The evil dentist

At the place where I grew up, there was a mean and evil dentist. His office was in the school building, right by the football field (football=soccer). When the ball hit his window, he got furious. He ran out and grabbed the poor boy that kicked the ball by the ear, and pulled him into the dentist’s chair. He picked the nicest and whitest tooth in the boy’s mouth. With an evil grin on his face, he drilled out a wide and deep cavity, while the boy cried and screamed in pain. Finally he filled the cavity with dark and ugly amalgam.

Don’t you believe it?

I used to tell this story to my little boys. They believed it, and even counted on my teeth the number of times I had kicked the ball at the dentist’s window >:)))

Perfect summer day for skiing

Today we had a perfect day at the glacier.

Last night temperatures fell below the freezing point in the mountains. So today the surface of the glacier was hard ans solid. Around noon the uppermost surface had softened a little bit, to make perfect skiing conditions.

Weather was nice, and no wind.

In the picture you can see the kids playground with the big jumps in the foreground and snowy mountains and other glaciers in the background. In fact, the landscape is entirely shaped by glacier through thousands and millions of years.

Most glaciers are not suited for skiing, due to dangerous crevasses. The glacier we're skiing on is special in that sense; it has almost no crevasses, just a few small ones in the upper part. The crevasses are less than a feet wide and only 10 feet deep, so they are no risk for the skiing.

Now we're back on the camping down in the valley. We have two cabins, with a total of eight beds. Little boy and I, and another ski-dad stay in one cabin. Six teenage boys sleeps in the other, in the most incredible mess. There are piles of cloths, helmets, back-protection plates, goggles and ski boots. In a mysterious way they are able to dig up the right stuff every morning before we drive up to the glacier.

We make the cooking very simple; there are two items on the dinner menu. If weather is bad, we eat pizza. If weather is good, we BBQ outside the cabin. Today, like yesterday, we BBQ'ed >:)

Summer at the glacier

Yesterday was our first day on the glacier. From the camping down in the valley up to the glacier is a 40 minutes drive, with 1500m, almost a mile, of vertical ascent.

Weather was mostly cloudy. On the way up to the glacier, we passed through the lower clouds, almost like an air plane climbing after take off. Throughout the day we had both warming glimpses of sun and cold gusts of snowfall. The skiing was like summer skiing often is, on the soft and slushy glacier surface.

It’s interesting to study the glacier front. The characteristic layering that you can see in the picture is due to many years of alternating snowfall in winter and surface melting in summer. The bluish core of the glacier can be hundreds or thousands of years old.

The science of glaciers is called glaciology, and is a Hell of a fun and cool subject (literally spoken hehe). There are two main types of glaciers; polar glaciers and temperate glaciers.

Polar glaciers are found only in arctic areas, like the ice caps on Greenland and in Antarctica. The polar glaciers are frozen to the ground, which makes them do fantastic things like surge.

Temperate glaciers are “warm”, in the sense that the base is always at the melting point, and water is flowing underneath. The glaciers in the Alps, on Iceland, and in Winterland are temperate glaciers, including the one we are skiing on these days.

The weather forecast for tomorrow is superb, and I will try to take a nice picture to show you >:)

Dirty dozen blogfest

I came over the Dirty Dozen Blogfest on a the blog by Watery Tart. I'm not quite sure what a blogfest is, but this one appears to be about favorite movies. Since today's 3rd and last game in Soccer World Cup is over, and I have nothing important to do, I thought I could write down my top 12. So here we go:

12. Matador. Movie by Spanish director Pedro Almodóvar, about death, religion and sex.

11. Betty Blue. French movie about a crazy French girl, with the fabulous Beatrice Dalle in the main role.

10. Braindead (Dead Alive). Zombie horror film from New Zeeland, with tons of blood, made with the ironic touch that makes it cool.

9. Bowling for Columbine. Michael Moore at his best, and insane conservative Americans blaming the high-school shooting on heavy metal and Marilyn Manson (during my years as headbanger, frequenting heavy metal concerts, I have realized that most people with long hair and black clothes are very nice).

8. Night on Earth. A movie about five taxi trips taking place in different cities around the world, directed Jim Jarmusch. The highlight is the last part, from Helsinki, made in co-operation with the Finnish Kaurismäki brothers.

7. Leningrad Cowboys Go America. Movie about a crazy Finnish rock band, directed by the Kaurismäki brothers, with Jim Jarmusch showing up in a bi-role.

6. Dr Zhivago. Classical movie from 1965, based on the classical novel by Boris Pasternak.

5. The Unbearable Lightness of Being. Good movie based on the novel by Czech author Milan Kundera.

4. Cinema Paradiso. Italian movie about … movies and theaters.

3. Pink Floyd The Wall. Great rock movie based on a great album.

2. Änglagård. Humoristic movie about the conflicts that occur when an urban couple moves out to the Swedish countryside, with the beautiful Helena Bergström in the main role.

1. Flåklypa Grand Prix. Animation movie made by Ivo Caprino in 1975 (dubbed to English as Pinchcliffe Grand Prix). I saw it first time when I was 10 yo, have seen it many times since then, last years with my kids. If you don’t know the movie, check out this link

Beethoven at the Polar Circle

Yesterday, I was driving from the north to the south of Winterland, together with my old lady. We were arguing about what to play on the stereo. She hates black metal, and I don't like mainstream pop and rock. We compromized on classics, which both of us like.

We started out with Vivaldi; Concert for Two Trumpets and Strings, and then The Four Seasons. My favorite is Winter, as you can probably guess. Then we played Tchaikovsky. When we crossed the Polar Circle after 6 hours, including one hour on the ferry across a fjord, we were on Beethoven; Fidelio, his only opera.

At the Polar Circle there's a souvenir shop, of course, and a monument. I took a picture from the back side of the monument; I thought the snow and mountains were a better background than the souvenir shop full of crap.

There's a scenic road along the coast, but it takes too much time. So we took the fast and boring route, through endless forests and mountains. After 15 hours driving, we were home ... damn tired of Vivaldi and Beethoven.

Today, I'm back on black metal >:)

Ready for summer skiing

The school's summer vacation is starting next week. As usual, we go skiing the first week of the vacation, on a glacier on the top of Winterland. This has become a nice tradition.

Every morning, we drive up to the glacier, and ski all day. Anyone who forget the sun protection will regret it badly in the end of the day.

In the afternoon, we go back to the camping down in the valley. We BBQ, play soccer and volleyball, jump on trampoline and walk on a slackline. If the weather is nice and warm the kids go swimming in the river. It's ice cold; only greenish melting water from the glacier. I prefer to just watch them from the river bank.

It's gonna be my boys, of course, and five or six of their friends, and I will be the "baby sitter" for the wild bunch. We're looking forward to it, both the kids and I >:)

Here's a little video from June last year. Put on your headphones if you like Italian opera:

Romeo and Juliet at midnight

I was cleaning my apartment today. Guess what I found; a Cuban cigar. In fact, it was my favorite cigar, a Churchill sized Romeo y Julieta. According to the cigar handbook, a good Cuban cigar should be rolled on the inside of a virgin's thighs.

President Kennedy was a passionate cigar smoker. He couldn't break the embargo against Cuba, of course, not officially. Fortunately, the British embassy helped him, by sending Cuban cigars in the diplomatic mail.

Tonight I went for a late walk, just around the neighborhood, at midnight, while smoking my cigar. I had my camera with me of course, and took the picture above half an hour after midnight. Nice isn't it? Just like a good cigar, you can enjoy the view for an hour.

Did you think this was a post about sex? What did Romeo an Juliet have in mind around midnight? Just use your imagination ... >:)

Tshabalala

I'm back in the land of the midnight sun. It's raining tonight, so it's not visible, but it will get better tomorrow.

I was watching Germany-Australia in the airport while waiting for Six Flags Airlines to take off. The play before the 1-0 goal was very nice.

I think the World Cup has been good so far. As usual the teams are careful in the first round. The fear of loosing is greater than the desire to win. It will get better and better.

To me, there are three highlights so far:

The TV production is the best I've ever seen in soccer. The variation between overview cams and close up cams is very good. The super-slow-motion replays, where you can see every detail of the action are fabulous.

Lionel Messi, the little Argentinian, the soccer wizard of Nou Camp in Barcelona, needed only one match to show that he's the best soccer player in the world. The way he advances with the ball in perfect control is art. He didn't score in the game against Nigeria, but it was very close.

Best of all so far, is South Africa's goal against Mexico in the opening game. Everything was great; the moves and passes leading to the goal, the left-foot shot from angle, the way they, Bafana Bafana, celebrated the goal. And the name of the scorer is almost like music - Tshabalala >:)

Kiss live

It was concert with Kiss in town tonight.

When I was 12 years old, I thought it was the coolest and most scary band in the world. When I was 15, I realized that it was not more than an average band. But it was cool to hear them live. Very good and experienced entertainers, great show.

Kiss has only two good songs, really; Detroit Rock City, and Black Diamond.

Epilogue

When we came to port, I went straight to the airport. I was able to catch the last plane out of the northernmost town in the world. A 45-minutes flight with Six Flags Airlines got me to the town known as the Paris of the North, due to its abundance of bars and pubs. It's the largest town north of the polar circle, and the gateway to the Arctic.

I checked into my hotel and went to a bar next door, where I met a lot of friends who where there for a geo-science conference. We had a couple of beers before I went to bed around 3 am.

From my hotel room I had a nice view to the Cathedral of the Arctic Sea.

Next morning I got on a plane to the south and made it home for the weekend, good to get home to my family and my drum kit. It's almost like summer today, and we have mowed the lawn, for the first time this year.

Next week there is a Kizz concert in town. You know, that band from the 70's with face paint and crazy outfit. It was one my favorite bands when I was a kid. Later I have realized that musically, it's a less than average band, but anyway, it will be cool to see them live >:)

Going home

I’m on the way back home. Around noon today, I was transferred from the seismic vessel to the chase boat by the FRC, an acronym for "Fast Rescue Craft".

In the picture above, the seismic vessel is in the background, and
the FRC is that orange little boat in the front. It’s a fast motorboat, about 20 feet long. It’s the rescue boat in case someone falls over board, but is used for various other purposes too.

The chase boat is supporting the seismic vessel, transporting food and fuel supply from port, and clearing the sail lines ahead for fishing equipment. The chase boat is only 48m (160 feet) long, and is rolling like crazy in the waves. Fortunately the sea is calm today.

The transit to port takes about eleven hours, long and boring, and no internet connection. I spend the time reading, writing and sleeping. Sleeping in a boat rolling on the waves is very nice, actually. We will arrive in the northernmost town in the world late tonight. Tomorrow morning I will try to get on the first plane back home.

The seismic data acquisition will continue for another two or three months before we’re finished. I will follow up the remaining part of it from the office. Then we will work on the processing and interpretation of the data for more than a year … and in 2012, I hope, we have identified the best spot to drill to find oil >:)

Almost spaghetti

Yesterday we lost the power supply on one of the cables. We had to pull all the cables up to the ship to get it fixed. This is a difficult operation. To avoid tangling, all the cables were stacked on top of each other at different depths, from 2 to 16m (7 to 50 feet) below the sea surface.

For a while we were close to making eight cables into a big spaghetti behind the ship. We had to steer the ship on a course straight into the waves to avoid waves and currents from the side. Fortunately we have some very skilled guys working on the back deck. Now we’re back on track, and the airguns have started to fire on Line 5.

In the instrument room, we are close to getting the on-board data processing up and running. Probably we will get it set up today. Then I can return to the office tomorrow.

Last night we had really nice weather, and approximately 3m (10 feet) of waves. Right after midnight, I was out on the helicopter deck to take the picture shown above >:)

Life on the ship

Life on the ship is an easy life. We work, rest, eat and sleep. We have satellite TV, internet, and plenty of DVDs. If anyone gets sick or injured, there's a medic and a full hospital on board.

The crew works in two 12-hour shifts, night and day. At this time of the year it's not a big difference; the sun is up all the time. There are two separate crews, actually; a maritime crew, which keeps the boat going, and a geophysical crew, which runs the data acquisition and processing. I’m here to make sure we get the on-board data processing up and running the way we want it. Then I will go back to the office.

There’s nowhere to go, and not much to worry about; no shopping at the mall, no lawn to mow, no dinner to cook, no kids to take to school and soccer practice. Sometimes I take a walk around the helicopter deck, to get some fresh air, or to enjoy the view of the midnight sun. There is nothing but ocean to see, but still the scenery is changing all the time; the waves and the clouds and the sun. It’s very nice, actually >:)