Destiny of a ski dad

It's summer and it's vacation. We could have been on the beach. We could have been down south in the warm sun.

But we have our habits. Guess what we do. We go to the snow. Same procedure as every year. In the first week of the school's summer vacation, we go skiing on a glacier in the mountains. We've done this for eight years in row now. No training camp and no races. Just vacation, and skiing for fun.

Yesterday was foggy and white-out, but good skiing. Today we had a nice sunny day with four inches of fresh powder and great skiing. Tomorrow we get who-knows-what; probably the oposite of what the weather forecast says. The high mountains and glaciers are unpredictable. Anyway, I hope night temperatures go below freezing.

Then skiing will be good. After a day of skiing, we go back to camping down in the valley. We barbeque, skateboard and play football (soccer), and we watch the Euro2012 games in TV.

Yesterday there was no TV-football, so we went for a historic walk around the camping. We visited the 12-century stave church, and passed by a farm from medieval times. Finally, we stopped by the house (more like a log cabin) of the author Tor Jonsson, who ended his life at the age of 35 yo.

Something for the body in the morning, something for the brain in the evening. That's a nice combo.



We've got six months of snow and winter. Why do we spend the short summer in the snow? Because the kids want it like this.

I could think of better ways to spend my summer vacation, no doubt.

America has soccer moms, and Canada has hockey moms. Winterland has ski dads, and I'm one of them. I enjoy skiing a lot, and I gave the kids the chance to get hooked on it. So here I am, stuck in the snow. It's my own fault.

It's the destiny of a ski dad >:)

(I took the top picture at the glacier today. It's the best day we've had so far. The 2nd and 3rd picture are from yesterday's historic walk near the camping.)

Two kings and a queen behind bars

For the next couple of weeks, I’m spending most of my free time in front of the TV. It’s Euro2012, the European football (soccer of course) championship finals going on right now. The event is almost as big as the World Cup, and better quality. Different from the World Cup, all the teams are very good.

The championship is hosted by Poland and Ukraine. Poland is a country in good progress, a young but stable democracy with steady economic growth. Ukraine is a parody on democracy, ruled by a corrupt president. Nobody understand why Ukraine was chosen to host the football event.
 
 However, five years ago when UEFA made the decision, the situation was different. The orange crowds had won the election. Ukraine was making progress. The queen of the Orange Revolution, Yulia Tymoshenko, was prime minister in Ukraine.

In 2010 she lost the presidental election to the oligarch Viktor Yanukovych, after election-fraud. Yulia Timoshenko was charged for abuse of power and sentenced to 8 years in jail. Yanukovych wants keep his poitical rival imprisoned till after the next election. Yulia Timoshenko is considered a political prisoner by USA, EU and Amnesty.

Yesterday Ukraine played their first match in the championship finals, and Yulia Timoshenko probably watched it on TV in her prison cell. Ukraine vs. Sweden, with two football kings on the field, captains of their respective teams; Zlatan Ibrahimovic and Andrey Shevchenko. 

Zlatan, the Swedish football genius, scored once.

Shevchenko, the former AC Milan and Chelsea superstar, scored twice. Ukraine won 2-1. Ukraine’s biggest hero, uniting the country across political divides, at least for one night.

There’s nothing like football >:)

(Pictures borrowed from the Internet. The prisoner (top), the loser (center, and the winner (bottom).)

Venus and Satan

This morning there was this rare astronomical event; a Venus passage, where Venus passes in front of the sun. I happened between midnight and 6 am, and we were in a perfect location to watch it.

The public broadcasting was sending live all the time (these long and slow broadcast is one of the things I like about public broadcasting).

But I wanted to see it live, with my own eyes. I enjoy watching astronomical events; last time was the eclipse of the Sun in 2008.

So, I set my alarm clock for 3am. That’s about the time of sunrise in June. I grabbed a piece of over-exposed film (the kind of stuff we used before DC cameras), for eye protection, and then walked up to our 17th-century fortress (a 5-minute walk). The fortress was built to have a good view, of attacking enemies and sunsets and Venus passages. A perfect place to watch the event.

Unfortunately, it was partly cloudy, and the sun was low. I didn’t see much, but at least I got a glimpse of that black little spot moving very slowly across the face of the Sun. Very interesting.

And when I walked back home about 5am, it all became clear to me; the Grand Conspiracy.

Venus is not only a planet, but she’s also the God of love in Roman mythology. When God (the Trinity) conquered the world, she got offended and teamed up with Satan to get revenge.

Today is the 6th of June, the day Satan was born. And there’s more, it’s 6/6/12 which equals 6/6/6*2. Do you see the pattern here? The number of the beast, and the 2 for Venus’ and Satan’s engagement.

The Venus passage was her spectacular present to Satan on his birthday! Pretty scary, isn’t it?

We may argue that the Venus passage yesterday is a consequence of us happening to observe the Sun and Venus from our Earth. Every day there is some point in space with a Venus passage.

However, keep in mind that both Gods (all of them) and Satan exist only in the imagination of man living on Earth >:)

(I borrowed the picture above from the Internet, since I don't have a proper camera to photograph this myself.)

Summer in Winterland

It’s June, and there are signs of summer. The trees are dressed in green leaves. I have cut the grass once already.

Last Sunday, we had a nice and warm day. Little boy and I biked to town in shorts and T-shirt to buy ice cream.

Yesterday it was snowing.

Today I’m wearing wool socks.

It’s summer in Winterland.

Summer in the north doesn’t mean it’s warm. It just means it’s light all the time.

The light summers are addictive (and the dark winters too). When you’re used to living in the north, you won’t consider living anywhere else, at least not for a long time.

The nature of the north is like a chubby woman, shaved by the cold and harsh winters, and then in the spring her fur grows back, just as it should, just where it should, leaving the highest mountains bare >:)

 (I took the picture above on a late summer night about a year ago, when I walked across the old town bridge on the way back home from a late night in town.)