Apparently, I’m it!, but I’m extremely tired (spending 3 hours chewing the fat with some very talented (they do exist out here in Delft!) web 2 prodigies at the mashup contest where Alper lifted himself into top spot wasn’t exactly in the planning for an already busy day but I’m very glad I went), so I’ll take the wimps way out.
I was originally supposed to mention 5 things no one (few) knew about me, and tag 5 other bloggers.
I’ll have to reduce that to 3 on both counts. Here goes, enjoy!
1. I’m a BASIC kid
My parents bought me a Commodore 64 back when I was.. uh.. 7? I think. Back then we played games like Beamrider with 12 people at a time (neighbours and the entire family), which suggests to me that Nintendo might be on to something… but I digress. This was the ‘platform’ I used to first learn programming. The ‘click’ that really made me go for it is perusing a rather graphics-oriented beginners book to programming the C64. One of the things (it was written in dutch) it said in one of the very first chapters is that it would ‘say’ (translated back to english) stuff ‘at’ me if I wrote 10 print "stuff"; run. I actually thought this would somehow result in the C64 speeching at me, something the SID music chip in those things certainly can NOT do, but it got me started anyway.
I stayed the course on BASIC even going so far as to program an Ad-Lib background (a TSR taking up 80k space, for those poor saps having to deal with DOS’s 640k limit back in the day) player in PowerBASIC.
After that I found Assembler, and did a lot of fun stuff by loading asm libraries into basic to tie it all together. Only much, much later did I finally bite the bullet and begrudgingly learnt java, the language I generally use today.
2. I’m a good cook.
Probably owing to my penchant for staying up all night programming combined with the total lack of 24-hour economy out here in the Netherlands, I’m an excellent cook, capable of mixing up something quite delicious off of frozen, canned, and otherwise long-term storable goods. Of course, my culinary preference is some sort of strange italian/indonesian combination featuring plenty of spicy foods, so my culinary skills aren’t much appreciated (yet!). A lot of experimentation paired with a disdain for pre-made sauce packets is really all thats required to become a mean hand at the stirrer and frying pan.
My personal favourite recipe, very tasty, very healthy, very quick to cook, and the ingredients keep for years:
Fried Noodles (per person):
75g noodles (the type that are prepared by leaving for 4 minutes into recently boiled hot water). For extra taste, cook in chicken or beef broth.
some frozen peas, chopped ginger, and maybe an onion or some such.
A good helping of sesame oil, sambal (sambal badjak is best if you can find it), and chopped garlic in oil base (keeps for years, no cutting needed!) to start things off. Cook this mix up for a bit if you want to take the spicy edge off. Frying sambal reduces the spicyness but leaves most of the taste intact. Just don’t let it burn.
Add the peas and the like to the simmering sambal mix. At around this time, rinse off the finished noodles and cool them off quickly in tap water to prevent them sticking together or burning quickly for the frying stage.
Add plenty of Mirin (rice vinegar) or ricewine vinegar (not quite the same) and salty Ketjap (‘Ketjap Asin’. ‘kikkoman’ is a world-wide brand that makes good ketjap asin. Also known as japanese ketjap – it’s the stuff you mix with wasabi to make sushi sauce), then add the noodles and fry it up (using a good frying pan or a ‘wok’, set your stove to ‘high’, and stir a lot over the course of 3 to 4 minutes so that the noodles get fried).
Transfer to plate and enjoy. Takes 10 minutes to make. The final 3 to 4 minute ‘frying’ stage should be separated for each plate – you can’t actually fry the noodles if you’re trying to do it all for 4 eaters in one sitting unless you have a huge pan. On the flipside you can ‘personalize’ each meal by adding some extra sambal (for the spicy inclined) or favourite greens.
NB: Sambal is a type of chilli paste. It’s extremely spicy by itself, and few can eat a spoonful of the raw stuff without chasing it with half a gallon of beer or milk.
3. I’m a weird sleeper
My sleeping patterns are extremely erratic. I can’t sleep unless I’m very tired but without a good reason to get up I snooze away for a long time, which adds up to being incapable of keeping a normal sleeping pattern.
On the flip side, almost all the ideas that turned out to serve me very well just sort of exist in my head when I wake up. As a result I’m disinclined to mess with my sleeping habits lest I lose my primary source of insights.
I have a very hard time falling asleep without music. In fact, I have a very hard time concentrating for very long times without some music in the background as well. I’d rather be blind than deaf if I was forced to choose.
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I started with Basic and 6502 machine language on a C64 as well. Ended up getting me hooked on programming and making games and simulations. I still remember William Shatner’s ads for the Vic-20 (Ok for about 9 months I owned a Vic-20 before the C64 came out). Totally hilarious.
I’m a totally weird sleeper as well. Completely unhooked from a circadian rhythm. Left to my own devices I can literally sleep for 24 hours and stay up for 24 hours without missing a beat. Sleep tends to enhance my creative process as well. Problem solving and sleep exist together very well.
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