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Telecomprovider KPN is met Apple in gesprek over de introductie van de iPhone in Nederland, een van de weinige Europese landen waar het toestel nog niet is aangekondigd.

Dat heeft woordvoerder Bram Oudshoorn van KPN dinsdag bevestigd. Volgens Oudshoorn lopen de gesprekken al enkele maanden. “Het is logisch dat Apple in ieder land naar de marktleider kijkt”, laat hij weten. Hij zegt niet te weten of KPN als enige met het bedrijf in gesprek is. Ook kan hij niet zeggen of en wanneer de onderhandelingen tot een overeenkomst zullen leiden.

“enkele maanden”…

pff. Ik zei het ruim anderhalf jaar geleden al tegen de toenmalig directeur Retail, en hij was het met me eens.

And just to confirm; they’re still minding the gap on the London subway…

So don’t worry, there was nothing wrong with me, just a short trip across the herring pond…

Here’s how I feel…

Dit bericht is voor de mensen die de afgelopen maanden gemerkt hebben dat ik nogal druk was…

ik kan eindelijk iets vertellen over wat ik heb gedaan. Vanaf september gaat het project met volle kracht vooruit, en tot die tijd is het een semi-open publieke beta.

Klik op het logo om te zien waar het om gaat:

Remember the accident with my car on December 4th? Well, here’s the brand new replacement…

I just received the damage assessment. Damage is at least € 5500, which is quite a bit more than the car is worth. Also, the garage told me that mechanically it’s unwise to repair the car..

I guess I’ll have to start looking for a replacement..

Here’s the back-side of my car:

And from the bottom:

Inside the trunk:

The front is also slightly damaged, but nothing spectacular enough for a picture here…

Well, this time the bad news is personal. My car was wrecked today.

I was at the tail end of a bunch of cars, standing still in lots of traffic on the left lane of the off-ramp of the A4 (Google Maps) when somebody didn’t quite get it that there was quite an amount of traffic, and hit the back of my car.

So now I’m waiting the damage assessment, and we’ll see what the insurer says about that, the car might be totalled.

And the car did exactly what it is supposed to do in a situation like this: protect me. Right now I’ve got nothing - no scratch, pain, neck cramp or whatever.

Progress is the word.

Today they let him wake up - so I had my first “conversation” with him… as far as you can have one with one party hampered with a breathing tube.

But it looks like all your kind words and thoughts paid off, and I thank you all for that…

If any of you ever need some kind thoughts thrown in your direction, or the direction of somebody you love, just drop me a line…

Thank you all for wishing me a great vacation. I’m starting to get in the mood, although this morning I have a bit of a cold. I’ll be rid of that before my flight coming monday, so it doesn’t worry me much. To show you what I’m going to do, I give you the picture above, taken by yours truly on an earlier trip. Click on it for a full 1280×1024 desktop sized picture (actually, it is my desktop picture right now). This may possibly be the best known dive site of curaçao, certainly it is the most visited, both by divers and snorkelers. This place has everything: the wreck of a little tugboat in only 10-15 feet of water, overgrown by corals; a beautiful vertical wall that starts in about 30 ft and drops down to 110ft; in shallow water giant coral-covered boulders provide a varied divescape; ledges along the shore cliffs are carpeted with orange tube coral; and large sea-plume colonies forming a veritable forest provide camouflage for numerous trumpetfishes, and sometimes large cornetfishes are also seen.

Am I going to this divespot again this vacation? You bet!

I’ll probably post a few more desktop sized pictures from my previous trips before I leave, stay tuned

I’m really due for a good vacation.

My dad is still showing good progress, and it looks like nothing will stand in the way of my planned vacation, starting next monday.. this weblog will go on sort-of-hiatus. I’ll have net access in curaçao, so I’ll probably post one or two nice underwater pictures, but you won’t get the stuff you usually find here…

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Researchers at the McEwen Centre for Regenerative Medicine at Toronto General Hospital have discovered the ‘SOS’ distress signal that mobilizes specific heart repair cells from the bone marrow to the injured heart after a heart attack.

While it has long been known that bone marrow cells have the ability to clear the dead tissue after a heart attack, what has not been known until now is the critically important role of bone marrow adult stem cells in repairing a damaged heart, restoring its function and enhancing the growth of new blood vessels.

“These cells act like generals in a battlefield, explained Dr. Shafie Fazel, cardiac surgery resident at TGH, University of Toronto surgeon/scientist program fellow and lead author of the study entitled, “Cardioprotective c-kit cells are from the bone marrow and regulate the myocardial balance of angiogenic cytokines,” published today in The Journal of Clinical Investigation. “When damaged heart tissue sends out an ‘SOS’ distress signal, this subset of bone marrow cells mobilizes quickly and stimulates the growth of new blood vessels in the heart. This is the first step in repairing the heart and in preventing the vicious downward spiral of heart failure in which the heart progressively thins and dilates, eventually causing death.” Despite advances in surgical procedures, mechanical assistance devices, drug therapy, and organ transplantation, more than half of patients with congestive heart failure die within five years of initial diagnosis.

a few decades ago, my dad would not have survived the things he has gone through. We live in truly remarkable times. Anyway, update: still slowly improving, and I’ve upgraded his status in my mind from “critical” to “hopeful”. All signs point towards recovery, but that’s only if nothing goes wrong.

Update: slowly, slowly improving…

(again: thanks for all the support!)

No real news, so below are a few things to keep your mind occupied… Again, thank you all for the kind words sent in my direction!

Thank you all for the heart warming comments, both on the site and in my mail. Your support is much appreciated.

Status update: still critical, but with careful optimism. Current prediction is that his state will remain critical over the weekend, but his situation is improving (but very slowly).

Below I’ll post some entries in the style and atmosphere you are used to on this site - and I thank some of you for sending some of them to me, as I clearly don’t have much time to find the good stuff myself these days…

I just got back from the hospital. My dad had emergency surgery - an aneurism, meaning one of his main arteries sprung a leak. The operation was a technical success, but he’s in intensive care right now, and will be in critical condition the next couple of days - it all depends on his heart, his strength, possible infections, and numerous other things..

I’m sure he’ll pull through, but it’ll be scary for a few days…