Belgium here I come!

Next week I'll be leaving for Belgium for 4 days. It's a trip organised by the CDL and we'll be visiting Leuven University and a brewery in Leuven. Also we'll be heading downtown to check out the longest road with taverns of Europe.

The rest of the CDL will be going to Groningen, a city in the northern part of the Netherlands. There they'll also visit the University and some institutes like TNO, a dutch government general research institute. So next week or so no update on this site, and maybe some nice stories afterwards!

Wallstreet reaches 13,000 mark

Today the Wallstreet Dow Jones Index has reached above the 13000 mark. This indicates a strong growth in the American economy since the burst of the Internet bubble in 2001. Now there's just the problem that the American economy didn't grow this much since that burst and that these figures are totally unjustified. When I look at the American house markets I only see weak figures and results from real estate investors. While this forms the fundamentals of a market, it seems the American market could collapse at any moment. When this happens the European markets will also fall a little but will be spared from the big fall, because these markets are just not as much overrated as the American. Nostalgia and arrogance again have taken their grip on Wallstreet.

Twenty

I'm no longer a teenager, last Thursday I reached the age of 20. This means I'm already over 25% of my expected life, which isn't very long being a chemist. Last ten years were nice, lots of targets were achieved, such as finishing primary school, secondary school and getting my propaedeuse (for completing the first year of University).

Back to this week now, yesterday I went to Corus IJmuiden, the Netherlands biggest steel manufacturer. I had arranged a trip to the facility with the help of Chi. It was a very succesful trip and all the participants had lots of fun while checking out the different kinds of factories needed to produce steel sheets.

Post number 50!

After 5-6 months of maintaining this blog I've reached the 50th post. Just like the 50 feet woman this is a wonderful event in the history of humanity. Well maybe that's a bit of an exaggeration, but it marks a nice moment in time though.

Today I've went to some classes and called some companies for sponsoring. Of course a lot of the people I needed to contact were in a meeting, having lunch or on training somewhere else. So again there's a lot of work left for the rest of the week.

Thursday will be my birthday. I'm still thinking about a time to have a party of some kind, because this week my calender is already full.

Dark Horizons Approach

Another week has passed... Trouble started for the Belgiecie, which organises a trip to Leuven next year. The person responsible for the contacts with the university of Leuven wasn't able to confirm our visit yet and had to call. When he called he heared that the Flemings had an Easter recess and that we had to call back next week, so more delays there.

I also had to hand in almost all of my reports for the inorganics labwork. Which I was able to do 2 days before the deadline. This gave me enough time to do other things last two days. I tried to get some sponsors for our introductionweekend for new MST students and went to a meeting with TG (Technologisch Gezelschap).

Happy Easter!

Happy Easter to all of you! Now some point of concern, what does painting eggs and bunnies have to do with the resurrection of Christ? It all seems a little unrelated, doesn't it? Well if you want to know what's the point of those rabbits you should definitely watch the newest South Park episode (S11E05). But please don't tell the church you know all this, it could give you some trouble.

Three more months

At the start of April there are just three more months left until the last exam of this academic year! It surprises me how fast time goes this year. Some things I remember like it happened yesterday, while others just seem almost a year ago. But some more interesseting news now:

I was able to successfully synthesize the cis-platin anti cancer agent, although it wasn't a lot. The compound which was scraped of the filter had a weight of 25 mg, while I should have made around 50 mg of product. Nevertheless, the product was the right substance as the Infrared spectrum and colour confirmed.

About this blog now, I've added a list of the three most recently played music tracks in the left side menu. Nothing special you might think, but this way you could get some insight in the kind of music I'm playing while I'm in Oegstgeest.

StOP fiasco

And after more than a week I'm placing another update on this blog. Last week I've been busy searching sponsors for the CDL and trying to make some reports, which obviously didn't work. Today I've made 3 of those reports and I am very proud about that (j/k).

Next week I'll have to learn for the exam I've got on Thursday, after the exam there will be the StOP party in Leiden. This year everything around that party seems to turn out bad. The promotional posters were available on the last moment and so were the tickets, and now the organisation notified us about a change of location. Instead of in Minerva the party will now be held in Four Reasons, which can only house half as many people.