A busy week, one of those where I make a list for Monday and need until Friday to do it all, either because things got more complicated underway or new things requiring immediate attention popping up.
The weather turned much warmer this week and it hasn’t rained in weeks so the irrigation system I re-installed last week has been doing very good work. The frogs like it too, talking a walk in the garden after it’s been watered.
In just 4 weeks Y’s school will close for 6 weeks of summer holidays, and we’re working to ensure that we’re ready to leave for some of that time.

This past week I

• Had the weekly client meetings.
• Did preparations for the Tactical Council on EU data strategy the coming.
• Did preparations for the Interprovincial Ethics Committee in two weeks.
• Had the monthly meeting with my business partners. Had second meeting to discuss rebalancing the workload of me and a colleague.
• Had a kick-off meeting of a four year collaboration between a client and the JRC, the EC’s research directorate, around the European data strategy and all it entails.
• Discussed the progress and final steps in an ethics project for the National Police, wrote and submitted a proposal for the second half of this year.
• Had a meeting with the data team of the association for municipal governments VNG to talk about how the EU data strategy laws affect them, and the opportunities they hold.
• Held Y’s birthday party with her friends. With a group of eight children we went to an indoor playground, and we had pizza for dinner in our garden with all of them. I enjoyed being able to show hospitality to Y and her friends. I think it is important that she knows bringing people home is welcomed.
• Within our team discussed our method and proposition for creating so-called algorithm inventories for public sector bodies. This is something that currently is a voluntary effort for most, but the Dutch government is running ahead of European legal obligations and likely to create mandatory requirements in the near future.
• Did most of the monthly invoicing.
• Took Y to her swimming lessons.
• Had lunch in town with the three of us. Enjoyed walking around town for a while, as E and Y were getting a haircut.
• Used the fact that is has been 15 years this week since I started in open data, to map out the evolution of that work, as part of mapping out my activities in general. It’s quite a bit of work. At the same time, my blog here and my Flickr photo collection makes it much easier to find the ‘receipts’ and ensure placing events correctly on a timeline.

Walking around town this weekend.