Cogs can think.

And as my final blog entry for this year, please do not forget to tune in to the Top2000; the final 50 songs will play during the remaining hours of this year, with my personal gems by The Eagles and The Boss (Hotel California at #3, The Last Resort at #35, and The River at #40). Basically every song of those 50 [.xls] is a gem, a classic, or in any otherway important (except for Katie Melua at #32; what on earth is that shallow meaningless sweet honeybunny sugar music doing there?).

Currently playing at #48: With Or Without You, U2. Great song.

Every culture has its own way of celebrating new year’s; even here in the west, each country has its own nuances. Where some prefer to look at what’s coming in 2007, Dutch people generally tend to look back and reflect on 2006.

For me, 2006 actually was a Very Good Year ™. First and foremost, all the various check-ups me mum got concerning her breast cancer were ok; doctors have not found a thing, meaning all the chemo and radiation therapy caught on. This is the single biggest reason why 2006 was a Very Good Year.

The second reason is of course the fact that I moved out of my parents’ into my own house, which took months to actually get ready to live in; as always, I had my mind set on a few very tricky things, as I wanted my doors/windowsills to be red (and anyone with a bit of experience in painting knows that means painting the same white door thee to four times), and of course the fact I wanted a wooden floor, and nothing else.

But now that I’m all settled, everybody just has to congratulate me with a very pretty house. It breathes me, weird colour choices, the walls filled with film posters, a huge glass desk and two humongous couches leaving no room for a dinner table; you name it.

The biggest kick is that I basically did everything by myself. Renate helped with tearing down the old wallpaper, and my dad helped with the final layer of paint on the doors (this is a very meticulous task), but doing the walls, laying the wooden floor; I all did it by myself. This insistence on doing it alone may have made evrything take longer, but I don’t care. This is now truly my house, and I will tear anyone apart who dares to lay a finger on it.

The third reason this was a Very Good Year are all my friends. I have so many good friends who are honest with and about me; mushy as it sounds, it’s a treasure.

The fourth reason is of course Twiek Lucifer Damien, my cat. Twiek is his name when he is relaxed and peaceful, Lucifer Damien when he has one of his many attacks of evilness (about four times a day).

It was a Very Good Year. What will 2007 bring? I can make a few wild guesses, but I’ll keep those to myself, okay?

Have a great new year’s, everybody, and take care of the things important to you.

To everybody in the Psychology Faculty at De Vrije Universiteit who doubted my abilities just because I was bad at statistics, and hence blocked my planned path of becoming a professional psychologist:

I passed my Statistics exam last Friday. My mark? Oh, just a 7.

Now you again.

In any case, good riddance. Apart from some of the people there (hi Renaatje!), Psychology sucked. Theoretically, I could go back to Psychology right now, streaming into the 2nd year there, as if nothing ever happened. No fcuking way, though. I’m in a much better place right now.

Seriously.

I just saw the most ridiculous thing in the history of mankind. Apparently, there is now something called ‘indoor skydiving’. This basically consists of floating above a huge fan, making it seem as if you are free falling. An indoor skydive centre just opened in Roozendaal, The Netherlands.

Fcuking nonsense. Where is the intrinsic fear? Where are the 7 bathroom visits during the 30 minutes before the plane takes off? Where is the unbearable tension as the plane slowly ascends to 3000m? Where is the total physical and mental state of panic as you slowly shift towards that hole in the plane? Where are the 200kph as you do a 30 second free fall? Where is that feeling of being cut in half as the chute opens? Where is the ‘flabbergastedness’ as you put your feet back on the ground? Where are those three days it takes for the adrenaline to leave your body?

I can know, as I have done the real thing. No, people, jerking off is not the same as having sex.

Eugenia blogged about the stagnation in the Linux desktop world. One comment was rather interesting:

Hate to break it to you, but the KDE devs are planning big things for KDE4.

KDE developers are indeed planning big things for KDE4– but that’s what they’re stuck at. Show me where the results are. KDE4 was supposed to be fleshed out by now, with a release somewhere early 2007. However, if you now take a look at the latest KDE4 dev build– it’s just KDE3, but uglier. We’ve been hearing Plasma this and Appeal that for a very long time now; however, nothing Solid (ha ha ha) has emerged.

All the wonderful ideas behind KDE4 (and the accompanying slick websites) are just that– ideas and websites. There are no development builds that truly show these ideas in a usable state. KDE4 is supposed to be released in the first half of 2007, but if all they have to show now is KDE3+, KDE4 is more likely to see release somewhere in 2008– Q3/Q4 rather than Q1/Q2.

GNOME3 is in an even worse state, as Eugenia pointed out. There is literally nothing, not even one line of code. In fact, there are not even ideas, not even a vision; there are only some random thoughts and ideas by random people in random places.

In the meantime, Vista is close to shipping, a significant step forward both under the hood as well as graphically from Windows XP; it is truly something different from XP (no matter what the anti-MS fanboys want you to believe). Apple, on the other side of the spectrum, has continuously been improving its operating system, making it faster, adding new and sometimes even innovative features. Leopard is planned for the first half of 2007, and is supposed to have some major new features (even though we know nothing of these features, I think we can give Apple the benefit of the doubt on this one seeing their track record of delivering).

And all that KDE and GNOME have to offer are some vague ideas, some vague visions (and in the case of GNOME, not even that). The future seems grim.

People (especially Americans) always wonder why Europe is so hopelessly divided, and why even the European Union fails miserably in creating a culturally united Europe. Aren’t all Europeans the same? Aren’t European countries in the Union similar to the states of the United States?

No. Not by a long shot.

European states are much older than the American states; however, more importantly, each country here has its own people, culture, language, music, food/kitchen, national anthem, royal family/nobility, you name it. American states do not have this (mostly), since the original inhabitants of America are delegated to zoos reservations and play little to no role in contemporary American culture. You guys across the pond are fairly similar to one another (differences exist, but not as big as i.e. the difference between Poland and France).

You guys also all share the same set of core values. A Democrat might differ from a Republican, but your core values are the same; you are all bound under the same flag, by the same constitution.

Today, in the newspaper, a study revealed that the majoirty of Europeans are against same-sex marriage, liberal drug laws, euthanasia, and more of those typically Dutch things, things we Dutch hold in high regard. Hence, were we Dutch part of some United States of Europe, we’d lose everything we value (equality, true freedom of the individual, regardless of sexual orientation, right to decide over one’s own life), simply because a majority of the Europeans don’t care for things like this.

And that would royally suck. Hence, I will never allow my country to succumb to the will of Brussels or anything other than our own Constitution, elected officials, and Royal Family.

I’m not a European. I am a Dutchman.

Last year, 2005, was best summed up by this song. If that certain something does not happen before the end of this year (I have absolutely no idea whatsoever), this song will sum up 2006.

It’s way too late to think of
Someone I would call now
The neon signs got tired
Red eye flights help the stars out
I’m safe in a corner
Just hours before me

I’m waking with the roaches
The world has surrendered
I’m dating ancient ghosts
The ones I made friends with
The comfort of fireflies
Long gone before daylight

And if I had one wish fulfilled tonight
I’d ask for the sun to never rise
If God lent his voice to me to speak
I’d say, go to bed, world

I’ve always been too lame
To see what’s before me
And I know nothing sweeter than
Champagne from last new year’s
Sweet music in my ears
And a night full of no fear

But if I had one wish fulfilled tonight
I’d ask for the sun to never rise
If God passed the mic to me to speak
I’d say, stay in bed, world

Sleep in peace

Today, the previous renter of my apartment dropped by to ask if I had some mail lying around here for her. I invited her in (common custom here, you don’t let people stand out in the cold for no reason).

Why did I invite her in, for god’s sake?

I’m a control freak. My house needs to be tidy, clean, and organised. Of course I lead a busy life; study, job, social life, you name it. Hence, I simply don’t always have the time to stay organised. And on top of that, I picked up a lot of my stuff from my parents’ house.

In other words, my house was one big disorganised mess. I fcuking hate it when people see my house like that. Seriously. I hate comforming to stereotypes (single man, student, messy house, unable to keep clean). I felt like a total disaster. Especially since she’s a, well, she.

Damn.

Well I guess Bush and Israel finally got what they wanted. Just in time for Christmas and Hanuka!

Repeat after me: We wish you a merry Christmas, we wish you a merry Christmas…

The bottom line of all this is that there are three groups:

1) the group that wants to ban non-GPL modules (by creating a patch that prevents them from running);
2) the group that thinks they should be allowed;
3) a group that is too pussy to actually make up their minds (Linus).

1 is bad because they limit the USE of the software, which falls BEYOND the scope of the GPL, which is a DISTRIBUTION license, and NOT an end-user license agreement. Were this patch to find its way into the vanilla Linux kernel, Linux ITSELF is not longer complying with the GPL, and hence is no longer Free software, because a restriction upon use is put in place.

3 is bad because it creates uncertainty. This is not necessarily bad for home usage, but it IS bad for companies. They REQUIRE legal certainty.

2 is the only possible way to go. Non-GPL modules should be allowed because it is a right of the USER to use them. If I want to run closed-source drivers on MY damn computer I should be allowed to. NO WAY that a bunch of Linux nerds can prevent me of that.

If this patch gets through, Linux is no longer Free software, and hence one of the prime reasons to actually use this piece of software becomes void.