notes to self :: corona edition

1. try not to be an asinine racist. even if you're frustrated. and tired. and shot through with the anxiety of the whole world, which because of some kind of connection to the whole (capital w) that pema chodron claims you should be thankful for, you are utterly in tune to. and which is actually freaking you the fuck out.

2. try not to sit at your desk all day, never getting up to pee or eat lunch, having one online meeting after another, recording some of them with camtasia because they're not really meetings, but software tests and then not really editing that much because there's no time and you really have to pee. try not to send evidence of your asinine racism to other people because you didn't edit the damn video and you have too many notifications turned on. and seriously, just refer to #1 and don't be an asinine racist in the first place. shame on you.

3. try to go outside. go for a walk. skip around the lawn. jump rope for half an hour. lie on a quilt under the big red maple tree and stare at the sky. whatever you do, just. go. outside. now. well, not now, now, because you should really be in bed.

4. get some sleep.

5. don't read all. the. news. and whatever you do, don't listen to it, because then you will hear that spray-tanned satan's voice. and this will not help with #4.

a little list to get my groove back

it's a very long time since i did a bit of bloggy visiting, but an instagram post reminded me of the wonderful and creative sandra juto's blog and she did this list, which made me want to do a list to ease me back into the rhythm of blogging. sandra is swedish, so there's a mention of fika, that delightful swedish custom of relaxing with coffee and something sweet in the afternoon.

do you?

have beer in the fridge? no, but you can always find white wine and tonic.

have a pet? anyone who follows my instagram knows i am a cat person and we have multiple cats. favorites are molly, charlie, sif, billy and kittens bob and bella (that's bella above). we have a few more outdoors, but it's ok, because they have awesome lives and we have 17 acres of land.

have a favourite sweet? i'm not really that big on sweets, but do regularly make chocolate chip cookies and if i have a sore throat, some salt liquorice is a good thing.

wear powder? no, but i do swear by becca's backlighting primer and mac soft & gentle highlighter for that daily glow.

have any plans for the future? we will eventually finish our house and it will be awesome.

have any "best" grades from school? it's starting to be awhile ago, but i always did well at writing and in my lit and literary theory courses.

have an addiction? it's probably white wine, but i also can't do without my kiehl's lip balm #1. and i would be very sad without podcasts.

have fika today? alas, i did not, which was unusual, because we often have cake in the afternoon at work.

wear nail polish? yes. almost always. these days, i'm into quite neutral flesh tones, but i can also do a nice bright blue or salmony pink.

have a friend who lives in another country? yes. lots of other countries. and i live in another country as well (thank goodness, with that cheeto at the helm) - for nigh on 18 years now.

who?

do you despise? i think we all know that it's that dangerously ignorant clown who is destroying the country of my birth.

share most memories with? at this point, knowing one another for 20 years, it must be husband. i would say my mother, but we don't share that many memories anymore with all of hers fading away...

do you long most for? i still miss my sweet frieda badida kitty and think of her often.

annoys you? rude drivers. people who are at the back of the line and rush forward when a new cashier opens. people who say, "ik' aw" constantly.

do you cuddle with? sif, she's the cat most likely to snuggle up and sleep next to me.

cooks? i'm the primary cook at our house, but i love cooking. it relaxes me. sunday evening dinners, where i throw together a bit of everything that i find in the fridge and in the garden make me happiest.

does the dishes? husband does, which is part of why i like to cook.

which?

magazine to you read? i just bought a digital subscription to the new yorker. but i like to pick up unusual magazines when i travel. things like tank or kinfolk.

bus do you take the most? i don't take a bus very often, but when i do, it's 34. i'm more likely to take an s-train to get around copenhagen.

day is your birthday? march 22.

season do you prefer? i've always loved autumn. it signaled the start of school (and i stayed in university for a long time), and i still retain that love for a new sweatshirt and the sense of a new beginning that came with the beginning of the semester. i can still conjure that feeling, just from the shift in the temperature and the angle of the golden light.

town did you grow up in? platte, south dakota. i don't think i could live there now, but i'm glad to have grown up there.

what?

are you doing right now? thinking that i should probably be wrapping this up and getting to sleep

is good about you? i have a lot of energy, am funny and generally in a good mood. i love sharing ideas and seeing what happens to them, without feeling too protective of them. i think there's a lot of power in shared ideas.

is bad about you? i procrastinate. i need deadlines in order to function well. i talk too much sometimes. if i don't like someone, i can't hide it.

do you want to work with? social media, fun content, people who give me energy, ideas, ships (luckily, i get to do this).

is most fun at the moment? being in copenhagen during the week and at home in the countryside on the weekends, hanging out with kittens and enjoying the garden. going on holiday next week.

are you wearing? a grey t-shirt with hearts on it and comfy grey lounge pants, both from primark.

kind of shoes do you own? i'm in total sneaker mode now that it's summer - faves of the moment are rose gold pumas, white pumas, green converse, light blue adidas. and when i'm at home, haviana flip flops.

is your shoe size? 40

are you reading? i'm half-heartedly rereading murakami's kafka on the shore and i ordered a book from the library on the history of the cia - legacy of ashes. i intend to take it on holiday next week. i'll admit that i read an awful lot of news online these days and it means i haven't been reading books much. that's undoubtedly not very good for me, so i need to remedy that.

are you going to do now? i'll post this and get to bed. tho' i'm actually sitting in bed, writing it, so i wont' have far to go.

well, that was fun. if you're still blogging these days, why not play along? it just might get you into the groove again.

* * *

reading this made me feel less helpless about the era of epic stupid we're living in. 

* * *

11 podcasts to brighten up your summer.

yoga and the unquiet mind

the sound of mats and heavy cream-colored yoga blankets being spread out. yawns and deep breaths as everyone settles in, trying to let go of a busy day and be there, on the mat, in the cool, dimly-lit room. the woman next to me massages her ovaries with abandon. on the other side, someone places a purple block under her lower back and stretches out, sighing deeply. i try to do the same (minus the ovary massage part). try to land there, in the room, in the cool, in the hush, to quiet my mind and leave my day behind. a siren blares outside. i wiggle around on my mat, trying to block it out. the instructor comes in. he's my favorite for now, while my other favorite is on maternity leave. i wonder briefly if that's ok, to have a favorite in her absence. i decide it is and try to clear my mind again. it flits gaily off to my undone to-do list. then to an afternoon conversation, then back to the list. i pull it back to the room, picturing in my mind my straining arm muscles, physically trying to pull my mind back to be here. present. in this room. right now. it sticks out its tongue and flounces off, cursing the travel agency, skating over an unfinished risk assessment, pausing over powerpoint and that two hours i'll never have back.

we start with that half moon pose, lying on our backs, legs curved to the right, left one crossed over right, arms stretched out to the right. i love this pose, except when i get a muscle cramp in my back, just beneath my shoulder blade. it loosens and i realize that i've just counted to 89 without even realizing it. stupid, restless mind. i mentally strain the muscles in my arms again, dragging it back to the room, to my purple mat. telling it to stay. it does, for about two seconds, like a disobedient dog. i'm not a dog person.

i think about the dentist appointment i made, the trips ahead, my undone to-do list, that obsession we have with cake at work, how that woman beside me massaged her ovaries, what's for dinner, yesterday's productive late meeting, how awesome it is to work with creative people. so many thoughts, so loud, so active. SO not present here, in this room, in these long stretches, that my muscles are longing for, but which my restless mind is clearly rejecting.

we do that position where you sit on your knees, feet out to the sides of your posterior and lie back over a yoga bolster. i always put a block under the end of my bolster, so it's at an angle, as my neck doesn't like leaning back. it's one of my favorite positions. mostly because i can do it easily and many others cannot. it makes me feel better about how i can't bend forward and touch my knees with my nose in those folded forward positions that seem so easy for everyone else. i wonder why it's easy for me and i enjoy the stretch on the front of my thighs. it's here i can still feel the remnants of how the nerves in my left leg were affected by my back problems of a year and a half ago, but i find it interesting and not painful. it feels like i'm helping the nerves heal. and for a few minutes, i'm there, in my body. my mind stops flitting around.

but then we lie back on the mat, to feel the buzz of the intense position. and my mind runs away again. back to the list, and the alzheimer's and the travel plans and the dentist and dinner. and as i once again reach 89 in the endless unconscious count, i remember that i'm practicing.

a list about right now...

~ a holiday cold - coughing, sore throat, mild fever, general aching. not really what i needed. husband has it too, but refuses to admit it, even tho' he slept in a heavy sweatshirt last night to try to sweat it off.
~ homemade ramen, featuring a rich broth made with the carcass from the christmas turkey and leftover pork roast has healing powers.

~ what if, of the 800+ photos i took last week, only a handful are usable? is that a good ratio? is it normal?

~ sunshine. a welcome sight after many, many days of rain.

~ cats are the greatest comfort.
~ i still miss frieda and her pretty profile a great deal.

~ watching making a murderer on netflix. it's like serial in television form and covers the two cases of steven avery, a trailer-dwelling, possibly inbred man in wisconsin who is rotting away in prison (for the second time) for a crime he very likely didn't commit. and the police/courts in wisconsin are shockingly corrupt and biased against the less fortunate.

~ this was fun! my nephew got the 2016 guinness book of world records and he found my name there for last year's lego minecraft diorama in london!

~ i've spent far too much time lying in bed for the past two months. but at least it's a very pleasant room - candles, books, warm (if unusual) colors (it was sabin's room before and she chose lilac and aqua 5 years ago), quilts, cats, plenty of devices for podcasts and streaming and general internetting.

~ enjoyed last week's trip with sabin very much. she totally knows how to airport. it makes me proud and it also made me realize that i'd gotten a bit rusty at it.

~ rough seas on the outbound trip however, were less enjoyable. 

~ enjoying reading all of the year-end wrap-ups around the interwebs. 2015 was kind of a crazy year, what with the madness of the republicans who want to be president, terrorist acts in the west, xenophobes running denmark, star wars (which i have yet to see) and obama really finding his groove (it was about time). 

~ i feel the bitterness i felt about a certain plastic brick and all their incompetent and possibly evil middle management put me through beginning to loosen. and that's a relief.
~ looking forward to sweet '16 (that's 2016) in a few days. i think it's going to be a great year.

* * *

how do corporations become evil?

i have some theories about this myself.

and oh, the tales i could tell.

* * *

the anxiety soothing store designs of right now.

embodied by amazon's first real store.

* * *

hey fellow moms, it's good for our daughters when we work!

so relax and enjoy your job!

harvard says it's ok.

* * *

this is a harrowing tale of a journalist who tried to understand ISIS brides.

* * *

the host of podcast note to self is incredibly annoying,

with her oddly narcissistic yet insecure way of presenting herself,

but she does cover some very interesting topics.

* * *

speaking of podcasts you should be listening to.

another round with heben & tracy.

being smart and funny, interviewing interesting people while drinking.

what more can you ask?

but don't take my word for it, the guardian even thinks so.

and if that's not enough podcasts for you, here are some more of the best of 2015.

i know i can never get enough.

* * *

abby bischoff photographs south dakota's abandoned places.

you know i love me a little ruin porn.

* * *

cultivating creativity.

good to think about as we embark on a new year.

* * *

it's gotten so much easier to be an entrepreneur.

a rather long time ago, inspired by the wonderful and still much-missed char, i did a post on life lessons. i even updated it about a year ago. but today feels like a day for a list, and since we never stop learning, here are the life lessons that come to mind here and now:

~ a g&t (or 3) does not make a good dinner.

~ especially if you also skipped lunch.

~ getting older is inevitable. and not really so bad.

~ apple will always come out with something new that you must have.


--------
cleaning up in my draft posts - this was written 15/9.2014, but not really published until 24/3.2016.

50 things about right now (mostly awesome)

i totally copycatted was inspired by molly's 50 things about right now post.

1.  in a word, kittens. two of them, tho' we thought she had 6 in there, her belly was so big.
2.  sunshine breaking through.
3.  working at home.
4.  sitting for too long in one spot when i work at home.
5.  building excitement over our coming holiday in london.

7.  flowers in bloom all over the place.

8. did i mention the two perfect, tiny kittens?

9. awesome projects at work.

10. great people to work with on awesome projects at work.

11.  a trip on the (rather distant) horizon to seattle and then new york.

12. yes, me, in new york.

13. for the first time ever.

14. cold white wine in the garden.

15. and the odd gin & tonic.

16. the coolest business cards ever. and i have some.
17. long, light summer nights.
18. being invited to a party this weekend.
19. horses with fly fringe attached to their halters.
20. the antics of our pigs.
21. the child hanging out with her good friends.
22. the awesomeness being submitted to the turtle competition we're running on eurobricks.
23. these are the ultra-creative people i get to work with. all. the. time.

24. pinterest.

25. looking forward to molly's kittens.

26. yes, that's more kittens.

27. awesome neighbors.

28. summer visits from friends.

29. rewatching friends from the beginning on netflix.

30. shark burgers for dinner.

31. salmon burgers for dinner.

32. burger burgers for dinner.

33. berries to pick.

34. the strawberries are done.

35. the child buying a nikon D7100 with her confirmation money.

36. arranging lunch dates with friends in london.

37. and tours of oxford with other friends.

38. packing up the "dining" room so it can become sabin's room.

39. reluctantly. because packing all those books away again feels wrong.

40. our independent, awesome feral hen keeping her babies safe up a tree every night.

41. overusing the word awesome.
42. but it's because everything is pretty much awesome.
43. looking at the calendar to find the best time for a weekend in rome.
44. and maybe one in berlin.
45. did i mention we're going to london?

46. getting to write at work too.

47. mowing the lawn.

48. strawberry shrubs.

49. staying up late.

50. sitting in the golden hour light with husband in the garden, sipping a cocktail and talking about our days, the future, living abroad, the angle of the roof, and what to do with all these cats.

* * *

seriously awesome reflection photos by kiripi katembo siku

they are stunning and so full of subtext and depth.

a big thank you to molly for sharing them with me.

signs

signs the world has gone mad:

1. iPhones containing flappy bird going for obscene amounts on eBay.

signs you have the best job ever:

1.

 

2.

 

3.

 

signs you are drinking too much coffee (you enlist your minifigures to help serve it to you):

signs of cuteness (and it's a cat!) in the world:

signs that your life may have been taken over by lego and that it might be time to head for bed.

a new month, a new project

one of my worries, starting back to a regular office job, is that i will forget to be creative at home (odin knows i'm going to be awesomely creative at work on a daily basis), so i decided to remedy that by giving myself a little project. i got this little wanna-be moleskine at søstrene grene some time ago and have prepared it with a bunch of list prompts inspired by this pin.

the prompts are from an old one of those 30 days of lists projects, tho' i have adjusted them to fit me and cut them down to 28 so it fits a february project (technically, i think there are 29, because i accidentally did two february 11 and didn't want to try to rip it off the page). it is also because i'd like to get back to the daily art journaling that i started clear back in 2010 and abandoned when we moved because things got too crazy.

because it's good to have goals and intentions, i started off with those. so my goals for the month are: i want to do these daily pages, eat vegetarian (tho' we're not giving up bacon, so it's not totally vegetarian, but more bacotarian), i also want to be healthier and that means abandoning my daily glass of wine while i cook (it will be good for me, right?), i want to get a bit more organized, which is why i chose to stick in the little photo of my pretty new boxes - it would be nice if there weren't art supplies on every surface in the dining room. and, last but not least, i want to have a great start at my new job. i have the rest of the prompts pasted into the book, so it should be easy to spend a few minutes every day, making a little list and playing with stamps and paint and pens and washi tape. so stay tuned.

what do you have planned for the shortest month?

the arbness of book lists

book lists, i really don't get them. whether it's 32 books that will change your life or 50 incredibly difficult books for extreme readers or the guardian's top 100 books of all time or just the list that my goodreads literary adventures group wants to read in 2014, they're all so subjective. tho' the guardian isn't as far off as the others. i mean, that 50 difficult books list doesn't even include ulysses. not even i, who have had an entire semester-long course devoted only to ulysses and wrote a 25 page paper on it, have finished the damn thing. then there's my own list of the 88 books i read in 2013 (+ 7 harry potter, which aren't on the list). it's not so much subjective as eclectic. and i'm not recommending that anyone else follow it. i just like that goodreads helps me keep track of what i've read. i'd never have remembered reading all those books. hell, at my age, i hardly remember yesterday.

that said, i do love the book lists on brainpickings. they're often recommendations by theme, like this one of 9 books on reading and writing. especially because no. 9, mortimer j. adler's how to read a book, advocates writing in books as you read them (something which i love to do), saying that it's even essential to do so (with apologies to denmark's libraries). or this one, on the year's best books on writing and creativity. or the best children's, illustrated and picture books of 2013.  quality lists, thoughtfully composed, that i like.

my reading right now (and most of the time) is all over the place. i've spent far too long on this nick harkaway angelmaker book. it was recommended by the same bloggy friend who recommended edna farber's marvelous so big, so i had to read it, even if it wasn't the kind of book i'd normally read.  it is very imaginative and well-written, with lovely and unique turns of phrase, and even features some steampunk machinery, which i love, but for some reason, i'm reading it at a snail's pace. and it's not going to help that liz gilbert's signature of all things just arrived via amazon today, as i'm going to want to dive right into that. and i have to, because in ten days, i have a book club meeting where we're going to discuss it (plus it was my idea to read it for the book club, so i'd better have finished it).

how do you decide what to read? do you read more than one book at a time (that's part of my problem)? does the internet get in the way of your reading? or does knitting? i recently listened to an audio book of a danish thriller while knitting but i wonder if that counts as reading? when do you read? i tend to read before going to sleep, but if i'm enthralled by a book, i read whenever i can. i also often read while i'm eating lunch. i also like to read in front of the fire in the evening, that's probably my favorite reading time, but that can also be social, family time, so i don't always get to indulge in that.

what are you reading right now? and what will you read next? will you consult a list?

likes and dislikes

i started my day reading susan sontag's list of likes and dislikes on brain pickings. that led me further to a similar list compiled by roland barthes, which made me want to start my week listing (but not in the nautical sense)...

i like: the first, piping hot cup of sweet, milky tea of the morning. hyacinths in winter. nail polish. kiddie band-aids. pinterest. a stack of new books. yarn. washi tape. cats. new stædtler fineliners. making lists. sparkly things. knitting. reading. lego minifigures. candles. sitting by the fire. procrastinating. new shoes. dressing up. wearing sweatpants. airports. snail mail. petit basque cheese. coffee (starbucks, of course). learning new things. going to ikea. staying up late. collecting. snow. silver rings. converse. ships.

i dislike: taking down the christmas tree. waiting. cold tea (when it's supposed to be warm). tight flight connections. procrastinating. gløgg (or any hot wine). chapstick. marzipan. people who have no queueing manners. the jerks who drive like maniacs on our road. danes in grocery stores on a friday afternoon. not being instantly good at something. getting up early. going to bed early. winter rain (it's so grey and dreary). bilka. taking photos of things i dislike (hence the lack of mosaic for dislikes).

what do you like and dislike on this rainy, grey monday morning?

* * *

amazing art by judith scott.

proving artistic expression will find a way.

life lessons revisited

three years ago, almost to the day, i did a post on life lessons. on this rainy, grey, early dark (after the time change) afternoon we have going on, with candles glowing on the window ledge above my desk, and a contented cat in my lap, it felt like a good time to revisit the notion and make a new list. which is not to say that i don't stand by the first list, more just that i do love me a list...

~ words matter.

~ to appreciate the sunshine, you need a little rain.

~ time really does fly.

~ moisturizer is really quite important.

~ people will often disappoint you, but you will get over it.

~ it's good to see the place where you live through fresh eyes.

~ you grow more patient as you age.

~ but you also tend to take less crap.

~ you are never too old for glitter nail polish.

~ you are never too old to dress up for halloween.

~ nothing beats a logical argument. but those are few and far between.

~ so much of who your child is is already there in the child. it's up to you to nurture it.

~ everyone is pretending at something.

~ don't ever go to work for a friend.

~ a glass of wine has healing powers.

~ sometimes you just need girl talk (best paired with above-referenced wine).

~ it is possible to do something creative every day.

~ many of life's most satisfying moments happen in the kitchen.

~ spending time alone is good for the soul.

~ chickens are smarter than you think.

~ a good night's sleep will restore you.

~ there is always a good book to read, it's just a matter of finding it.

~ the internet is huge.

~ blogging is cheaper than therapy.

~ sometimes you don't know what you think until you write about it.

~ you're never too old to learn something new.

~ you can learn from your mistakes, but it might take a couple of tries.

~ it's totally normal to listen to the same song over and over again.

and that's my list. for now. play along if you'd like (please let me know, so i can read your list as well). it's surprisingly cathartic.

* * *

you never know who those people are.

a laundry list of impressions from tedx copenhagen

my head is spinning and i'm still processing the whole TEDx Copenhagen experience, so this is just a quick post to check in and make a little list of all the things i want to remember to tell you about. most important is that a tweet i tweeted during the event has quite likely landed me a radio spot tomorrow, giving advice about denmark to the new us ambassador. yup, it was that kind of day.

but don't let me forget to tell you about:

~ live musicians in the bathroom
~ the homeless guy who helped himself to some of our lunch
~ a lovely, charming young girl who invented a molecule at the age of 16
~ the crazy, bossy coffee lady
~ the lack of swag
~ how the two hosts had obviously recently broken up and couldn't stand one another
~ the human arabesque video
~ now, new, next
~ pretentious anti-everything poseurs
~ an annoying irish woman to whom i lost a competition i didn't know i had entered
~ be my eyes, an app that will let you volunteer from your couch
~ the really weird outfit the copenhagen fashion week woman was wearing
~ changing the straight world order
~ a pretentious young brit who was fighting a battle against the so-called mainstream media without knowing what their agenda was or who/what might be behind it
~ why they played 5 TED videos i could have watched at home
~ the filter project
~ why we are biologically inclined to avoid being reflective for too long
~ surprises and disappointments

but i need to process it all first, it's still tumbling around my head.

for now, i leave you with a youtube video i managed to find of kalle's world tour, a most amazing musician who may have been the highlight of TEDxCPH for me today. this will just give you a taste, but today, he combined death metal and children's music and it was awesome:

sharing my eclectic book list

remember how i told you about my reading out in the corners? well, it's about to get a whole lot more public. i've made a reading out in the corners reading list and a cute poster for a display at my beloved local library. we're going to share my diverse reading list with the other library users. it will hopefully inspire and also inform about what a great service the library has for bringing pretty much any book you might want nearly home to your front door.

i generally read in english if i can - it's much faster for me that way and i'm more able to get things read in time to return the books. on the list we're making available at the library, the books that are available in danish are listed with their danish title, tho' part of the point of this is to show people how very much there is available in english! very nearly anything you want. they go to great lengths to get a book for you if it's possible - "my" copy of the humument actually was borrowed from a german library and sent "home" to my local library for me. i think that's awesome. it's a great service and one of the few things in this country (and probably even the world) that's still free.

i really enjoyed making the poster and finally used some of my hoarded pretty papers and ephemera. it feels like they were at last put to good use. i chose books that had recently been on my bedside table, as well as a few old favorites and the list is by no means exhaustive. here it is, including capital letters, no less:

The Great Good Place: Cafes, Coffee Shops, Bookstores, Bars, Hair Salons, and Other Hangouts at the Heart of a Community
by Ray Oldenburg

What I Talk About When I Talk About Running
by Haruki Murakami, Philip Gabriel (Translator)

The Passport
by Saul Steinberg

Joseph Anton: A Memoir
by Salman Rushdie

The Bell Jar
by Sylvia Plath

Wildwood: A Journey through Trees
by Roger Deakin

Hornet Flight
by Ken Follett

A Humument: A Treated Victorian Novel
by Tom Phillips

The Republic of Wine
by Mo Yan, Howard Goldblatt (translator)

Less Than Nothing: Hegel and the Shadow of Dialectical Materialism
by Slavoj Žižek

Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland with Art
by Yayoi Kusama

The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle
by Haruki Murakami, Jay Rubin (Translator)

The Corrections
by Jonathan Franzen

The Bean Trees; Animal Dreams ; Pigs In Heaven
by Barbara Kingsolver

The Master and Margarita
by Mikhail Bulgakov

The Kreutzer Sonata
by Leo Tolstoy

Notes from Underground
by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Tartine Bread
by Chad Robertson, Eric Wolfinger (Photographer)

Ukrudt - en kogebog med nordiske urter
by Rasmus Leck Fischer, Katja Dahlberg

* * *

if you want to see what else i'm reading, hook up with me on goodreads, i keep track of it all there.

good things or have i mentioned our fox?

so much goodness going on right now...

~ as you can see, our fox continues to enchant. we were sitting in the garden, sipping wine with friends this evening when she came out to join us. one of the big barn kittens ran towards her, wanting to play (and nearly giving me a heart attack) and she ran away. she's not a normal fox.

~ preparing for my upcoming real life blogging course! it will run locally the month of october in two locations! and i'm not taking it, i'm the teacher if you can believe it! it's so much fun putting together the lesson plan, i'm really excited about it.

~ also preparing for the beginning russian course i was roped into teaching. i'm still hoping a little bit that they don't get enough people signing up for it to hold it, as i'm not sure i remember enough russian to teach it, let alone teach it through danish rather than through english! ack! at the same time, i'm enjoying talking to the interested people (read, cute-sounding older ladies) who are calling to inquire about it.

~ i think i can live with reading on an iPad if the book is in PDF form and i can open it in notability, where i can highlight and scribble in the margins, just like in a real book. maybe there is something to this whole eBook thing after all.

~ our summery days have returned and they are glorious.  as is that moon. i didn't bother to try to photograph it, i just took a picture with my eyes and am holding it in my memory.

~ trying out a new, more subdued blog banner. i'm not sure how long it will last, but for tonight, i like it.

~ we ordered some insanely cute and probably poisonous japanese candy from eBay this evening. you know about stuff like that if you have an almost-teenager in the house.

~ the almost-teenager is still the most sensible member of the family. i was going to buy some frozen shrimp to put in tonight's pasta dish and she said, "mom, wait 'til friday and buy fresh from the fish guy when he comes." why didn't i think of that?

~ the next iPhone is coming soon. we're ready.

~ it's been four days since i've bought lego minifigures.

the pleasures of typing

i read tom hanks' delightful ode to the typewriter from yesterday's nytimes. who knew he could write like that? what a multi-talented man. but i digress. already and i'm only three sentences in. *sigh* immediately after reading it, i rushed to my little antique erika typewriter, removed the poem by head doctor morgen schiebel of viborg hospital that came in it and made myself a funny little list.

i can only say that tom is so completely right. the pleasures of the sound and the feel of the keys and seeing the letters appear on the paper cannot be underestimated. i'm going to start every morning this week with a little old-fashioned typing. i'm not going to wax on and on about it, as tom expressed it all so beautifully. i'm definitely going to be needing more vintage typewriters.

things i learned this week...

gratuitous bunny shot

~ zumba is HUGE among the over-forty set in the back of beyond. (don't worry, i haven't tried it, so the populace is uninjured.)

~ whatever lego wants, lego gets.

~  sometimes people are just assholes and there's not much you can do about it. it's best for your sanity to just get over that.

~ when the child gets sick, she goes down fast. and whines kind of a lot.

~ you can work for the mayor and not have a clue as to what's going on in your community.

~ there's nothing to stop the wind between us and the north sea. (and lemme tell ya, it's blowing.)

~ a lot of people have their own domain.

~ teachers apparently have lower divorce rates than the general population (informal and potentially sketchy evidence based on a sample of 21 - tho' the divorce rate was 0% among those polled).

~  the handmade movement has not come to denmark.

~ those jerkies at dk hostmaster (the people who insist on centrally managing the .dk domains) are ROTTEN at customer service.

~ sometimes when the bunny escapes, it's permanent.

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i'm sure there's more, but that's what i've got right now.  happy weekend, one and all!!

friday confession or just another random list

i haven't done a friday confession in ages, so i thought i'd revive that idea and get some things off my chest (despite being a disciple of appleism, not a catholic).

i confess...

...that i was gleeful this week when a little drama worked out against the dramatist. kinda proving that drama isn't all it's cracked up to be. i also confess that it was all i could do not to openly do a little happy dance when the drama queen was put in her place. i actually walked away for awhile, not to be seen looking a little too satisfied.

...i have little time for such dramas anymore and easily become impatient with them.

...that i swear a lot while i'm driving.

...i really, really am not fond of the "let's see how far the car can drive after the gas light comes on" game. (sadly, this seems to be husband's favorite game.)

...i might smother him in his sleep for that.

...i got a lot less done this week than i hoped i would.

...i'm pretty surprised that mira seems to be proving to be a good mama to her 5 baby bunnies. bunny instincts are pretty strong.

...when i was in school and they had that "no running in the halls" rule, i thought that was for the others, but not really for me. so sometimes i ran in the halls. but only if i thought no one was looking.

...i don't talk to my parents often enough.

...that a couple of days this week have really gone by slowly. in a good way.

...i need to do the blog makeover i've been pondering now for a couple of weeks.

...that i don't miss the corporate world. not one little bit.

...i do, however, miss traveling. and planes. and airports.

...i think denmark's new fat tax is pretty lame. i can appreciate needing to do something about public health when you have a state-financed health care system, but shouldn't unhealthy fat products - like potato chips and pork rinds - be what's taxed, rather than basic baking ingredients like butter and cream? they say there was broad political backing for the tax (which is so complicated to calculate that companies have had to hire whole new fleets of accountants), but it seems they neglected to ask whether there was public backing (which i just accidentally spelled baking in a freudian slip) for it. i never heard even a whisper of debate about it.

...i'm happy that it's friday.

happy weekend, one and all.

things i don't get...

there are many things i don't understand, but i thought maybe throwing out a list of the ones vying for attention in my head at the moment might help turn off the obsessive counting thing that's also going on in my head (what is that about?).

...how the sun has shined for ten days straight in denmark without that ever having happened previously in the nearly 13 years i've been here.

...why they say global warming is a bad thing (see above).

...why the victoria & albert fabrics weren't hotter than they were.

...sherbet pips mania (even as i admit, i fell for it too (can you say charm packs?)).

...photoshop textures (there should be a law against using too many at once).

...the popularity of said photos on flickr.

...what it is that makes a photo popular on flickr.

...why we don't regularly wear hats.

...botox.

...why they stopped making boston legal.

...why the people in this house are completely unable to return the kitchen shears to their rightful drawer.

...the incomprehensible vanity of pretentious "poets." (wish i dared to provide a link.)

...why both the mailwoman and the garbage man skipped us yesterday.

...how i managed to take about 50 photos in bright sunlight at 3200 ISO.


getting all that out should help the counting somewhat.

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this is very clever.
and this is making me long to go to istanbul.

and here's what the new blogger dashboard looks like:

i hope it comes  to all of you very soon, i love it! tho' the new compose space is a bit more word doc-like and thus slightly intimidating in all of its space, but i'm already getting used to it. and i do wish the labels would pop up with suggestions from your previous labels, like it did in old blogger (i'm still hoping they fix that). there's also that thing that it's back to publishing posts at the time you began them, rather than the time you hit "publish," which is a throw-back to way, way old blogger. i'm also hoping they fix that.

dear universe, are you listening?

more about these violets in the near future.

in the interest of revisiting my mantra that writing is the new praying, i hereby want...

~ to write for a living (this is the prayer, the rest is just a list (except perhaps the one about birch pollen)).

~ to make magical meals all week from only what's in the refrigerator and the cupboard.

~ to make a quilt of fabric i hand print myself.

~ to bake bread using a sourdough starter that i've been feeding for over a week.

~ to stop being allergic to birch pollen.

~ more sunny, beautiful days in the garden like today.

~ not to operate the tiller ever again (it's pure luck that i wasn't sucked into it and hacked to bits).

~ to design flags.

~ to see the hedgehog again.

~ another horse.

~ flowers from the garden in the house all summer long.

~ a good night's sleep.

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does anyone else love the new blogger dashboard?

so cool and hip!

what i learned at the market

1.  pick a perfect, sunny day that's not too windy.

2.  make a fetching display.

 3.  pick partners with whom you are proud to display your wares.

4.  think creatively when it comes to displays.

5. expect (and perhaps fear) colorful characters.

6.  find a market that fits what you're selling (this is where we went wrong).

7.  be slightly worried if it's before 12 and your potential customers are on their 4th beer.

8.  let a guy who looks a bit like john lennon and isn't afraid to wear your girly sunglasses to shield his winter eyes from the sun design some awesome shopping bags with pictures of local fishing boats - because those will sell like hotcakes. (plus, he can totally change a tire. - thank you!)

which brings us to:

9.  have products that the locals can relate to.

10.  two 'tweens will get bored and have to be sent to the beach.
where they will, without supervision, get into the water, at least up to their knees.
and they will probably also want a sausage.
regardless of the quality of said sausage.

the market was not the success sales-wise that we had hoped, but we had a lovely day, learned a lot and are not afraid to try again. plus, we raised the caliber of the whole thing by about a thousand percent. and that's something we can be proud of.  a big thank you to judith and elizabeth for a wonderful day and for being partners with me and giving me courage to do this. and for the inspiration. you guys rock.

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on the bright side, tomorrow my various shops (see the shop tab above) will be well-stocked with fish and birds and garlands and photos and quilts and scarves and more!

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and a bonus lesson: you can never go wrong when you're wearing chucks: