First hike of the year

Weather was still nice today, no sun, but no rain or snow either, so I went on a small hike.

I went up on one of the hilltops near our house today. I don't want to call it a mountain, because it's not high enough. Even though the hill's not very high, and it's not a very long walk to the top, it's very exhausting, because it's steep. Steep + snow = slipping, sliding and falling over, a lot. You would think that because it's steep I could just sit down on my bum and slide down when going home, but there's too many rocks, roots and trees in the way for that, so instead I just fall over a lot.

I found out I need to whip my body back into shape! I started panting after only a couple of minutes, and it took me twice as long to get up than it did last summer. I could of course just say it took me longer because of the snow, and because I was talking it slow since it's been about 6 months since last time I hiked, but TWICE as long!? The last time I hiked up there and time myself last summer it only took me 20 minutes, so I was up and down in about an hour (5-10 minute rest at the top). Today it took me about 40 minutes just to get up there!

To top it off I met some (not too bad looking..) guys walking back down again as I was close to the top. Of course I had a lobster red-"I'm exhausted"-face... very attractive.

At the top

The hilltop is very popular all year round, so they've built a shelter at the top.

 If any axe-murderers ask you to go on a hike with them, don't.

Axe-murder heaven?

 A lot of people hike up here in groups, and some at night, so I guess it can be nice to have a small oven/stove. It would probably be fun to spend the night up here, especially with a few friends. And if the sky's clear you could see lots of stars.

The view

The only green spot is the football field.

I'm glad I only wore a t-shirt under my jacket, I was boiling when I reached the top!

We've got this local competition called Fjellgeita (the Mountain Goat), where you collect points by hiking up mountains. The one I hiked today has the lowest score along with a few other hills. They're scored according to difficulty. Last year I managed to collect quite a few points, I even hiked up a mountain that had one of the highest points, and my knees were shaking all the way back down again, it was terrifying (and exhausting)! I didn't enter the competition though. To keep track of who's been to which mountain, the people entering the competition has to write down what date they climbed up what mountain, and also there's a book at the top of every mountain where you write the date and sign. The books are kept in plastic bags inside metal boxes so they're safe.

I'll probably feel the hike tomorrow, good thing I've only got a short shift.

Career choice

So I finally found out what I can be. I realized last night after tweeting Kevin (52 characters in search of a script), I said I wanted a job where I don't have to leave my bed, and then it hit me, I could be a mattress tester! I would have to leave my bed for different beds though.

I could start when I go to Australia, I travel all around Australia testing mattresses, that way I can travel while I work. I could become the worlds best mattress-tester so that when I'm finished in Australia I can travel all over the world testing mattresses!

And I just realized this post has the possibility of sounding a bit... wrong. Which wasn't my intention!

Reply

Lilly,

Don't kill the rooster, we're vegetarian.

Here's some sunshine, don't get too excited, we probably won't let it last too long. You Norwegians tend to go into shock if you have sunshine for longer that a few days consecutively.

Anyway, you're going to the land of (almost) eternal sunshine in a few months, so stop your complaining! 

Although, seeing as we don't really like you, we might hold back on the Australian sunshine for the duration of your stay there. Mwahahahaha!

The Weather-Gods.

Dear Weather-Gods,

I know you guys don't like me.

I know I live in Noway and should therefore not expect spring to come until the end of May.

But if would be nice if we didn't get so much snow. It's starting to look like it did in December!

If you do have to give us this much snow, can't you at least make it pretty like it was in December? At least back then it was a nice whitey-blue colour, not this constant boring grey.

If you have to give us snow, let it stay cold until you've decided to start spring. Stop teasing us with snow one day, then rain that makes the snow slushy the next day. Then when the snow has finally gone away you make it snow again!

I'm sorry us humans have treated Mother Nature bad, but many of us are trying to fix it now. You should at least give us credit for trying, right?

I'll sacrifice this chicken to you... Well actually it's a rooster, but never mind.

At least I'm getting some exercise shoveling all the snow... See? I can make it into something positive! Does that mean you'll stop sending us snow now?

I'm out,

Lilly

Dancing on the ceiling!

I've been granted a working holiday visa to Australia!!! And I've booked my plane ticket!

So, yeah, I'm not going to study after all. I don't know what I want to do with my life, so paying loads of money for an education I'm not even sure I'm going to use seems a bit wasted. But on my WH visa I can study for 3 months, so I guess if I find a short course I want to do I can do that. Anyway, I'm going to Australia! It's actually happening!

I'm not sure if I should just bring a backpack, or a smallish suitcase. A backpack would probably be easier in a way I guess. I just need to find out what to pack (dreading that). Maybe I'll have to buy a new backpack, as the one I've got isn't very big... I'll have to think about that and see. I don't pack much compared to many girls, but it's still going to be hard to decide what I'm going to "need" and not.

I'm thinking about finding a job before I go there, like as an au pair or something, because then at least I have a job to start with, and then I guess it will be easier to find the next place to go and the next job when I'm there.

I'm getting 4 nights free at a hostel in Sydney when I arrive in Australia, and I also get a trip to Blue Mountains. It's all booked through Kilroy travels. I'm also thinking about getting a bus pass, so that I can just jump on a bus and go wherever I want to go. I almost wish I had a licence so that I could just rent a car and drive myself, but I guess this way is better for the environment and also I might meet some cool people, and it's probably cheaper as well, since I don't have to pay for the rent of a car and gas money and stuff, and I don't have to get a ridiculously expensive licence.

I'm really excited right now, and I'm looking forward to July which is when I go.

Anyone got any suggestions to where I should go and what I should do while I'm in Australia, or what I should pack?

Obviously I've already decided I'm going to see Uluru and dive into the Great Barrier Reef.

Earth Hour 2011

So earth hour 2011 is over in Norway. I didn't light a candle and read a book as I planned, I went for a walk instead. So as well as saving energy I got some exercise as an added bonus!

I'm kind of disappointed at how few people had turned their lights off though. Even the lights that lights up the church on the outside was still on! What's the point in that? All the street lights were on as well. I also think that the shops that were open could have turned off the lights they could have managed without. Most of the houses I walked past still had all their lights on. Some of them only had lights on in what I guess was their living room, and some only had their TV's on (as I could tell by the flickering blue/green light)... at least they saved some electricity. The few houses I walked past that was completely dark made me happy.

I can kind of understand people that are into football watching TV, as there was a big game on (Norway vs. Denmark), as for other people I think earth hour could be a great excuse to have some quality family time instead of just sitting in front of the telly on a Saturday night. Why not go out for a walk, or sledding? The only people I met on my walk was a group of three teenage girls that were sledding, seeing them made me smile. Or maybe light some candles and play board games or have story-time? There are so many things you can do instead of watching telly.

I looked across the fjord to Molde. I'll have to try and remember to do that another night to compare, but I think it looked slightly darker there than usual ,and they did turn their street lights and any lights outside public buildings that doesn't have residents or patients off according to their webpage. I can't remember if I can usually see the stadium at night, but at least I couldn't tonight, so maybe they had turned their lights off, since it would fall under public buildings, right?

Our earth hour house. The neighbor right across the road had all their lights on (as usual) and their lights kind of lit our house up. So the light you can see in the windows is the reflection of the neighbor's lights.

How did you spend earth hour 2011?

Earth Hour

Don't forget about Earth Hour tonight! 8:30pm wherever you are in the world

What are you doing for Earth Hour? I'm going to do the same thing I did last year: light a few candles and read a book.

Football and me.

This little place where I live lies right between two cities, weird right? Anyway, these cities has a football team each (that's soccer for my American readers), there's Molde Football Club (MFK) and Ålesund Football Club (AaFK). Both teams are apparently really good, and there's this big rivalry thing between them. Once there was a game between them in Molde and apparently AaFK-supporters wasn't allowed in the restaurants, there was a kind of soup-tent outside the stadium for them instead. 


I don't think AaFK is very happy at the minute, because MFK's stadium was just announced Norway's best. 

Since out little place lies right between, people that live here is divided into MFK-supporters and AaFK-supporters. 

Say, about 5 years ago, I worked in a bakery in this little place. One day this guy wearing an MFK football uniform came over and asked me where he could find the manager to the little shopping center the bakery was in, so I told him. He looked at me a little strangely but went where I told him. I thought it was weird that he was wearing a football uniform, but I just figured it was game day and he was a supporter. Next thing I know, him and two or three others in MFK-uniform are setting up a table, people are queuing up, teenage girls are screaming and applying more make-up and the "supporters" are writing autographs.... Guess they weren't supporters after all...

They were sat with their backs to where I was working and a few people asked me who was sitting there.

Me: "Some football players it seems..."

Them: "Well I can see THAT! Who is it?!"

Me: "I don't know, I think that's the Molde FK uniform though... Isn't it?"

When I said this the person that was talking to me pretty much backed away from me slowly as if I was insane or something. How could I NOT know who the football players were?! Even if they were from the rivaling team, or ANY team for that matter, I should KNOW who they are!


That's probably why the footballer had looked at me strangely, I had just talked to him normally as if he was "no one".


I'm not into football, as you probably understand from reading this, but I think it could be fun to see a game between MFK and AaFK at a stadium, just to get the whole atmosphere.

Celebrity at work tonight!

You know when you say hi to someone, how the hi is different depending on who you say it to? Like if it's someone you know or not.

I was having some trouble with one of the freezers at work tonight, so I had to call the manager and get him to come down about an hour before we closed. As he arrived I said hi to him. There was this kid right in front of my boss that thought I was talking to him, and then he looked at me as if he was waiting for me to say something else (probably because of the way I said hi.). I just gave him my best "customer smile" and walked past him to get to my manager and explain the problem. When the kid had gone my manger told me: "That's that kid that plays Mowgli at "Chat Noir"" (big theater in Oslo)
Me: "oh-kay..."
I had no idea who he was. He's even been in the local paper quite a few times, since he's (fairly) local. So maybe he thought I said hi the way I did because I recognized him...?
Even if I didn't know who he was though, it's kind of cool that we got a "celebrity" in the store... It's a small place, we take what we can get.

I used to know about a lot about celebrities, when I was a teenager, and I lived in Oslo. But it was still more the foreign ones, not the Norwegian ones. I even met a couple of celebrities when we lived in Oslo. My father works in television, and I got to go with a couple of times when he filmed some celebrities. I wish I had his job. He gets to travel the world.

By the way, it stopped raining... Kind of. It's snowing instead.

Bah... I'm ready for spring now please.

Homemade water?

We drink tap water, but we have a large bottle that we fill up and keep in the fridge so that it's always cold. We drink from it everyday though, so the water is always "fresh".

At dinner today my mother thought the water smelled funny, which can be a dangerous comment as my mothers cohabitant pretty much IS the local water authority. No worries though, the comment was safe this time, because it's been raining a lot the last few days so a few places are flooded, and this affect the water. So we were talking about how the water usually tastes and looks the same, and smells the same even though the weather's really bad and all that. Then my mother made me laugh:
"Yeah, it's not like homemade water, which could have pieces of dirt in it.." We all just looked at her.
Me: "Homemade water?"
Mum: "Yeah." (My mother realized her mistake, but didn't back down.) "Housewives used to make it."
Me: "How do you make it?"
Mum: "I don't know, I'm not a housewife."
Me: "But it's got dirt in it?"
Mum: "Yeah."
Me: "Sounds yummy."

I love having these discussions with my mum, they make me laugh. Anyway, what she meant when she said homemade water, was well-water. Because obviously "back in the days" when people got their water from wells, then when there was really bad weather and floods and stuff dirt would get in the water.

So now you know what homemade water is.

God's men against the "norm".

I just read a post on ...Petty Witters blog, Pen and Paper, about a vicar dressed as a tart. I feel sorry for the vicar. Fair enough, we don't know the whole story, but shouldn't vicars be allowed to let their hair down as well? They're just regular people like everybody else. Some people can be very judgmental. 


We have a local priest here that kind of goes against what most people think priests should be like. It's not as "major" as the vicar on ...Petty Witter's blog, but anyway. 


This priest teaches Krav Maga, which is a hand-to-hand combat system developed in Israel. I went to a self-defense weekend for women a few weeks back, which he was teaching. I would not have known he was a priest if I hadn't already been told.


Most people, myself included, think of priests as very anti-violence, turn the other cheek and all that, yet the KM-priest told us to strike our attacker as hard as we could (which is of course what we women need to do if we are attacked by a big burly man) so hard that they wouldn't be able to get up for a while. He doesn't just teach self-defense for women either, he has regular KM classes too... Although I guess (or hope) that he tells people to just use it as self defense then too, or just as exercise.


In other words: He's a "cool" priest. I wonder what his services are like. 


Another thing is I've always imagined priest and other "men of God" to do is talk a lot about God, religion and those kind of stuff. I don't know why, I've got plenty of Christian friends, and they don't bring God into every conversation. But when I went on the KM weekend I wasn't quite sure if I wanted to go, I was worried that since the instructor is a priest, that he would say things like "God want you to do this." and almost make it in to a sermon. I've got nothing against religious people, I just don't like to get religion "forced" onto me. I needn't have worried, I don't think he mentioned God at all those two days, and he didn't say anything else that sounded specifically religious in any way either. 


I was also worried that I would swear during the KM class. I don't usually swear, I used to do it a lot when I was a teenager, but then I grew up and realized that lots of swearing just means you've got a limited vocabulary, and I stopped swearing. But, and that's a very annoying but, the few times I'm in church, say at a wedding or christening or something, I suddenly almost swear. I've managed to stop myself most times just before I've said the swear word most times. One time I was standing just outside the church doors after a wedding when I realized I had forgotten something inside.
Me: "Shit! Oops, I mean Fuck! No, oh, ARGH!!! I left something inside." Then I practically stomped back in (because I was mad at myself for swearing).


I don't know why it's like that, maybe it's the stress of trying not to swear? But even if I'm not a religious person I don't want to swear, especially not in church, in front of priests, vicars etc or in front of children. It's just rude and disrespectful, and it's not like we actually need swear words.


Anyway, the KM priest has received loads of complaints from people that think he's not acting like he should. I shudder to think what would happen if we got a vicar like the one in Witter's post... People would probably get their torches and pitchforks and hunt him out of the village. The small minded people that can't handle anything different anyway...


I found a great quote the other day: Great minds discuss ideas. Average minds discuss events. Small minds discuss people.

Fish BALLS??

I'm not a big fan of fish, usually when we have fish for dinner I just eat the veg that we're having with it (although eating only potatoes and carrots isn't very nice either). I think there are 4 fish-things I can eat without gagging:

Mackerel in tomato sauce (very nice on bread with mayonnaise)

Image from Stabburet.no

Cured herring

image from supercook.org

Fish cakes

image from fiskeruta.no

And lastly, my favorite, fish balls. 

Now, whenever I say/write fish balls in English it makes me think of an illustration by Roald Dahl, about what he thought about when he heard of fish balls for the first time as a child. Which is basically a drawing of a fish with "balls". I couldn't find an image of it, but I thought it was funny when I saw it. I can't remember if the drawing was in one of his books or in a book about him. If it was in one of his books, then it's probably in "Boy, tales of Childhood" or something like that.

Anyway, it's not made from the fish's balls and it look like this:

image from nrk.no

I've only ever had the store bought ones before, and they don't taste like fish at all, which is probably why I like them so much. I wonder if I would like them if I had some home-made ones? They would probably taste more of fish... Urgh... But they would most likely be healthier as well. Maybe I'll try to make some one day. I should get some store bought ones as well if I do, just in case they taste horrible when they're home made.

Now all I need to do is find a fish with huge balls...

Japan

Hi guys,

As you all should know by now, Japan was devastated by the 9.0 earthquake and tsunami that hit last week. Thousands of people are dead and many more are still missing or injured.

It is only appropriate that we as a world help as much as we can. Please don't think that if you can only donate a small amount it won't matter, it does help. It's true what they say: "Every little helps".

Having just escaped the 2007-2010 financial crisis, it's understandable that times might be tough financially for all of us, but in Japan there are literally thousands of individuals that has lost everything overnight. From homes, to friends and family. And to top it off, many are now suffering the negative effects of the leaking radiation, with the worst only to come.

Please donate what you can to help those in need.

I myself have donated NOK 150 to the Red Cross, I wish I could afford to donate more. My contribution will also be matched by a Norwegian comic called Pondus. They will match all contributions made to the Red Cross before Monday, so if you're Norwegian, or live in Norway, please go here. And if not, donate through one of your own country's charities.

My contribution

Brownies

Loads of sugar!

A friend at work made some brownies and brought them with her to work the other day. They were so nice I just had to get the recipe.

6 eggs
9 dl sugar
450 g butter/margarine
9 tbs cocoa powder
2 ts vanilla powder

1. Turn the oven on 175 degrees (Celsius)
2. Mix together the eggs and sugar. Stop before you get eggnog.
3. Melt the butter and put in the mixture.
4. Add all the dry ingredients and mix together with a rubber/silicone spatula.
5. Put the thick mixture in a large baking tray coated with baking paper.
6. Cook for 20-30 minutes (the cooking time varies, so keep an eye on it)

If you haven't got a big baking tray (picture at the bottom) you should probably half the recipe.

You could also add 1/2 dl walnuts if you want.

The batter gets really thick!

Yummy!

They turned out really nice! I'll definitely be making these again.

BIG baking tray

Raske Menn

I've just come back from watching a show with Raske Menn. They're a Norwegian comedy trio. It was really funny, I had a great time. They are probably my favorite Norwegian comedians. My mum's cohabitant got us all tickets, which I think was really nice of him.

The only downside is we were sitting so close to the stage all the chairs in front of us and the ones we sat on were just sat on the floor instead of being raked seating, and there were only tall people sitting in front of me (typical), so I couldn't really see everything that was happening, I had to crane my neck all the time. Although it was enough just to listen some of the time. If I ever go to another show at Bjornsonhuset in Molde I will make sure to get a seat higher up than row 10, because after that there's raked seating.

We weren't allowed to take pictures or anything, so here's an old clip of them, the only one I could find with English subtitles.

And now a shower...

I don't think the weather-gods liked that I dried my hair in their wind this morning. They soaked me as I walked home from work tonight!

Lovely uniform isn't it?

The light bit is where my coat covered me. I'm glad I wore one going to work. I considered just putting a jacket on because it was quite mild when I left for work.

It's in weather like this I almost wish I had a car. And a licence.

Nature's hair-dry

The snow's almost gone, and it's fairly warm outside. We've actually got temperatures above 0 Celsius. But I'm not getting my hopes up for "proper" spring yet. Last year it snowed here just a few weeks before I moved back. Which was in mid-May.

Trainers wasn't really the best choice of footwear when I walked through the forest. It's because I forgot that the trees block the sun in the forest, so the snow and ice doesn't melt as fast there.

My hair was damp when I went outside, but after about 10 minutes it was almost completely dry. Eco-friendly hair dry.

That's my face hiding somewhere behind all that hair.

I don't really know how this next picture turned out the way it did, probably just the sun, but I really like the colour of the sea.

It looked prettier when there was loads of snow.

Northern lights

As I was walking home from work tonight I noticed that there were Northern lights on the sky (where else?). It was beautiful. Northern lights isn't common this far south in Norway. It wasn't the colorful ones that you get further north, it was just a greenish shade, but it was still beautiful. I've not seen it very often. Obviously the sky was clear since I could see it, and the Northern lights and the stars looked so nice together.

I didn't get a photo of it because
a) my camera's crappy
b) it was really faint anyway, so I think I would have struggled to get a good picture of it with all the lights on the ground and stuff.

Here's pictures of the weird "Northern Light" phenomenon from 2009:

Looks photo-shopped doesn't it?

Amazing.

Obviously this wasn't actually Northern Lights at all, but a failed Russian missile launch.

I still lived in England when this happened. I was told about it from all angles. People in England asked me what it was (what would I know? I was in England with them), and friends and family in Norway told me about it happening (they didn't know what it was either when they told me about it), but none of them live anywhere near where it happened, so they didn't see it with their own eyes..

I think it would have been fun to actually have been there when it happened, and witnessed it. But I also think I would have been a bit terrified if I actually witnessed something as weird as that happening on the sky first hand. I don't know why. Maybe scared it was an alien invasion? Haha.

Would you be scared or just think it looked pretty/cool/pretty cool if you witnessed something like this first hand?