19:00 uur


Many thanks to whoever uploaded the Rimini project CD! Cool, I really needed that today ;-)

To Smoke or not to Smoke ... is it a Question?

If, for every word written against smoking there were one single person who really had stopped – there would be no smokers in this world. Everybody in the Western World recognizes that tobacco-related diseases are the biggest preventable health problem of this century; yet, adolescents and young enjoy the privilege of youth that nothing can harm them anyway (from not wearing seatbelts to smoking!) and the imperceptible increase in Asian and developing countries affluence manifests itself in higher cigarette consumption per capitem. In Europe, between 25 and 30% of all cancer deaths are due to tobacco smoking. The World Health Organisation estimates that about one third of the global population, some 1.1 billion adults, are smokers. This number is expected to increase and the worldwide death toll is already greater than from HIV, tuberculosis, maternal mortality, motor vehicle accidents, suicide and homicide combined.
- copyright Cancer Watch

july 3 2001

Manic depressive Jules Sans Scrupules has an announcement to make: Sorry, too busy.

No, but seriously, how people today manage to have families, children and friends next to having jobs and dinners and internet and TV and sportschools and music instruments, beats me. Now some annoying things I ran into the last days:
- Those dumb idiots walking on the middle of the streets of Amsterdam pretending they don't know they are in the way, pretending they don't know there are people living and working there that need to get through! If I'd be ringing the bell on my bike for everytime I should warn people that there happens to be a sidewalk where they should be on instead, the sound just woulnd't stop! Without exception they jump away from my lane and pretend to be sorry "whoops, sorry, ehehe" Really, if you think it's so funny you can't watch your stupid careless asses in traffic, I hope you get run over by some biker that does not have my level of tolerance, let's see how sorry you are then.
- The dutch tax-system is amazingly silly. We now have 19% BTW (VAT) over here. And if you're expecting to get paid in this country, don't get your hopes up too high: bruto 16765 amounts to netto 9753 guilders. Something like 58%, talk about royal tax-deductions for employers, truly insane! Then there's the ever growing level of "Onroerende Zaakbelastingen" and rent, how do these fools come up with this mafia shit anyway? And if you want to buy yourself a (new) laptop, it now is cheaper to buy a ticket to Germany, Ireland or the US, buy your toughbook over there and take a plane back to NL! Something is very wrong in how they're running this country financially, and surprise surprise: those who 'make' the least suffer the most.
- Then there's banks: Before you know it you have like 5 different accounts on just your own little name. One for a credit-card (visa etc), one for savings, one to simply pay and get some cash out of the wall, one for extra interest savings etc. They all have their own so-called secure website and password and PIN, so to have enough money to pay with, you need to constantly bounce money from one to the other account. Wouldn't it be smarter for banks (and easier for us) to just let people have only 1 bankaccount with all their money for all their credit-cards on it? I mean, this is getting sick; To be able to pay stuff on the internet I need to open another entire new extra bonus bankaccount. Phew, like I had time left to watch out for one more debet-credit level, to read yet another 'Latest Money News' leiflet, oh please: Fuck You!

june 28 2001

This page gets way more frequent visitors than I thought it would get, who even send me enthusiastic email. Which is all great and stuff, but also costs me extra time! Some people I know personally are waiting for email from me, others are waiting for other things I should have finished for them a long time ago. I'm behind on my life about a month or two, really sorry everybody! A Julius needs to set his priorities in life, right?
Few things that cause this 'delay': The very nice weather we're having is one. Then my home is a total mess and I should really clean up good. Get new and more furniture.

june 27

Luckily I finally got to finish me-and-my-cousin's software-controllable hard-reset robot, and as you can see in the pic; it's pretty complicated stuff ;-) in fact, you won't believe how brilliant and complicated it actually is, what it is for, why we created it, and no, I won't explain it either. I can only say it is very useful to us, it is a mechanic relais electronically controlled by a delayed relais which in turn is controlled by the keyboard's Numlock LED, which in turn is controlled by home-made software. Right, so now I'm the total geek to you? Well I do these type of things only when they're really needed and useful and they take months for me to finish, I don't plan to do this often. It reminded me of the days back when I used to build my own (pirate) FM-radio and TV-transmitters and shit like that. Then another time-eater is me getting to learn how to handle BSD servers. I'm also slowly getting all my old webpages a little more organized, which is still not half near ready, but it's getting there... For one, my really old guestbook is back online! Check the older entries, they're very funny. And, last but not least, I'm totally CRAZY about a girl I met recently. No, not a cyber-thing, haven't met her online. It's all in a premature state but it looks very hopeful, "about time!" I hear some of you say and yes, for me to write this here means it's really worth mentioning. Maybe you'll get to see her soon ;-) I'm really very sleepy when I write this, and I need to get up real early tomorrow, so this is it for now... Later!

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Ciao

Yours truly

elke beetje lul heeft zijn eigen url

Julius B. Thyssen

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