...the invitation to St. Petersburg came through.

And why would I need an invitation? Well, it is part of the process of getting a visa for Russia. As I am not staying in a hotel, I had to get Mari to send me an invitation. Yesterday it came through on fax, and today I went to the Russian embassy in Oslo and picked up the visa. Though "picking up" may not be the proper term, as it came quite expensive. Not only because I started out with the wrong address, resulting in two tours around Oslo in taxi before I got to the right place, but also because it is expensive to get a visa the same day you apply for it... One thousand Norwegian crowns, to be precise (that equals some 128 euros according to the American Express Currency Converter).

Yesterday I also had my long-awaited ADSL broadband connection installed. The guys from the telecom company said it would just take fifteen minutes to install it. This seemed sound to begin with, considering that the line was active until I returned from Strasbourg. However, fifteen minutes became half an hour, and turned into one hour. By that time, I had finished both lunch and dessert and started doing my homework in French while the guys worked on the line. After two hours they finally made it work and I could return to the office. Yesterday I worked late.

Tomorrow I am getting up at 05:45, and with three cans of Norwegian liver paté in my bag I am flying to St Petersburg to visit Mari for the week-end.