Asbjørn in Oslo

The end

2008-08-16T08:47:00.002+02:00

To be discontinued.

This is what I did last summer: http://asbjornonvikingtour2008.blogspot.com/

Stay updated on flickr: http://flickr.com/asbjorn_floden

My bike is back...

2008-04-19T20:24:00.002+02:00

...in my living room, and I am back on the road riding it.

Summer is coming! :-)

Video, or looong pictures, on Flickr!

2008-04-09T12:32:00.003+02:00

Flickr now accepts video, and you might wonder "why--we already have YouTube and MySpace" (and many others). From what I understand, videos on Flickr are aimed towards "pictures with duration", or pre-rendered slide shows if you like. However, I don't know whether Flickr will moderate uploaded video content, and it will be exiting to see how the video feature really works. The best way to find out will probably be to upload one, and I have an idea on what to upload... Stay tuned!

Moonlit Easter

2008-03-30T19:01:00.004+02:00

Blue Easter moon

This year, I spent Easter with Trine, Bente, Arnljot, Daniel, and Tor at my fathers cabin in Valdres. Although we had a day and a half with snowfall, we found time for cross country skiing in wonderful sunshine, digging and building a fortress (mostly the work of Arnljot), jumping from the roof as well as skijumping. And photographying the moon, which shone brightly every night but one!

My phone wants to be lost

2008-03-12T08:32:00.002+01:00

For the past few days, my mobile phone has become independent and stayed behind after I've visited friends. Or, seen in a different perspective, my disliking the Nokia E-65 is becoming unconsciously explicit as I forget to bring the phone with me when I leave.

Mental note to self: Never mind.

Online slideshows with PicLens in Firefox

2008-03-11T13:55:00.002+01:00

A colleague just introduced me to the Firefox extension PicLens by Cooliris. The extension let you browse and display online pictures in a neat interface, including integrated search with online pictures like flickr as well as a nice slideshow feature. So, if you don't have it, install it--if you don't have Firefox, install that too...

And enjoy!

Desserts, snowboarding, skiing, and bicycling

2008-03-10T15:48:00.007+01:00

35 chocolate dessers in 2008

2008 started with a decision to cook all 35 chocolate desserts in a leaflet I have by the end of the year--in other words, one dessert in every week and a half. I am currently slightly behind schedule, but picking up speed in order to celebrate my birthday with one of my favourites, namely fundue au chocolat. As part of this project, I upload pictures of every dessert on flickr. Click the leaflet to have a look.

Off-piste in Hemsedal

Travelwise, I am keeping an environmental-friendly profile with no flights so far this year, and have traveled in filled up cars and buses on my two trips snowboarding in Hemsedal. Within the city and surrounding areas, I go by metro, bus or train--also for cross country skiing. And since last Sunday, bicycling adds to my current means of transportation, though mostly for excercise until the temperature rise to more relaxing levels.

A new year of training

2008-01-27T09:22:00.000+01:00

Once my fractured rib healed in mid-January, I resumed training and participated in a swim gathering for triathletes last weekend here in Oslo. Facilitated by two (or three?) times Swedish champion in triathlon Ted Ås, Swedish ex-elite swimmer Torbjørn and finally Swedish swimming coach Henning Degermann, who has coached Sweden's Olympic swimmers, quality was highly professional. Additionally, with all coaches from Sweden, quite a few Swedes participated as well. So, in total 18 amateurs swam back and forth for no less than nine hours in less than two days! It's only now, one week later, that my left arm is starting to feel normal again. But however exhausting, the gathering was a big success--I don't immediately swim a lot faster, but now I know a few things I should work on. So when summer comes, I'll hopefully be fit to participate in a triathlon or two...

Update:
Sorry, but no pictures this time either. I do have a video of myself crawling, but don't see any reason to publish that... Admit that a decent picture of me with swimming, water splashing around, would be cool though.

Why do Microsoft move buttons to the right?

2008-01-16T10:28:00.000+01:00

I just installed Internet Explorer 7. It looks nice, but what on earth did Microsoft think when they moved some of the toolbar buttons to the right? Did they completely miss out on the idea that people stack windows, rendering the buttons invisible when a window partially overlap?

I can understand that not everyone reads from left to right, and therefore would like buttons to display to the right rather than left. But why distribute them all over the place?

I just don't get it...

Who is Lyra Belacqua?

2007-12-21T23:56:00.000+01:00

The answer: Lyra Belacqua is the main character in Philip Pullman's trilogy "His Dark Materials", of which the first book is now on screen as "The Golden Compass" (my copy says "Northern Lights" on the front cover).

To those who know me, the following may come as a surprise, as I am more of a realist than a fan of fantasy literature. However, when my cousin Peder gave me the full trilogy, I would be disrespectful not to show appreciation and read the books--no matter how sceptical I was towards fantasy. Working my way through the pages, I learned to know Lyra beyond her capabilities to succeed with everything she engages in, and I soon devoured the full trilogy.

This was a few years ago.

Today, I saw the first part of the trilogy on screen. Preparing for the motion picture, I freshened my memory and read the first book once more--this time with even greater joy than before, and although a bit sceptical I looked forward to the movie. I even read a couple of reviews and was mentally prepared for an intense two hours with action and special effects following special effects and action...

What I was not prepared for, was the movie's failure to portray Lyra. Yes, it shows Lyra as a clever and strong girl, who is not afraid of nothing (double negation is used extensively in the dialogue...). But the story jumps from one thing to the other, and you don't get to know her beyond being a child running around sorting things out--and barely that, as you really have no idea what to expect before it happens. Faced with this, missing and shuffled scenes doesn't really matter. Even the misplaced emphasis on massive battle-scenes become secondary to the lack of insight into Lyra's being and her drive to pursue what she believes in.

The one quality that makes the movie worth seeing, set aside the special effects, is the brilliant play by Dakota Blue Richards (Lyra) and Nicole Kidman (Mrs. Coulter). Just too bad that the script and direction don't make their talents work the story...

Is walking more polluting than driving?

2007-12-17T22:17:00.000+01:00

On August 4, The Times quoted UK parliamentary candidate Chris Goodall who claims that walking 3 miles (4.8 km) adds four times more CO2 to the atmosphere than driving the distance in "a typical UK car". The calculating behind this statement assumes that a person has to eat about 100g of beef to power the walk, and beef production is polluting. The question that jumps to mind is, what about the car's fuel? Where did that come from?

Here are another few questions that might balance the statement a little (I don't know the answers to them, so maybe they don't add any balance whatsoever. And although thinking requires energy and thus adds to my emission of CO2 today, I find them both amusing and worthwhile to ask):

Who lives solely on beef? I don't question that meat production requires a lot of energy--I recall having heard already in secondary school (about 20 years ago) that producing one kilo of meat consumes 10 kilos of fodder. The problem is that I can't think of anyone who only eats meat--perhaps with the exception of people who follows the Atkins diet...
How much CO2 does the walking person emit directly into the atmosphere, not considering that she (or he) have to eat in order to walk? This is probably an over-simplified way of ruling out the cost of producing and transporting petrol, but nevertheless an interesting way of putting things into perspective...
Or what if we start off from the beginning, and compare 1) how much energy and emission it takes to raise a human being ("a typical UK citizen") with 2) the energy and emission it takes to produce "a typical UK car"-- including putting shoes and clothes on the human being, and mining and transporting metals for the car, etc...?
And finally: How much energy and emission does it take to bring the person back to nature (the concept of "earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust") compared to decomposing the car (no similar expression for the car, as nobody have yet witnessed a car become earth, ashes or dust--without help from mind-bending amounts of energy).

Of course, nobody can give definite answers to any of the questions above, with perhaps the last being the exception. However, it wouldn't hurt if journalists spent two extra calories to ask questions that might help people (like me) to better understand what is actually going on.

Or maybe not, as it would require extra energy, contributing to even more emissions of CO2...?

Update:
Even more alarming than the journalists lack of questions is the teeny-weeny white-paper beef.pdf that is supposed to support Mr. Goodall's statement--it clearly says that the question about where the car's fuel comes from is in fact not at all taken into consideration...

But it gets even better, as the document actually says that "we have gradually become aware of the huge amounts of grain needed to feed our animals". I don't know the definition of "gradually", but someone actually thought this out and delivered the message to me and a lot of other kids some twenty years ago...

The one good point in the document is that sharing a car is still good, although with an incredible argument: "if there are two of you, and you share the car, then walking would be eight times as bad for the climate". In other words, although we've known it all the time, it is good to share a car-ride, but now because it would be twice as bad (for the climate) to walk! Go figure.

All these negative comments aside, there is in fact one underlying positive message in Mr. Goodall's statements: Modern food production is very energy-consuming, with the brute example being prefabricated food conserved in refrigerators. So the moral is: grown your own food, or buy it fresh from your neighbour.

Bon appétit!

Re-ripping my CD's in FLAC with Easy CD-DA Extractor

2007-12-09T23:34:00.000+01:00

I guess the title says it all: after discovering that Easy CD-DA Extractor embeds album art (or CD-cover pictures) into FLAC music files, I am now using it to rip my CD-collection in lossless FLAC format.

Actually, I stumbled across this fact somewhat accidentally today when I used CD-DA Extractor to rip a new CD and then updated the music index on my Sonos player (a techie way of saying that I added the CD to my Sonos). The CD-cover showed up on the Sonos screen as if I'd used iTunes to rip, despite the fact that there was no "folder.jpg" file alongside the FLAC files--based on lengthy discussions in the Sonos forums, I believed the "folder.jpg" approach to be the sole way to show album art for FLAC music files. Somewhat surprised by this discovery, I started digging in the FLAC format documentation and found that the format can hold quite a few pictures as metadata in each music file.

So, to repeat myself once more: I am now ripping my CD-collection all over, but this time in lossless, open FLAC format. Geeky, you say...? ;-)

An Online Photo Frame for Grandma?

2007-12-03T07:18:00.000+01:00

I take digital pictures, and so does the rest of my family. I would like to show some of these picture to grandma, but that is difficult unless I print them or bring my laptop computer to her. However, printing is expensive, and I can't really leave my laptop at her place--not even if she'd manage to use it. In addition, and I regret this a bit, I don't stop by her often enough and the result is a large number of new pictures between every visit.

This is where a digital photo frame might come in handy. A digital photo frame is simply a small monitor with a picture-like frame around it and a small computer behind it, usually including some amount of storage for pictures and controls for flipping through them.

A photo frame for grandma should be easy to use, preferably with big, easy-to-read physical buttons on the front so that she can easily navigate between pictures, and get tactile feedback as she does. The photo frame should also run on batteries so that she could bring it around the house--although quite vigorous for her age, she doesn't run around her house anymore. Thus, the frame should be small and lightweight rather than big and heavy. In addition to these qualities, the perfect photo frame would be online and automatically download the latest pictures from a pool to which I and the rest of her family can upload pictures.

Philips 9" PhotoFrame

Finding a digital photo frame that meets all the requirements above has proven to be very difficult. Philips has quite a few models, all of which runs on batteries (for about one hour), but none of which has wireless network capabilities, nor buttons on the front.

NT-700 with visible buttons

Digital Spectrum, on the other hand, has both wireless frames and one frame with buttons on the front, but none with both WiFi and batteries (their NT-700 has the buttons and battery, and although the buttons aren't physical it is the only frame I've found with any controls visible from the front). And this is how it is all over: after considering a dozen or so, I haven't found a WiFi-enabled photo frame that runs on batteries, and only one (the NT-700 from Digital Spectrum) with visible buttons on the front.

In the end, I guess it all comes down to visiting a store and have a look at a real life product. Maybe a digital photo frame for grandma doesn't have to run on batteries? Or maybe it doesn't have to be online? The only dilemma remaining now is where to go: to an electronics market or a photo shop?

Should I abandon lossy audio compression?

2007-11-25T21:17:00.000+01:00

The last couple of weekends have been calm, and I've had time to reconsider a couple of things, one being whether I should abandon using AAC for my digitised music (stored on a NAS and played through Sonos).

Until now, I've been using iTunes and Tunessleeve to copy my CD's
in AAC-format and download album covers from the Internet. But, after comparing a lossless (WAV) version and a lossy (AAC) version of the same classical music, I began to seriously considering a lossless solution. And then FLAC (free lossless audio codec) came back to mind. After browsing around, I've downloaded J. River Media Center, which successfully copies a CD to FLAC, looks up info (track names etc.) on the internet and downloads the album cover automatically. Sounds perfect, right? And except from that I have to copy all my CD's once more, it is a nice solution. Except from one thing: the database from which J. River downloads CD-info seems to miss out things like production year and stuff... So now I don't quite know what to do--again.

In the vacuum of a perfect solution, I've had time to explore Adobe Lightroom and uploaded a couple of pictures to Flickr--of which I personally prefer the slightly manipulated one of some frozen roses.

Update:
Bjørg tipped me about CD-DA Extractor, and it appears to be a viable alternative to J. River Media Center. The user interface is awful, but CD-info is better than J. River.

Sailing in Greece

2007-10-28T15:51:00.000+01:00

Sun Odyssey 49

Last weekend, I went sailing with Kaj, Knut and Leo in Greece. We flew from Oslo to Athens on Friday afternoon, and left the Lavrion harbour on Saturday. Our first stop was Mericha on the west coast of Kythnos. On Sunday, we continued south around Kythnos and back up at the east coast where we stopped at Loutra for the evening, taking a dip in the open air mineral bath. The initial plan was to return to Lavrion and fly back to Oslo Monday evening, but strong winds prevented us from leaving Loutra and we spent Monday looking around on shore. Tuesday morning, the wind had calmed down and we left early and had a wonderful journey back to Lavrion along the eastern coast of Kea, and we caught the flight in perfect timing.

Usability at Yggdrasil

2007-10-16T23:47:00.000+02:00

After an amazing weekend in Oslo, comprising massive partying on Friday, an awesome game of squash with Christian and Hans Jakob on Saturday, a calm and social evening at home serving exquisite foie gras de canard with matching Alsacian gewürztraminer to Jan Walter, Gunn and Karl (and Erika), a visit to the Holmenkollen ski museum on Sunday, and finally a nice Sunday dinner with Bente and Arnljot, Monday and Tuesday sported the annual Norwegian conference on usability: Yggdrasil! (Note: "Yggdrasil" is originally the name of a tree in norse mythology, though I don't know why the usability conference bears the tree's name.) The conference takes place in Lillehammer, centrally located in southern Norway.

This year was my first visit to the conference, and I got a really good impression. Luke Wroblewski from Yahoo opened the conference with a plenary session introducing the challenges of today's rich and social applications on the internet. His speech was blazingly efficient and equally difficult to summarize, but my notes disclose at least a few topics: people find your content through different social applications, like accumulators such as del.icio.us and Digg, profile pages on Facebook and mySpace, blogs, and of course various search engines including Google. Content is still king and should get the most space at your page, while adding links to relevant content further enhances the page's value to the user. Luke also mentioned a couple of ways in which you can ensure content quality in social applications: either by making it easier to submit content that is good for your application (the example he used was an online creature design tool that made it easy to design nice looking creatures but difficult to design ugly ones), or by making it a bit more difficult to submit content so that only those who REALLY wants to contribute goes to the effort of clicking through several screens (which by the way reminds me of the Elaboration Likelihood Model of persuasion, which in this context says that an enthusiastic user is less likely to stop an ongoing task when encountering an obstacle, whereas users with cursory interest will drop out unless encouraged to continue the task).

Cher James-Tanny held the second plenary session, talking about how communication has evolved and will continue to evolve. Her main prophecy was that we'll see fewer words and less text, exemplified by reference to the SMS language of abbreviations as well as visual communication such as the LEGO build instructions (small kids can't read, so the instructions are all illustrations).

After the opening plenary sessions, the conference sported three parallel sets of sessions, and a total of four simultaneous workshop sessions on Tuesday morning. I participated in the workshop session about "designing from the inside and out"--design with focus on the most important unit of information, how you get to them and what you can do with them. The prime example here would be Flickr, which is all about pictures, but with various tools for finding and using them in different ways.

Also worth mentioning is the last session I attended, which was about how Fast Search and Transfer has tried to develop a social music service for use on mobile phones. However, various obstacles such as technical incompatibility between mobile phones, slow response (not "instant play" as your current MP3-player), music licensing issues, and expensive network operator pricing models, the concept is not yet operative as the ideal design suggests. Yet, a couple of early examples exists through ezmo and moox. So, look out for your friend's instant recommendation for a song when you're on your way to work sometime in the future!

Cultural autumn

2007-10-11T22:55:00.000+02:00

Contemporary dance in a box of glass

It happens every year: after a summer with people playing around outdoors (well, except this rainy summer...), autumn comes and although people tend to withdraw to their warm houses, culture pulls them back out to refill their cultural conscience with exiting exhibitions. This year, CODA Oslo International Dance Festival pulled me out to see contemporary dance in a box of glass downtown Oslo.

Model of the Holmenkollen ski jump

One week later, Jan Walter and Giulia brought me to the architectural exhibition "Culture and risk" at DogA, and between panels with descriptions of risky architecture in the Nordic countries, a model of the new Holmenkollen ski jump appeared!

If you're in Oslo, the dance festival is off now, but the architectural exhibition is still on for another five weeks until it closes on November 17.

Phones don't float, but birds do

2007-09-24T13:25:00.000+02:00

This weekend, I lost my mobile phone into the water while sailing in a regatta. But, as opposed to the seabirds that have appeared all over the Oslo fjord these days, my mobile phone didn't float very well and as my Internet connection is down for the moment, I am currently not available except by personal attendance.

According to local newspapers, the strange birds are white-breasted guillemot ("lomvi" in Norwegian), but I have seen both these and another rare kind of bird in the Oslo fjord and surrounding areas this weekend, and I suspect the journalists haven't reached the whole story yet.

Anyway, the birds are all over the water (I am sorry for not having a picture of them -- the closest I get is this picture of a shrimp trawler docked at the city hall quay). And by "all over", I mean they aren't afraid of anything and are easily hit by boats. I guess that's part of the reason why they also appear in relatively large numbers floating upside down.

It's getting colder

2007-09-19T08:10:00.000+02:00

It is getting colder in Oslo, and last night I pulled out my winter duvet from the closet. Temperatures have been reported dropping below zero (Celsius) in areas outside Oslo, but this morning I overheard someone at the metro saying it was minus one degree in Oslo last night. Or to use her own words (translated from Norwegian): "if it rained it would snow!"

Ouch!

2007-09-17T16:31:00.000+02:00

I just started feeling a bit bad. I've kind of disbanded this blog, but checked in now to have a look at the stats (bottom of the right-hand column) and saw that people are in fact visiting. So I guess I'll have to put in a bit more effort here again...

I'll start with a brief summary of what has happened this summer (click the links for pictures):

I spent my vacation trying to get a tan by my mom's summerhouse/cottage in Norway (near the city Fredrikstad). Then I visited Stefanie and Mitsou, Kristina and Laurent in Strasbourg, before traveling by TGV to visit Jan Walter in Tours (recommended sight: Chateau Chenonceau). Then a brief stop in Oslo before flying north to visit Regina and Peder, as well as Hege and Dag Ragnar, in Bodø, including two trips to the Lofoten islands and one trip hiking the Lurfjellet mountains just south of Bodø. Eventful and lovely vacation!

Afterwards, I've spent most of my days around Oslo, with the exception of a visit to the U.S. for training, including one weekend in New York (recommended sights: Rockefeller Center and MoMA), and one weekend in Chicago (recommended sights: The Cloud Gate and the Art Institute). Cool!

And finally, I've been race-sailing the Norwegian championship for the 11:MOD class (pictures by Fredrik). Also a lot of fun, but please don't ask about results... ;-)

Unsolicited mail

2007-06-26T09:07:00.000+02:00

If you have an e-mail account, you've probably received one or two (million) e-mails with offers to buy viagra, cheap software or invest in a business so good that you would have kept it secret if you had invented it yourself. In other words: Spam. Until I opened the anonymous envelope I received yesterday, spam has been an electronic phenomenon to me.

The envelope contained a letter telling the story of some rich farmers somewhere in Africa. As the local government, or was it the mob--I can't remember, had taken over (and/or burned down) their farm, the unfortunate farmers had to leave as refugees. Thus, they flew to South Africa, seeking asylumn with some 20 million dollars in cash as hand luggage. However, as refugees they cannot deposit money into bank accounts. Therefore, they offer me 20% if I can help "transferring" their cash into their bank account.

I didn't have to read the letter to understand that it was a physical breed of spam. Neither do I have to convince myself to refuse the offer of 20% revenue. Actually, I'm facing a totally different dilemma: Should I file a complain to the postal service who didn't filter out this unsolicied mail? After all, I do subscribe to the "no ads in my mail"-service! Or, should I file it to the Norwegian National Authority for Investigation and Prosecution of Economic Crime?

What is art?

2007-05-08T22:39:00.000+02:00

Reading on Ken Rockwell's well-written web page about photography, I came across a small test that evaluates your art gauging skills. My curiosity about this art thing triggered me to take the test. It takes about two minutes to complete, so why not give it a try? You'll find it here, at modestypanel.

Photo upgrade

2007-05-07T00:43:00.000+02:00

It's been quite a while since my last post now. There are several reasons for this, but the major one is that I've been occupied playing around with my new digital camera: about three weeks ago (or was it two?), a Nikon D200 entered my life and I've been busy showing it various places in Oslo. It's been nice getting to know the solid little fellow, and although there is something wrong with one if it's eyes (the 28mm) the other one works perfectly fine (the 50mm). I've just uploaded a few good glimpses on Flickr.

In line with the sturdy D200, Karl-Inge convinced me to buy Adobe Lightroom for managing my pictures. Although I've had some mixed feelings about getting attached to a professional memory hog from Adobe, it certainly has its advantages over Picasa. (I know, Picasa is free and shouldn't be compared with Lightroom, but I cheat and do it anyway.) To me, the most obvious advantage is the extremely powerful function for tagging pictures with keywords--I learn new things all the time, and today I just learned that Flickr imports the tags I create in Lightroom! Combined with an export function that generates filenames based on picture title and automatically starts Flickr Uploadr, uploading pictures to Flickr now is a breeze! So, look out for more pictures...

Danm car!

2007-04-14T23:59:00.000+02:00

I've been out bicycling again. As easter passed with a minor cough I had to disband my plans to bicycle a lot, and therefore today's trip with some Rye triathletes was much longed-for.

The trip started just as last time, following Griniveien before climbing over Kolsås to Lommedalen. This led to a re-run of the descent where I hit 65 km/h, so I figured let's try 70! For a while it seemed I might manage to break my previous record, and passing 60 was a breeze (literally...). But then, I caught up with a car and had to stop acceleration. Neither could I pass it on the fairly narrow and curved road, so I got stuck behind the car driving just above the 60 km/h speed limit.

Forest ride

The trip continued in hilly terrain, and expecting to find a "back route" to Asker we found ourselves bicycling through the forest only to turn at a radar station near Rustad. Judging by the surrounding buidlings, we thought the radar was completely abandoned and inactive, but all of a sudden there were noises coming from it! Sounded like some engine, and we concluded that the radar is still in operation. Hope none of us were fried from sitting directly underneath it...

Rolling again!

2007-04-01T18:08:00.000+02:00

Pause at Blakstadtangen

On the last day of March, I had my first real bicycling trip this season with Line and Dag. In magnificent sunshine we had a nice trip around Kolsås to Blakstadtangen and back to Oslo, 73 kms in total.

Update:
Forgot to mention that I sat a new personal record with top speed at 65 km/h. Looking forward to hit 70 later this summer... ;-)

More pictures from Narvik

2007-04-01T01:20:00.000+02:00

Just a small update to announce that I've published a few more pictures from Narvik. I've organized them chronologically into my photostream on Flickr, and you'll find them most easy by opening the narvik photo set.

A summer preview

2007-03-25T22:37:00.000+02:00

Yellow crocus

Summer is coming to Oslo, and this weekend has been a nice preview:

On Saturday I went with Hege and Thomas to a boat exhibition. Not looking for an investment (not much to invest anyway), I fell for a couple of amazing boats: first I fell in love with the red version of the classic-style Nordic Star's Sportsman (only blue exterior on the website). Then, an in my opinion most remarkably well-designed boat materialized in the Fjord 40' Open! It looks like no other Norwegian-based boat I've seen, but reminds me of exclusive, Italian vessels. A refreshingly delightful acquaintance.

Today (Sunday) started with a swim. Albeit indoors, I stumbled across an assorted set of crocuses in the Botanical Garden on my way to the pool. Afterwards, Arnljot and I had planned to drop by another trade fair named Elektrofil (Electrophile)--Arnljot to look at (or was it buy?) the new Sony Playstation 3, and I to get a closer look at Nikon D80 and D200. However, there was a long line of people waiting to enter, so instead we strolled to Aker Brygge and sat down in the sun with each our bowl of fish soup accompanied by a nice bottle of Chablis.

Yep, summer is definitely coming!

Snowjumping in Narvik

2007-03-22T12:26:00.000+01:00

Narvik is awesome for skiing and snowboarding! After three years of studying there I kind of knew this already when I booked the flight for last weekend, but the conditions turned out fantastic! After one week of rain, Friday came with a heavy snowfall resulting in more than 30 centimeters of nice powder for me and Eirik to play with--yet the thin base and loose powder printed some serious marks into my snowboard...

However, sunlight and an awesome view all the way to Lofoten easily put our minds off any scratches, and let Karl-Inge and Tini shoot a couple of nice pictures! To top it off, Dana and her family made our visit so comfortable I cannot think of any reason not to revisit Narvik.

Blown away in Hemsedal

2007-03-13T09:31:00.000+01:00

Swaying lift

Not completely blown away, but last weekend's trip to Hemsedal resulted in my first visit to the slopes at Solheisen--simply because most of Hemsedal ski resort was closed due to strong winds on Saturday. So instead of long queues and windy slopes, I got to twist and turn through the not-so-steep forested hills of Solheisen in nice, soft snow. The soft snow also made me jump both higher and longer than before.

On Sunday, the wind had calmed down and all of Hemsedal was open--until the wind picked up again, that is. On our way towards the top Tinden, the lift started swaying a lot and was closed just after we got off. Apart from that, and the warm weather that rendered the snow wet and heavy, it was really nice to get back on the snowboard again--particularly as I am starting to get some air under my board now.

I hope to increase the "airness" in Narvik next weekend (high-res map)...

Visioning music heaven

2007-03-03T19:17:00.000+01:00

After one week with the Sonos, I've learned a thing or two about music management. I'll skip all the details, and cut straight to the vision that's forming in my mind:

The Sonos cannot play from a UPnP server (as of firmware version 2.1). I got this confirmed by customer support, who also had it noted as a feature request. In parallel, I've searched the internet and eventually installed a trial version of the UPnP server TwonkyMedia on my DNS-323 NAS. Of course, the Sonos couldn't see it so I had to install Cidero UPnP A/V Controller on my PC to confirm that it worked - and it turned out I could control playback on the Sonos from Cidero! Nice, yet not quite what I expected...

I also came across another nice music management tool, namely MusicIP Mixer. This program is capable of creating playlists of songs that sounds the same - after an extensive analysis of the tracks (currently running on my PC...). So, with all my songs indexed, I guess I can play in shuffle mode, and ask for "similar songs" when I hear a song that I like. In other words, my own personal DJ! The only problem is that this only runs on my PC...

So here is my vision for music heaven: an upgrade that enables Sonos to play music from a UPnP server, and a UPnP server capable of serving "similar songs" on my NAS... *twirling eyes* :-)

Sonos now playing in my living room

2007-02-25T12:38:00.000+01:00

Sonos Controller

After several months of thinking, researching and warming up with the D-Link DNS-323 NAS disk, I finally bought a Sonos player on Friday. It is probably one of the most expensive ways of playing MP3s on the stereo, but probably also the most convenient. You can read all about the features on the Sonos website, but in brief all my CDs are available alongside any web radio station--conveniently remote-controlled.

But nothing is perfect: although the new remote IS awesome, it would be sooo nice if it had an IR interface so it could control my normal stereo... I'm used to controlling my whole stereo from a single remote, but now I have to use two... Shame.

Another thing is that I am having problems accessing my music through anything but a normal file share. Which works fine, but is not so fine considering that my network disk has both an iTunes Server and UPnP support--both of which the Sonos should be able to connect to, but for some reason does not. So currently I am investigating how to make these features work. For those familiar with Linux, there is a nice Wiki with lots of hacks and stuff for the D-Link DNS-323, but I hope that I won't have to dive in there...

More cool stuff

2007-02-16T10:49:00.000+01:00

In the spirit of good old weblogs I add another link to a cool website:

Ajax13

Ajax13 is a collection of simple web-applications--that is, applications that runs on a remote server through your web browser. Maybe not all that revolutionary (both GMail, Yahoo Mail, Blogger and Flickr demonstrate similar functionality), but still a cool indicator on what we will see more and more of in the future (while home computers become smaller and smaller with faster and faster online connections...).

Skiing with Bente from Stryken to Oslo

2007-02-11T18:48:00.000+01:00

The title says it all, and the pictures document a wonderful day with Bente in fresh snow. Enjoy!

The coolest websites!

2007-02-04T22:19:00.000+01:00

Looking for examples on cool online stuff, I came across a list of seven cool ones at TIME.com of which two caught my interest:

Of the two, Pandora really stands out as the most amazing site I've ever seen! With Pandora you don't need a radio channel anymore--just enter a song or artist name, and Pandora keeps playing similar music. Wonderful!

Update:
Only US citizens can register on Pandora, because Pandora don't have an international license for distributing music. Yet...

Another update:
Looks like most of the cool web pages only works for US citizens. Hmpf.

Cultural and gastronomic pleasure

2007-02-03T16:37:00.000+01:00

Gastronomic pleasure

After the wonderful experience of snowboarding in Hemsedal a couple of weeks ago, I repeated the success last weekend.

This weekend made for a change, and on Tom's invitation today I joined him on a visit to the Astrup Fearnley museum of modern art and their exhibition of Richard Prince's paintings--maybe one of the best art exhibitions I've seen so far, with delicately humorous and somewhat controversial statements on huge canvases. Lovely!

Topping the event, we stopped by Stockflet's café for a double espresso and an exquisite piece of Valrhona chocolate. Wonderful!

Alive

2007-01-15T13:50:00.000+01:00

Off-piste in Hemsedal

Just a note to let you know that I am still alive after another awesome weekend in Hemsedal. Took the large bus up there and back, and had an easy evening watching Shortbus at the movie theatre afterwards.

Art for my music

2006-12-30T11:01:00.000+01:00

After I got the NAS up and running, I've been copying my CDs to it. Now, I use iTunes to play my music, but intend to buy a Sonos player not too far into the future. And as both iTunes and the Sonos makes nice use of CD covers (or album artwork) I also want to store the covers for my music. (Btw: funny how we like to "see" the music and hang on to old-school CD covers when music has been freed from the physical medium.)

But, as I don't intend to scan all my CD covers, and cannot add album artwork through iTunes because I don't have an iTunes Music Store account, I had to look elsewhere. Another argument against that built-in feature is that iTunes 7 no longer embed album covers into the song files, but keep them in a separate database. Nice if you intend to stick with iTunes--not so nice if you play music with a Sonos player.

So I've been searching for applications that can add album artwork to my music files. After reading web page after web page, these programs made it to the final and was tested in real life: iTunes Art Importer, Mambo, mp3Tag, and TunesSleeve.

And the winner is... (drums rolling...): TunesSleeve! Because: The program is easy to work with and efficient. It embeds album covers into the music files, and let you actually see the various covers it finds before downloading. But the best feature is that you can initiate a Google search for additional covers, and drag the one you prefer onto the album in TunesSleeve! The one single thing I don't like is that you can only select music through playlists--it would be nice to select music by artist(s) or album(s) too... So now that I've made my contribution to the author of TunesSleeve, it is time to present my wishes for future versions...

Is your brain male or female?

2006-12-29T01:20:00.000+01:00

Find out with a simple test at BBC's website.

Apart from being a little less than average male, my results indicate that I should be a heavily published rocket scientist caring for my colleagues well-being. But I'm not. Yet. ;-)

The NAS was buggy, but works now

2006-12-28T00:15:00.000+01:00

As most gadgets I put my hands on, the NAS I bought before Christmas was too good to be true. First, my computer spent three nights and two days to copy my pictures and music to it over my wireless network (I must optimize that WLAN). Second, believing that everything was all right, I deleted all the music and most of the pictures from my laptop.

But things were far from right--it turned out that a huge number of pictures from 2005 was missing! Luckily, I had decided to keep this and last year's pictures on my laptop and had a backup of all the missing pictures. So I tried copying them once more (using wired LAN this time...), but again pictures didn't get copied.

I turned to Google and found that others had similar problems and that the solution was to update the firmware and reformat the disks. So I had the firmware updated and tried to reformat the disks. But formatting stopped, and I had to visit Ole Kristian (my sister's fiancée) to put the disks into a desktop PC and delete the partitions as described. After that, formatting was a dream, and the NAS is now up and running again. I haven't checked for lost pictures yet, but will do once they are (supposed to be) all copied.

During the process I learned that updating the firmware of the D-Link DNS-323 involves reformatting the disks every time! I hope I won't have to do that often...

Continental bells in Oslo City Hall

2006-12-23T11:10:00.000+01:00

To make my ginger snap model of Oslo City Hall as true as possible, I'm studying it's dimensions in a book. Among the more exotic facts I have come across, is that all but the six largest (original) bells in the carillon on the eastern tower was made in Colmar, France. In addition, the machines making the bells chime, the clockwork and the striking mechanism was all made by Ungerer & Cie in Strasbourg!

For those who don't know: I lived in Strasbourg last year. Cool!

All set for Christmas

2006-12-22T23:58:00.000+01:00

My Christmas tree

After spending afternoons making marzipan, cutting it, dipping it in various chocolates, leaving the pieces to rest for the chocolate to congeal, and finally wrapping them all up, I am now done with this year's Christmas presents (including other things than chocolized marzipan). In the midst of it all, I found time to buy and put up a Christmas tree as well, which probably made the whole job a little easier bringing some Christmas mood into the apartment. Tomorrow I'll finish by building a scaled down model of Oslo City Hall in "pepperkakedeig" (a dough similar to ginger snap).

Skiing again!

2006-12-20T14:55:00.000+01:00

White mountains in Hemsedal

In extreme contrast to last year's cold, snowy and accordingly bright autumn, this autumn has been extremely warm, wet and dark in Oslo--and most other parts of Norway. Thus, as the local newspapers reported plenty of snow in the mountains and a corporate cottage had several rooms available, I turned my back on the dark city and Christmas preparations in favor of a weekend in Hemsedal ski resort.

And what a weekend! The valley of Hemsedal was totally dominated by its surrounding white mountains, and conditions in the slopes were magnificent! In an attempt to teach Hege how to twist and turn, I spent Saturday on rented slalom skis while I had my snowboard serviced. On Sunday, however, I was all over the mountains on my snowboard!

Another cool NAS disk

2006-12-11T16:15:00.000+01:00

Some time ago, I wrote about the Thecus N2100 network disk (cabinet) with RAID support and cool design. After that, I withdrew from the idea of buying an expensive RAID-based storage solution for storing my pictures and music--instead, I've been thinking about buying a single-disk network storage device. Simply because it is cheaper.

Now, D-Link has introduced the DNS-323; a two-disk network storage device (cabinet) with RAID support, just as the Thecus N2100. Almost simultaneously, Thecus has released new firmware for the N2100 increasing its performance. However, the D-Link disk not only looks better, but it appears to be even easier to install with no need for tools when mounting the disk(s). The D-Link also has UPnP (Universal Plug and Play) AV support, making it suitable for media streaming--which means that players supporting UPnP can connect without hassle, at least in theory. Alongside a lot of other useful features, of course. To top things off, it is cheaper than the Thecus N2100--almost as cheap as the Synology 106 single-disk NAS--and comes from a more well-known manufacturer than Thecus.

It seems I might end up with a NAS capable of running two disks after all...

Update, Sunday December 17:
The D-Link DNS-323 NAS and two 500GB Samsung Spinpoint disks have been ordered. As Christmas won't be white, I won't spend time skiing anyway...

Superb statements!

2006-12-09T10:51:00.000+01:00

It is not in my nature to declare someone an ideal, but Norwegian politician and former prime minister Kåre Willoch has a tendency to utter the most brilliant statements. In today's article in Aftenposten about economical incentives to fight global warming, he forth two gems of wisdom:

First he cites Reiulf Steen (another Norwegian ex-politician) who once said that "a leader should be in front of his supporters, but not loose them out of sight".

The second is Kåre's own, and a response to the journalist pointing out that last winter sported plenty of snow (as opposed to the rainy winter we're experiencing in Norway these days): "I will warn against basing global environmental politics on local conditions in Oslo and Akershus" (Oslo and Akershus is the two most densely populated counties in Norway, located in the south-east).

I would like to see our current politicians bringing these words of wisdom to life.

New language magazine

2006-12-03T23:19:00.000+01:00

Spending another Sunday dining with Ragna, I ended up buying the first edition of a new Norwegian magazine named Ordforord (Eng: Wordbyword). Judging by first looks and the editorial comment, it discusses literature in diverse contexts (political, philosophical and other) and language development or deterioration--the last being a completely separate, and very interesting, topic in my opinion.

Funnily, last time Ragna and I walked into a magazine-/bookstore I walked out carrying the small book Hva er språk? (Eng: What is language?) in my hands. It seems Ragna makes me attentive to non-material values, ironically enough resulting in the materialistic act of buying...

Lucky Lipstick on a String

2006-11-21T14:11:00.000+01:00

Or, if not lipstick, then at least he was lucky, the unemployed British young fellow who dangled from a 25,000 Volt train contact line when the power was incidentally cut off for seven minutes. With that kind of luck, he shouldn't be unemployed for long...

Meet the family!

2006-11-12T23:42:00.000+01:00

Proud father

My dear friends Gunn and Karl are now officially a family! Monday one week ago their lovely daughter joined our world, and today I gave my first visit to the newborn baby in her family's home. So small and apparently fragile, I was almost afraid of touching her as she was sleeping on my lap, but I guess I'll get several chances to overcome that fear in the future...

Strolling Oslo on a Saturday night

2006-11-12T01:58:00.000+01:00

Downtown Oslo has a major road that runs from the main railroad station, by the Parliament building and ends in front of the royal palace (which tourists not always notion a real palace, given its modest size...). This road is called Karl Johans gate (the Karl Johan road), and plays a major role in Oslo's nightlife.

With the forthcoming football cup final tomorrow, the street was crowded beyond recognition tonight: the bars poured music into the streets where both happy and drunk people eating kebabs made the street and surrounding areas appear as crowded as a sandy beach on a hot summer day--except tonight temperature was below zero (Celsius).

In other words, walking home from a nice evening out with dinner and drinks became a slightly interesting and amusing study of the behaviour of drunk football supporters visiting Oslo and locals, occasionally controlled by a small group of policemen.

It all made my previous sensation of being a little bit drunk vanish into thin air...

Being a chef

2006-11-05T23:52:00.000+01:00

People don't ask me often, but when they do I rarely say no to helping out in the kitchen--most often assisting mom with the occasional Sunday dinner; on rare occasions I rule the kitchen alone.

Today the latter was the case when I brought food, wine and recipes as a response to Bente's and Arnljot's request for a dinner for themselves and Arnljot's mother. Not to forget Arnljot's childhood (?) friend Daniel, who is establishing the habit of dining at "Arnljot's" at least once a weekend.

Today's menu was partially inspired by the season, partially by Jamie Oliver, and partially by French cuisine: Both starter and veggies for the main course came from Jamie's second book The Return of the Naked Chef, a fresh leg of lamb cured with garlic and rubbed in thyme and rosemary with oven-roasted potatoes followed for the main course, and from my cordon bleu cookbook with food from French Regions I selected cream cheese dessert with raspberry coulis.

With the assistance of Arnljot, cooking was a stroll, and judging by the response from the fed it was all tasty and good. Myself, I am most satisfied with the strawberry coulis, but that may simply be because I love dessert... On the other hand, I served dessert without a matching wine, and thereby missed the finishing touch that would make it all brilliant. Next time, however... ;-)

First snow

2006-10-31T13:59:00.000+01:00

The first snow I've seen this autumn/winter is now falling down outside my office window. Snowboard season is approaching...

Impatient Norwegian cinema audience

2006-10-30T00:16:00.000+01:00

I just saw the movie Volver by Pedro Almodóvar, which has been on my "to-see"-list all since Stephanie recommended it a long time ago. And it is indeed a nice movie! Shame I don't understand Spanish though, 'cause then I'd understand more of the nuances.

Another thing that troubles me a bit is the impatient Norwegian cinema audience: after some two hours of emotional twists and turns, the wast majority of spectators jump out of their seats and almost run for the exit, the lack of overhead illumination being the only reason they slow down.

Sometimes I really wish I never left France...

Preparing for winter

2006-10-29T19:33:00.000+01:00

Torstein in the boat

After what turned out to be an amazing Friday out with colleagues, featuring a lot of drinks and dancing like never before, Saturday sported a full day of downrigging and lifting the sailing boat ashore. Although I was a little bit reduced after a late night out, the day went by at comfortable pace and even the long-feared final positioning of the crib on land became a trivial event.

With the boat safe ashore, I began thinking through what else needs to be done before I am ready for winter, and I realised that my bike is still at the workshop! I should stop by and bring it home - and have it swap positions with my snowboard.

Frightening Fritt Vilt

2006-10-22T21:28:00.000+02:00

Living lovers...

Thrilling and frightening, Norwegian motion picture Fritt vilt made the whole audience jump, and in part scream, throughout most of its one and a half hour of playing time. The opening was expectantly calm and nice with a joking dialogue and wonderful snowboard-scenes, but just as the five snowboarders found shelter in an abandoned hotel, the movie audience started off every time a corner came up. I must admit that I sat tensed up in my seat most of the time, and even now, an hour later, adrenalin leftovers are still circulating my vains. So, if you're in Norway and appreciate a nice shock every now and then, this may be just your kind of movie.

Has Paris gone Texas?

2006-10-13T08:16:00.000+02:00

Yesterday's dinner at Paris Texas in Oslo makes me wonder if the people running the place indeed have. Whereas earlier dinners have taken place in a crowded restaurant characterised by excellent service and delicious food, yesterday was totally different.

Almost empty, the waitress lacked the joyfulness, calmness and ease of her predecessor, and although nice and tender my duck was served with red cabbage totally lacking the refinement of the bird. And although drinkable, the wine wasn't much of a recommendation for the orange sauce, which by the way barely tasted of orange.

I hope Arnljot came out better with his fillet of beef, and enjoyed this year's birthday present from me.

Check out Apple iGreen

2006-10-12T15:19:00.000+02:00

Never heard of Apple iGreen? Then check it out!

Sorry if you were disappointed--as you can see there is no Apple iGreen. At least not yet. But who knows what may come up in response to Greenpeace's campaign on making Apple turn greener, i.e. abandon using (extremely) hazardous materials in their products. I came across Greenpeace's spoof site reading the nGenWorks blog.

I think it's a good idea that campaigns like this are thrown, although at the cost of a single company. After all, it's consumer behaviour that matters, and if putting Apple on the stand makes people consider the more environmental-friendly alternative next time they go shopping, I believe that progress has been made.

Having said that, I still live in one of the world's richest countries, and am thus one of the world's most consuming citizens. It shouldn't stop me from being concerned, though...

How big is your ecological footprint?

2006-10-09T15:02:00.000+02:00

I stumbled across this term surfing from an article about global over-consumption. An ecological footprint is a term used by U.K. organisation Best Foot Forward to indicate an individual's consumption of natural resources. They even put together a simple calculator showing how big your ecological footprint is--given that you live in the U.K. I found the calculator inspiring, and would like to see similar ones for other countries, followed by politicians taking measures to reduce the ecological footprints of their citizens.

The headline leading me onto this track had a link to NEF (New Economics Foundation), which in turn provides links to articles in The Guardian and The Independent.

If you lived in the U.K., would you have a small or large ecological footprint?

One year in Oslo

2006-10-08T23:53:00.000+02:00

Oslo today

Today, October 8, it's one year by the date since I returned to Oslo from my studies in Strasbourg. It's been a nice and eventful year (just look through the blog archive in the right-hand column), but the period in Strasbourg was actually both nicer and more eventful--I don't mind going abroad again...

Le Café Rustique

2006-10-07T16:26:00.000+02:00

Having dropped off my bicycle for yet another round of repairs of the crank, I met with Trine Lise and stumbled across a nice café called La Rustique. The place goes very well with it's French name: the interior is as rustic as it suggests, the place is somewhat randomly organised, and the girl behind the counter wandered charmingly disturbed around searching for plates before she ended up improvising with napkins. However, despite all this it would be wrong of me to recommend the place, 'cause then I'd never find a free seat for myself...

No need for a swimming pool

2006-10-05T09:05:00.000+02:00

This morning I planned to stop by the swimming pool on my way to work. But I stayed a bit too long in bed and dropped the idea--until I looked out the window and saw the street filled with water from tonight's rainfall. It then struck me that I might have to swim to work after all...

Cool car

2006-10-03T12:44:00.000+02:00

Whether it's because I have been thinking about buying a small car so that I can invite friends to join me skiing/snowboarding/hiking/camping/whatever, or simply the fact that I like Volvo's "new" exterior design, reading about the new Volvo C30 in today's article in Aftenposten made me want to buy one. Would you?

Phone gone crazy

2006-10-01T17:02:00.000+02:00

My mobile phone has gone crazy! Maybe it doesn't like getting wet behind the ears...?

I guess that's what has happened, 'cause laying in the back-pocket of my bicycle pants it got a little wet when I fell into a pod on my way through Østmarka (hilly forest east of Oslo) today. I have tried to dry it up, but it appears to live it's own life--where people go crazy from alcohol, my mobile has gone crazy from water. Guess I'll have to detoxicate it, i.e. dry it up. Next time I'll put on protection...

Anyway, now you know the reason if I don't answer calls or messages.

Update (Sunday evening):
With the use of mom's hairdryer and a little patience, the phone became civilized again and stopped living its very own life. Feel free to call to verify.

Rolling beats

2006-09-27T07:24:00.000+02:00

Yesterday, I did two things: I delivered my washing machine for repair, and I bought the new CD of Norwegian group Ralph Myers and The Jack Herren Band--the latter caused by the former.

Driving to work after delivering the machine (because of an awful beating sound it made when spinning up) I heard a review of RM&JHB's latest record on the radio. The reviewer wasn't all that enthusiastic, but his characterization of it as mix of "punk, soul, funk, disco and dub" made me curious enough to buy the record after work. Having listened through it, track number eight "Boombox Breakdown" stands out as extraordinary (independent of what the review says) with it's Norwegian rap lyrics and rolling beat--far better than the rumbling that came from my washing machine. So; by delivering the washing machine at the workshop, it's rhythmic noise was replaced with a rhythmic sound. At great pleasure for me, but maybe not my neighbours...

New version of Picasa adds geotagging!

2006-09-19T15:58:00.000+02:00

Recently, I discovered that you can "geotag" pictures on Flickr, i.e. show on a map where they were taken. When I started Picasa today for uploading the pictures from yesterday's bicycling trip, a new version was available for download. I installed it, and among a few other new features it now supports geotagging in Google Earth. I haven't had the time to investigate this to any depth yet, but combined with the new Picasa Web Albums this may turn out powerful...

Going off road

2006-09-19T15:13:00.000+02:00

Strangely enough (or maybe not, considering that I've finally got an offroad bike after my previous one was stolen in Strasbourg last year), I've spent quite some time bicycling on gravel roads in Nordmarka north of Oslo lately. However, yesterday was maybe the most fun so far: although bicycling with colleagues turned out a tough experience (I am not in as good shape as I thought...), it was also very fun when we left the gravel road in favour of footpaths. The others pulled up speed here too, but I managed to hang on and discovered the excitement of going fast on rough ground and even climbing away from them at times. Very fun indeed!

Eased by Uro

2006-09-16T23:58:00.000+02:00

I just saw the Norwegian movie Uro ("unease" in English). It portrays the turbulent life of an undercover police inspector, following a lead that takes him out on deep water and involves both his mother and a girl from college in a drug investigation not authorised by his superiors.

Magnificent performance by all scriptwriter, actors and director come to life in a movie that got my full attention, and I left the movie theatre as if my brain was put in the washer and spinned gently--totally blank yet with a minor fuss. It even made me get off the metro a couple of stops early so that I could wander home at slow pace.

Without doubt one of the best movies I've ever seen. Not all accidental that it was rewarded "un certain regard" at this year's film festival in Cannes, I guess...

Latenight holiday in Sweden

2006-09-09T16:34:00.000+02:00

Kyhls Strand

Saturday one week ago, I returned to Oslo after one week at Kyhls Strand in the southmost part of Sweden. As in 2003, Bjørg and Karl-Inge arranged the trip for their friends and family. And with the option of bringing other friends, I invited Stefanie who most courageously came all the way from Strasbourg via Berlin to join me and seven other Norwegians from the very northest part of Norway.

As a meeting of people from the northern and central Europe, the holiday gave some interesting perspectives on habits--most noticeably around the breakfast and dinner table where conversations were modest and calm, at least when held in more than one language. But although interesting to observe from the far end of the table, the meals were nice social gatherings. In particular the dinners, comprising multiple dishes of exquisite taste and quantity--at times in excessive amounts...

With everyone having a digital camera, photografying became a major pastime and almost every activity were thouroughly documented in visual forms. Well, everyone except me, that is; after going through all my things twice without success it turned out that I had forgotten my camera in Oslo. Very clever.

But the lack of a camera was no problem. First of all because there were multiples around all the time, resulting in pictures of people taking pictures... Secondly, as the southmost area of Sweden is very flat, I and spent time rolling along the country roads on my road bike from village to village, with the highlight being a three-hour ride north to Kristianstad encompassing a session of excellent drive-by-shooting by Karl-Inge (as well as a soaking rainfall).

Stefanie's stay almost ended in me having to drive her a bit further than to the bus-terminal in Malmö, but gave me the opportunity to have a closer look at the awesome high-rise building Turning Torso and its sourroundings. And while I enjoyed modern architecture in peaceful solitude, the others were racing around on a go-cart track near Tomelilla. The following day I joined them to put things straight, winning all three rounds.

If there is one thing I missed during this wonderful week, it would be sunbathing on the beach. And experiencing local cuisine in a restaurant. Maybe next time...?

Ready to go off road

2006-08-17T10:29:00.000+02:00

My new bike

Four days before the one-year anniversary of my Cannondale R700 road bike, I bought a Specialized Stumpjumper mountain bike yesterday. Now I can finally go bicycling in Nordmarka (the forest north of Oslo)!

To the sea

2006-08-09T20:31:00.000+02:00

Me underwater

Last weekend I visited my mum at her cabin near Fredrikstad. As in May, I went by bike. But opposed to last time, this time I also returned home by bike.

My mum's brother has a cabin next to hers, and together with his family we visited "Søsterøyene" (the sister islands) and chilled off in the nice water. There, I tried my uncle's diving mask and snorkel--my first attempt at using a snorkel since I was a kid and swallowed our whole swimming pool through one. With this dramatically improved underwater vision, I finally managed to take a couple of fair underwater pictures--though at the cost of a salty refill...

At great pleasure for the local seagulls, I also went fishing for mackerel with my cousin and his girlfriend, which turned out very successful to both humans and birds--as long as we don't consider the lives of 31 small mackerels a major loss.

Talking about the sea: Yello has a song titled "To the sea" (featuring screaming seagulls and splashing waves and everything) on their album Pocket Universe. The song comes in a normal and a remixed version, of which I believe the remix is a perfect match for spinning--when the outdoor bicycling season ends.

Moving on to HDR photography?

2006-08-04T09:51:00.000+02:00

Today, Arnljot sent me a link to an interesting article about High Dynamic Range (HDR) photography. In brief, the concept is to take multiple pictures of the same (unchanged) scene at different exposures, and use special software to render a picture that captures details in both bright and dark areas.

I'm definitely gonna give this a try, and hopefully come out with results good enough to be uploaded to flickr.

Frozen strawberry margarita

2006-08-02T12:09:00.000+02:00

Wrapping up the strawberry season, I have concluded on a nice way of blending a frozen strawberry margarita.

Serves two:

5 dl fresh strawberries (without the husk)
5 dl crushed ice
1 tbsp sugar
4 cl tequila
2 cl Cointreau
2 cl fresh lime juice (about half a lime)

Put everything in a blender, and blend to a fine pulp. Add sugar to sweeten, lime to freshen.

Enjoy!

PS. Sorry for the missing picture--I was too thirsty to stop for photographing the drinks...

The truth

2006-08-01T10:58:00.000+02:00

Reading a document on internet browser statistics, I came across a quote at the end of the document:

"The pure and simple truth is rarely pure and never simple"

Oscar Wilde

I don't like MSN Live Messenger

2006-07-31T10:47:00.000+02:00

Today I gave MSN Live Messenger (i.e. version 8 of MSN Messenger) a try. I downloaded and installed it, and started configuring it to suit my simple needs: a list of contacts on MSN, preferrably transparent, without commercial ads.

But then I started thinking... Where does the chat history go? How do I get rid of the annoying window that pops up in my face? Why can't I configure the window to be transparent? (Microsoft, the creator of MSN Live Messenger, introduced the transparency feature in Windows 2000, yet I haven't seen them use it a single time, while others like Trillian, Miranda and Picasa all do. For free...)

After a few minutes of annoyance, only compensated by the potential of seeing the fancy smileys that people send me from time to time and the certainty that others will see my avatar picture properly, I closed MSN Live Messenger and fired up Miranda again. Back to basic.

Update:
Annoyance grew out of proportions when Stefanie made me try chatting on MSN Live Messenger; compared to the simple setup I use in Miranda, the chat window looked like the most messy place on earth--or my display, at least. And all the fancy smileys only added to the mess. I think I can manage without...

Five persons stabbed near my apartment

2006-07-27T15:05:00.000+02:00

While I am safely located in the office, online newspapers Aftenposten, Dagbladet and VG reports that five people have been stabbed just one block away from my apartment in downtown Oslo. Apparently, the violence began as an argument in a Kurdish youth club, while the stabbing took place on the pavement outside when several persons came to a blow. The perpetrator (who according to eye witnesses was male) has not yet been caught. I hope he is...

Pictures from Sunday on Flickr

2006-07-25T18:37:00.000+02:00

Waterskiing on Ulviksjøen

Just a note to tell you that I've uploaded some pictures from Sunday's trip to Ulviksjøen in Aurskog on Flickr. Enjoy!

Update:
Later, I've added the "picture previewer" in the right hand column, with a selection of my most recent pictures on Flickr.

Speeding around

2006-07-23T23:54:00.000+02:00

Today I went waterskiing with Gunnar, Ragnhild and Ole Kristian at Ulviksjøen some 45 kilometres east of Oslo. But not only did I speed around on the water surface. As I bicycled to the lake (while the others went by car) I equalled my speed record of 60 kilometres per hour. I repeated the act on my way home, and also sat a new personal record with an average velocity of 30 km/h over a 50 kilometre distance.

To settle things down, after I got home I had a chat with my Turkish friend Basak. She just bought a new digital camera and are taking great pictures with it. Take a look at her pictures on deviantArt. (The link is also in the linklist in the right hand column.)

Latenight café life

2006-07-22T09:30:00.000+02:00

Ragna and her glass

Yesterday (as was the original name of this blog), Ragna came over for dinner, and brought her new Canon Ixus 800IS digital camera. Dinner was the most tender sirloin of pork, but the main motive for her visit was to play with her new digital camera. So we walked to a café, had some coffee, took a few pictures and walked through the concrete jungle with its tall buildings towards the seaside. However, when climbing a bridge Ragna's skirt flew up turning her into Marilyn Monroe for a second, and we decided to turn around.

The sunny side of life

2006-07-20T14:51:00.000+02:00

Sunbathing with Bente

Although working, the nice weather have forced me to take some time off and go to the beach. After I first visited the beach "Katten" in Oslo with Kristine on Sunday it has become my favourite, featuring grass and smooth coastal rock to lay down on, and diving boards and a small sandy beach from which I can take a dip in the Oslo fjord. Picture is from yesterday's visit with Trine Lise and Bente.

Take a look at time

2006-07-20T10:43:00.000+02:00

In a previous blog post I mentioned my new alarm clock from Rosendahl with its square shaped LCD display, which shows hours above minutes.

Bringing similar LCD design to the wrist, the July edition of Wallpaper* presents a watch from Swiss company Ventura, "the world’s first and still only automatic digital watch that does without a battery" (according to themselves).

Most of Ventura's collection appeals to me, at least the models that display hours above minutes just as my alarm clock. So maybe I should abandon the six-year-old habit of not wearing a watch, and wish for a SPARC fx from Ventura?

Lousy service

2006-07-09T15:36:00.000+02:00

Non-Norwegian speaking readers have to excuse me, but here is a complaint I sent to both NSB (Norwegian State Railways) and Trafikanten (a Norwegian service for public transport):

I dag oppdaget jeg ved en tilfeldighet at Østfoldbanen er stengt på grunn av at en bro har falt ned ved Loenga. Denne informasjonen kom jeg over på nettsidene til Dagens Næringsliv. I et forsøk på å få bekreftet informasjonen sjekket jeg nettsidene til NSB og Trafikanten, uten å finne noe informasjon. Søk på togtider fra Oslo S til Holmlia ga heller ingen advarsel om at Østfoldbanen er stengt. Etter å har ringt NSB Kundesenter og fått vite at køen der var på 12 minutter og 31 sekunder, ringte jeg Trafikanten og fikk bekreftet at joda, Østfoldbanen er stengt og det går buss fra spor nr 19 til samme tid som toget.

Denne informasjonen burde ligge på forsiden til både NSB og Trafikanten, og også komme opp når man søker etter avgangstider på de respektive nettsidene. Det er rett og slett for dårlig at jeg må ringe for å få slik informasjon.

Briefly summarized, the story is that I am having dinner at my mom's place today, and I usually go there by suburban train. Today, however, I accidentially discovered--through the Norwegian newspaper Dagens Næringsliv--that a bridge has fallen down on the line, blocking it totally. But neither the web pages of NSB nor Trafikanten said anything about traffic problems, not even when I searched for departures; everything appeared to be quite normal. So I had to call to get the information confirmed. Incredible that this information is not available online!!!

Being a computer geek

2006-07-08T03:53:00.000+02:00

Tonight, I felt like a real computer geek alongside Arnljot at his place. While he worked on configuring a Linux-based multimedia computer, I browsed the Internet for Network Attached Storage (NAS). A NAS is basically an external disk drive, but with a network interface that makes it independent of a computer. And why would I need that? Well, in addition to being a place to store away music, pictures and video recordings, I would like to play the music without having to use a PC--perhaps with something like the Sonos ZP80 and its companioning controller unit.

In my search for a NAS, I stumbled across Tom's Networking were I found many interesting reviews of diverse NASes. However, the Thecus N2100 stands out both in functionality and appearance. And price. It comes without hard drives, which must then be bought separately. And not only one, but two. But, although this solution is expensive, it features real-time backup so that when one hard drive fails (which they tend to do after some time) I won't lose any of my pictures or other data. And as already mentioned, it comes in a wrapping that can actually be part of the media solution in a modern, civilized home...

Update:
Tom's Networking also did a review of the Sonos player.

J'ai fini mon tour en France!

2006-06-28T19:49:00.000+02:00

Ten days and 1422.6 kilometres after I left Oslo, Kristina welcomed me to her and Laurent's apartment in Strasbourg Tuesday June 27.

Day 1: Fredrikshavn - Hobro (115 km on map / 124.8 km on the bicycle computer after 5 hours and 24 minutes)
After a night on the boat from Oslo, I rolled off the ferry half past eight Sunday morning June 17. I had a nice meeting with the bicycling paths in the flat country of Denmark (which should turn out not so flat further south), said hi to the windmills, had a lazy Sunday lunch in Aalborg, and ended my first day at a reasonable hour in Hobro. In lack of restaurants, Alanya (the first) served dinner.

Day 2: Hobro - Vejle (138/154.5 km @ 6:13)
On the second day I learned the importance of precise navigation; having fueled sun protection and energy in Bjerringbro, I somehow missed the exit to Silkeborg near Kongensbro and did some 15 damned kilometres extra (on the map!). Consequently I had a late lunch in a forest near Silkeborg. Rolling down national road no. 13 among cars and heavy lorries, a rainfall stopped me to put on protective clothes--only to stop after ten minutes. Conveniently enough, a friendly old farmer refilled my water bottles with the most refreshing water (some 22 kilometres north-west of Vejle). Finally in Vejle, people in the youth hostel neighbourhood must be living for their gardens--yet, they have to turn to Alanya's for dinner (which I did, anyway).

Day 3: Vejle - Flensburg (112/135.7 km @ 5:52)
After sharing room with a snoring but very nice Danish guy from Copenhagen working on an archeological project in Vejle, I followed road no. 170 south against the wind towards the German border, only stopping for food in Haderslev and other necessities along the way. The stress resulted in a very painful right hip, and I had to abandon Schleswig as destination and stop in Flensburg where I saw a physioteraphist--and all she came up with was some light massage and the usual advice of going easy. The Germans themselves went crazy, as they won their game in the World Soccer Championship that afternoon, and I had pasta in a nice and quiet Italian restaurant while Jake (an American student wrapping up his studies in Stockholm by bicycling to visit friends in Hamburg) arrived to share room with me and Miyazaki (a Japanese guy travelling Europe with a particular interest in thatched roof houses) at the youth hostel. Nice meeting you, guys!

Day 4: Flensburg - Neumünster (99/112,8 km @ 5:27)
I tried to follow the advice of going easy on Wednesday, and stopped for an early lunch in Schleswig. But after meeting a language professor in French I was so cheered up that I failed to feel the pain and rolled straight through Rendsburg all the way to Neumünster, only cursing about paved roads and a silly misnavigation placing me nicely in the centre of a field. Neumünster youth hostel was governed by a strange but nice lady and filled with kids crazy about soccer, but offered the most awesome room! In addition, I found the nicest, calmest, and best serviced dining place (at not so cheap but still a fair price) in Bistro Blechknapf located in the refurbished and reused paper mill factory Dienstleistungszentrum Papierfabrik just two blocks away! Neumünster is not a nice city, but certainly has its share of qualities.

Day 5: Neumünster - Soltau (137/144 km @ 6:33)
Thursday started with my brand new Fujifilm Finepix V10 going into "pink mode", and my minimalist pack now comprised a piece of high-tec waste--amazing! In an attempt to turn waste back into high-tec digital camera, I stopped by two camera shops in Hamburg. But Fuji has no "camera replaced, no questions asked"-service, magic remains a mystery, and I had to continue with pink mode on. Consequently, as I am not crazy about pink, there are no more pictures from the trip... Sorry about that. Lunch in Hamburg meant sleeping somewhere else, and the day ended at a hotel in the quiet city of Soltau.

Day 6: Soltau - Elze (120/125 km @ 5:27)
After one night in drab Soltau, Celle followed as a marvellous place and I almost regretted that I didn't go the extra 47 kilometres (on the map) the day before. Instead, I had lunch in wonderful Celle before rolling to and through Hannover. I stopped reasonably early in a place called Elze some 31 mapometres further south. Elze featured a hotel by the train station and that was it. So I ate dinner, slept and had breakfast there. Nice hosts, though.

Day 7: Elze - Bad Hersfeld (175/192 km @ 8:16)
After a few days in flat terrain, things got bumpy south of Hannover and all of a sudden I found myself climbing uphill and speeding downhill on my way towards Göttingen, where I planned to stop by a bicycle workshop and find out why my bike was squeaking. A guy directed me to Radsport, where it took three minus two seconds to conclude that my crank was about to blow. Being exceptionally kind, the workshop guy--whose name I should have known but don't--called around town, the next town (Kassel) and even Frankfurt to find a spare bottom bracket for my FSA crank, but without success. Neither did any of the open shops in Göttingen have a spare Shimano 105 crank that I could change to, so I had to continue with the squeaky one--after lunch of course, this time at Nudelhaus. I continued head first towards Bad Hersfeld along a "scenic" route, meaning a nice drive by car and a heavy ride on bike. Yes, it was nice... And so was it to finally find a place to stay in Bad Hersfeld, where a music festival was attracting visitors en masse, filling up the hotels... Dinner became a repetition of Elze: schnitzels.

Day 8: Bad Hersfeld - Frankfurt (135/183 km @ 8:13)
Sunday is excursion day, and this Sunday the local bicycle club arranged a tour in the area around Fulda. For a period I felt like a participant, but got rid of the competition when I continued beyond Fulda. Instead, I got into serious navigational trouble and wasted time, energy and my spare inner tube before I found the right track towards Frankfurt. Cursing around on gravel roads and doing some major detours in the heat almost made me loose my mind, but serious refuelling with an awesome piece of cake in Neuhof saved the day, and I even got a bed in a youth hostel in the busy soccer-city of Frankfurt. Meeting real skyscrapers for the first time was not the grand experience I thought it would be, but nevertheless an experience.

Day 9: Frankfurt - Heidelberg (90/99.9 km @ 4:10)
Waking up to a working Frankfurt on Monday, I got my bike to a (work)shop and had the crank replaced with a Shimano 105. But it wasn't exactly done in a flash, and as my room-mate at the hostel told me that Heidelberg was a very nice city, I dropped the plan of going to Speyer and stopped for sleep in Heidelberg instead. A clever move, as Heidelberg turned out to be very nice (and Speyer very ugly...)--particularly the old city of Heidelberg, where I had my last German dinner.

Day 10: Heidelberg - Strasbourg (140/150.9 km @ 5:59)
Except from being one day early, everything was going as planned when I left Heidelberg Tuesday morning. I even found the way to and through Speyer when the sky became dark and it began raining. There was also a piece of action, as two cars bumped into each other at the petrol station I was at when the rain began. I left the involved parties arguing uninterrupted by me, and rolled on in rain-protective clothes only to take it off a few minutes later when the rain stopped. Focused on getting to Strasbourg I totally forgot to stop for the normal lunch break, and only stopped by the occasional bakery for energy refill. Being eager, I reached Lauterbourg in France earlier than expected, and recalculated my arrival in Strasbourg. Which I failed tremendously at, and therefore had to send two SMSes to Kristina postponing my "new" arrival one hour each. I finally arrived in Strasbourg just before 5 p.m.

I don't know where I'll go bicycling next time, but did I hear someone mention Strasbourg-Brest...?

Ready to return to Strasbourg

2006-06-15T22:09:00.000+02:00

Besides participating in the sailing regatta named Færderseilasen last weekend, I have spent the last days preparing for this summer's trip to Strasbourg. It turned out that Olympus couldn't repair my digital camera in time (they had to send it off to Portugal!), and I ended up buying a Finepix V10 from Fujifilm. It's not the best camera money can buy, but I get a cool camera (I ordered the orange version of course) and in the end that's what really matters, isn't it? I might not need its video game feature, but who knows what skills I'll develop during ten days of bicycling...

I have also finished mapping the route from Fredrikshavn to Strasbourg, and it totals at 1246 kilometres--given that I don't look for places to sleep or eat or do things like occasional sightseeing, relaxing and other boring stuff.

In addition, I have planned how to pack the things I have to bring, like a set of clothes and some foodish stuff (energy drink powder, to be specific). And maybe a spare tube, a lock and maps. I will send other necessities for my stay in Strasbourg by parcel--hoping that the postal service is able to get ten kilos from Oslo to Strasbourg faster than I can go there by bike.

Tuesday, Karl helped me adjusting the saddle, which resulted in a very back-set position. So today I stopped by Sykkeldelisk where I bought the bike last year and got some additional assistance from "the pros". They calculated the seatpost a bit higher, and the saddle a bit forward again. I guess I'll have to adjust the seat on my way south.

Adding to the circus of preparations, I even got my hair cut today. Some of you might ask why the heck I did that here and not in Strasbourg. The answer is that I don't know, but my hair was growing long and I felt like cutting it. Besides, I paid it with a gift-card that was lying around.

Before I close this post: Today is Stefanie's birthday. She is a very nice girl who lives in Strasbourg. Happy birthday, Steff! See you soon!

First time vertical

2006-06-05T23:54:00.000+02:00

Today I tried rock climbing for the first time since our sporty gymnastics teather in high school took my class to Hauktjern. Today's event took place at the Skådalen crag with my flatmates from Strasbourg: Espen, Jan Walter and Lars. Cool!

Eventful sailing

2006-06-04T23:31:00.000+02:00

As has become increasingly usual this year, neither this weekend did I manage to sit still but sailed in a two-day regatta called Aker Brygge Cup in Oslo. After two refreshing days in nice weather, my achievements span from fine-tuning in the top of the mast to a refreshing bath in the Oslo fjord as I was pushed over board by the boom while sailing on spinnaker (I assume the water to be approximately fifteen degrees centigrade). Crew achievements span from being the first boat rounding the tack buoy, to being the boat finishing last. And wind conditions varied accordingly from strong and stable on Saturday to gentle and rotating on Sunday. Overall the regatta built lots of experience.

While I was sailing, my friend Eirik visiting from Harstad spent the days enjoying live music and shopping in Oslo, while we spent the evenings out together. I really appreciate him having the chance to spend some time with me, and hope that I wasn't to brutal a host leaving him onshore. Thanks for being patient, Eirik!

Photostop

2006-06-01T12:03:00.000+02:00

I've sent my digital camera to Olympus for repair, with the hope of it getting fixed before I leave for Strasbourg in a couple of weeks. But I fear it might not be ready in time, 'cause when I called Olympus today, my camera hadn't arrived yet. Which is strange, because I mailed it on Monday and snail mail usually only takes a day or two. Maybe I have to go to Strasbourg without the "good old" Olympus this time. That would be kind of sad. Unless I get me a new camera, he he...

My ribbon "de bonheur" fell off

2006-05-27T10:31:00.000+02:00

This morning, my lime green brasilian ribbon of luck, or "bonheur" as it said when the text was still readable, had loosened from my wrist and stayed in bed as I got up. According to Wikipedia, this means that I am gonna get the last two of three wishes fulfilled, as the last two knots that held it in place loosened sometime last night. But the wiki doesn't say anything about when those wishes will come true, and neither does seanesse in her blog post. The only problem is that I don't remember what I wished for back in September 2005 when Pascal tied it on...

Lots of action

2006-05-25T23:14:00.000+02:00

The new blues brothers!

It's been quite a while since I posted here. And to Flickr. So I'll try to put things straight now. First, I've uploaded some pictures from Beitostølen. Then, me and my brother visited a cat exhibition with Hercules in Spydeberg. He (Hercules the cat) didn't win this time, but is nevertheless still my favourite cat. Finally, the Norwegian national day passed by with a splash on Wednesday May 17, but still the streets were filled with nicely dressed people. If any of my friends abroad ever decide to visit Oslo, the childrens parade on May 17 is definitely worth seeing!

Apart from these photographed events (my digital camera is starting to fail seriously and I might have to buy a new camera), poor(ing) weather has dominated the last couple of weeks and seriously reduced my bicycle training before the trip to Strasbourg. So today I made an effort to exercise for real, and met up for an introductory trip with Frøy bicycling association. The result was almost 90 kms on the seat, and two stiff legs. But it feels right, and now I have to continue putting kilometres on my wheels; I'll start this weekend with a two-day trip to our cottage near Fredrikstad, some 90 kilometres each way.

The Sounds in my head

2006-05-03T08:23:00.000+02:00

Kind of annoying, yet at the same time very nice, Tony the Beat by The Sounds has been playing in my head since I got out of bed this morning.

The reason may be that I was at Beitostølen this weekend, taking my snowboard and cross-country skiis for a final trip. What this has to do with The Sounds? Well, before going, I created an audio CD with both their albums for playing in the car (Beitostølen is a three to four hour drive from Oslo). In addition, yesterday was a looong day at work and when I finally got home and discovered that I had to clean the stairway in the building where I live, I HAD to play some noisy music to set (or blow?) my mind straight.

That's probably how Tony the Beat got into my head, and doesn't seem to wanna leave anytime soon. Which is perfectly fine with me! :-)

Bloody tax assessment

2006-04-27T23:23:00.000+02:00

Thanks to the internet, I just delivered my annual tax assessment for 2005--in time before the deadline on Sunday. But working my way through all the forms and fields and guides and everything, trying to figure out what to do with the additional form I had to fill out because I rented out my apartment while I was in Strasbourg last year, took a teeny-wheeny bit more time than I imagined... Tired as h..., I now have to pack for the trip to Beitostølen this weekend, and I should also prepare a meeting at work tomorrow. I guess I'll have to prepare for that meeting tomorrow morning. And get some sleep now.

I am sailing...

2006-04-27T14:10:00.000+02:00

Or at least I was last evening when I had my initial meeting with the crew I will be sailing with this season. The boat has the somewhat self-ironic name Jalla Jalla (NOR 158), and is an 11:MOD (11:Metre One Design)--the same kind of boat I have been race-sailing with in Accenture four seasons from 2001 to 2004.

Although Strasbourg is a nice city to live in, it has no coast or lake for sailing. Back home in Oslo, it is good to be back on the water!

Impressive by Telenor

2006-04-20T08:35:00.000+02:00

Having missed the initial door delivery of a new wireless router (to replace the old one which had stopped working), I stopped by the post office and picked it up yesterday. For some reason it didn't work, and I called customer support at Telenor. The problem wasn't solved and the issue was forwarded to second line support for investigation today--my job was to make sure the new router was connected before going to work. On the tram for work this morning, my phone started vibrating, and I got an SMS saying that my internet connection is now fixed! If the line now works, I'll do something I never thought I would ever do: commend Telenor for excellent service!

On the road again

2006-04-19T23:40:00.000+02:00

After a long winter covered by a tarpaulin in the basement, I decided to take my Cannondale R700 performance road bike for a breath of fresh air in the sunshine today. The small excursion opening the bicycling season was 37 kilometres long and lasted an hour and a half (effective bicycling). It took me to Sandvika, Bekkestua and Ullevål where I stopped by the hospital to visit my grandmother--she was sent there yesterday and are to return home tomorrow.

Earlier, on my way home from work, I stopped by a bicycle shop and was briefly introduced to a Gary Fisher Big Sur hardtail mountain bike (2005 version--Gary Fisher don't make Big Sur anymore) at a discount (now selling at NOK 9000). Tempting...

Holiday in the Norwegian alps at Sunnmøre

2006-04-17T17:08:00.000+02:00

Climbing Saudehornet

Home from Easter holiday, I look back at a few amazing and eventful days at Sunnmøre, Norway, with steep mountains and excellent off-piste descends on snowboard! I also look back at the longest drive by car I have ever done, but that is a whole other story.

Although I have been snowboarding quite a few times this winter, I just debuted on snowboard in Engelberg before Easter one year ago, and had yet to try off-piste. Yet, in the alpine mountains of Sunnmøre, I was not only to try off-piste snowboarding, but also to climb the mountains by foot--on snowshoes that is. Consequently, I stressed around in Oslo a couple of weeks before Easter to buy some good snowshoes, and ended up with some pretty expensive ones. For safety I also bought me a helmet, but as everyone knows you never fall when secured. But the helmet did a good job as a nice wind-resistant cap.

We started off on Maundy Thursday, heading for Kolåstinden (The Kolås Pinnacle)--one of many spectacular peaks at Sunnmøre. However attractive, the weather forced us to turn at Stretet, a narrow passage just below the summit, and we had to start our descend from there. And what a descend! The snow was soft and nice, yet not too deep and loose--nice for me, as I am used to the firm slopes. By the time we hit softer snow I had learned to handle it and was floating freely down the mountain! What a feeling!

Facing a poor weather forecast for Good Friday, we looked around the corner and up towards Saudehornet. The peak was hidden in the clouds, but as the weather was changing rapidly and the mountain was close, we decided to give it a try and started off in nice sunshine. Bloody hot indeed, yet nice--as long as it lasted. On our ascend we experienced all kinds of weather, yet the clouds kept hanging around the summit. So we had to turn on the ridge. Strap on the snowboard that is, and float down another mountain side. Wonderful! But a bit short, so while the others continued down to the car, I replaced snowboard with snowshoes and walked back up for another ride. This time the weather got worse, and I turned around at the same place. Going down alone was not as fun as in a group with others, but apart from that I don't regret for a second going back up!

On Holy Saturday we decided to take an easy day and visited Ørsta ski resort in Bondalen--maybe the smallest ski resort I've been to this winter, but far from boring. Although it only had two lifts--one bringing you just above the treeline and another streching another leg up the mountain side--it offered a really nice off-piste slope, and the wonderful moments of floating recurred to me yet again!

The weather forecast Saturday evening gave hope of a nice Easter Sunday, and we started making plans for a trip to Skårasalen, optionally Eidskyrkja. However, when Sunday came the weather stayed gray and boring, and we decided to do something completely different: We packed our bags, cleaned the house, got in the car and drove off to Ålesund where we visited the Atlantic Aquarium. Recommended! From there, we drove off towards Oslo through wonderful Romsdalen, before following the long line of cars returning from Easter Holiday and arriving in Oslo just before 1 a.m.

Unless something even more exiting comes up, I'll return to Sunnmøre next year if someone invites me!

It's Easter!

2006-04-11T23:53:00.000+02:00

So, the time has come, my bags are packed and I am ready to go. Almost. I just have to stop by a couple of shops tomorrow morning--need to get an avalanche pole, and hope that Jan's avalanche transceiver comes in my mailbox before I leave. Because I am taking Wednesday off (and Thursday before Easter is public holiday in Norway), and fill up my mom's car (she has already gone on holiday to Peru) with people, snowboard and equipment for climbing the alpine mountains of Sunnmøre on the west coast of Norway. Espen, my ex-roommate from Strasbourg, is from a small place called Ørsta and has invited Lars (also one of my Strasbourg roommates), Satu (Finnish girl who also was in Strasbourg), me and a couple of others to this amazing place for skiing/snowboarding the steep mountains!

Now I only need to get some sleep and get ready for the eight hour drive...

Trip to Trysil

2006-04-03T22:33:00.000+02:00

Ragnhild sliding by

Yesterday (which was the old name of this blog, btw) I went to Trysil with my sister and Ole Kristian for snowboarding. After looking out the window and evaluating different weather reports for about twenty minutes, we finally got the wheels running at eight in the morning. Three hours later, we were sliding down the soft slopes. The weather never became brilliant, but low contrast did worse than the light snowfall. Going back in the afternoon took another two hours and a half, and both me and Ragnhild dozed off... Luckily for us, Ole Kristian did not.

Swimming to Sicily?

2006-03-31T13:35:00.000+02:00

The "Swim to Sicily" campaign closed today, and with this mornings entry of another thousand metres I totalled at 31,000 metres. With 10,000 metres sufficient to be included in the drawing, it now remains to see if I will be the lucky winner.

Flying around

2006-03-28T20:56:00.000+02:00

Landscape reflection

After a weekend on the snowboard in Hemsedal (Norway), I spent the last two weekends in Strasbourg (France) and Alta (Norway). To begin with the end, visiting northern Norway was amazing! Although the weather started off poorly on Thursday, it improved day by day and ended in brilliant sunshine on Sunday! But the weather didn't stop us from taking trips on the two snow scooters we had, and I got to experience real white-out (when you see nothing but white wherever you look), as well as taking a bath in the sauna and chilling out in the snow. I also experienced a different kind of picnic. In France (and some other places as well), you bring a baguette, a bottle of wine and maybe some salad, put out a blanket and sit down in the park. Up north, you bring some meat, a kettle and some grained coffe, and put up an open fire on the snow, on which you heat the meat and prepare the coffee. However different, both variants of a picnic are nice ways of spending time with your friends.

In Strasbourg, I didn't go on a picnic. And now you may call me a liar, 'cause actually, I did. But the thing is, I had a major hangover on Sunday, and although I had a great time lunching in the fountain next to Palais de Rohan, eating was kind of difficult... Yes, there was a party the night before. Actually, it was the reverse of the house-warming party I went to when I was in Strasbourg in December, combined with a couple of birthday celebrations. Backtracking even further, we spent Saturday hiking in the Vosges mountains. And Friday night was spent celebrating St. Patrick's Day with Canadian girl Trishia and her partner.

For a change, I'll be spending the next week-end at home. Except from a one-day trip to Trysil for snowboarding on Sunday...

On the board again, and again, and again...

2006-03-05T20:29:00.000+01:00

Here I come!

Since I tried snowboarding for my very first time in Engelberg last year and gave it another in Trysil and then in Tryvann here in Norway this winter, I ended up bying my own snowboard two weeks ago. Since then, I have been taking it for a ride all three weekends (two Sundays and this last Saturday). And except from a few hard falls on a very icy slope in Norefjell the previous weekend, the snowboard is the most joyful investment I have done so far this year (there are plans for a new off-road bicycle...). It also puts me in a somewhat strange position: while others wish for the snow to melt away and spring to begin, I enjoy the snow and the cold weather that keeps it nice and dry. Next weekend I am off to Hemsedal!

To break up the pattern outlined above I visited a cat show with my sister's cat Hercules on display for his very first time today. He won lock, stock and barrel!

Cats in the cottage

2006-01-29T22:18:00.000+01:00

Hercules, the cat

This weekend I returned to the mountains. But opposed to the Trysil trip two weeks ago with fifteen people mostly heading for the downhill slopes and after-ski, this weekend took place near the mountain Spåtind (english: bode mountain) and was reserved for cross-country skiing with my sister and her fiancé. And their three cats... The cats stayed inside while we were out skiing, but got to experience the snow from time to time. Hercules had his first encounter with snow, reluctant at first, but soon comfortable with this new element. To me it was the other way around; Saturday was great, but Sunday was so windy it became difficult to do proper cross-country skiiing. Anyway, getting out of the dusty city and into the fresh mountain air was excellent!

Introducing the new Oslo metro

2006-01-26T21:50:00.000+01:00

The new Oslo metro train

Yesterday, Oslo Sporveier put two new metro trains into traffic. Not yet in production, the two trains are now in a two month "public pilot" test period before full-scale production commence. And this morning, while Dag Ragnar was in town for an overnight visit and we were heading for a swim at Domus Athletica, I had my first ride with one of the two bright, clean and yet-to-be-tagged trains. First impressions: The white exteriour doesn't only make the train stand out from the old red ones, but also enlightens the underground stations! Then, having to actively push a button to open the door was unusual, but worked ok. Inside, the train is amasingly quiet, and opposed to the old trains you don't have to scream to hear yourself talking. Quite the contrary--as everybody else were quiet, it felt like we were screaming when talking in a normal voice. The cars are spacious, but the seating arrangments come a bit surprising to me. I guess I'll make use of the opportunity to give feedback...