Random thoughts and observations
I’ve been browsing tonight for information about my grandmother’s family. She was a Zelen from Helden, Limburg, in the Netherlands. I haven’t been able to find much so far, I’m afraid. Please contact me if you can help. I did learn however, that this is the flag of the municipality of Helden. The municipality includes [...]
My mother was born in the Netherlands province of Limburg with the German surname of Wassenberg. We have a detailed family tree on her father’s side tracing back to the 1600s. With my current subscription to www.ancestry.com.au I have explored some of the female lines branching out from various generations. Again, I have been able [...]
It’s remarkable that you can store a computer operating system on a USB stick and boot from it. I’ve known this for a while, but only tried it for the first time today and I’m impressed. The distro I’m using is MCNLive, codename Jordaan. It’s based on Mandriva and comes from The Netherlands. The download [...]
Wilbur Smith is a master storyteller. He has the rare gift of making every word count, and Blue Horizon is no exception. I love the way that Smith maintains the pace throughout his novels. There is no slackening; no time to draw breath; and at no time does the flow slow to a trickle. Blue [...]
Batavia’s Graveyard by Mike Dash gives a fascinating account of mutiny, shipwreck, murder and survival. It tells the true story of a 17th century psycopath who orchestrated the murders of more than 100 people. Jeronimus Cornelisz was a chemist who fell on hard times and signed up as a low-ranking officer in the Dutch East [...]
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