December 31, 2014

Last day

Today is the last day of the year.  Tomorrow comes a new day with a new year. Who knows what ut will bring.

New oportunitues and new challenges? New problems and new obstacles?

Maybe it will be status quo, or maybe its time for a revolution, for me and for you.

We will see.

Happy new year >:)

(Picture taken a couple of days ago when I was out skiing with the boys. They are much better skiers than me now, even little boy. So I hang around watching them in the snow park from time to time. It's fun)

December 27, 2014

Skimas

Vacation in the mountains. Skiing with the boys. That's nice. There's only one person I'm missing right now.

Christmas. Christ mass. I'm not into the religious part if it. I should call it something else.

Snowmass? No, that's a place in Colorado, close to Aspen. Nice place. I've been there many years ago, when we lived in Colorado

Skimass or Skimas?  That's a nice name for the holidays. I have to check on the Internet if it already exists.

Lunch break is over. Time for a couple of more runs on the slope before its getting dark. Days are short in the north at this time of the year. Sunset at 2pm.

Tomorrow is another day, I believe >:)

(Picture taken today, before lunch. Blogpost written on my cell phone)

December 20, 2014

Winter solstice

Tomorrow is the darkest day of the year. It’s the winter solstice. We only get about 4-5 hours of daylight. The day after tomorrow we start the the journey towards increasingly longer days. That’s good.

Also, we are approaching Christmas. That’s not so good. I’m not into the religious part of it, and the commercialism just makes me sad. I try to keep it on a very minimum. When I enter the malls with Christmas-pop-music on the loud speakers (Jingle Bell Rock, Santa Claus is Coming to Town) and people running around carrying bags full of stuff, it makes me feel sick.

The only place I feel fairly comfortable is the bookstore. So that’s where I try to do most of my shopping.

It’s been a rush at work as usual. Projects and reports need to be finished before the end of the years. Managers sitting with there Excel spreadsheets counting deliverables, worrying about the KPI’s.

If you don’t know what a KPI is, you’re lucky. KPI means Key Performance Indicator. That’s the measures by which managers can maximize their bonuses, by local optimization in their little pond, and private agendas. At the same time they usually harm the overall interest of the company. But who cares. This is competition. This is the wonderful capitalist world.

Whatever, it’s great with two weeks of vacation, skiing in the mountains.

I hope I get the book by Thomas Piketty for Christmas. If not, I buy it on sale in January.

Happy winter solstice >:)

(Picture from my archives, from a past Christmas, in 2010 or 2011 I think. We have less snow this year, but thanks to efficient snow making system, the skiing is not at risk)



December 5, 2014

Soviet retro style

The streets were dark and cold. It was winter in Siberia.  It was silent. No people around, except us.  The old brown log house was lit by only a weak lamp.

They brought us down in the basement.  Heavy brown chairs and tables.  Small bronze statues of working class heroes. The the red flag with hammer and sickle. Old pictures on the wall. Pictures of Yury Gagarin and Leonid Brezhnev, and the hockey team from 1985; Krutov, Larionov, Makarov, Fetisov and Kasatonov.  The best team ever, raised and trained under the red star.  An old TV set showing a classical Russian movie. Black and white.

We were back in the Soviet Union. Retro style.  Even the menu. Russian vodka and Russian beers. Traditional Siberian dishes. Fish from Lake Baikal. Steamed sig.  Frozen omul in thin slices, eaten raw with salt and onion. It’s called Stroganina. Siberian sushi. Sig and omul. That’s the Russian names. The English names of these species of fish I don’t know.  But the fish was very good.

After the food, we got a Soviet-style chewing gum. Made from resin. Tasting of pine. Quite interesting. Just like the chewing gums we made ourselves when we were kids.

(The pictures were taken at the restaurant, Unfortunately, my crappy cell phone camera takes bad pictures in the dark. Sorry about that. I need to get a new one.)

November 13, 2014

Game of Thrones over Siberia

We left Irkutsk this morning, on the Aeroflot flight back to Moscow. It's quite a long trip, more than 6 hours. Fortunately, we were flying on business class, which is a lot more pleasant than the packed rows on economy. We got comfortable seats, with plenty of space to stretch out the legs. The food is very good too.

There is an entertainment system on-board, of course. On the flight from Moscow to Irkutsk, I mostly watched documentaries, about the Kola Peninsula, and the province of Bashkiria. I never watch TV series. My Russian colleague isn’t much of a TV watcher either. But on the flight from Moscow, he started watching Game of Thrones, and got hooked. He recommended me to check it out.

I like to look down on the places we’re flying over. In the beginning we had a nice clear sky and a good view. But then we entered into clouds. There wasn't much else to do, so I decided to watch the first episode of the first season of Game of Thrones. I can tell you,  that I didn’t get  hooked.  It was pretty boring, and I don’t like watching violence.

The scenes with naked girls were nice of course. I have heard you can find compact compilations on the Internet with only the hot scenes from the series. I think I go for this option.

I still haven’t become a TV-series watcher, and probably I never will. I rather spend my time reading books and science papers, and watching girls. Just watching >:)

(I have the habit of taking pictures from planes. This is a picture I took today, cruising over the endless frozen Siberian wilderness.)

November 12, 2014

Siberia

So, I ended up in Siberia. It wasn’t too bad. It was very nice actually, except for the beginning

The jetlag is bad when going 7 time zones eastward. It’s still bothering me a little bit.

I arrived at the airport in Irkutsk a 4:30 in the morning. I traveled together with a colleague from our Moscow office.  I have seen the city only in the dark. But it looks very nice, with all the old large log houses in the city center.

We have been working all day, and only went down to the city center to eat after work. I’ve eaten lots of good food, mostly fish from the Lake Baikal. It was species of fish I’ve never heard of before, such as sig and omul. They are species that live only in Baikal.

We have been effective at work, so today we finished at noon and went for a trip to Baikal. It’s the lake of the lakes, 1600m (5300 feet) deep, and contains 20% of the (liquid) fresh water on earth.  

I really liked Siberia. I think I would like to go here for vacation some time,

Tomorrow Aeroflot will take me back to Moscow.

(Picture taken today on our afternoon trip to Lake Baikal.)

November 9, 2014

Sent to Siberia

Someone must have been telling lies about me. I knew I had done nothing wrong, but his morning I was sent to Siberia.

You may have recognized the opening already.  I borrowed and adapted it from The Trial by Kafka.

It’s true that I’ve done nothing wrong, as far as I know, nothing serious at least. We all do things we regret, and things we should regret. That’s the case with me too, but nothing to worry about. YOLO; that's what the kids say.

It’s also true that I’ve been sent to Siberia, by the company I work for.  I’m on my way to Irkutsk, close to the Lake Baikal.

 It’s such a long flight, so I was allowed to fly business class. Now I’m sitting in the Aeroflot lounge in the Sheremetyevo airport, waiting for my next flight. I kind of have a feeling that I’m surrounded by Russian oligarchs, people with expensive clothing and jewelry, and small dogs carried in expensive bags. Actually, many people look quite ordinary too, poor guys like me.

Whatever. The lounge is quite good. I get free food and drinks, and I can relax while reading and writing, but I wish they could turn down the volume on the TV.
  
It’s gonna be interesting to visit Siberia. I wonder if it’s very cold there now. We will see tomorrow >:)

(I haven’t been to downtown Moscow today, just waiting in transit at the airport. So I picked a picture from my collection, taken a couple of years ago, from the top of Moscow State University, one of the famous Seven Sister, built for the 800 year anniversary of Moscow. The big venue in the center of the picture is the Olympic stadium from the 1980 summer Olympics. The games were boycotted by most western countries due to the Soviet invasion in Afghanistan.)



October 19, 2014

Suicide (at the public library)

I made a quick trip downtown today, on my bike, to the public library. I was looking for books by Peter Handke.

After the controversy when he received the Ibsen Prize, I got curious. I want to read a couple of his books, to make up my own mind.

I wasn't the only one. All the books by Handke were out.

So, I borrowed a book by Stig Sæterbakken instead. He was one of our finest contemporary authors. I say was, because he died in 2012. He committed suicide at the age of 46. He often wrote about dark and unpleasant themes, such as loneliness.

I have always found authors who comitted suicide (for instance Hemingway and Bjørneboe) very inteteresting.

The French/Algerian author Albert Camus said that "the only serious philosophical question is suicide"

All animals and humans have a natural fear of death. Those who commit suicide are able to defeat the greatest of all fears.

Don't worry; I'm not one of them. I just find it interesting>:)

October 1, 2014

Handke and other jerks

Last week, the Austrian author Peter Handke was awarded the Ibsen Prize. This created a Hell of a lot of noise; demonstrations and protests. The reason for this was Handke's support for the Serbians during the war in ex-Yugoslavia in the 1990s. Handke also gave a speech in Slobodan Milosevic's funeral in 2006.

Handke was awarded the Ibsen Prize for his plays, not for supporting Serbia. The question is, can we judge an artist's works independent from his actions and opinions?

We appreciate the novels by Knut Hamsun in spite of his pro-nazi attitude during the war. He met both Hitler and Goebbels in person. Hamsun was convicted for act of treason after the war, but was put in a hospital rather than jail due to his high age.

We enjoy the writing of Jean Genet (e.g. The Thief's Journal), even though he spent years in jail, for theft, robbery and gay prostitution. Jean Paul Sartre recognized Genet's talent as a writer, and helped him avoid a life-time sentence.

We can be entertained by Marquis de Sade's novels even though the sexual abuse he describes (e.g. Justine; The Misfortunes of Virtue) is horrifying.

I think I'm gonna order a couple of books by Peter Handke from Amazon, to make up my own mind regarding his work as an artist. I usually like books by people with twisted minds.

As far as I know, Peter Handke has done nothing illegal. He has just stated opinions that the majority of people don't like, just like Ibsen's Dr. Stockmann did ... >:)

(Picture of Peter Handke borrowed from Wikipedia)

September 27, 2014

Storm

This weekend we had the first storm of the fall coming in. It's been windy, cold and raining. It's the kind of weather when you would rather stay indoor reading a good book, or playing with your new toy.

Last night I was out in the yard to take down the kids' trampoline before the wind takes it. Sometimes these wind-borne trampolines end up in the neighbors garden, or smashing the neighbors car. I don't want that to happen, so better be precautious.

I made a quick visit to the town center today, to buy a new shirt. Commando shopping as usual; fast in and fast out, with a brief stop in the bookstore afterwards, In the streets people were hurrying from shop to shop or wherever they were going, dressed in raincoats,

All these nasty storms are coming in from the west, even though Russia is to the east. Just joking. I like the Russians. Many of them are very nice people. I always enjoyed traveling to Moscow. I just don't like Putin's aggressive politics, domestic and abroad.

By the way, after the opening of the iron curtain, some precious gifts from the east have come to cross my path.

This storm isn't too bad, actually. There are worse to come, I think. Whatever, we'll probably stay happy as long as there are good books and fun toys >:)

(Picture taken with my cell phone today outside the mall. Not the most interesting picture. I'l try to take some more exciting ones tonight.)

September 25, 2014

The red dress (part 2)

(You should read part 1 first)

“Come by and visit me some time", I said. "Then I can show you how the apartment has become. You already know where is.”

She thought this was an excellent idea, and she emptied her glass of Boston Lager in one big gulp. I must admit that what followed surprised me a bit.

“Come on, let’s go,” she said and took my hand.
One minute later, we were out in the street. It was a warm and pleasant night, and it was light as always in the summers in the north. The street was full of people, some of them going home, and some on the way to another pub.

We walked as fast as we could in the direction of my apartment. It was just a five minute walk, but this time it took somewhat longer. All the time the woman my hand. To me it felt somewhat awkward, since wasn’t used to it, and had hardly ever done it before. About half way, we passed by a fastfood restaurant. It wasn’t too crowded yet, and I was hungry.
“Would you like something to eat?” I said. “A burger, or maybe a kebab?”
“No, that’s not what I want now,” she said, and pulled my arm when I slowed down outside the restaurant. We moved on, and shortly after we came to my block.

I opened the front door and supported her while we walked the stairs up to the 4th floor. She was a little bit unsteady, due to both the high heels of her shoes, and the drinks she had consumed. The Boston Lager I bought her wasn’t the first that night.   

When we came inside my apartment, she hugged me, and said;
“So good to be back. It feels like I’m coming home.”
“If you feel like home in my place, maybe you can tell me your name,” I said.
“Names don’t matter. It's a stupid label. You can call me Fanny.”

She kicked off her shoes and flung herself down in the sofa. When I sat down next to her, she leaned against me and rested her head on my shoulder. I felt a little bit uncomfortable, and asked her if she wanted something to drink. She shook her head.
“All I wanna do is to sit right here next to you,” she said.

She looked at me and smiled her fairly charming smile. I must admit that I started to get a excited. I’m an introvert eremite. It doesn’t happen very often that a woman visits my place.

“Where did you get all your money from?” she asked.
“I don’t have a lot of money.”
“You had enough to buy this apartment. What are you working with?”
“I’m a math teacher at the university,” I said. I didn’t mention the money I inherited from my late Uncle Otto.
“Math was my worst subject in school,” she said, “I never understood all this stuff about pi and things like that, but it’s good that you do.”
She had no more to say,  and neither did I. 

We sat there in silence for a while. Suddenly, she got up and started to explore the apartment, almost like she did a few weeks earlier at the showing with the realtor. She opened the door to the balcony, and went outside to breathe the warm summer air, and enjoy the view of the fjord.  Then she looked at the books in my shelf, before she ran to the bathroom.

I was still hungry (since I didn’t get my kebab), and opened the fridge to find something to eat. I made myself a sandwich with cheese and salami, and opened a can of beer.I sat down by the kitchen table to eat it.

She was gone for quite some time, and after I while I started to wonder where she was. Maybe she fell a sleep in the bathroom? After all, it was an hour or two after midnight, and she was a little bit drunk. Or maybe she was checking out the sauna and taking a shower? I waited for a while, five minutes ten minutes. Then I gently knocked the door to the bathroom. No answer. I opened the door and looked inside. Nobody was there. There was only one more place where she could possibly be.

I opened the door to my bedroom and went in. Her clothes was thrown over the chair in the corner, with her bra and panties on the top of the pile. She was in the bed, in my bed, under my blanket. Only her head was sticking out. Suddenly, she pulled the blanket to the side, and spread her legs. I looked into this warm, soft and wet that only a woman can offer.
“Lick me,” she said, with a voice that was both seducing and commanding.

Like an obedient dog, I climbed into the bed, and dived in between her legs. I  let my tongue slide around between the folds she has down there. Kissing lips is kissing lips, no matter where they are located. She twisted and moaned under my face. I must admit that I liked the salty taste of her oyster, and that this act excited me quite a lot. After all, I’m just a man. However, this incident came to define our relationship, and the rank between us. She was the autocratic ruler, I was the submissive minion, obeying every command from my master.

The next morning, I lay in my bed watching her. She came out of the bathroom with a big towel wrapped around her body. She dropped the towel, and turned her big butt against me. It was a nice butt, for sure.  She picked up her clothes from the chair in the corner, and got dressed. Then she disappeared from my bedroom. When I heard the front door was closed and locked, I thought that she walked out of my life for good.

Unfortunately, I was wrong. 

To be continued ...

September 12, 2014

The red dress (part 1)

I know exactly when it started, this chain of events that led to so much trouble. It was a Thursday morning in the beginning of May. I sat by the breakfast table, chewing on a slice of bread with Swiss cheese. As usual, I looked briefly through the morning paper. After the sports pages, with the soccer results, and before the stock market listings, I came to see this real-estate advertisement. It was exactly what I had been looking for. The apartment was on the 4th floor in a building in the old part of town. It was recently refurbished, with a new bathroom and a large balcony facing west. The view was magnificent, towards the university, where I work, and the fjord, where the coastal express sails every morning at ten o’clock.

The apartment had only one bedroom, but that’s good enough for me. I’m unmarried and without kids. Hardly anyone comes to visit me, and certainly not to stay over. A guestroom is redundant. It was just the kind of den I wanted, a place to relax after work, with good music and a good book, and a view to the snow-covered mountains on the other side of the fjord (in the winter time).

I called the realtor immediately.
“Hello, this is Easttown Real Estate, how can I help you”
The voice of the woman on the phone was soft and sweet. I wondered what she looked like. In my imagination she was chubby with red hair and green eyes.
“I’m interested in that 4th-floor apartment that you advertised today,” I said.
“Yes, that’s a nice one. There are a couple of other guys interested. We will have a showing this evening at 5 pm.”
“Thank you, I’ll be there,” I said and hung up.

I was very excited when I stood on the walkway outside the apartment building at 5 pm. There was no sign outside, but there was no doubt I was at the right address. The BMW Z5 that was parked outside the building smelled real-estate agent. I’ve seen them before, these young guys in Armani suits and Italian shoes, and the sly salesman smile on their face

There was no elevator in the old building, so I walked up the stairs, and knocked the door with the “for sale” sign on the 4th floor. The Armani suit opened the door. He was in his in his socks only, The Italian shoes were placed on a carped by the door. I interpreted this as a sign that I should take off my shoes before walking on the new hardwood floor. He gave me his hand and said
“Robert. Welcome.”
I took his hand, but didn’t bother to say my name. It wouldn’t be of interest to him anyway, at least not before we would eventually sign a contract.
“I talked to a woman in your office regarding the showing,” I said.”
“It was probably Carol, our secretary.”
“Yes, probably.” I didn’t tell him that I was disappointed to meet Robert, and not Carol, at the showing.

A middle-aged couple had come before me, and was already viewing the apartment. It wasn’t what they were looking for,   with only one bedroom. They hadn’t studied the prospect very carefully.
“Too small,” she saud.
“Too expensive,” he said..
It felt like a relief to me. They were unlikely to make a bid.

Right after my arrival, a red summer dress came soaring through the door. The woman wearing the red dress immediately started to inspect the apartment. Barefoot, she danced like a ballerina through the rooms, and out on the balcony. She was very enthusiastic. Her large breasts moved up and down when she breathed. I couldn’t help imagine what she would look like free from the red dress. She expressed her excitement for the bathroom with the sauna, the living room with the shining hardwood floor, and the balcony with the view to the fjord.
“It’s awesome,” she said. “I love it.”
She had a fairly charming smile, but she wasn’t very pretty. I must admit that I quickly forgot her.

The next morning I called Robert to submit my bid. I even raised it right before lunch, to show that I was serious, and to scare off competing bidders. What I had in mind, of course, was the woman with the red dress and the fairly charming smile.

I must admit that I had to stretch beyond my budget. Without my late Uncle Otto it would not been possible. Uncle Otto had made a small fortune as an umbrella manufacturer. He was unmarried and without children. It was a big surprise, when he for unknown reasons provided me a large amount of money in his will.

I have a permanent position as a mathematics teacher at the university, but my income is by no means enough to pay for such an apartment. My modest position involves only lecturing of undergrad courses. I’m not expected to do research. How could I? There is nothing I could contribute to the work of the great masters, such as Gauss, Cauchy and Hilbert.

Three weeks later I moved in. Two of my friends, Frank and Joe, offered to help me move. I very much appreciated this, of course. I wouldn’t be able to carry my furniture up the stairs on my own. Swearing and breathing heavily, we pulled my sofa up to the 4th floor. It was heavy and hard to get around the turns of the stairway. On the 3rd floor, we paused for a while to recover.
“When this is over, I’ll invite you to a party,” I said in a moment of imprudence.

I immediately regretted what I had said. I‘m an introvert man, and I don’t have many friends. I don’t want to have many friends. Most of the time, I prefer to be on my own. In fact, the only persons with whom I have some social interaction are Frank and Joe, who helped me move. Frank is a scholar in the Institute of Mathematics, where I work, and Joe is an old friend from college days. Just the tree of us, and a six-pack of beer, wouldn’t make much of a party. Therefore, a party in my apartment was out of question. On the other hand, I couldn’t withdraw my invitation. I had to think fast.
“Let’s go to the bar by the old bridge next weekend,” I said. “The beers are on me, of course,” I added.
“Great idea,” said Frank.
“Sounds good,” said Joe.

The next weekend we met in the pub by the old bridge; Frank and Joe and I. I was dressed in my best black shirt, and my only jacket, the upper half of my only suit. My credit card was safe in the pocket. I was in a good mood, and so were the others. Around us people around us swang foaming pints of beer and shouted half-understandable  sentences in each other’s ears.

I ordered three Brooklyn Brown Ales, and handed my credit card to the bartender. The stereo played Guns ‘n’ Roses on full volume.
“Sweet Child of Mine,” Frank shouted.
“Best guitar riff ever,” said Joe.
“Give me some death metal, such as Nile,” I said, to show my knowledge of metal.
This kind of spiritual conversations took place all night. After all, we shouldn’t just talk science stuff when we were partying.

After a while, the pub was packed with people that I had never seen before and would probably never see again. It didn’t matter for me. The pub was just a backdrop of hustle and bustle. I got the feeling of being part of a big social community, at least for a night.

We fought our way through the crowd to get another beer at the bar, Leffe Brune this time. Abbey beer from Belgium. After all they did something useful, these monks.
Eventually, I lost the sight of Frank and Joe. They diffused into the crowd.

It was right before midnight, when I was hanging at the bar alone, when a woman gently touched my arm. I turned around and looked at her, but couldn’t remember having seen her before. Her brown hair was gathered in a ponytail. She was dressed in a white singlet that had a hard time covering her big breasts. The black skirt was tight around her chunky butt.  The pumps on her feet made her appear taller than she was, about the same height as me. I recognized her only when she smiled.
“I think you have a lot more money than me. Maybe you buy me a beer?” she said.
It was the woman from the showing, the woman with the red dress, which she certainly wasn’t wearing tonight.
“Sure”, I said. ”What do you want?”
“A Sam Adams Boston lager would be great.”
We made a toast, and talked about my apartment, that she liked so much.

That’s when I made my biggest mistake.

To be continued ...

(I took the picture in Battery Park New York about a month ago. I have no idea who the woman in the red dress is)

September 9, 2014

Disappointed?

Some days ago I bought a new pair of sneakers. I tried them after work today at the gym. I didn't run any faster. My endurance wasn't any better.

I was very disappointed.

Money can't buy me running ability, and happiness?  Tomorow I will go back to the store to complain.

After my exercise, I went to the university to attend a guest lecture on astrophysics and cosmology.

The lecture was in the big auditorium where I took my undergrad courses in calculus and complex analysis 25 years ago. Cool to be back.

I learnt that there are some 500 billion planets in our galaxy. Millions of them have conditions similar to the earth.

In the future, Mars will become like the Earth, and the Earth will become like Venus. On Venus the temperature is 400 degrees (Celcius).  The longterm weather forecast is not good. But this is still a billion years into the future.

The best things in life are for free; science, knowledge, maybe happiness ... and a couple of other things >;)

September 5, 2014

Shopping

This afternoon I did something that I hardly ever do. I went shopping. I bought a Hell of a lot of stuff.

This is what I bought:
o 1pair of shoes (for me)
o 2 pairs of sneakers (for me and little boy)
o 2 pairs of ski pants (for me and little boy)
o 1 pair of goggles (for me)
o 1 jacket (for little boy)

I bought as much in one day as I normally do in one year. It feels like I carry the entire consumer society on my back, alone

That's a heavy load.

Fortunately, I didn't pass by any bookstores >:)

August 24, 2014

New shoes

Yesterday I went downtown to buy some new shoes. When I passed by the bookstore, I felt this strong attraction which was impossible to resist.

I didn't want to buy any books, just take look in the shelves. 20 minutes later when I left the bookstore, I had bought a book by Paul Auster.

I met my best friend. We went for a cup of coffee, and I felt such a strong attraction again.

Then I walked back home, with my old shoes.


August 20, 2014

Just walking around

I'm out walking, more or less at random. Just needed some fresh air, to clear my mind.

It's a nice summer night, but summer is soon gone now. It's getting dark around 10 pm. The long light summer nights belong to the past.

The students are back in town. They make s lot of noise. Get-to-know-eachother parties and stuff like that. Happy young people, new to the town. Those were the days.

There are still some tourists around. The Japanese climb on everything they want to picture; statues, monuments, the rail og the old town bridge. I took a picture too (below), like I was a tourist in my hometown.

I stopped by a bar. Bought a glass of beer, the local beer on tap. I don't like it very much, I prefer the dark beer. Just bought it to remind myself that I really like this town, I like to live here.

It's been a wonderful summer. Who knows what the fall will bring. I'm optimistic >:)

Happiness

There is no such thing as happiness. You can only chose how to be unhappy.

That's life.

And then you die, and it's all forgotten.

July 25, 2014

Temple of Capitalism

This morning we visited the Temple of Capitalism. The one and only true god is Money. The view from the 86th floor wss magnificent.

Then er walked down to Greenwich Village. I bought a book by Saul Bellow (Ravelstein) for $6 in a second-hand bookstore on Mercer Street.

I met an ice-cream seller on Chelsea Market who was a fan of Opeth (Swedish metal band). So am I. He recognized the band name on my T-shirt. In the bookstore I bought a book by Paul Auster (New York Trilogy).

Buy, buy, buy. Oh great Money; we worship you. Do we?

(Picture taken to day from the 86. floor of the Empire State Building)

July 22, 2014

Saving lives

It was lunchtime, and Tom and Anna sat in the grass by the fjord. It was warm, and the sun was shining. They had just finished their sandwiches.

"Everything feels so right with you, so natural, even eating a shrimp sandwich," Anna said. "But now I want the desert”.  

She stroked the bulge on his trousers, and then she opened the zipper to feel his bare skin.

“Be careful”, he moaned, “I don’t want to spill it on neither your clothes nor mine.”

“Don’t worry, I will take care of it”.

She embraced his erected penis with her mouth. Her lips moved slowly up and down the shaft, and her tongue caressed the head. Tom felt relaxed and excited at the same time, lying on his back in the grass. He looked up at the blue sky, through the sparse green leaves of a birch. In a wonderful moment of joy, the leaves of the tree appeared yellow and red.

Anna looked at him and smiled.

“You’re clean now. Nothing was spilled,” she said.

“Thank you,” said Tom.

He put his hand on the inside of her naked thigh and started to explore. She had no panties on. She spread her legs to let him touch her wet and smooth cleft.  She closed her eyes and moaned, and the wrinkle of pleasure appeared between her eyes.

Her body started to shiver. Two ants were climbing up along her thigh. Tom snapped the ants away, saving them from drowning in her ocean of wetness

“We have just saved two lives,” he said.

"Yes, yours and mine."

They were two happy horses grassing on a green field, and with no fence around >:)

(Picture taken a couple of days ago. I don't know who the people are. There are people everywhere, doing all kind of weird things on these nice and warm summer days ... )

July 11, 2014

Corporate values

It was one of the sunny and warm summer days that are rare in the north. Tom Snare sat in his hot office, trying to solve an equation he had been struggling with for some time.  Occasionally, he looked at the fjord outside the window, where the sun was blinking in the calm sea surface. He wished he could go out to enjoy the sun, but he had this damned equation to solve.

Around noon, Anna knocked the door to his office. He was happy to see her sweet smile, and her green emerald eyes.

“Will you join me for lunch today, Tom?”

“Yes, of course.”

“I’ll get some sandwiches and cold drinks for us,” she said, “and then we can meet down by the fjord.”

Ten minutes later, Tom pulled his ID card at the detector, to open the gate in the main entrance. Then he was out in the warm and pleasant sun.  He walked quickly down to the fjord, to the little cape where they sometimes met.

Anna arrived with sandwiches and soft drinks a couple of minutes later.

They sat in the grass eating, and talking about the sea and the sky.

When the sandwiches were swallowed and the bottles were empties, they lay down in the grass, so close that they could smell each other’s breaths, and hear each other’s heart beats. Tom closed his eyes and he felt Anna’s sweet lips against his, and he stroke the soft skin on her arm. His hand continued to explore under her skirt, and he could feel that she was moist and longing for him.

Tom watched a plane crossing the blue sky when Anna sat down on top of him.  She was wet and soft and wonderful.  He closed his eyes and enjoyed the thrilling flight of the moment. When he opened his eyes, the plane was gone, landed on the airport nearby.

Tom had landed too.

Anna again sat next to him in the grass, fiddling with her ID card. She read aloud the four words printed on the backside of the card:

“Courageous.  Open.  Hands-on.  Caring.”

“We’ve been through all of it now”, Anna said, and smiled.

“Yes”, said Tom, “sometimes I almost believe in corporate values.”

(Picture taken a couple of days ago, by the fjord. I have no idea who the girl in the picture is. She wasn't supposed to be there.)

June 16, 2014

Amsterdam

Blogging while traveling seems to be my new schedule. Now I'm sitting in a bar in central Amsterdam. Fortunately they have lots if TVs because the match between Germany and Portugal is starting very soon.

(I took the picture around noon today in a street crossing in Amsterdam. I have no idea who the girl is. I just thaught she had a cool hair)

June 2, 2014

The land of the midnight sun

It seems like I’m back on my old informal blogging-schedule;  blogging while traveling. That’s when I get the time to do it, when I have the evenings  off, by myself. 

This year I have hardly been traveling at all. Yesterday, when I got to the airport security, I realized how much I appreciate being at home, with just a 10 minute commute to the office (thanks to the inventors of video-conferencing).

This week I’m up north, in the city known as The Paris of the North, and The Gateway to the Arctic.   

It’s quite some time since last time I was here for real. I’ve been here many times in transit. This is the town were I used to board the Antonov-24for Murmansk, when I travelled regularly to Russia. This is the transit stop if you want to experience the Arctic magic. This is where I have boarded vessels heading for the Arctic Seas, and where I slept over when I returned.

It’s great to be here in the summer, at 69 degrees North, well beyond the Arctic Circle. The mountains are still capped with snow, and the birches have just got a slight touch of leaves. It’s not very warm, but it’s light.  The sun shines around the clock. The last sunrise was 20th May, and the next sunset is 25th July. Two months of continuous daylight.

My hotel  (and all the other hotels in town) are down on the harbor, with a nice view to the bridge and the Arctic Cathedral on the other side. God present is here too, apparently. Religion is hard to get rid of no matter how far north you go.

The north is challenging for the Muslims. They all died out one summer when Ramadan was in the months of the midnight sun. I’m just joking.  The Muslims up here has a special permit (from God?) to follow the clock-times in Mecca. During Ramadan, they can eat when the sun sets in Mecca. Funny isn’t it?

Religion (all of them) is pure madness. That’s why I stick to science >)

(I took the picture above this morning. When I checked the last link above, I realized that I had basically the same picture 4 year ago. But if you compare, you will see that the weather is better today.)

June 1, 2014

Such a nice and sunny day


It's such a nice and sunny day. People are hiking
the trails along the fjord, and I'm sitting indoor in my office. Not for a long time, though. I'm just in for half an hour to print a student thesis that I have to read through, tonight on the plane to the North >:)

(It takes some time to print 170 pages. In the mean time, I took the picture above through the window, and wrote this post.)


May 6, 2014

A-Z Challenge reflections


I'm in a hurry right now, so I have to be quick. There's been a lot of things going on recently

This weekend we were up in the mountains for the season finale in the skiing resort. We had a good time on the slopes, as usual. Yesterday we had new and fresh snow and good skiing in the high zone.

Today I attended a full-day research meeting in the university. Tonight I've been out eating dinner and drinking a couple of beers with scientists from all over the world.

Also, I'm in the process of applying for a new job, and I had to write the job application today. So, I had to decide if I should write the job application before the beers and this blog post after the beers or vice versa. I concluded that I should write the job application before the beers, and I think this was a wise decision.

Now, let me turn to the real subject: I enjoyed taking part in the A-Z challenge, and I will probably do it again next year. This was my first time, and I chose to just write about random things, like I do most of the time. Next year I may do some kind of theme. We will see.

That's it. The time is 1 am and I'm going to work tomorrow (or actually later today).

Good night >:)

(I took the picture above on the slopes yesterday. Great day. I'm already looking forward to November, when the resort open for the next skiing season.)

April 29, 2014

A-Z Challenge 26: Zusammenfassung

It's the last day last day of the A-Z Challenge, and time for a summary. I thought I might do it in German. Zusammenfassung is German for summary. I learnt German (our 2nd foreign language) in school. When I was a student, and traveled around Europe every summer as a backpacker, I was a decent German speaker (but I never understood the Swiss). I haven't practiced German for many years, so I should probably stay with English (our 1st foreign language in school).

Slightly off the topic: Once upon a time, I spent 2 hours on the train between Mariazell and Sankt Pölten in Austria together with 3 Catholic nuns. We had an interesting discussion on various philosophical and theological questions, in German. My vocabulary was pretty good, but my grammar was somewhat shaky. I must admit that I found it slightly annoying when the nuns corrected my grammar all the time, repeating every sentence I said in correct and proper German. After all, I'm not the one to blame for the Tower of Babel. I should probably write a blogpost about my trip to Mariazell sometime.

Doing the A-Z challenge has been fun. I have written about topics that I wouldn't have done, if I wasn't forced to twist my brain to come up with an idea for every damn letter of the alphabet. Some posts were fairly good, some were bad, but now it's water under the bridge. Also, I have discovered new blogs, and read some cool posts written by other participants.

During the A-Z Challenge I've been posting a lot more (10 times more?) than I would normally do. Now I will probably take a blog-break for a couple of weeks, and then return to my natural frequency and my usual topics; life in Winterland, travel to various places, memories from the past, criticizing right-wing politics, and mocking the gods. My to-write list was only partly covered in the A-Z Challenge, and I will pick it up later.

Today is the last day of April. Tomorrow is the 1st of May, the International Workers Day, which is a national holiday (we live in a social democracy, which means we're half-communists. In the Soviet Union both 1st and 2nd of May were holidays). On Sunday at 4:30 PM the skiing resort is closing for the season. Tomorrow I'm off to the mountains together with the kids, for the last four days of skiing.

The last four days of zunny and zlushy zpring zkiing ... zzz  >:)


(I took the picture above a year ago, when I was watching the kids in the snow park at the 2013 ski season finale. We hope it will be as good this year.)

A-Z Challenge 25: YNWA

I have some Facebook friends who write weird status updates. Sometimes they write YNWA, and nothing more. I wondered for a while what does it mean? It seams like crazy to me to write YNWA, and nothing more, on a regular basis.

After a while it came to my mind that all these guys writing YNWA have one thing in common: They belong to the football (soccer) religion, and they worship the gods of Liverpool FC. YNWA simply means "You'll Never Walk Alone". This old song has been sung by the Liverpool FC supporters for more than 50 years, and have become like a hymn or anthem for the club. (Here is a YouTube video of the mixed choir of 45.000 voices on Anfield Road singing YNWA .)

This season Liverpool has been very good, and are currently lading the Premier League. Therefore, the Liverpool fans have written their cryptic praise quite often (but yesterday, when Liverpool lost 0-2 against Chealsea, their FB updates were more like WTF). Some of the hard-core Liverpool fans (including my brother) even tattoo YNWA or the club logo on their arms.

I don't have this religious relationship with football, and I'm not a Liverpool fan (I support Leeds United), so I don't write YNWA all over the place. But once, I went to Liverpool together with my brother to see a Premier League game, and I must admit it was a Hell of a lot of fun. I might even do it once again this fall.


(I took the picture above 3 years ago by the memorial of the Hillsborough disaster outside Anfield Road Stadium in Liverpool. In the FA Cup semifinal in 1989 at Hillsborough Stadium in Sheffield, 96 Liverpool supporters were killed and more than 700 injured in a crush on the stand when  to many people were given entry.)

April 27, 2014

A-Z Challenge 24: Xenology (the Vatican way)

Religion is an interesting phenomenon, and sometimes it can be quite entertining too. Some years ago French literature's enfant terrible, Michel Houllebecq, said in an interview that  "Islam is the most stupid religion" (he was taken to court in Paris by a human rights group and several Islamic organizations, but Houellebecq, was found not guilty on the grounds of free speech). I’m not sure how he would rank the Catholic Church, but the Catholics do indeed stage some really entertaining shows, like the one we saw from Rome yesterday:

The late Popes John XXIII and John Paul II can now prepend Saint to their names. Yesterday, they were canonized by Pope Francis in the St Peter's Cathedral in the Vatican City (pontifex emeritus Benedict was there too, to watch the show).

Saint John and Saint John Paul will be added to the list of the 2000+ official saints that the Catholic Church already has. In addition there are thousands of unofficial saints, kind of local saints, not approved by the Pope, but more or less by acclamation in their neighborhood. That’s why the Catholics celebrate the All Saints Day (also known as All Hallows’ Day) on 1. November. The celebration starts on the night of 31. October, with All Saints’ Mass, and kids ringing the door bells asking for candy. The kids don’t know about the connection to the Catholic tradition, but who cares. Candy is candy, for Protestants, Catholics and Atheists.

I’m fine with the saint-fauna as a historical curiosity from the Medieval Times, and as a folklore tradition. Martin Luther didn’t like it. He thought the worshiping of saints was a violation of the 2nd and 3rd Commandments. It was one of the reasons why he started the reformation, but that’s different story.

What makes the saints ridiculous in the 21st century, is the formalized canonization process (from 1914, revised 1983) run by the Vatican bureaucracy. First there is the process called beatification , a detailed study which eventually leads to a written confirmation from the Vatican that the candidate-saint has performed at least one miracle, and has safely arrived in Heaven (in Internet-age this should be easy, if the candidate has updated his Facebook status). After the beatification (which has nothing to do with The Beatles), the candidate can prepend the title Blessed (Bl. for short) to his or her name.

But it takes more to become a saint. It must be documented that the wannabe-saint has performed a 2nd miracle after his death. This is the difficult part (because he wouldn’t brag about it on Facebook, of course). The written documentation of the miracle is carefully examined by the Vatican’s canonization office. For today’s canonization of the two popes, more than 2000 pages of documentation had been gathered. The Vatican takes their xenology seriously, just like they used to do with the stamp production.

I used to collect stamps when I was younger, and once I visited the Vatican's philatelist.shop, which was quite impressive at that time. Stamps used to be a big source of income for the Vatican, but I'm not sure if anyone collects stamps anymore

In some countries rhe religion known as Soccer in the USA, and as Football in the rest of the world, has become very popular. This religion has, among other merits, had great success attracting commercial sponsors.

The Catholic Church has always been good at acquiring earthly goods, and they have apparently learnt a couple of tricks from soccer. The event in Rome yesterday was sponsored by several major international companies, including Nestle and ENI (the Italian state oil company).  

Remember the 11th Commandment: “God is great; money is greater”. Amen >:)

(Do you remember Roberto Carlos’ free-kick goal for Brazil against France in 1997? It’s regarded as a miracle among soccer fans, and it’s documented on YouTube. Should be good for at least a beatification)


April 26, 2014

A-Z Challenge 23: Window or aisle

Window or aisle? That's the question, because nobody wants the center seat on the air plane.

You know that claustrofobic feeling of sitting in the center seat, squeezed between to big fat guys. The silent war for the armrest is going on all the time. When the food is served, you can hardly move the fork and knife in order to eat it.

So, window or aisle, that's the attractive options. What do you choose?

Many of my colleagues, and most business travelers, I think, go for the aisle seat. Then you can easily get to the toilet, and you get quickly out of the plane on arrival.

I always choose a window seat (it's in my profile at the travel agency). I want to sit in the window seat, because I like to see where we're going, in particular on international flights.

Just think about the awesome views you can get from the window seat; the ice bergs on the southern tip of Greenland, a huge flock of  reindeers on the Kola Peninsula, Manhattan and Central Park, the mighty Rocky Mountains, the dry mountains of Iran, and meandering rivers on the Russian plains >:)


(I have the habit of taking pictures from planes. The example above is over western Russia, on the way to Moscow.)

April 25, 2014

A-Z Challenge 22: Venom

For most people, I guess, venom does give any positive associations. It was the same with me, until I heard Venom, a heavy metal band from Newcastle. In 1982 Venom released the album “Black Metal”, which gave the name to a new subgenre extreme metal.

Venom initiated the first wave of black metal, and influenced the bands that developed the second wave of black metal (Mayhem, Darkthrone, Burzum, Gorgoroth, Satyricon, Emperor, Taake, Dimmu Borgir), in the late 1980s and early 1990s.

The bands I mostly listen to came out of the second wave of black metal, but still it’s worth listening to the title track from Venom’s album “Black Metal”. The YouTube link is here

April 24, 2014

A-Z Challenge 21: Utopia

Some time ago, I was cleaning out my desk and shelves in our office up north. In a magazine box, I found an old note book, between math notes and calculations. The note book contained some poems and short stories and memoirs that I wrote between 1987 and 1990.

Nice surprise. I thought that book was lost and gone long time ago.

It was fun to read. I was astonished by some of the stuff I wrote. Maybe I will post some of the high-lights (if any) on my blog. I just need to get it typed and translated to English.

Here's one of the poems, which is easy to translate, since it's free form. According to my note book, it was written on the night-train from the south in April 1987:

Utopia
Those
who can write
write, and
those who cannot write
print books and
make jellymen and
grow tea and
tobacco
for those who write.
By the way,
I have quit
today

What the Hell does it mean? I'm not sure, but maybe I tried to quit the tobacco. If so; it failed. I'm still using it. I don't smoke, but I use this black stinking stuff that you put under the lip; snus (kind of moist snuff) >:)

(I struggled a little bit finding a good U-topic, and I'm a little bit short of time right now. Therefore, I had to re-post some old stuff. Sorry about that. Anyway, I don't think many have read it before. I'm not very interested in poetry, and stopped writing poems long time ago.)

April 23, 2014

A-Z Challenge 20: A touch of Tourette

My wife believes I have Tourette’s syndrome. Not much, just a slight touch of it, but enough to be noticed. Here are the symptoms I have, again according to my spouse:

I have tics, not much anymore, just some eye blinking, shrugging my right shoulder, bending and stretching my right arm. I know I do it, and I can suppress it, if I want, but then it comes back ten times more as soon as I am by myself.

The doctors never suggested Tourette's when I was a kid and had serious tics. They blamed the tics on the bike crash I had when I was five years old. Now, it doesn’t bother me at all, with one exception: I’m getting big dentist bills because my teeth are worn out from teeth grinding.

I’m swearing too much, in particular when I'm talking with the boys. Who cares, nobody's taking any harm from a little swearing. And I have no problems keeping my mouth shut if I’m in a church. I just swear more once I get out.  (Yes, I do visit churches from time to time; to see the architecture and the art.)

I’m sometimes saying crazy things. I guess my blog is a good example. I better do it here than in a dinner party, where I may happen to offend some poor sensitive God-fearing soul.

Anyway, I’m very happy with my syndrome, and I don’t bother to visit a doctor to get a diagnosis. (The doctor doesn’t bother me, so why should I bother her?)

I think Tourette's is a very nice syndrome, actually. It’s not nice if you got it really badly, but just a little, that’s fine.  And whenever I say or do something crazy, I just say:

“Oh, what the Hell, it’s just my fucking Tourette again.” >J

April 22, 2014

A-Z Challenge 19: Selfie

It’s interesting how new words come into our vocabulary, and sometimes become very popular in a short time. A selfie is a self portrait, usually taken with the digital camera on a smart phone, and usually posted instantly on the Internet, on Facebook or Instagram.

If you search for #selfie on Instagram, you get 103 million hits (I just did it). Today everybody knows what a selfie is, but who had heard this word just a few years ago?

Self portraits are not new.  Many of the greatest artists made one or more of them. Picasso, Dali, van Gogh, and Munch all painted self portraits. Making a self portrait with paint and pencil took so time (and some skills).

Making a self portrait with a digital camera is so fast and easy that nobody have the time to pronounce the full word anymore, and then we got the selfie.

Everybody are taking and posting selfies. My kids do it. Rihanna and Beyonce do it daily. Even Obama and the Prime Minister of Denmark do it (on inappropriate occasions).



I don’t post pictures of myself on the Internet, but I think I need a selfie, just to show that I’m following the trends of the time. Above is a picture I took on the chairlift a couple of days ago when I was skiing in the mountains. It shows the tips of my skis and my shadow. Does that count as a selfie?

April 20, 2014

A-Z Challenge 18: Refurbishing

Normally, my skiing season lasts from Early November to 1st of May, and then my handyman season starts and goes to next skiing season. That’s what it’s like to live in a 100 year old house; you automatically get a hobby, a handyman-hobby.  There are always things to be fixed, repaired, and maintained.

The last year has been somewhat different, because the handyman season that started last spring never ended. We have been refurbishing, and in fact, it’s still going on.

We ripped out everything on the 1st floor, the ceilings, the panels on the inner walls, and the wooden floor. We removed all the clay and ironwork-waste between the bars in the floor, tons of it. In the old days this was used to block the sound between different levels of the house. It’s a really dirty and nasty job, not the kind of things you want to do by hand. We hired a company with a huge vacuum cleaner on a truck to do this.

Then we built everything up from scratch, insulating and leveling the floors, walls and ceilings, putting in water-borne heating, replacing the kitchen. I didn’t do all of this myself, of course. We hired professional handworkers to do the difficult things. All the easy and time consuming things, we did ourselves, like the demolishing, and cutting and putting in the insulation.

But of course we didn’t give up the skiing season (little boy would never allow it), so this winter it’s been going in parallel, the skiing and the refurbishing. It’s OK. I enjoy doing both.







(I try to take some pictures at every step of the refurbishing process, just to document what has been done. )

April 19, 2014

A-Z Challenge 17: Quantum leap

You sometimes hear people talk about quantum leaps as a metaphor: “We have made a quantum leap”. If you study physics, you learn about quantum leaps in the lectures on quantum mechanics, of course. That’s where the metaphor comes from. In the physics lectures, you also learn that a quantum leap is incredibly small. Usually, it’s an integer times Planck’s constant, which is order 10 to the power minus 34 (in units of Js, Joule seconds). That is, 0.000…01, with 34 zeros after the decimal point and before the digit 1. Correspondingly, the Planck length is order 10 to power the minus 35 meters. That's the scale of the quantum leaps.

The Planck length does not have a clear physical meaning, but Planck's constant does. Multiplied by frequency, it's the typical separation between the energy levels of a quantized system (e.g. a harmonic oscillator), and hence the magnitude of a quantum leap.

So whenever I hear a car or computer manufacturer claiming that they have made a technological quantum leap, I think this is not an improvement worth paying for, if you see what I mean.

April 17, 2014

A-Z Challenge 16: Porn - some pictures from my private collection

Internet is made for porn. There’s tons of it out there. There is the traditional stuff that used to be in the colorful magazines we hided when we were kids.  But also new creative varieties of porn have entered cyberspace. Here are some examples that I’m aware of:

Skyporn: Pictures of awesome sunsets, and other scenic horizons.

Cloudporn: Pictures of cloud patterns against the blue sky.

Foodporn. Pictures of people making food, eating food, or just zooming on delicate dishes.

Rockporn. It's not about music. It's pictures of various types of rocks; sedimentary, metamorphic as well as bedrock. Popular among geologists.

Skiporn: Pictures and, more popular, movies of freeskiers in terrain parks and in the backcountry. There’s even a ski movie from Poor Boyz Productions titled Skiporn. The trailer is on YouTube.

Surfporn: As skiporn, but showing wave surfing rather than skiing.




(Above are some pictures from my private porn collection; rockporn from Arches National Park, Utah, skyporn from my hometown, and cloudporn shot from an Aeroflot plane over the western part of Russia)

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