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3.12.03
Today's topic: Bad news. Really bad news.
Well, I wrote a coupla weeks ago about having a crappy week and my body giving off error messages? It turned out to be not so much error messages as what feels like the bodily version of the BSOD.
This blog will be non-updated for a while. At least until I am able to think long enough to string coherent and semi-positive thoughts together. Which might be a while.
So long, and thanks for all the fish.
1:05:00 PM
21.11.03
Today's topic: Friday five
1. List five things you'd like to accomplish by the end of the year.
a) Send out all the X-mas cards on time.
b) Make sure all the X-mas presents going overseas are sent out on time.
c) Learn how to calculate probabilities.
d) Bake more than one kind of christmas cookies.
e) Make sure the catlet gets neutered in time.
2. List five people you've lost contact with that you'd like to hear from again.
a) My mom. Not very likely, as she died nine years ago.
b) My friend S., who has gone green and back to nature outside Barcelona.
c) My friend T., the drop-dead gorgeous architect in Stockholm.
d) My friend F., currently a single mom somewhere in the south of Sweden.
e) F.'s ex-boy friend L., last seen teaching photography in Stockholm.
3. List five things you'd like to learn how to do.
a) Mathematics.
b) Speak Persian.
c) Ride a motocross bike.
d) Make mille feuille (flaky) pastry.
e) Weld.
4. List five things you'd do if you won the lottery (no limit).
a) Pay off all our debts.
b) Invest in something for when the kidlet grows up.
c) Throw the MOTHER OF ALL PARTIES with a free bar.
d) Give at least ten percent of it to a worthy cause.
d) Buy shoes. Not that I have an Imelda complex or anything ... but I would buy shoes, oh yes.
5. List five things you do that help you relax.
a) Sleep.
b) Drink red wine.
c) Tell (or be told) silly jokes.
d) Read trashy novels.
e) Take a hot bath, ideally in combination with one or more of the above.
2:28:00 PM
Today's topic: Pedophilia, Michael Jackson and I
Well, Michael Jackson's been highly profiled in the news again as a possible pedophile. I've read him quoted as saying nothing untoward has happened, but that he enjoys sleeping (as in sharing bed) with children and tucking them in.
And this is what gets me worried. I love tucking my son in. On occasions, he has been known to sleep in our bed as well. This week, hubby's been in Scotland and kidlet wanted to sleep in our bed. And I let him. We had a "book night" -- reading a chapter of Harry Potter, then talking a little. As kidlet was about to drop off he asked me if I could please scratch his back. And so I did.
And though the comparison between me and Wacko Jacko is meant as a joke, I still wonder that were to happen if our nighttime/tucking in habits were splattered over the tabloids. Would I be a possible child molester as well?
2:15:00 PM
14.11.03
Today's topic #1: Crappy week
Crappy week because:
a) I had to wipe my harddisk and reinstall (well, upgrade actually) the OS. Big hassle.
b) tons of stuff going on at work
c) my body keeps sending me vague and uncomfortable "error messages". Not sure if it is a side effect of getting older, some sign something is going on or if I am turning into a raving hypocondriac.
Today's topic #2: More on aliens (and technology)
I posted the other day about the Culture. Over the weekend I bought and hubby and I watched The Matrix - reloaded and I have been thinking about how technology is presented so fundamentally different in The Culture vs The Matrix.
The Culture is dominated by technology and AIs (minds, ships) but technology is essentially benign. The Matrix is dominated by technology that is malign and bent on destructing the rest of the humans (or maybe not, given the end of the Reloaded movie?). Two sort of opposite views of "the future", yet I find both equally interesting and credible (at least when in culturally absorbent modus, ie reading or watching movies).
Today's topic #3: Friday Five
1. Using one adjective, describe your current living space.
B I G!
2. Using two adjectives, describe your current employer.
Demanding and rewarding.
3. Using three adjectives, describe your favorite hobby/pasttime.
Fun, challenging and expensive. (That answer works well for both my favourite hobbies - pub quizzes and riding motorbikes!)
4. Using four adjectives, describe your typical day.
Long, busy, organized, random.
5. Using five adjectives, describe your ideal life.
Peaceful, healthy, educational, comfortable and fulfilling.
3:56:00 PM
7.11.03
Today's topic: Friday five
Yeay! Here goes:
1. What food do you like that most people hate?
Ummm ... sashimi?
2. What food do you hate that most people love?
Cheese! All kinds!
3. What famous person, whom many people may find attractive, is most unappealing to you?
Christina Aguilera. She looks as if she is trying to imitate that fugly guy from Twisted Sister.
4. What famous person, whom many people may find unappealing, do you find
attractive?
Bill Gates. A dead ringer for an ex-boyfriend of mine.
5. What popular trend baffles you?
Body piercing (painful) and/or parachute jumping (scary).
9:33:00 AM
6.11.03
Today's topic: Aliens and materialism
Aliens: Am currently re-reading Iain M- Banks' State of the Art. On this morning's commute I finished the story in which Diziet Sma (as well as Skeffen-Amtiskaw) is orbiting the Earth, watching, occasionally visiting and debating with the ship whether or not to Contact.
And I got to wondering what it would be like if the Culture really was hovering around, out there, somewhere? I think I would mostly feel relieved -- someone with the ability if not the inclination to sort out the mess.
Materialism: Kidlet got a very early Christmas present yesterday. Since we now live only minutes away from the ski slopes, his grandparents bought him a ski kit -- skis, poles and boots. He L O V E D it. He loved it so much that when he went to bed last night, he did so wearing his brand new ski boots. Aaaaw. I snuck down later and took some pictures of him, teddybear and catlet by one end of him and elephantine-looking ski booted feet in the other.
And even though ski stuff is a pretty extravagant gift to get it still pleases me to see how pleased he gets when he gets something he really, really likes.
12:29:00 PM
5.11.03
Today's topic: Rising fog
We now live just north of Oslo, in a valley. On the valley floor runs a river, the east side of the valley is gently sloping farmland while the west side (our side) is steep and wooded.
This morning, when kidlet and I got up, there was a thick fog sneaking along the river below us. We then went about our morning business (breakfast eating, lunch box making, kitty loo delittering etc) and as we went out and headed for the station, the fog had risen and was completely surrounding us. Kidlet thought it was spooky and so did I. He imagined seeing trolls and ghosts in the fog, me, past the age of troll-belief, thought about moose.
I saw kidlet off on the school bus and got on the train. As the train travelled citywards the fog rose further and as we passed Maridalsvannet it had lifted completely. Sun was out (if timidly) and the view of the city was clear.
9:31:00 AM
31.10.03
Today's topic: Friday five
That time o' the week again!
Unfortunately, all of today's question were Halloween-related, so I cant' answer any of them!
When I was a kidlet, there was no such thing as Halloween in Norway. Now that I am the mother of a kidlet, there is one -- as far as I can recall, it was started not too many years ago by the retail business. Damned if I am going to fork out oodles of money for a totally commercial and alien celebration!
Soo .... I picked a random Friday from the archives. Here goes, from September 13th, 2002:
1. What was/is your favorite subject in school? Why?
English and social sciences. English because I was good at it, social sciences because it was about things that interested me.
2. Who was your favorite teacher? Why?
My math teacher from junior high school. He loved mathematics and even though I did not, he managed to make it interesting. Plus he was a really cool person. Sort of like an outdoorsy nerd, with a beard and a whittling knife.
3. What is your favorite memory of school?
Finding friends and forming friendships that have lasted 25 years and counting.
4. What was your favorite recess game?
Poker. And sneaking cigarettes between the trees behind the school.
5. What did you hate most about school?
Being forced to attend classes whose content/subject matter I knew already, just for the sake of attendance and discipline. Totally demoralizing and not really necessary.
3:29:00 PM
30.10.03
Today's topic: Odds and ends
Early at work today, arrived at 0615. Still pitch dark. No sunrise for a while yet.
Eirik posted a really cool link to the Atlas of Cyberspaces. Most interesting. In Norse mythology, Yggdrasil was the Tree of life, under which the norns, goddesses of fate, sat spinning their threads and weaving the web of all beings. Sometimes, I imagine them still at it, watching, weaving and supervising the web in which I spend a lot of my time, contributing my own little strands every now and then.
Roberta wrote about memes a few days ago. I am sure there are a number of Wired articles about memes, a lot of people and probably a whole new research field dedicated to the topic as well, but I like her view of it.
So what are my personal memes?
Any argument can be settled with a dictionary.
Splatting ketchup on your dinner is a sign of a lack of education.
(Ditto ready-made, pink, mayonnaise-based salad dressings.)
The presence of beer in the fridge is a sign I am about to become an alcoholic.
All of the above is childhood residue, except possibly the beer thing. I think the beer thing is more of a class thing ("Vintage wine good, beer bad"). We have booze in the house, mostly cognac and single malts reserved for Occasions, and I will every now and then buy a bottle of wine. This causes me no concern. But having a can of beer (or worse, a six-pack!) in the fridge makes me feel like a drunkard.
7:30:00 AM
28.10.03
Today's topic: Ringworm
Ugh!
Catlet brought the ringworm into the house. Now hubby and kidlet's got it too. (So far, I am only scratching myself psychosomatically.)
Despite the name, it is not a worm -- it is a fungal infection. Bothersome, but not dangerous. Hubby and kidlet need to go see a doctor to get the diagnosis confirmed. Ditto catlet (to the vet, not the doc). Catlet probably needs what looks like an expensive round of fungicidal antibiotics.
The worst part is, it seems as if the whole house needs to be disinfected (SEVERAL TIMES!) to get rid of all the spores. Boiling clothes, steam-cleaning furniture and hosing down walls etc etc with a livestock disinfectant. SEVERAL TIMES!
Oh, the unjoy of it all.
9:29:00 AM
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