Life and its little pleasures

5 weeks

Another 5 weeks to go before the little one arrives and I feel like shit. I have the mother of all colds and can't seem to get rid of it. It sucks because Mike has the week off and I have visitors here from Belgium, but I can't seem to be able to get out of bed or off of the couch for more than 30 minutes a day without feeling worse. Because of the pregnancy, I can't take any medications or pain killers and the light cough medicine and the Vicks Vaporub are not doing the trick. I'm coughing my brains out and green slime is coming from everywhere.

Not cool.

De slimste mens...

Gisteren kwam ik via via te weten dat de mensen van De Slimste Mens ter Wereld blijkbaar een foto van mij gebruikt hadden tijdens de kwis. Het gaat over een foto die ik in september 2007 had gemaakt op de trouw van mijn neef. Ik heb de uitzending natuurlijk niet gezien hier in New York, dus ik weet niet in welke context hij juist gebruikt is. Ik weet alleen dat de vrouw van mijn neef zich effekes verslikte toen ze een foto van haarzelf zag in de populaire show.

Ik vraag me nu af of het normaal is dat ik dat toch een beetje raar vind, dat ze die foto zomaar gebruikt hebben zonder mij daar maar iets van te laten weten. Ze hebben de foto zonder twijfel op Flickr gevonden en gewoon van daar gekopieerd. Alhoewel ik natuurlijk een beetje gevleid ben dat ze de foto goed genoeg vonden voor de show, toch blijft er zo een beetje een wrange smaak in mijn mond achter. Door mijn foto's op Flickr te gooien, heb ik toch niet zomaar alle rechten van alle foto's ook zomaar te grabbel gegooid? Of ben ik daar mis in? Ik heb al een paar keer aanvragen gehad van mensen via Flickr of ze mijn foto's mochten gebruiken, van de kampioenenviering van Standard tot foto's van New York en ik heb daar altijd ja op gezegd op voorwaarde dat ik de credit voor de foto ook kreeg. Dat is ook altijd gebeurd.

Nadat ik het nieuws vernam heb ik op de Facebook pagina van De Slimste Mens een berichtje gelaten dat ik het toch zou apprecieren als ze mij de volgende keer iets zouden laten weten vooraleer een foto te gebruiken (al is het maar zodat ik iemand kan vragen om de show op te nemen, zodat ik er ook van kan genieten). Maar dat bericht is binnen de paar uur verwijderd geworden en dus niet meer zichtbaar. Ook geen antwoord erop gekregen.

Ligt het nu aan mij of is dit toch maar een beetje louche allemaal? Laat me zeker weten wat jullie van dit vinden.

Update: De Facebook pagina is blijkbaar van een fan en niet van Woestijnvis. Dus ik heb Woestijnvis niet recthstreeks gecontacteerd en Woestijnvis heeft niks van mij gedelete. Ik ga Woestijnvis ook niet contacteren, want daar win ik niks mee. Ik wil hier niks voor, ik vroeg me gewoon af of dit zomaar kon  en of dit wel professioneel was. Blijkbaar denken de commentators hieronder dat dat inderdaad niet zomaar kan. Bedankt voor de reacties.

The Red Chord

One of Mike's favorite bands is The Red Chord and a couple of years ago, one of his best friends, Paul Romano introduced them. Since then, Mike has done some artwork for them, including the art for their latest album: "Fed Through the Teeth Machine".

You can hear one of the band members talk about Mike and the art by clicking here. See question 8 and 9.

Mike used a lot of his sketches on the inside of the album and I although I'm not a great fan of the music, I really like the work he did, especially on the lyrics pages.

19 December, they are performing in New York together with GWAR, and if everything goes according to plan, I'll be watching the gig from somewhere backstage. Unless GWAR wants to fake-deliver my baby on stage in an awesome blood-spewing show! :-)

Check out some more of the artwork for the album below and on Mike's site:

 

Apartment

With only about 7 weeks to go, I'm glad that our apartment is finally coming together. I really feel at home here and the eclectic mix of colors and stuff kind of makes it funky (in my humble opinion). The baby room still is waiting for some of the decorations, but I don't want to show those yet as they give away what sex the baby will be. The bedroom could be better, but having to share that room with a gigantic drum kit kind of limits the possibilities... Here are some pictures. 

Monkey

The monkey really likes my belly... He can be kind of cute in the evenings when he needs attention. And yes, the belly keeps on growing. To monstrous proportions... I feel like I don't have enough space inside my body for this baby. My stomach is going to rupture any day now with Alien-like hands creeping through my skin!

Mike interview on Amazon

The Omnivoracious blog on Amazon interviewed Mike on the work he did for the Lost Symbol by Dan Brown. Check it out here.

My favorite question:

Amazon.com: Your name, "Michael J. Windsor," is, as anyone can easily see, an anagram for "Clown Miser Jihad." What should we make of that? Does it provide a key to Robert Langdon's next adventure?

Windsor: That’s too funny... That’s how I’m going to start crediting myself: Jacket design by Clown Miser Jihad!!!

That makes me sound like a fanatical burka-wearing circus performer. Bozo the Terrorist, and his exploding clown car...

I think I will call him Clown Miser Jihad instead of babe from now on :-)

Baby room 2

Mike finished the baby room and I have to say, it looks awesome! Some pictures below, and more if you click here. What do you think?

Frieten

I just spent the whole morning pre-frying fries and making mayonnaise for our Belgian style thanksgiving dinner tonight. The "Hollanders" are preparing the appetizer, Charlotte & Pieter are making stoofvlees, Roel is preparing dessert and Hilary is getting the wine (better to leave the drinking bit to the English...).

Hubby is in Ohio at his mom's house doing it American style and no doubt being spoiled for 4 days straight. I'd be surprised if he has to lift one finger :-). Well, let him enjoy it... Those days will soon be over!

The latest hospital ultra-sound showed that the placenta has moved away from my cervix, so all is perfect in babyland.

Happy Thanksgiving everybody!

My parents were awesome

I saw that Pietel was going to scan some pics after seeing this website and I thought I would do the same (again... Yes, copying is the highest form of flattery).

I do think my parents were awesomely cool when they were young! I especially like mutti's comic book dress and my dad's sun glasses.

 

I also think they still look pretty dashing today, some 35 years later...

 

Baby names

Ever since we found out that I am pregnant, Mike and I have been tossing around names to each other to see what we both like and dislike. We realized quickly that we have completely different tastes when it comes to this. I like short, 1 to 2 syllable names, that are simple. Mike seems to like weird, long and unusual names. So conversations like this happen quite often:

Me: What about Max for a boy?
Mike: Yes! Maximilian, I love it.
Me: Nono, I mean Max, just Max, nothing behind it.
Mike: Huh? But it is short for Maximilian?
Me: Nonono, it doesn't have to be short for anything... Just Max
Mike: No, I hate it

So after names like Sam, Emma, Nathaniel, Balthazar, James, Gregory, Gustaf, Hazel and Femke were quickly dismissed, we were kind of stuck. On top of that, our names had a few of our own "rules" that they had to follow.

First of all, the name has to be pronounceable by both our families, meaning both in English and in Dutch, without sounding too weird. So Wout, Tuur, Kaat, Manon, Lotte, Seppe and other very typical Flemish names are out as my family-in-law will have a hard time with those names. Luckily, English names are fine for my family, as long as they are not too complicated...

Secondly, the name has to fit with the last name Windsor. And although I thought a British royal name would be cool like Charles, Harry or William, Mike didn't agree at all... 

We both like the names Silas, Noah, Lucas, Eli, Sarah, Becca and Seth, but as we are both very strong atheists, I have a problem in my mind with these very biblical names... I don't want anyone to think I would name my baby after someone in the bible. Maybe that sounds silly, but that is just how I feel, no matter how much I like the names.

Since we are no Frank Zappa or Bob Geldof, names like Ahmet Emuukha Rodan, Moon Unit, Peaches Honeyblossom or Pixie are not really an option...

So this exercise proved a bit more difficult than we thought at first, but I think we came to a good result. For a boy, our top 2 is Cole and Miles. For a girl, we love Lily and Ella. At least for now... (response of 5 -year old Marie to the boy names: Wat? Cole? Miles? Da's zo moeilijk... Waarom niet gewoon Bertje?)

We have about 11 weeks to decide...