davidii

Working at Players

2004-08-30T01:02:42Z

Besides learning to trade in the forex market and spend some free time here, the last few weeks I spent at least 3/4 of my nights at Players, the stripclub. Working at the frontdesk

I haven't been involved with Utopia, the dance club, at all anymore since that's a losing situation anyway. They can't get it running and just hope to find someone to buy it. Player sis starting up slowly, the summer is a bad time to open up such a club, because it's a time where a lot of people prefer to do outdoors stuff, and when they go out they go to a club with a patio. But of course there's some people who want to visit such a club anyway, and there our problem is that our investor still hasn't come up with all the money he promised.

His problem is that this way, he ends up paying more money, and he's complaining about how he has to pay so many bills at the end of the month. But well, that's because he is used to the real estate business, where he can stall and stall his payments and that way often even get a discount because people are glad when they finally get some money... In this business, you need to have your money up front for a lot of things. Sure, some bills can be paid later, but the problem was that we already have some bills that are late. And employees, you never can skip on that (and here in the US most of the time people get their paycheck every 2 weeks). And for advertising they always want the money upfront, and this last thing is something we have been missing out on. Advertising outside of the club (more radio, bigger paper ads that stress our kitchen for a 5pm crowd), and advertising inside the club: more money for the dancers to keep them happy when there's no customers to tip them - so you at least always have some dancers when an early customer does walk in).

These last two things have been a problem, we don't get many people in until it's very late, and therefore we don't get many dancers excited for dancing early so people who come in early aren't that excited to come back (at least, not early...). So it's a psiral we only can get out either by some money now or by being very patient. Everyone agrees it's a great place, much better than all the other stripclubs in town, it's just missing the action. So if we keep floating, we'll slowly grow. If we want it fast, Michael will have to come up with money at the beginning of the month, not the end... He's complaining it's costing him so much money every month while we're not making profit yet, but hey... If he spends the money at the start for once on advertising, that will bring in a lot more people who will then let us make more money so he won't have to pay so many bills! He's just a hard learner it seems, thinking because he has made a lot more money than the rest of us, he knows better how to run a business. Well, that's a totally different area of expertise! Better listen to the people who know this business.

Ah well, anyway, to make sure they don't have to pay even more for someone at the front desk, I've been sitting there for most days the past few weeks and checked if people have a membership and otherwise sell it to them, and ID'ing them. I also walk the dancers out after they were done, carrying their bags and making sure customers don't bother them (actually had to do that one time - even with the little business we have now). So basically I'm also kind of a bouncer, who'd ever thought that!

There's some funny rules in Utah. Any club that sells liquor, can only accept people if they're a member or if they're being sponsored by a member (a member can sponsor up to 6 other people). You can sell them a temporary membership (max. 3 weeks, ours are 2 weeks) for a minimum of 4 dollars, and a year for a minimum of 12 (we do the minimum amounts). Then it's up to you if you want to charge cover (we don't until we'll have a lot of business going on). The system used to be even more complicated, but the bureaucrats who devised it soon found out how much work it gave to themselves, so they made it a bit easier. But it's still a difficult arrangement.

And about ID'ing: this is not only for checking their age, you even have to ID obviously 85-year olds because people have to have an ID on them when entering the club... We're lucky that we're in a different "district" and are in good standing with the vice squad, so we don't really have to expect troubles. Nevertheless, we have to be careful, because at some other clubs (in a different "district") vice sometimes just checks people when they're leaving the club... And if they don't have an ID, the club gets fined, no matter how obviously old enough they look. Also, sometimes they try to enter the club undercover without an ID themselves, this happened at Utopia several times so they got fined there! So although the last few weeks we've been letting in some people who were part of a big group just because we needed the business, from now on we'll be very very strict!

We didn't have that many business the past few weeks, some nights it was OK, only fridays it was really busy because of Texas Hold'em (poker) tournaments and there's certainly been some nights where it was almost empty, except most days after 11pm or sometimes even midnight when we got a rush of people who just wanted to have a drink and see some dancing for one last hour... Not enough to make of course.

But it was OK, I could read a lot, work on some ideas for a LRP setting I've had in my head for years now, hang out with the people who work there and hear some anecdotes, and I had good food every night because the cooks we have are awesome. Even made a little bit of money sometimes from tips, though to be honest most tips came from dancers when they'd had a good night and I walked them out to their car. Sometimes I really declined, when I knew they had had a bad night. After all, even though I am working there but not getting paid for it, and tipping for any small service is just very normal over here, I feel bad for taking their money if they've had a bad night. Because in some way they are working for me, since if the club ever makes money, Diederik will share it with me for making money investing it in our future businesses. But well... I can use the money sometimes, so I don't have to beg Diederik for some when I go out, so if I know they had a good night I will accept it. And keep in mind that if I ever make a lot of money myself, I will go to the club and tip them a lot more :)

Ah well, in the long run the club will make it, I'm sure of that, as long as Michael keeps paying the bills until it starts making it's own money! And the faster he spends a little extra, the quicker he won't have to keep on spending! If only he would understand such a simple thing...

10 days left...

2004-08-30T00:50:10Z

Ok, so I am going home in 10 days... What have these almost 3 months brought me?

Most of all: a lot of sitting at either the computer or at the front desk of my cousin's club. Both were pretty boring at times, but it was OK.

I've been busy learning more and more about the forex market, and I think I now all the tools enough to really start making money. I have to learn one more thing: patience. Because I know the systems now, I really want to see them work. Seeing it work in the past is easy, because you can see when a signal was really a genuine one, or when it would trace back after a while. The problem with doing it in real time is that you cannot see yet how it will work out. And even more important, because I want to see the systems work, I become trigger happy. So I sometimes to decide on a tarde when not ALL the signals say I should, but it's more a situation where it might go the way I want it to go. And of course, if it then doesn't (which is often the case), you lose again. So I've devoted the next week to showing patience. Don't be too eager to do a trade because I want to see it work, because I think 80% of the signals will probably be OK because often it is... Wait and wait and ait for the signals to show me to buy or sell and then do it not because I am eager to see the system work, but because the system says I should... and then hope it will work!

In one week, we'll know if I really believe I'm ready to become rich as a forex trader or not :) I sure hope so, because me returning quickly to the USA is a bit dependant on that. But more on that later.

I will tell in a seperate post more about working at the club, for those who really want to read everything I write. The rest I will just tell the short version: I've been helping out almost every night for the past few weeks, sitting at the front desk. It wasn't that much work, so I read a lot and hang out with my co-workers. It's a fun experience, one not many people will have in their lives :)

Furthermore I have done some fun things the last few weeks, hang out with a few people, did a photoshoot (would do one more of the same girl today, but I'm waiting for a phonecall when she's done with work... expected it already 2-3 hours ago...) and went to some parties. I also saw the Bingham Canyon Mine, apparently the world's largest (and maybe also first) stripmine. For next weeks I have a few plans to go hiking around here, and hopefully see some other sights as well.

And then... I go home. And still unsure exactly what will happen after that.

I really believe I can make this forex trading work, so I will be able to give diederik and myself some income so I can move back to the USA in October. However, where I'll be living then is not sure. Diederik and Catherine are moving to California, they're sick of Utah and everything that has gone wrong here. Catherine is from California and has all her friends there, she never liked it there and only moved here for Diederik. He always liked California more (movies etc. for work, and the people and atmosphere in general), moved here when he married Sandy and then stayed for Sophia. But the situation with his ex-wife has escalated so much where she was interfering too much in his life to make it difficult, so he decided he better choose for himself and also Catherine and his son. If he stays here, making his own life so much more difficult and stressing out, and probably failing anyway since he can find his ultra-rich ex-wife, he might even lose them if he stresses out. Sophia will be fine anyway, maybe not in the way he'd like her to be (as a "good" person instead of the spoiled rich bitch like her mom) so he better focus on the other important people in his life. And this way he will be able to spend some quality time the few times when he sees Sophia, instead of now having to take of her while being stressed out by his ex-wife and that way hardly having time for his daughter anyway who has to live through the stressed out atmosphere as well.

He has a deal now with his ex-wife (she just wants to see him leave the state) that he gets a few more years of support (she wanted to take that way... long strange story) and she'll buy his house when he can't sell it within 2 months. That way he'll have some money start over with in California, and also for the first few years some extra money every month. So if I move back to the USA, I might go there as well. However, another option is that I will go for a few more months to Utah (have my own apartment here if I can generate the money for it, or maybe stay in one of the houses of Michael Naumu, the investor in club Players) and keep an eye out on Diederik's business here and help out with them when I'm not forex trading.

All of this will probably become a lot more clear the next few weeks, I'm still quite sure I will return, just not exactly when in October (but don't worry Katie, we'll work it out ;) and whereto!

Anyway, I'll be back in Holland in 2 weeks and anyone who wants to spend some time with me... Let me know!

Finally an update again

2004-08-10T21:41:14Z

But my apologies for the Dutch-impaired, I just feel like writing in Dutch right now... You can try an online translator to try to understand it ;) It's about my (lack of) social life over here.

Tja, ik zou gaan schrijven over mijn sociale leven, maar wat er vooral over te vertellen viel is dat het best wel tegen valt. De eerste weken kon ik weinig uit, omdat Diederik erg voorzichtig met zijn Mercedes was en die dus niet graag uitleende, en de truck vaak door Catherine werd gebruikt overdag en 's avonds Diederik dan weer zeurde dat de truck zoveel geld kost (even voor de duidelijkheid: hij is "duur" voor Amerika maar als je het omrekent naar euro per kilometer ongeveer net zo veel als mijn Peugeot 205 in NL). Laatste weken kon ik iets vaker weg omdat we nu een huurauto hebben (zie verder voor verhaal daar over), maar omdat ik nu veel werk en ook mijn nichtjes hier een weekje waren en zij dus weer telkens de auto hadden, heb ik er weinig gebruik van kunnen maken.

Daardoor ben ik maar weinig uitgeweest, en als ik uit ging altijd alleen, en op de 1 of andere manier ben ik dan minder open om nieuwe mensen te leren kennen dan wanneer ik met andere mensen uit ga (en die me dan de hele avond nauwelijks zien omdat ik bezig ben anderen te leren kennen...). Dus de meeste mensen leerde ik kennen via internet, en er waren best wel veel mensen enthousiast om eens iets af te spreken... Maar het bleef in vrijwel alle gevallen bij woorden, op de 1 of andere manier vinden mensen het hier niet nodig zich aan hun afspraken te houden, en bellen ze nooit terug als je nog details moet bespreken of als ze beloofd hebben "over 2 dagen te weten wanneer ze tijd hebben" of laten ze een afspraak gewoon niet door gaan zonder iets van zich te laten horen. Of ze hebben deze week geen tijd, maar volgende week wel maar dan moet ik even in het weekend bellen om iets af te spreken... en dan hebben ze alles al weer volgepland. Dit is dus echt het geval bij minstens 9 van de 10 mensen hier. Oftewel: de laatste weken waren voor mij een opeenvolging van teleurstellingen, en elke keer dus steeds meer omdat als je al een rij teleurstellingen hebt, je je meer gaat verheugen op iets nieuws... en dus ook rotter voelt als dat niet door gaat.

Desondanks zijn er wel wat mensen met wie het wel goed ging natuurlijk, maar ja, die hadden het ook druk dus due zag ik maar heel af en toe en als je hier nieuw komt na wat ik de maanden er voor had doorgemaakt, heb je gewoon erg veel behoefte aan veel sociaal contact. Dat ontbrak dus. Daardoor heb ik ook veel dingen die ik graag wilde doen (kamperen in de bergen, lange wandeltochten, allerlei films gaan kijken) niet gedaan, want zulke dingen zijn gewoon leuker met gezelschap. Maar het lijkt alsof er nu eindelijk een b'tje verandering begint te komen, ik heb een houding van "sommige mensen zoeken het maar zelf uit" en ga er niet meer achter aan zitten, en een aantal anderen lijken wat oprechter... al blijft dat nog even afwachten natuurlijk :)

Met wie ik dus wel al wat dingen heb gedaan zijn Sara en haar zussen/nichtjes, hen kan je zien op de foto's van Payson Lakes en Donut Falls. Heb met hen ook wel eens wat films gekeken (SLC Punk -jaja, een film over punkers in Salt Lake City- en de Amerikaanse versie van de TV-serie Queer as Folk) en lekker rond een vuurtje in de tuin gehangen. Verder zijn er wel wat mensen die ik van i-net ken die ik dan 1x heb gezien, maar helaas vielen zij daarna ook in de categorie teleurstellingen (soms gewoon door een misverstand, maar desondanks doordat het enkele keren gebeurde voor mij genoeg om het nu aan hen over te laten om te laten merken of ze nog interesse in verder contact hebben of niet) of waren het gewoon mensen om "eens een keertje te ontmoeten" zonder dat we echt hebben afgesproken dingen te gaan doen.

Tja, wat heb ik dan wel gedaan? ben nog wel eens naar de bioscoop geweest met Diederik en Catherine (King Arthur... best een leuke aanvulling op de mythologie) en anderhalve week geleden kwamen mijn tweelingnichtjes (zusjes van Diederik) ineens langs, hoorde ik dus pas 1 dag van te voren. Ze zijn door Amerika aan het reizen en kwamen dus ook even enkele daagjes hier langs. Werd uiteindelijk bijna een week omdat Diederik druk bezig was met een aantal dingen en hij hen wel goed kon gebruiken als oppas voor Sophia (zijn dochtertje). Met hen ben ik een keertje naar de film geweest (Ella Enchanted - tot mijn verbazing erg leuke film, kozen die omdat het de waarschijnlijk best te pruimen film was die ook voor Sophia geschikt was en door wat fantasy elementen nog wel wat aardige beelden zou kunnen hebben, maar bleek dus een uiterst grappige film te zijn waarbij heel wat fantasy- en sprookjes-cliché's op de hak werden genomen - je zou kunnen zeggen dat het een iets mildere live-action variant op Shrek is) en hebben we afgelopen donderdag een wandeling gemaakt bij de trail achter ons huis. We hebben een stuk gewandeld dat ik in maart ook al eens heb gedaan, kan je bij de foto's van destijds wel zien. We deden de wandeling midden op de dag, in de brandende zon van 35 graden, kan je zeggen dat dat best wel vermoeiend was!

Bij het houten bruggetje (zie foto's van mijn wandeling in maart... toen lag er nog sneeuw!) zijn we gaan spelen in het beekje: lekker met grote keien slepen om zo de koers van het beekje iets te wijzigen (nuja in dit geval omdat het in een uitgesleten kloofje stroomde en dus niet echt verlegd kon worden, meer een kwestie van het snelstromende deel van links naar rechts verleggen). Altijd weer leuk, en de laatste keer dat ik dit had gedaan was volgens mij in 1997 met Paula in Glencoe (Schotland - toen wel degelijk de stroom over een stukje voor een meter verlegd).
Lekker speels geweest dus :)

Nuja, dat is wel zo'n beetje mijn sociale leven hier de afgelopen weken. Oh, voor ik het vergeet, zou nog vertellen over mijn auto-"ongeluk". Paar weken geleden was ik even op weg met de Mercedes voor wat zaken voor de club, toen er voor een rood stoplicht de auto voor me ineens keihard achteruit reed. Ik probeerde zelf nog snel achteruit te gaan maar ze had een voorsprong en knalde dus tegen me aan. Niet heel erg hard, ik had totaal niks, maar de auto was dus wel behoorlijk beschadigd aan de voorkant. En dat terwijl Diederik hem net wilde verkopen! Ze beweerde achteruit te hebben gekeken en me niet gezien te hebben, omdat de Mercedes een stuk lager was dan haar auto, maar ja, daar zijn dus de zijspiegels voor... Ze zei wel dat ze me daar niet in had kunnen zien, maar zij wist niet dat ik best wel een eindje (3 meter of zo) achter haar stond! Dus ze had echt niet gekeken gewoon. Bovendien toeterde ik ook bij haar eerste spurt achteruit (ze stopte even), dus dat had ook wel wat aandacht mogen trekken. Maar ja, ze gaf wel toe dat het haar fout was (ze wilde van rijstrook wisselen, ook wel vreemd want de strook naast ons was dus ongeveer 6 auto's langer...) en zou haar verzekering er over inlichten.

Uiteindelijk bleek het allemaal best wel voordelig. De Mercedes krijgt nu een nieuwe motorkap, nieuwe bumper, nieuwe grille... Allemaal op kosten van haar verzekering. Bovendien hebben we al die tijd ook op hun kosten een huurauto, die een stuk voordeliger rijd en ook een normale achterbank heeft zodat we deze ipv de benzine slurpende truck kunnen gebruiken wanneer we met meer dan 2 mensen op stap gaan! Bovendien scheelt dit weer honderden mijlen op de teller van de Mercedes!

Al met al dus een groot geluk bij een ongeluk, al is het nog steeds nodig dat Diederik heel spoedig zijn auto verkoopt.

Nuja, dit was het wel weer voor nu, ik hoop spoedig weer wat meer te vertellen over mijn werk (ik zit bijna dagelijks bij de voordeurbalie van de stripclub en ben nu ook echt aan het oefenen met demo-accounts voor forex trading... tot nu toe alleen maar geld verloren maar dat was vnl. om de software te leren kennen en ik niet wilde wachten op een goed moment... toen dat er was, zat ik net ff niet bij de computer) en over het familieleven hier. Er is een hoop gedonder met de ex-vrouw van Diederik die probeert zijn leven ten gronde te richten... het zou wel eens kunnen zijn dat ik niet al in oktober weer terug kan hierheen, of dat Diederik gaat verhuizen en dit dus mijn laatste weken in Utah zijn en ik als ik later terug kom, in California terecht kom... des te meer reden om de komende weken ook nog veel te doen hier, nu maar hopen dat de "vrienden" hier meewerken!

Pictures!

2004-07-22T22:24:41Z

Oh, and I've added some more pictures at http://www.xlii.nl/da5id/pics/usa (the link is also provided in my userinfo if you ever want to see if there's updates).

Some of Donut Falls which I already told you about, some of Payson Lakes where I went swimming and "pedalboating" (NL: waterfietsen) a few days later, and some of a beautiful thunder sky of last Sunday. I can tell you, on the pictures where the sky looks very red... That is really how it looked like!!!! We've also had some really wonderful thunderstorms the last few days, with beautiful lightning in the mountains when it was dark... So you saw their contours outlined, and beautiful arcs hitting the tops of the mountains... Yes, it's really beautiful here and I haven't seen even 1% of it!

I am terrible

2004-07-22T22:06:36Z

I am so terrible in updating, don't know, sit a lot of the day at the computer but somehow never done a really good update on my life here. Of course many of you talk to me online, so know a lot of it, but often I say to expand on it here and then I don't. Seems I'm just not in a writing mood these days.

But I'll give it a try, I've been here for almost 6 weeks now, longer than last time!

The first few weeks were again used ror settling in a bit, and also the preparation for the re-opeming of Players. I won't bore you with the details of the court battle now, though it was still fun and a learning experience so I hope to find some time soon for those still interested in the details :) Most important is that we won, otherwise we'd lost the club to a former owner who we still own a loan on the building to.

Now we could go ahead, but because those weeks we hadn't wanted to pour money and energy in something we might lose outright, we had some delays again. The 2 weeks after the trial we did a lot of work, finishing the painting inside (Diederik has made it look like light marble), cleaning out the kitchen etc. The latter proved a problem as well, as the people who would run the kitchen had been put on hold for too long so weren't there to help us clean and arrange the kitchen 2 days before the re-opening. I had warned for this, had seen their look of "well, seems like we're not getting anywhere here" after their last 1-hour meeting with Diederik where he was 40 minutes on the phone and I tried to agree on some things with them that seemed like we could get the kitchen going, only with Diederik wiping all of that off the table when he was off the phone and pushing them back to point zero with his "oh, it'll be allright if you guys just do this and this" but forgetting about all the necessary requirements. I know he couldn't give them any money yet... but this way he didn't help getting the money ready as well, as there was no plan at all. Sometimes he's just very frustrating to work with, but ah well... He's giving me a great opporunity and is very generous in how he will share money if we start to make money again, so I'll have to endure that :)

I must admit I do not agree on many management decisions made by Diederik and Cory, in some things they just don't know how to handle these things. They were too used to having all control over the money, and now they always blamed it on the outside investor that things couldn't be done if he didn't gibe the money, but I kept on saying how they should present him a full plan and not just go to him with messages like "we need more money", even though he had promised more. A well laid-out plan would probably have made the money-stream more steady, and therefore also make the things that needed to happen, really happen, or at least with a lot less stress and trouble and when they needed to happen. Now they just did it all chaotic, try to arrange things just when they thought about it... that just doesn't work.

So when the "big opening" was last week, we almost had no kitchen. I had been working my ass off for two days, one day with help from Diederik and others, but well.. I'm not experienced with restaurant kitchens so I could only do so much, and needed the people who were going to run it to help with setting things up etc. Luckily, for thursday we had some guys from the other club doing the catering, and that day we also had Buffy come in, who turned out to be our saviour angel. She has a lot of contacts (works for Sisko's, who deliver food and catering supplies etc.), has been cook herself, is now more into managing kitchens etc., and she made sure that last friday we had a staff of 2 dishwashers who did a lot of the cleaning of both dishes and the kitche itself (it was so bad, I had only been able to get rid of the really really worst stuff), and two cooks. They did an amazing job the last few days, and we're lucky to have a kitchen running! The guys working there now work for Buffy's husband, so they can't stay, but she's trying to get us some good people for the long run, she really helped us out and I'm confident she'll do a good job for us.

The opening party was OK, not packed, but quite some people. The days after it has been very quiet, but that was to be expected with hardly no promotion at all. Only this week have we started that for real, so hopefully it will pay off in a few weeks. We're getting more girls to dance the next few days, so we can offer a bit more of variety, last few days it was almost always the same and only 2 or 3 on a day. But well... it's starting up, and that's something.

We've started promotion now, the last few days Diederik and I have printed and laminated cards that we've been handing out to bellboys and concierges at the big hotels. If they give these cards to people in their hotels who inquite about a club, these people get a free membership and entrance to the club (we make money from the food and alcohol) if they hand thiscard to us, and the person from whom it originated (the cards are numbered) gets 5 dollars. Nice extra income for them, and some even mentioned handing them out to friends, which is OK with us. The 5 dollar is worth a member who comes in frequently, actually even better than business people who're here for only a day or two :) But most guys were really excited about it, so let's hope they bring in a lot of people!

We're also going to spread flyers with free membership cards all over the city, and next week radio ads will start, so hopefully we have a booming business soon. We're going to try the same deal with cab drivers as with the bell boys, if they bring people to our club, they get 5 dollars! I'll be hanging out there a lot to cut costs on employees we need someone to man the door, which I'll be doing a lot I think. I'll keep you updated!

In the meantime I have also been reading a lot about real estate deals, which Diederik thinks is a good thing to invest money in when we have it. I'm not sure, the courses I've read show a different kind of what he wants to do. They're the more basci "buy a cheap house, fix it up and sell for a lot more" while he wants to invest in buildings that still have to be build, so you get them cheap with some early money down, and then sell them for a lot more when they're almost finished. I think that's more risky, and more of a long-term investment for when you already have a lot of money. But we'll see. I think this is something we won't deal a lot with in the near future anyway, or else only the lower end of the market with fixing up homes (something Diederik would be good at).

Another thing I've been looking into is the foreign exchange market, another idea of Dietrick's. I was first very sceptical, because I thought there were some prossible pitfalls just like in equity or futures trading (voor de Nederlanders: aandelen en opties - de "beurs" dus)), where you could very easily all your invested money in one stroke of bad luck. But after reading more about it and going to some workshop, I now think this might certainly a possibility. At the workshop they promoted some software which can be very useful, and help you as an unexperienced person to start making money in this market. It took away some of my scepticism.

Only thing is, the software costs 3000 dollars, and of course at the workshop they show you some ideal situations how you can make a lot of money quickly. But when we buy it in a few weeks, I'm gonna spend a full week on it, and if I think it's not gonna work, we can always return it for our money. We could've done that last week, but were too busy with the club and I wouldn't have time for it this week. But there's a workshop again in a few weeks, and then we'll buy it. I really think this might be a great opportunity if it works even half as good as they make it look like, I am a numbers guy so it is really something for me. And Diederik says that he'll provide the money, and together we can try it, but mainly me, and he'll share the profits. So who knows... We really can use the succes! If you're interested in what I'm talking about here, go to http://www.4xmadeeasy.com (the software, so a lot of promotional talk) or http://www.dailyfx.com (more general info, history etc.).

Well, that's it for now, this was all talk about the business... Next post I'll tell more about my (lack of) social life... Haven't done a lot, hopefully more soon though, and have done some fun things!

Diederik vs. Dietrick

2004-07-05T08:23:06Z

I just noticed how I start to call my cousin even in here "Dietrick", just because I always call him that to people around here.

On the same sybject, it's great how most people don't have a problem with pronouncing my own name the Dutch way! They pick it up quickly, and most of the time also introduce me that way to others.

And if some people want to be able to call me by my last name and have troubles pronouncing it properly, then it's their own problem :p
Be happy I'm leaving it at the first half!

Donut falls

2004-07-05T08:14:34Z

Still not in the mood of telling long stories, don't know, sometimes I just feel like it, sometimes I don't. So I still owe you the stories of Dark Arts festival, the battle in court for ownership of Raskals/Players and just in general some things I've been doing the last 3 weeks. I hope I will like to tell about those later.

Right now I have the house for myself. Yesterday Dietrick and Catherine left for Moab, to visit some nice places in the area. I would have loved to go there with them, last year it was a blast. But I reckoned that they might like some time together, and actually I wouldn't mind 2 days to have all for myself. Also, yesterday morning I had a headache and didn't feel like a 4-hour ride, so I stayed home.

Though it's July 4th today, festivities were yesterday, sinc today is Sunday. Didn't see much of it, but it was OK. Went to Sugar House Park to finally meet Kearsten, someone I already knew from the internet en numerous phonecalls since last time I was here, but never met. Hang out with her, her boyfriend derek and some friends, watched some fireworks (though from the balcony of the apartment we were at you hardly saw anything) and afterwards I decided to go to Area 51 to dance some energy away. Met some people with whom I headed into the mountains this evening, we went to Big Cottonwood Canyon where we followed a trail to some waterfalls, called Donut Falls. It was great! Pictures will follow soon, and then all of you can see how this guy with some fear of heights did some awesome daring rockclimbing :)

This week is going to be busy, thursday Players will open, and a lot still has to be done. I'll try to keep you informed!

Picture time!!!

2004-06-29T05:46:21Z

Ok, tomorrow I'll try to write some more about what I've been up to the last few weeks, but here's some pictures from both my previous visit which I didn't post yet, and from my stay here now.

See thm at http://www.xlii.nl/Da5id/Pics/USA

I'm also working on gettin new lay-outs etc. for my new website, which will also incorporate many personal pics, so the link might change the next few weeks.

My trip to SLC

2004-06-29T05:42:37Z

80% of this was written the day after I arrived, I just didn't get to finishing it... so just read it as if written 2 weeks ago ;)

Well, the trip to SLC went quite differently as expected. When I booked a few weeks ago, I noticed how in New York City I'd arrive at one airport (JFK) and then leave at another (Newark). I inquired if this connection would be no problem, if the 3 1/2 hours would be OK, and they'd assured me it would be no problem, and it would be arranged for me by Delta Airways.

Not!

But first things first... Friday morning Deanne&Lothar (for those not-in-the-know: my sister and brother-in-law) brought me to Schiphol airport, where I checked in (less hassle than last few times, like no scanning the luggage before checking in) quickly and then we went for a drink. Lothar had to leave for work, and a while later Deanne brought me to the gate. The flight to NYC went OK, I had a window seat and had a great view of the Netherlands, Britain and America during the flight. I also slept a bit, something I hadn't done the night before, when I'd been busy with all the last things before going away, like last-minute packing of things I suddenly decided to take with me after all and cleaning the last remnants of mess in my apartment (before the previous trip I'd had a lot of help with that from nachtvlinder, but this time she refused to help me with it when visiting me last wednesday! >:/ ).

Ah well, arrived at JFK airport exactly on time. Then I had to go through immigration and customs, which took a long time. At customs they checked all my luggage, but the guy was actually quite friendly and he even inquired about things like if absinthe was legal in Holland, and he was more curious than freaked out by my bag with all the goth clothing :D I was also allowed to keep my veggie-burgers, so the next weeks at least I'll have some decent ones before having to throw myself at the American ones.

But well, it all took quite some time, and finally, after more than an hour, I could inquire about my trip to Newark airport. To keep it short: after some asking around it turned out I had to take care of that trip myself, and it was either fast by taxi (70 dollars) or slower by bus (26 dollars), but both wouldn't make it in time. Now consider I'd taken this option instead of flying to Newark directly because it was about 20 dollars cheaper...

But ah well, they could tell me that if I made it at Newark before 17.00, I would be in time to have them reschedule my flight through Atlanta. So off I went, and when I arrived at Newark about 16.45, I felt lucky. But oh no, it turned out the last flight to Atlanta that would be in time to catch a plane to SLC, would leave at 17.00 so they couldn't arrange that for me.

What they could tell me at Newark was that if I'd stayed at JFK, I could have taken a direct flight to SLC at 17.30... which I now wouldn't catch anymore (trip between the two on a friday afternoon is at least 90 minutes). Soooo... if the people at JFK had said that immediately!!!

Now the next flight for me would be the next morning, around 7.15. I was stuck with my luggage at Newark. Since 9/11 they don't have lockers anymore, so I had to drag everything with me, so taking a train to New York downtown to enjoy the city wasn't an option. So I was stuck, and no czk, I didn't get a hotel room, not even without a guard...

Ah well, I managed to get my US cellphone working so I called some friends in SLC, and I even managed to sleep a bit, so it wasn't that bad. And another good thing of this adventure was that I did get to see some of New York when driving from one airport to another, which was fun, especially the part where I was listening to my Lux Aeterna CD when I suddenly noticed I drove past Coney Island (that's where the story of Requiem for a Dream takes place, and Lux Aeterna is from the score of that movie).

So... next morning I got my plane, and a bit later than originally planned I arrived in SLC, got picked up by Diederik and the rest... some of it I already told you, the rest I will write about later!

Workworkwork

2004-06-23T08:21:39Z

The last few days there've been about 4 moments where I thought "Wow, finally done... I covered all receipts, reports etc." and then suddenly Diederik would miraculously uncover a new pile at least as big as the previous one. So what I expected to be 1 or 2 day job, turned out to be almost a week's work!

And of course, there were a lot of double occurences of the same transaction (both a receipt and a check, an invoice and a credit card report - and I even had to go through two almost identical credit card reports), so I couldn't just enter everything, but had to check all items if they hadn't been entered before... And the difficulty here were some discrepancies between the date on an invoice and on the credit card or check report, or sometimes an invoice had been paid in two terms or the name of the company turned out to be different on the cc report! But luckily, with my keen memory of numbers, I managed to uncover a lot of those, even when sometimes I had entered the earlier occurence of the investment a few days before! Probably I have missed some, but it can't be more than 5.

And now, it's really done. All investments of Diederik in one of his clubs have been entered into the spreadsheet, so his accountant can sort out some tax stuff and prepare it for an audit. And for the next few days I don't want to see any bill, invoice, check report or whatever!

You can't say I'm not earning my right to be here right now ;)

Doe, a deer, a female deer

2004-06-22T20:45:49Z

2 minutes ago, a deer was standing in our garden and looking in through the window! It just stood there, munching grass and looking at me, less than 2 meters away! I didn't have my camera in reach, but could take a quick snapshot with my phone, although it just bowed it's head down behind a pane. Before I could take another, it slowly walked on to our neighbours.

Isn't that just amazing?

Thunder & sunset

2004-06-19T03:09:15Z

That's one of the beautiful things of being here... First there's this fabulous thunder & lightning (I saw 2 beautiful lightning forks!), and when it's over, a lovely sunset over the mountains right next to the dark clouds covering some of them.

That's for sure, it is here so much more beautiful than the flat Netherlands. But then again, at moments like this, the "missing" suddenly pops up it's head again as well...

and yes, I still have to finish my story about my trip, and I also have some stories to tell about the last week... including seeing an American court room from the inside!

In SLC again!

2004-06-14T21:50:37Z

Well, I'm still writing about my trip to get here, when the story has been finished, I'll post it! For now, just a short message to let you all know I arrived sound and safely in SLC last saturdaymorning (a bit later than planned...) and I'm doing fine!

I feel better than expected, seems like my mind is finally finding some peace with the situation, though it'll take a long time to really settle down completely. But I think the distance and all the work that I'm going to do here will help me out with that, and to be honest: last wednesday's visit also helped a lot to at least feel as if not everything has been lost. It made me feel less distressed about going away, since now at least it didn't feel as if I was leaving a big black hole behind me. Thank you!

And now... we'll see how it goes. Already busy with helping out with the clubs (helped varnishing the walls that Diederik's has painted to look like marble in Raskals->going to be Players) and reading into forex (foreign exchange) trading, something that Diederik is thinking about venturing into.

Raskals is still running only 2 nights a week, and it seems the planned June 24th re-opening won't be possible, since Michael (investor) is still late with turning up the needed money. He pays bills that are extremely urgent, but for the rest it's hard to get hold of him. So Diederik is now talking to other possible investors, to see if they can help out better. It'll all come around, it just takes a bit longer. However, last weekend was a HUGE succes for Club Utopia (former Axis) so it seems that one might finally get back on track as well.

Also settled into the house now, unpacked today and made my room a bit more really "my room"... for as long as it lasts, since Diederik hopes to sell the house soon. But only to be able to buy a cheaper but quite bigger house, half of the costs of this house goes to the status it provides... Something he could afford before, but not anymore.

And even my social life is picking up, kept in touch with a few people in SLC and hopefully will meet some of them this week already. And the weather is great, about 27 ºC but with a nice breeze. At the end of the week it might even get a bit hotter. So mid-day won't be a good time to venture out into the moutnains again, but later in the afternoon and beginning of the evening will be fine!

So, seems like life won't be that bad... Not as I'd dreamt for a long time how it would be, but still, something to be content with for now.

Well...

2004-04-18T01:06:41Z

There I go, back to Holland. My last days here seem unending, my mind is focused on Monday or actually even Wednesday...

My mind is going nuts, it's hard to find distraction, concentrate on anything. I can only think about the last 2 weeks, what happened, how it was possible, how it coyld happen so unexpectedly, why I didn't act when I started to think I should, and what to say/ask next week and on what grounds we then will continue...

So until this is over, I'm just useless. Afterwards, only time can tell.

I'll be back in Utah sometime in June. The business is actually kicking off, the financer finally came through after a long time of contemplating, not with as much money as hoped first, but enough to start! Lots of changes which actually originally were his ideas and we got excited about, can be implemented later.

So when I'm back, the new club might actually be running.

My future now is so totally different from what I'd dreamed about lately, I need a lot of time to adjust to it. One day, new dreams may pop up, but I'm afraid that for a long time, if ever, they can't beat the reality that even beat my best dreams I ever had before.

Life goes on...

2004-04-07T02:38:55Z

Last few days I'v been a bit ill, it started saturday but sunday and monday I really started to notice how I was a bit tired and moody. Monday I also got a harsh throat, and last night I couldn't sleep that well, and got some headaches on top of that. So this morning I stayed in bed for a long time, and in the afternoon I felt a bit better.

Nevertheless, I had a busy weekend. Catherine's parents had come over to see their grandchild. Luckily they stayed someplace else, because with Diederik+Catherine and the baby, little Sophia, my aunt and me it was already crowded enough! Catherine's parents were very nice, didn't get to know her mother that well but had some good conversations with her dad. They also brought a lot of food with them every day, and tried to find nice an interesting things for me, the vegetarian, as well. They brought some very spicey bread, which I can't eat too much of in one session, but really tastes well with some cheddar cheese.

Sunday Diederik, Alonzo (Catherine's father), Sophia and I made a trip with the truck into the mountains. Turned out Diederik and Alonzo had decided to do some shooting up in the mountains. Diederik had a gun with him which apparently is the most powerful handgun in the world, and some disgusting garden ornamentation which was going to be the target. After some eventful off-roading we arrived at a beautiful spot in the mountains, with a great view. I made a lot of pictures of the mountains, Utah lake, the sky and sunset, I'll probably post some of them online again in a few days.

And for the first time in my life I shot a gun. To be honest, it's fun, but I couldn't care less about the "macho" part of it. I like the thrill of trying to hit an ornamentation or something like that, but can't see the fun in ever doing something else with it like hunting... So why should have to be a "real" gun? Some air-pressure gun is fun enough for that (although it wouldn't be able smash an ornamentation - but this gun was overkill again and the power only made it harder to hit the target), and archery is even more fun.

No, the thrill of firing it is not worth the danger guns provide in daily life. Of course it's fun to be able to say I once fired a real gun, and might do so again if I by chance accompany Diederik or someone else when they're doing it, but I'll never feel any inclination to go out and do it myself or ever buy a gun. No thank you...

In the "work department" things finally seem to start moving for Raskals, which with the re-opening will be re-named Players. I've started to do some organizational stuff for it, for the 3 big guys keep on talking about everything in general and then suddenly concentrating on minor details, without any structure to it. So I've started to arrange a to-do list on the 3 big areas: Physical remodelling, Marketing and Organization. I've also started to assign priorities to the many items on the list, so we really can get a clear picture of we NEED to get done, what we'd really like to get done, what would be nice if we got it done for the re-opening but also can be done at a later time, and what can be neat if we ever get to it. Then the big 3 can discuss it, remove and add items, re-assign priorities if they like, and hand it back to me. I plan on starting to taje all the different items on the list now and describe them in detail. We can then also add things to every item like the time it will take to get done, costs etc.

So it seems I get back to what I seem to have a knack for: plain organization and managing. It's not so different from the general coordination of a LRP event after all :)

I also was a key figure in their decision in the name, after I showed them the consequences of the name "The Beach" when they were leaning towards that choice. It's too much a theme-name, which forces you to make the club in that style, and themes get boring after people have seen them a few times. Also, a name like that suggests another kind of club, in my opinion it'd only fit a stripclub which is.... at the beach.

I was also planning to arrange a meeting of several key figures in the running of Axis, but maybe that'll get postponed again. But at least I'll try to do something like I did for Raskals, if only to get a list of all the things we'd like to do but can't unless the money starts flowing...

Cell phone!

2004-04-04T03:29:18Z

Yaaay!

I finally got my cellphone! Due to some wrong information they gave me, I cannot use it to make any international calls nor use the contract while in Europe, but for the rest it can do everything I want and more :) Luckily I can send text messages (sms) to Europe, though I'm not sure yet if it costs me 15 cents or 1 cent per message (local costs 1 cent, but read further for some curious details about USA cellphones...). I also can receive calls and messages, so who wants to give me a call or send me a text message (sms), please do!

My number: +1 801 792 0735

I even can make pictures with it, and I can use it for my Dutch contract (so my mom can keep my old Dutch phone :).

Some curious details:

1) in the USA, you pay for both incoming and outgoing calls (not sure what about ), but most of the time it is still comparatively cheaper when your calls are 50% incoming and 50% outgoing. And you can get deals where you have unlimited use for weeknights and weekend. I pay 40 dollars a month which gives me 600 minutes anytime and unlimited during nights and weekends. Not sure if I have to pay for international calls, or if they get deducted from my monthly total etc. I guess the latter.

2) You also pay for incoming text messages, that's really ridiculous. However, it's much cheaper, from 0.6 to 5 cents (on t-mobile, others maybe more expensive) both for sending and receiving, so with a 50%/50% ratio it's cheaper again.
Not sure about international, it's more expensive (15 cents for me) but not sure if I pay for incoming international text messages...

Gonna have dinner, so that's it for now... Cya!

Garage doors and other happenings

2004-04-02T05:35:30Z

OK, I decided I'd make this a seperate entry. The other was all about my work and business, this is about some things that happen in my "private" life...

I've been visiting some other local clubs, including the local goth club, which was fun! Also visited a few of the "competition" of Axis, and though that was kinda from a business aspect as well, it was also fun to just go out and talk to some people. The weather has been a bit on and off, after the first sunny week we had some days of rain and even snow just a bit higher up in the mountains, then beginning of this week some sun again and now it's rainy again.

Tuesday I crashed the garage door. It's a door that slides up, you activate it with a remote in the car. I was borrowing Diederik's truck to pick someone up for a nice picknick in a park. Normally the doors slides up in 10-20 seconds, and I'd been busy with changing a CD etc. so that had taken at least a minute. I also didn't hear the door anymore, so I just drove back... and heard a crashing sound. Turned out somehow the door hadn't slided up all the way, there was about 30-40 centimetes sticking down, and because the truck is very high (especially because of the rack on top), that was enough for it to crash into it. A whole wooden panel had been crashed, and some of the metal had been bend as well. In the end it turned out not as bad as we expected, but still... I felt very guilty. But ah well, it wasn't really my fault, it could've happened to anyone. Luckily we could get it opened so I could drive the trcuk out, and despite the bad start the picknick afterwards was very nice, good weather, some icecream, nice bagels and donuts and good talking.

For the rest I haven't done a lot the last few days, just a lot of reading, internetting, listening to music... I also try to spend some time with Sophia, Diederik's 6-year old daughter, watching movies etc., to take some stress away from Diederik.

And it's good to find some rest, although sometimes I do miss my busy social life in Holland. I hope I'll get to know some more people around soon, and get to go out a bit with them. Visiting clubs on your own just isn't the same when you don't already know like 100 people who'll be there :) But I guess that's a matter of time. I'm just not used to not having so many people who visit me or whom I can visit anymore. And of course there's one special person that I miss particularly... But we'll manage.

Update

2004-04-02T05:18:19Z

So, time for an update again... I promised to tell more about what kind of work I;m doing here, but for now, it's all still just a bit of this and a bit of that. Most of the time helping Diederik our with brainstorming and attending meetings...

The situation is this: although I came originally to help out with Club Axis, the danceclub, I've hardly done anything for that. The club is floating, about making as much money as it's costing, and they have to wait for a lona from the owners of the building to get things done. They want to re-name it, change some of the interior, build out the patio etc. etc. But without money, that's impossible. It's a complex situation where the owners suddenly don't want to pay some promised money, not yet realizing that if the club closes down, it's clublicense will go as well and the prize goed down by about 1/3 (from $1.6mil to 1.1mil approx.). So it's just hoping they will realize in time that it's not in their interest to let the club go broke. There's some good plans which can be done with about $30k-60k, if only someone's willing to pay. They're now trying some other options, but actually, if business doesn't catch up soon , they're thinking about dumping this club... But ah well, it probably won't come that far, many people expect the club to catch up again even without a lot of the changes, major problem right now is a lot of competition. But many people expect that people who are now visiting the "new" clubs will spread again a bit after the novelty wears away, and actually some new clubs might not even survive that because they've made huge costs to be able to open with a bang. So we'll just see how it all goes. Maybe the new Thursday night (right now they're open on only Wednesday, Friday and Saturday) will bring in enough people, and the saturday which now features a fighting night, might get better as well. It's only been twice now, and it seems the people organizing the fights (an outside company) have done some bad advertising. So when that gets fixed, hopefully it'll bring in a bigger crowd.

The other club, Raskals, which has been doing even worse lately, is in for a major restyling. When they bought it a year ago, they tried to tone down the stripping element, and make more of a variety club out of it, with comedy nights etc. That didn't work, people got confused, some of the female dancers left because they wanted to work someplace where they can dance all week. So in the end they were left with 2 nights of the week with some male dance show and afterwards a regular dance night. But this just didn't cover the costs.
So they decided to turn it into a full female dancer club after all, 7 days a week. A "gentlemen's club" ;) They had some talks with people from a stripclub chain before I came here, but that was going to slow. Right after I arrived, they found an investor. But of course that took some time to get things decided (what approach, a name, interior redesign, time schedule etc. etc.) and now it seems things are finally rollin'. And that's what I've been involved with.

So it's quite different from what I expected... Suddenly I'm sitting at the table with multi-millionaires discussing the major rebuilding of a club, instead of jusr talking with some employees about small improvements, themed parties.... And I suddenly get to know all the ins and outs of the stripping business, the laws concerning it in Utah etc. etc.

Now I only have to wait for the whole business to make money, because when there's no money coming in, Diederik can't pay me more than what's needed to support me. Which is fine for a while, but in the end I'm here to make some money :)

Pictures!

2004-03-23T06:05:25Z

Here's the pictures that I made during my walk in the mountains yesterday:

http://www.xlii.nl/Da5id/Pics/040321%20SLC%20Mountains

Here's also a picture of Diederik's girlfriend and their less than 2-weeks old son:

Also look at that sunset! I will try to post some pics I made of it that day as soon as possbile.

And I'm so happy with my new version of J Album, I can make so much nicer picture sites with it!

Liquorish!

2004-03-22T01:17:28Z

For those who are thinking about using the address I posted earlier... I totally forgot to take liquorish (NL -> drop) with me! And since only the Dutch, Northern Germans and Scandinavians like, sell and buy the stuff, I probably won't be able to buy any over here. So if you really feel the urge to make me happy...

I especially like it salty (salmiak or "dubbelzout") though a mix is also OK.

Mountains

2004-03-22T01:12:36Z

OK, since I know there's several people who want to read this in English, I will indulge for this one time, though I can't promise I will always do this ;)

I could tell you about my first week "working", but I'm not in the mood for that so I will update you on that later. Actually it's not so interesting and I'm only orientating right now, in 1 or 2 week I'll be able to tell a lot more.

More entertaining are my trips into the mountains! Yesterday I hiked with Diederik, Sophia (his 6-year old daughter) and Kiki (friend of his daughter) into the mountains behind his house. I didn't know there was a trail into the mountains, otherwise I'd gone there last year for sure!

But ah well, at least now there was a new surprise for me :) We went up the trail and after some climbing we descended again to a lovely mountainstream. We coudl traverse it by a bridge and after that it was going up again! Sometimes the trail was easy, but there were some steep parts with many loose rocks so we had to hold the girls to prevent them from falling quite a lot (and of course with them being kids, they sometimes didn't listen to us when we said they were going to fast when going downwards and they fell a few times, luckily they got only some scratches and their tears dried quickly). After a nice walk we arrived at a small valley with a pond in it. We rested a bit and afterwards went back home again.

Today I decided to do the trail by myself, because yesterday I hadn't my camera with me and I wanted to make some pictures before the snow has melted. Snow? Yes, snow! And I'm not talking about the tops of the mountains where there will be snow for months, but next to the trail where we were walking. That's so amazing, walking in your shorts and t-shirt, a nice temperature of about 15-20 degrees celsius and snow all around you. But with these temperatures, most of it will be gone quickly I guess, though some parts remain hidden from the sun most of the time so might keep their snow for a while.

Today I managed to walk a whole lot more, without the kids slowing me down. I walked down several trails near the pond, following another stream up the mountain and seeing even more snow! It was a bit colder up here, but the hiking and climbing was warming me up so much that shorts and t-shirt were still more than enough. And I only saw a little part of everything there's to explore, I didn't even walk most of the main trail, preferring to first check out some small trails near the pond. So I'll be able to entertain myself a lot when I feel bored the next few months! Someone I met during the hike told me the main trail leads to a small waterfall (winks to nachtvlinder) and there's often mountaingoats around, though I didn't see any today. I also saw some butterflies but I wasn't able to catch them on camera. But I made a lot of pics and I'll put them online one of these days, so I can prove I've been walking in the snow with only a t-shirt and shorts!

People who know me well can imagine I've been fantasizing about many live roleplaying adventures that are possible in this environment (I sometimes bore people to death with it when exploring new sites in Holland)... Now I have to find some friends willing to fly over for a 3-day LRP-hike in the mountains. Could be fun! :)

Adres

2004-03-17T21:23:27Z

Mocht iemand het ooit nodig hebben, mijn adres hier is:

David van Nederveen
c/o 10255 Grayboulder Court
Sandy UT
84092
USA

Zet echt mijn voornaam neer, want alleen "D." zal gezien worden als post aan de heer des huizes :)

Ik heb nog geen telefoon, zodra ik hier een eigen nummer heb, laat ik het weten.

Aangekomen!

2004-03-17T21:11:53Z

Nou, daar zit ik dan. In Salt Lake City. De laatste paar dagen in Nederland waren nog behoorlijk druk en ik heb weinig tijd gehad om mijn ogen dicht te doen, maar heb de boel dan wel met een tevreden boel achtergelaten. Dinsdag was Ruthy zo lief me weer naar Schiphol te brengen, en ons afscheid vond plaats op ongeveer dezelfde plek als toen ik naar Ghana ging!

Na de douane ben ik meteen doorgelopen naar de gate, bij het fouilleren stond zowaar iemand die ik van LRP ken :) Nuja, hij herkende mij eerst, ik weet wel dat hij van LRP is maar wie precies ook alweer...

De eerste vlucht vertrok op tijd, ik zat in de middenrij aan het pad, maar de stoel naast me was vrij dus kon daar lekker spulletjes kwijt. En ik zat weer in rij 42! Vlucht verliep OK, zoals vaker was het weer even gedoe met de vegetarische maaltijd maar gelukkig hadden ze extra (reisbureau had dus niet doorgegeven).
Onderweg een b'tje gedoezeld en de erg leuke film "Love Actually" nog eens ge zien (tijdje geleden al in bios), wel leuk die weer te zien, maar soms ook wel moeilijk, vooral bij sommige afscheidsscenes e.d., dan besefte ik weer iets te goed hoe lang ik Ruthy niet zou zien... Paar traantjes heb ik toen toch wel gelaten. In beginsel hadden we met de reis een voorsprong van een half uur, maar door sneeuwstormen in Noord-Oost Amerika werd dat uiteindelijk een vertraging van 40 minuten.

Daar bleek het uiteindelijk best een chaos door de sneeuw, allerlei vertraging of
gecancelde vluchten. Liep ik me dus eerst nog te haasten om mijn aansluitende vlucht te halen (16.30 kwam ik aan, uur immigratiedienst en douane etc., opnieuw inchecken en naar de gate... vlucht zou 18.25 vertrekken en stond als "op tijd" genoteerd), toen ik bij de gate aankwam om 18.10, bleek dat het vliegtuig er wel was maar de crew niet. Tijdje wachten, toen werd aangekondigd dat we 19.35 zouden vertrekken en later werd dat 20.00. Dit laatste klopte wel ongeveer, maar daarna duurde het ook nog een half uur omdat de vleugels besproeid moesten worden met anti-vries aangezien er allemaal sneeuw en ijs op zat.

Daarna vertrokken en iets meer naar het westen was het weer alweer stukken beter dus verder geen vertragingen gehad, 2 uur later vertrokken en 2 uur later aangekomen. Ik had nu heerlijk 3 stoelen voor mezelf, ik zat weer aan gangpad maar kon nu lekker bij raam gaan zitten, deed de armleuningen omhoog en kon lekker mijn benen strekken terwijl ik bij raampje tegen de wand leunde. Opstijgen met al die sneeuw en lampjes was mooi gezicht maar door wolken wel snel voorbij, het landen bij SLC was dan weer leuker, die enorme uitgestrektheid lichtjes...
Tijdens deze vlucht nog de film "Intolerable Cruelty" gezien van Ethan&Joel Coen, die was erg leuk. Verder een b'tje gedoezeld, voor mijn gevoel was het natuurlijk alweer tegen de ochtend, en dagen ervoor ook al weinig slaap gehad.

Op vliegveld van SLC ging alles dan snel, omdat het binnenlandse vlucht was kon ik overal gewoon doorlopen, Diederik (die ik vanuit NY even gebeld had dat er vertraging was) stond buiten al met de auto en de bagage was er ook heel snel. Ingeladen en op weg gegaan. Diederik moest uiteraard weer even showen hoe hard zijn sportwagen ging, we hebben zelfs nog even moeten racen door wat kleine straatjes om de politie die ons tegemoet reed en omdraaide te ontvluchten :)

Diederik moest nog even langs de club, wat dingen bespreken. Hij liet ook wat dingen zien over hoe ze gaan veranderen, maar ik was zo doodop dat ik vnl. even ergens op een stoeltje heb gezeten. Daarna zijn we naar huis gegaan, alvast aantal dingetjes besproken die ik kan gaan doen. In beginsel voornamelijk promotie en gaan plannen en organiseren van speciale evenementen... Club Axis, de gewone dansclub, is door aantal zaken wat minder bezocht de laatste tijd en ga ik proberen weer de goede kant op te helpen. Raskals, de stripclub, is laatste maanden dus een variety club geworden zonder stripdansers, maar dat werkte niet en gaan ze wel een volledige stripclub van maken, maar daar zal ik minder bij betrokken zijn, hooguit wat promotie denk ik.

Daarna mijn bedje opgezocht (rond 2 uur) en tot 10 uur geslapen. Vandaag de baby gezien (1 week oud dus nog heel klein), Catherine (Diederiks vriendin) ontmoet, Agathe (mijn tante, Diederiks moeder) weer na tijden eens gesproken )die zit hier nu ook voor een paar weekjes) en nu dus jullie eens op de hoogte aan het brengen. Ga vandaag mijn kamer eens wat inrichten, en lekker nog uitrusten en bijkomen. Morgen gaan we dan meteen aan de slag, er moeten voorbereidingen worden getroffen voor zaterdag, als er een nieuw evenement in Axis komt: Ultimate Fighting Challenge. Iets met boksen en zo. Waar ben ik in terecht gekomen??? Hihi echt niet mijn ding maar ach... Komt allemaal wel goed, en jullie hoeven niet bang te zijn dat ik er door zal veranderen. Ik kan werk en persoonlijk leven goed van elkaar scheiden.

Ik ben heel benieuwd hoe mijn avonturen hier gaan lopen!