Up north.

Love and I drove to Oslo yesterday, Love having a business meeting and I had to pick up my new passport.
About ten minutes outside our town (further inland, we're at the coast), it was snow everywhere.
Did I mention my evil powers melted away the snow that fell yesterday? No snow here *pulling face at Karla and Norwegian Eileen*
Anyway, whoa! Snow much? I almost landed on my a*ss when trying to walk from Toys'r'us to "Biltema", where Love had let me loose to roam while he was having his meeting. Ick...
It was absurd, seeing how the snow got thicker and thicker as we drove further north. I mean, we're talking about an hour's drive, not ten hours and three quarters. But that's the joys of Norway for you!
Oooh! Another thing we did yesterday, shop at Ikea! I love Ikea. Even when I hardly have any money left (like yesterday) I love Ikea. Got very cheap matching flower pots for my potless flowers (giggle) and a new toilet brush, for those who wanted to know that.
That about sums it up for our big expedition up north. Hehe.

Eeeek! Snow!

Sorry Karla, my evil doings couldn't keep it away any longer. The wet, slimy, dirty stuff came down today. Someone up there is mocking me, I swear!
Snow... Arrgh! And not even proper snow that can sort of be nice when it first rears its ugly head, but sleet. Sleeeeeeet. Ick! I was soaked AND half frozen when I got to school today. Oh, the joy.
It's all melted now, but the memory remains. Brrrr...
But tomorrow we're heading north (more specific, Oslo) where I've heard some rumour about the locals being surprised by the white stuff.
News flash people! This is NORWAY. And almost November. AND below zero. Add those up? A huge chance it'll be snowing. But every year people are simply dumbstruck and go "Huh? Snow? Now? But... huh?" And of course they've forgotten to change tyres, so when they get out to go to work and see three inches of white fluff, they're all... "Fuuuuck. I'm staying home, the streets are dangerous!"
It's a bit unneccessary to say this, but not to be a knowitall (hey, I've already ranted like I am one, so... errr... I like contradicting myself, ok?), but winter tyres are kinda... mandatory now.
Yes. Hyacinth got hers back on last Saturday. I could smell that white ick, that's why! No, really, I had some customers at work coming from Oslo, and they said it was snowing there, so I figured it was about time.
Brrr... I am so not wanting to see snow yet. No matter how much Love claimed it got him in that "christmas mood". No. Don't wanna! You can't make me!
Unfortunately, winter can make me. I had to pull out my winter coat today.
Bummer...

Bah!

I'm siiick! I hate being sick! Especially when it's lasted a week and doesn't look like it'll loosen up right away either. No siree, sporting a fever and a nasty cough now. Even though I'm taking every legal remedy I can lay my hands on. Nice mix of two different cough syrups, lozengers that sedates (?) from Germany (not sure they're actually legal here, but you can give 'em to kids in Germany so I take my chances), three other kinds of lozengers with vitamin C and whatnot, herbal pills with two different spices that are supposed to help for my sinuses to clear up, but so far has only made me burp pizza-ish burps all day. Oh, and did I mention lozengers? I'm considering taking some fever reducing stuff also, but I'll see if it gets worse first.
Fuuuuuck! I'm so... frikkin sick of it all! (no pun intended)
And I had to go to work today. Even though walking from the living room to the bathroom made me overheat and feel dizzy, I went to work. Simply because I hate calling in sick. Especially when I've been away from work because of my vacation. And I have this paranoia that tells me that my boss doesn't really believe that I'm sick. So yeah... I went to work. Bah... Prolly shouldn't have.

But anyway, now I've vented a little. Hey, it's a human right to whine when you're sick. I think...?
Oh, and "Celebrations" was on tonight, a show honoring the 50 years of Eurovision Song Contest, and electing the all time favorite ESC song. "Waterloo" by ABBA, not such a shocker there. But "Hold Me Now" by Johnny Logan was my big favorite when I was younger, so it was fun seeing it in third place :)

Home and sick.

Got home last Sunday BTW, but I've been sick all week. Not stay-in-bed sick, but I haven't felt like putting two sentences together all week, fearing that it would only be bitching about this and that.
Such as it being frikkin cold here. Coming home from 20 C every day to a cold front of 2-3 C here... ick! It hasn't helped my cold (sick) either.
And being sick... my nose seems to not be THAT snotty at the moment, but now I'm starting to cough and it feels like my whole throat has been precisely scraped with a knife.
You know, that kind of bitching.

But on the brigth side. I love our new Poshmobile. It has a b*utt toaster (as in heated seats) and gets warm almost instantly when you turn the heat on.
And it has such a spacious boot! It was such a hassle getting mum and my luggage (yeah, I could fit mum in there also, but I actually meant her luggage) to fit in auntie's car, but in our? No problem.
The Poshmobile has also already paid off. Almost... last night, on our way home back from Love's brother there was a police control. At 11 at night! The whole row in front of us were pulled in, but we simply got waved past. I mean, WTF? They saw the Poshmobile and thought "Hey, that's one poshy ride, that's prolly all OK". Good thing though, 'cause the Poshmobile need new backing lights... *eep* We would surely have gotten a fine for that.
But bloody hell, imagine what we would have gotten with Pea! Heck, it would cost us more than the value of that clonker itself!
So yeah... Poshmobile is definitively a step up. Getting waved past police controls... whoo hoo!
The Poshmobile has a name now BTW. Hyacinth Bucket. From "Keeping up the appearances", a hysterically funny British comedy show about a stark raving mad woman who desperately tries to be posh, but really isn't. Our Poshmobile is kinda like that, trying to be posh when it really was a bit cheap.

But, time to go to bed. I'm supposed to go to work tomorrow, and I seriously hope my throat isn't worse in the morning, 'cause... I need to work tomorrow, I've worked so little this month.

I'll show you mine too!

FoFuSa wanted to see mine.

Desktop that is, pervs!


Sorry it's so tiny, but I do have *brag brag* a 1600x1200 resolution, you know ;)
The image is BTW my own, from Germany. Also from the road leading to auntie's house.

Again, for your eyes only.

Nicked mum's camera.






Even though it feels like summer here, the corn tells otherwise.


Biking around this area isn't too shabby.


Also from my bike route.


How can you have a bad day when this is what you see in the morning? I've been getting out of bed early every day not to pass out on this.



Playing with the neighbour's little kid. I made the best sand-cakes.


Auntie's kittycat. Kater. With his mouse. He's adorable, although a little too fond of nekkid toes.


And Cy? The Starbucks vanilla latte was great :)

Starbucks first timer.

Yesterday I visited my first ever Starbucks. Don't laugh! We don't have 'em in Norway, and you know... Starbucks is sort of legendary. It's one of those things, along with Orios (not my thing, a big disappointment to be honest), poptarts (never tried, don't think I wanna) and KFC that you hear about and see in movies. You know, exotic stuff for us non-americans. Usually this exotic american stuff has disappointed me (Mountain Dew, Hersheys kisses, any chocolate bar... keep it!). But I couldn't resist getting a coffee from Starbucks. I'm one of those people who love trying stuff. Even if it turns out gross (if you're in Germany and see a yoghurt with pieces of cake in it, stay away! eww...).
So... Got a double vanilla latte and a souvernir. Of course I had to have a souvernir, I mean... Starbucks! *LMAO*
OK, so I wasn't specifically looking for a souvernir, but I found this tumbler and... fell in loooove.
It has flowers and cute skulls in bright orange, purple and pink. What's not to love?






So... Yes. I've finally visited a Starbucks. *lol*

Germany, a visual guide... Sort of.

Uploaded some of the shots I've done with my cell phone. I'm going to borrow mum's camera also, but haven't done so yet.


This is the ceiling at the Cologne/Bonn Airport train station.



This is the ceiling at the Cologne main train station. Which btw is right beside the massive Köln dom. Yikes, that's big!



This is the car I should have had. It had a cow pattern both outside and inside.



I saw this on display in Münster. Not sure, but it looks like a Cowparade cow.

Hello from Germany!

Hmmm... Auntie has wireless. Wacky...
So what sums up my visit so far? Shopping, squirrels and an a*ss that isn't used to being on a bicycle.
Spent too much money, ate yoghurt with cookie flavour and uhmm...

It's beautiful out here though. It's in the middle of nowhere, with a small dorf close by and many adorable barn houses. Me likee!
The last two days have also been uncommonly warm, and almost summerlike. In october? WTF?

Anyway, I will keep you updated. It's a quiet life here, but I like it.

Phew! I made it, I think?

Sorry for the lack of updates, but I've had one heck of a run the last couple of days.
OK. First the car issue. Getting everything right took longer than we expected, and I was halfway panicking every so often during this week. But we picked it up on Thursday and it's a wonderful thing to be driving around it. I imagine that those cloud cars the Care Bears have must feel almost like this one. At least when comparing it to Pea. It sits low on the ground, and I don't get tossed around in curves like I did in Pea. Whoo hoo!


I finished my two assignments as well. The writer workshop one turned out pretty neat. At least I'm somewhat satisfied with it and feel I've done my best. The mythology assignment on the other hand... poo. It's embarrassing to turn in such a piece of shitty work, but I have no more time and my head isn't where it's supposed to be at, so I'm not thinking right either.

The *ahem* concert. Last thursday I went to see my old "heroes", the Backstreet Boys. Although not up to their former crazy wild shows, I enjoyed myself. It was rather absurd seeing them again on stage, after... kinda... you know, growing up? But I wish they had played more of the new songs, because some of them aren't that bad. But they did the whole walk-down-memory-lane thing... Bah! I wanted the new stuff!
But boy do they have an image problem now! They want to be taken seriously, and their music kind of reflects this, but the show? It got sucky reviews because it was compared to the wild circus they did back then. And compared to that, it was a big step down, action-wise. If they'd done a one-eigthy and come up with a new way of doing their concerts instead of halfheartedly doing half of what they did, then the reviews would probably be better too.
But it was fun seeing them again anyway. See how much older they had gotten and realise that, dayum, I'm older too. *lol*
And the audience was much more behaved now. I was in the mosh pit (as always, a great way to let out some aggression!), but there was no pushing, no squeezing. People just stood still. Oh well... It was fun anyway.

Leaving for Germany tomorrow morning. Got half of my stuff packed, and I'll prolly forget stuff I need also. As long as I bring my passport, I'm sure I'll be allright.
So I'm leaving you here for a while, as I don't think I can get this updated while I'm gone. And while I trust my Love to take care of both our piggies and my coffee plant (err... a bit unsure about that one, to be honest), I can't let him take care of this *lol*
So... See you in a couple of weeks.