... and then she spake ne'ermore!

Vanished? Not without stain remover

devil mood tagged people like me to the following:
1. Open your library (iTunes, Winamp, Media Player, iPod, etc)
2. Put it on shuffle
3. Press play
4. For every question, type the song that's playing
5. When you go to a new question, press the next button
6. Don't lie

To make a film with a plot like this work, I'll need Orlando Bloom to star as me! But here goes...

Opening Credits: My Vision (Seal)
Waking Up: Beibi (de Lillos) – very sweet song about love-making...
First Day At School: Elskling (de Lillos) – what could have been
Falling In Love: Fragile (Sting) – well, I've been in love with Sting for a long time!
Fight Song: [track 07] (The The) – probably unknown title because I wouldn't fight
Breaking Up: Sne og is (de Lillos) – breaking up with Norwegians it would have to be
Prom: Mysteriet deg (Bjørn Eidsvåg) – extremely romantic...
Life's Okay: Misunderstood (Robbie Williams)
Mental Breakdown: The ubiquitous Mr. Lovegrove (Dead can dance)
Driving: Vienna (the Fray) – ok, I'll get directions from viamichelin right away!
Flashback: This hard land (Bruce Springsteen)
Getting Back Together: Better Man (Robbie Williams) – they always say that...
Wedding: Papa Stone (Jørn Hoel) – was he?
Birth of Child: sanvean (Dead can dance) - way to name your firstborn!
Final Battle: [track 07] (Massive Attack) – as I said!
Death Scene: Mamma (Beckstrøm) – most likely word to shout out, yes...
Funeral Song: I cried for you (Billie Holiday)
End Credits: Where is my mind? (Pixies)

I can't believe no Rufus-songs came out! [pun intended]

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And apart from this?

Trips planned: Edinburgh in September (with my colleagues), de Lillos concert in September (with my hubby), Berlin in October with my hubby! -- and see Rufus Wainwright live while we're there! And then Rufus is coming to Oslo in December... Have I got tickets? Duh... (While we're away, the kids will be here, there and everywhere. Hopefully, we'll find them when we get back home...)

Status: one-armed. Well, tendonititical [it's not a word, but it's tangible..], at least. You won't believe the time this epistle has taken me to type.

Status II: 6 kilos lighter than 5 weeks ago. Yay! And not even hungry :)

Status III (continual): Happy! Just extremely unproductive blogwise...

Bad hair day. Must go to Berlin.

My hair is getting like this again. A little too long to be short, a little too short to be long. The wavy / curly shape makes the hair gather around my neck like a scarf. I really hate it. If I want to wear a scarf, I'll put one on, I don't want to live in it. So I must go to Berlin.

See? This was me after arriving in Berlin in May. I look a bit flustered. And I've got a hairscarf.

Sister did not listen to my complaining about the hairscarf for long, but pushed me into the nearest hairdresser's.

A blessing, as it turned out. I can't remember this hairdresser's name, but she was wonderful, everyone was really pleasant, my sister got coffee while waiting and we were all happy.

Just look how happy I am without the hairscarf!

And see who I landed with this new hairdo... (Yes, he'll go for anything with a pulse, and yes, of course that's the real Robbie we bumped into in the airport in Berlin...)

Berlin behaviour

While in Berlin, getting off our tram near the hotel, we were suddenly surrounded by police cars, policeMEN (I didn't see any women!) and for every ten of them, one football fan... We asked about (German really is quite hard to forget, even though I hadn't really used it since high school) and found out Dynamo Berlin was meeting with Berlin Union at a stadium near our hotel. We're talking football, and not even top division. But a very emotional encounter, apparently! I have no idea who won, though...
The police cars numbered at least 50 - for once I'm not even exaggerating - and they kept coming. There were 5 or more policemen in each, getting out, putting on full riot gear - including body armour and guns (Norwegian policemen don't carry weapons, so we were slightly put off by this).

One of them was standing in the tram as we were getting off. It was packed, and he was right in front of the door, looking as if he owned the world. As people tried getting off, he didn't budge an inch. We all sneaked (snuck?) past him. Now - imagine a British policeman doing something like that?? I mean, possibly even a Norwegian policeman would have gotten out to let us off before going back in himself. A British one would have apologised for being there in the first place... Whereas this German officer (and not old enough to be a leftover Stasi..) had us feeling we really ought to stay until he was ready to get off...

(Right: getting into riot gear.)

We vigilantly clad in grey so as not to be mistaken for fans of either team, and pussyfooted back to the tram station, and on to the Mitte district...

To be fair to the sour policeman - other Germans weren't really that much nicer! In service professions, no less; A couple of shop owners shouted at us to make us leave, and a waiter at a restaurant made remarks at us - for complaining about the appallingly stained tablecloth... (Yes, we left him.) Though the people at our hotel were nice, there was that little old lady on the tram, and several non-ethnic Germans that knew how to behave!

Potsdamer Platz

For some reason I just couldn't wait to get to Potsdamer Platz while we were in Berlin, I think I went on about it from the moment we landed. When we actually got there, there wasn't much of a square (as Platz means) at all, but plenty to see nonetheless!

Looking into an art installation by Pythonist Terry Gilliam

This un-square square must be the obvious spot to take your geometry class...


The Sony Center

My perfect "room" that is just for me and me alone

"D" wrote an excellent response to my call for an explanation about the Roman helmet-wearing tricycle-riding dad, it's actually quite moving, go see for yourself! She also challenged me to respond with the above title, so I'll give it a go...

To be fair, Devil Mood also undertook this challenge without thinking twice - you'll find her explaining-away here!

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I started writing this post weeks ago - exactly a month ago, actually - and I have been thinking about it, at least. I found that my perfect "room" these days is having the time to do whatever comes to mind, to be impulsive. And that's what my sister and I did while in Berlin - we jumped on buses or stopped at monuments etc. whenever we felt like it, and the greatest treat - to us - was that we didn't have to get to anything at any special time...

(Here at Potsdamer Platz, my sister not usually so much shorter than me...)

Preview

There's just so little time, what with 17th coming up etc. (More on that later.) But as some of you may know, I spent last weekend in Berlin, and I'll give you a quick look into the first leg of the journey:
- My local boat at sunrise / my packed lunch and bottle of water which I enjoyed on board



Arriving at the airport by train / My sis taking the last goodbyes before take-off


As viewed from the taxi: Brandenburger Tor / Siegessäule


Landing, literally, in the hotel room / view from same room (East Berlin, Weissensee area)

I'll get back to this. We loved Berlin! Two days isn't nearly enough though - we felt like those Americans (begging your pardon..) travelling "through" Europe in a week, saying things like 'it's Tuesday, so this must be Berlin'... But we saw enough to take a lot of photos! And to decide we'd better go back sometime.

Plans for tomorrow (erh, today) - generally ironing shirts and flags for the 17th!

... then we take Berlin

What did I say? It's Thursday, a few raindrops have started to fall... [I haven't been totally abstaining from the internet, I must admit, I've been - very sporadically - working on two different blogs, one on my travels and one as a sort of personal Greek language training programme... I'll get back to you on what and where if it ever turns out as anything.]

But - why bother with the rain... tomorrow morning at 06.30 I'm taking the boat from here, and at 11.35 my sister and I will land in Berlin! And BBC has the following to say about the weather there:

Friday: Sunrise 05:16 (CEST) Sunset 20:48 (CEST) Max day 26°C / 78°F Min night 15°C / 59°F
Sat'day: Sunrise 05:14 (CEST) Sunset 20:50 (CEST) Max day 23°C / 73°F Min night 12°C / 53°F Sunday: Sunrise 05:13 (CEST) Sunset 20:52 (CEST) Max day 18°C / 64°F Min night 5°C / 41°F

Oh, and I've borrowed my dad's camera again. (Luckily he's not going to Crete again until after the 17th of May.) Yes, my travel photos will come back to taunt you a second time! In the mean time, Berlin will experience sister's who're doing it for themselves.. According to Google earth, we'll be staying not far from the Berlin Reichstag. And now I guess I really should start packing..

On the road again...

So, inspired by the amazing trip to Lisbon, I'm going away again shortly. This time with my sister - and we're off to
!
Sought out, planned and paid for by her husband for her birthday. Lucky me got to be included in the gift :) Now, I'll be wanting your tips on what to see!

Then there's summer, which I am sure will be fine...