Writings

Yesterday I used ChatGPT for the first time. Well, that’s not true. Let’s rephrase: yesterday I used ChatGPT for the first time to actually help me complete a task. A boring tedious task. It did help me complete the task, but I’m still not very convinced on whether it was faster than doing it manually.

Swimming. An activity that can be very relaxing, and, at the same time, straining and very good for your body. Since I was a kid, I’ve always had a complicated relationship with swimming. I enjoy the process of swimming, and I can swim, but as soon as the body of water is deeper than my height, it’s a hard no-go.

Uff, I wanted to write this before the end of August, but I’m still on time. August is over and it’s starting to feel a bit like autumn to me. Quite excited, as it will become a bit colder, hopefully, and it’s also one of my favorite seasons. Very colorful! But now, let’s recap August!

Last weekend - starting on Friday - we went on a small trip to Limburg, the southernmost region of the Netherlands. The initial plan was to bring our bikes and bike to some interesting points in this region. Due to my wrist, we decided it would be better to just walk. I’m so glad we made that decision!

July is coming to an end and the sun is shining. This was a month with quite some events for me, both on the good side of the spectrum, as well as on the bad side of the spectrum. But mostly good. Let’s dive into it!

Vandaag heb ik de uitslag van mijn Staatsexamen Nederlands als tweede taal ontvangen en ik ben geslaagd! Ik heb officieel Nederlands niveau B2. Volgens de ERK (Europees Referentiekader) ben ik nu een “onafhankelijke taalgebruiker”.

Today is the 12th of July. For most people, this date doesn’t say much, but it marks the anniversary of this website, counting from the first ever blog post I wrote here. And… that was ten years ago, in 2014. Yes, gentle reader, this website is now officially a decade old!

Welkom bij de achtste deel van deze serie: vergeet niet om in te checken. In deze serie schrijf ik een beetje over mijn leven in het Nederlands. Vandaag ga ik het hebben over de afgelopen maand en ook een beetje over de laatste dagen.

Two months ago I announced I was leaving my previous job, a completely remote position, for a on-site position. This is my first on-site position, since my previous job was also my first and only job until now. It’s been now a bit more than a month, and I have some thoughts I would like to share.

It’s time to take an indefinite break from my Dutch language classes. I have been following Dutch courses since the end of October last year. That is almost eight months. Non stop. Well, I did stop for one to two week breaks between courses, but that was only because of the dates at which the courses started.

Time flies and now it’s June that is coming to an end. This was the first month, or at least first weeks, of summer. Despite all the rain and the mild weather that we’ve been having here in the Netherlands, it reached 30°C last week. A bit too warm if you ask me, especially when it comes to how houses are not prepared to deal with heat.

Over a bit more than a year ago, I started going to the gym. Since then, I went from going there one time a week, to two times a week, and more recently to three times a week. During this time, many things have changed, from my goals, progress, and how I feel about sports and being active in general.

A few months ago I wrote about the struggles I was having with Bosch’s eBike Flow app and their FIT files. Since then, I have been using my script to clean up the files and later import with HealthFit. I have now just found a better solution though.

Welkom bij de zevende deel van deze serie: vergeet niet om in te checken. In deze serie schrijf ik een beetje over mijn leven in het Nederlands. Vandaag gaan we het over mei en een beetje van het begin van juni hebben.

May is coming to an end. Not that much happened this month, but it was still minimally eventful. I made a few updates to this website, there’s some life-related changes and updates regarding my gym journey. Let’s dive into it!