Cogs can think.

Yesterday, my parents and I were back at the AVL cancer hospital.

I’m not going to say much about it, but there is this one thing.

Does anyone else find it unnervingly funny that dozens of people are frantically smoking cigarettes in front of the cancer hospital’s entrances?

You’d think that, at one point, someone has gone through enough crap. That at some point, nature or god or luck or whatever says, hey, look, let’s give these people a break for a while. Let’s, like, not fcuk them for THREE DAYS.

Well, turns out that’s not the case.

Millions of brainless gutter sluts get breast implants every day, without a single complication, without a single problem. Yet, the one person that actually kind of really needs those implants gets screwed over. My mother’s left breast implant got infected. During emergency surgery, it was removed, and it was concluded that the infection was too strong to put anything else back in. This effectively means we’re back to square one.

They say that what doesn’t kill you, makes you stronger. In that case, my mom must be made of diamond right about now. SUCK ON THAT, DE BEERS.

My mother went into surgery Tuesday. She had a complicated breast reconstruction done - her remaining breast (the other, cancerous one was removed 3 years ago) was removed, and two ‘new’ ones were constructed, using flaps of skin from her armpit, and… Well, it’s complicated plastic surgery, I won’t bore you with the details.

It was quite the ride too, of course. My mother was nervous ever since last Wednesday, when she got the call it was her turn. The hospital she’s at is most likely the best hospital in the country - the Antonie van Leeuwenhoek Hospital (the AVL) in Amsterdam. The AVL specialises in treating patients with cancer and patients with cancer-related issues - like my mom’s case. It’s so good because it doesn’t look like your average hospital - the atmosphere is almost cosy. You’d pay a good deal of money per night if it was a hotel. The contact with the staff and doctors is also very close and warm, and they guide you from the moment you enter through the revolving doors - literally.

The surgery went perfectly, and she already sat up straight and made a few first steps this morning - only twelve hours after a very serious piece of surgery. There’s like ten million tubes draining blood and fluids from her wounds into bottles that lie scattered around her bed.

When my father and I drove up there late Tuesday night, at around 21:00, I said to my dad, look, she’s probably gonna be all talkative already.

And she was.

I have an intrinsic fear of the concept of suicide. The whole idea frightens me so much, it even makes me panic a little bit. The idea that someone can be so deep in a pit that he’s willing to take his own life seems so unreal to me I simply cannot imagine it. I start locking up, and feel all uncomfortable and uneasy for days.

Last Saturday, when my bestest best friend Renate and I had one of our meet ups at my place (think us making fun of one another, watching TV, having deep conversations until deep in the night), one of our talks was about suicide. I explained to her the whole idea makes me sick to my stomach, how I find it highly unnerving, and how it makes me feel very scared and upset.

You know, it might have to do with the fact that I discovered my brother’s suicide note when I was 10 years old. THANKS FOR THAT ONE, ASSHOLE.

One key feature for most users was a sense of community. Even though blogging is an inherently one-to-many activity, most readers felt a personal connection to the author. This could foster the feeling that the reader belonged to the community even in the absence of participation, and led those who did participate via comments to agonize over their content.

Hi, I’m Thom Arvid Holwerda, born on 1 December 1984. I have two brothers I never talk about, because their (in)actions severely damaged the connection I had with them - most likely beyond repair. And I don’t even care. My mother suffered from breast cancer a few years ago, which taught me a serious lesson about mortality. I have a lot of friends whom I appreciate and love dearly. I vehemently oppose the death penalty, legalised guns, and intolerance. The principle of unconditional equality is one of the two most important values - together with unconditional loyalty to the people I care about.

I am superawesome, incredibly smart, incomprehensibly funny, and NOT AT ALL ARROGANT.

Now, CONNECT GODDAMNIT.

I turned 23 today. Exactly 23 years ago I enlightened the world with my shining, glowing presence. Destined for greatness.

Just kidding, of course. The arrogant bit that is - it really is my 23rd birthday today.

I’m currently reading the final part of the Thule trilogy I told you about earlier. It’s the first I actually ever read, a gift from my parents, a long time ago.

The reason the two societies in the trilogy don’t get along very well is mostly based on the fact that while Baden is governed “traditionally”, that is, by men; Thule is governed by women, and that has resulted in a society completely different from what we are used to.

This difference is best illustrated in the final book, when Elvira, a young Baden girl living in one of the Baden colonies in Thule, moves into enemy territory to find her father, only to found out he died because of supposedly friendly fire (killed by bullets - Thule doesn’t have bullets). This sets in motion a whole chain of events, which lead to her being seen as a negotiator (by the Thule women) between Baden and Thule. When one of the prime leaders of Thule, Thura, explains Elvira’s role to her, Elvira says:

The Supreme Governour will roll over the floor laughing. He’ll say: “Woman, don’t be ridiculous, get married, have six kids, that’s how you serve your country.”

My first daughter will be named Elvira, by the way, whenever I have kids (600 years from now).

• My dad and I have decided to buy a digital SLR camera together - I want to take good pictures damn it. We both want one, but in order to make it affordable for me, we decided to buy one together. After consulting the interweb and Eugenia and her husband, we decided on getting the Nikon D40 (we’ll buy it somewhere in the coming weeks). It has gotten raving reviews, is easy to use, and is relatively affordable at ~500 EUR. As for a lens, we’ll be settling on the kit lens (18-55mm) for the time being, seeing that has also been getting very good reviews (despite it being a kit lens). We can always buy a better, more professional lens later on. They don’t come cheap at all, you see. Great stuff.
• For the first time ever, Debian has let me down. A dist-upgrade on my laptop went tits up, and manual fixage got me quite far, but not far enough. I’m quite pissed off right now about this one. Ten pounds of suck, that’s what it is.

Several times on my blog, I’ve tried to explain what it is that ties me so deeply to my hometown -why don’t I move to Amsterdam like many of my friends? Regular readers will know why - I prefer the peace, calm, quiet, and… ‘Conservativeness’ of the countryside. In addition to all that, there’s another reason… Just look at it. Ain’t she pretty?

The Warmenhuizen sessions.

Twelve photos I shot today in my hometown. As always, unedited.

I regularly wonder, how on earth do you teach your children proper use of the computer?

On the ‘children’s news’ just now, they reported on an application for Windows which parents can use to timely shut down a computer. This functionality is of course built-in into Vista and OS X (parental controls), so I don’t really know why they had to report on this particular application, but hey.

I just don’t get this. What kind of parent are you if you cannot even control your own chlidren’s computer usage? When I was younger, my parents weren’t exactly very strict on this issue - they gave me enough time to play on the computer, and they quite effectively distributed computer time between my two older brothers and I. However, when my parents said, “and now it’s enough, shut the thing down”, I did just that. Of course, I did try to sneak in an extra few minutes, and of course tried to whine until they let me play longer, but in the end, when my parents really said “end”, it really did mean “end”.

I can remember one time I was playing Age Of Empires online, and since I did not want to ruin my online ranking, I kept on playing despite my father telling me to stop - he went back the living room. Since I didn’t stop, my father got quite angry (and rightly so), and after that, I never did it again. That is proper parenting.

I really don’t understand the present day culture in parenting; parents try to shove all responsibilities they have as parents towards the schools and teachers, the government, to programs that block computer usage, censorship, and more of that nonsense. ‘Modern’ parents in this country expect schools to teach their children morals and values, because they themselves are too busy at work and going out. They expect the government to teach their children condom use, the dangers of smoking and - of course, our biggest problem - alcohol (ab)use. And now, they expect computer programs to stop their children from sitting behind their computers for too long.

But in the end, all these things won’t properly raise children. Children ought to be raised by their parents. That is your job as a mother and father. Sure, it ain’t easy, but did anyone ever say it was? As a parent, you have to be strict, but at the same time, you need to be able to compromise. You need to make harsh decisions, but you also need to know when to let your children decide for themselves. And to make matters worse, each of your children requires its own specific parenting style - trust me, my own parents know a thing or two about that one.

You also cannot just take the easy way out - prohibing your children from everything won’t exactly work. It’s the classic story of Bluebeard - tell someone he can enter every room in the house except one, which room will that someone most desire to enter? Prohibiting your child form doing anything even remotely dangerous will not help in raising him - in fact, it will make him weak, unable to cope with the harshness of real life. In other words, a pussy.

My children will most likely be taught computer usage the way my parents taught me. Sure, you can use the computer, and do whatever you want with it. But when I say schluss, it’s schluss. If I have to rely on software parental controls, I probably failed as a father.