New Year Resolutions

First and foremost, Happy New Year, everybody!! I hope this turns out to be a great one for all of us!

In light of my latest entry, I thought I should update. I've had a nice week and a half off so far. Absolutely unproductive, but nice. Yes, I'm horrible. Yes, I really was determined that I was going to design some new stuff at the time I wrote my last entry, but well...you know how it goes.

I was busy for a few days driving back and forth from Leeuwarden to Delft. I really needed to try to get my lease all settled before the new year started, and I think I managed, but just by the skin of my teeth! I still have to find out if I actually managed it or not, but I'm not going to stress about it. Just not worth it. :)

I had a pretty nice New Years. I'm sure you went out and did exciting things, but I just stayed with my boyfriend, had a few coolers and went up on the roof around midnight with him to light some firecrackers that we had bought. We lit a few of the senko-hanabi that I had imported from Japan, and then some of the ones that Marnix had bought. And of course I enjoyed all the fireworks that other people were shooting off. It had to be expensive! But it seems that the people over here who have money REALLY have money.

Oh and of course, I can't forget. This year marks the start of the use of the euro. You knew that the EU (European community) was all switching over to the euro, right? No more guilders, Deutch marks, French francs, etc. No, everyone has to use the euro now. They've been running ads on TV for the past half a year it seems, trying to make sure everyone will be ready for the euro. So far so good, as far as I can tell. Maybe those annoying commercials did the trick. I even picked up my free euro-kit last week - all the new coins, all 8 of them! It'll take some getting used to, but for me it's no different than just traveling to a new country and having to use the currency there, so I just don't see what the big deal is - not for the consumer anyway. I do feel a bit bad for some of the millionaires here though. I mean, the euro is 2.2 times the worth of the guilder. So for those people who had less than 2 million guilders.... well, they're not millionaires anymore! Kind of sucky, don't you think?