A trend I’ve noticed in the past year, is that the burning ambition that I had when I finished my study and had my first two starter’s jobs… has dwindled. What used to be a burning fire and a need to prove myself, is now smoldering embers.

No, work is not the most important thing anymore. Reading back to 2004-2007 I was so focused on work, getting better, trying to get somewhere… and somewhere during this year I just decided… fuck it. Ambition’s all nice and good… but I’m just so much happier now that I have a job that DOESN’T suck out my soul.

I still work, I still work hard at times… and at other days it’s more quiet. But it’s work. Just that. And if I have to choose, I’d ten times rather hang out with the girls in the pub or the sauna, or tag along to the jam sessions of the boys. If I’m at work for a week and I have a concert to go to on Thursday evening - then the latter is what I am focusing on.

I’m not kidding when I say that I want to ENJOY myself, and that’s my new year’s resolution. I want to put some time into getting into shape again and continue the good step I took with fitness and reiki… but partying and smiling are the top of my list. And partying can be cuddling/giggling in bed with Olli or sitting on the couch together by the light of Brenda’s LED candles that she forgot over at our place, or eating sushi or tapas, or singing along at some concert or lying in the grass at a festival or Rock Rock or the park… I don’t care.
I just want to enjoy myself.

I work to live. And I live to enjoy myself.

And here it is, my end of year reflection for 2008! Just as long and wordy and insightful as all the others.
Just for shits and giggles: pay some attention to the things I said at the end of last year, by the way - and then see what’s come of them. Isn’t it funny how new years resolutions are so utterly useless and life always throws you curveballs and what may be true and right at this moment, can be bollocks in six months time?

January - March
We started off 2008 dressed as rockstars and drinking champagne, which might be a bit symbolic for this year. It was a fun party, everyone looked lovely, and we ended the night/started the morning by driving home through thick fog at 6.30am. It was a good start of the first bit of the year that didn’t feel very right for me. Despite a fun time in Brugge with Olli on our retreat weekend, I was quickly growing disillusioned by work and all of its awful politics and was struggling to make ends meet time-wise because of the increasing workload of my study. Affairs and lies and drama galore at work, and at the end of March I decided that it was time to change things. I started sending out job applications. Also, Olli and I were starting to think about buying a house in Den Haag area, and Olli and the boys started a band, which they loved fiercely.
To distract myself from winter and work ickiness, I thought up the Rock Rock concept, and got everyone enthusiastic about it.

April
April started off very cold. Of course this happened to be the week that I was spending in a tent in the Ardennes on a communications training. I was an intern with the communication trainers there, they taught Uni students about the values of communications, conversation techniques, and working together. All this in falling snow and freezing cold, which was a bundle of fun in that not really kind of way. In hindsight I’m glad I did it, the students were amazing – but the trainers team sucked and the weather as well – so I won’t do it again. But I do have those laughs with the students to look back upon, the laughter fit I had when I realized it had snowed in the night, as well as those hours sitting in a deserted forest listening to blaring loud In Flames, so I’m glad I did it.
Afterwards, all things except work turned for the better quickly. Not only weather-wise, but for me as well. I was finishing up the last bit of my study (which was a LOT of hard work), was going to job interviews, but I had a lot of fun with friends. The Fantasy Fair was brilliant, we watched the last show of the 10 dB’s which was hilarious, we went to the Parkway Drive gig… and most of all, Olli and I found a house in Leidschendam that we started bidding upon.

May
May started off with our own impromptu festival on a camping in Ommen: Rock Rock! We had a great time. The days were sun-laden and the nights were frigging cold, but we had a good time just sitting around the campsite, listening to music and talking and laughing. Just goes to figure that you don’t need a great lineup to have a good festival feeling anyway. I really hope we can make this into a tradition; that first festival of the year is a really good feeling.
Right after, though, limbo started. My job interviews were not getting back news, and neither was the house in Leidschendam. One frustration-filled week later, it turned out that both had fallen through and it was back to the drawing board for us. And I wanted to get out of my job so badly. Where it came to houses, we did find another house that we thought was awesome, but it was kind of expensive, so we kept looking.
I spent the rest of May working frantically on my portfolio so I could finish off my study and get my degree. Just before May ended, I turned in my portfolio, it was approved, and then there was the beautiful wedding of Wendy and Arno… which was so full of warmth and happiness that I completely recharged for a while there.

June
June was maybe one of the best months of the year. I graduated my study and obtained my post-bachelor’s degree as Trainer & Teamcoach, I got ridiculously drunk (and hungover) at the Popomeet in Alkmaar – and that was already a great start of the month. There was another job interview at this company in Leiden that was really promising, too. The only shitty thing that month was that I got my wisdom teeth removed and I had a sore face all week. And smiling hurt. That was SO depressing – to ache every time you smiled.
But then everything came together; I had my second interview in Leiden and an offer pretty much in the pocket, the pain in my mouth went away, the sun was shining… and I quit my job. And suddenly I felt like I could take on the world. Also, my boss was happy to let me go quickly, so I could finish up the month and then I suddenly had a month off until I started at the new job in Leiden. Also, we bought ourselves Tangy, which was awesome.
But first… first there was Graspop Metal Meeting, where I partied my ass off with friends. Sun-laden, beer-filled, music-filled fun. Is there anything better than that? Soilwork and Sabaton rocked my socks off, In Flames was a lot of fun, Iron Maiden was impressive, there was fireworks and laughs – it was all great.

July - August
Because I had the month off, it pretty much rained for the first bit of it. I didn’t mind too much. I spent a lot of time recuperating, gaming, and going out for drinks and tapas (there were lots of tapas) with nice people. The most important thing though was that Olli and I decided to start bidding on the expensive house in Nootdorp anyway, and we bought it. We won’t be able to get the key until March or something, but it was still a huge thing. And the house is SO beautiful. <3
In the last week of July the weather suddenly turned gorgeous, so I went to the beach with Lie and Bren, and then it was already time for our birthdays – for which we had a good party. On Olli’s birthday we had a power outage though, which lasted until late August. We took that as a sign to start redecorating soon, which we did.
But first there was the new job, which started off very pleasant but hellishly busy. It was a hell of a relief after the drama-fest of a job I had left behind me… just WORK, with all its ups and downs and smiles and frustrations. For now it’s good enough, but the relief of it had me dizzy with happiness for weeks on end.
It was only two weeks, though – because I had two weeks off in August for going to Lowlands – which was BRILLIANT with good music, fun, the most perfect festival weather I’ve ever had, playing bongo’s, hanging out with Lie and Olli, blowing bubbles in the sunshine and oh did I mention the perfect Editors gig already?!) - and going to England. First Olli and I played the tourist in London, which was a lot of fun, and then we hung out with the nice Euromeet people in Towchester.

September - October
I was busy with my new job, and at home we were very busy redecorating the computer room in our apartment. Wallpapering, painting, the works. Our house looked like a bomb had gone off because of it, but in the end it was definitely worth it. There was more constructive stuff that I did; I resolved to finally finish off my story Shards, preferably before November & Nanowrimo. Which I did; I wrote over 40K in a month and a half and wrote some heartbreaking stuff that I’m still happy with. It needs some edits, but it was very satisfying to write.
Brenda, Wendy and I hung out a lot together, we discovered the sauna in the Hague that was more than decent and a beautiful way to spend a free Friday afternoon. There were also lunches and laughs and hanging out with Lie and some fun concerts (Scars on Broadway and In Flames).

November
This might very well be the first time in seven years that music was more important than writing in November. Because for me, this year’s Nanowrimo kind of didn’t do it for me. I wrote my 50K, but the last 15K were the equivalent of pulling teeth. It’s because I already wrote Shards of course – and it turns out that I had just way more emotional investment in that story, which made Frostbite one hell of a letdown. I might finish the story one day because it does have potential, just not now.
Thankfully though, there was more than enough music highpoints to make this month one made of rockage. First there was the Soilwork gig which I’ve lamented before, but OMG that just completely blew my mind. I have never partied harder during a gig, I think. Then there was Slipknot, which was brilliant as well (Corey <3), and we finished off the month with Rodrigo Y Gabriela and a good night out.
Of course, there was also the reiki initiation, which was very interesting and wonderful as well. I’m glad I shared it with Wendy, it was really special. I should update my list of coincedences, btw. Because I have a few more to add to the list which make me wonder if I should really believe in this.

December
And December was mostly winding down, looking back. A heavy flu, a cool Flogging Molly show, but mostly just working and looking back on the year… and somewhere down the line I decided fuckit, I want to have fun. No use wondering how things could be when you have the opportunity to experience them, right?

That’s basically the thought of this year. The first bit of it utterly sucked… looking back on the whole work situation I’m surprised how long I managed to hold on in that toxic environment. I’m so glad that I now have something that doesn’t suck out my soul AND earns me reasonable money. But oh, the music, the laughs, hanging out with the boys in the jamplace and with the girls in the sauna… the shitloads of tapas I’ve had, the cocktails, the sushi. The Popmundo meets, new friends. Somewhere a switch was flipped, and I suddenly had a brilliant time. So no, I’m not going to lament on the first part of the year which was made of suckage. I’m going to focus on how we managed to change it all around by getting a new job, a new house, on music indulgence and writing out my heart story this year, which was Shards… and on giving love to those around me… how easy it is, in the end, to love.

It was like an awakening. So yeah, this year’s End of Year song is called “As The Sleeper Awakes”, it’s by Soilwork, and I’m going to thoroughly enjoy it when we play it on New Year’s Eve.

And for next year, I expect many more indulgences and new experiences. Because that’s what life is for.

I don’t write that much romance in my stories, I’ve realized. Hardly ever do I have a boy-meets-girl-and-they-fall-in-love storyline. The storylines in this story either deal with an established relationship, or with no relationship at all. I’m usually perfectly happy to let my characters co-exist without falling in love. Thinking back, the only times I’ve gone for that spiel recently, was the Joy/Seamon pairing in Through Crystal in 2006. One could argue for Kayley and Jenni in 2004, but there was something fundamentally wrong with THAT relationship, so let’s not go there

And it makes sense I suppose: you write about what you know and about what you fear. And I know established love, I fear losing it. So in my stories there’s already the relationship, usually. It’s never easy, though… love isn’t easy. There’s no true wuv forever like movies and books have us believe. I’d die for Olli, and our relationship is the most beautiful thing in the world I know… but it’s LIFE. Nothing is ever easy. Nothing can be taken for granted.

I noticed that very clearly when I wrote Shards with Joy and Seamon - dealing with their aftermath of their adventure in Through Crystal. Yes, they’d fallen in love back then. But their love wasn’t easy, because they weren’t easy people. Never mind their situation. There was bound to be friction, and that was so logical to me. Writing them was the realization of the true wuv 4eva that didn’t exist - they had to work for their relationship, accept that they weren’t perfect for each other… accept that, get over it, deal with it and move on together. For a while I thought they didn’t, but thankfully they did. It felt like a damn relief

And I felt this so bloody keenly when I was writing out that short Fortress/Forsaken story about Lannie and Walter. That might very well be the most heartbreaking thing I’ve ever written, and nobody understands how painful it is but me, because I understand their relationship - the love they have and the curveball life’s thrown them, and how they deal with it, losing each other because of it. It’s half what I know, it’s half what I fear. And if there’s a heartstory, there’s one for you right there. No wonder I’ve kept returning to that couple since I gave Bren the premise for their story somewhere way the hell back in 2006. No wonder I had to write Walter in my 2007 Nanowrimo story Forsaken. To me, his story’s even more important than Dani’s - who was the main character.

Just my thoughts on romance the stories I tell, and some musings on where I stand in life. I love Olli, I love my relationship and my life with him. But love isn’t easy. If it was easy, everyone would do it, right?
Still, it doesn’t mean that the lyrics below aren’t love, either.

It is as if you’ve come along too soon
and I’m trying to fit you in
but I can’t seem to follow

You’re a cutie if it all falls through
We can piece it back together
I can learn to trust you too

You’re just too good to lose
and I can’t refuse
so don’t make me choose
between the two
I’m fed up in here
in my atmosphere
Don’t you know who you are
You’re my shooting star

9.30PM and another 1000 words while I was waiting until I could rinse out hairdye I’ll put them up when I’ve got the chapter done, or  a good ending point for this thing. Because right now it’s 2K of getting to know Kalinka.

7.30PM: I have more & more love for Write Or Die. That running timer is doing wonders for my output. It really forces me to produce and keep producing. I just wrote 1000 words in 20 minutes. Awesome. I’m going to share it with you here, btw… as soon as the chapter is done. For now, just know that I’m the proud owner of 35058 words written in my nanowrimo file

4PM: Chapter seven is done. It’s a sad one though… and it brings me to 33877. The Write Or Die website helps me a lot, it really forces me to produce. Also, I have a bit of plot again, so for a little while longer, I know where I’m going.

1PM: For your enjoyment, this is chapter six of which I wrote the most yesterday, up till 29.5K. I did 1K today so far, but there’ll be more forthcoming. For now, here’s chapter six. In which stuff happens that was unplanned, because from here on I have no plot anymore
Wordcount: 30603

You can read what I’ve written HERE!

What surprises me sometimes is that people expect me to judge so much harder than I really do. They think that my judging weighs heavier than how much I love them and want them to be happy. I’ve had people genuinely be surprised when I helped them find comfort in their beliefs, in their faith. People who thought I would laugh, because X religion isn’t mine and I’m a self-proclaimed agnost.
But seriously, if it gives them love and support and happiness, who am I to judge then?

It surprises me that it surprises them. And to be honest, it stings a little. Don’t they know that there is so much love?

Oh man, what can I say? Lowlands was bloody brilliant. The weather was beautiful - the perfect festival weather that’s not hot enough to scorch and dry and warm enough to make it lazy and chilled out… the music was alternating between nice and gorgeous… the spirits were high and I partied more than I thought possible. I got to that point that I ended up using reserves that I didn’t really think I had.

But to start at the beginning… here’s a story (with pictures!) of the awesomeness that was Lowlands. *t all started on Thursday of course. Olli and I did some last minute poncho and grocery shopping, cleared out the computer room for the electricity dude, and then loaded our stuff in the car and left at about 3-ish. Of course we ended up in a traffic jam of doom before we could even be let onto the camping terrain, do we didn’t arrive until after 6pm. From there on the long trek to the festival began, because they’d dumped us on the parking lot in the most backward of places. But we were in good spirits so we didn’t care. In the end we had to wait only a little bit for the rest of the group to catch up with us - time we spend wisely with beers. We also ran into Jos at some point and hung out for a while, eating Tijs’ lovingly prepared egg sandwiches and drinking some more beer before we would brave the line before the entrance. That took the better part of another hour and thus it came to be that we entered Lowlands at about 8.30pm. Which means that the campings were full to bursting by that point. It was quite the bitch to find a space to set up camp, but we managed eventually. Shortly after Nathalie and Marijn arrived as well, for which we begged a spot from our way too antisocial oversized campingplace of our neighbours. But soon enough our tents were standing proud and tall.
I met up with Rick as well, and took him and Nathalie to meet up with Jos so they could actually see face-to-face. We had a fun time at Jos’ camp chatting the night away and I think I went to bed about 4-ish eventually.

Friday dawned bright and early - with brilliant weather that we had not expected but loved muchly. Lie arrived around 10-ish, glad that we’d set up her tent for her already. And after waking up Olli it was time to go to the festival terrain! The festival kicked off with Henry Rollins, who did a sketch/speech on life and lowlands in general, during which I mostly lazed around in the grass soaking up sunlight. Quickly thereafter though, it was time for Killswitch Engage!! What a way to start off a festival, hehe. It was a lot of fun. Not mindblowing, but full of energy and fun and shouting the lyrics along on top of your lungs and sharing brilliant grins with other fans. I had the camera in my face a few times as I was standing way in front before the stage, so maybe I was on tv as well. Anyway, after the concert I emerged dripping with sweat and doped up on adrenaline, so the festival was off to a good start.
We goofed around a bit, checked out the festival terrain and the market, and then Lie and I went to see The Wombats, which were a lot of fun! Exactly as I expected, just lots of cheerfulness, good gig, and everybody going crazy during “Let’s dance to Joy Division”
After this we roamed the festival terrain some more, Olli, Lie and me. Lie got a spray tattoo of moons and stars on her arm, we had cocktails, Olli bought me an Editors t-shirt and we generally had a good time Then we caught up with the others again to go and see Junkie XL but it was so bloody BUSY there, that the others went elsewhere and Lie and me ending up with the two of us. It was a great show, though. Although by then I was so knackered and my feet were aching up a storm, so we didn’t make it too long.
Already I’ve completely forgotten what we did that first night after Junkie XL, isn’t that horrible? I think we went back to the tentcamp to chill out for a while, but the bad thing is that I remember going to bed at 4-ish once again, but it’s already fading what we did that night. Oh wait, now I do. We went to watch the sneak preview movie! It turned out to be Hellboy 2, which I thought was not all that good. It had some pretty pictures though, and I have to cut the movie some slack because I exhaustedly slept through the first forty minutes of it. It might have been really good in the beginning and I missed it

Saturday was bloody brilliant. We started the day off with a fun gig of Korpiklaani, who were terribly cheerful. After that we had a few beers in the shade with Jos and his friend. After this we checked out Volbeat and N*E*R*D in the Alpha tent, which were great as well. I do admit that by this time I was pretty inebriated and slept through parts of NERD while lying in the grass. I did hear how they got the audience to sing along, which was cool too see.
After this most of the group went back to the tentcamp. Olli, Lie and I chilled out at the Lima tent. Then it was already time for dinner, and then…. Underworld! They started off a bit slow, I have to admit. But once they got going,it was a real party. I danced myself into a sweat, but once I heard those first notes of “Born Slippy”, I suddenly had gooseflesh all over my arms. That was SO beautiful. Also, they had balloons. The concert took place during a lunar eclipse, which was very visible outside the tent and looked really cool.
We went back to the Lima tent to chill out for a while and played bongo’s for shits and giggles (which you could do there) and regained our strength, until Lie proposed we go and check out the Alpha DJ’s - who were pretty much DJ’s playing good music in the Alpha tent. Best. Idea. Ever.
I thought at that point that I was completely spent after Underworld, but the opposite turned out to be true as they started to play music from bands ranging from Flogging Molly to System of a Down to the Fratelli’s and the Foo Fighters. They even played that song from the movie Blade - the blood party song. I believe it’s by Orbital. And of course the Chemical Brothers. Needless to say, it fucking rocked. I was completely wasted with fatigue, but I couldn’t stop dancing. We had a lot of fun!
When that was done, it was about 2.30am and we stumbled back to our tents.

And then there was the Sunday. The day started a bit later, because it was slightly overcast so we didn’t cook out of our tents. That was good, because I had some sleep to catch up with. Olli, Lie and I bragged about the awesome party in the Alpha tent during breakfast and then we went to the festival terrain, where we mostly boozed up the whole afternoon during We Are Scientists and Danko Jones, who both sounded good. Oh, and the boys played Rock Band and performed (surprisingly) well Eventually we moved to the Alpha tent to watch Gogol Bordello (which sounded like a lot of fun!) and back to the Grolsch for the Fratellis, who were pretty boring.
After this the group kind of split up. Olli, Lie and I opted to go and watch Tricky perform, also because the clouds started drifting in and looked damn worrisome. We figured that when it would start raining, at least we’d be in a tent. That turned out to be a great plan, because the torrential downpour that started soon after was pretty devastating. What once was nice festival terrain turned into a mudpool. By that time Lie was going home, so Olli and I went with her to the camping to pick up her stuff and bring her to the Kiss n Ride, where Sjoerd would pick her up.
And after that I said my goodbyes to Olli as well. He would go and check out Sigur Ros (which apparently was bloody awesome), and I was aiming for a spot in front at the Editors gig. Je ne regrette rien. I walked out with misty eyes and full of love for the world. “Escape The Nest” made me teary eyed… and the rest was either a party or beautiful. They played so tightly, were sympathetic, played all my favourite songs, and I was right in front of it. It was in popoterms literally a perfect show. When they announced their last song I was hoping for “Fingers In The Factory” and nearly fell over when they started playing those first notes. So they ended it with a party. And I walked out in a daze, all partied out, all satisfied. Not half-horny like after Killswitch, but just very afterglowy and wanting to hug people.
So afterwards we went back to the camping, hung out at the tentcamp for a while, but I was so exhausted that I went to bed pretty early. And that concluded Lowlands.

The Monday started out rainy, but we had enough of a dry patch to fold up our tents and then spend our last Lowlands coins on a very decadent breakfast. And then we went to the car, and drove home through new rain. And it’s been raining on and off ever since. Lowlands is definitely over.
But man, it was beautiful. I had a great time <3

Man, I don’t even know where to begin. Do I ever? Graspop was fucking great. The weather held up brilliantly, the bands I came for didn’t disappoint, the beer tasted heavenly (thank God for Maes beer, best festival beer EVER), no hangovers - can I please go back??

Let’s just start at the beginning, I suppose

We arrived at the festivalterrain on Thursday evening around 8 or 9 or so, after surprisingly few trafficjams given the fact that we left Den Haag at 5.30pm or something. The longest trafficjam was in Dessel itself, waiting to be let onto the parking. It was all in good fun though. Our tentcamp was built up quickly, and we had a few celebratory beers before going to sleep at some point.

In the morning on Friday it initially rained a little, which we mostly avoided by snoozing in our tents for a little longer. Then came the beer - we had to drink it before our coolbox would stop working and the beer’d get warm, right? So we drank beer. But eventually we went to the festival terrain and the weather cleared up beautifully and brilliantly. By that time I had quite a bit of beer in my belly, I have to say. I was pretty damn sloshed by the time we arrived at the festival terrain and the sun was burning down on us while we had to stand in line for fucking forever to get our drink tickets.
Eventually I sat down in the shade somewhere and kind of passed out/slept for a while, before Olli came and brought me a fruit cocktail which sobered me up and saved me from a heatstroke. Still, it was all in good fun We kind of watched Saxon, which failed to impress me, there was a bit of rain in between, and then Def Leppard and Whitesnake, who didn’t fail at all! It’s at moments like this that you realized that as a child of the eighties, you know a lot more Whitesnake songs than you thought you did, and they performed really well! It was a good start of the festival.

Saturday brought more bands that were interesting! There was drizzle rain at first, but since it was still really damn warm nobody cared. It’s interesting to walk around in your t-shirt and have it rain upon you and not being bothered. Anyway, we checked out the metal market, where Derek bought a t-shirt of a band called Alestorm which we’d never seen before but we liked in concept (scottish pirate metal, how can you go wrong?). Volbeat had cancelled, which was a shame. But the good news is that because of this Sabaton could play a little longer. And DAMN did they deliver. Had a great time. The singer is terribly charismatic and they’d never played for such a big crowd before. The crowd in turn loved them, which exhilirated the band - it was a great symbiotic thing going on there, and the enthusiasm was terribly infective. ‘Prima Victoria’ especially - such a great time
After this Olli and I went back to the camping to chill out for a while, while the rest went to check out Sonata Arctica and Iced Earth. Not really our cup of tea. We missed out on Korpiklaani though, but figured we’d catch them at Lowlands anyway. Because the sun was burning down on us again at this point, Olli and I set up the partytent and sat smugly in the shade for a while, before going back to the festival terrain with Brenda in tow. (In the end the partytent didn’t last long though, the wind tore the thing apart while we were gone - good thing that Tijs and Kat were in camp at the time O_o) Anyway, we lazed around on the festival terrain with beer and chats, and then it was time for the Kiss gig. By this time there were many people makeupped as Kiss, which was funny to see. The beer made it more funny, I had to admit. Marco and Derek joined up with us to watch the show, which was… a disappointment. There was about half an hour of drum- & guitar wanking, ten minutes of chatting to the audience, and about fifteen minutes of actually playing their hits. They played ‘Strutter’ and ‘I Wanna Rock & Roll All Night’, which was fun, and they had fireworks, which is always a winner with me… but the reason I had a good time at the Kiss gig was not because of Kiss but because of us being quite intoxicated
Back at camp after the show the good times continued, and we went to bed at 3.30 am or something, after severe cases of the giggles.

Sunday, however, promised to be the best music day of all. At least, for me. In the morning we checked out some band that because of reschedules and cancellations I never caught the name of, but was pretty decent. The weather was once again bloody gorgeous to the point where I had to walk around with my longsleeve draped over my poor tortured sunburnt shoulders. I also bought a new hat, and I drank beer. Apocalyptica didn’t really do it for us from the distance we were standing. The sound wasn’t all that good with the wind and all, and by now I’ve seen them a gazillion times so it wasn’t really anything new.
But then it was time for Soilwork! Oh, Soilwork, how I love thee, let me count the ways… This is a youtube clip of the actual gig, which just shows how much everyone was enjoying it. My only beef with the show was that it lasted only 45 mins, but it was incredibly hot in that tent so I don’t think I would have survived if they would have played longer. They did however play ‘As The Sleeper Awakes’ which just totally made my festival. Also they played ‘Exile’, ‘20 More Miles’, ‘Stabbing The Drama’ and ‘Nerve’, which was freaking awesome. They played tightly, they managed to get a definite rise out of the audience, and I was soaked with sweat to my underwear. I am SO looking forward to their gig in November <3 Much love!!
Then after some time at the camping and some muchly needed drying up the sweat, it was time for In Flames - the other band I came for. They played 90% stuff of the last two albums, which I appreciated muchly. In the beginning we hung back for a while at our usual spot, but Derek and I decided to say fuckit and go to the front, where the sound was a lot better and the show was as well. Stuff definitely gets lost in the distance, I think. Anyway, Derek and I rocked out and had a great time. I’m looking forward to THIS gig in the fall as well.
And then, knackered as we were, there was still Iron Maiden coming up in a two hour (!) gig. Now, I’ve never really been a fan, but I have to hand it to them, they’re awesome on stage. I really, really liked their show. We were pretty close in front for the first part of the show, but after an hour and a toiletbreak I watched the rest in the back. I was pretty damn tired at that point.
The last night in camp was quiet - we were all completely tired after a long day of partying and rocking out, so we went to bed relatively early.

And that concluded Graspop Metal Meeting.
I learnt a few things during this festival:
1- Maes beer is the best festival beer in the world.
2- The atmosphere at a metal festival is great.
3- It helps that there weren’t 70K people, they topped out at 55K, which is better.
4- I’m more of a rockchick than a metal head, it turns out. I’m kind of in-betweenish, I think. At some point I was really wishing for a bit more mellow stuff squeezed in between. All the death metal doesn’t do it for me.
5- Soilwork is love.
6- So is Sabaton.
7- Next time I’m drunk, I have to put on sunscreen when the sun’s shining. A beerbuzz does NOT prevent you from getting sunburnt.
8- Getting free beer is easy when you’re a girl on a metal festival camping. You don’t have to give a shit about decency, though.
9- I fucking loved and needed this.

Oh, and if you’re interested in the pictures, you can find them here

I love you, babe.

And another week’s gone by. Dude, time passes so fast. I realized just today that it’ll be June in a few days. The days are longer, lighter, and warmer (well, mostly - if you don’t count the torrential downpour of this afternoon). Summer’s here.

So is Wendy’s wedding. Tomorrow she and Arno are going to tie the knot and I’m terribly excited over the whole deal! *squeals* I’m such a girl sometimes It’s going to be my first wedding where I’m actually not the one marrying, so this time I get to experience it all as one of the party people.
I so hope that the weather will be as lovely as the fact that these two are going to make official what they’ve been doing for the past six years already.

It’s funny how I always divide my year into living towards certain events. It can be things like birthdays, holidays, festivals… and in this case a wedding. And then after that, there’s going to be two weeks of quietness, and then there’ll be Graspop already. Dude, time’s really flying!

Back!
Happy, sunburnt, and with more than a small inclination to sleep.

Pictures and stories will follow soon.