Do Not Fold

I can hear people say it already: “Silent for weeks… and then… this movie on his blog:”.

Sorry for the lack of recent updates here. It’s not my year, this year, but as you might have noticed… it’s almost over ;) I’ve got lots of things planned. More on that later!

My life changed a lot lately. It’s been exactly a year now that she and I announced that we where getting married. But as you probably know, we didn’t. After eight years she decided to break up and cancel the wedding. In the meantime, we’re a couple of months further and we both moved to a new place. I’m finally getting all the boxes empty and books on the shelves. It’s time for a new chapter in my life. Don’t worry… people that know me, know that I’m a guy that keeps his chin up, and tries to get the best out of every situation.

What’s next then? Well, for all my life, I always wanted to move to New York but had accepted that I’d never work/live there because of the wedding etc. But because of the recent events it feels like I’ve got my second chance. As of this month, I’m soliciting in various companies in New York, San Francisco, Seattle, Chicago, Stockholm, London, etc. If you are looking for an experienced specialist in web development, I’m your man! ;) You can download my resume here. I look forward to hearing from you!

One last thing: I want you to know that I’m not trying to “escape from my current situation”. That’s definitely not true, because I really like how it is now. These Days is an awesome company! I’ve learned so many things, got loads of opportunities and it just keeps on getting better and better. The colleagues are nice, the work is fun and challenging, the mojitos are good and the boss rocks! ;) [UPDATE] The other boss got jealous on the fact that I didn’t chose his picture :P Sorry Sam, you’re really awesome too!! I’m not joking, you better re-read that recommendation I wrote about you on LinkedIn.

So I really love my job, but I feel like I should take my career to the next level. I want to build high-quality, next-generation websites and web applications. I’m looking for a company that demands pixel-perfect implementations and thinks further than the typical. There are such companies, but most are abroad. This is the main reason why I feel like I should move abroad and step into the next chapter of my life.

Quite useless, but fun to watch afterwards: Daily Mugshot. I took about 103 images so far and could order myself a neat little flipbook, but I’m going to wait with that until I’m fed up with taking a picture of myself every day :P

You probably noticed the lack of updates recently? That’s because it’s Christmas and I’ve got loads of things on my hands these days. Sorry for that! For now… A Merry Christmas! ;)

As you might have read I’ve got myself an iPhone developers certificate now. Cool eh :) I’m still learning the shizzles and nizzles in Cocoa Touch, but I need some good ideas for iPhone apps. I don’t promise to actually make your app-proposals – but if it’s really good – I might. As we speak, I’m finishing off my CoffeeCounter app, which is really stupid actually, but a good practice. You can count the coffees you drink a day and I’m planning to let you twitter them automatically. I know, pretty stupid (like most other iPhone apps), so give me your ideas people!!

When someone asks me where the name Do Not Fold came from, it’s a bit difficult to respond. It’s a combination of many things — somewhat stupid but it has a meaning. It all started with a towl. By pure chance I saw a towl with the ‘do not tumble dry‘ icon and text on it. In my mind that line (somehow) brought me to ‘do not fold’. Anneleen said: “Yeah, that’s it! Because websites can’t be folded too, no?”. I thought that was a really lausy reason — sorry dear — but I liked it because it sounded catchy.

Then it struck me. In Flemmish some people say: “Nie pleujen” which means that you shouldn’t let people mock you. You should stand up for yourself and don’t just do anything what people tell you to do. Back then, I was a shy guy and some people told me that I should be more assertive. Later on, I really changed a load and I think that line really fits me.

So I got a name, but needed a logo too. At the moment I don’t use it much anymore, but if you haven’t seen it, check out my twitter profile picture or add this site to your iphone home screen. Anneleen once noticed me on the fact that there are always black birds near me. Whether I’m in the middle of the city or walking in the park, they’re there. I like them because they are stately, misterious and ominous. Some people are a bit scared when they see them, but like other birds they are really shy. I blaim Alfred Hitchcock ;)

The three most famous black birds are Raven, Crow and Jackdow. I always liked those birds a lot, but the true reason for why I used a crow on my logo is because of the saying “white raven”. I don’t know about the rest of the world, but in Belgium there is a saying where “white raven” means that it’s very rare. Probably they just are rare too. So for me that’s another good reason to use a white raven for a logo, I’m rare too, no? :) Anyway, I wanted you to know all that. Make sure to check these cool pictures too.