January 18th, 2000

Happy Birthday to me, Happy Birthday to me, HAPPY BIRTHDAY, HAPPY BIRTHDAY, HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME!!

If my 29th year is as good as my 28th, I'll be very surprised and overjoyed. I'm pretty happy with my 28th year. I moved to Holland. Got a work permit, residence permit, and brought Spook over. My project is going much better. I've made quite a few close friends in my new office while keeping in touch with a ton of old ones. My work has improved although I've been emphasizing the project management role rather than my programming. I've started to learn Dutch. I got CPROG.com up and running. My poker game has improved. And I can now parallel park into a spot only 18 inches larger than my car.

But I'm not ready to turn 30. That seems too much like a grownup age to me. And I still don't know what I want to do or be when I grow up. Absolutely not ready for 30.

The Dutch have a custom that the celebrant brings the cake to the office. With an office of 20 people + drop by guests, this guarantees treats pretty much every week or two. So I found a bakery and got 20 Moorecakas. They looked like chocolate eclairs. Very tasty. The office gave me a gift of flowers and a gift certificate to a local music store.

Clare asked me this morning if my mother had called me and wished me happy birthday. I replied breezily, "No. This is the 90's, she emailed me!" Of course everyone understood the spirit of what I said, but the technical inaccuracy is bothering me. What do we call this decade? The naughts? The zero's? Any guesses anyone?

Thanks to everyone for sending cards, greetings and presents. They are gratefully appreciated.

I celebrated my birthday by ordering a pizza and snuggling with Spook. She felt she deserved a pepperoni, I respectfully disagreed. I couldn't convince her. We wound up agreeing to disagree.

I've been busy apartment hunting in Amsterdam. I have been shown a couple of good candidates in Amsterdam. Tomorrow I'll see the contenders again and choose from them.

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