I'm surrounded by Christmas cheer and I think I need to spend some time with the Grinch just to get my perspective back.
I like the family time and the food and the candles, and stuff. I like that for one day. But after one day I feel an inner teen aged rebel rumbling within me.
But here in a sleep deprived state on the eve of a new year I feel all set to start the new year off right and sleep it all off on January first.
My mom's brother and his wife have been kind enough to take me in over the holidays, and we've had a nice time together. It's been great to get to know their 4 sons better. If you click on the link and study the pictures you will learn a little bit about them.
My uncle's an interesting guy; he's a retired seaman, full of stories from way back. Here's one:

Einar Gjelsvik was a bus driver in Volda back in the 1930's. His bus route went around the fjord east of Volda. That road is still narrow and windy, (I just drove that route last week.) The weather during our story made for slippery roads that day. There are steep precipicies and at a certain precarious point the old massive shoulder stones were absent. This is where Einar lost control of the bus and by the time he finally got it stopped the right front tire was hanging off the cliff. Our intrepid, yet fearful bus driver saw the danger of the bus falling off and down the cliff into the fjord. He grabbed an axe he had there handy. Swinging the axe he forced all the passengers back to very backety back back back of the bus and shouted to the them that if they didn't stay back there he'd go after them with the axe. When it was clear that they all understood him, he said one man could come forward and get off the bus to find some men and ropes and a truck to pull the bus back onto the road. This plan worked, the bus and all the passengers made it safely home.

skateboarding in Norway

I had a skateboard once, my brother and I got matching yellow "banana boards", I managed to learn to scoot along on mine sort of, but he was shorter and lower to the ground, so maybe that's what made him braver, anyhow, he could skate.
Then in the end of the '70's we lived in Norway for a couple of years; he took his skateboard to downtown Volda and showed some wannabe's a few tricks. That gave the small town "lensmann" (sheriff) something to do, and he got onto Sven's case and we learned that skateboarding was indeed a crime.
The kids in the photo here are some I snapped in Trondheim before Christmas, I asked them how long ago skateboarding became decriminalized here, one of then said 11 years, the other one said 30 years.
Either way I'm sure they're too young to remember the "olden days"

proof that vampires exist

So you're sitting on the couch with 3 other people, someone aims a camera at the 4 of you...what should you do?
a)cover your face with your hands
b)just sit there with a vacant look on your face
c)scoot in nearer to the group being photographed

The laptop with the digital photo gets passed around the room. You are:
a)smiling and photogenically portrayed in a cool picture with 3 nice people
b)your eyes are closed, otherwise you're looking good.
c)totally missing from the picture.

Your reaction is:
a)you admire a great picture of your good friends
b)you stare transfixed and keep a smile like grimace pasted you your face
c)conclude that it's proof that vampires are invisible on photographs and go into blogger mode.

I miss my virtual life

When I was prekindergarten I had an imaginary friend named John. He was fairly "real" and we did stuff together and had a few conversations. I knew he wasn't really "there" because I'd get self conscious if anybody asked about him.
So then I grew up and a friend led me down bloggers' boulevard. It's kind of all imaginary too, but it's kind of like finding my friend John again at a yellow light on bloggers' boulevard. I almost have time to make out the features of his face and I'm trying to listen to what he's telling me, but the traffic is still moving.
I'm in the middle of real life now, it's across the fjord from google earth Brilliant thoughts make epileptic tidal waves through my brain, but I'm intent on making it through these rounds without landing with a cold or the flu, so they just roil in the gray matter without making a splash on the web. (otherwise I could stay up all night writing.) Maybe after Christmas I'll have it figured out and ready to post.

Snow driving...

I haven't driven in snow since 1980 probably; so why start now? Because in Stryn, where we were last night there was over 1 meter of snowfall and towering mounds of show piled up on spare street corners. We left Stryn for Bergen this morning and I'm happy to say that we made it safe and sound, and the car is still in good shape with four fine fenders. One stretch of road is very narrow, only wide enough for one car. There are turnouts intermittently where you stop and wait if you meet a car. Today I saw a sign there that I've never noticed before, It says "Olden - Innvik
Norway's worst road"
I was in a little car wreck on that stretch in the late 80's, so I thought about that today as we carefully skidded across the snowy washboard textured surface, to our left was the unyeilding stone mountainside, to our immediate right the frigid, grey fjord. Then we met a car, and I had to stop and back up to the nearest wide spot.. got stuck and couldn't get out of there The nice man stopped and got out to push, and Inger J got out and pushed, and a truckdriver stopped and got out to help push, push from behind...no good, push from the front, no good...it's starting to snow...a car caught up behind us and couldn't get past, then a big bus came and had to wait...oh dear, then the nice truckdriver man got great big snow chains out and laid them out front of our right front tire, then they pushed, and we're on our way! We drove very carefully from there, up over the Utvik mountain pass, and ever so carefully back down, because of those nasty slippery hairpin curves - hitting the brakes to slow down can have unpredictable consequenses when the road is as slippery as an old soap dish...finally after Førde we had clear roads, now all I have to watch out for is those speed cameras...

the six days of facebook

On the first day of Facebook my network gave to me: forty-one new-found o-old friends.
On the second day of Facebook my network gave to me: two rude refusals a-and forty-two new-found old friends.
On the third day of Facebook my network gave to me: three inbox messages, two rude refusals a-and forty-three new-found o-old friends.
On the fourth day of Facebook my network gave to me: four mystery seeds, three inbox messages, two rude refusals a-nd forty five new-found o-old friends.
On the fifth day of Facebook my network gave to me: five on line friends! Fou-r mystery seeds, three inbox messages, two-o rude refusals a-and forty-seven new-found o-old friends.
And on the sixth day of Facebook the fates hand out to me...no-broadband-basement!
No more online friends, no mystery seeds, inbox is all dead, two rude refusals, but still all my new-found o-old friends!

My brother and the King of Norway

This was also in San Bruno; my mother found out that King Olav was flying in to San Fransisco. This was before the days of terrorism as we know it today, so we could go in to the gate area and actually meet the plane. The Mayor of San Fransisco (Mr. Alioto?) was there along with a gaggle of officials to present the king with the keys of the city. We were also there, dressed in our Norwegian national costumes. My brother was sitting on our dad's shoulders and he was waving the Norwegian flag, so of course it was quite natural for the king to bypass all the black suited officials and come right over to us to shake our hands! My dad says he made one mistake that he's regretted ever since: he should have introduced the Olav to the San Fransisco mayor!