Books I've read in 2011 - March

Hollendergraven by Monica Kristensen – AUDIO
I döda språks sällskap by Ola Wikander
Menneske uten hund by Håkan Nesser
Musketerenes siste bedrifter, volume 2 by Alexandre Dumas
Kullunge by Monica Kristensen – AUDIO
Et hav av språk by Åshild Næss/Atle Næss
En helt annen historie av Håkan Nesser – AUDIO
Trusselen av Guillermo del Toro/Chuck Hogan
Vårlik by Måns Kallentoft
Volvo lastvagnar by Erlend Loe - AUDIO
Å by Knut Nærum
The Boy Next Door by Irene Sabatini
Stille dager i Mixing Part by Erlend Loe - AUDIO
Ø by Knut Nærum - AUDIO
Baa Baa Black Sheep by Rudyard Kipling (a Penguin 60)

I never learn ... :-) I'll be updating this later (tomorrow?) with some more info and some links. :-)

Barcelona street art

One thing that I really noticed around Barcelona was a lot of seriously cool grafitti. I loathe tagging but real grafitti can look great sometimes. And this wasn't actually on walls and things, but on the metal screens used to cover storefronts and the like. So ... I liked it. I'm having postcards made of it. :-)

Quote of the Week

Life is pleasant. Death is peaceful. It's the transition that's troublesome.
Isaac Asimov

Wenche Foss 1917-2011

It wasn't unexpected as she had been ill for some time - in fact, some months ago, she wasn't expecting to make it till Christmas - but it's still so incredibly sad. She was one of a kind. She really was. We're all supposedly one of a kind, but let's face it, most of us aren't really that special. :-) But Wenche Foss was very special. What a woman! For one thing, a fantastically talented actress. A consummate professional. I remember one time I saw her at the National Theater in some play with Toralv Maurstad ... I don't remember what it was called, but he played George Bernard Shaw and she played some woman that Shaw had a relationship with. It was just the two of them on stage the whole time. She was so impressive. This was after she had retired, of course. She had so many lines, and she remembered almost all of them ... when she didn't, she handled it like a star. You barely even noticed. So classy. :-)

Anyway, in addition to being such a wonderful actor and a natural born diva, she was also by all accounts a wonderful person. She really did a lot for the causes she believed in. For those not in the know, this was first and foremost the rights of the mentally disabled. She also changed a lot of lives for people in this group by the very valuable example she set. When she was 36 years old she had her first child - the first of two sons, the second of whom is now the mayor of Oslo. :-) This little boy had Down's syndrome. At that time - this was in 1953 - children like him were something people were ashamed of, they were kept away from the public eye and nobody talked about it. But Foss refused to be ashamed of her child and was open about his disability. She did more than anyone else, I think, to change people's minds on this issue.

Unfortunately, the boy got leukemia and died when he was only four years old. :-( So she had sadness in her life as well as success. But when you live to be 93, what more can you really hope for. :-) She was a fantastic woman and a fantastic artist. R.I.P.

But still and all, life goes on. Look what I found on my way to the subway this afternoon. Yay!!!

IRELAND 2011 - Lipstick

I'm not entirely sure what to say about this entry. o_O Is it really cool or is it a waste of space? It seems to be both. It starts out well, it seems to be catchy and it's a bit unusual. Like it may stand out a bit in the lineup this year. The first time I heard it I really liked it ... at least for about a minute.

The problem with this song, I think, is that it doesn't have anything worth mentioning in the way of distinction between verse and chorus. I mean, it's there, but you have to really focus to catch it. So it becomes like just this wall of sound and ... well ... just annoying. Not to offend any Irishmen who may randomly be reading this, I don't know ... this song just gets really old really fast. Even hearing it twice in May - assuming it gets through from the semi, which I'm not at all convinced it will - may be too much for some of the audience.

This could have been really good, but is in fact just annoying. Too bad for Ireland. :-( This may do well ... the young audiences down east may like it ... but I think that depends a lot on the presentation. Not too weird. :-) Their hair is perhaps weirdness enough. ;-)

I'm not a fan of this song. It gets on my nerves. It could have been fun, but it's mostly irritating. I kind of hope it doesn't get through from the semi. I'm sorry. But it gets on my nerves. All the more so since I suspect it could have been so much better.

Oh well. This is Jedward - identical twins, yes - performing Lipstick by Dan Priddy, Lars Halvor Jensen and Martin Larson. They will be competing for Ireland on Thursday, May 12th. They will be closing the show, which may work to their advantage. We'll see. I'm not convinced. :-)

Widescreen here.

Lyrics here.

Quote of the Week

They say a little knowledge is a dangerous thing, but it's not one half so bad as a lot of ignorance.
Terry Pratchett

Not In Daily Use

Board game night at Calyx and N.'s place tonight. Across the street from them someone had parked a bike against a wall. Not recently.

Yes, you really are seeing what you think you're seeing. Item is not in daily use ... o_O