something different. A very good whisky and although it is only a 10 year old, it is not too sharp. A lovely Scotch.

Funny thing is that I have been ranting about the Caol Ila Distillers' Edition. I have one bottle of it, but that is empty save a few drops. I am afraid to drink it, because the whisky was so good. Now, just after I bought this 10 year old, the shop owner told me he still has a couple of 1 litre bottles in the back, but keeps forgetting to put them in the shop again... Damn, dude, get me one... I could hold myself back, but will buy it the next time. A waste not to.

Our trip to Scotland

We have finally planned our trip to Scotland. Indeed, Scotland, not Islay. We tried to go to Islay, but since we only have a few days, taking a 3 hour bus trip, and a 3 hour bus trip, twice just to get to Port Ellen seems like a waste of time. Including flight, that would cost us more than half our trip.

So now we booked flights to Glasgow, from Brussels. We plan to go to Edinburgh as soon as we get there (on a Thursday in October) by train, and do stuff around there. We fly back around noon on Sunday, so we plan to get back to Glasgow on Saturday afternoon.

This is, of course, only concept planning. The only thing certain is the flights. I read an article in Whisky Magazine yesterday about the distilleries you can visit around Edinburgh and Glasgow. I am really looking forward to it.

We planned all this last thursday, while we were enjoying a series of nice Scotches and one Bushmills 10. We ended the evening with an 18 year old Caol Ila. Since then I have decided that my personal Distillery top 4 (I haven't gotten any farther) looks like this:

1. Caol Ila
2. Talisker
3. Lagavulin
4. Highland Park

Of course, this might change, I am only a novice whisky lover.

On the project: I am planning to do a tasting in the near future, but since summer holidays are on the way for a lot of people, that might experience a slight delay. The whiskies thus far are:

• Auchentoshan 10
• Old Pulteny 10
• Arran 10
• Glenfiddich 12
• Auld Edinburgh Islay (Bruichladdich 10)
• Tobermory 10
• Smokehead
• Glen Grant 10

I have not tasted the Bruichladdich yet, but I think the Old Pulteny, the Arran and Smokehead are highest in the list, but that is mostly because I like island whiskies.

Lectric Decade Party

Since the company I work at exists for ten years this year, there was ample reason to have a party. That party was last 23rd of June. For the first time (since I work here) partners were welcomed as well, so Anneke joined me to see if the big stories I always tell are anywhere near the truth.

We were welcomed in a very official way, red carpet, official photographer (paparazzi Joop van Tellingen), and some sort of champagne. After that there was a speech by Jan Hein, the big man behind Lectric, and that was it for the official part. Drinks were on the house, and there was a good cocktail bar. Guess where I spent most of the evening...

The party was a huge success, I might upload some pictures later, if there are any that show me from my better side =).

Root canal, part 2

So, after being incredibly happy for about an hour, the pain came back. The Friday evening was my sister's birthday, so I had some distraction and it was bearable. The night was worse, and I slept for only a few hours.

In the morning I got out of bed tired and lay down on the couch right away. The pain was worse than anything I have ever experienced, and I didn't know if I had to go up or down to make it better. The strongest Ibuprofen you can get at a regular drugstore without a perscription didn't do anything, not even with Paracetamol Codeine backup.

I made an appointment with a dentist that worked on Saturday and went there around five. Before that I took another couple of pills and for some miraculous reason they did work, and I could sleep a bit in the afternoon.

When I got to the dentist, he gave me an anaesthetic and cut open my gums, and the membrane that covers the jawbone. The infection underneath my tooth had tried to find a way out, since all kinds of dirty fluids had built up in my root canal, and they tore through the membrane (hence the pain). So, today is better, a lot actually, and my lip didn't swell too much.

Still using Brufen though, just to help my system defeat the infection... Again, thank God for dentists.