When the covid pandemic started we searched long and hard for things to do at home. In the end we did a lot of different things and one of these was exercise in the living room with youtube. We had various exercise programs which we tried out, and it was all good fun. Now, with covid still around, but with less restrictions we dont exercise at home anymore. We simply go to the park, or go out to visit the maintain, or the beach, or whatever park we feel like visiting.

We don’t exercise at home anymore with one exception. Tanju! Tanju is a trainer that has somehow captured our attention. He was one of our favorite trainers during the lockdown, and even now we still follow his programs. His first video we came across by coincidence on the first day it was posted on his channel. After a few days it was gone, and we were all very sad. Then later we found he has moved to another channel and we could enjoy his workouts again.

The Tanju workouts are a mix between workout and dance and although Tanju does not talk much he radiates an incredible amount of energy and happyness. He is one of the few persons who made a youtube video and achieved adding value to the world. The workout itself is quite easy to follow but every now and then Tanju picks up the pace and ‘goes wild’. These are moment of pure joy as we try and keep up.

Just a couple of days ago Alex and Alan both made a nice cozy habitat for a couple of snails we found outside our home in the mini garden we have. Alex has lots of snails (around 10) and Alan only wanted one, and later added a few more so he had three. For two weeks the kids have been feeding the happy snail cucumber (their favorite), tomato, lettuce.

To avoid damaging the snails whenever that are picked up (as little as possible) the kids wash their hands, to clean any salt and dirt from their hands. After handling the snails they again clean their hands to avoid whatever may occur after touching a snail. They have even cleaned some of the snails a couple of times by holding them gently under slow running lukewarm water. Basically the snails seem to have their own private heaven.

The are happy and it shows. After two weeks both snail farm are already crowded with lots of little snail eggs!

Last weekend was spend inside because the entire island was covered by a strange yellow thick fog. The fog was not made out of water, but existed out of sand. The sand came all the way from the Sahara desert and was/is being blown over the island. Slowly everything here is being covered by a thin layer of yellow/orange sand. It looks pretty nice, but the same layer of sant in our lungs is probably not the best thing, so we spend the weekend inside with all the doors and windows closed. The one time we were outside it was like being in a ghost town. No cars, almost no people and the people that were outside were wearing mouthcaps.

“Ollie Ongeluk” is on of the main characters in the Dutch animated series “Helden van de stad”, Heroes of the city. Alan is a big fan and he especially likes the character Ollie. Ollie is a very unlucky character. He walks around with his leg in a cast, his arm in a cast and his beak has a big bandaid. Almost every episode het gets into trouble and he accumelates more harm. He will fall over banana peels, fall into fountains, cause fires and just generally cause lots of trouble.

Alan is a fan, and it looks like Ollies bad luck is rubbing off on Alan. Suddenly Alan is going through a period of increased unluckiness. He fell on the street and needed two stitches on his forehead and during playtime at school he fell and bit his tongue. Now he is walking around with a blue inflated tongue. Poor guy. Lets hope his unluckiness is over.