Cogs can think.

My Nokia 8800 just died. Well, its internal speaker just died, meaning I am forced to use the speakerphone function to talk to people. And trust me, that really defeats the purpose of a mobile phone. And it looks completely ridiculous.

Anyway, no problem, I thought. The Nokia 8800 is a premium phone (as in, a shiny exterior and crap interior), so I have very decent Nokia warranty; 24 months, no questions asked.

That is, if you have the receipt. And despite the fact that my obsessive-compulsive mind forces me into keeping every goddamn receipt - I have receipts pre-dating the first coming of Christ for god’s sake (two beer at the Bethlehem Inn) - but no, the receipt for one of the most expensive items in my household… No receipt. I have the Fed Ex shipping notes, the invoice documents from Dutch Customs (it’s from the US), but no Nokia 8800 receipt. Sometimes I wonder, is all this obsessive categorising and cleaning actually worth it?

And then I look at my kitchen cabinets and feel all proud.

Yesterday eve, as I was driving home from Amsterdam after seeing Transformers, I popped Bruce Springsteen’s Greatest Hits album into my car’s CD player. When it reached “Better Days”, I remembered how this song used to, like, help me through the rougher patches during my mom’s illness.

Now a life of leisure and a pirate’s treasure
Don’t make much for tragedy
But it’s a sad man my friend who’s livin’ in his own skin
And can’t stand the company
Every fool’s got a reason to feelin’ sorry for himself
And turn his heart to stone
Tonight this fool’s halfway to heaven and just a mile outta hell
And I feel like I’m comin’ home

These are better days baby
There’s better days shining through
These are better days
Better days with a girl like you

All this, of course, after I fantasised about my Micra being a Transformer. He’d She’d be called “Micron”, and have an eternal minority complex.

I stayed in little-boy-mode a little too long.

Transformers. Best film of the year? Time will tell. Ratatouille isn’t out yet.

Anyway, it was one hell of a trip. The special effects are so good - the robots are real. They are physically part of the scenery, and that’s a huge stride forward compared to all those other crappy blue/green-screen crap where you can easily spot the computerised graphics. The humour was excellent too.

The story was crap of course, and obviously, it was ‘over-the-top’ in every way imaginable - but that’s a good thing. You should see this film through the eyes of a seven year old boy… And when you do that, everything will fall into place.

I felt 7 all over again.

I just want to say I’m in full support of Great Britain in this case. Russia fails to cooperate in a high-profile murder case, and will not supply Britain with the single and prime suspect. If Russia wants to be seen a serious, Western nation (as if, with Putin at the wheel), they better learn to cooperate in these cases.

Russia, you’re only a shadow of your former self during the USSR period - and let’s be honest, even back then you were a third world country. Face reality already.

Apples love pixels! That’s for sure. May I introduce you to Pix’d, every obsessive-compulsive maniac’s dream. Icons, lovingly crafted pixel-by-pixel, isometrically, depicting various pieces of (mostly) Apple hardware. Currently, all I can show you is a preview, so head on over to the Pix’d page!

Please note that the background of this preview image is copyrighted by David Lanham (”Phosphoric Acid“).

I have no release date set for Pix’d, it may take weeks, it may take months. The icons will remain at 64x64 only, due to the fact that pixelart doesn’t scale well (in other words, I’d have to craft all the icons at different sizes).

Our former Secretary of Finance Gerrit Zalm (one of the best secretaries, in any field, we ever had; great guy, too) summed up pretty well why I simply do not believe miracles, crop circles, alien visits, conspiracy theories, or other forms of mass hysteria. He said it during a discussion about a popular TV program here where people who have experienced miracles can tell their tale.

There are 16 million people in this country, 365 days, each of which has 24 hours. Coincidences are bound to occur.

Well said, Mr Zalm. Six billion people + enough time = a whole lot of nonsense.

I still have the moves, baby.

After not having done anything related to pixelart for more than a year, I just recreated my Cube in isometric pixelart.

My ideal vacation trip.

The perfect t-shirt for me.

My nickname is grandpa. I’m the oldest guy in my group of friends (only like 3 months older than Levi, but hey), I’m balding, I’m fashionably chronically late, I hate change, teenagers annoy me, I refuse to live (”Like normal people do”) in a city, I like peace & quiet, I’m totally into old music, and I talk funny.

Interested? You can request pricing & availability information here.

You start with the Nokia 8800 (my phone). The best phone design ever, no question about it. Stainless steel, built like a rock, elegant, beautiful, small but not flimsy, and a good, heavy feel to it. A decent ‘clunk’ when sliding the phone open. A luxury feel. There’s little you need to change about the design.

Obviously a slider, I detest any other phone design. Every candybar phone I’ve ever had had its keypad fail. Clamshell phones are clumsy, and let’s not even start about ’swivel’ phones (whoever came up with that nonsense ought to be shot). Touch screen phones like the iPhone and LG Prada are even worse - no tactile feedback, smudges on the screen, no blind operation, awful. Just… Awful. Usability nightmare (for me).

Strip the phone’s functionality. Phone calls and text messaging functionality is all I need (and be honest, how many of you have used all that crap on a structural basis, other than you, Eugenia ;) ). All the other stuff is useless crap that only bog the device down and get in the way. Camera, video, ‘internet’, MMS, email, they all need to go. If you rip all that pointlessness out of the phone, then the only reason I see for having Bluetooth would be transferring contacts and ringtones - and since that can be done just as easily by a cable, Bluetooth can go too. This would void the need for unusable 3x3 menu structures, softkeys, and weird icons. Every ‘feature’ of the phone would be geared for either calling, or text messaging.

On the outside of the phone, all you need is an on/off button, and a slider button to switch between silent and non-silent operation. A mini-USB port for the data/charge cables, and that’s it. You could replace the energy-draining TFT screen with a more efficient and more elegant OLED screen. I’m not sure where the technology on OLED displays stands, but antialiasing wouldn’t hurt (currently, the 8800 lacks that anyway).

That would be my ideal phone.