gone to Copenhagen

I like penguins, tourists look for them all the time in Iceland which is really funny.
Anyway I´m gone to Copenhagen to see Depeche Mode in consert tell you all about it when I get back on Monday.

worst hairdo ever

Here's proof that this handsome young man does not wear a toupee, it's just a really bad combover.

the end

I know that sometimes a mysterious and unresolved ending for a story can be part of the writer's "artistic vision" but I get so frustrated when the end is left open for me to figure out for myself. I can't decide whether or not I should accuse the writer of getting out easy or whether I should respect their "vision" for the story. I just read the Griffin and Sabine trilogy by Nick Bantock. The presentation was entertaining (a collection of postcards and letters between Griffin, a postcard artist, and Sabine, a stamp designer who has visions of Griffins art). I hope this doesn't spoil it for anyone who has yet to read these but at least there were only two main options for the outcome. Either Griffin was insane the whole time or they finally got together. I haven't decided yet which one I have chosen.
Update: Lucky for me I just discovered that the trilogy actually continues for three more volumes...what kind of a trilogy includes 6 volumes??? So at least I haven't spoiled these for anyone...
(click on the picture for a larger view of one of the postcards)

challenges

I read the second book in a graphic novel series by Michel Rabagliati about a young guy named Paul, living in Quebec in the 70's. (I couldn't find the first one, Paul in the Country, and the third one, Paul Moves Out, is on its way)
Paul's job is as a camp counsellor for underprivileged and dilinquent kids. He starts out being scared of the woods, impatient with kids; pretty much defeated. He ends up falling in love with the kids, learns to rock climb and canoe and generally creates great memories for himself.
This just got me thinking about some of the times that I have felt defeated and overwhelmed (a prime example being when I start a new job). Because I didn't give up, I learned great things, made friends, improved my life. It makes me really regret the times that I have given up and potentially missed out on some amazing experiences.

my favorite author

recently i've found some time to read again and my first choice is Pearl S. Buck. here you can read a small essay she wrote on something dear to my heart. i like her for more than her books, but also for her life. she adopted over seas which is a dream of mine, but more than that, she recognized the need for foreign adoptions and she started her own adoption agency, all the while writing fabulous books about china and it's unique culture. her books are historically and culturally accurate given that she spent most of her childhood in china. i also love her because she presents the feminine role so compasionately and sympatheticaly. my favorite book is "pavilion of women". as one of my heroines, i named my van after her; the pearl.

Audrey Niffenegger

I remember the thing I really loved about The Time Traveller's Wife was how she would describe one of the characters making art. It was just so lively. Now that I have read The Three Incestuous Sisters, it makes sense that she can so vividly describe the visually creative process. This picture is from one of my favorite scenes in the book, when Clothilde gives her nephew (who is still just a fetus in her sister's womb) flying lessons.

piano man

I went to see Jon Schmidt last night with my piano teacher. He is a pianist and composer, started composing at age 11. It may seem strange that I would voluntarily pay to go see a pianist, but this guy is good. He's young and entertaining and not at all what I expected. He didn't wear a suit, he wore a t-shirt and pants. He did a Dana Carvey song about broccoli. He plays a mean piano, making good use of every key. He can get so many different sounds out of a single key. There has probably been plenty of people throughout history that have been able to do that but I think this guy has a little more fun with it.

I´ve been reading some very good things about The Three Incestuous Sisters. Lis have you read it yet? I remember you talking about it some time ago. It´s really interesting to know that it took the author 14 years to finish it. I was reading in Locus http://www.locusmag.com/ that she actually started The Time traveler´s Wife as a way to procrastinate on finishing The Three Incestuous Sisters.

opening a can of worms?

Ok, first of all I consider myself a Christian.
I was looking at the "Church of the flying spagetti monster" website and I thought it was hillarious. To me it is a joke, I was not offended. http://www.venganza.org/ I´m curious, are you guys offended? I read some of the hatemail the site has gotten and I just can´t belive that some of those people call themselfs Christians.
I was thinking that maybe I was not offended because the ID theory stuff has not been an issue here in Iceland.
The seperation of Church and State is not a fact here. When I was little just about everyone I knew belonged to the national church. Still today when you are born you automatically belong to it unless your mother belongs to a diffrent religion. When I met Rus in 1990 I had never met a person that I knew to belong to a diffrent church then me, although in theory I knew they existed. (and I guess I had already met alot of people that did not, seeing that I was in Canada at the time, I had just never discussed it with anyone)
When I was in elementary school we had Christianity as one of the subjects and I don´t remember ever having been educated in any other religion in school although I´m sure we must have talked about them at some point. (Now Icelandic schools don´t have christianity but sociology and teach about all the major religions, someone must have complained)
When I was prepering for my confirmation when I was 14, I remember my priest getting very upset when we asked him about darwin and creation. We where studying evoluton in biology at the same time and my biology teacher told us his belive which I realize today was very simular to intelligent design theory. I remember being facinated and I think we all where at the time because we (my whole class) was prepering for confirmation at church. My priest could not handle those questions and banned them from our studies. I think it probably did more damage to our faith than not.
So what am I missing here? Should I be offended and am I just a bad Christian.

we got the cronicles of narnia for christmas and i've strted reading them to the children. i'm surprised that they will sit through a whole chapter at a time, but they were written with a compadable perspective. i just wish i would have bought the books before the major motion picture came out.

the kite runner

My current reading material is The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini. It starts out in Kabul, Afghanistan in the early 1970's. The main character, Amir, is the son of a wealthy businessman and has a servant his age named Hassan who will do anything for Amir. The funnest time in their lives is the winter when they have huge kite competitions. The whole neighbourhood sits outside to watch as hundreds of kites are flown in the sky. Participants must cut each others kites so that they fall, and then they chase down and catch ("run") the fallen kites. The winner is the last one flying and he/she must run the last kite that was cut to bring home as a sort of trophy. The copy I'm reading has the green cover but as I was googling for an image of the book, I came across this other tan one. It really caught my attention because it suggests the main incident of the story, the turning point in Amir and Hassan's life. It kind of gave me the shivers because it's not a pleasant incident at all.

taggarama

So, I have been "tagged" by Aisy (right of way). I am supposed to share five weird things about myself. I have to say that my first thought was "I hate these things". But then I felt an obligation to follow through with it and then it became a challenge and then I started enjoying it. However, I am going to rebel a little and not tag anyone else.
#1: I can't swim. Well, I can swim in the shallow end of a pool but I have never ventured into the deep end or jumped off a diving board. When I tell people this they are either shocked, amused or disgusted. Where's the sympathy!?
#2: I am a mutant. When I was born, my two smaller toes on my right foot had not yet separated. There was bone, they were just stuck together by the skin. For reactions, see #1, although my husband thinks it's pretty cool. They are separated now.
#3: I'm not a Canadian citizen. I guess that's not really weird but it does set me apart sometimes because I can't vote and do certain other things that require citizenship. I have never wanted to be a politician anyway. I would like to be able to vote but I would have to lose my Danish citizenship for that and that is something that I don't want to give up, because I am able to work anywhere in the EU, if the desire and opportunity to do so should arise.
#4: I can spin wool and weave tapestries. Although I am not very good at it (it has been at least ten years since I have last tried) and I don't have the patience to pursue it, my mother taught me to spin and weave. For some weird stuff on spinning doghair and such, see Ninjutation's post in Popscoff.
#5: I sincerely enjoy living in a small town in southern Alberta. This might not seem weird to those who don't know me well but to those that have known for a long time, they would never have thought this would happen. Although I spent my childhood equally in rural and urban communities, I thought the city was where I belonged. Turned out I just needed to find what I was looking for before leaving for something more peaceful. I didn't know it at the time but what I was looking for was the truth about life. It came to me in the best form possible: a husband in the church, followed by a twin pregnancy.

Ok so I know that I said I wouldn't tag anyone but I think I wanna tag Phyllis Sweetwater(the epitome) after all, mostly out of curiosity and because I know she has some weirdness up her sleeve and this is the sort of thing that would suit her personal blog.

love books can´t read them

I love books, stories and storytelling of all kind. I tend to like music with lyrics that tell a story even if they just hint a story behind the song. My favorite song when I was 13 was Love is a battlefield with Pat Benatar. I would spend hours listening to it and wondering about the story behind the song or what happened to the people in the song. Strangely as much as I love storys I can´t seem to read anything at the moment I pick up books and start reading them and put them down again. So I am posting pictures by one of my favorite bookcover illustrator Jody Lee. You might recognice her work you can´t go into a bookstore that sells fantasy without seeing one of her covers. I like the detail and the promise of a story that her work hints.
http://www.jodylee.org/

Bright Eyes strikes again

This is good. Except for the expression on the girl's face when the plane starts to crash. That's an adult movie expression. Also, for those of you who didn't see his Leno performance, here's that one.

foreign food

One of the best things about traveling to another country is the food; the way it's presented, eaten, etc. I flipped through this book called Mangoes and Curry Leaves. It is written by a couple that travels frequently to other continents and this is one of their books that they have compiled full of recipes, pictures and facts centered around food from Bangladesh, India, Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka. I didn't read very much of it, but it made me think of all the good food that I have had on my travels. My husband always raves about the extensive selection of ice cream flavours in Taiwan. We find some of the same good stuff in Asian supermarkets. Perhaps in search of the perfect ice cream, we have been making it a point to try ice cream whenever we leave Canada. I think the grossest ice cream we have ever had was a popsicle in Denmark that was lemon and licorice flavoured, but not the North American kind of licorice. It was the salty European kind. Blech. Here's a fun fact about ice cream in Denmark: They slice their ice cream, they don't scoop it.

smart

One of the arguments people use for driving huge vehicles such as the hummer is "i feel safer in a bigger vehicle." Manufacturers of these large vehicles don't have to prove that they are especially safe because consumers already have this false notion that just because they're big, they're safe. Here is more proof that smaller is safer. I believe there was a post on popscoff about this once.

Depeche Mode

I´m taking my Visa creditcard to the bank tomorrow and turning it in. So the last thing I did was to buy tickets to Depeche Mode´s concert in Copenhagen on Febuary 25th. I´m already so deep in dept that a ticket to a concert won´t change anything. So now I just have to figure out how to get there.
It´s a good thing I have another creditcard...

http://www.depechemode.com/

Book purist

I´m a book purist.
It´s silly but I dislike it immensly when I´m unpacking books at work and the distributor has packed brand name books like Warhammer or Dragonlance with my precius children books by "respectable" authors. Maybe that´s more snob than anything else.
Oh my, I´m a snob.
The lego thing Rus, that´s also snob.
Noooo, my friends and I can´t be snobs maybe it´s some form of a mental illness, that would be much better. At least we would be a respectable minority.

list-o-rama

All those lists out there has made us want to compile my own. My husband and I have collaborated to bring you our own best/worst of lists for 2005. Tell us your best/ worst-of's.

Best Music:
Hurra Torpedo (specifically The Only Egil Band)
Regina Spektor
Smoosh

Best Books:
The Alchemist (not published this year but I finally read it this year and it deserves it)

Best Graphic Novels:
"Pyongyang" by Guy Delisle
"War's End" by Joe Sacco
"Carnet De Voyage" by Craig Thompson
"Jeffrey Brown's Girlfriend Trilogy": "AEIOU" was published this year and it hasn't come to a library near us yet, but we've read "Clumsy" and "Unlikely" so it makes the list on their merits.
"Embroderies" by Marjane Satrapi

Best TV:
My Name is Earl
Bright Eyes on Leno
Arrested Development

Best Other Stuff:
2 Legged Dogs

Worst Radio Show:
Freestyle

Worst Music:
K-Fed

Worst Other Stuff:
yellow (ribbons, bracelets)
more bottled water
more antibacterial soap
under-reported news stories
bigger monstrosities driving the roads

barf

Here's a book that I do not recommend unless you're 12 years old and are into the Babysitter's Club series. I was curious to know what all the hype was about but I couldn't get past the third page without barfing.