3 days drunk...how're you?

Woo! I like Tallinn! I've done nothing but drink, eat and walk for three days. Woo! I'm fat, happy and have muscular calves.

So yesterday we found this cool little wine shop in a 14th century building. The owner was a fairly young guy whose "hobby" was wine, so he opened a wine shop. He had a couple of tables in there, wedged into this tiny shop filled with shelf upon shelf of wine, and offered wines by the glass. He also offered great conversation. What a charmer! We had a few glasses of vino each, and ended up talking to him for a couple hours. He also gave us some rather large samples of champagne..yum! We bought some bottles of it from him....I would always rather buy from a person who not only enjoys what they sell but also enjoys people. If you ever go to Tallinn, go to In Vino Veritas, and have a glass of wine and a chat with Michael, the owner. You won't be disappointed.

After that we had dinner reservations at an Italian place called Controvento. It was in a 14th century warehouse. (Notice a trend?) OHMYFUGGINGGOD I had the best steak I have ever had there. A really nice filet in a mushroom sauce...holy crap it was good. Washed it down with more wine. Yummy yummy wine...numm.....

So today it was a bit hard getting up, but we managed. We went first to the Kadriog park, where there is a palace built by Peter the Great for his mistress, a slave of war who got traded around as war booty until she ended up married to him and crowned as Queen Katherine. The palace there was not too large, rather cozy and lovely, and had a great collection of art from countries other than Estonia. Some nice Dutch artists and a decent collection of portraits. We wandered around the park briefly but it was too cold, so we headed back into town for...you guessed it...more food and drink. This time courtesy of the Olde Hansa, a medieval theme restaurant in a 14th century warehouse that is the be all and end all of tourist places, but actually manages to be authentic, charming, tasty and fun. The decor is phenomenal, the toilets were a hoot (I took pics, but you have to wait as I can't upload from this computer) the food was good and the whole place was lit by candlelight only. Gorgeous. For the boys, there's comely wenches galore, for the girls, there's boys in tights....what's not to love?

Tallinn is seriously one of the most gorgeous olde worlde townes I have ever seen...and did I mention the beer and the food?

Two local beers are widely available: Saku and A le Coq. They both have a good variety of flavors, my favorite always being the darker versions. At this one pub we went to, Hell Hunt, they also have a great selection of beers from Europe, all the ones I like including the Czech ones (Krusovice), Belgian wheat beers (Hooegarden) and similar yumminess. None go for more than $4 a pint.

There are lots of other good pubs, too....and believe me we hit as many as we could.

MMM......mmm...yummm.....weeee!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Northern lights...no. Aquavit? Hell yeah.

So...bad news....I didn't see the northern lights. Nota hint, not a sign, not a mere wisp. Nada, nuthin. It was a clear and cold night, but there weren't nuthin' happening of a magnetic, light show, freaky sort of nature. I checked. Muchly.

Damn.

I DID, however, get to join in on a true, real, honest to God traditional Norwegian Julebord, and it was an awful lot of fun.

Our building's yearly Julebord is a joint effort, coordinated by the building committee and joined in by the whole residency. We all sign up for something to bring and gather at one person's flat for pre-drinks and another for the dinner. So we had martinis at this one woman's flat (gin! Ack! I haven't had gin since 1989...it hurt me badly) as an apertif and hung out there for an hour, then up to the other flat (our neighbors across the way) for the dinner.

If you didn't know already, when Norwegians gather for a party, they PARTY. So after the gin (ACK!) we had wine, beer, aquavit and cognac. Oh, yeah, and for food? Let's see...there was pinekjott, sausage, sausage, mashed turnips (yum! my first time and they were good!), potatoes, and some other stuff. I brought a dessert, chocolate cake from a very traditional Southern American recipe. I think it confused everyone by its very chocolatyness (and the pound of butter it calls for) but they all ate it and seemed to like it. Hey, it's chocolate, not many people turn down warm gooey chocolate.....

The closest I can describe pinekjott is lamb spareribs. It's a very traditional Norwegian holiday fare, and pretty good. Thankfully, lutefisk was not on the menu....I smelled it once and know I could not ever eat it. There are some traditional Norwegian foods that I am pretty sure you just have to grow up with in order to like...luckily pinekjott is not one of them.

Anyhow we chowed on the food and our host poured me generous amounts of aquavit, which, luckily I also like. I generally tend to like any herb liquor...ramazotti, aquavit, slivovice, schnapps,etc. You are supposed to drink aquavit with most traditional Norwegian meals, as the food is fairly heavy and can be greasy, so the liquor is supposed to cut the grease and help your tummy along. In the old days it also protected against food poisoning by killing any bad germs. The Aquavit went down easily, as did the wine and the beer.

Everyone there was very nice about using English when they thought we might need a little extra help, but I acquitted my self fairly well with my Norwegian, even joining in some word games and such. Rich did well, too, and managed to use the one word he knows well, "Takk!" as his word in the alphabetical word game, getting a big laugh at his short, yet precise answer.

In between all this hilarity, I did manage to drink some water and take a few breaks with the booze, and so am proud to say I am not hurting much today. It might get me a little later (I get delayed onset hangovers now, they hit around 2pm) but I think i've escaped it for the most part.

So, I may have missed out on the northern lights, but it does not mean I had a dark night, by any stretch of the imagination.

SKOL!

The $17 chicken

I seriously splurged on a 3lb chicken today. It's not the highest quality, organic one (that would have cost more like $35) but it's a nice little fat beast anyhow. And I am gonna roast that sucker up using that French Laundry technique I first read about in Jaye's blog. Seems simple enough...salt it and roast the hell out of it. No basting, nothing.

Of course, I will be economical and use the leftovers to make a chicken stock. No sense wasting good boner...uh, I mean bones.

As my Dad always says, when something tastes good: Mumph mumph.

Though, after reading this in today's Aftenposten, my appetite has sort of waned....man, that's just all KINDS of gross.

nice day for me, not so much for Julia

Eventful days this week, people, eventful days.

Last night I met my niece Bethany for dinner at Austin Land and Cattle. I think I have mentioned that place before, but let me just remind you....if you like steak, and want it cooked to perfection, there is no other choice in Austin. This is the best steak in the world. AND they have the famous Shiner Bock Battered Mushrooms. Like, I don't think I could choose between the two. Luckily I don't have to and I get both. Heaven. That and a rocks margarita with Couintreau and I am a happy omnivorous gal. Bethany, my niece, is like me in her steak eating preferences and I am proud to report we both completely ignored the spinach that came with it. EW. I am always so impressed by Bethany. That girl has got her shit together and is a hoot to boot. Smart, funny acerbic and great to talk to. She's so far ahead of how how I was at that age....compared to her, I was a rank idiot. Rock on Miss B!

This morning I got up early (well, it felt early, anyhow, after the steak and margaritas...c'mon, when it's that good ya gotta have two!) and met Amamgets (see her blog to the left) at Mozarts for coffee. Can I just say how AWESOME she is? She drives a GIANT Suburban, but on it she has a bumper sticker that says "Draft all SUV drivers". Seriously, how can you not love someone with a sense of humor like that? She's totally cool and I hope to get to know her better whenever I get the hell home, which honestly better be SOON because I heart Austin, y'all.

After coffee with Amamgets, I met Bookhart for lunch at Chuy's where I had my usual Shrimp Tacos and she had her Chicken Sopapilla with the ranchero sauce on the side and traditional Mexican rice, not the hatch chile stuff. Yes, we always order the same, for years now, and I also always get a regular big ol' Coke, she gets Diet. I love that tradition, and a visit to Austin would feel incomplete without it. We have been going to Chuy's for almost 20 years now.

After lunch I dropped her back off at the office, picked up my contacts, did some shopping and got to see Karla May and Jaye for a brief visit. I also got totally insulted at Whole Foods when this random guy in the vitamin aisle asked if a girl in that aisle and I were related and said we looked alike. I looked at her, she was standing right behind me, age around 25-30, and then he asked if I WAS HER MOTHER!!!!!!! This girl who I had never seen before and just happened to be in the same aisle as me....was I HER FUCKING MOTHER!!!!!! All I could do was harumph and hmmph and growl and I left that aisle in high dudgeon. Asshole, asshole of the first nature. I DO NOT LOOK OLD ENOUGH TO BE HER MOTHER! That was the only sucky part of the day, for me.

After that I went to Shepler's Weatern Store to pick up some Levi's for our friend Martin back in Norway. There is not much that's more fun or truly Texan than shopping at a Western store. Boots of every color, strange women's clothes with bedazzling all over them, helpful workers in tight Wranglers, ropers and cowboy hats who lead you through the store and find exactly what you want, all the while calling you "Ma'am", and everyone y'allin' up a storm, that's MY idea of Texas shopping fun.

I got back to take a nap. Heather was not here. I figured she was at baby yoga or something.

Nope. Turns out she was in the emergency room with Julia, who got in a wreck this afternoon. She's ok, just banged up a bit, but her car is toast. Heather called just a few minutes ago. Poor Julia. She is a really good driver, so whatever happened is pretty much guaranteed to be the other person's fault.

They will be home soon, I should go straighten something or get some ice together or something. SOMETHING to be useful......

that's a big 'un

I just helped mom lug the 22 lb turkey up the basement stairs. It's a big 'un.

Mom's been cooking, baking or planning for about three weeks now. She's in cook heaven(hell).

Kit is just waiting for the when the turkey crisps up so he can get to the skin. I am a gravy hound of the first order and actually think that all the rest is just corollary to the gravy. Forget the other stuff, just gimme gravy and a spoon. Dad happily eats it all. Whatever you put in front of him, he'll eat it. Mom daintily has a small portion of everything, which is the secret to her phenomenal figure after all these years, but I know she'll be "testing" the food as she cooks it as well.

Kit's girlfriend, Kathy, is manfully holding her own in this loud, opinionated and oddly close-knit family. She manages to toe the line between my leftist leanings, Dad's so- far- right- he's- left- passionate speeches and Mom's 'in one ear out t'other' middle ground. Kit just goes and pounds on the new puppy or rides around on one of the 4 wheelers. He always was the smart one. I'm better, though, about not getting into it with Dad anymore. Hey, we both abhor GWB and that is enough of a middle ground for us to sit back and enjoy each other's company on a father-daughter level. You shoulda seen us in the Clinton years, though...woof.

We'll eat around 3 or 3:30 and then one of us will put in a movie (something more boy oriented than girl, even though there are MORE GIRLS here right now) , to which Dad and Mom will be snoring within 20 minutes. Kathy and I will no doubt pull out our Macs and do our internet nerd thing, and Kit will read a magazine or pretend not to snore with the parentals. If Rich was here, (he's back in Norway) he'd be politely trying not to snore, but would fail miserably. Though he would have won MASSIVE brownie points (as he always does) by helping to clean up after the meal. The first time he did that, I swear Mom almost passed out. Men in this family have not been trained to help with the clean up. A man in the kitchen is as rare a sighting as a UFO. (For us, the alternative meaning of UFO is Unrepentant Farting Object.)

Tomorrow we NONE of us will be hitting those horrible 6 am sales on "Black Friday". Family tradition demands NO shopping on the one day that you are supposed to go. We are, you see, contrarians of the first order. Nobody tells US when to shop! Besides, Friday is Turkey and Gravy Sandwich Day, which for me is the whole point of Thanksgiving....I just wanna get to Friday when the REAL fun starts.

Happy Thanksgiving one and all......

Stuff I was thinking

A random post...I offer no guarantees as to transitions, where my thoughts might head or what the hell I am talking about.

Mascara: I have two mascaras, both of which i love but both of which are very diffferent. One is Great Lash, that Maybelline stuff in the pink and green tube. Classic, waterproof, a little crispy on the lashes, small wand that I tend to poke in my eye by mistake, but a good solid choice.
The other one is called 'Backstage' by Dior, and I luuurve that one. The brush is HUGE and will cover your eyelashes if you even wave it in the vicinity of your face. As someone who is VERY nearsighted, mascara can get a bit tricky, what with the trying not to poke your eye out and concentrating on seeing and stuff. So I appreciate a good big mascara brush. If you are nearsighted, try this one out. Get the waterproof kind, though. I got the non waterproof and it can get leaky pretty fast, even from slightly teary eyes.

Coffee: I go to the nearby 7-11 (if someone will explain to me WHY there are 7 Narvesens and three 7-11's on every corner in every Norwegian town I would REALLY appreciate it...isn't one of each enough? I mean, there are two 7-11's and two Narvesens within 500 feet of each other right at my train station!) every morning for my coffee and bun. The guy that works there is SO nice. SO NICE. He always greets me with this eager bob of his head and a "go' morn". I luurve him too. I luurve him more than the mascara.

TV: So Rich was reading the Entertainment Weekly that we religiously subscribe to (we call it the Bible), and there was a list in there of TV that you must watch to have a perfect TV viewing week. American shows, mind you. He read out to me the shows...and 80% of them show here in Norway. Granted they are all a season late, and the TV channels here show them at really wierd random times, so that you have a hard time keeping up with when things are on...but they are almost all accounted for. I wonder how Norwegians feel, their TV being co-opted by American shows (in English, too, with Norwegian subtitles, leading, I think, to a nation of very fast readers), the shops all carrying American items, Burger King and McDonald's almost as prevalent as the 7-11's? Hey, we LOVE the TV being all American, PLUS we get BBC Prime and Food, but still, American pop culture is a total virus.........

Clothes: I wore leggings today. Yeah, leggings. 80's style, with black mary janes? I caved. They've been everywhere in the magazines, I swore I would not do it, but I caved. Now, granted, I would not be caught DEAD wearing leggings as, say, pants? Because my nearly 40 year old self knows there is nothing cute about a baggy sweater or a jacket over leggings, and honestly, it wasn't even cute in the 80's. But they are handy under a skirt when you don't want to commit to tights but want to still have something covering your legs. So I wore them under this black satin bias cut dress with a shorter, belted sweater dress over that. It was all very fitted and sort of multi-layered asian looking. With leggings. Yes, leggings. Sigh. Hey, I already bought the skinny jeans, might as well be a fashion robot and go all out. Besides, I wanted to wear the mary janes and they only ever look right to me either with leggings or white socks. Once 80's, always 80's.

I draw the line at the return of the stirrup pant though......

And I still haven't found a dress for the reunion.

Food: Tonight, out of some random boredom and desperation for something vaguely healthy for dinnner, I created the following dish:

Take some chicken breasts, drizzle with olive oil. Drag them through ground up tortilla corn chips that are seasoned with cumin, chili powder, garlic and pepper. Make sure breasts are coated in the chips a la Shake and Bake. Take a glass baking dish and dump a can of black beans in there, juice and all, sprinkle with chopped (or dried) onions. Place the chicken breasts on the bed of beans. Bake for 25 minutes to half an hour at around 375. (The oven was at 190 celsius).

Serve on a bed of rice, or spinach or salad. Yum. Sour cream makes a good garnish.

Exercise: I am sore from my workout yesterday. But good sore. I will go again tomorrow. I felt SO GOOD after my workout yesterday, I always have to remind myself how good it feels after. And what an absolute BITCH it is to make yourself go at first. But I did a good 25 minutes on the rowing machine at highest setting , and then another 15 on the elliptical, on level 7, 'glute workout'. THEN I lifted weights. I am sort of confused at how I have these totally strong stomach muscles, I can go forever on stomach exercises, yet my shoulders? Weak as a kitten. I swear, I was dying lifting 15 kilos on the shoulder killer machine. Embarrassing. A 6 year old kid could do better than me. I used to have good shoulders, I am not sure what happened.....but I wonder if I can get them back by November?

Damn Slate magazine to Hell.

So today I was listening to Slate's podcast and they did about 15 minutes on the history/popularity of Ranch Dressing.

Ranch dressing.

Creamy, cold, herby, fattening ranch dressing.

Ranch dressing into which you dip pizza, or fries or fried anything.

Ranch dressing. Which I adore.

Ranch dressing which you really should not start thinking about directly after your belly dancing class, as you listen to your iPod, on the way home from the gym. (Even though you are hungry and haven't eaten much today because the conversation over lunch ended up being...roaches, which killed your appetite completely and you could not eat your hard boiled egg and salad. Lunch conversations at work are always interesting.)

Ranch dressing, which is fairly hard to find here in Norway, but guess who has a small supply of ranch dressing mix?

Ranch dressing, which you make as soon as you get home and then you make a pizza because hell, pizza dipped in ranch is so damned good.

And you eat half the pizza and a big glob of dip.

Ranch dressing....creamy, cold herby goodness made with mayonnaise and milk. NOT a low fat food.

Damn Slate magazine podcasts all to hell. DAMN THEM. Don't they know how suggestible I am?

Thanks to Dave, I am posting pictures

Dave gave me advice on how to view my thumbnails all at once. Totally made things easier. That's the the thing about Macs, they are like the party snobs of computers. It's all about who you know, that can let you in on the secrets. Dave was kind enough to let me into the "in crowd" at least for picture viewing. So, for your viewing pleasure, pictures from Berlin!


On a boat ride on the river Spree, I managed to catch a shot of this guy climbing on top of the Reichstag building dome. I don't know why he was up there. But it was cool to catch a glimpse of him doing it.

I spent a few lovely hours wandering about Kaufhaus Des Westens (KaDeWe) and they have a floor of the building dedicated to food. I think it's better than Harrod's. I had a pause for a lovely Krusovice dark. Yes I know it's Czech beer but I adore dark Czech beers and drink them wherever I find them. People in the litte bar smiled and nodded at me while I took this picture. They obviously understood my eagerness to preserve this beautiful sight.

This is a shot of my riesling and Rich's pilsner at a fun bar in the Savigny Platz area. They had a fat cat that wandered around and an eclectic clientelle. Cool place.

More alcohol, this time in Potsdam. We had a lovely pfifferlinger laden lunch there, at a very traditional style Austrian-German restaurant. They ran out of dessert before I could have my sacher torte, though. Damn.

The sign says "wait here for further instructions". That tickled me.

Two pairs of Trippens and a pair of yellow slingbacks to balance the earthy shoes.

The purse I bought that I later found the shoes that matched exactly. Isn't that wierd? And it's a much more greeny yellow than it shows here, it's a wierd color. Not your average yellow. So, now I have my feet and my accessory needs covered for my high school reunion in November. I only need to find something to cover the rest of me...literally.

Last night I got off my mopey ass and went to the pub with a bunch of Rich's work buddies. These are all big, bluff, manly men who have been all around the world for many years for work and have seen it all. They've been everywhere and done everything. Tell ya what, there's nothing better for cheering up a mopey gal on her birthday than alot of beer and raunchy tales of the world told by a bunch of rough, tough, cussin' guys. They just good naturedly kept me beered up and treated me like one of the boys. Well, mostly like one of boys. One of the boys with cleavage, maybe. It was fun. Thanks guys. Really.

in which she finds a cure

One cure for PMS is as follows:

Leave work a bit early.

Come home, crash.

Husband calls you at 6 saying that he is at the pub with some work buddies. He'll be home in an hour.

You, now that you are awake, decide to open a bottle of wine. Discover bottle of German red wine that was purchased in Berlin.

Germans make DAMN fine red wines.

No, really. (sip) They are good. (sluurp) Damn fine red German wines. (glug)

Drink said bottle of German wine. Cook massive amount of pfifferlinger, following simple traditional German recipe. Now have iron clad excuse for having opened bottle of German red wine: you needed it for the pfifferlinger. (No matter that you only needed, like, an ounce. A recipe is a recipe, right? I needed the ingredient.)

Husband said he would be home at 7. 7 comes and goes. So screw him, he's late, did I mention this wine is damn fine (sip) and serve self pfifferlinger with a nice steak and spatzle.

Continue with wine. (gulp) Damn, DAMN fine German red wines. Why aren't these more famous?

Damn, damn fine German red wines. pms? cramps? who cares! (slurp)

this will be totally random

There will be no continuity in this blog post. Let your mind skip about from topic to topic...and just breathe. We got back from Berlin at 1:30 am and I am tired tired.

Let's see. BERLIN ROCKS. I could totally live in Berlin in a heartbeat. Just do yourself a favor and go. Between the nice (really friendly!) people, the awesome transportation, the amazing food (ich liebe Deutsches essen) and the shopping, it's as close to nirvana as it gets for this girl.

This trip can be characterized by three things for me: Beer. Shoes. Mushrooms.

1. Beer. Lots of it and all good.
2. Shoes. Some girls buy Manolos, I buy Trippens. I bought some sandals made out of elk leather. Have you ever felt elk leather? Like butta. And then I got this other pair of shoes as well. Seriously, if Brad Pitt or some other hottie walked up to me and offered me my every explicit sexual fantasty while I was shopping at Trippen, I would basically spend the whole proposition looking past him at the shoes and then say, "What? Did you say something?"
3. Pfifferling. It was Pfifferling Zeit. Everywhere we went, Pfifferlings* were on the menu. Sauteed, made into soup. Roasted. With cream. It was AWESOME. I loves me the Pfifferlings. Especially with a nice wienerschitzel and some pommes frites, and a large dunkelweisse. heaven.

We did some other stuff, of course. I mean, it wasn't ONLY shoes, beer and shrooms. I bought a kick ass purse as well.

Ok I'm being facetious. We also saw some palaces and did a boat tour and a bus tour and spent the day at Sanssoucci. Sanssouci takes more than a day to see, so we missed alot, and it was raining like crazy, but it was still an incredible day out. We ended up walking more than 10 miles a day.

I did ok speaking German. Whenever I try to speak Norwegian one of two things happens: The person I am trying to speak to looks pained at my attempts and so starts speaking English to me, or I forget the Norwegian and use a German word instead. In Germany this word transference was not a problem, obviously, and my German accent is actually good enough that people think I am more fluent in it than I am, which is good for my learning but bad when they get past me in speaking to me and I end up saying "huh?". But I learned alot and I think if I had a few months I could be well on the way to fluency.

Now I am back here in Norway and I keep trying to speak German and I am getting really confused.

Today I started my belly dancing class. Det ar pa Norske, men jeg forstar bra. I mean, honestly, how hard is it to understand "move your hips this way and your shoulders like this"? Even I can understand what a "rumpe" is. It's a very fun class, the folks are all nice, and we can just be women, no matter our background, shaking it and laughing at ourselves. I will tell you, it's a big benefit to have some junk in the trunk and some lady lumps up front, those skinny girls just didn't look right shaking it like us more meaty ones.......

I've got pictures of shoes, palaces and beer, give me a few days to get organized and caught up and I'll post.

Oh! I also meant to leave you with the link to this interesting article about traveling through Heathrow in the recent travel horrors. I still can't fathom not having a book on a plane....and then this article points out that even though you were stuck in Heathrow, a veritable mall, for like, HOURS, you still couldn't shop because they won't let you bring it on the plane? Ugh. That has got to be my version of purgatory....nothing to read, bookstores and shops everywhere and I can buy anything, but I just can't take it with me.

*Pfifferling = chanterelle mushrooms. I had to look it up.

**ffrrp* *buurrrp* ('scuse me)

*bbrrfffp*

Just got back from the Hard Rock Cafe, Oslo.

I actually had fairly low expectations because it seems like many "American style " places around here just never really get it. I mean, it's close, but there is always something not quite right and it ruins the experience. (Like the time I order fajitas and they came cold with more pineapple and corn than chicken pieces and with parsley as the main seasoning. Not terrible, mind you, but not actual, real fajitas.) (Let me also say, I rarely eat at American style places, but sometimes, you just gotta have a bite of home, you know? So back off, all you people who think we only want things the American way. That's not the case at all.) Also, we had a disapointing experience at a Hard Rock in Copenhagen last time we were there, so I did not expect much.

Lemme tell ya, the Hard Rock did not disappoint. In a word, YUM.

We started off with a plate of nachos, which cost just over $20. We didn't flinch (much) because that's par for the course here. Things just cost. You get used to it. When the nachos arrived, I was BLOWN away by how BIG they were. Like, real, big American nachos! Big! Huge! Cheesy! They even had JACK cheese on them. Jack cheese is not available in grocery stores. I even asked the waitress to find out where it came from, she said that the Hard Rock IMPORTS it! Jack Cheese! Oh heaven! Those nachos were so worth the cost, especially by Norwegian portion standards. It would have fed us for a week......

We ate every bite of that whole huge plate of nachos. Beans, guac, salsa, pico, cheese, chips, everything. I swear, I felt like I had just come off a desert island and landed on some sort of American food heaven alternate universe. They were perfect in every way. Oh, Lord, yes, I now have a place to go for my cheesy Mexican cravings.

Rich ordered a burger for his main, and I ordered fajitas. I was impressed when the waitress asked me how I wanted them cooked. Wow, I get a choice? I said rare as I can get 'em. Rich asked for medium rare for his burger.

Burgers are always dicey to order hereabouts. I got one, once, at TGI's in Oslo, and it was tiny and dry. This is a common problem throughout Europe, with burgers. I usually just save the craving for when I get home. I mean, burgers are NOT a native European food, so I don't expect perfection, but I continue to try every so often when the cravings hit too hard. I got the fajitas because I figured less chance of disappointment and they came with more JACK cheese...yum!

When the food came....I was almost jealous of Rich's burger. It was BIG it was JUICY it was flame broiled and it was GOOD. A perfect burger. A perfect, $20 burger. The onion rings were gorgeous, crispy and oniony good.

My fajitas were good, too. Cooked to order, the beef nice and rare and the chicken flavored nicely as well. Loaded with cheese, pico de gallo, guacamole, sour cream and CHEESE! Unfortunately, the nachos were so good and so big that by the time I got my food....I could only eat the one taco. I felt like a total wimp. I finally get to strap on a Texas sized food bag...and I can't do it. Damn my European influenced eating habits. Make them go away!

To drink I had a Hurricane (I splurged, it cost around $17, but it was good, ) and Rich had two Guinnesses. I was just about as happy as a Karla can be, especially when they played a NIN song directly followed by Cameo's "Word Up". I figure, any restaurant that will play Nine Inch Nails and feed me jack cheese is alright with me.

As for dessert? We wimped out. Just could not do it. We really wanted to, but the bellies did not want what the heads wanted and we urped our way out of the joint happy and fat.

Total spent including a large-by-Norwegian-standards tip was 900 nok, which is about $145. Expensive, sure, but cheaper than a ticket home.

Happy Birthday honey. I sure am glad I got to share that one with you.......

hard rock oslo

Tomorrow is Rich's birthday and to celebrate we are going to the Hard Rock Cafe, Oslo. It opened last December and I have yet to get there.

I'm quite excited. Not really because it's a Hard Rock (been there done that) but that I get to have AMERICAN food cooked by someone other than me! Woo! Oslo also has a TGI Friday's that I have been to a few times, but to be honest it's not that great (even if I am craving US food it still disappoints) and it's crashingly expensive. I never spend under $75 there, and for that kind of food, that is way too expensive. Even if they refill your Cokes "American style" every two seconds. It might be the only place in Oslo with free Coke refills. The Cokes do cost around $5 bucks, though, so they should be refilled often, no?

I'm sure Hard Rock will be pricey as well, all restaurants here are, but I can only hope the appetizers will be appropriately greasy and salty, cheese will be properly melty, the burgers properly oversized and juicy and the Cokes never ending.....

Just when you are at your ebb....

....I am assuming "ebb" is the low point, right?

Anyhow, I have been in a funk for about two weeks now. The weather has been overcast and rainy and chilly, nothing is materializing with my "job", my energy is nonexistent. I look like crap, I'm tired and am frankly bored. I smell like eggs because I am forcing myself to eat two of them every morning in an affort to get into the breakfasting habit. (Urg, I don't like breakfast. At least, not FOR breakfast.) I think about making jewelry or starting that writing project that I keep thinking about, but I just don't feel that creative spark. Even blogging seems to be a big effort. I've been oddly stressed and slothful at the same time. I feel discombobulated and out of sorts.

I've been going for walks whenever the weather holds out long enough for me to get out there, and that usually perks me up. I listen to my podcasts and think about whatever pops into my head. It's usually very therapeutic. I went out today but I just couldn't get into it. I felt like I was heaving myself along the paths. So I gave up and went to the local shopping center. I tried some retail therapy and that did not work as there is nothing I really like or need or want, and what I would consider buying is either WAY too expensive or isn't cut right for my body. (I would KILL for a nice American mall at this point.)

Imagine how I felt, then, after a completely unproductive egg-smelling, energyless, nothing-fits-I -am-a-fat-cow day, when I checked the mailbox and found that Bookhart sent me a care package from the US! I burst into tears just seeing the notice. It was like Christmas coming suddenly on the worst day of your life. I pulled myself together enough to literally RUN to the post office to get my goodies:
NONE of it is diet food, it's all processed and colorful and bad for me and I thank her from every fiber of my being for sending it to me! I've been CRAVING Fruit Loops because my dish washing soap smells like them. She sends me sponges because the ones here are crappy foam rubber ones and they squeak and feel icky and I hate them. She sent me dried onions because they cost, like, $8 for a small bottle here. Kraft Mac and Cheese!!...'nuff said! Fruity Pebbles! Cherry Twizzlers! Cherry Sours! Big Red Gum! Taco and guac mix!

The best part, though, is the love. She sent me a big box of love. I'm verklempt. Talk amongst yourselves, I'll give you a topic.....

Man Cook Meat. Fire! Fire! Fire!

This is the FIRST and probably LAST time I will ever do this, but I got this in an email today and it is so true I had to post it here. I was laughing like a loon (all by myself, which makes it even loonier). Girls reading this....I KNOW you will identify.....

______________________________________
BBQ Season

After several long months of cold and winter, we are finally coming up to summer and BBQ season. Therefore it is important to refresh your memory on the etiquette of this sublime outdoor cooking as it's the only type of cooking a real man will do, probably because there is an element of danger and involved.

When a man volunteers to do the BBQ the following chain of events are put into motion:

1) The woman buys the food.

2) The woman makes the salad, prepares the vegetables, and makes dessert.

3) The woman prepares the meat for cooking, places it on a tray along with the necessary cooking utensils and sauces, and takes it to the man who is lounging beside the grill - beer in hand.

Here comes the important part:

4) THE MAN PLACES THE MEAT ON THE GRILL.

After that:

5) The woman goes inside to organize the plates and cutlery.

6) The woman comes out to tell the man that the meat is burning. He thanks her and asks if she will bring another beer and a clean platter for the meat while he deals with the situation.

Important again:

7) THE MAN TAKES THE MEAT OFF THE GRILL AND HANDS IT TO THE WOMAN.

And then:

8) The woman prepares the plates, salad, bread, utensils, napkins, sauces and brings them to the table.

9) After serving dessert, the woman clears the table and does the dishes.

And most important of all:

10) Everyone PRAISES the MAN and THANKS HIM for his cooking efforts.

11) The man asks the woman how she enjoyed "her night off." And, upon seeing her annoyed reaction, concludes that there's just no pleasing some women .

right now I am just not sure

Sorry I have been so absent. I just really have not felt the writing mojo. You know how it is, right?

Not that things are bad, in fact things are pretty ok, but I just haven't felt like writing it down.

So, here's what's what, as far as I know, which seems to be shocking little at present.

Um, went to Sweden yesterday with a friend to go grocery shopping. It's considered to be a bit tacky to go do that, spend your money in Sweden instead of supporting the Norwegian (tax and monopoly) economy by buying stuff here, but stuff there is WAY cheaper. Mostly. So I got my usual chicken and beef, and some stuff I can't get here (Cocoa Krispies, for god's sake) and hit the Swedish version of the wine monopoly and got wine at a little more than half price. It pretty much takes the day to go shopping in Sweden. It's about a two hour drive each way on very low speed limit roads that are constantly under construction. You go through insanely beautiful rural country. Meadows, rolling hills, farm houses dotting the landscape which breaks into impressive gorges with blue water and vistas out to the sea. Wow.

The shopping centers themselves aren't that impressive, considering I just drove two hours to get there, but the prices and selection are much better. (Why oh WHY are Cocoa Krispies not allowed here? Why can't I get canned chili? Why is chicken less than half the price there? WHY?) The only bad deals were on American imported goods, which, honestly, I can get better ones here for about the same (astronomical) price.

There was one shop that was fairly spectacular. It was the biggest shop dedicated to candy and junk food that i have EVER seen. It was the size of a regular grocery store. It was packed to the roof with nothing but candy, chips and sodas. (And beer.) I've never seen anything like it. I'm not actually a big candy eater, so only got some peanut M&M's, which are so expensive here as to be prohibitive. The wierd thing was, the second level of this behemoth store dedicated to, well, behemoths, was one of those 'health food' stores catering to men trying to build muscle. It was all Creatine powder and chromium and weight lifting gloves and energy powders. I was just stunned, seeing that chapel to the body beautiful (photos of muscular abs everywhere) tacked onto the church of the obese. It seems the marketing guys were either really brilliant or smoking crack when they teamed up those two business enterprises.

I got a call this morning about going back to work...today. I'm not really sure what's up, but it's kind of short notice. (I already missed the trains and busses I would need to get there, and a cab? Why bother working, just give all your money to the cab driver.) Not that I don't appreciate it, but I like some warning so I can plan my week. I'm not good with last minute. I'm a planner. So I arranged to go starting Thursday, tomorrow being a holiday and all. Sounds like the work will be more interesting this time, a little more challenging.

Tomorrow is 17 May, the Norwegian Independence Day. It's always fun, with parades and cook outs and lots and lots of flag waving. And of course, a day off work. Today, May 16th, is also apparently a day when many many Norwegians get drunk. (Well, especially the Russ kids, as it's their last day of Russ.) This I was told by Norwegians, so don't kill the messenger. Hell, I'll probably join them.

My hair is trying like hell to show its orangey-ness through the temporary cover. I'm gonna have to figure out a permanent solution soon.

Rich has booked us tickets to Milan and Bergamo for early June. He's on a travel frenzy, spending every evening looking up flights. I have a feeling it will be a busy summer of four day weekends. (Hmm. Maybe I'll get my hair done in Milan....)

And this, dear people, is the end of this uninspired transmission. I think all the sun and spring weather has my thoughts outside to hikes and walking and blooming fields. Ahh.....

and here we go again

More pictures. I'm not yet sure of what, so lemme dig thru and find some stuff....ah, yes, to continue with the previous food theme, I offer you:


Ronald McDonald on Khao San Road, Bangkok. Sorry, but he is just freaking scary whether Buddhist or not. Urg.


A restaurant we did NOT go to in Chiang Mai. Though I rather like the German-Mexican aspect of it, because that would totally fit in with the part of Texas I am from. We have a large German contingent in the Hill Country. And everyone likes Mexican food, right?


Well, here we go from the cheesy to the sublime. This was the appetizer I had at Le Normandie at the Mandarin Oriental Hotel in Bangkok. It is a seared tuna something or other with a reduction of this and a wasabi infused glace of that. I had no idea, I just ate it. It was phenomenal. That restaurant was so posh. They even gave me a little stool to put my purse (my over the shoulder embroidered $3 bag I got in Laos!) on so it would not have to rest on the floor! There I was, a glamourous tourist; sweaty, red faced, disheveled hair and disgusting from having toured the Wat Pho in 100 degrees of heat and humidity that morning, now sitting at the poshest damn restaurant in Bangkok. Nice.
The guy seated at the table next to us looked exactly what I would think a Chinese Emperor would look like. He ordered a thousand dollar bottle of wine to have WITH HIS LUNCH. Seriously. It was amazing. I was considering offering him 5 bucks just so I could have a sniff of that wine, because I know it would have smelled heavenly. But he also looked like the sort of guy who could have had me killed just by a slight hand motion which would have called over a bodyguard who would have then snapped my neck like a little twig. So I refrained.

This was the main course I had. It's also, like, the second time in my life I have had veal, because veal gives me the willies. But nothing else on the very small exclusive menu was anything I really wanted (other options including pigeon, sea urchin, etc.), so I got veal because at least I knew it was beef. Even if baby beef.

It was good. That baby cow died a noble death. (Yes I KNOW how they are kept which is why I don't eat veal, but well, it was already dead, wasn't it?) The little ice cream cone looking thingy in the upper left corner was a bit of cous cous in a radish. Very cute.

Today is the sort of day that reminds me why Norway can be so nice. Crystal clear skies, today it will be 75 or so. The breeze coming in the windows gently blows the freshly washed white curtains aloft. The air smells crisp and like the mountains. I have iTunes Radio on, broadcasting some trancey-dancey music that lifts my spirits in time with the floaty curtains.

I never understand why Norwegians leave this gorgeous weather in summer. I'm glad I got out in winter and early spring. Now I can enjoy the summer and have the whole country to myself. I am now going to go find my walkin' shoes and go for a hike.

Food. Pink Drinks. Big Beer. Life is good.

I've gotten a request for pictures of food we ate while on our recent trip to SE Asia. I did take a few pictures, so here we go. Being me, and hello, EVIL, of course I also took pictures of drinks as well.

We had an amazing meal at Le Normandie at the Mandarin Oriental in Bangkok. (Pictures of that in the next post.) First, of course were the drinks. I've always followed the "when in Rome' theory of drink, so when in Thailand drink...Mai Thais! Mm.....Yummy Mai Thais. I had them in many posh places......

Here's the Mai Thai I had at the Four Seasons in Chiang Mai. Nothing so refreshing after a long ride on an elephant as a fruity rum drink!

Not being a snob, and once again practicing 'when in Rome', in Luang Prabang I drank Beer Lao. Beer Lao comes in big bottles. Beer Lao cost a buck. I drank alot of Beer Lao.

This was an appetizer we got at the River Ping Palace in Chiang Mai. We just told Esther, the owner, to set us up with whatever she wanted. This was part of the amazing meal that followed. There were fried mushrooms (interesting ones, not just white ones), chicken with lemongrass, calamari, prawns and some other stuff. It came with really spicy, not so spicy and sweet sauces. We ate it so fast I didn't really get a chance to keep track of it all.

Ok, so I kind of suck. The meal that came after the appetizer was so awe inspiring that I never got a chance to take a 'before" picture. There was a whole fried fish, Tom Yum soup, a curry, a prawn dish, fried rice and a whole bunch of other stuff. It was all so good and amazing, even had I had the forethought (and could get my jaw off the table) to take the picture, I don't think the others at the table would have had the patience to wait for me to take it!

There were many memorable meals that I did not get pictures of as well. One that sticks in my mind was the Thai style bbq we had in Mae Hong Son. I blogged about that one already, so won't bore you with it again, but for $8. including drinks, it just can't be beat as one of the best cheap meals I have ever had.

Face of Jesus in my Quesadilla, y'all.

And I am SO not lying.

I made quesadillas tonight. (I make 'em GOOD, too.) In the third one I made, there He was. About an inch and a half across. I called Rich over and I'm all like, "Does that look like Jesus in my quesadilla?" And he's all "Holy (haha) Shit! It DOES!" So he took pictures.

Tell me if you can see it.




Did you see it? I SWEAR it is exactly as it appeared, right out of the frying pan. It is NOT retouched or photoshopped or anything.

Here's another shot, with a circle around the face:

See? It IS Him, in'it?

Of course I ate it. My quesadillas are really good. Did I mention that? Didn't want to waste it.

But then, I just thought of something: did I really screw up and I should have saved it and sold it on eBay, like the grilled cheese sandwich with the Virgin on it?