"The only way to waste time, is to forget enjoying it." ~ Loesje

Loesje has the most awesome phrases now and then :D

*goes of randomly filling in the other text boxes as soon as answers to them pop up in my mind* (Should I put "my mind" there? Officially, I'd say no, but putting "his mind" just looks plain awkward without a subject.)

Hmm, it seems most of what I was going to say is now covered by the other boxes. How convenient!

Mijn moedertaal is in principe Nederlands, maar sommige dingen zijn gewoon makkelijker uit te drukken in het Engels. Het is dan ook goed mogelijk dat ik je een Engels berichtje stuur, hoewel we allebei Nederlands zijn. Aan de andere kant, er is niks mis met een goeie blend van Nederlands en Engels :)

Currently I'm studying advanced technology (which is basically physics, material science and electronics combined). I'm enjoying myself quite well, and the only thing I feel like I'm lacking at the moment would be someone to love. But no pressure or anything ;) Seeing someone for quite a while now ^^ It's going quite well, I don't expect it to change any time soon :D

My long term view would be something like research, basically discovering things. For example, I recently read a bit about a group of scientists trying to simulate a part of a rat's brain by linking thousands of processors together, and just simulating individual neurons that interconnect. (link) Those things interest me greatly. I hope to get somewhere that does groundbreaking research, possibly in nanotechnology or something similar.

Rational thinking, which comes in handy for what I'm studying.

Enjoying things: My rational thinking says that doing things just for the fun of it is a valid reason as well. I've recently taken an acoustic guitar with me from my parents (it had been there unused for a while), and now I'm attempting to learn it by myself from scratch (youtube guitar lessons for the win!). I'm actually putting more time in than I had anticipated, it's pretty cool! :)

Climbing. Climbing is fun, be it in trees, up climbing walls, or a form of urban exploration that gets you places no-one usually goes. I can, for example, point out a tree on our university campus where you can actually sit on the highest point of the tree (it's a kind of weeping willow, with a very thick branch at the top which curves downward. The top of the branch is even above the leaves).

Dexterity games on the computer. Somehow, I have the capability of becoming quite good at things like Hamsterball, N, Frets on fire or Gish. This, as the other side of the medal, comes with a drive to be on top of highscore lists if I know it's even remotely possible :)

Hmm, maybe I can use that drive to keep me going in my guitar playing... *ponders*

It depends on the situation. It could range from "Why is that guy sitting in a tree?" to "Ack, that was one of the most horrible puns I've ever heard". (Mmm puns. And self referential statements. This sentence is only funny because it references itself.

(Also, Gödel's incompleteness theorem is pure genius))

Longer term impressions may include the following: "That guy has too many random tidbits of knowledge" or "Who the hell would in their right mind try the uberman sleep schedule for 6 months?". (That was a bad idea, by the way. I don't have enough self-discipline to keep it up consistently; I still get people that say I didn't look very awake most of the time. I do believe it's possible though, with enough devotion.)

Books:

The Lord of the rings, the Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy, Harry Potter (or actually I prefer HPMOR), Children of the earth, the Discworld series, The hollow chocolate bunnies of the apocalypse and its sequel the toyminator. Probably more, but I'd have to have a list to cross. Multiple choice is much easier than open questions.

Moving pictures:

The lord of the rings, the Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy, Harry Potter (I'm getting repetitive.. quick, let's fix that), the Matrix (All three of them. I'm able to watch a movie without expectations, thus I can always enjoy a decent movie), Doctor Who (I said moving pictures, not movies ;)), Chuck, probably more as well.

Music:

I'm strange when it comes to music. Up until recently, i did not care for music at all. Nowadays I sometimes listen to music, but I equally well enjoy peace and quiet. Quietness can be awesome, by the way. Being outside before dawn, hearing no human-made sounds. As for genres, I'm not sure. I couldn't tell rock from classic (okay, I /can/ do that, but I hope you get my point :)).

I basically like music which I already know, which is kind of a catch 22, but it's remedied by other people listening to music in my vicinity.

I'd like to be able to do solos on the guitar in the long run (which kind of clashes with the fact that I have an acoustic guitar, not an electric one). This is probably heavily influenced by playing guitar hero frequently in the last few months. Ultimately, I'd like to be better at real guitar than I am at guitar hero, but my affinity for dexterity games makes that a difficult goal .

Food:

Nothing particular, really. Living in a dormitory, I can cook. Nothing fancy, but I won't die when put on my own next to a supermarket. I like a quiche one flatmate usually makes: take a pack puff pastry, some broccoli, an amount of eggs, crème fraîche, diced bacon, work some magic having to do with cooking broccoli, baking bacon, mixing egg and crème fraîche, some sprinkled cheese on top and an oven, and you've got a delicious, easy to make quiche. I recently made it when I was at my parents' house, got my little brother to eat it, and he actually liked it! Which, knowing my brother, is quite a feat, since he'd never eaten anything of the likes before.

Webcomics:

Xkcd, Ctrl-alt-delete, Questionable content, Order of the stick, Looking for group.

Games with interesting gameplay dynamics:

Gish: Ever played a blob of tar? You should! Jumping by squishing yourself on the ground, then rigidifying your blob when it's at its most squished state is awesome. http://www.chroniclogic.com/index.htm?gish.htm

Shift: Are you stuck? Invert the ceilings with the free space, and carry on! http://armorgames.com/play/751/shift

Bastet: Replay value doesn't last very long, but having a tetris clone that always gives you the worst block in your particular situation is some pretty cool programming. It's fun to let unsuspecting people try to figure out why they can't get more than 4 rows before they fill up their screen :) http://fph.altervista.org/prog/bastet.shtml

The list goes on... Bloxorz, Ragdoll masters, Liquid wars, Bontãgo, Echochrome, etc etc. If you know of a cool game, let me know! I like trying new ones.

Hmm, difficult. I can see myself adjusting to/rationalizing in many different scenarios. That's at least one thing I can't do without, ration. It's something that basically defines a great part of me, and I can't predict the outcome were I to lose that. (I've actually read a bit about a girl who lost a part of the left hemisphere of her brain. The other side took over the lost functions, and she stopped her studies and pursued an art career. The human brain is a magnificent thing.)

Life without other people would probably suck as well. An apocalyptic scenario in which I certainly knew that I was the last person on earth would probably be the only scenario in which I could seriously break down. Except that in such a scenario, you don't know if there's more people, and it's actually likely that there's more people that have survived. Thus, I'd keep going anyway :)

Everything.

I think about how things around me work, mostly. This ranges from actual physical devices that I try to figure out, to the interesting social dynamics you get from mixing different groups of people at a party. Basically, I like figuring things out.

When I was young, I was wondering about why, when I squeezed a bottle and put my hand on the opening, the bottle wouldn't go back to its original size, but kept looking squeezed. I then figured it was probably because air couldn't be empty, and for the bottle to go back to its original size, it needed air to flow in through the opening. I assumed this as truth, and when the time came that someone tried to teach me the real reason, it took some serious convincing before I could disregard my conviction.

It may be possible during a discussion I get distracted into analyzing the discussion. Did you know that the brothers Wright occasionally switched viewpoints, to see the arguments from the other perspective? xkcd portrayed this nicely: link

not really an outgoing type. Nor on any other night for that matter :) I do enjoy socializing with a group of people I know, but randomly walking up to people to make new contacts just isn't for me. That's why I like this site: before you start, you at least know you have things in common.

So what /do/ I do on a Friday night? At the moment, I usually watch a movie or something with some of the other people in my dormitories. Some time ago I threw a birthday party (which indeed had interesting social dynamics. People seemed to like the party, I myself got the feeling that I prefer to meet seperate groups of people separately).

You should message me if you have some interesting remarks or tidbits of knowledge to share, if you saw a spelling/grammar mistake or other point of improvement, if we have a high match factor, if we have a phenomenally low match factor, or for any reason, really. You can even message me if you can't think of a reason to message me.

I'll respond to all messages I get. Your message doesn't even need to contain a whole lot; starting a conversation is difficult enough by itself :P Also, if you think the guy should initiate the first message, not the girl, then you should send me a message saying that, and I'll send you a message to initiate a conversation :)