Starting the first of March I’ll be developing in ColdFusion and PHP at Rhinlofly.
I hereby like to thank my family and Cal, Jouri and Remco for their support in the process of finalizing my decision to switch jobs.

On Saturday morning I traveled to Amsterdam and took a flight to London. From London I then had a flight to San Francisco, where I arrived on Saturday evening. Ivo told me to take the BART instead of a cab for traveling down-town; this would only cost around five bucks instead of forty for a cab. When exiting the BART, I headed over to 3rd street (I thought), but I went the wrong way. After about 10 minutes of walking and looking at street-names I finally started Google Maps from my mobile phone to look up where I was and what directions to follow to my hotel. After walking 15 minutes the other way, I arrived at the Westin, checked in and went out to get some food. Around the corner was a DelTaco, where I had some tacos, before taking a bath and going to bed.

I left the curtains open, because of the great view of the city skyline by night, from the 33rd floor, so when I woke up the next morning, I was greeted with the following view:

After setting up my wifi first, and later on fixed-ethernet because of the bad reception, I checked on my mail and did a web cam session with the kids. Then I went looking for something to eat. After wandering around for a couple of hours I saw a big line of waiting people in front of Mel’s drive-in. This either had to mean the food was for free or it was good, so I queued up.
The lunch (it was that late then) was very good and the coffee was terrible. Especially if you’re used to strong European coffee. Because I was around the corner of the Moscone Center, I decided to pre-register and pickup my badge and conference guide. As you can see there were only a handful of people there, so it only took 2 minutes.

I had some time to spare, the dinner meeting was at six thirty, so I walked over to the Apple store to look at all nice toys at hand. After playing with the iPod Touch for a while, I bought one, and went back to the hotel to play with it, until it was time for dinner.
We met in the lobby at six thirty and walked to restaurant Lulu, were we had a very nice dinner and conversation on who we were, what we do and what interests us, both work and private. I had some very nice talks with Zeke Koch, Adrian Ludwig, Paul Reinheimer and Larry Ullman.

Tuesday evening was reserved for the customer appreciation event, that was held in The Academy of Sciences and de Young Museum. At first Larry and I thought of skipping it, having a dinner together and then go to the hotel to get some sleep. On the way to the hotel we ran into Aaron Conran and we got into a nice conversation on the corner of 4th and mission street. After standing talking there for about an hour we decided to go with Aaron to the Customer Appreciation Event. We got on the bus around the corner of the Moscone Center, that took us to the de Young Museum. When we entered the museum, there were bars, buffets and musicians playing.
We tried to get some food first, but there were only sweet desserts, so we attacked. Then we walked around and saw there were buffets with different food types scattered around. Eventually we had some very good food. It was very cool to be able to walk around in the evening, eating and drinking between old skulls and the Haute Couture from Yves Saint Laurent. Around 22:30 the museum closed and we were transported back to the Moscone Center. When we were in the bus, we passed another building, that spit out a lot of people too, we then realized that was the Academy of Sciences; we didn’t even get that far. Hearing all stories and seeing the pictures of the Academy of Sciences, I felt sorry that we didn’t pay a visit to that too.

Wednesday evening, after the last session on the “next version of Flex Builder”, I went back to my hotel, just to walk into Larry again. I wanted to have a dinner and Larry could use a bite before taking his plane too, so we wandered a bit around the financial district, until we found a nice thai restaurant. We had some very good food there, before we walked back to the hotel. On our way back we had a nice coffee from Pete’s. Pitty it was only half a cup, because they were closing and it was the last they had . Larry left to the airport and I packed up too. I had to leave the next day at one.

On my last day in SF I got up late, packed my stuff, and went down to check out. Thanks again Mike ! That was a nice surprise!
I then went back to the Apple store to return my iPod Touch; I really enjoyed it, but hated the lack of internet if no public wifi was around, so I decided to get an iPhone instead! With that taken care of, I could use some food before having a trip that would take almost 25 hours, so I checked out the hotel restaurant. They had some expensive pasta, that turned out to be very small portion, but at least it tasted good.
I took the BART back to SFO and left SF with a temperature of 15°C. When I arrived home it was 16°C colder… brrr

As told on my company blog: It was an awesome experience and I’ve learned a lot.
I’ve learned lots of new stuff on AIR and FLEX and I’ve learned it’s wise to not over-plan your schedule, but leave some holes in which you can socialize and network or just write up some of the things you need to remember for blog-posts like this.

More pictures I took in SF:	More pictures by Justin Korn:

• We finally completed the garden… Yay !
• We had a very nice holiday in France
• The girls are growing like crazy and it’s hard to keep up with their development.
• We think one of the girls has mild “Selective Mutism” and we’re now trying to stimulate her and her school in getting her trust back and letting go of her fear.
• I switched to a new employer; the best PHP development firm in The Netherlands and the UK: Ibuildings. I’m working for the team in Sittard and work there two days a week and telecommute the other three. Having lunch with the kids is a real plus !

Watch this space… more updates will follow…

I am hereby officially tendering my resignation as an adult.

I have decided I would like to accept the responsibilities of a 6 year old again.

I want to go to McDonald’s and think that it’s a four star restaurant.
I want to sail sticks across a fresh mud puddle and make ripples with rocks.
I want to think M&Ms are better than money, because you can eat them.
I want to play kickball during recess and paint with watercolors in art.
I want to lie under a big Oak tree and run a lemonade stand with my friends on a hot summers day.
I want to return to a time when life was simple.
When all you knew were colors, addition tables and simple nursery rhymes. But that didn’t bother you, because you didn’t know what you didn’t know and you didn’t care.
When all you knew was to be happy because you didn’t know all the things that should make you worried and upset.
I want to think that the world is fair. That everyone in it is honest and good.
I want to believe that anything is possible.
Somewhere in my youth…I matured and I learned too much.

I learned of nuclear weapons, war, prejudice, starvation and abused children.
I learned of lies, unhappy marriages, suffering, illness, pain and death.
I learned of a world where men left their families to go and fight for our country, and returned only to end up living on the streets… begging for their next meal.
I learned of a world where children knew how to kill…and did.

What happened to the time when we thought that everyone would live because we didn’t grasp the concept of death?
When we thought the worst thing in the world was if someone took the jump rope from you or picked you last for kickball?

I want to be oblivious to the complexity of life and be overly excited by little things once again. I want to return to the days when reading was fun and music was clean. When television was used to report the news or for family entertainment and not to promote sex, violence and deceit.

I remember being naive and thinking that everyone was happy because I was.
I would walk on the beach and only think of the sand between my toes and the prettiest seashell I could find.
I would spend my afternoon climbing trees and riding my bike.

I didn’t worry about time, bills or where I was going to find the money to fix my car.
I used to wonder what I was going to do or be when I grew up, not worry about what I’ll do if this doesn’t work out.

I want to live simple again.
I don’t want my day to consist of computer crashes, mountains of paperwork, depressing news, how to survive more days in the month than there is money in the bank, doctor bills, gossip, illness and loss of loved ones.
I want to believe in the power of smiles, hugs, a kind word, truth, justice, peace, dreams, the imagination, mankind and making angels in the snow.

I want to be 6 again.

(found online somewhere)

More updates will follow soon !

After commuting for about 3 to 6 hours a day, for over 6 years, things start to get better now. We’ve bought a house that’s only 20km. (about 1/2 hour drive) from my work.