Go Moron, Lady Musgrave

Yo kids, I'm back in internetland!
And the "real world", so to speak, but it's hard to get excited about that

Watch this space for photos soon.
(The one between 'this' and 'space'.)

home... briefly

I made it, in one piece, and fully clothed. Which is actually quite impressive when you consider what I was wearing. My glasses are falling apart, my jeans are splitting up inside leg. I was wearing my old white (off-white, beige, mother of pearl) sneakers with the semi-detached soles, and my carry-on baggage was the old blue backpack I used for my entire 8-year university career, and it popped a zip mid-journey.

Probably not the best outfit for a two-day, four-flight migration; they should all have been binned in Sweden, but each item had expressed a wish to die in Australia, which I can't help respecting deeply.

Sydney is wet and muggy. Getting off the airport train at Museum, coming onto Elizabeth St, I saw something I haven't seen for a long time: sweaty people in sweaty clothes. I beat them at their own game, though, having sweated into my tattered rags for 41 straight hours by that time. Needless to say, the lay-dies (who don't sweat, but glisten) were drawn to my teeming pungence en-masse, like a high school biology class to a mangrove swamp.

Back at the pare's at tuz, feeling a bit woozy. Plans are afoot for a meeting at some sort of eatery/drinkery/sitdownery tomorrow night. Next morning I head north, to join the cok, ced, woody, marcus, magda, jenny and many others, for the annual Lord of the Flies re-enactment on the great barrier reef.

The post that certain Norwegians may have been expecting will come after the reef trip. Resistance to saltwater needs to be tested.

Fight the power, dudes.
xo

Pack Yr Suitcases

b'coz flight two-two is off to honolulu,
flight two-two is off to honolulu,
flight two-two is off to honolulu,
. . .

Well, Sydney. But that doesn't rhyme, so I'm thinking of changing my tickets.

Over the last 2.5 months, I've gone
Sydney - Melbourne - Singapore - London - Stockholm - Umeå - Stockholm - London - Stockholm - Umeå - Kiruna - Umeå - Stockholm - London - New York - London - Stockholm - Umeå - Stockholm - Oslo - Bergen - Ålesund - Molde - Oslo - Stockholm - Umeå.

In the next month I will add:
Umeå - Stockholm - London - Bangkok - Sydney - Brisbane - Bundaberg - Brisbane - Sydney - Bangkok - London - Stockholm - Umeå.

34 flights in all. Boy are my arms tired!
from all the flapping... get it? hahahah, ripper
(You can catch me tuesday nights at the Brighton le Sands Comedy Club, try the veal!)

Northside: seeya later, alligator
Southside: seeya sooner, vaudeville crooner.

update: grr, I'm very angry with london and its airport. particularly how far terminal 3 is from terminal 4 (several miles as it happens). Jo, Katie, other Katie, b-roq, work on it. I want to see significant improvements when i return.

I got more back issues than Guns and Ammo, cuz my uzi ways a ton and I never let go of the handle.

Update: in the interests of procrastinating doing my presentation slides, I've cleaned up my blog a little bit, including updating the titles of B & Doc's blogs, removing Chia Chia, who mysteriously evaporated into internet nothingness, and Big Bear Tim's blog... love ya buddy, but it's been 8 months since you updated, I think we have to admit it's over.

It's wild and crazy, the moon is out, tonight it's time for experiments...

Everything in the post that follows is based on actual events. Only the names, locations, and events have been changed.

* * *

Old news for some, but I just accidentally attempted to defraud my uni out of $1000. Almost got away with it too! Without me or them noticing!

(Aside: Can you be subconsciously deceitful? If someone has a subconscious intention, that just means they act in a way people would normally act if they had that intention, but without thinking the associated conscious thoughts. But deceit, if done well, is acting normally on the surface with dishonest thoughts and intentions, so subconscious deceit is just acting normally?)

Anyway, I finally got around to claiming the travel expenses for my convoluted journey from Australia to Sweden (remember all the visa troubles in London...).

I collected the receipts and summed their values, but I accidentally put in the receipts for my (personal) trip to new york to visit LB&Co. The department secretary noticed... I look surprised, which always looks fake when it's real... awkward moment as she held a private conversation with herself assessing my integrity...

I'm not worried though. Jo, one of London's best known criminal barristers*, has agreed to represent me. Quote from chat sarvo:

Ian says: So I might need some legal representation... are you up on Swedish fraud law?
Jo says: Erm...

(I choose to interpret her failure to explicitly refuse as implicit agreement)

Corrections were made, we entered the values into the payroll system, and just before we hit "confirm" I realised the secretary had done it so the money would go to her and not me. Unintentionally... I think.... anyway, I'd say we're even.

*- best known to me. I mean, the barrister in London that I know best. Only other one being Will, who mostly represented sexual deviants, so I'll save him for another trial.

* * *

Speaking of deceit, that reminds me. On new years eve, at the big family bash we crashed, I was going up to random people doing the "Heeey, how are ya man, haven't seen in you in... shit, must be five years? Not since uni!!! I've been Australia last couple, what you been doin.." shtick.

Each time I got the nodding, smiling, going along with it punctuated by middle-distance-staring indicating memory cogs turning. Never did the fact that I obviously didn't speak a word of Norwegian tip anyone off that I was not actually their childhood friend...

True story.

Risking life and limb...

More show and tell from the Norway archives: a stream near G-Rock's hut.

You may notice the splotch marks in the middle, and also it's quite blurry, although it's hard to tell with such a small picture. There's snow on the lens, and there's a reason why.

Interesting and relevant fact: It turns out the river actually extends significantly further to the left than the snow-water boundary line would indicate.

Snow was powder nearly knee deep, I swooshed down to get a good angle for the photo... maybe a bit closer, shuffle over, and woah nelly! Ground gave way under my right foot, down it went into the river. I instinctively fell with all my weight to the left, and with my left foot, which still had traction, pulled myself up through the snow (which, don't forget to remember, was knee deep powder) to safety. Apparently I quickly took a photo, although I don't remember doing that, and I hastened back to the hut to thaw out my foot.

Turns out my boot had submerged to just below the ankle, and I had narrowly avoided water rushing in and around my warm and unsuspecting woolly socks. It only took a couple of minutes to get back to the hut, but upon inspection the lower sections of my right boot were completely encrusted with ice! Polar bears sought toe-nail holds to traverse to the penguin colony on the toe.

Told G-Rock I fell in the river to some extent, she said "I knew I shouldn't have let you wander around on your own". I suspect there's some wisdom in that, but 2006 is the year of me wandering around on my own, and even the consequences that seem bad are actually good.

David McGhan's World Around Him, Volumes 2, 3 and 4

Volume 2: Culture

Most discussions of Swedish culture on this blog have centred on its more laughable aspects. But from time to time I am forced to acknowledge certain areas in which the Swedes show a level of enlightenment and wisdom such as I've never seen before.

For example: if you win the lottery in Sweden, you don't get money, you get a Fez:

Or perhaps you get a boggle-eyed bearded guy wearing a fez. Either way, I think you'll all agree it's much better than cash.

I bought two tickets for Katie and Jo, who are still Fezless (New readers, see here).

Volume 3: Physics

I took this pic out the window on my way to Norway. Why is there a rainbow pattern around the plane's shadow? Diffraction around its edges? (Doesn't the light source have to be coherent? I know I've got some physicist readers...). It's something I've never seen before, anyway.

(No joke here, that's a real question)

Volume 4: Technology

One of the households I imposed myself upon in Norway had this super-space-age toilet:

Now for the mystery: Look at the control panel below. Why does the button for "Bidet" have a picture of a face on it???

(Also funny is the button for Vask På, which roughly translates into arse fountain. But is the spray going in or coming out? I know there's a certain blogger who should be an expert on such matters...)

Nothing much to say, but here's a pretty picture

Taken from my balcony this arvo. Really, half the sky was on fire.

Made the afghani dish again today... turned out a bit too watery this time, but still nice. Otherwise, pretty slow weekend. Just gotta get some work done before I head back to oz.

Definition of a mathematician: someone who thinks that what things have in common is more interesting than what makes them different.

David McGhan's World Around Him, Volume 1

Ever since the dawn of this morning, scientists and interested laymen have been perplexed by the strange stripey patterns of snow that appear on trees in the Umeå region.

Early theorists explained them as the droppings of an enormous worm that only eats snow and climbs trees to shit. However, after many failed attempts to trap this bizarre creature, the popularity of this explanation is dwindling.

A more recent theory is that the trees are throwing a fancy dress party, and through some embarrassing coincidence all the trees came dressed as pepe le pew, but many critics have noted that pepe le pew cartoons are not actually very funny, and are unlikely to be popular enough amongst the tree demographic for such a coincidence to take place.

Perhaps these noble giants will keep their secret forever, such petty and spiteful shits they are.

Aloha Tambourinist!

I'm comin for ya, little buddies!

Succumbing to pressure from the family migratory birds who have suckled me through my Swedish infancy, I'm flying south for the winter.

Arrive in Sydney the 16th, 2 days later I head up to Mecca (sorry, I mean Bundaberg) then by boat to reefy goodness, then couple days w/ Sam in Brisvegas, then back to Sydney at some point not quite yet decided (end of Janish). Back to Sweden late feb. It's all official like toilet tissue.

I was served at the travel agency by a definite Swedish Marie.
(Aside to LB and Brett: How jubbly was Marie? People forget that! Remember she used to give us chocolates every time we went in?)

Had a small meeting in the hallway with boss and colleages yesterday.
Boss: "Pedro, continue working on those System ID problems. Anders, try to finish your measurements on the motors. Ian... just keep doing whatever it is you're doing".
Me: "Travelling the world?"
Boss smiles a "haha, yes, but seriously" smile
Me: "By the way, I'm going to Australia at the end of next week"
Boss: "Okay, that's fine, you can do what you like. Just let me know the dates."

Icing on the cake: while I'm in oz, I'll be getting payed by both universities. (Probably bringing me up to almost what all you people with real jobs earn - go for gold!)

This is my lucky star,
Here I will make a stand,
Doesn't look that faaaaaaaar to me,
And the road.... is in my heart,
And the Road! Is in my Heeeeaaaart!!

Some pictures from Norway

are HERE.

The most important ones are yet to come.

I have really enjoyed "Norway". I heartily recommend this product or service to all my friends and family.

UPDATE: Looking to book flights for my triumphant return to the land of spiked pavlova. It is cheaper to by a return ticket than a one way. I don't mean less than twice the price, actually cheaper. like 2.5k return, 4k one way... whattup wid dat???

Gott Nytt År!

That's happy new year in Norwegian, and Swedish too.



At Gurocknroll's house at Innfjorden, a town of 400 people in a valley surrounded by massive mountains, in the fjord east of Ålesund. The scenery here is gobsmackingly beautiful!!

The pic above I found on a website for the area, it's just up the road from here.

On the 30th we went downhill skiing at a resort half an hour up the road from here, was pretty dark and cloudy, low vis, but fun anyway. Two members of the Norwegian national ski team were there. World champions. Guro's sister used to train them. They just pointed their skis straight down and zooooooooomed down! That night, we cross-country skied about an hour up a "brief" hill to their mountain hut in pitch darkness, with only one torch between four people. ("brief" being a standard guide-book euphamism for "fucking huge".) Arrived starving and exhausted, but thankfully G-Rock's parents were already there, and had prepared a hearty meal for us. We went for a bit of a sightseeing ski near the hut the next day, then back down the hill at dusk. Luckily, we got down the super duper steep part when there was still some light, but by the time we reached the cars it was dark again.

Cross country skiing is damn hard work!! For some reason we always did it on an empty stomach and in the dark, which was probably not smart.

Anyway, this, of course, was new years eve, so back at Guro's we stuffed our bellies, had some wine and aquavit, then went out to a party at a big house up near the ski resort.

Turned out to be a big family gathering which we pretty much crashed, but they were very welcoming. I actually met another girl called Guro there. I asked her if her friends call her Gurocknroll, got a non-committal response. Got smashed at some local pubs, wandered into the middle of a fireworks launching area, one failed to launch and exploded 3 metres away from us, Guro attempted drunken first aid on a lady's eye. Turned out she was hit on the skin near the eye, so no serious damage. Apparently someone's down-filled jacket caught fire. I can see why they banned them in oz! Continued at some local drinkeries and danceries, went back to the house at 3am and found some fried chicken in the pantry, scarfed some of that before it dawned on us that it was probably there for the big family lunch they intended to have the next day, passed out on the sofa and awoke surrounded by little blond kids with colourful knitted jumpers all I could think was "where am I? Have I joined a cult?". They put on a big breakfast for us, and we headed back to Guro's place to sit in front of the tv and recover.

Probably more downhill skiing tomorrow, then I'm off to Oslo to hang with Kjetil for a day, then back to Sweden for a week and a half, then back to Oz for the reef trip!

So, 2005 was pretty jubbly, 2006 is looking pretty good so far!

New Years Resolution: watch less episodes of Joey