Saturday, December 31, 2005
I have missed Classic FM. And the M6.
I got the hire car first thing this morning ready to drive up to Scotland today. I'd booked a Ford Fiesta but they gave me a Vauxhall Vectra instead, which was very comfortable and had a great radio that I immediately tuned to Classic FM.
For some reason that probably involves firewalls and Microsoft I can't get Classic FM in Iceland, either at home or in the office. It was both a jolt to the system and incredibly relaxing to be able to listen to it again. It was also curiously relaxing to drive on motorways. The distance between Liverpool and St. Andrews is the same as that between Akureyri and Keflavík (give or take three miles) but the UK driving is much easier and faster.
By the time I arrived at Wayside the Harris Mob and the Beards were already there, so the wine began flowing and we had a very civilised evening with games and champagne at midnight. It was a good end to a mediocre year.
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For some reason that probably involves firewalls and Microsoft I can't get Classic FM in Iceland, either at home or in the office. It was both a jolt to the system and incredibly relaxing to be able to listen to it again. It was also curiously relaxing to drive on motorways. The distance between Liverpool and St. Andrews is the same as that between Akureyri and Keflavík (give or take three miles) but the UK driving is much easier and faster.
By the time I arrived at Wayside the Harris Mob and the Beards were already there, so the wine began flowing and we had a very civilised evening with games and champagne at midnight. It was a good end to a mediocre year.
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Thursday, December 29, 2005
So much for organisation
I thought I had all of my presents organised.
I started buying my Christmas presents at Worldcon, where I found some particularly good gifts. As I was going from Worldcon to the caravan to the airport, I left the bag with the gifts at the caravan and asked my Mum to take it back down to Liverpool when next she went to the van. Several times. Today I went search of the bag and there's no sign of it. Mum doesn't even remember seeing it, and they've closed the van down for the winter. As a result, I've now got to go into the city centre to buy two more fairly major gifts before Saturday. I've no idea what to buy and I'll have to tweak the finances to do it. I was told that another gift hadn't arrived, but found it in an opened box. And other things that had arrrived and either I hadn't been told about them or had arrived and been lost.
On top of this, while I was looking for the bag I came across my missing Palm T5 - the one that disappeared and made me think I'd lost it at Coronation. It seems that someone had tidied it up and hadn't bothered telling me either that it had been found or where it had been put, in spite of my asking (several times) if anyone had seen it.
So I'm furious. I've spent a small fortune to fly a thousand miles to come home to listen to arguments and grumbles, to clean the house and to put up (and no doubt to take down) all the decorations. I've had to bite my tongue at my father being every -ist under the sun because he's never going to change and it's not worth the effort of trying to reason with him. I've managed not to tell my mother that my father wouldn't be so difficult if she'd stop provoking him.
Christmas on my own in a hotel in the Bahamas next year sounds incredibly tempting... except for the guilt trip they'd both lay on me for not coming home for Christmas. No wonder I see the food as the highlight of the entire event.
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I started buying my Christmas presents at Worldcon, where I found some particularly good gifts. As I was going from Worldcon to the caravan to the airport, I left the bag with the gifts at the caravan and asked my Mum to take it back down to Liverpool when next she went to the van. Several times. Today I went search of the bag and there's no sign of it. Mum doesn't even remember seeing it, and they've closed the van down for the winter. As a result, I've now got to go into the city centre to buy two more fairly major gifts before Saturday. I've no idea what to buy and I'll have to tweak the finances to do it. I was told that another gift hadn't arrived, but found it in an opened box. And other things that had arrrived and either I hadn't been told about them or had arrived and been lost.
On top of this, while I was looking for the bag I came across my missing Palm T5 - the one that disappeared and made me think I'd lost it at Coronation. It seems that someone had tidied it up and hadn't bothered telling me either that it had been found or where it had been put, in spite of my asking (several times) if anyone had seen it.
So I'm furious. I've spent a small fortune to fly a thousand miles to come home to listen to arguments and grumbles, to clean the house and to put up (and no doubt to take down) all the decorations. I've had to bite my tongue at my father being every -ist under the sun because he's never going to change and it's not worth the effort of trying to reason with him. I've managed not to tell my mother that my father wouldn't be so difficult if she'd stop provoking him.
Christmas on my own in a hotel in the Bahamas next year sounds incredibly tempting... except for the guilt trip they'd both lay on me for not coming home for Christmas. No wonder I see the food as the highlight of the entire event.
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Panic buying
I managed to get into town this morning on the train and do my panic shopping mainly at Past Times. I even gave in and joined the Past Times club - after all, a 5% discount is always useful, and I've found that I end up buying quite a lot of gifts in there throughout the year.
Kayte arrived from Nottingham early in the afternoon. Seemingly she could tell when she got to Liverpool - someone had nicked all of the snow. We haven't had any of the snow that the news has been highlighting today, although that's only to be expected as Liverpool is, like St. Andrews, very sheltered.
As a result, she couldn't stay late, so we had quite a quiet evening.
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Kayte arrived from Nottingham early in the afternoon. Seemingly she could tell when she got to Liverpool - someone had nicked all of the snow. We haven't had any of the snow that the news has been highlighting today, although that's only to be expected as Liverpool is, like St. Andrews, very sheltered.
As a result, she couldn't stay late, so we had quite a quiet evening.
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Tuesday, December 27, 2005
Snow?
So the east coast has snow, has it?
No sign of anything similar here in Liverpool, where it has been a bit chilly and we had quite a good frost last night but certainly nothing special. I find myself wondering though if it's likely to affect Kayte coming up from Nottingham on Thursday.
It's really nice to have news, even if there's no news worth watching. It's also nice to have UKHistory, BBC4, ITV3 and E4. The complete day of Time Team the other day was just wonderful. Hmm... that pretty much states what I think of mainstream TV this Christmas, doesn't it? Still, while I've been here I've finished a large embroidery, designed a smaller one and made up three fabric-covered balls for the Christmas tree. So it hasn't been a complete write-off.
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No sign of anything similar here in Liverpool, where it has been a bit chilly and we had quite a good frost last night but certainly nothing special. I find myself wondering though if it's likely to affect Kayte coming up from Nottingham on Thursday.
It's really nice to have news, even if there's no news worth watching. It's also nice to have UKHistory, BBC4, ITV3 and E4. The complete day of Time Team the other day was just wonderful. Hmm... that pretty much states what I think of mainstream TV this Christmas, doesn't it? Still, while I've been here I've finished a large embroidery, designed a smaller one and made up three fabric-covered balls for the Christmas tree. So it hasn't been a complete write-off.
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Monday, December 26, 2005
Turkey
I like turkey.
I like turkey quite a lot, in fact. I'd be quite happy to have turkey, followed by turkey sandwiches, then more turkey and finally turkey curry. Unfortunately the rest of the family are not so keen on the idea.
Sad though it may be, I find the food the most enjoyable part of Christmas nowadays. The turkey doesn't argue with the pudding. You don't have to be nice to the sprouts even if you're not that fond of them. The mince pies don't complain about the brandy butter.
Of course, I may be biased by the fact that I like Christmas pudding quite a lot too, and it's difficult to find Christmas puds at any other time of year. I think I'm going to have to make some room in my luggage to take a couple of small ones back with me.
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I like turkey quite a lot, in fact. I'd be quite happy to have turkey, followed by turkey sandwiches, then more turkey and finally turkey curry. Unfortunately the rest of the family are not so keen on the idea.
Sad though it may be, I find the food the most enjoyable part of Christmas nowadays. The turkey doesn't argue with the pudding. You don't have to be nice to the sprouts even if you're not that fond of them. The mince pies don't complain about the brandy butter.
Of course, I may be biased by the fact that I like Christmas pudding quite a lot too, and it's difficult to find Christmas puds at any other time of year. I think I'm going to have to make some room in my luggage to take a couple of small ones back with me.
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Sunday, December 25, 2005
Christmas Day
Friday, December 23, 2005
I really must persuade Mum that Tesco Online is a great way to get your Christmas food shopping.
It would prevent the requirement next year to spend an hour and a half battling the hordes of other people also doing their food shopping. I hate to imagine what it'll be like tomorrow. *Sigh* Ah well, I knew that coming home for Christmas would be stressful. It always is.
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It would prevent the requirement next year to spend an hour and a half battling the hordes of other people also doing their food shopping. I hate to imagine what it'll be like tomorrow. *Sigh* Ah well, I knew that coming home for Christmas would be stressful. It always is.
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Thursday, December 22, 2005
Yuletide gift to myself
Today I bought myself a new toy.
It's a Packard Bell EasyNote R1000 widescreen laptop computer with wireless and DVD writer. It's cheap and cheerful and is faster and has much more memory and hard drive space than my office computer.
Yes, I know it's not a Mac. I gave serious thought to a new Mac, but unfortunately I need something that'll run particular windows-based programs for work purposes. In the end I decided that I'd buy a cheap PC laptop then wait for the new desktop Intel Macs to come out and buy one of those for use at home.
I think that I astonished the assistant by being a female who knew what she wanted and just went out and stuck it straight on the credit card instead of farting about with monthly installments. But then again, I don't think they'd take monthly payments from an Icelandic bank. And I caved in to tempation and bought Myst too. One day I might give in and buy Civilisation IV, but I wouldn't want to be too hasty, would I?
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It's a Packard Bell EasyNote R1000 widescreen laptop computer with wireless and DVD writer. It's cheap and cheerful and is faster and has much more memory and hard drive space than my office computer.
Yes, I know it's not a Mac. I gave serious thought to a new Mac, but unfortunately I need something that'll run particular windows-based programs for work purposes. In the end I decided that I'd buy a cheap PC laptop then wait for the new desktop Intel Macs to come out and buy one of those for use at home.
I think that I astonished the assistant by being a female who knew what she wanted and just went out and stuck it straight on the credit card instead of farting about with monthly installments. But then again, I don't think they'd take monthly payments from an Icelandic bank. And I caved in to tempation and bought Myst too. One day I might give in and buy Civilisation IV, but I wouldn't want to be too hasty, would I?
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Wednesday, December 21, 2005
Planespotting geekiness
My inner geek rather enjoys sitting in Costa's at gate 8 in Heathrow terminal 1.
There's something strangely engaging about drinking coffee while watching aircraft landing and taking off. It allows me, for instance, to keep my airline livery recognition skills up to date. Every now and again a new one pops up that I haven't seen before - such as Egypt Air, which has something that might be Horus painted on the tail. I'm quite impressed by Virgin, actually, as their long-haul birds have paintings of scantilly-clad floozies along the fuselage. Very Memphis Belle.
Today though wasn't really a day for livery, but rather a day for aircraft themselves. I've always been very bad at identifying civil aircraft. I can do Concorde and the Fokker 50 and that's about it. So today I took careful note of the type designators that some airlines helpfully keep visible. I think I've got the Airbusses sorted out - little arrow-shaped thing on the end of the wings, the 319 is tiny with three exits to a side, the 320 is bigger with 4 but two are close together over the wing, while the 321 is larger again and has 4 spread out. Of course, I may not have taken into account subtle variations like number of passengers.
Then there are the Boeings. The 777 is big and wide and has little folded-up wingtips. The 747 is huge and has two storeys. None of the airlines I saw were helpful enough to label their 737s and 757s, so I can't do those yet. I'm also completely at a loss on the MacDonnell-Douglas ones too. Clearly more coffee in more international airports is called for.
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There's something strangely engaging about drinking coffee while watching aircraft landing and taking off. It allows me, for instance, to keep my airline livery recognition skills up to date. Every now and again a new one pops up that I haven't seen before - such as Egypt Air, which has something that might be Horus painted on the tail. I'm quite impressed by Virgin, actually, as their long-haul birds have paintings of scantilly-clad floozies along the fuselage. Very Memphis Belle.
Today though wasn't really a day for livery, but rather a day for aircraft themselves. I've always been very bad at identifying civil aircraft. I can do Concorde and the Fokker 50 and that's about it. So today I took careful note of the type designators that some airlines helpfully keep visible. I think I've got the Airbusses sorted out - little arrow-shaped thing on the end of the wings, the 319 is tiny with three exits to a side, the 320 is bigger with 4 but two are close together over the wing, while the 321 is larger again and has 4 spread out. Of course, I may not have taken into account subtle variations like number of passengers.
Then there are the Boeings. The 777 is big and wide and has little folded-up wingtips. The 747 is huge and has two storeys. None of the airlines I saw were helpful enough to label their 737s and 757s, so I can't do those yet. I'm also completely at a loss on the MacDonnell-Douglas ones too. Clearly more coffee in more international airports is called for.
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Tuesday, December 20, 2005
Hostelling joys
Reykjavik City Hostel has two great advantages.
First of all it's much cheaper than a hotel room in the city. A single room with breakfast comes in at at least £80 a night including breakfast. The hostel, however, is £12 a night in a shared room with on-suite facilities,plus a further £7 for breakfast. But if you're getting the early flight out of Keflavik and have to be on the FlyBus at 05:00 then you're probably not going to want breakfast anyway.
Secondly, you get to meet all sorts of interesting people. This time it was an Australian who's lived in London for 7 years and regularly hops on a flight to somewhere else in Europe for a few days. It's a more civilised alternative to backpacking around Europe for a month. In the past I've met people from France, Germany, Austria, China, Argentina, and even Liverpool. I've done several hostels in Iceland and one in London, all belonging to the Hostelling International group - a bit more expensive and upmarket than the normal Youth Hostelling Association places.
I don't know that I'd use them for a long stay, but for overnight stays they're great. Comfy beds, hot showers and personal reading lights. What else do you need?
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First of all it's much cheaper than a hotel room in the city. A single room with breakfast comes in at at least £80 a night including breakfast. The hostel, however, is £12 a night in a shared room with on-suite facilities,plus a further £7 for breakfast. But if you're getting the early flight out of Keflavik and have to be on the FlyBus at 05:00 then you're probably not going to want breakfast anyway.
Secondly, you get to meet all sorts of interesting people. This time it was an Australian who's lived in London for 7 years and regularly hops on a flight to somewhere else in Europe for a few days. It's a more civilised alternative to backpacking around Europe for a month. In the past I've met people from France, Germany, Austria, China, Argentina, and even Liverpool. I've done several hostels in Iceland and one in London, all belonging to the Hostelling International group - a bit more expensive and upmarket than the normal Youth Hostelling Association places.
I don't know that I'd use them for a long stay, but for overnight stays they're great. Comfy beds, hot showers and personal reading lights. What else do you need?
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Sunday, December 18, 2005
Christmas is coming
And the television is full of Christmas adverts.
It's quite nice not to have to sit through oodles of ads for computer games and other kids stuff with ludicrous price tags. Come to think of it, there are no prices mentioned at all in adverts here.
No, the things that are advertised here are books. Hardback books in Icelandic, so I suppose the ludicrous price tags are taken as read. None of them look particularly appealling, to be honest. There doesn't seem to be much of a market for science fiction here, nor even for thick tomes of fantasy. Most of the books being advertised are by Icelandic authors, although I have seen a couple of translations of authors like Patricia Cornwell. All very mainstream stuff.
There's been a lot of fuss here recently about Icelanders going shopping in London and New York and the IcelandAir having to leave large amounts of luggage behind for later return flights. The standard 737, it seems, does not have enough cargo or luggage space for Icelandic Christmas shoppers.
Still, the flight on Wednesday shouldn't be too bad - maybe lots of empty suitcases. And as it's IcelandAir I'll get food and drink to go with it. Woo-hoo.
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It's quite nice not to have to sit through oodles of ads for computer games and other kids stuff with ludicrous price tags. Come to think of it, there are no prices mentioned at all in adverts here.
No, the things that are advertised here are books. Hardback books in Icelandic, so I suppose the ludicrous price tags are taken as read. None of them look particularly appealling, to be honest. There doesn't seem to be much of a market for science fiction here, nor even for thick tomes of fantasy. Most of the books being advertised are by Icelandic authors, although I have seen a couple of translations of authors like Patricia Cornwell. All very mainstream stuff.
There's been a lot of fuss here recently about Icelanders going shopping in London and New York and the IcelandAir having to leave large amounts of luggage behind for later return flights. The standard 737, it seems, does not have enough cargo or luggage space for Icelandic Christmas shoppers.
Still, the flight on Wednesday shouldn't be too bad - maybe lots of empty suitcases. And as it's IcelandAir I'll get food and drink to go with it. Woo-hoo.
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Saturday, December 17, 2005
Being diplomatic
Yesterday was a big day for the university.
It marked the official opening of the new Centre for Asian Studies, attended by the President, the Chinese ambassador and the previous Icelandic ambassador to China. Naturally this was an excuse for various people to make long speeches, but it also included a free lunch from Peng's, the local Chinese resteraunt.
Naturally, this being Iceland, the visit of the head of state was, shall we say, low-security, with people wandering past up to offices and so forth throughout the event. Several people wandered in just to see what was going on. One of the advantages to being a small, close-knit community, I suppose.
Iceland is doing a lot to get involved with China. Last year the president went there on a state visit. This new centre is one of only an handful world-wide with this level of state support. Maybe the Icelandic government has decided to ignore Europe in future and ally with China instead. Well, the prime minister here makes major decisions - like joining the Coalition - without bothering to ask the cabinet, let alone the rest of the government. So maybe the two countries have more in common than appears at first.
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It marked the official opening of the new Centre for Asian Studies, attended by the President, the Chinese ambassador and the previous Icelandic ambassador to China. Naturally this was an excuse for various people to make long speeches, but it also included a free lunch from Peng's, the local Chinese resteraunt.
Naturally, this being Iceland, the visit of the head of state was, shall we say, low-security, with people wandering past up to offices and so forth throughout the event. Several people wandered in just to see what was going on. One of the advantages to being a small, close-knit community, I suppose.
Iceland is doing a lot to get involved with China. Last year the president went there on a state visit. This new centre is one of only an handful world-wide with this level of state support. Maybe the Icelandic government has decided to ignore Europe in future and ally with China instead. Well, the prime minister here makes major decisions - like joining the Coalition - without bothering to ask the cabinet, let alone the rest of the government. So maybe the two countries have more in common than appears at first.
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Friday, December 16, 2005
Today's word is...
...Stjörnuhlíðið
Stjörnuhlíðið - literally star gate-the is a reasonably obvious neuter compound word.For some reason they spell Abydos as Abados, although I can't see why on phonetic grounds. Maybe there's some strange letter transformation that I don't understand yet, similar to the a changing to ö whenever there's a u in the next syllable. What does confuse me, though, is that I've already seen the word vélmenninn, which is how they were translating Cylon in Battlestar Galactica.
Now there's a series that's been worrying me. Never mind the Christian overtones of The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe, Battlestar Galactica is looking scarily like an evangelical Christian tale of a lost tribe redeemed by its outcast creations. Or something like that. I really hope they're going to do something else with that series, as I've enjoyed it rather a lot and would be quite put off it by heavy-handed propaganda from the God Squad
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Stjörnuhlíðið - literally star gate-the is a reasonably obvious neuter compound word.For some reason they spell Abydos as Abados, although I can't see why on phonetic grounds. Maybe there's some strange letter transformation that I don't understand yet, similar to the a changing to ö whenever there's a u in the next syllable. What does confuse me, though, is that I've already seen the word vélmenninn, which is how they were translating Cylon in Battlestar Galactica.
Now there's a series that's been worrying me. Never mind the Christian overtones of The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe, Battlestar Galactica is looking scarily like an evangelical Christian tale of a lost tribe redeemed by its outcast creations. Or something like that. I really hope they're going to do something else with that series, as I've enjoyed it rather a lot and would be quite put off it by heavy-handed propaganda from the God Squad
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Thursday, December 15, 2005
Word of the day
Today's word is snjómokster.
Snjómokster means 'snow-making machine', and on Saturday there ski lifts are going to be free all day to celebrate the unveiling of the snjómokster the town has bought. It was going to be last week but there was too much snow. Then this week the snow melted away so they can start using the new machine instead.
I've been discovering more about the different usage of words in English and Icelandic. The English verb 'to rise' - að rísa in Icelandic - can be used to describe the take-off of a bird. This is not the case in Icelandic, where the verb að fluga - 'to fly' - would be used instead.
This came up because I was sitting flicking through the dictionary the other evening and started playing with words (the way I do) and produced my first poem in Icelandic. I ran it past Pálina tonight to see if I had the right endings and she suggested the change but seemed quite impressed that I'd written it myself.
Hrafn flýgur,
Snjó fellur.
Vindurinn syngur,
En jörðinn er þögul.
The raven flies,
The snow falls.
The wind sings,
But the earth is silent.
Now... I wonder if I can document the structure and make it an A&S entry for something? :) I vaguely remember seeing something similar when I read Snorri Sturlasson's Edda last year. I shall have to check.
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Snjómokster means 'snow-making machine', and on Saturday there ski lifts are going to be free all day to celebrate the unveiling of the snjómokster the town has bought. It was going to be last week but there was too much snow. Then this week the snow melted away so they can start using the new machine instead.
I've been discovering more about the different usage of words in English and Icelandic. The English verb 'to rise' - að rísa in Icelandic - can be used to describe the take-off of a bird. This is not the case in Icelandic, where the verb að fluga - 'to fly' - would be used instead.
This came up because I was sitting flicking through the dictionary the other evening and started playing with words (the way I do) and produced my first poem in Icelandic. I ran it past Pálina tonight to see if I had the right endings and she suggested the change but seemed quite impressed that I'd written it myself.
Hrafn flýgur,
Snjó fellur.
Vindurinn syngur,
En jörðinn er þögul.
The raven flies,
The snow falls.
The wind sings,
But the earth is silent.
Now... I wonder if I can document the structure and make it an A&S entry for something? :) I vaguely remember seeing something similar when I read Snorri Sturlasson's Edda last year. I shall have to check.
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Wednesday, December 14, 2005
Intelligence, design, and intelligent design
To mix my curses, the frelling broadband's smegged again. But apart from that...
In general, I am not a net surfer, I'm a net diver. My personal view is that there are three main approaches to accessing the net. There's surfing - wandering from site to site, clicking on random links, letting the tide of information take you where they will.
Then there's trawling. This is, in effect, using the internet as a giant library and googling for whatever it is you're interested in. You cast out an electronic net and draw in information from shoals of subject-related websites.
Finally there's diving. That's when you know precisely what you're looking for, where to get it, and just go straight to those sites. This is what I tend to do. OK, so I do quite a bit of trawling, but for the most part I dive to extract specific items.
So when I go into the office I do my standard set of 'dives' to catch up on the daily news. Recently I added Scott Adams 'Dilbert Blog' to my diving sites, and today he had a particularly interesting view on intelligence, design and intelligent design.
He argues that most of the things we use intelligence for - sex, politics, work and so on - are irrelevent to God and so therefore God might not be something we recognise as intelligent, that the universe itself could actually be God. Very anthropic principle, I know, but it made me think. If God 'made man in his image' then he must be getting pretty frustrated having all of this intelligence devoted to sex and no-one to try it out on.
Unless the ancient Egyptians were right, and Atum really did masturbate the universe into existance...
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In general, I am not a net surfer, I'm a net diver. My personal view is that there are three main approaches to accessing the net. There's surfing - wandering from site to site, clicking on random links, letting the tide of information take you where they will.
Then there's trawling. This is, in effect, using the internet as a giant library and googling for whatever it is you're interested in. You cast out an electronic net and draw in information from shoals of subject-related websites.
Finally there's diving. That's when you know precisely what you're looking for, where to get it, and just go straight to those sites. This is what I tend to do. OK, so I do quite a bit of trawling, but for the most part I dive to extract specific items.
So when I go into the office I do my standard set of 'dives' to catch up on the daily news. Recently I added Scott Adams 'Dilbert Blog' to my diving sites, and today he had a particularly interesting view on intelligence, design and intelligent design.
He argues that most of the things we use intelligence for - sex, politics, work and so on - are irrelevent to God and so therefore God might not be something we recognise as intelligent, that the universe itself could actually be God. Very anthropic principle, I know, but it made me think. If God 'made man in his image' then he must be getting pretty frustrated having all of this intelligence devoted to sex and no-one to try it out on.
Unless the ancient Egyptians were right, and Atum really did masturbate the universe into existance...
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Tuesday, December 13, 2005
Ég ver að sauma í Sunnudaginn
Well, actually, I wasn't.
Ég ver að sauma í Sunnudaginn is my latest triumph in Icelandic. It means I was sewing on Sunday, which I wasn't as I was too busy doing my Christmas shopping. Nevertheless, it marks a giant leap forward in that a) it's in the past tense, and b) it's got that tricky accusative thing in it.
I'm only just beginning to get the hang of this nominative, accusative, genitive, dative thing. Never having done Latin - or formal English grammar, for that matter - at my local comprehensive school I've never before had need to deal with it. As a result I find it quite difficult to work out which one of these cases I need where, and as Icelandic is very heavily inflected I really need to know what I'm doing.
Unfortunately the classes are rather slow. As a teacher I quite understand the idea of going at the speed of the slowest learner, but it's very frustrating for the couple of us who are champing at the bit to learn more than 'Hello! My name is Nik. I come from England. I eat chicken and drink coffee. I have a sister called Kayte'.
(Note to self: Hállo!! Ég heiti Inigo Montoya. Þú drepaðir pabbi minn. Undirbúaðu að deyja! ???)
Pálina, our tutor, appreciates that as well, but there's nothing she can really do about it given the current setup. I think that I'm going to build myself some tables on things like grammar, regular verbs and plurals (I so appreciate the English approach of generally just adding an 's'!) before next time and try to work on getting these right and adding little bits of vocabulary.
I'm getting reasonably good at reading and writing, but my understanding of the spoken language is still very, very shaky. If I know what someone's said I can generally frame an answer, but actually understanding it in the first place is still a problem. It's the same with my French - I can work out what to say, but I can't necessarily work out what's being said to me.
Maybe I should carry a small whiteboard around and just get everyone to write everything down...
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Ég ver að sauma í Sunnudaginn is my latest triumph in Icelandic. It means I was sewing on Sunday, which I wasn't as I was too busy doing my Christmas shopping. Nevertheless, it marks a giant leap forward in that a) it's in the past tense, and b) it's got that tricky accusative thing in it.
I'm only just beginning to get the hang of this nominative, accusative, genitive, dative thing. Never having done Latin - or formal English grammar, for that matter - at my local comprehensive school I've never before had need to deal with it. As a result I find it quite difficult to work out which one of these cases I need where, and as Icelandic is very heavily inflected I really need to know what I'm doing.
Unfortunately the classes are rather slow. As a teacher I quite understand the idea of going at the speed of the slowest learner, but it's very frustrating for the couple of us who are champing at the bit to learn more than 'Hello! My name is Nik. I come from England. I eat chicken and drink coffee. I have a sister called Kayte'.
(Note to self: Hállo!! Ég heiti Inigo Montoya. Þú drepaðir pabbi minn. Undirbúaðu að deyja! ???)
Pálina, our tutor, appreciates that as well, but there's nothing she can really do about it given the current setup. I think that I'm going to build myself some tables on things like grammar, regular verbs and plurals (I so appreciate the English approach of generally just adding an 's'!) before next time and try to work on getting these right and adding little bits of vocabulary.
I'm getting reasonably good at reading and writing, but my understanding of the spoken language is still very, very shaky. If I know what someone's said I can generally frame an answer, but actually understanding it in the first place is still a problem. It's the same with my French - I can work out what to say, but I can't necessarily work out what's being said to me.
Maybe I should carry a small whiteboard around and just get everyone to write everything down...
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Monday, December 12, 2005
Crampon my style
This black ice thing really is no fun.
Crack of sparrows (i.e. 09:00) this morning I took my car down to the garage for them to have a look at the windscreen wipers. Actually it wasn't that simple. Before I even got to the car I had to cross the car park, which is about ten feet of solid and very slippery ice. Nevertheless, after three attempts to find a relatively easy path I made it without falling over.
I even made it most of the way up the hill to the office from the garage without falling over, although there were one or two scary moments. The point where I did fall over I couldn't see the ice at all - a combination of clear ice and darkness. So I got into the office a bit wet down one side, but nothing was broken.
Skip forward seven and a bit hours. It's dark again, and I'm walking back to the garage doing the scary downhill thing on the ice. I was, however, much less worried than in the morning, for I had collected my removable crampons. Ah, the joy of the firm footing! Even the expanse of ice beside the garage was no match for my spike-shod feet.
The car was fixed, and I took the crampons off to go into the shopping centre. Once I got back to the flat though, it was on with the crampons again to cross the car park, this time with far less stress than earlier this morning.
Tomorrow the crampons are going on as soon as I get out of the door.
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Crack of sparrows (i.e. 09:00) this morning I took my car down to the garage for them to have a look at the windscreen wipers. Actually it wasn't that simple. Before I even got to the car I had to cross the car park, which is about ten feet of solid and very slippery ice. Nevertheless, after three attempts to find a relatively easy path I made it without falling over.
I even made it most of the way up the hill to the office from the garage without falling over, although there were one or two scary moments. The point where I did fall over I couldn't see the ice at all - a combination of clear ice and darkness. So I got into the office a bit wet down one side, but nothing was broken.
Skip forward seven and a bit hours. It's dark again, and I'm walking back to the garage doing the scary downhill thing on the ice. I was, however, much less worried than in the morning, for I had collected my removable crampons. Ah, the joy of the firm footing! Even the expanse of ice beside the garage was no match for my spike-shod feet.
The car was fixed, and I took the crampons off to go into the shopping centre. Once I got back to the flat though, it was on with the crampons again to cross the car park, this time with far less stress than earlier this morning.
Tomorrow the crampons are going on as soon as I get out of the door.
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Sunday, December 11, 2005
Christmas shopping complete
Well, almost.
I've got a couple of small things left to find, but they should be quite straightforward and probably from the duty free shop at Keflavik. Best of all, I don't have to carry everything in my luggage. :)
I do like this internet shopping thing - it makes things so much easier for us ex-pats. And everyone else, by the sound of it. In a way I'm not surprised that the high street shops are now forcing manufacturers to offer lower prices to them than to online dealers - online shopping is so much easier than having to face the crowds in, say, Liverpool city centre.
What I had meant to do this afternoon was to write my Christmas cards, but the list I had on the computer was the gift list, not the card list, so I thought I'd get that out of the way first. I must admit that I also added a couple of things for myself while I was at it - Jakob Nielson's book on Usability Evaluation, for instance.
Now I've just put the remains of yesterday's tuna bake into the oven to reheat while I finally write those cards, then I can sit back and watch the final episode of Battlestar Galactica. Mmmm...
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I've got a couple of small things left to find, but they should be quite straightforward and probably from the duty free shop at Keflavik. Best of all, I don't have to carry everything in my luggage. :)
I do like this internet shopping thing - it makes things so much easier for us ex-pats. And everyone else, by the sound of it. In a way I'm not surprised that the high street shops are now forcing manufacturers to offer lower prices to them than to online dealers - online shopping is so much easier than having to face the crowds in, say, Liverpool city centre.
What I had meant to do this afternoon was to write my Christmas cards, but the list I had on the computer was the gift list, not the card list, so I thought I'd get that out of the way first. I must admit that I also added a couple of things for myself while I was at it - Jakob Nielson's book on Usability Evaluation, for instance.
Now I've just put the remains of yesterday's tuna bake into the oven to reheat while I finally write those cards, then I can sit back and watch the final episode of Battlestar Galactica. Mmmm...
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Saturday, December 10, 2005
Fun movies and the Today programme
Ah, this unlimited broadband is wonderful.
Not only have I just pottered around to the dulcet tones of John Humphreys on the Today programme, but there seems to be less of a load on the system at present and ISIHAC isn't suffering the quality loss it was last night. If it wasn't for Classic FM being better during the week than at weekends I'd have that on for the rest of the day. Oh joy, oh rapture!
The only downpoint so far is that Five Live only broadcast football matches in the UK, so I can't listen to Liverpool v. Middlesborough live. Ah well, nothing's perfect.
Still on a media theme, I finally got to see Tomb Raider last night. Jolly good fun, I thought, with definite shades of McGuyver and the Lost Treasure of Atlantis. It was great to see Chris Barrie in a less comedic role than ususal. I've long been convinced that, like Hugh Laurie and Tim McInnerny, he's quite capable of doing serious drama. It was a little odd to see him credited as Christopher Barrie though.
Now what we need is for someone to start making Honor Harrington movies with Angeline Jolie in the title role.
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Not only have I just pottered around to the dulcet tones of John Humphreys on the Today programme, but there seems to be less of a load on the system at present and ISIHAC isn't suffering the quality loss it was last night. If it wasn't for Classic FM being better during the week than at weekends I'd have that on for the rest of the day. Oh joy, oh rapture!
The only downpoint so far is that Five Live only broadcast football matches in the UK, so I can't listen to Liverpool v. Middlesborough live. Ah well, nothing's perfect.
Still on a media theme, I finally got to see Tomb Raider last night. Jolly good fun, I thought, with definite shades of McGuyver and the Lost Treasure of Atlantis. It was great to see Chris Barrie in a less comedic role than ususal. I've long been convinced that, like Hugh Laurie and Tim McInnerny, he's quite capable of doing serious drama. It was a little odd to see him credited as Christopher Barrie though.
Now what we need is for someone to start making Honor Harrington movies with Angeline Jolie in the title role.
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Friday, December 09, 2005
Broadband returns
Woo-hoo! I have broadband again!
Not only that, but I have unlimited downloads to go with it. OK, so Radio 4 sounds rather tinny and pauses from time to time, and Humphrey Lyttleton sometimes sounds like a dalek, but it means that I have news, real radio news!
It also means that I can post this from home rather than having to transfer a text file when I go into the office in the morning, and that I can now finish my Christmas shopping.
I'm not going to be back in the UK until the 21st, as I have a meeting on the 19th and my final Icelandic lesson on the 20th. This time I'm flying with Iceland Air to Heathrow, rather than Iceland Express to Stansted, then getting a BMI flight up to Manchester. It's not much more expensive and it avoids me having to cross London with luggage during late-night opening in the pre-Christmas rush.
It should be interesting - Iceland Air are one of the more luxurious european airlines, and I've only once flown through Heathrow before, on the way to and from Luxembourg. Somehow I don't think that I'll have quite the same view I had last time; experiencing the landing from the plane's flight deck is frowned upon nowadays.
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Not only that, but I have unlimited downloads to go with it. OK, so Radio 4 sounds rather tinny and pauses from time to time, and Humphrey Lyttleton sometimes sounds like a dalek, but it means that I have news, real radio news!
It also means that I can post this from home rather than having to transfer a text file when I go into the office in the morning, and that I can now finish my Christmas shopping.
I'm not going to be back in the UK until the 21st, as I have a meeting on the 19th and my final Icelandic lesson on the 20th. This time I'm flying with Iceland Air to Heathrow, rather than Iceland Express to Stansted, then getting a BMI flight up to Manchester. It's not much more expensive and it avoids me having to cross London with luggage during late-night opening in the pre-Christmas rush.
It should be interesting - Iceland Air are one of the more luxurious european airlines, and I've only once flown through Heathrow before, on the way to and from Luxembourg. Somehow I don't think that I'll have quite the same view I had last time; experiencing the landing from the plane's flight deck is frowned upon nowadays.
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Thursday, December 08, 2005
At last, a chance to catch my breath
It's been an incredibly busy day.
Today was day one of a two day workshop investigating the feasibility of building an internet portal for the Arctic Council. As an HCI/usability practitioner I'm a member of the 'expert team' (as opposed to the management team) for the project. It's an interesting project with a lot of international cooperation - we have delegates from Canada, the USA, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Russia and the UK, as well as representatives from some of the indigenous peoples and UN bodies.
This is two complete days of talks, although I had to dash out for a new faculty curriculum planning meeting in the middle of it, return, then leave as soon as it ended to get to my Icelandic class, before heading out to a resterant in town for the workshop dinner. It's now after ten and the first time all day I've had to myself. Ahhh.....
Being an 'expert' means that I can solve the problem at hand rather than getting involved with the politics. Unfortunately that's not the case with the curriculum meeting, where I definitely had a political corner to fight, more so today as Mark's ill and so I was the sole representative of the IT faculty. Still, I don't think I agreed to anything disastrous.
The Icelandic is progressing reasonably well, although I do occasionally have the urge to use German words when I can't remember the Icelandic. This evening was a case in point: Já, ég á systir - yes, I have a sister - almost came out as Já, ég á schwester. What I think I need to do on my own now is to pull out my teach-yourself-style book and work out the common verb forms and noun endings, as we're not getting any grammar in the classes. The whole inflected endings thing is really confusing. I might also break out the little blue book of vocabulary I started in January but never got very far with.
I have, however, discovered what the Icelandic is for embroidery - útsæmmur or 'outseaming', as apposed to sæmmur, which is normal sewing. Makes sense, in a strange kind of way.
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Today was day one of a two day workshop investigating the feasibility of building an internet portal for the Arctic Council. As an HCI/usability practitioner I'm a member of the 'expert team' (as opposed to the management team) for the project. It's an interesting project with a lot of international cooperation - we have delegates from Canada, the USA, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Russia and the UK, as well as representatives from some of the indigenous peoples and UN bodies.
This is two complete days of talks, although I had to dash out for a new faculty curriculum planning meeting in the middle of it, return, then leave as soon as it ended to get to my Icelandic class, before heading out to a resterant in town for the workshop dinner. It's now after ten and the first time all day I've had to myself. Ahhh.....
Being an 'expert' means that I can solve the problem at hand rather than getting involved with the politics. Unfortunately that's not the case with the curriculum meeting, where I definitely had a political corner to fight, more so today as Mark's ill and so I was the sole representative of the IT faculty. Still, I don't think I agreed to anything disastrous.
The Icelandic is progressing reasonably well, although I do occasionally have the urge to use German words when I can't remember the Icelandic. This evening was a case in point: Já, ég á systir - yes, I have a sister - almost came out as Já, ég á schwester. What I think I need to do on my own now is to pull out my teach-yourself-style book and work out the common verb forms and noun endings, as we're not getting any grammar in the classes. The whole inflected endings thing is really confusing. I might also break out the little blue book of vocabulary I started in January but never got very far with.
I have, however, discovered what the Icelandic is for embroidery - útsæmmur or 'outseaming', as apposed to sæmmur, which is normal sewing. Makes sense, in a strange kind of way.
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Wednesday, December 07, 2005
Lit up like Blackpool
The window lights have now been installed.
Even with the comet and the red frame mine is still one of the more restrained examples of yuletide illumination on the block, and certainly pales into insignificance beside the next balcony along, which has strings of lights, icicles, wreaths and frames over not in window but also on the balcony itself.
Balcony lights seem to be quite popular. Whole blocks have the same red lighting ropes coiled along the balcony rails; others have similar ropes twisted around street lights. Several houses have beautiful fir or pine trees in their gardens decked out in lights and real snow (it was -12 C / 10° F this morning). Most of them also have illuminated figures in the windows, or at the very least the extremely scandinavian up-and-down staircases of candles.
For some reason the figures are not just stars, trees, snowmen and santas here. One flat on my landing also has crosses. If these were Easter illuminations I'd understand it. There is a wicked part of me (inspired by Kevin) that has this strange urge to display an illuminated Elder Sign in the window. I'm sure it wouldn't stand out too much, given the assorted things in windows around me. :)
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Even with the comet and the red frame mine is still one of the more restrained examples of yuletide illumination on the block, and certainly pales into insignificance beside the next balcony along, which has strings of lights, icicles, wreaths and frames over not in window but also on the balcony itself.
Balcony lights seem to be quite popular. Whole blocks have the same red lighting ropes coiled along the balcony rails; others have similar ropes twisted around street lights. Several houses have beautiful fir or pine trees in their gardens decked out in lights and real snow (it was -12 C / 10° F this morning). Most of them also have illuminated figures in the windows, or at the very least the extremely scandinavian up-and-down staircases of candles.
For some reason the figures are not just stars, trees, snowmen and santas here. One flat on my landing also has crosses. If these were Easter illuminations I'd understand it. There is a wicked part of me (inspired by Kevin) that has this strange urge to display an illuminated Elder Sign in the window. I'm sure it wouldn't stand out too much, given the assorted things in windows around me. :)
0 comments
Tuesday, December 06, 2005
Integrating into society
Tonight was my second Icelandic class.
It was part of a course that I today learned is going to set me back about £170. Curiously, there was nothing about cost in the original advert or the information they sent me. I may be able to get some of that from the university or the union, but it was still something of a shock. Everything over here, even the language, has a price, and it's generally a high one.
It's turning into more than an Icelandic course, though. On the way I'm also picking up snippets of Polish from my two Polish classmates, which is quite fun although the spelling is very strange. Another thing I'm discovering is that there are sounds I can hear but have problems reproducing. The differences between o and ó and the u and ú are particularly tricky.
I'm not good at languages, mainly because it requires a lot of memory work. Give me a verb and I can decline it (no thanks!) because that's just learning a pattern. Ask me what that verb means and I'll have a much more difficult time of it. I suspect I'm going to end up buying the Icelandic dictionary for my Palm in order to plan conversations in advance.
My other concession to Icelandic society is that I went out today and bought some lights for the window. At present my flat window is a dark gap in a block that looks like Blackpool during the Illuminations. I've therefore got red lights and a large white comet. Interestingly enough, you can get little sucker things that aren't hooks but are specifically designed to hold lights to windows. Very strange.
0 comments
It was part of a course that I today learned is going to set me back about £170. Curiously, there was nothing about cost in the original advert or the information they sent me. I may be able to get some of that from the university or the union, but it was still something of a shock. Everything over here, even the language, has a price, and it's generally a high one.
It's turning into more than an Icelandic course, though. On the way I'm also picking up snippets of Polish from my two Polish classmates, which is quite fun although the spelling is very strange. Another thing I'm discovering is that there are sounds I can hear but have problems reproducing. The differences between o and ó and the u and ú are particularly tricky.
I'm not good at languages, mainly because it requires a lot of memory work. Give me a verb and I can decline it (no thanks!) because that's just learning a pattern. Ask me what that verb means and I'll have a much more difficult time of it. I suspect I'm going to end up buying the Icelandic dictionary for my Palm in order to plan conversations in advance.
My other concession to Icelandic society is that I went out today and bought some lights for the window. At present my flat window is a dark gap in a block that looks like Blackpool during the Illuminations. I've therefore got red lights and a large white comet. Interestingly enough, you can get little sucker things that aren't hooks but are specifically designed to hold lights to windows. Very strange.
0 comments
Monday, December 05, 2005
Someone's bored...
The wonders of DVD.
DVDs are wonderful things. Take, for instance, my recent acquisition of David Starkey's Six Wives of Henry VIII and Elizabeth. It is a singular joy to have a growing collection of documentaries and these, together with the BBC The Planets have been getting a viewing lately.
OK, so I've seen them all before, but it's good to have intelligent (and pretty!) things to watch. What would cap everything off, though, would be the BBC releasing DVD sets containing complete seasons of Horizon... ah, what a joy that would be! Still, come January I should have Digital &Iaxute;slands from Vodafone which should give me some intelligent viewing.
I caught the train end of another of our many reality shows last night - Rockstar: INXS. I've no idea if it has anything to do with the group INXS but it does appear to be another US 'vote for your least favourite person' job. It was on just before CSI. This particular episode seemed to introduce us to the LA team... is there a new CSI:LA on the cards, I wonder?
0 comments
DVDs are wonderful things. Take, for instance, my recent acquisition of David Starkey's Six Wives of Henry VIII and Elizabeth. It is a singular joy to have a growing collection of documentaries and these, together with the BBC The Planets have been getting a viewing lately.
OK, so I've seen them all before, but it's good to have intelligent (and pretty!) things to watch. What would cap everything off, though, would be the BBC releasing DVD sets containing complete seasons of Horizon... ah, what a joy that would be! Still, come January I should have Digital &Iaxute;slands from Vodafone which should give me some intelligent viewing.
I caught the train end of another of our many reality shows last night - Rockstar: INXS. I've no idea if it has anything to do with the group INXS but it does appear to be another US 'vote for your least favourite person' job. It was on just before CSI. This particular episode seemed to introduce us to the LA team... is there a new CSI:LA on the cards, I wonder?
0 comments
Sunday, December 04, 2005
Broadband woes
I'm beginning to get annoyed by my lack of broadband.
It had got quite sporadic before I went to Reykjavik for the week; now it's non-existant. I've phoned Vodaphone once and they told me to disconnect everything but the router and then connection light would come back on and return to its solid connected status. And indeed it has, but I still don't get data back.
Another call to Vodaphone just now led to another switching of cables at my end and a collection of tests at their end has now provided the suggestion that I take the router into the local shop and get them to have a look at it. *Sigh* Well, I had to go shopping tomorrow anyway.
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It had got quite sporadic before I went to Reykjavik for the week; now it's non-existant. I've phoned Vodaphone once and they told me to disconnect everything but the router and then connection light would come back on and return to its solid connected status. And indeed it has, but I still don't get data back.
Another call to Vodaphone just now led to another switching of cables at my end and a collection of tests at their end has now provided the suggestion that I take the router into the local shop and get them to have a look at it. *Sigh* Well, I had to go shopping tomorrow anyway.
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Saturday, December 03, 2005
Only ten years late
Stargate is coming to Icelandic television.
As of December 16th SkjallEin will start showing Stargate SG1 from the beginning. I suspect that it's going to fill the Battlestar Galactica slot when the current series finishes, although I suppose they might put it in the old Enterprise slot instead. Even so, I'll be very surprised if it gets more than one repeat a week rather than the three repeats that the cop shows get.
And December... that's a very strange time to start a new series, but it's not just Stargate they're starting then. Several series are due to start that week. I'd understand it if they were starting the new series in January, but December's a most odd time.
Icelandic TV is ten years behind in other ways too. Tomorrow night we have - in prime-time viewing on SkjallEinn - this year's Miss World competition. I suppose it goes well with the mindset that shows endless reality-tv crap such as American Idol, Survivor:Guatemala, The Bachelor and the home-grown Icelandic versions thereof.
I'm just surprised that we haven't had Stóra Bróður, as I'm sure that Big Brother would go down very well here.
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As of December 16th SkjallEin will start showing Stargate SG1 from the beginning. I suspect that it's going to fill the Battlestar Galactica slot when the current series finishes, although I suppose they might put it in the old Enterprise slot instead. Even so, I'll be very surprised if it gets more than one repeat a week rather than the three repeats that the cop shows get.
And December... that's a very strange time to start a new series, but it's not just Stargate they're starting then. Several series are due to start that week. I'd understand it if they were starting the new series in January, but December's a most odd time.
Icelandic TV is ten years behind in other ways too. Tomorrow night we have - in prime-time viewing on SkjallEinn - this year's Miss World competition. I suppose it goes well with the mindset that shows endless reality-tv crap such as American Idol, Survivor:Guatemala, The Bachelor and the home-grown Icelandic versions thereof.
I'm just surprised that we haven't had Stóra Bróður, as I'm sure that Big Brother would go down very well here.
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Friday, December 02, 2005
Puffin
Puffin. Noun. Small seabird with dark plumage and brightly-coloured bill. Very tasty.
Puffin was one of the starters on the Yule menu at the Viking resteraunt in Hafnafjörður last night, so I decided that it was time to try another local delicacy. The staff seemed a little surprised that an outlander would try something that clearly falls into the 'cute and cuddly' food category, and checked twice that it was what I actually wanted.
It's quite delicious. Sufficiently so that I'll probably see if I can get it up here as a treat from time to time. Imagine something stronger than chicken but not quite as strong as duck, with a distinctly fishy tang to it. I followed it with lamb as a main course, and Icelandic lamb is also extremely good. It was all washed down with Thule lager.
The food isn't the only thing that recommends the Viking resteraunt - it has an excellent 'floor show' too, consisting of a singer/storyteller wearing a particularly fine leather jerkin over his t-tunic and wielding (alternatively) a guitar and the classic viking shortsword with the 3-lobed pommel. The rest of the staff were in garb too.
Matt and Rebecca joined us for dinner and noticed, as they were leaving (to get Matt home in time to get a little sleep before going on duty in the ludicrously early hours), that the sky was not only cloud-free but also putting on a pretty good auroral display. Thus Mum and Kayte got a chance to see the aurora before flying home (Dad's seen it before).
I can confirm, by the way, that Bobby Fisher is stalking the streets of Reykjavík. He was walking past the bookshop opposite the hotel as we arrived back.
As we didn't get to see Harry Potter last weekend, the Euseys and I were going to go see it tonight... until I saw the weather forecast for the north and decided that I needed to get back up here before things got too bad to drive. The family were delivered onto the bus to the airport then I headed northwards. The two dodgy bits from last weekend had now merged into one longer section, and I discovered that the best way to do the high passes is in the dark, as you can see neither how bad the road conditions really are, nor the drop to each side of the road. I don't think I'd want to do tonight's blizzard during the day.
So here I am, back in Akureyri with a weekend to recover from a very social week. My hermit-like tendencies are about to get an outing while I unwind after the usual familial stresses.
0 comments
Puffin was one of the starters on the Yule menu at the Viking resteraunt in Hafnafjörður last night, so I decided that it was time to try another local delicacy. The staff seemed a little surprised that an outlander would try something that clearly falls into the 'cute and cuddly' food category, and checked twice that it was what I actually wanted.
It's quite delicious. Sufficiently so that I'll probably see if I can get it up here as a treat from time to time. Imagine something stronger than chicken but not quite as strong as duck, with a distinctly fishy tang to it. I followed it with lamb as a main course, and Icelandic lamb is also extremely good. It was all washed down with Thule lager.
The food isn't the only thing that recommends the Viking resteraunt - it has an excellent 'floor show' too, consisting of a singer/storyteller wearing a particularly fine leather jerkin over his t-tunic and wielding (alternatively) a guitar and the classic viking shortsword with the 3-lobed pommel. The rest of the staff were in garb too.
Matt and Rebecca joined us for dinner and noticed, as they were leaving (to get Matt home in time to get a little sleep before going on duty in the ludicrously early hours), that the sky was not only cloud-free but also putting on a pretty good auroral display. Thus Mum and Kayte got a chance to see the aurora before flying home (Dad's seen it before).
I can confirm, by the way, that Bobby Fisher is stalking the streets of Reykjavík. He was walking past the bookshop opposite the hotel as we arrived back.
As we didn't get to see Harry Potter last weekend, the Euseys and I were going to go see it tonight... until I saw the weather forecast for the north and decided that I needed to get back up here before things got too bad to drive. The family were delivered onto the bus to the airport then I headed northwards. The two dodgy bits from last weekend had now merged into one longer section, and I discovered that the best way to do the high passes is in the dark, as you can see neither how bad the road conditions really are, nor the drop to each side of the road. I don't think I'd want to do tonight's blizzard during the day.
So here I am, back in Akureyri with a weekend to recover from a very social week. My hermit-like tendencies are about to get an outing while I unwind after the usual familial stresses.
0 comments
Thursday, December 01, 2005
Iceland and Wales
Is there some strange cultural link between Iceland and Wales about which I am uninformed?
For some reason, while the hotel room has BBC1 as part of its assorted tv channels package, it has BBC1 Wales. Right now I'm hearing about the problems of water contamination, the ferry situation, a small child who's onto his third liver transplant, and a the lack of a new football stadium for Cardiff City.
Strange as it is, it certainly beats the Icelandic local news for understandable information content, although I'm not sure I'd say the same if it was actually in Welsh.
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For some reason, while the hotel room has BBC1 as part of its assorted tv channels package, it has BBC1 Wales. Right now I'm hearing about the problems of water contamination, the ferry situation, a small child who's onto his third liver transplant, and a the lack of a new football stadium for Cardiff City.
Strange as it is, it certainly beats the Icelandic local news for understandable information content, although I'm not sure I'd say the same if it was actually in Welsh.
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