Leisha's Random Thoughts & Ponderings

Quote of the Week

2012-02-02T19:30:00.000+01:00

Dette oppslaget og denne framtvungne og meningsløse kritikken er et tegn på hvor dårlig stelt det er på komifronten i Norge om dagen. Vi har falt i tant og fjas-fella alle som en. Vi har åpenbart latt alle mulige grupperinger av forskjellige religioner og minoriteter slippe altfor billig unna altfor lenge. Så lenge at noen stakkarer altså forsøker å analysere en slags nedlatende og sjikanerende holdning ut av selv den platteste vits eller den tynneste suppe av et harmløst poeng tatt fra toppen av hodet og servert av oss og meg i "Brille". Jeg er flau over at når jeg først skal beskyldes for å sjikanere noen, ikke hadde et mye drøyere, friskere og mer raffinert poeng å slå i bordet med, enn det jeg fikk ut av meg i "Brille". Jeg er ikke for jødehets spesielt, men hets generelt. Alle må få litt hver. Jeg tar som komiker, også på vegne av humorstanden, selvkritikk på at vi ikke har klart å gjøre både majo- og minoritetene, og diverse religiøse grupperinger og folk generelt, mer hardhudede og tolerante overfor slengbemerkninger og humoristisk småsjikane. Vi klovner må med andre ord ta oss sammen og brette opp ermene for de har tydeligvis blitt for godt vant alle der ute som trenger en vits om seg. Vi trenger flere vitser og mer humor om alle dem som vil ha seg det frabedt så de ikke begynner å tro at de er hevet over alle oss andre.
Atle Antonsen

Jeg digger Atle Antonsen. Go for it.

Too many books??

2012-02-01T22:41:00.000+01:00

Is that even possible? I'm sure many will disagree; I may be one of them. ;-) But in the BookCrossing zone at Oslo Central Station there really are almost too many books right now. It's chock full of books! It may not initially look that full from this picture, but there are double rows on all three shelves. Lots and lots of good stuff!! Readers in Oslo, go find a free book! :-D

Books read in 2012 - January

2012-01-31T22:18:00.000+01:00

Dronningens fiende, volume one by Alexandre Dumas

The City and the City by China Mieville – AUDIO

Det synger igresset by Doris Lessing – AUDIO

Aldri alene byLori Lansens

Kadaverdoktorenby Lene Kaaberbøl – AUDIO

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot

Girls of Riyadh by Rajaa Alsanea

Enken by Gil Adamson – AUDIO

Et selsomt paradisby Terri Jentz

Monster by Knut Nærum – AUDIO

Honningkrukkenby Gert Nygårdshaug

Mashallah – enreise blant kvinner i Pakistan by Hege Storhaug

The Murders in the Rue Morgue by Edgar AllanPoe

Spilt blod by Åsa Larsson – AUDIO

Alle mine tristehorer by Gabriel García Márquez

Alle tiders torsdag by John Steinbeck – AUDIO

Vanunu – hans kampog kampen for ham by Fredrik S Heffermehl

10 printed books, 2,815 pages

7 audiobooks, 65h 26m

'Side by Side'

2012-01-30T22:17:00.000+01:00

A very interesting documentary that will be released before too long. On the differences between and coexistence of 'real' film and digital, by and with Keanu Reeves. The list of major names he's talked to is ... wow. This will be pretty unmissable for anyone interested in the world of American movies. Here's the trailer.

Side by Side Official Trailer (2012) from Company Films on Vimeo.

My wish for Aisha and Leyla

2012-01-29T20:06:00.001+01:00

I've been following the debate recently surrounding the two young supposedly Norwegian women Aisha Shezadi and Leyla Hasic. Aisha has worn the niqab for a while and Leyla has taken it up very recently, apparently after being picked on for wearing the hijab. I could say a lot about both of them - about Aisha traveling around on what is basically tax money lecturing school kids about her decision to segregate herself from normal society, and about Leyla's total lack of understanding of the concept of freedom of religion. But whatever. Let them wander around like the Ink Blot, let them wallow in their ignorance and let them think everybody's against them through no fault of their own. Let them support the Taliban and wish for sharia to their hearts' content.

But I have a wish for them too. I wish that Aisha and Leyla could get the chance to live the life that they dream of. I wish that Aisha and Leyla could spend some time - let's say ten years, that will give them enough time to really immerse themselves in the culture and learn it inside out - in Afghanistan. Let's say in Nuristan, that's probably the best area for them to go. The situation there is the closest to what they would like to see, AFAIK. I wish that Aisha and Leyla could get the chance to go there, stay there and live the life that is fit for a woman under their ideology. Then after those ten years, I wish they could come back here and tell us all just how great they really think that society is and just how it really is the best way to live for women.

This will of course never happen - both Aisha and Leyla will stay here and enjoy all the freedom and wealth of the West. They'd be crazy to do anything else. But a girl can dream.

ESC 2012: Norway, round two

2012-01-28T19:53:00.000+01:00

Wheee ... !! :-D

No family members present (at least not any two-legged ones ;-) so liveblogging is on ... ! I love my pathetic life. :-D

There's very little by way of intros this year. Just straight on with the show. Larvik is hosting this round, their first time hosting. Marte Stokstad in a pretty cool dress, but she's standing funny. Huh. My mother ranted so much against Stokstad last Saturday, she must have prejudiced me against her without my noticing it ... o_O

Entry #1: Keeps On Dancing by Cocktail Slippers, performed by Cocktail Slippers. I've been looking forward to this entry. It makes me think about my dream of one day seeing Katzenjammer represent Norway in the ESC. ;-) Katzenjammer would be amazing. But these girls ... aren't quite on that level. I really like the chorus, but the verse is way too ... bland. Their performance could be more energetic, the song could be catchier, the singer's voice could be better, the whole thing could just have been a lot ... better. I like it, but I haz disappoint all the same. Fun with a girl band, but doesn't have the personality to be a big hit. Alas. So far the best entry though. ;-) I wouldn't be unhappy with this as our entry, but I'm pretty dang sure it doesn't have what it takes. I do like it that they've written their own entry though.

Entry #2: I've Got You by Thom Hell and Isabel Ødegård, performed by Isabel Ødegård. Again, good that the performer has at least participated in writing the song. Nice dress. A voice that's rather weak, but with personality. The song is very low key, the voice kind of makes the whole thing. The melody is sweet but this is probably too forgettable. The bridge is very good though. A charming and sweet entry. She's got the audience going, that's always good. But there's no real hook to the song and although the performance as a whole is good this would be forgotten too soon.

Entry #3: Make It Better by Hanne Sørvaag, Tommy Berre and Tommy Fredvang, performed by Tommy Fredvang. Kudos as above. Major pros he's collaborated with, so this song should be good. Unusual opening to the performance, is that a good sign? :-) Ooh! This is good! A very confident singer and a sudden rush of music, that can really work to make the audience remember the entry. His voice isn't necessarily very good, but certainly good enough for the ESC. ;-) He's good looking and that's usually at least as important. :-D The melody is catchy and the lyrics simple. We may be on to something here. Top of the list so far.

Entry #4: Another Heartache by Rikke Lie, Maria Marcus and Niclas Lundin, performed by Rikke Lie. Another singer-songwriter, that's a plus. But weird dress. The singer is playing the piano, that's unusual, may be a plus. The song itself ... meh. Nothing wrong with it, but I feel like I've forgotten it already. Pretty singer, not a strong voice, but again, with personality. Character, whatever. The song is way too bland and forgettable. And WTF is with the backing musicians??? The audience seems to love it but sheesh, what are they on? Totally doesn't mesh with the song's message ... or the melody for that matter. And why show us something that can't be used in Baku?? At least one thumb down for this entry, primarily on the performance.

Entry #5: Crush by Beyond 51, performed by Malin Reitan. A singer from the Junior ESC and a songwriting team that's already been represented in the real ESC (sorry, kids). By the extremely unpopular Haba haba, but still. I dig that song. :-) This one I've heard really bad things about though. What an outfit ... !! And again too many people on stage. Why do they do that?? In a way they're lying to the audience. There's no way we can get what we're voting for with these entries. >:-( I also don't like the silly dance moves, however many they are. >:-( A pretty girl, professional performance, but a very weak voice. Catchy song, but way too juvenile. I seriously hope this won't get anywhere, but she has a lot of fans - and of exactly the right voting age in these circumstances - so she may well get through. Not a big problem, Nora al-Jabri would crush her in the final. >:-) But seriously, this is total plastic. Let's not vote for this. Too American and way too plasticky.

Entry #6: Ola nordmann by Glen Hauger and Lars-Erik Blokkhus, performed by Plumbo. The song is written by two of the band members and they're singing in Norwegian, kudos for that. I really feel like sending a vote their way as a matter of principle. The song itself is ... pretty catchy, or at least the chorus is catchy. The verse, as usual, a little more bland. But not too bad. A bit of an international flavor to the entry too with the flute and what not. Not a winner, but certainly not bad. They deserve to get through if for no other reason than that they're the only ones tonight who are singing in their own language. o_O Also nice with some guys on stage, and something that kind of resembles rock. Not at all a bad entry that definitely stands a chance.

Entry #7: You And I by Minnie-Oh, performed by Minnie-Oh. Everyone's singing their own songs tonight! Some of them have designed their own costumes too, and it shows. Ouch. This isn't getting through. Kind of catchy, but a weak singer, annoying synthesized music, a repetitive melody. I seriously hope we won't have to hear this again. I doubt this will appeal to the masses. Unless of course the blacklight and crazy light effects will do the trick. Kind of fancy with the Kali arms but ... no. Nah. Let's not vote for this.

Entry #8: Shapeshifter by Silya Nymoen and Rikke Normann, performed by Rikke Normann. Again with too many people on stage. Sheesh. NRK, what are you thinking? Another weak singer who doesn't want to 'work' with anything other than music. Pretty catchy song, but what is the title supposed to mean? If anything? I'm not sure how the dancers' costumes tie into the song's ... message, if that's the word I mean. A messy entry that would need a lot of work if it were to win ... but it won't. Problem solved. :-D Nope, not a winner. So far tonight - or in fact this year - I can't begin to guess which of these songs could make it to Baku. Except Somewhere Beautiful, possibly. Well, we may well not have seen the winner yet at all. But this one definitely isn't it.

That's it ... !! I have to say that the lineup tonight is pretty even, but not strong. Alas. Gotta think a little bit how I'm going to vote here. :-) Can I just complain a little before I do that Per Sundnes is WAY too quick to grab the mike away from his interviewees?? He hardly ever lets them finish talking. What's up with that? Every time ...

OK, so, I've voted twice for Make It Better and once for Ola nordmann. In good conscience I can't vote for anyone else. And I hardly dare to venture a guess as to which three songs will make it through. Nothing stands out tonight, to be honest. Unusual.

And we're back. Voting is over and the results will be revealed. Again, I really can't hope to guess. Such a weird lineup tonight. I am torn. Obviously I hope that the two I voted for will get through. And I think they have a good chance. But I really don't know. Cocktail Slippers might be good too. They'd be fun and stand out a bit in the final, if nothing else. I just really hope that Crush doesn't get through, but I fear I'm in for a disappointment.

First entry through is ... Crush. Of course. Dagnabbit. I will be SO embarrassed if we send this to Baku. My only consolation is that she at least came in third. I really wasn't longing to hear this one more time.

Second place goes to ... Make It Better! Yay! This was definitely tonight's strongest entry. And I'll enjoy hearing it again, unlike ... well. This is something that could theoretically have a chance in Baku, so I'm glad my countrymen were sensible enough to vote for it. :-)

I really think Plumbo have what it takes to make it to the top at least on this level of the contest, so they may end up taking the last place in the final tonight. Ooh, the excitement ... !

And tonight's winner is ... the audience seems divided ... it's ... yup, Ola nordmann. Not really a major surprise. :-) Aw, they're so happy. Suck on that, antiracists. It'd be fun if they won the whole thing. We'd probably bomb in Baku (I'm tempted to say again :-) but who cares, we'd be sending something totally different yet again, and not at all a bad song. And the guys are soo happy. Aw. :-) A good time was had by all. :-)

Amazing elephant story

2012-01-27T22:55:00.000+01:00

I read this amazing story somewhere online ages ago, but forgot to save the url, and then forgot where I'd found the article. I remember the story though, it's almost beyond amazing. I don't know what I'd give to have an experience like that. :-) Recently a friend wrote a blog post that got me thinking about it again. I've been digging around on Google tonight trying to find it. It took a while, but yay, success. :-) Here it is, you should go read it. If you love elephants half as much as I do it'll give you goosebumps. Elephant twins are very rare, and usually don't survive, because it's so hard for the mother to breastfeed them both. There's really only enough milk for one. But in nature, sometimes the strangest things can happen. :-)

What's in a name

2012-01-26T19:43:00.000+01:00

I just started reading a new book today. It's a Phoenix mini paperback, one of those Penguin 60 ripoffs. Not a problem. However, another thing is kind of a problem. The book contains two short stories, The Murders in the Rue Morgue and The Masque of the Red Death. So we all know which author I'm talking about. Edgar Allan Poe. Not Edgar Allen Poe. They've stuck with the misspelling consistently, in the blurb and everywhere. Seriously? I know he never liked his middle name, and would have preferred to not even have it, but since he does have it, at least show the common courtesy of spelling it correctly.

I really never thought I would see the day when a writer of this stature had his name misspelled on the cover of a serious publication from a reputable publisher. What's next? Jane Austin?

Quote of the Week

2012-01-25T20:36:00.000+01:00

Weak Sauce. A completely inscrutable god like the one he's describing could be anybody. Cthulhu, Quetzacoatil, Vishnu, or the Great Green Arkleseizure ... who cares if a god is real if we have no idea what he wants or how to kill him?
Commenter ChaosSong on The Atheist Experience blog

New games!

2012-01-24T21:28:00.000+01:00

I always have a list of games that I'm thinking about getting hold of, and when an opportunity presents itself of getting hold of them at a bargain price ... I seriously consider it. :-) KAS was kind enough to pick up two such bargains for me and I got them tonight when we went to the movies together - Shame, by Steve McQueen. I hardly know what I think of that one yet. But I know that I look forward to trying these games. :-)

Habitat, a card game where each player tries to put together a functioning ... well, habitat, with different animal groups and resources.

Blue Moon City, a sequel to a card game I've never played, but supposedly actually better than the first. Or so some people think. It's by Reiner Knizia so I'm sure it's cool. :-) The pieces are wonderful. There are dragons. Yay for dragons!! :-)

Lucky Octavia Spencer

2012-01-23T19:49:00.000+01:00

Anyone who's seen The Help - and if you haven't, you should - will remember Octavia Spencer, who brought to life the irrepressible Minny Jackson. She's from Montgomery, Alabama, but moved to LA some years ago to pursue a career in the movies. I'm sure she's had several OMG/WTF moments since then, but this is totally the coolest one she'll ever have. ;-)

Widescreen here.

ESC 2012: Norway, round one

2012-01-22T21:28:00.000+01:00

Yay, we're on!! :-D The first part of our national ESC selection was tonight, I was going to liveblog it, but I had my family over, so I didn't manage to. Apologies to Findabair. ;-) Going to try to make this a pretty brief recap *cough*.

Eight songs, three go on to the final. The format's a little different this year, no semifinal to give contestants a last hope. Gotta keep it interesting, I guess. o_O

Entry #1: Elevator by Anne Judith Wik, Nermin Harambasic, Ronny Svendesen (??), Robin Jenssen and Carl Pritt, performed by Irresistible. Meh. Extremely American, me no like. And Europe no like either, in the ESC. Kind of catchy chorus, rather unmelodic verse. Forgettable. And enough with the rap already. Forget it, that combo's not a winner. Sheesh. And they have too many people on stage. The show is supposed to be spectacular, but why should we vote for something that we obviously can't show in Baku? None of us thought that this would get through.

Entry #2: Så vidunderlig by Elin Nygård, performed by Kim André Rysstad. Norwegian lyrics, good. In dialect, even better. :-) Folk music meets Whitney Houston? No, not really. It's pretty, but doesn't have what it takes. Predictable lyrics. We kept waiting for some kind of lift to the song, some kind of high point to it, but that never came. This might do relatively well, Norwegian audiences might like this, but it'd never get far in Baku.

Entry #3: High On Love by Thomas G:son, Ovi and Tommy Berre, performed by Reidun Sæther. Gotta love it - Ovi will never give up, he is going to win this thing some day. More power to him. :-D And this song, hey, now we're talking! Kind of pretentious title, but what a voice! This woman can sing. Clearly the best so far (although my father is highly opposed to that kind of wide-legged stance, what are people thinking, it's all over the place these days). Good song, cool performance. This is something they'd like in Baku. ;-) A real Eurovision feel to this. Pretty standard, but entertaining, and has that oomph. I like this. Figured we'd probably hear this again. :-)

Entry #4: You Break It, You Own It by Rune Berg and Asbjørn Ribe, performed by Rudi Myntevik. Not a very good voice, but may have a certain charm. Cool outfits on the band. Original lyrics, I like this take on it, but the phrase is actually you break it, you buy it ... but whatever. An OK entry, but nothing special. No hook to the melody. We all dismissed this as a contender. :-)

Entry #5: With Love by Tommy Berre, Johanna Demker, Anita Lixel and Lisa Stokke, performed by Lisa Stokke. An extremely glam outfit! In fact it's almost a bit much. This entry is of course very professionally performed, and Stokke has a good voice. A real show tune that may have potential. Nice to have lyrics that go a little outside the standard parameters. And of course, pyrotechnics and what have you. Very showy. We thought this would be quite likely to get through.

Entry #6: Little Bobbi by John Lundvik, Philip Halloun and Thomas Felberg, performed by United. This was my favorite entry by default, since Benedicte Adrian, one of my favorite singers, is in this group. I don't like the silly title though. An interesting opening to the performance. Rap again, sheesh. Not my favorite, and totally not an ESC hit. It's catchy though. Sadly in a way that quickly gets enervating. Too American. Benedicte also rapped, which was strange, we thought she'd be doing something totally different. :-D She kind of did too, eventually. Cool show, a song that stands out. Could never hope to win in Baku, but kind of original. However, it still so annoys me that they allow performances that couldn't be presented internationally. It's basically a trick, I don't like it. I thought this might possibly get through but probably wouldn't.

Entry #7: Somewhere Beautiful by Christian Ingebrigtsen and Eivind Rølles, performed by Nora Foss al-Jabri. Now with this girl we already knew the performance would be stellar. What an absolutely fantastic voice she has. I keep thinking it's got to be some sort of scam that she's only 15. o_O Very professional performance, but still emotional and genuine. Good song too. A real Disney tune. :-D The UK did well with this kind of powerful emotional ballad in 2009. This might be a hit, they'd like this down east. I'd love to hear this again. I was convinced that this would get through.

Entry #8: Don't Touch the Flame by ... all the guys in The Carburetors, performed by The Carburetors. The guys themselves are kind of annoying, but it's cool to have a real rock song in the contest. Good song, catchy, and they're real pros on stage. But what's the point of running around that whole thing if he's not going to jump off anything afterwards? o_O It would have been really cool to send this ... it wouldn't win, but it'd be so cool to send it. :-) Great response from the audience in the hangar (long story :-). I thought this might get through.

That was all the songs, a pretty good lineup IMO, although my father needed a cup of coffee to stay awake. :-D We figured that Somewhere Beautiful and With Love would get through, and I also really believed in High On Love. That seemed weird to me though, three female soloists? No, that's too unlikely. But which of the three would miss out?? Turned out it was Stokke and The Carburetors took her place. Good for them and better for the lineup. :-) So glad Nora Foss al-Jabri came out ahead of everyone else, she really deserved it, and it meant soo much to her. :-D

That's all, looking forward to next Saturday when I definitely won't have those people hanging out here ... :-D

Quote of the week

2012-01-21T23:15:00.000+01:00

On the infrequent occasions when I have been called upon in a formal place to play the bongo drums, the introducer never seems to find it necessary to mention that I also do theoretical physics.

Richard Feynman

Board game night

2012-01-20T23:52:00.000+01:00

Cartagena. Fun again. I probably shouldn't be admitting this, but I totally prefer this game Jamaica style, with concealed cards. I'm just not a strategist, I'm in it for the laughs. :-) O. won this one. :-)

Piece o' Cake. A new acquisition that we tried for the first time. When I first came across this game I thought it looked pretty silly, but then I thought ... cake. I do like a bit of cake. ;-) So after reading up on it, I bought it, and yeah, it's as much fun as I thought it would be. Very easy to learn and a lot of fun to play - who doesn't like cake?? I won, Tanumine lost, but she would have come second if I hadn't accidentally tricked her so she scored ten points less than we thought she would. I'm so sorry ... !! I don't know what I was thinking ... ! o_O

Ticket to Ride - the Card Game. Ooh, the beautiful artwork ... !! Another game that was quick to learn, although it took me a little while to figure out the rail yard/on the track thing. In the board game version it's visualized with the train pieces, but here it's all done with cards ... obviously. :-) I won this one, I managed to complete all of my ten tickets, I could hardly believe it myself. :-)

Awesome ad

2012-01-19T19:50:00.000+01:00

Yeah, I know, I try to avoid using the word 'awesome' if at all possible ... but I just couldn't resist the alliteration. :-) Check out this fantastic ad. I love it. I've never been to Milwaukee, although the city has a place in my consciousness because two of my all time favorites have such strong connections to it - my favorite serial killer, Jeffrey Dahmer, committed most of his murders there, and my favorite pianist*, Liberace, was from there. Now I'm thinking I'd like to go there and visit the library. I like it there already. :-)

*OK, let's say favorite male pianist, and let him share the honors with Ingrid Bjørnov. :-)

Stop SOPA/PIPA

2012-01-18T21:58:00.000+01:00

More, if you need it, here.

Sheesh, humans.

My calendar wall, January 2012

2012-01-17T22:26:00.000+01:00

Last year I totally neglected the calendar wall here on the blog. Shame on me. This year I'll do better.

How about a new shirt?

2012-01-16T22:15:00.000+01:00

I'm pretty sure he's able to afford a few new t-shirts - even with the relatively steep prices in Paris, where this was taken - but hey, it's still wearable. Far be it from me to judge, etc.

Political correctness gone amok

2012-01-15T22:49:00.001+01:00

This thing right here - seriously, this showcases everything that's wrong with political correctness. OMG, someone made a pun that references color ... !! SHOOT HIM!!1

If I recall correctly, I seem to remember one of these Madcon guys calling some white fellow 'vanillaface' during a concert somewhere ... last year, was it? But of course, that was merely an amusing joke. Silly me, I forgot that only white people can be racist.

Now there's talk about not allowing Plumbo to participate in our national ESC contest, Melodi Grand Prix, as they are scheduled to do. I hope they are allowed to compete; anything else would be totally ridiculous, and if they are, I will vote for them.

Two player board game night

2012-01-14T23:57:00.000+01:00

I have several board and card games now that are for only two players, and last Saturday we weren't really enough players to spare two for those games ... so I didn't get to try any of them. :-) I've only played one of the six two player games I have before. Tonight Anne Ida came over and we got through four of the six. Yay us! Some were better than others, but I think we'll be playing all of these again.

Mr Jack. A detective searches for Jack the Ripper one dark night in Whitechapel. There are eight characters, one is the Ripper. One player is Jack and the other is the detective; Jack tries to escape and the detective tries to deduce which character he is. We played this twice - I was the detective, and Jack escaped, then I was Jack, and was caught. :-D (I'm not necessarily any good at board games, I just enjoy playing them. ;-) Oddly enough Inspector Lestrade was the killer both times, even though I thought I shuffled the alibi cards pretty well. o_O

Tortuga. A very pretty game, I love the look of it. Obviously. ;-) Each player controls eight turtles - that's to start with, you can take over the other player's turtles too - and the objective of the game is to get one of your turtles into the other player's 'home base' (the field with the biggest turtle symbol). We played it once, I won, very quickly I might add. This seems to play very quickly, at least with as little thought to strategy as we put into it. We both have the same idea about playing a game for the first time - let's just do something and see what happens. :-D I think after playing this a few times one will start to see a lot more strategy options develop.

Scarab Lords. I am a Reiner Knizia fan, so I was positive about this game before we even started playing, but it took a good long while to figure it out. I have the Fantasy Flight Silver Line edition with the Swedish rule book, and sheesh, are they crappily written ... ! They are soo convoluted and so much trickier than they have to be. We read through them and were more confused than we were before we started. So yeah, we just did something and waited to see what'd happen. :-) It turned out to be a pretty good game ... although we could have and would have played a little differently if we had had a better grip of which cards are available in each player's deck. Basically you have a deck of cards and can play them in various phases of your turn, and they establish you as more or less dominant in a crypto-Egyptian setting. Your opponent can place curses on you to hinder your progress. I think we will have fun with this game once we learn a little more about which options each player has to choose from. There's also an advanced set of rules where you use an additional deck that both players share; needless to say we didn't try this. :-) We played it once and I won - maybe I shouldn't have, because I suspect in hindsight that we read one rule wrong, but on the other hand I was pretty far ahead, so I would quite probably have ended up winning in any case.

Atlanteon. More Knizia! In Scarab Lords the theme worked really well with the game, in this one it seems very tacked on. The theme could have been absolutely anything here, so that was a little disappointing, because as a theme it's pretty cool. Who doesn't want to visit Atlantis? :-) The game itself works OK though. We've played Kingdoms quite a few times, and that looks very similar to this, but the scoring is different, so we kind of confused ourselves with that. :-D In this game you play tiles not to score points, as such, but to dominate the tiles you place yours next to. o_O We need to learn to 'read' the scoring a little better, but I think we'll be playing this again, it was a quick and pretty simple game. We played it once, Anne Ida won the first time after quickly taking over all three palaces which is one of the victory conditions ... the second time I made sure to get hold of one palace too to keep this from happening again, and that round lasted quite a bit longer, but I'm not entirely sure who won ... ? When only two tiles were left we got to talking so much about the placement of those two and what would have happened if this, but what if that ... so I think the actual victory kind of got away from us. :-D But an OK game in any event. We'll try this again too.

Quote of the Week

2012-01-13T23:42:00.002+01:00

"Write," she said, "as if you'll never be read. That way you'll be sure to tell the truth.

Lori Lansens, The Girls

Dandylion in concert

2012-01-12T21:19:00.000+01:00

I mentioned a certain concert I went to the other day ... ? Now you can see part of it on my Youtube channel. The rest of it is coming up over the next week or so. Enjoy. :-) Isn't she great - you can't even tell she had a pretty bad cold. :-)

Widescreen here.

More games!

2012-01-11T20:58:00.000+01:00

Yay, more games! I just picked up a package from the post office this afternoon - I've been waiting for it for like three weeks, I had hoped it would arrive just before Christmas, initially. No such luck, obviously. But better late than never. I think these three games will turn out to have been worth waiting for. :-) I got them from Nerdvana Games on eBay ... a good seller, friendly people, and really good shipping prices. It's not their fault that my order took so relatively long to arrive, they mailed it on December 15th. You never know with international shipping.

What I got:

Piece o' Cake. Players collect - wait for it - pieces of cake. :-) You can choose to either eat your pieces to score immediate points, or you can try to keep them to put together the biggest cake. I think we'll have a lot of fun with this. :-)

Chaos. A card game where players try to collect almost complete sets, but watch out for the fourth card in any set, it'll unleash chaos!

We Didn't Playtest This At All. Yeah, that's the name of the game. Another card game. You take cards, you play cards, you see what happens. The object of the game is to win, so try not to lose, because then you don't win. This is a very quick game AFAIK, so hopefully it'll be a good inbetween game. Supposed to be a lot of fun. :-)

The boringest place in the world

2012-01-10T22:15:00.000+01:00

And look, Herman has to live there. :-(

It's only for a couple of weeks, and he gets to be in the tank for a few hours every day. But it's sooo boring. I'm pretty sure he's slept all day today, till I came home. What can I do, I have to put him through it, it's for his health. :-(

Better or worse?

2012-01-09T22:41:00.000+01:00

By this time tomorrow, I'll know. I can hardly wait. I'm finally going to go see The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo tomorrow night. The remake. I know, 'finally' ... it's only been out for like two and a half weeks. :-) But I wanted to see it on opening night, I've just had to put it off again and again ... it's been a very busy couple of weeks. Which of course is good in a way, but still. I've been dying to see this. I'm skeptical about it, because, well, it's a remake. Which is all Hollywood dares to do these days, and it's soo infinitely boring. The critics are raving about this one, and saying that the filmmakers have understood the novel so well ... OK, that may be so, but in all honesty, I'm not convinced. Have you seen the poster? Well, right there they're veering off from the novel. Rooney Mara is supposed to be the perfect Lisbeth, but look, she has boobs. Which Lisbeth doesn't. Of course any Hollywood heroine has to be shapely. But that means they by definition won't be able to stay true to the book ... or at least not to this character. So. I am not convinced. :-) But we'll see, we'll see ...

Hot air balloon-ish

2012-01-08T21:39:00.000+01:00

As I mentioned yesterday, I like hot air balloons ... and look, here's one now, or at least one thingamajig that is kind of like one. It shares certain important features with one. We saw it on New Year's Eve ... these people who were standing right behind us sent up first one, which went well, and then this one, which kind of struggled. But it got there in the end. Kinda fun that I filmed them releasing this one. :-)

Widescreen here.

Board game night

2012-01-07T23:55:00.000+01:00

One of my resolutions for 2012 is to get back to having regular board game nights. So this year I'm going to host them twice a month, invite everyone on this mailing list I've set up and hopefully have fun playing with whoever shows up. Tonight was the first time. We ended up being six for most of the night, and got through, let me think, four games. Two of them twice. A good time was had by all, I think. So, the project is a success so far. :-)

Another thing I really want to do is to play all the games I have. I have some really seriously cool games that have been well considered purchases and have really been worth the price, but I do also have a bunch of more random buys *cough* that have just been sitting on a shelf for years and never been played. Some of those I'm almost completely sure totally suck, but hey, we gotta try them. Don't knock it till you try it. So every time we do this I'm going to force people to play one of these old clunkers and we'll see what we get out of it. Who knows, there may be some undiscovered gems in the pile too.

Of course I also want to try all my new games ... ! :-) So, six people, and this is what we played:

Cartagena, a quick game that's very easy to learn, hardly any rules. You construct the board yourself from a bunch of loose pieces, so it's different every time. The players take the parts of pirates escaping from the supposedly impregnable fortress of Cartagena. (This really happened in 1672.) One of the games I got on Thursday. Definitely a good buy, we'll be playing this again. We played it twice, once with open cards and once with concealed cards - both are possible under the rules of the game - we definitely preferred the latter.

Montgolfiere, one of my old games that we've never played. The players control hot air balloons and the aim is to fly to the moon. :-D You rise or fall by playing various cards, ballast of various weights, storms, etc. Another quick game, very straightforward, almost nothing to complicate it. Some opportunities for strategy but you have to play it a couple of times to get the hang of them. We played it twice tonight. Great artwork, I love hot air balloons.

The Pillars of the Earth, with the expansion set that lets six people play. Fantastic game, based on the novel of the same name by Ken Follett. (Still haven't read that, but will one day. :-) The players build a cathedral, using workers, resources, craftsmen etc. A lot of pieces and rather daunting to look at, but once you start playing you quickly get the hang of it. Takes a while, but worth it. Fantastic game.

Rattus, with some cards from the Pied Piper expansion and also the Jester bonus card that was made especially for BoardGameGeek.com. This is such a cool game. Europe in the mid-fourteenth century - rats are spreading the Black Death and the players try to keep their populations alive (forget about stable!) as best they can. Various characters help out, they give you abilities that can help you but are also potential liabilities when the plague strikes. We played once, had fun with the characters we used, but since you only use a few at a time we need to play this a lot more with the various new characters to figure them all out. We selected the six character cards at random and added the Jester.

Rattus ... !! :-D

Quote of the Week

2012-01-06T23:44:00.001+01:00

She's the most important person in the world and her family living in poverty. If our mother is so important to science, why can't we get health insurance?
Rebecca Skloot, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks

A shopping spree

2012-01-05T20:52:00.000+01:00

I has a crazy ... !! At least it feels like I've gone a little bit crazy today, but that doesn't hurt anyone, does it? We all need a little bit of crazy sometimes. :-) Throughout 2011 I've been saving up loose change and what not ... a twenty every week, for starters ... with a view towards a wild shopping spree in a board game store some day in the new year. And that day was today. I went out to Kjeller after work to visit the brick & mortar store attached to the very tempting online store Brettspill.no. KAS met me there - she works right around the corner - strangely enough neither of us had ever been there. (A bit stranger in her case, I have to say. :-) I had something in the region of a couple of thousand crowns to spend. I know - dangerous ... !! :-D

Well, it was hard to choose - and of course they're sold out right now of the one game I want most of all at the moment - but I managed to muddle through somehow. *cough* So many wonderful new additions to my collection!! Those of you who are coming over for board game night on Saturday won't know what hit you. ;-)

The store!! Oooh ... !

From whence I brought home, wait for it ...

Rattus: Pied Piper. An expansion for a really fantastic game, in which a swarm of Rattus norvegicus spread plague across Europe.

Mr Jack. A two player game where one player is an investigator and the other takes the part of Jack the Ripper. The investigator tries to find out which of the game's eight characters is the notorious killer, and Jack tries to escape from Whitechapel.

Carcassonne: the Dice Game. The dice version of the now classic tile laying game. Supposed to be very quick and easy.

Cardcassonne. The card version of the now classic tile laying game. :-)

Cartagena. Pirates try to escape from the dreaded prison fortress.

Thurn und Taxis. Players set up mail routes in the late 15th century.

Galapagos. Biologists follow in the footsteps of Darwin, exploring the Galapagos islands. Designed by the same people who made Rattus, so I have high hopes for this.

Carcassonne: the Tower. One of the very few Carcassonne expansions I didn't have. :-)

And in addition to this, KAS decided to get me my Christmas present early - very early ... !! :-D We found the perfect gift, which she would have given me for Christmas three weeks ago if only she'd gotten around to visiting this place earlier. :-D So now she's gotten off to an extremely early start on her Christmas shopping. ;-) KAS: come December, all you have to do is wrap up, ooh, I know, a KvikkLunsj! :-D and put a note inside where it says REMEMBER TORTUGA ... !! :-D

Anne Ida, you and I will be playing this at the earliest possible opportunity ... !! :-D

Oslo BookCrossing meetup

2012-01-04T20:54:00.000+01:00

A couple of pictures from this month's BookCrossing meetup here in Oslo. This afternoon, in fact. We meet once a month, normally on the first Wednesday of every month, at 5pm in the La Baguette café in the Central Station. If you're a BookCrosser, or if you're just interested in BookCrossing - or even just in reading - stop by! We're a very friendly gang. :-) You can usually tell which ones we are by the stacks and stacks of books on our table ... ;-)

If you're interested in a meetup but you're just passing through Oslo, let us know! We'll try our best to drum up a meetup while you're here. In the past couple of years we've had extra meetups for BookCrossers from Australia, Finland, Germany and England. The best way to get hold of us is to post about your plans on the Scandinavian BC forum. You'll be almost guaranteed to find some people here in Oslo who'll be able to meet up with you. :-) And share some books ... or a lot of books. :-)

The zone is between two of the couches, you can't miss it. It's really full right now, so if you're looking for something to read and you're passing through the Central Station, look no further! :-)

Ooh, fancy

2012-01-03T22:25:00.000+01:00

Actually, not so fancy ... at least not in this picture. It's kind of crappy, I know. It's the light, and the not so great angle. But this is just to let you know of better things to come. See, it was pretty fancy in real life. :-) Marianne Sveen of Katzenjammer fame just released her first solo album, or at least the first part of it. That was on Friday, and the release party was tonight. I was there, unsurprisingly, so for those of you who are interested, there will be some treats coming up on my Youtube channel shortly. She has a cold right now but she sounded great anyway. :-)

A sad thought

2012-01-02T19:37:00.000+01:00

This morning when I woke up, my very first thought was Hey! It's January 2nd! I have to text Eva and wish her happy birthday, it's her birthday! But then I remembered that no, it's not. :-(

She would have been thirty today. I am sad.

Happy new year!!

2012-01-01T22:37:00.001+01:00

Happy new year to all of you reading this; I hope you had a good evening yesterday. Whichever way you prefer to celebrate the end of the old and beginning of the new. :-) And I hope that if you have made any new year's resolutions, you've picked some simple ones so that you'll be able to keep them without too much trouble. ;-)

I for my part have at least one resolution ... to be a better blogger than I have been for the past month or so. That should be manageable. Here's hoping. :-) I also have one that I will definitely carry out within this coming fortnight - to take Herman to the vet to have his shell looked at. He's got some trouble with it again that I'm really worried about, it's been coming on for a while but I've been putting off taking him to the vet because, well, I procrastinate about everything, but mostly because if you don't know something bad for a fact, you can pretend you don't know it at all, right? I know, I'm a terrible pet owner!! He obviously feels just fine, it doesn't bother him at all. At least not yet. But it definitely doesn't look right. I'm incredibly busy this coming week, unfortunately, but I will be calling tomorrow to book an appointment for the week after. Fingers crossed he'll be fine again. :-(

Any other new year's resolutions I will have to think about a little more. One thing I will definitely carry on doing in this shiny new year - badmouthing the so-called 'newspaper' Dagbladet. Marie Simonsen's comment on the two new year's speeches - the king's, which I watch religiously, and the prime minister's, which I usually try to avoid, as politicians generally turn my stomach - how ridiculous is that?? Fine, I know they're republicans, but can't they at least pretend to be serious?? Stoltenberg touched on many of the major events, unlike the king who only stuck to July 22nd - WTF? Did she watch what I watched? I thought the king barely mentioned July 22nd! He went on about the earthquake in Japan and the Arab spring and I don't know what all ... I was sitting there waiting for him to mention it. o_O She definitely didn't watch what I watched, she wore her republican glasses. Bitch. As for the PM's speech, sheesh, fuck that shit. I'm sorry, I have to switch over to Norwegian here, I can't be bothered to translate all of this.

Dette er internett på sitt beste. Internett på sitt verste er når totalitære forførere får snakke uimotsagt i mørke kroker på nettet.

Dette må vi møte med fasthet. Vi skal drive dem ut med kunnskapens lys. Å ta til motmæle mot ekstremisme er å ta ansvar for fremtiden. Jeg oppfordrer alle til å bli gode digitale nabokjerringer. Ikke for å sensurere meninger eller kvele debattene. Vi skal tåle det ubehagelige. Det som irriterer, provoserer og endog sjokkerer. Men - vi skal ta igjen. Vi skal svare.

Ja, da kommer jo datalagringsdirektivet til nytte, eller hva, Jens?? >:-(

Angi naboen til staten kan du gjøre selv.

Books I've read in 2011 - December

2011-12-31T13:26:00.000+01:00

Kvinne blant krigsherrer by Malalai Joya
Odd and the Frost Giants by Neil Gaiman
Pastwatch: The Redemption of Christopher Columbus by Orson Scott Card - AUDIO
The Killings on Jubilee Terrace by Robert Barnard
Veien til verdens ende by Sigurd Hoel - AUDIO
Damenes detektivbyrå nr 1 by Alexander McCall Smith - AUDIO
Diana, volume two, by Alexandre Dumas
Egalias døtre by Gerd Brantenberg - AUDIO
Til salgs: Mariana, 15 år by Iana Matei
The Quiet American by Graham Greene - AUDIO
Snobs by Julian Fellowes
The King of Elfland's Daughter by Lord Dunsany
Sjiraffens tårer by Alexander McCall Smith - AUDIO
Moral for vakre piker by Alexander McCall Smith - AUDIO
Fyrster i tåkeland by Emberland/Pettersen, eds.
The Kalahari Typing School for Men by Alexander McCall Smith - AUDIO
The Great Crash of 1929 by John Kenneth Galbraith
Akimbo and the Elephants by Alexander McCall Smith - AUDIO
Kurtby by Erlend Loe - AUDIO
The World's Most Fantastic Freaks by Mike Parker

To bring or not to bring ...

2011-12-22T23:52:00.003+01:00

... a turtle on one's Christmas vacation. That is indeed the question. I'm going to my parents' tomorrow for five days, and I am so torn about whether or not to bring Raphael. I brought him last year ... but that was for his health, because he was so strongly affected by the severe cold we had last winter - what was it, the coldest November for 104 years? - and I was seriously concerned that if I left him at home he would hide himself away somewhere as soon as I walked out the door and sleep for 120 hours ... underneath the carpet, or wherever he'd end up. (That's not a joke about the carpet.)

It's not good for him to be on dry land for that long, so I wasn't too thrilled about that idea ... and ended up taking him with me on vacation, which he wasn't too thrilled about. It was very confusing for him to be in a totally new place like that, even though he had his pond and basking spot and everything. (My mother also wasn't too happy with him being there, she has ophidiophobia and is repulsed by his supposedly snakelike head. :-D But his presence did not adversely affect her health.)

This year it hasn't been anywhere near that cold ... November was extremely mild, in fact, and it's only over the past few days that December's gotten really cold. So I don't have the same worry as last year. But I'm still thinking about taking him with me. He'd probably be fine at home alone, but I know that he's only really interested in one of the two. He'd much rather stay home than go anywhere else, obviously - turtles like familiar places - but he definitely doesn't want to be alone. He wants to be with me ... ideally in physical contact with me, and ideally all the time. I may have mentioned this before; he is rather oversocialized now and overly interested in human contact. Well, at least contact with me. Reptiles supposedly dislike that, but Raphael seems to have missed the memo on that one.

The past couple of weeks I haven't had much time to spend with him, for obvious reasons ... Christmas preparations and all that that entails ... and I can tell that he's not too happy with that. He wants my attention --> is not getting my attention --> is not happy turtle. Five days' vacation would make it possible to spend a lot of time with him, but then of course he would have to be there with me. So I'd have to bring him, even though he won't be happy about going there. But he would be happy about spending lots of time with his precious twolegs. So what to do? To bring or not to bring?

If only turtles could talk ... :-)

Blog neglect

2011-12-19T21:34:00.000+01:00

Sheesh, time flies ... ! It's been a week already since my last post, I don't know where the time has gone. o_O I know I've been really neglecting the blog recently, this month especially ... it is of course a very busy month, so let's blame it on that. I'll do better again soon. Fingers crossed. :-)

YES!

2011-12-12T22:09:00.002+01:00

I totally vote for this! Surprise! :-D

WTF are they doing here?

2011-12-11T20:34:00.001+01:00

'They' being, in this case, Helen Mirren and Rosario Dawson. They are hosting the Nobel concert tonight. I am of course not watching. But I really am wondering WTF these people are doing here. Same old, same old ... I ranted about this last year too, you can read that post here. And I have to specify that like last year, I have nothing against Mirren and Dawson as such. They're just so stupidly irrelevant. And it's so embarrassing that they're here ... that the whole concert and celebration is set up the way it is. Sheesh. Read my post from last year, I already said it all there. :-)

But I also want to say, and this is not repeating myself, since he just came out with this now, that I totally agree with Michael Nobel in his views on the Norwegian Nobel Committee. Geir Lundestad needs to go. Don't even get me started on Jagland ... but Lundestad, seriously? When confronted with Nobel's criticisms he actually laughed. What an arrogant prick that man is. I for one totally agree with Nobel that the Committee have exceeded their mandate to an appalling degree. I'm not sure letting the Swedes take over would make things any better, but something definitely needs to be done.

How about changing the committee from a final resting place for washed up politicians into, I don't know, a team of normally intelligent professionals with relevant backgrounds and expertise? I don't know, it's just a crazy thought I had. Crazy ...

Name and shame

2011-12-10T21:23:00.002+01:00

There's clearly something wrong with the laws in this country when guys like the scumbag in this article is walking around as a free man. And working a new job, no less. (The article is in Norwegian, but I'm sure that all of you reading this, if you're not Norwegian, have people just as scummy in all of your own countries too.) It's so wrong that it's actually possible to deliberately scam people out of their money - inflict economic harm on others for your own personal gain - and risk no legal sanction for it as long as it's done the right way. Well, 'right'. And they call it 'business'. Shit. What kind of business is that that doesn't produce anything, not even money, just numbers? Fuck 'em.

Now that the harm is done, what IMO is also really wrong with our laws is that Aftenposten in this article is - I presume - not allowed to name the guy in their article. Since he hasn't been convicted of anything, it's probably slander if they do. Fuck that shit too. People like this should be named and shamed. All of Bergen should be plastered with posters of this guy. And I would really like to know where this guy works now so I can avoid that institution at all costs.

I'm sure I'm not the only one who'd like to know that. Fortunately, in our brave new world of information everywhere I'm sure someone will be able to suss the guy out and start a group, or whatever, against him on Facebook. I'd theoretically consider joining that group.

A beautiful poem

2011-12-08T21:46:00.000+01:00

I'm not much for poetry, but this is just beautiful. I love this. So wonderful what can be done with words.

Postcrossing annoyance

2011-12-07T22:00:00.005+01:00

Can I just mention one thing that really annoys me on Postcrossing? It doesn't happen often, but when it does, I always feel like ... well, it really pisses me off. I won't name names, but if this applies to you, you should seriously reconsider what you're doing, because pretty much everyone else who comes across you on the site thinks you're a cheap hypocritical bitch.

Isn't it incredibly annoying when you either get somebody's address, or you get a card from somebody, and you see on their profile that they specify that they don't want ad cards ... and then you go to their wall and see that pretty much EVERY SINGLE CARD they send out is - you guessed it - an ad card? Kinda like the one they just sent to you, say.

Yeah, that seriously pisses me off. >:-(

SNOW!!

2011-12-06T22:08:00.004+01:00

This afternoon at work the phones suddenly disconnected, and just then I noticed that it was snowing outside. It had been snowing for a little while but I only noticed it then. Totally unrelated of course, but still. :-) I'm not much of a snow fan generally, but right now I'm thinking YAY! :-D You know, as long as it's only a couple of inches and not three feet.

What if he's right??

2011-12-05T22:34:00.000+01:00

Well, she spells it 'Stephenie', but other than that I think this is spot on. It really is the only sensible explanation. Alas.

Books I've read in 2011 - November

2011-11-30T22:02:00.003+01:00

Diana, volume one by Alexandre Dumas

The Elephant Whisperer by Lawrence Anthony

Politi og røver by Kjetil S Østli - AUDIO

Not Buying It by Judith Levine

Den vidunderlige kjærlighetens historie

by Carl-Johan Vallgren - AUDIO

Sitt ned og hold kjeft by Knut Nærum

The Forest of Hands and Teeth by Carrie Ryan

Solar by Ian McEwan - AUDIO

Dypet by Tom Kristensen - AUDIO

Mysteries and Legends - Virginia by Emilee Hines

En verdensomseiling under havet by Jules Verne - AUDIO

Ulysses by James Joyce - AUDIO

The Vintage Mencken by HL Mencken, Alistair Cooke

Tordengudens sønn by Arto Paasilinna - AUDIO

The Moth Diaries by Rachel Klein

Kurt blir grusom by Erlend Loe - AUDIO

Quote of the Week

2011-11-29T19:06:00.000+01:00

All men are frauds. The only difference between them is that some admit it. I myself deny it.

HL Mencken

It's happening again

2011-11-28T22:25:00.000+01:00

I think Keanu's becoming a meme again. Well, at least this time he's philosophical instead of sad. Kind of stupidly philosophical, but still, it's an improvement.

Not too smart

2011-11-27T22:17:00.000+01:00

Staying up really really late watching American Horror Story and then, standing in your darkened hall about to go to bed, totally forgetting that the light sensor in the hallway can detect motion inside the apartments too, if it's just inside a door and the door has a peephole. So no, the fact that the lights just went on in the hallway - very noticeable via that very same peephole - doesn't mean that someone standing outside your door just moved. You did that yourself.

Better check all the same, just to be on the safe side.

IT IS DONE

2011-11-26T16:26:00.005+01:00

Yes, finally, my torment is over. I can't tell you how happy I am. In the future, I may be happy about the actual achievement as well, but right now, I'm really only so thrilled that the ordeal is behind me.

I have read, all the way through, James Joyce's Ulysses. I really have. Remember I posted about how I was reading it, or trying to, and just slowly struggling my way through it ... ? That was only three weeks ago. Well, 20 days. And now I'm actually done. It was a long hard slog at first ... I seemed to be making hardly any progress and I felt like I would never hear the end of this thing. But about a week and a half ago I got my metaphorical second wind and got really serious with it. Some days I've been listening to upwards of ninety minutes of this boring trash. It's been horrendous, but now I finally have my reward. I finished it this morning.

NEVER AGAIN ... !!!

Kleine kids

2011-11-25T23:23:00.008+01:00

Den siste tida har jeg innsett at jeg ikke er inne i slangen de unge bruker nå til dags. Det er jeg forsåvidt glad for. Jeg hadde egentlig trodd at jeg ikke helt hadde mistet kontakten med ungdommens språk, men jo, det har jeg nok, og det er slett ikke det verste som kan skje. Når jeg tok Aftenpostens språktest her om dagen fikk jeg opplyst at jeg har en språklig alder på ... hva var det nå, 74 år? Bare fordi jeg ikke er så tett i nøtta at jeg tror at det heter et hamster. >:-(

Men i alle fall. Jeg har skjønt at jeg ikke vet hvordan ungdommen snakker, og denne innsikten har jeg oppnådd gjennom massemedia. Til og med Dagbladet har altså fortsatt sin misjon. Som alle gamle avfeldige knarker som ikke forstår verden rundt seg lenger irriterer også jeg meg over hvordan disse unge jyplingene maltrakterer språket vårt. Det er spesielt to ord som irriterer meg i ekstrem grad og som jeg nå bare må beklage meg over.

Det ene er adjektivet kleint, som tydeligvis er det helt store dilleordet for tiden, av en eller annen ubegripelig grunn. Det må være svært mye brukt - alle unge kvasikjendiser, fra Trekanttullinger til jockeyer som har sett døden i hvitøyet, og en lang rekke helt ukjente brødhuer, blir sitert på dette ordet. Da kan jeg knapt forestille meg hvor ofte de bruker det i dagligtalen, hvis de er villige til å la seg forevige i landets største aviser med så idiotiske utsagn. Hvor kommer dette fra? Dansk? Tysk? Det virker ikke særlig kebabnorsk. Men det er i hvert fall utrolig irriterende.

Dog ikke på langt nær så irriterende som det faktum at nordmenn nå tydeligvis har begynt å bruke ordet kids når de mener barn eller unger. Dette begynte vel som noe hipsterironisk, at de som var hakket eldre skulle virke underholdende nedlatende mot generasjonene under seg ved å kalle dem for kidsa. Men nå har det altså gått over i mainstream, dessverre, og det ser ut til å brukes som om det var et virkelig ord, et normalt ord. Og ikke bare av ungdommen heller - folk som hevder seg å være småbarnsforeldre bruker det. Jeg er far til to kids, for eksempel. Hæ? Er du en geitebukk, eller hva er det du innbiller deg at du sier?

På tross av at det norske språket er langt fra fattig sliter jeg med å uttrykke hvor enormt irriterende jeg synes dette ordet og bruken av det er. Språket vårt er ikke fattig, men om det noen gang blir det, så kommer det til å være på grunn av disse personene som bruker slike ord. Er du en av dem? Du skulle faen meg hatt deg en på trynet.

News flash

2011-11-24T21:03:00.002+01:00

Til de som trenger å høre det, og dem er det visst noen av:

Ytringsfrihet kan ikke misbrukes. Det er derfor det er ytringsfrihet.

Veldig god kommentar her. Langt fra alltid jeg er enig med Gunnar Stavrum, men denne gangen er han god. Men hartkorn staves altså ikke med d.

Turtle attack

2011-11-23T20:19:00.000+01:00

The camera strap will be defeated ... !!

Interesting interview

2011-11-22T22:41:00.002+01:00

Not available yet, but will be soon. Only in Norwegian, though. :-) We recorded another episode of Saltklypa tonight and devoted the entire episode to Andreas Heldal-Lund, of Operation Clambake fame. It's going to be a pretty long one, because, and I quote, we 'let him talk way too much'. :-D His words, not ours. Time goes so fast ... and everything he said was so interesting. :-)

Keep an eye out for the episode - it'll be released in a few days' time - and in the meantime, check out Andreas' website, here, for everything you ever wanted to know about the 'Church' of $cientology.

Suddenly, a wild thought appears!!

2011-11-21T21:46:00.000+01:00

Actually kind of a weird and creepy thought. Goes really well with this photo.

A hell of a show

2011-11-20T21:09:00.004+01:00

So, we saw the show yesterday, and we both laughed our heads off ... along with the rest of a very happy audience. It rocked. If you twist my arm, I guess I would have to admit that it isn't quite as good as the previous production. It's really very very good, but it's maybe not quite up there with the 1996 'version'. We both agreed on this. It looks extremely similar - they may even be using the same sets and props - and the director is, strangely, the very same, so I have no choice but to put it down mostly to the actors.

I say mostly because we also both agreed that we have become older and more blasé since 1996. ;-)

Don't get me wrong, they did a great job, both of them. But Hatlo and Joner were amazing. They're always amazing together, whatever they're doing. They just absolutely blew this show out of the water and I think that anyone who saw them in it back then will probably be just the teensiest bit ... not let down, but ... well ... slightly less impressed this time around.

But all the same it's a hysterical and fantastic production and we totally loved it. I'm thinking I want to see it again. :-) You should go too!! :-) You'll laugh till your face hurts, or you should see a doctor. :-)

Fadervår forbedret

2011-11-19T13:12:00.004+01:00

En svært forbedret utgave av Fadervår. Denne liker jeg. Kan nesten overveie å begynne med aftenbønn nå. ;-)

Fader vår, la din bok holdes lukket, prakk den ikke på oss for vi er opplyste og gjennomskuer dens falskhet. La dens vold være historie og plag oss ikke mere for vi er et sekulært samfunn.

Fra en kommentar i diskusjonen under denne artikkelen i Aftenposten.

Want to get a good laugh?

2011-11-18T23:50:00.002+01:00

Then you really can't beat live theater at its best. Sure, movies can be tremendously funny too, but IMO there's really nothing to beat live theater when it's done just right. And right now here in Oslo you have the chance to see something that is exactly right. :-)

Anyone remember Mysteriet Myrna Vep? It was produced for the first, or was it second, time in Norway right here in town in 1996, starring the fantastically comical pair of Anders Hatlo and Johannes Joner, and it was absolutely beyond brilliant. I went to see it three times and I laughed till it hurt every time. Now it's on again - opened a month ago - this time starring Simon Andersen and Stig Werner-Moe. The former I'm sure will be fantastic; the latter I have never seen in anything, but the reviews indicate that the casting is right on the money this time too.

The Mystery of Irma Vep is a brilliant play for two actors. They must be either both male or both female; this is stipulated in the performance rights. There are seven characters; crossdressing is inevitable and costume changes extremely frequent and very impressive. Each actor needs his or her own highly skilled dresser, who are almost as important to the play's success as the actors. The play, which was written by the American playwright Charles Ludlam in the early 80s, is on the face of it a gothic horror mystery, but it's really a totally wacky comedy. If you can see this play without laughing, you must be dead.

The current production will run at Centralteatret through December 17th. I'm going to see it tomorrow night. I am SO excited that I can hardly wait. We've had our tickets since August and now we are practically swooning with excitement. One more day ... !! :-o

Innenriks, anyone?

2011-11-17T22:12:00.001+01:00

Usj nei, norsk er et vanskelig språk altså.

Quote of the Week

2011-11-16T21:20:00.000+01:00

A celebrity is one who is known to many persons he is glad he doesn't know.

H.L. Mencken

Ninjas and pirates and zombies, oh my!

2011-11-15T21:23:00.002+01:00

And princesses and aliens! But not just any old ninjas and pirates and zombies and princesses and aliens!! No! MEEPLE ninjas and pirates and zombies and princesses and aliens!!! :-D

Look they are so many!!1 Everywhar!!1!

Five different kinds, and all of them SO COOL ... !1! They are all megameeple, normal sized meeple don't come in this much detail, it would be too tricky. So sayeth the wonderful folks over at MeepleSource. But who cares!! We'll squeeze those giant meeple on there! Pirates on the roads, zombies in the fields!! Aliens in every town!! Are you with me?? :-D

Watch your back, the aliens have got their eyes on you ... o_O Aliens in Carcassonne. It's what's always been missing in my life.

Consider yourselves warned (you know who you are) - next board game night, we are soo playing Carcassonne. ;-)

He totally would have!

2011-11-14T22:33:00.001+01:00

Ahahahahaha!! Fantastic! :-D

If you haven't seen this movie, you really need to get hold of it. Al Pacino as Satan, come on! :-D

Little house in the big woods

2011-11-13T20:44:00.002+01:00

Well, I'm not sure it's exactly the big woods. You don't have to go very far to hit a main road. Then again, it is Värmland. :-) There's nothing much except the road. ;-)

My mother bought a house in Sweden this summer, much to the distress of my father at the time, but now he's fixing it up like a champ. Even doing lots of stuff that nobody's asking him to do ... and loving it like I knew he would. ;-) It's already very charming but I think it's got a lot of improvements ahead of it still. I totally love the place, I can't tell you why exactly but I just love being there. I jump at every chance to go. Like this weekend ... my mother's in Copenhagen, but my father was going to Sweden, so I asked to go with him. Of course he was thrilled at the idea.

Now, I totally accept that he was primarily happy to have company. And especially that of his only child. However, it was certainly very convenient that he also wouldn't have to cook dinner for himself, since naturally I would be doing that. I'm a woman, so ... Right? I put this to him and he denied the charges, of course not, anyone who feels like it can do the cooking, he wasn't thinking about that at all. I pretended to believe him. This was on Friday.

Then yesterday - by which time he had clearly forgotten the details of our conversation - he came in from doing some work on the property, I was sitting in my room reading, in my new* chair. I heard him opening the front door, this was about 1pm ... and I heard him call out, Leisha? Are you going to make me some lunch?

Sure, anyone can cook who feels like it! :-D

Here's our little house, isn't it pretty. And soo Swedish-looking. ;-)

*I say new, what I mean is that I kind of rescued it from the dump. But it's new to me ... and totally comfortable. Free stuff, yay!

Pointless but harmless

2011-11-11T11:11:00.002+01:00

I didn't actually post this on Friday. I left for Sweden early Friday morning and didn't have time to post anything. But I'm still going back to update the blog with this post, because I want to have something posted on this very unusual date - 11/11/11. I know, it's totally meaningless ... but it's kind of fun anyway. And at least this is harmless. Some people take it a few steps further, and it can definitely get beyond harmless. Sheesh, humans.

Quote of the Week

2011-11-10T22:18:00.000+01:00

I'd like to share a revelation that I’ve had during my time here. It came to me when I tried to classify your species, and I realised that humans are not actually mammals. Every mammal on this planet instinctively develops a natural equilibrium with the surrounding environment; but you humans do not. Instead you multiply, and multiply, until every resource is consumed. The only way for you to survive is to spread to another area. There is another organism on this planet that follows the same pattern... a virus. Human beings are a disease, a cancer on this planet, you are a plague.
Agent Smith, The Matrix

Even though I'm such a massive Keanufan, I never really got all that into The Matrix. Probably because I rooted for the other guy. I think Agent Smith is totally right. We suck. The world would be infinitely better off without us. >:-(

Post inspired, if that's the word I want, by this tragic and infuriating news.

Norgesrekord!

2011-11-09T21:06:00.000+01:00

Norgeshistoriens beste oppmøte på BookCrossing-treff, så vidt jeg kjenner til: 15 personer. Noen bedre? :-)

J&M tell it like it is

2011-11-08T21:07:00.002+01:00

I love Jesus and Mo. I mean, who doesn't? Sometimes - or in fact, often - the Author just says things so well and puts his finger on something so exactly. And in only four panels, too. Major kudos.

REEVES

2011-11-07T22:15:00.000+01:00

YES. :-D

I really love this shot for some reason. :-)

Less interesting book

2011-11-06T20:31:00.004+01:00

Another book I'm reading, or trying to read, is far from recommendable. Ulysses by James Joyce. I'm reading it because it's on the 1001 list. (I know, I know.) I got it on audio and it lasts FOREVER. Seriously, it just goes on and on and on and on. Each track is about half an hour long and there are 64 of them. o_O I could only do this on audio. I don't mean to offend any Irishmen reading this, but, sheesh. I hope they don't make you read the whole thing in school. I know it's supposed to be an amazing classic, but it's mostly just boring me to tears. I'm now at track 25 and I can hardly find anything at all to keep my interest. And there are forty more tracks!! :-o At least there's a mention here and there of a Dublin street that I remember walking along, otherwise I might almost be tempted to throw in the towel.

I know, I know ...

V. interesting book

2011-11-05T11:25:00.001+01:00

Just started reading it. Very thought-provoking. Deals with some issues that I think about a lot. So far highly recommendable.

Quote of the Week

2011-11-04T23:54:00.000+01:00

If we are to go on living together on this earth, we must all be responsible for it.
Kofi Annan

This is SO TRUE

2011-11-03T22:13:00.001+01:00

This is the truest Rage Comic I've ever seen. I feel this.

Ooh, and on a totally unrelated subject: happy birthday to James!!! :-D

A pretty crazy story

2011-11-02T20:07:00.002+01:00

Finally getting around to telling that crazy story I promised. :-)

Anne Ida and Tanumine and I went to my mother's house in Sweden this past weekend, to celebrate Anne Ida's birthday, and we might have had a more eventful time than we expected. Fortunately that didn't pan out, everything was fine and we made it back home alive and unharmed. ;-) Here's the crazy back story.

The weekend before our trip, my parents were at the house and spent some days there. When they got there Thursday night, they suddenly got an unexpected visit from a hitherto unknown neighbor. There are a couple of neighbors that they've introduced themselves to, they seem nice and normal, but this guy, well ... did not. They didn't even know about him, but apparently he lives pretty close, we just can't see his house through the forest. So, it was dark by then, and he arrived while they were carrying their groceries in from the car, but they felt they had to invite him in for coffee.

While they were having coffee he told them about himself. Oh, and he had a dog with him too, a 'creepy' dog according to my mother. It was an amstaff, so she may have just thought it looked creepy - they aren't exactly eye candy - because they can be really sweet and wonderful dogs. But she says no, it really was creepy too. I can't say, obviously. But she didn't like his dog. He told them that he had worked for years in a psychiatric institution, and told them various stories from them days ... this was kind of fun actually, my mother said that although he said he'd worked there, she and my father had kind of been thinking, well ... And I said, you were thinking that he was actually a patient instead. OMG YES! :-D

Anyway, he stayed for what they felt was a little too long, but they finally got rid of him. The next day was a Friday, and they were having some electricians come over to fix the pretty shoddy electrical system in the house. They didn't know when in the day they would get there, so my father had given them his key. Turned out they got there early enough that my parents were still in. The guy with the key gave it back to my father. Now, he remembers getting the key back. The problem is he doesn't remember what he did with it afterwards. o_O

He thinks he may have tried the lock with it. The lock is kind of tricky, it doesn't work all that well, at least not with my mother's key, which was the only one they'd tried. He wanted to try his key too ... that's what he was planning to do. But he doesn't remember. Whatever he did, the key is now gone without a trace. Nobody remembers seeing it after he got it back. This is where it gets kind of crazy.

Friday afternoon my uncle and aunt arrived, and of course spent the night. Saturday morning they all went out to drive to Arvika, one of the closest towns. Actually a pretty charming place. (Coming up on my Youtube channel. ;-) When they got out to my father's car, they saw that a huge pile of dog shit had been left right outside the driver's side front door, and, get this, the mirror on that side was twisted all out of whack. I don't know anything about cars, but my father says that the way it was twisted is something that can't really happen by accident, like if you brush up against it ... you have to really grab it and twist it. So someone must have been there and done it on purpose ... someone with a dog. Sound like anyone we might know?

It's obvious where this is leading. My father thinks the possibly crazy neighbor came over again in the night, let his dog take a huge dump on our property, temporarily vandalized the car and stole the key that some irresponsible person left in the front door. Far be it from me to point fingers. But this is his theory. He admits that he probably screwed up, which is pretty rare. ;-) When we were there this weekend we looked for the key, but unfortunately couldn't find it. Alas. It would have been so fantastic if we had found it in his jacket pocket. >:-)

Now, my dear old dad may have messed up with the key - though we still don't know if he really did forget it in the door - but no one can say that he doesn't clean up his messes. When we arrived at the house (with proper warning ;-) we had to negotiate two booby traps ... one a snow shovel that fell out of the front door when we opened it, and one a thread strung across the front door that anyone entering would have snapped if they didn't know about it. It was not snapped. We also had a list with us with the details of the beer and liquor supply, which we had to check, to see that all of his beers were still there. They all were. I noticed he didn't bother to count my cans of cider. They were also still all there, but even so.

We spent a quiet and uneventful weekend, as far as visits from weirdo neighbors go, and upon leaving followed my father's instructions and rigged the thread and snow shovel booby trap again. :-D Next weekend - a week and a half from now - he's going there to, among other things, change the lock.

What do you wanna bet we find the missing key in about five days' time after that?

Luke 6:41

2011-11-01T21:53:00.001+01:00

I know, you don't often find me quoting the bible on this blog. Or anywhere else, for that matter. But right now it says exactly what I want to say.

Why do you look at the speck that is in your brother’s eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye?

Has anyone else been following the debate - if that's the word I want - on what to do about the recent assault rape epidemic here in Oslo? Fabian Stang, our mayor, said something sensible on the issue this weekend ... that maybe we should consider trying to get some kind of control of the asylum seekers (quite a few of them probably no longer asylum seekers, but illegal immigrants) who are committing an absolutely grotesque percentage of these criminal acts. Of course the PC brigade was immediately up in arms and frothing at the mouth, as per usual, over this hideously racist idea. :-(

The amazing thing is that these people really don't see the logs in their own eyes. They critize Stang for branding a whole group as criminals, and stigmatizing people by generalizing in this way. I disagree with that, I don't think Stang is stigmatizing these uncivilized barbarians, I think they manage that just fine on their own. But what I want to point out is how their argument then continues. It's pretty amazing.

Let me see if I can sum it up here. I've seen this argument, if that's the word I want, pop up a number of times in the past few days. This problem has to do with attitudes that men have. Rapes happen because men need an attitude adjustment. Here it's explained over eight paragraphs. Men are the problem.

Stigmatizing whole groups and overgeneralizing is a really bad thing, mmkay?

Books I've read in 2011 - October

2011-10-31T21:44:00.002+01:00

The Woman in Black by Susan Hill

Det ufattelige var sant by Walter Laqueur

Motstand by Owen Sheers - AUDIO

Ravnene av Vidar Sundstøl - AUDIO

Den hellige liga, volume 3 by Alexandre Dumas

Norsk litteraturhistorie fritt etter hukommelsen

by Knut Nærum - AUDIO

Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen - AUDIO

Döda vita män by Johan Hakelius

Jane Austen. A Life by Claire Tomalin

Dreadfully Ever After by Steve Hockensmith

Prosten og hans forunderlige tjener by Arto Paasilinna - AUDIO

On Beauty by Zadie Smith - AUDIO

Småtrollene og den store oversvømmelsen

by Tove Jansson - AUDIO

The Vicar of Wakefield by Oliver Goldsmith

Gutten i graven ved siden av by Katarina Mazetti

Den tionde kretsen by Jodi Picoult

And happy birthday to Anne Ida!!! :-)

Need gloves?

2011-10-30T20:25:00.002+01:00

Or mittens? Can't decide?

WHY NOT ZOIDBERG???

A promise

2011-10-28T15:08:00.000+02:00

If I survive this weekend, I will tell you a pretty crazy story. :-)

Have a good one!

Popcorn, anyone?

2011-10-27T18:14:00.003+02:00

An interesting article in Aftenposten online today about movie theaters in Oslo and their development over the years. From movie theaters to popcorn machines. :-) Good reading and some interesting points raised. You should read it. :-)

A wonderful biography

2011-10-26T21:44:00.001+02:00

Jane Austen is one of the most fascinating historical figures I know. Someone who lived such a limited life, and had such enormous creative power. Imagine what she could have achieved if she had lived in our time, and had all the options available to women now that were only flights of fancy - if that - in hers. Or ... ? Maybe she would have been distracted by all the myriad, well, distractions that are almost ubiquitous now ... the constant media barrage you can't get away from, the social and commercial pressures on women that I'm sure Austen would have chafed under, and so on. Maybe her creativity would have found easier outlet in our time, but maybe it would have dispersed to many little trickles rather than the great force it became while she lived. I really don't know.

Whatever she might have been, she really was a fascinating person. If you want to learn more about her and her time and society, and be hugely entertained too, then you should keep an eye out for this book. Wonderful. :-)

When I grow up ...

2011-10-25T22:11:00.002+02:00

... I want to get a job in the equal rights factory. I just need to learn a little bit about the trade first, like what measurement unit is used for equal rights.

Is this guy trolling now, or what is this?

Our high percentage of women in the workplace is one of the most important reasons why our economy is so much better than in other countries. Srsly? It's not because of the oil?

This is why this nation is going to have an absolutely brutal awakening the day that very finite resource runs out. We don't have leaders, or politicians generally, that talk about what really needs doing and how we can get it done. What are we going to live on when the oil's all gone? Seriously? Sure, he's not saying that the oil isn't important. Just that equal rights are more important. o_O Having women work and pay taxes, and not just men, means a lot more resources being pumped into our economy. I get that that's what he's saying. But.

Isn't it the case right now that something like 75% of all Norwegian women above the age of 20 are actually already in the workforce? I think that in the age group 30-49 it's 80%, or maybe even closer to 85%. So how much exactly does Lysbakken think we have to go on? The overwhelming majority of Norwegian women already work. I despair at a leading figure in national politics actually thinking that that is the issue.

Then again, anyone who'd name their child 'Aurora' clearly has some kind of problem.

Yeah, or ...

2011-10-24T17:41:00.000+02:00

... 'Fuck, I forgot The Matrix.' o_O

Widescreen here.

Sukk

2011-10-22T22:57:00.000+02:00

Når jeg leser sånt som dette skammer jeg meg over at jeg noengang har stemt på SV.

Audun Lysbakken, SVs sikreste vei rett under sperregrensa. Det er nok muligens like bra.

A funny story

2011-10-21T22:56:00.003+02:00

Or maybe it isn't funny, maybe it's more kind of sad and pathetic. But here it is.

Yesterday at work O. and I were talking about the certain kind of helplessness that is typically found in a certain generation of men. Basically, our fathers' generation. :-) A customer got us to thinking about it. O.'s mother passed away when he was just in his early twenties, and he told me how he and his brother, who had both left home by then, were pretty frustrated by his father being extremely impractical with cooking and things like that which his wife had normally taken care of. This reminded me of a true story from my own life. My mother's still alive of course, so my father hasn't had to learn how to cook. >:-) But he can cook a few things. Like pancakes. Or so I thought.

Back when I lived with my parents, we used to always have pancakes one day a week, the day when my mother worked late. I would get home first and make the batter. It should sit for a while, so I used to leave it until my father got home ... then he would fry enough pancakes for the two of us and we'd eat together. My mother would get home a couple of hours later and fry up the rest of the batter for herself, so she'd get fresh pancakes too. It was a perfect scheme. :-) Then one day the following happened.

I was delayed one day on pancake day, so that I only got home almost an hour after my father did. I sent him a message about it, he said OK, so I figured that by the time I arrived he would have the pancakes ready and we could just eat. But no. Nothing was ready. He was just sitting in his easy chair reading the newspaper. I asked where dinner was, hadn't he made any pancakes? No, of course not. He couldn't. There wasn't any batter ...

So that was kind of messed up, IMO. But this afternoon at the grocery store, the guy ahead of me in line - he was about my father's age, what a coincidence - was buying ready made pancakes. Seriously. They were vacuum packed ... I'm not sure how many were in each package, looked like about ten, and he was getting three or four packages. OH MY FUCKING GOD. What is wrong with people???*

If this is where the bar is set my dad could become a chef in his old age. o_O

*What's wrong with people is that everybody complains that food is so expensive in this country, and then there is actually a market for ready made pancakes. Fuck you, my fellow Norwegians. You need professional help.

Quote of the Week

2011-10-20T22:02:00.002+02:00

APOSTATE, n.: A leech who, having penetrated the shell of a turtle only to find that the creature has long been dead, deems it expedient to form a new attachment to a fresh turtle.

Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary

Vintage lizard!

2011-10-19T22:03:00.000+02:00

Ooh, check it out ... ! Very cool postcard that I got from Daïre in Estonia on my birthday last week. Isn't it fantastic? Black and white works incredibly well in photographing reptiles sometimes ... it's to do with how it shows light and shadow on their bodies, I think. Kind of chiaroscuro, if that's the word I want. :-)

Pretty sure this is 'just' a regular bearded dragon, Pogona vitticeps or some related species. But it's still wonderful. Hey, there's a reason why they're so popular.

I love dogs, but ...

2011-10-18T22:25:00.000+02:00

... I really wouldn't want this one. Ick. Who wants that in their house? I wouldn't be able to sleep at night. And that thing would probably be standing at the foot of the bed staring at me.

Make sure to check out the alternative captions, there are some really good ones. Free puppy - the assassinations cost extra.

Do you know ...

2011-10-17T22:07:00.000+02:00

... what people who work in emergency rooms call people like Keanu Reeves?

Donorcyclists.

Yeah, I know, he wears a helmet when he rides in California. (Which I assume was in fact the body that passed the helmet law, and not the city of L.A.) But he'd rather not. That's pretty pathetic. To borrow the immortal words of Jerry Seinfeld: a brain so stupid it doesn't even try to prevent the cracking of the skull that it's in.

Weird, because Keanu is mostly a really smart guy. But even smart people can be really really dumb sometimes.

Quote of the Week

2011-10-16T22:37:00.003+02:00

I declare after all there is no enjoyment like reading! How much sooner one tires of anything than of a book!

Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice

'Rockeulven'

2011-10-15T22:39:00.005+02:00

So, we went to see it last night, and I gotta tell you, it is FANTASTIC. We all agreed that it exceeded our very high expectations. Everything was fabulous. There was really nothing I could put my finger on and say that this was a weak point. Totally and absolutely fantastic. You must see it. :-)

The plot has been changed a bit from the movie (and when I say the movie, I'm talking about the English language version which is the only one I have seen - I know that the Russian and Romanian ones have different storylines, but I've never had the chance to see them), there are fewer characters and they've sort of thrown the music about a bit. The same songs pop up several times in different scenes. That actually works really well. Since it's partly for children (there were a LOT of adults in the audience ;-) I'm sure it's a good choice to keep familiar things coming back like that. The music is so fantastic that hearing it over again is never annoying, only wonderful. :-)

The costumes are just to die for ... they are all so well done, emphasising the exact right traits to make each of the characters convincing as whatever animal they are supposed to be, as well as keeping the 70s look just right for the movie fans. The costume department must have had soo much fun making them. :-) Hair and makeup are all great too. I really loved the white hair on the Hens. :-)

The scenography is brilliant, fantastically well done ... very simple, the stage is kept almost bare, but soo suggestive, you never wonder what it is you're seeing, even when there's hardly anything there. I'm pretty sure that would have been the same even if we hadn't seen the movie. The few set pieces there are are extremely evocative and really brings the scenes to life, even as simple as they are. Absolutely wonderful. Of course I expect that, it's the National Theater, but even so I was impressed.

What really made this so perfect though was the cast. O.M.G. I hardly know what to say. Absolutely everyone was absolutely fantastic. :-) Not a single person could have been better. That is extra impressive because there are children playing some roles ... the Lamb, the Piglet and the Chicken are played by adults, but for obvious reasons the three kid goats have to be played by real children. (If I tell you why that's obvious, I'd be revealing too much of the plot, so sorry, you'll just have to go see for yourselves. ;-) And they were pretty young children - one of them, the littlest goat, can't have been more than five, six at most. She was still really really good. She didn't just say the lines that she'd been taught, as most children that age will do (even in legitimate theater), she really acted her part. A very talented girl. Although if the one we saw was Elsa Døvigen-Ousdal (there are three children for each of these three parts) she clearly has acting talent in her genes. ;-)

Since it's the National Theater, you expect some big names ... but in a play like this, maybe not so much. Well, they're here, though. Quite a few big names, some very big. Lasse Lindtner, Anne Marie Ottersen, Anne Krigsvoll, Mari Maurstad, Kjersti Elvik, Finn Schau, Anne Marit Jacobsen ... the latter in one of the best roles of her career. She plays the Chicken. She is beyond fantastic. I'd go so far as to say that she's perfect.

All the actors do a marvellous job, really showing the species characteristics of each animal that we need to recognize them. The four Hens are really wonderful. Lena Kristin Ellingsen and Øystein Røger are fantastic as the Goat and the Wolf. But the one I have to really point out is someone I can't say I am familiar with at all - Tor Ivar Hagen, who I never heard of but suspect may be on loan from Trøndelag Theater, where this play was first produced, and where he also played the same role. He is totally and completely amazing as the Donkey. He IS the Donkey. His costume and hair is one of the absolute best in the entire production, so of course that helps a lot, but it's also his face, his delivery and first and foremost his body language that just makes him be this character. He totally blew me away. This production is almost worth seeing for him alone. o_O

I have to apologize that this post is so laden with superlatives, but I can't help it ... this thing really deserves every last one of them. And more. I'm tempted to use the a-word. If you love musical theater and you have any chance whatsoever of getting to Oslo, you MUST see this. Seriously. You must see it. You can buy tickets at the theater's website, here. GO AND BUY YOUR TICKET!!

Don't forget that half an hour before showtime they sell whatever tickets are left at half price. ;-)

A tiny glimpse from the show here - the Goat teaching the kids the secret song:

Just outside, in the background, you can see the Donkey as he listens and relays the lyrics to the Lynx and the Wolverine, as part of their nefarious scheme to help the Wolf gain access to the Goat's house and eat the innocent little kids. :-D

Fullscreen here.

Happy birthday to me!

2011-10-14T00:15:00.000+02:00

I'm so excited! I just can't hide it! Whee!! :-D

Happy birthday to C.!

2011-10-13T23:14:00.000+02:00

A truck stop along an Egyptian highway. What next?? ;-)

An episode

2011-10-12T16:46:00.002+02:00

An episode which happened to me at work today, with a customer who I think maybe had an episode. :-D

This guy comes in pretty often, he's in charge of purchases for a division of one of our biggest customers. I've talked to him a hundred times and of course I know his name. And he knows that I know it. So this was kind of weird.

He came in to pick up some stuff and buy a few things, and also to bring in a power tool that needed repairs. Whenever I get anything in for repair I fill out a form on it, with info on what is wrong and the customer's contact information and so on. So I wrote down the company name and the guy's last name. Let's call him John Smith. So we're looking at the paper where I've just written 'Smith,' - he's seeing it upside down of course, but still, it's his own name. Then the following was said:

Me: So, your phone number, what's that again?
Customer: Smith!
Me: No, I already have your name, I meant your phone number.
Customer: John!
Me: ... Still need the phone number.
Customer: Oh, right. Let's see [tells me the number, which I write down].

He had a younger colleague with him, to help carry I guess; he was really laughing, he even asked the guy, Did you just have a stroke or something? :-) Sure, we shouldn't be laughing at stroke patients, but on the other hand, if you can't laugh, what can you do? (Take up politics, perhaps.) And it was pretty funny at the time. This is such a crazy busy week that I don't have time to blog about anything serious. :-)

Miss Austen, WTF?

2011-10-11T21:30:00.004+02:00

So, I'm rereading Pride & Prejudice. An audio version this time, that I got over at emusic. It's the sixth or seventh time I've read it. One of the hallmarks of great literature is supposedly that no matter how many times you read it, there's always something new to discover. And this time, I actually did notice something in the story that I've never picked up on before. It's so weird that I think I must have misheard. One of you other Austen fans, help me out here.

Right, so, after the shit hits the fan with the Bingleys, a few weeks later it's Christmas, right? The Gardiners come up from London for the holidays. Jane is feeling blue and Elizabeth and Mrs Gardiner decide that she should go stay with them in town for a while. So after Christmas they take her back to London with them. Then nothing much happens in January and February, but in March, Lizzie's going with William and Maria Lucas to visit Charlotte. On the way they spend one day and night in London, and of course they stay the night in Gracechurch Street. The Gardiner kids are excited about the guests arriving, especially Lizzie because she's such a favorite. But they're still a little shy with her at first, because, and this is what I think I must have misheard, they haven't seen her for like a year. WTF?

Is Austen really saying that Mr and Mrs Gardiner went off at Christmas to spend the holidays with their favorite relatives and have fun in the countryside, and left their children at home?

I always read them as really good parents, but now I have to reconsider. o_O

Samurai ... !!

2011-10-10T22:16:00.001+02:00

Keanu with a fan on set of 47 Ronin. I'm really looking forward to seeing that movie. :-)

Quote of the Week

2011-10-09T22:29:00.000+02:00

Nothing amuses me more than the easy manner with which everybody settles the abundance of those who have a great deal less than themselves.

Jane Austen, Mansfield Park

Mmm, mias!!

2011-10-08T19:27:00.002+02:00

Hvem liker vel ikke mias??

Mais derimot er ikke jeg så kjempefan av, men hver sin smak.

Eat a dead horse

2011-10-07T17:20:00.003+02:00

Why yes, says Sparta, I rather think I will!

Widescreen here.

WHY can't there be a rule ...

2011-10-06T21:07:00.004+02:00

... that says that before you can write about something in the newspapers, you have to show that you actually understand what you're talking about?

This happens all the time, I've ranted about it before too, maybe not in so many words, but it's part of what I mean when I talk about how debates are skewed because we focus on the wrong things. We can't discuss matters properly when the starting point is wrong; we end up talking about the wrong things. Here's a good example. Inger Anne Olsen, who I usually never agree with, writes about children produced through surrogacy and the difficult legal situation surrounding them.

Information for foreigners: Surrogacy is illegal in Norway, which means that this difficult situation is created by the parents who use surrogacy - it's legal in a number of US states, it's legal in India, so they blithely assume that Norwegian authorities will just accept the fait accompli when they show up with their babies. Fortunately it's not quite that easy.

Because of a few high profile cases, there was quite a bit of debate of this issue earlier this year. Feelings ran high, of course. Didn't make the debate any better; rather the opposite. There were a lot of assumptions made that either were blatantly wrong or didn't make sense, which, as you can imagine, drove me up the wall sometimes. :-) One of the wrongheaded assumptions that keep popping up is about the fact that the rules about who is the mother of a child, and who the father, are supposedly so rigid in this country. (Although they're the same rules as almost everywhere else, AFAIK.) The woman who gives birth to the child is its mother; her husband is its father, unless some other man should actively dispute this. This is, according to the surrogacy advocates, so incredibly old-fashioned and behind the times. How is it possible for a woman whose DNA is in a baby to not be the mother? How dares the state deny her her rights!!1 o_O

This is what so many people don't get, and it seriously annoys the shit out of me. Olsen doesn't get it either. She really takes it a step further though - she writes, get this:

The rule about the mother has its roots in simple biological conditions. The rules about who the father is cement monogamy as the ideal, preserves male control over the woman's offspring and her body, and also preserves society's need for system and order.

WTF??? I consider myself a feminist, but seriously, Olsen needs to get her head out of her ass.

She's vaguely right about the last point, but not for the reason she thinks. And she's right about the first point too - but again, for a different reason than she thinks. Here's the deal, and I don't know how it's possible to not understand this:

Parents don't have rights. Children have rights - parents only have duties. Any child has the right to parents, but no parent has any rights to a child. Not in this country. That's why we call the Child and Parent Act simply the Child Act for short - because it regulates the rights of the child and the duties of the parents, and the former are the most important. Since Norwegian children have various rights, first and foremost the right to have parents and to receive proper care from them, the state, whose duty it is to maintain these rights, must have some way of enforcing them. In other words, legal parents must be provided - eg, the state must know where to place the paternal responsibility, it must know whose these duties will be in the eyes of the law. Therefore, pater est. Because the law really only cares about the law. The state gives the child legal parents - people who are legally obliged to provide the care the child needs. What more is the law supposed to do?

The surrogacy advocates seem to be struggling with the misapprehension that the law can regulate biological parenthood. What can I say, they're wrong. The law is what we have for the legal stuff. And if you're a parent, it doesn't give you any rights. I have to say I think it's pretty incredible that someone can be so involved in this debate, and so much a part of it, that they actually go all the way to producing a child via a surrogate mother, and they still don't understand this basic point.

Kinda makes you wonder about some people.

In other news, I'm curious to see who will be named for this year's Nobel Peace Prize tomorrow. Thorbjørn Jagland was on the Daily Review tonight talking about how living up to the Will is such a big priority for the Committee. So I'm fully expecting their choice to be something seriously fucked up. :-D

Cutest thing on TV

2011-10-05T21:49:00.001+02:00

At least right now, because of course there are many adorable things on TV. :-)

If you're interested in dogs, or puppies, or cute animal babies in general, and you're in Norway, I'm sure you're already watching The Litter. Aren't you?? OMG, you've got to watch it!! Tonight was the second episode (second of eight) but you can see both episodes so far on NRK online, here. There'll be reruns of tonight's episode as well, two, I think. At least one on Saturday. You should definitely watch it, it's totally adorable. :-)

It's a reality show, I guess you have to call it, but there's no competition element. Basically a dog has a litter of puppies and they all go to new homes, where their new families have to adjust to having them around. Which in my experience is a little challenging, but a lot of fun. :-) The show is a little special for me because the dogs are English cocker spaniels, and that's the breed my dog was. Some of the puppies even seem to be the same color she was, blue roan. That's when they have black fur in patches interspersed with patches of white, and the white patches have black hairs in them as well. It looks kind of grey at a distance, but it isn't really. :-) I say they seem to be blue roan because it's hard to tell when they're babies; the black hairs in the white grow out over time, they start out black and plain white. So we'll see. But seeing those little critters run around and play and squabble really takes me back. And even if you don't have any nostalgic feelings like that, puppies are still adorable. So you should check out this show. I'm loving it. :-)

Desert island ...

2011-10-04T22:32:00.001+02:00

Hm.

Hmm, TIFF

2011-10-03T22:33:00.000+02:00

Now that's someplace I'd really like to go. Well, not so much a place as an event. But still. Looks like 2009 might have been a good year.

I was away over the weekend, at our summer house in Sweden ... had an absolutely lovely time there, I love that place already. :-) And it's not really a summer house even, it has electricity and plumbing and everything, you could live there all year if you wanted. Which we don't. But still. I like it. :-)

Books I've read in 2011 - September

2011-09-30T16:36:00.003+02:00

Battle by Sara Villius

Gud og hver mann by Eva Lundgren

The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet by David Mitchell

Luftslottet som sprengtes by Stieg Larsson - AUDIO

Den lukkede bok by Jette A Kaarsbøl - AUDIO

The Sooterkin by Tom Gilling

Mordet i Eiffeltornet by Claude Izner

Den hellige liga, volume 2 by Alexandre Dumas

Bønn til månen by Fatima Elayoubi

Cleopatra - A Life by Stacy Schiff - AUDIO

Arsenikktårnet by Anne B Ragde - AUDIO

Barnegråten ingen hørte by Gitta Sereny

En lykkelig mann by Arto Paasilinna - AUDIO

Ungdom by J M Coetzee