So, September 11th again huh? It’s impossible to think of this day as anything positive now after the brutal killing of Anna Lindh last year. Feel sorry for anyone that has this as their birthday, that’s gotta be tough.
When I went to bed last night I thought to myself “now that we’ve got so little to do at work, shouldn’t I donate some blood?”. I actually felt bad for not donating blood in a while. See, I’m the only one in my immediate family that is currently in such good health I actually can donate blood so it’s really more of an obligation I think. Not to mention it’s a good calorie burn! Then I realised they have this 3-months rule, and last time was … June 15th. So another week I guess. Woke up the very next morning and found a “it’s that time again!”-letter from the bloodbank. Terrible coincidence that I couldn’t ignore so first thing today I went up there. And even though my self esteem got a little boost, your ego takes a little beating when filling out the form you have to fill out every time. They have this little yes/no-box saying “in the past three months, have you had a new sexual partner?”. And no matter how much I wanna put down a yes, I really don’t think these are the kinda forms you wanna lie on…
Now I actually have an excuse for not doing shit here on the site! For the past week I’ve done stuff perparing for the Swecon 2004 – the first swedish Star Trek convention with the first official Star Trek visit. Tim Russ, the guy who plays Tuvok on “Voyager” is in town for the convention which, to Star Trek in Sweden, is HUGE! And what do I do? Except for miscellanous stuff that I always do for Stockholm Trekkers I have been given the title “The Offical Driver of Swecon 2004”. So yeap, I picked the guy, his girlfriend and her parents up at the airport and I’m driving him to and from the hotel, which is actually fun and a good chance to just chat about non-Star Trek stuff. And today I had to do something that was actually something alot of people think I can pull off easily – bodyguard duty. When we were going from the hotel, 4 hours after he’d been on an national radio show promoting it, he had some fans down in the lobby at the hotel so I had to muscle up a bit. Never thought I’d be the bastard that pushes people away that just wants an autograph but the dude made it really clear he didn’t want to be bothered when he wasn’t at the convention so if any of those people are reading this – sorry!
Now I have a perfectly good reason for not posting anything in a while I’ve been totally busy with work and playing Doom 3. Seriously, that game is dangerous for your health. Don’t play it if you have a weak heart. And my computer is begging me for an upgrade, god knows how I’m suppose to afford that. But looking forward to another great weekend. I’m playing housesitter for four days, so it’s just me, huge house, a cat and the weather which I’m hoping is gonna be all sunshine!
I wish I could say I’ve been too busy to update this place. But the fact is I’m just lazy… no, actually, quite the opposite, I’ve been possessed by some workout deamon. When the scale 114 during my latest physical I thought it was time to do something about it. So I started working our and after two weeks I actually bought a scale to see if there was any result… 117 kilos. That’s what two weeks on sickleave with a busted ankle will do to you. Or did to me anyway. But right now I’m passing down to 114 again and I’m not planning to stop. Until I’m bored …
Saw an interesting docu-movie today about the rise and rise of Adolf Hitler. Covered the years from when he was sent to jail right up the the start of WWII. I like to consider myself a history buff, especially WWII, but I didn’t really know that much about this part of Hitler’s life. First of all, one has to assume there are some made up stuff in a movie to increase the dramatic part of it, but this one was pretty seriously made. And there were some frightening stuff in there and afterwards it was pretty weird to think of the old saying “history has a tendancy to repeat itself”. To be brief about it ; the guy went from being in jail to being the leader of a superpower using loopholes in their constitution and used the arson against the german government building to push through some radic laws temporarily superceding human and civil rights which made him in charge of basically everything and then went to war. In short! Let’s think a little bit bigger. Do we have someone in charge of a superpower right now, with a criminal past, that used constitutional loopholes to gain power and then used an attack against them to push through some laws superceding human and civil rights and then went to war?… hehehe, frightening stuff… Big difference is ofcourse Adolf was a smart asshole. Bush is just an asshole. Another huge difference is that Bush has to face a re-election. Adolf was smart enough to get out of that.
As usual I’m not nationalistic or patriotic in any way, but when big championship comes along that changes. All yellow and blue! And today was the big day for swedish soccer in the Euro2004. Versus Italy. Noone expected it to be much of a match, but hell it turned out to be the best one yet. And Zlatans equalizer… guess I can’t say “he’s not that good, he’s just hyped up by the media” because that was a helluva goal. Or to quote Irene Cara – “oh what a feeling!”.
I’m so not 20 anymore! Picture this – I limp back to the hospital to return the crotches and decided to donate blood. After that you get iron supplement pills. The day after I go out having a couple of beers (more like a dozen) with some friends and wake up today TOTALLED. With lack of blood and the mess in the stomach that iron supplement causes, added with alcohol and OUCH today is not a good day to do anything at all.
As I mentioned in yesterdays update I did my annual physical in may and last friday me and the doc went through the results. I was expecting her to say stuff like “you REALLY need to cut down on the fat, lose some wight and start excercising”. Which she kinda did. She said “you really need to cut down on the bad fat like fast food, chips and candy and get more good fat like olive oil. And it wouldn’t hurt to lose a few pounds”. As if I didn’t know that last part! In christmas of 2002 when I hit 110 kilos I got an excercise bike from my parents. And yes, it was on my short “all I want for christmas”-list. And I actually used it alot and was down to 104 when I started travelling and stuff and didn’t have time for it. So now I’m up to 112 kilos. And since I’m not gonna be travelling anytime soon I can’t use that as an excuse.
Too bad I busted my ankle 🙂
Today I did something I haven’t done in over a year. Donated blood. I haven’t been allowed to do that since I’ve been to “malaria infected countries” which results in a 6 month ban from giving blood. And obviously they have read my entry about me not being able to donate blood at Huddinge hospital, because now I can. Unfortunately, their computer systems aren’t connected to the ones at the donor place I used to go to so I had to fill out all the forms and take new blood tests to ensure that my blood is clean. They didn’t trust me when I said I had my blood tested twice in may -03 (blood donation & pre-vaccination), august -03 (pre-vaccination), twice in november -03 (once for malaria and once in nigeria), december -03 (trying to diagnose salmonella), january -04 (pre-vaccination), may -04 (annual physical) and once just two weeks before when I busted my ankle (still don’t know what one has to do with the other!). I had to take one more blood test to be sure. So I’ve REALLY made up for never having my blood tested before that and now I’m so positive and reassured I’ve got no bad things in my veins.
You’d think that when I’m on sick leave I’d have some time to update this site with more updates and stuff… yeah, you’d think! But I’ve had stuff to keep me busy all the way which makes me kinda worried what it’ll be like when I actually go back to work next wednesday. But then I won’t have weeks of Star Trek to catch up on or a Dead Zone DVD box to watch. Or this good weather!
Saw “Day after Tomorrow” today (thanks sis!). Liked it. Alot. I’ve always liked catastrophe movies. And I always like US of A getting their asses kicked in movies. And I’ve always liked Dennis Quaid ever since “Innerspace”. And I’ve always liked Sela Ward. But there was just one minor teeeeeeny little detail that got me upset – again they portray the US president as a nice, decent and righteous dude.
[Stop readin now if you don’t wanna be spoiled about the movie!] The role of the asshole is the VICE president who later in the movie becomes the president and all of a sudden he becomes a good guy. So vice presidents can be assholes but not presidents? Why? When we all know that it’s George-boy we’re talking about and bashing, why not go all the way? Little disappointed over that.
You know how “they” say that your health takes a dramatic turn for the worse when you hit 30? I’ve heard that it just get’s worse and you have a much easier time getting sick? I guess I’m a little bit ahead of schedule. Cause one year ago I had never been on sick leave (not once!) and had never been to the hospital since my little operation when I was a kid. I was going on almost 20 years without going to the hospital (and no, visiting someone else doesn’t matter). But then BAM, 3 times in 2 weeks in november and now once more unto the breach! Got off the Arlanda-parking buss and my foot just gave away. I guess there was some rock or there that just made my foot go all wrong, but that doesn’t matter cause the result was the same – busted ankle. So now I’ve been to the hospital for x-rays (rather that than limping for the rest of my life) and been on sick leave twice – in the past 6 months alone. And I turned 29 yesterday so it must be that. Or bad luck.
Oh no, it’s that time again. That time of the year that you’re reminded of just how fast time flies. Which I guess is a good thing since that usually means you’re having fun. Which I totally am. But I don’t want another birthday. Thank god I’m out of the country…AGAIN!
Unfortunately this is the last trip I’ll ever do for this government project. I’ve done my 15 or so embassies, and we were 7 techies so that about covers them all. 🙁
My grandmother dying didn’t come as a shock to anyone I guess, she’s been ill for a long time and already last wednesday we were pretty sure she wasn’t gonna make it over the weekend. So my family started making arrangements to go over to Scotland for the funeral. But I couldn’t. For a lot of reasons like my economy couldn’t handle it and I’ve been travelling so much in the past 12 months I’m so tired of it and I also have a ton of stuff to do this week that I couldn’t reschedule (my wisdom tooth has got to go) and so on. But the main reason I didn’t want to go is that a hate funerals more than anything else in the world and this time, as oppose to the last funeral I went to, I was never close to my grandmother. I don’t even remember the last time I saw her. But that’s my fault and loss. So the only reason I had for going was to be there for my mother. But I’m trusting my two sisters will handle that, they are far more capable of that than I am. And as I’m writing this I realise how egotistical it sounds, but it’s how I feel right now.
This weekend had all the ingredients to be absolutely awesome! Star Trek Voyager DVD box #1, two new Enterprise episodes, a Stockholm Trekkers day which usually means I get to see friends I haven’t seen in a while, the hockey championship finals, a Formula 1 race and beautiful weather. So what happened? I forgot how many times I’ve seen the first season of Voyager so I already knew all the episodes by heart, I haven’t had time to see the new Enterprise episodes, one of my best friends came down with the flu and couldn’t make it to the Stockholm Trekkers day, I got a speeding ticket, we “lost” the hockey final to Canada (again!), the F1 race was pretty boring since noone can come close to the Ferrari’s – and to put in the biggest blow – my grandmother passed away. Now I’m gonna go to bed, forget all about this weekend and try to deal with that last part.
But atleast the weather kicked ass!
What happened today has been coming for a long time. Almost three years to be exact. I was caught speeding. Fortunately it wasn’t by much so I only got a ticket for $90, but it’s still pretty sour the way it happened. I had to go home to get my laptop and I was driving on Huddingevägen, 2 lanes and no traffic and limited to 70 kph. And I come along a blue and white that’s doing about 70. So I pass him. And they accelerate to 80 and they’re not catching me. And they wait for about 6-7 minutes until they catch up with me at the next traffic light, take me aside and say “we drove 80 and you drove away from us. We couldn’t clock you but you were doing over the limit for sure!”… “yeap, I was, so?”… seriously, why argue? I’ve never hesistated passing cops and they’ve never stopped me before. But these two guys just had to give me a ticket. So my perfect clean sheet, the kind that can only be faked that you hear about in movies, is now tainted by a speeding ticket.
“It’s another day, for you and me in paradise!”. One more of those “this is life” moment. After spending all day walking around in beautiful sunny Rome and eating a home cooked italian meal and just kicking back on the porch with a whiskey in my hand and one of my best friends on the other side of the table! Oh, didn’t I mention that? When it was decided I was gonna do the Rome-installation, my half-italian friend Ricki decided that would be an excellent time for them to go down there and visit his family. So he and his wife Mona came down here on thursday and I’ve been spending all sunday with them getting a tour of the city… this is life…
I’ve done so many trips and installations that I know all the routines and stuff that this time I’ve done everything I possible can to do everything as quickly as I possibly can and that has really paid off! I’m sitting out on the porch at the embassy just bathing in the sun without a care in the world. In Rome. Can’t believe it, I’m finally here! Or I can actually not believe it took me this long to get here!
I got a bitter-sweet problem that I don’t know how to deal with. Long story though, so here goes!
About 5 years ago one of the weekly highlights was to tune into a radio show called “Städdagen” on Radio Stockholm. It was a hilarious program hosted by a guy and his assistant who did all the dirty work. And they started an internet chat through their website as they were broadcasting. And I joined in ofcourse. And the more I chatted with his assistant the more I liked her. Then one day they started the show by saying how miserable she was feeling that day. So I made a call to fed-ex over a flower to brighten her day. Which it did. And that became a tradition that lasted a few months. Wonder if she thought that was sweet or if the stalker-alarm went off? Anyway, then I finally met them In Real Life and I liked her even more. True to my tradition she was a little spitfire, but when I saw that she had a CARTMAN on her desk I just had to ask her out. But nope, as usual, all good ones are taken. Then her career moved her over the pond to Finland so I lost contact with her. And had it stopped there it would only have been a “bitter” problem. The sweetness of the story comes from the fact that ever so often she popps up either on TV or on the radio! Like yesterday when I finally got to bed at 1 am and turned on the radio as I always do, and there she was. And everytime that happens I remember that year and her with a smile on my face. Although I’m totally over that little crush, I’ve even had girlfriends since then. But it still makes me feel good. Is this even a problem? Maybe not… well, it’s 4 am so I’m not surprised if I don’t make any sense at all.