Yaaaay!!

Oh, I love football! And I love it even more when Liverpool wins!! And I love it to bits when they beat unbeatable Barca!!! We're on our way... How convenient then, that our new membership cards from LFC fan club arrived earlier today!

***

On a different note, I've taken on a couple of extra translation jobs and haven't had time for anything but lately. Stayed up till 2:30 last night and it really wasn't as much fun as I thought it might be... I'll hand in the first one tomorrow (thanks to proofreading Merujo!) and the next one isn't due till mid March, so I might pop by again.

In the meantime, I may also be found over at Facebook. I'm sure I'm supposed to be way too old for this, but I think "poking" my friends and tagging them in photos from 1980-something is absolutely hilarious :D

***

It's winter holidays over here, and the kids are home. Today we've played kiddie pool, cards, yatzy in between my "working" attempts...

***

Today was Thomas' turn to go to the dentist. He's been talking about it for the past two weeks - making sure we didn't forget, he's been so happy! Whereas Anna cried herself to sleep the other night because it wasn't her turn... Everything turned out fine - no cavities - and Thomas will have to wait a year or more for a joyous return...

***

Oh, and I believe I've developed a rather serious case of Smileyaticus Sentencis Vulgaris - the state of not being able to finish two sentences without at least one Smiley on board... ;)

Quote of the day (17)

I was telling Filip of a friend who's expecting a baby. And the baby's father won't be there with them because he didn't want children... Filip pondered this. Then said:

- Poor kid who doesn't have a daddy. Because daddies do all the work around the house!

Touché...

Momma bear

I'd be lying if I said I was the least bit interested in website perusal, or slightly into net surfing. Lying through my teeth, in fact. I'm not very interested in these things. I'm helplessly addicted to the things, that's what...! Well, anyway, perhaps not so strange, then, that it has somehow rubbed off on the kids.

Jakob is leading the way, of course, being the oldest. I love teaching him about the more technical details, as well as showing him around Google Earth (boy, did we get lost!)... He's a quick learner (aren't all kids?) and it intrigues me how he finds penguin bashing yetis and walrus-tossing competitions all by himself, not even knowing much English!

Being the responsible parents, we have, of course, installed a parental control device on the kids' account, and the email account I created for Jakob sends his emails straight to me... (Mind you, he hasn't sent - or received - a single one in about 6 months...)
Then there's msn... That's what he needed an email address for, of course. Half of his classmates were already on - as well as a friend who lives elsewhere - so I figured it'd be alright. Later I half regretted... I mean, usually he's only on in the evenings, when we're around, and he's not on for very long either (what with the penguin-bashing etc taking up a lot of time), but some days he comes home on his own. And could be doing anything, really, but what I worried about was msn... Who knows what crazy people could be out there?

So I copied all of his contacts. (sic!) I prefer to look at it as momma-bearish rather than thievish or spyish... Later, when they've logged on and found this unknown address, they have asked me who I was, and then it was just fiiine. Really! I was concerned I was prying. Now it feels more like mingling! So the next time Jakob tells me "xx is using foul language" (he'll say things like that..), I can message them back, telling them not to. And the weird thing? They're ok with it. They seem to like it somehow. Some of them will even message me of their own free will (rumour's out I've got quite a few emoticons...) and chat for a while. Jakob should be safe. And so am I - until he's a teenager and creates his own aliases on a daily basis...

Phew...

Your Language Arts Grade: 100%

Way to go! You know not to trust the MS Grammar Check and you know "no" from "know." Now, go forth and spread the good word (or at least, the proper use of apostrophes).

Are You Gooder at Grammar?
Make a Quiz

I'm keeping the job :)

Tuesday tale on a Valentine Wednesday

What is your favourite quote?
There are so many excellent quotes. I'm a quotomaniac. If that's a word. Well, it should be. My favourite quote is probably still Oscar Wilde's "Only dull people are brilliant at breakfast", though. Go figure...

Your favourite slang word?
Hmm. English or Norwegian? I don't really use a lot of slang, I don't think. Possibly, the kids' (not just my kids. Anyone's kids these days..) adoption of the English "rules", as in "Liverpool rules!". Which they do, of course, only in Norwegian ("Liverpool ruler!") it still sounds a little quaint, methinks...

What is your least favourite slang word?
Well, in keeping with what I just said, this could be the Norwegianisation of "sucks" (as in "ManU suger") which as an expression is already here to stay but which I personally find extremely offensive still. Ok, and funny. At least in this connection...

If you could have a book about your life, who would write it and why?
Good question. Great author urgently needed. There are a few bluddies around with the gift of the, erh, keyb? Anyway, I'd better write it myself, I think. Another writer would go insane from all my post-editing, whereas I do editing as a profession... And seriously, I don't think anyone else could be bothered.

- Oh yes, happy Valentine's day to anyone so inclined*!

*I originally wrote "to anyone so declined", but then I thought you might think that I thought that this was how the saying went, so I thought better of it. Very thoughtful...

"Poem"

What is a blank page?
My favourite pastime
Something that will keep me up all night
Just so I can ruin it

This morning - in Lofoten

My mum took this on her cell phone this morning, it's from home, Lofoten. I know, mum, sometimes I wonder why we've moved so far away too... But at least we'll be coming back in the summer :)

Musical evening

No, I haven't been to a musical (lately). But Friday "my" choir and I had an appointment with, well, the rest of the population here, really. The local choirs (5) and whoever else who wanted to come along, were gathered to sing. The choirs had 2-3 songs each in between, but the rest was pure singalong (not karaoke..).

Before going I felt as if I was a hundred years old, because that's what I expected the average age of the people attending to be - but no such thing. Admittedly, average age was possibly 50, but there was such a genial atmosphere, and fun songs to sing! It was great listening to the other choirs and there was even food and drink.

Very un-Norwegianly, people smiled and talked to complete strangers, and I doubt not that the compere was right when he said you couldn't sing and be a sourpuss. I didn't feel like a hundred years old, and I even answered when called upon by strangers...

I'll just give you a couple examples of the singalong (as usual, it's sound only - for atmosphere, the localities where wrapped in semi-darkness). It's not particularly beautiful, but it's kind of silly-funny, it's two songs phonetically translated to Norwegian - Ferje over Mjøsa (= ferry cross Mjøsa, from "ferry cross the Mersey", of course - at least it's about a ferry ride too) and Du kan godt få sitte innte meg Leif (= feel free to move in closer, Leif, from "got to get you into my life" - it's got absolutely nothing to do with the original, but it sounds like it...)

Our performance? It wasn't too bad, actually. We'd had two practice sessions before this evening... The second song (a medley) I won't go into, but the first one had several people coming over to us afterwards saying things like "most enchanting of the evening", "most special" and "most true (= in tune) singing they'd ever heard". I can live with that...

Savoury Saturday

From he woke up this morning, Filip demanded we baked a pancake cake. He'd seen someone make one on children's tv, and wanted one for himself. Hubby was away on a football trainer course, and I didn't want an entire day alone with the kids to include a whining Filip - besides, there were som pancakes in the freezer - so I indulged him.

Different kids, different tastes, so half is creme au chocolat, the other is strawberry cream.

See? I actually thought it looked kind of cool... Unfortunately, the quads (all opting for the choc half) didn't really take to it, so settled on a bowl of corn flakes instead... Jakob and I thoroughly enjoyed the strawberry cream, as did hubby after he returned.

Jakob also made us a fruit-in-a-bag kind of thing; apples, pears and pineapple (= the fruits we had lying about) soaked in pineapple and strawberry sauces and wrapped in tin foil, cooking in the oven for about 20 minutes. His class had made it before on one of their trips to the forest this winter. Served with custard sauce. Very tasty!

Afterwards Anna and Mathias decided to make som artwork, while the others went out to play in the snow. All in all - we barely had time to notice hubby was gone before he came back!

Reading habits

Our polar bears seem to do a lot of reading when we're not home... Here, Anna's 'Lille Mille' caught reading a Pooh story, you can tell she didn't expect the camera!And here - a collection of the books Mathias has read since Christmas... He taught himself how to read in the summer, just before starting school, and since Christmas he hasn't done much else! Just like his mum did, he prefers the company of books to quite a few other things...

We've started making a list, he's on 84 now, and counting (the shortest ones have only a few words in them, the biggest one had 320 pages. The highest stack is 60+ pages books.)

But even though he is, I can't really say he reads better than his oldest brother, can I? I know Jakob wouldn't appreciate it...

Friday, August 31, 1711 - early version of blogger comment, from the time they knew how to say things:

Mr . Spectator, I have observed through the whole Course of your Rhapsodies, (as you once very well called them) you are very industrious to overthrow all that many your Superiors who have gone before you have made their Rule of writing. I am now between fifty and sixty, and had the Honour to be well with the first Men of Taste and Gallantry in the joyous Reign of Charles the Second: We then had, I humbly presume, as good Understandings among us as any now can pretend to.

As for yourself, Mr. Spectator, you seem with the utmost Arrogance to undermine the very Fundamentals upon which we conducted our selves. It is monstrous to set up for a Man of Wit, and yet deny that Honour in a Woman is any thing else but Peevishness, that Inclination is the best Rule of Life, or Virtue and Vice any thing else but Health and Disease. We had no more to do but to put a Lady into good Humour, and all we could wish followed of Course. Then again, your Tully, and your Discourses of another Life, are the very Bane of Mirth and good Humour. Pr'ythee don't value thyself on thy Reason at that exorbitant Rate, and the Dignity of human Nature; take my Word for it, a Setting-dog has as good Reason as any Man in England.

Had you (as by your Diurnals one would think you do) set up for being in vogue in Town, you should have fallen in with the Bent of Passion and Appetite; your Songs had then been in every pretty Mouth in England, and your little Distichs had been the Maxims of the Fair and the Witty to walk by: But alas, Sir, what can you hope for from entertaining People with what must needs make them like themselves worse than they did before they read you? Had you made it your Business to describe Corinna charming, though inconstant, to find something in human Nature itself to make Zoilus excuse himself for being fond of her; and to make every Man in good Commerce with his own Reflections, you had done something worthy our Applause; but indeed, Sir, we shall not commend you for disapproving us.

I have a great deal more to say to you, but I shall sum it up all in this one Remark, In short, Sir, you do not write like a Gentleman.

'I am, Sir, Your most humble Servant.'

From The Spectator Essays. The real ones... The 'letter to the editor' of course written by Steele himself!

You can only keep five things you have. What will they be?

- In what I thought would be the increasingly inaccurately named Tuesday tales, but which are actually deadly accurate. After just one week offline. So far...

(I would say my kids, but even though they're 5 they're hardly things..)

1. My cell phone. Sad, but true. We didn't have one until about 7 years ago, then we shared one for a year or two. Until I became addicted and bought another for my dear hubby...
2. My beloved iPod – including the music on it, of course!
3. My bed. I’m sure I could sleep in a different bed too (after all, I always fall asleep the minute I decide to, wherever I am), but I quite like it…
4. A working internet connection. Aarrrghhhh. I don’t know if it really counts as a material possession, but these last few days at least have shown me that I can’t function properly without one.
5. There’s got to be five? Hmm. Oh, well, the computer! Not much point in an internet connection without one…

And here’s to hoping I’ll be properly connected by next Tuesday!

Diagnosis: offline

Symptoms:

• strongly diminished social skills (sic!)
• severe restlessness
• impatience
• verge of madness

Mood:

• Foul (see photo)

Cure / Medication:

• moan, wail and gnash teeth (check)
• curse computer wiz (check)
• curse internet supplier (check)
• call computer wiz (check)
• call internet supplier (check)
• have internet supplier fix their lines (duh!) (check)
• have computer wiz update router information after internet supplier replaced old modem (check)
• curse internet supplier for offering that high-speed broadband connection just before Christmas without actually asking if your modem could take it (check)
• keep cursing as nothing works anyway...
• bill internet supplier for new modem and computer wiz’ working hours on the router [oh yes, will do, shortly!]
  

Survival expectancy: Surprisingly, yes… At least now I've got two days' work in town and online ahead of me...

Relapse expectancy: Absolutely none! Then I’d rather work in town every day… Or -
of course, being offline wouldn’t necessarily be intolerable…

... If this was where I was at...

(And no, of course I'm not spending my first day at work, online, blogging. I wrote this at home. In the weekend. In a textfile. Duh... And the computer wiz is coming around to my home office Wednesday morning. Hopefully all will be well after that...)