With just a couple of hours in the year 2009 left and the 2nd decade of the 21st century about to start, it’s time to look back at what has been a very good year. 2009 has been a year with a lot of highlights, and in retrospect I can’t really think about anything happening that I didn’t like.

I am glad I was able to travel a lot in 2009. Jeanine and I visited The Gambia and Izmir even twice. I am writing this from the warm Canary Islands, a good place to be to welcome the new year :) 2009 was also the year I bought my first car, and although it immediately required a lot of fixes it’s still running happily :) Having a car is one of those things you can’t live without once you have one.

Another major improvement to my live was the laser eye surgery I had done to get rid of my contacts. Having my eye-sight perfected to 130% I can say it was a really good decision. I’m glad I finally gave in to Jeanine and just had it done.

So what will 2010 bring? Well, it’s bound to become an ever better year! Starting from February I’ll start working on my final thesis in my company: dotBlue. Also, I intend to do a lot more blogging (but probably Dutch only).

Regarding New Year’s resolutions: as every year I have quite a list. But I think it would be better to just keep them to myself, as I have a track record of breaking them within the first 2 weeks of the new year.

I wish everyone a very healthy and successful 2010! See you on the flip-side!

Since yesterday 1 pm 1 out of 4 customers of Vodafone in The Netherlands are unable to set up or receive voice calls, send text message or use their 3G connections. I am one of the happy few. Anyway, aside from this issue they have another problem: an unavailable website. The other Dutch telcos are probably throwing parties right now ;)

Now the Halloween holiday is getting more and more popular in The Netherlands Jeanine and I decided to give pumpkin carving a try. Nowadays you can even buy pumpkins and carving tools at Intratuin (the local garden shop) so one could say Halloween really made it here. To be honest I was rather impressed with my own pumpkin (the ‘thing’ on the right) but when Jeanine finished her pumpkin it just looked so damn ugly in comparison. I was really impressed by Jeanine’s carving skills!

Happy Halloween!

Joseph Kittinger (born July 27, 1928) is a true hero in my opinion. Not only did the man win 2 Silver Star awards, 2 Legion of Merit awards, 6 Distinguished Flying Cross awards, 3 Bronze Star awards, 2 Purple Heart awards, a Meritorious Service Medal, 24 Air Medals and a Prisoner of War Medal but he also claimed the highest parachute drop in history. From a whopping 103,300 feet (31.49 km) he jumped from his gondola aircraft as part of Project Excelsior and descended for 13 minutes and 45 seconds during which he reached a top speed of 988 km/h. You really have to see it for yourself:

In a related video: some space enthusiasts successfully recorded HD video from the edge of space on a budget as small as $148 USD. Watch and enjoy :)