Oh passport my passport!

I don't have a very good record with passports.
One day after a long trip I was doing laundry and guess what I've found, my passport! It wasn't a pretty day, the passport was useless. Luckily I'm an European Union citizen which means that between the European Union states I can travel just with my Portuguese ID card. That saved me the trouble to have to ask for another passport in the Portuguese embassy and I was able to fly to Portugal and take care of the passport in a few days.
Then, after my last trip to Brazil I was doing my laundry once again and guess what I've found... yes, my passport!
I was devastated and called myself so many names that day. I just couldn't believe it. The good news was that it was still usable, at least the pages didn't glue themselves and the magnetic strip seemed to work! I've been traveling back and forth with it without many problems until I had to fly to New York. Funny enough nobody raised any problems when flying to the states but as I was coming back I had to deal with a foreign police officer that must have had a bad day and had to ruin another person's day too and I guess he had found his chance, me and my almost decomposed passport!
He started making lots of questions and took me to this small room in Schiphol airport in Amsterdam. He must have been looking for a promotion or something like that and he must have thought that if he could catch this black dude with a fake or not valid passport he would get his chance.
I had to wait more than an hour for them to check the passport and most probably my whole background but I was cleared to leave the premises since I'm a row model citizen and always pay my taxes.

Anyway, all this to say that until yesterday I didn't know where my passport was and I'm due to travel to Brazil in 2 days so I was starting to get nervous. Finally I did find it in the pocket of a very old jacket but still. On my way to Brazil I'm making a pit stop in Portugal so I can issue a new passport and hopefully nobody will stare at my passport anymore.... that is until it put it in the washing machine again!

Mom and Dad

Mom and Dad,
originally uploaded by Paulo Taylor.

These are my parents on this picture, in Brazil next to their restaurant "O Escafandro" meaning The Diving Dress.
The most amazing stuff happened the other day, I got my parents first instance message from MSN. It was a memorable day, especially because I have a company based on Instant Messaging (www.e-messenger.net).
Each one has its own MSN account so that they can start chatting together since my mother is still in Portugal while my father tends to spend his time in Brazil just until my mother gets her retirement sorted.
Anyway, history was made and I'm very happy that now I can just text them easily, next thing is to teach them how to use e-messenger.net, I don't want them to fall into the hands of the competition ;-)

brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

It's damn cold in this country, definitely something I can't get used to. Temperatures barely go up to 0 degrees Celsius.
At least it's sunny, it's one of those periods when the sky is blue, the Sun is shining and you get tricked to go outside with not too much clothes on you until you first go out and experience the cold temperatures. You then go back inside and put two extra jackets on, a scarf, gloves and an extra pair of socks and you're ready to go.
Anyway, today I went to the post office and guess what was waiting for me... my ticket to Brazil!
For brief moments I forgot about the cold and was already making the whole picture of me on the beach drinking cocktails... and then... knock knock! Back to really it's freezing outside and I have to go to work!

Salvador here I come

I've manage to get myself a ticket to Brazil.
It was quite a mission to find an affordable ticket to Brazil in such a short notice.
Anyway the important is that in February I'm going to be in Brazil, enjoying my very deserved vacations.
Still have to plan is right though. I plan to go to Natal and spend a couple of days with some friends there but in Carnaval I'll be in Salvador to attend the biggest party in the world... wan to join? ;-)

My dear .com domain

What a soap opera it has been about my personal domain.
About 4 years ago I've registered the domain paulotaylor.com where I used to have my personal homepage. The domain registration and hosting was dealt by a Portuguese company called Nova Atlantida at the time.
In the meanwhile I had some issues with this company, they were charging me for extra traffic on my website which was an absurd, the traffic was never recorded on the web server logs and they insisted that I had to pay so I stopped dealing with them and they kept the domain for themselves. I did try to get the domain back a while ago but they seemed to be persistent with they position and me with mine.
Then, not so far from now, I decided to check what was going on with the domain and I found out that paulotaylor.com was now owned by a company called GoldStandardNames. If you check the site you'll see that it's under construction since 2004, kind of weird since we're talking about an internet company making money out of domain names.
Anyway, just out of curiosity I've decided to check with these people and for much of my surprise the domain is actually for sale at a mere $1000!
I couldn't stop laughing about it, I kind of felt good about it, after all we're talking about my previous domain which is now worth $1000 and I must have paid $10 when I initially registered it myself.
The good thing about this whole story is that now I own paulotaylor.net where I chose to host this blog too.
Now I wonder, should I start thinking about selling this domain too?! I think I'm going to try eBay - how about $1000 as a starting bid? This way I can buy my domain back - why not? I've seen people selling a lot worse stuff in that auctions website, check it out!

I turned 29

Yesterday was my birthday! On the 3rd of January 1977 I was born in Angola.
I was expecting to be just another day but it was far from that.
It started really bad actually! I had a terrible day at the office. Everything went wrong at the same time and I spent most part of the day fixing stuff in our servers we did the best we could to have the system up and running as soon as possible and after long hours it was back to normal.
I've decided to call it a day and went back home and I learned that Vitor was fixing a dinner with some friends and it was just what I needed. After a really bad day the best thing I could have was to either spend the rest of the day alone by myself and just let it go, or spend it with your best friends and I was very pleased to realize that it was actually the last option.
I had a wonderful dinner with Vitor, Nuno and Bernardo, my best friends! The restaurant was great, it's a Portuguese restaurant pretty close to the Central Station here in Amsterdam.
The food was exquisite and the wine wasn't far behind, Vitor did a good job setting it up.
Unfortunately Bernardo had to go home because he wasn't feeling very well, which is understandable since he broke his wrist last week. So the three of us left the restaurant straight to the bar scene already a bit touched of course, specially Nuno. But it was fun, we had a couple of drinks but then we had another retirement. Vitor wasn't feeling that good either and also had to leave in pain. By then we were already with more friends. Claudia was there too and she was wild, she's the coolest woman around! Just out of curiosity, I met her here in Amsterdam and it turns out that she knows a friend of mine that used to live right next door where I grew up - this world is really such a small place!
Anyway, After the bars closed we just took the party outside just talking and joking about each other - just like friends do. I was feeling good next to the ones I love and the ones that love me.
In the end it was a great day well spent with the people that mean the most for me and I wished my birthday was everyday.

Thank you my friends.

Happier New Year

1st of January 2006 was probably one of the meaningless days of my life.
It started the best way, I'll have to stay. I went partying wild, together with my friends - the real ones.
All started at home drinking cheap wine with coke (please read Coca-Cola) and some Vodka Redbull which I missed so much last time I was in Paris (Did you know that Redbull was banned in France?)
Anyway, after long hours dancing and plenty of Vodka Redbulls I was done for the first day of the year, Sunday was a complete waste. It's night and I'm tired as hell, can't sleep at all and now I'm wondering if those French guys are right or not!
The next day it's time to go to work! After just sleeping a few hours (that damned Redbull!!!) I was even afraid to look at the mirror so I decided not to. Went straight to the shower and felt just like new after a while (a long while). But somehow I had a good feeling although it was just another day. Dumped the trash as any other given Monday and for much of my surprise it's a sunny day.
The year just got a lot better, since it has been pouring snow and rain in the last few days. Streets were dirty like one would expect after any new year's eve in Amsterdam and I wish I had brought my sun glasses.
In the office everybody was in a good mood too and I had a productive day, even had the chance to have lunch with Vitor which doesn't happen very often so it turns out that this year might just have started on the right foot and hopefully it will keep like that.
I hope this year will bring lots of good things to us in general, to you in specific and to me if possible. Happier Year of 2006!

It's now past 2am and I should go to bed. Ohh... and it's my birthday today...