And it was. Only one double lecture at university, on a topic that actually was rather interesting, as I knew it would be, since it was the "right" person talking. He looks so boring, but he is not. Or maybe it is only because of the topic that it does not feel boring. Anyway. The world is going to pieces if we continue the way we do, according the prophecies there should an energy crisis any second now, and oil prices have only gone one way since 2001: up, up, up. Up and away. And the winners? Norwegians and for some reason I did not understand, the Chinese. Come to think about it, that is actually a rather large part of the world's population. Who are winners. Unless we do not find a new Saudi-Arabia every fourth year, alternative energy sources must be found quickly. But there is a lot in the Earth, though, not just oil, and gas. When olivine production replaced what dolomite had previously been used for, CO2 emission was halved. If we could only have a discovery like that every fourth year. But, yes.

The the weekly porridge with people, and Fride finally showed up with glasses. They suited her. No matter what she says. And then some absolutely impossible physics and math, which was a total waste of time, but it was Friday, it was alright. Then I went off to see Camilla. I had no idea if she had asked me to meet her so early because she had other plans for the evening or what. But she had not. Her boyfriend was sleeping when I came, so we sat in the living room of their new apartment talking in hushed voices. I am always, always positively surprised by how a nice person she is. More than that. I will not say how much we have in common, because it is not that. She is sort of, relaxing, makes me relax, maybe because I have know her for so long, (even though we lost contact), I do not feel like I have to constantly think about how I am all the time. Difficult to describe. After some hours, her boyfriend woke up, and agreed to drive us into town. But first up to my room so I could put down my math books. This nation has a slippery surface, I was glad I was not the one driving, (not only because I do not have a driving license). I bought a really nice green shirt, and realized that I am completely out of fashion when it comes to trousers. They are supposed to be narrow-legged now. So they cannot fit over your boots. Dinner at Italian restaurant, and came home at about ten after staring at a car wreck. Of all the possible things you can drive into, I think fotoboks (I do not really think anyone who might read will not understand Norwegian, but just in case: the device standing by the roadside that will automatically take your picture if you drive past it too fast,) is one of the more ingenious.

After Camilla's boyfriend had driven me home, (it takes about five minutes to walk from their place,) I just sat down on my bed, eyes sore, and generally tired, and realized that now was the first time that day I thought about Greger. No, I meant what I wrote in the first paragraph. I felt good about it. Then went to sleep after watching two episodes of The Hitch-hiker's Guide to the Galaxy.

Woke up today, and finished washing clothes and going to the store before noon. After that, however, I have done basically nothing. Soon I must be getting ready for bus far, far away, the whole way out to Mari's place, and say hello to her cat. Who is adorable. But so is Mari. That girl is lovely strange. She is coming to Oslo during Easter. Which reminds me that, help, I have no clothes to wear. Somehow that lovely strange girl managed to talk me into buying tickets for the Inferno Metal Festival. Only one day ticket, but I still fear I will feel extremely out of place. So I need some clothes that will not make me feel a bit less out of place. Amazing what clothes can do. And how they can make you feel, when you discover that you need one smaller size than you thought. Bras are funny that way.

I have ordered plane tickets home for Easter. I will have a long Easter vacation, Friday through second Tuesday, but decided I owe my parents that much as I have decided not to go home for my dad's birthday next weekend. Too much stress for too little time. Is Freia factory outlet open for normal people? Can we go when I come home? Fride, Mari and I went to Nidar not too long ago. Bad/Good idea. I am now the proud owner of four kilograms of chocolate. I cannot say I do not love it. But I wonder it was such a very smart idea. I am strong, It will last forever. And they have started selling Easter candy at the store already. I talked to Siri about it the other day. Reactions fitted perfectly. She mentioned the best candy, and after a while we realized we were talking about the exact same candy eggs but neither of us had actually specified which we meant by "the best Easter candy". Oh, yes. Candy... She also told me that women on hormones and drinking the same amount has two bottles of wine a week are the most endangered to get cancer. That should be a warning to all those who take contraceptive pills. But then, two bottles of wine is quite a lot per week. I would not worry.

There is a new lunar eclipse, says my horoscope, at the end of the month. I see two possibilities: up or down. I vote for up.

I have currently moved the laptop upstairs, and am listening to my dad commenting the Prime Minister's New Year's speech. It makes me very happy on several points: that I am not Prime Minister, that my dad is not Prime Minister, that I am soon going back to Trondheim, and that Norway is not a larger country that it is. Of course, I did not even hear half of the speech, partly because I was not listening, partly because my dad was constantly commenting (on TV, it is showed with subtitles). Oh yes, and then I had a huge quarrel with the DVD player / HDD recorder. I won, at least almost. It is currently copying Hawaii, Oslo from the hard disc to a DVD. In a deadly slow rate. But the main thing, it is copying, so I can free some space and avoid having dad delete my recorded movies while I am in Trondheim. I am indeed surprised he has not done so already. After all, he used to record crime series over my recorded VHS movies all the time.

Christmas is over already, a New Year has started, and I have done very little of what I had planned to do, done something I had not expected I would find time for, and in general let my mind go on vacation. As far as possible, that is. I have been forced to keep more of it than I had hoped, but something good has come of it as well. Something I had not expected, hoped for, yes, but not really dared to believe. It has inspired a New Year's resolution, but I do not think it will actually come to anything. If you really want to change something about yourself, you can do it any time of year. So it is not a resolution in that respect, just a thing that needs changing. To be very dramatic, my immediate happiness depends on it. And besides, it is not a bad thing, if I manage it. Haha, (for once,) I did not mean to make you curious. So no more about that. Short about Christmas:

Came home with the night train from Trondheim, which meant that sleeping hours had already been messed up. Worse than jet lag. And saying goodbye to someone I would not see until we come back was also a bit sad, and a bit of a relief. Then seeing people again was absolutely great, and I wish I could have spent more time with them before actual Christmas, as the holiday itself was so full of family dinners for my friends when I had nothing to do and the other way around. But at least I got to see Yme, my mother's cousin's dog, twice, and she is so adorable. I miss Athene. But back to Yme. Walking her is always fun, and at her place, (yes, of course, the whole farm belongs to the dog,) it was white. As in snow. Something I have not seen too much of since I came home. Real snow. Covering the ground. I loved it. Worse walking here, around home, as it was slippery. We were both worse than Bambii in the ice. But no legs broken, dog tired, and wanting comfort. All the clothes I wore that evening are still covered in white dog hairs. And some grey. She is old, I dare not remove them, what if I never see her again? Why cannot animals become older than people? Huh? Selfish, little me.

Seeing family is alright, but I felt this year more than ever, that it is a bit boring. I do not feel like one of the adults, still not, but I can no longer be treated like a child, either. So adult it is, which brings along many boring conversations, and I know I of all people should care about the oil price, but I just do not know enough about to be able to discuss it. That is basically how I feel about everything. New Year's resolution: start paying attention to the news. Especially the interesting news. Like this. Grow up. Become more interesting. And a few other things. It is stuff I should have done ages ago. And then I forgot what I was going to write next. I watched Cold Mountain, did not watch The City of Lost Children as I could not bring myself to do it. Ate a lot of meat, which I have not done in months. Therefore, I was very glad when Vilde made a very good pie for New Year’s Eve, which was spent at her place with good friends. Had a nice time. Am currently looking forward to the new year, and most of what it hopefully will bring. Tone is picking me up on Friday, she is going to drive Siri and me all the way to Trondeim! (But, of course, that is because she lives there as well.) Tomorrow, I think I am going into Oslo (again, I wonder if… Never mind.) with Vilde and Anne at least and possibly other people as well.(?) And hopefully I finally will see how they live. That will be fun. And, I am tired already, so I think I will go to bed soon. Time to get the sleeping hours right before university starts next Monday.

I have this tickling sensation in my stomach now, possibly because of too much sugar, all this talk about going back to Trondheim, and other matters. I like it.

wolfoflonliness

Comment on this post and I'll give you a band/artist. Don't worry, I'll make it one you know and love. You put your ten favorite songs by that band on your LJ and in reply to the comment, then challenge others to do the same. So here we go: Nightwish.

01. Sleeping Sun

02. Deep Silent Complete

03. The Carpenter

04. Slaying the Dreamer

05. While Your Lips Are Still Red

06. Swanheart

07. Wish I Had An Angel

08. Elvenpath

09. Two For Tragedy

10. Feel For You

The weather. Yesterday, I think it was, Tuesday, it was snowing like, like... it was snowing. A lot, mind! It actually covered the ground in a beautiful white carpet, and it was really nice and I was waiting for the bus and getting wet, but not minding, and thinking of my winter clothes now safely in my wardrobe, ( I cannot believe I managed to fing room for them all, ) when I realized that I was ten minutes late for the bus. Only, this is Trondheim at it was around five in the evening, which means I came just in time. So far so good, but honestly, I had not even found a place to sit in the bus yet. I guess I could have stumbled. I had met Ida at Gløshaugen, which was really weird because I have never seen her there before, I only meet her on the bus to, and sometimes from, university. Together, we had figuered out why it is so cold where we live: SiT has installed this weird temperature regulator that turns itself off after three hours no matter what, which makes it ice cold in the mornings and when you come back in the evenings. The reason there does not exist some fancy apparatus that can make this temperature regulator turn itself on, like, two hours before waking hours is because Electronics and Product and design positively cannot stand each other and therefore cannot co-operate. Too bad.

It was not snowing so much by the time the bus had left campus and was nearing the first roundabout. Then we turn, then we turn a bit more, and then the bus is going in the wrong direction. People start panicking pretty fast and I cannot blame them, if they have never experienced anything like that before. I remember the first time I sat on a bus here in Trondheim and wondering whether something was the right turn or not. "My" bus route is a bit stupid, as it drives first up a small road and then back again the same way before continuing into to town. The only problem is that, sometimes, a) it was an express bus and should not have driven up that small road, or b) it should have taken the detour but the driver forgot. Alternative c) is that the bus drives up that little road on the way from town instead. So if you live there, you can never know when the bus is coming, or whether it is actually coming or not. The first time I sat on a bus that forgot the small road the driver just said he was sorry and then continued. The second time, however, he turned in the first roundabout and drove back up again, like the bus was not already more than enough behind schedule.

And driver not seeing people waiting for the bus, forget to stop even when the stop sign is on, or just not opening the doors after actually stopping ( on a few occasions, closing them again has been a problem as well, ) happen on a daily basis. And Greger wonders why I am afraid of buses! Is it not obvious? ( I have made him see my point, though, and he quite agrees. I wonder why I am not afraid of flying. ) So yes, bus life in Trondheim is never boring.

But yes, the bus had just made the wrong turn and was now driving up towards Dragvoll, the campus most science/technology shun, the first roundabout ahead lay about five minutes drive or more up the hills and I just realized that the Dutch guy I am sharing kitchen with also sat on the bus. The driver had by now been informed of his error, and was looking for a place to turn. There were no better places than in the middle of the road. It was quite interesting seeing the bus drive in a small side street, and then reversing the bus back out among the passing cars again. Of course, we had to wait a few minutes before the bus could reverse, and then finally two other buses, ( one from each direction, and both were supposed to drive that route, ) stopped so that the bus I sat on could slowly manouvre out and turn its head down towards the roundabout again. At last. People started breathing again, and those that had fled the bus on the first occasion were picked up on the next bus stop. Everuthing when fine the next four hundred meters or so.

It really is not a very long drive, but as we were always there, almost at the end stop, people were very much on the alert, now being reassured that they were in fact on the right bus, when the bus started swinging right where it should continue straight ahead. There was a loud scream of "NOO!" and the bus made a lurch, a sharp turn to the left, and we were back on track. I have seldom been more glad of getting off a bus. And by that time, it had stopped snowing altogether. But it was still white and light. That has to count for something.

Today, or, this evening, Siri and I went to Samfundet to look at Kunstakademiet's art exhibition. I saw a horse for the first time since I moved out. It was wonderful. Greger is going home this weekend, well, not home, but to Oslo, same thing. The point is, I will not see him Friday, Saturday and maybe not Sunday either. I think not Sunday, if he is taking the night train, and that will be almost strange. That is three days, and yes, I may be overreacting a bit. Only a bit. Or not at all. And I hope I will see him tomorrow. If not. Train is not leaving before eleven in the evening, after all. Then two weeks, and then I am going home. Then exams, and then Christmas. Looking forward to Christmas, I think. See people again, for real. If they want to see me, that is. I have to admit, the Little Green Book and Greger do wonders for the ego, and I am worrying it might grow a little too big. Hit me if that is the case. I got a B on the geology test, by the way. One of 17 people who got a B. Nobody got an A. And there were 143 people in all who took the test. And I have looked it up: after Christmas, we are going to have an Ex.phil lecture every Monday morning at a quarter past eight. Maybe there will be as many people there as in math lectures.

The snow is gone now, if anyone was wondering.

Right, beginning. Chemistry course. Met a really sweet girl who is going to start a different engineering studies, but hopefully I will see her around nonetheless. Also, I have her phone number which could make it a lot easier keeping in touch. I am not going to go into detail about the course itself except for the freakingly scary student assistant who I think may be kind of cool after all. The thing is, he had all these cool t-shirts, the first was “Idiot” instead of “Idol”, then there was something about Gollum’s Preciousss, third day, cannot remember, then the t-shirt said “Folker-eaksjonen mot orde-ling-sfeil” and the last day was “42 % of all statistics is made up on the spot”. I loved that one, and I keep wondering if 42 was an arbitrary chosen number. But the man himself (yes, I have to call him a man, because he was working on his doctorate,) was scary, so scary we did everything we could to avoid letting him help us. His explanations were on a completely different level, naturally, and he had really problems with lowering himself down to ours. The problem is, after three o’clock, if you asked for help, you would never get rid off the bored student assistants again. Like him. It was twenty past three and another girl and I just got stuck with him talking. Now I mean, really talking, and not about chemistry, but about everything from the Lord of the Rings to when he started university. I am almost surprised we did not get his whole life story, everything delivered in that same monotone voice which made me think of our history teacher at IB. Come to think about it, they really had a lot of things in common. Hmm.

My friends’ list in Trondheim was at the time counting four people and university had not even really started. And before Tone arrived. Had dinner with her and her mother, but unfortunately I did not dare see her flat as it could start raining any second and I was biking. So I have to see how she lives really soon now, (do you hear that?) Then the fadderweeks started, partying or something else happening every single day and night. The first night at Studentersamfundet for instance, was really great. I think I solved the problem of getting back to my flat in the middle of the night to Wendesday pretty well, actually. After the second night at there, I woke up with the worst hangover I have ever had. It truly was one of those days where you promise yourself you will never drink again. At least I managed to keep that promise throughout the evening. But yes, I said to myself that I would go home early, it was Friday and it had been late all days of the week. At half past three, a girl from my student village and I were still chatting when a guard kindly asked us to leave as they were closing now. Sitting so still must have caused the extreme hangover. Now I have her phone number, been stealing half of her clothes and all of her CDs and I am steadily moving through her movies as well. But she is great. And it is official. I am coming home the first weekend in December Maybe once before as well, but definitely then. Nightwish is playing at Sentrum Scene, and that girl and I are so going. No matter it might be in the middle of the exam period, but I have to manage that somehow. I can read on the train. Or plane. Depending on what kind of means of transportation I can afford.

I cannot mention everything, I realized, to have to skip the least essential. This week I even found time to wash my clothes. I am quite impressed actually, and I realized that Camilla, who I went to primary school with, is a really great and kind and loving person and I have no clue as to why I lost contact with her, big mistake. Or maybe we just both have grown. So, I invited her over to wash clothes, hum. The worst part is, we completely forgot it, so she had to come back two days later. Then we managed and I have now enough to wear again. The first day, we went to the food store and other boring stuff which turned out to be not so boring after all, and just talked and talked, and we drove in her boyfriend’s car to where she lives and they have a really huge freezer and a very nice place with short way to school. Which reminds me that I must start looking for an apartment I can buy. But we also met some guys from her high school and one of them I have gone to class with as well. And I suspect the guy living in the apartment just below me is someone from junior high, but he does not recognize me, at all. Therefore, I am not completely sure. But it must be him. And yes, he shares kitchen and bath room with none less than a very good friend of Athene’s owner. That is a bit weird. It seems like half the world has just moved up here. Well, Trondheim is Norway’s third largest city, with the second largest university, but is by far the country’s largest student city. As much as one out of five of the inhabitants of Trondheim is a student. The city is very empty during summer vacation.

Pub crawl was embarrassing, especially since I was not drunk enough. Moving on. Bowling is fun, and I re-learnt the name of a guy I talked with the first day. Very glad of that, as he was the only one I could find at Pirbadet the next day; me without glasses and contacts am unable to recognize faces. Well, there was this other girl from IB in Wales who found me first but I lost her again. She is also very nice. I think almost all people are very nice. Pirbadet is Norway’s largest indoors swimming … well, not pool, rather pools with bubble baths and a couple of slides and stuff. They even had a climbing wall, straight up from the water. And a salt water pool, it was really cool. And normally very expensive, but they were running a campaign for students at the time.

Saturday came again, and I was originally going to the student village where there are party basements for all the different study lines, but first I skipped the vorspiel and the then that party. I had a lot more fun stealing my new friend’s clothes. The skirt was a little too short for my liking, but for once I did not jump about. We started drinking in her apartment, and then went to “the House” at the student village, where they have a bar and play music, much better than the basements. Then I met some other girls I know living there, they were going to Samfundet and I was going to leave with them except I never got that far. I ended up chatting with a really strange guy, uhm, man, with two pony tails! That night really demonstrated how much clothes mean, because I talked to that kind of people that would never have talked to me if I had worn my own clothes. That pony tail man included. When I went up to my apartment again, it was really great, it was just in a door and up some stairs! So short way, not waiting for a night bus that is not coming or anything. I really must go there again, my friend is going to be bartender next week, must see her. She will be partly in control of the music, which is great. Within Temptations, Tristania, Leaves‘ Eyes, Nightwish, Sonata Arctica, she likes Tori Amos as well and this crazy woman playing the violin, Emilie Autumn, and quite a few others I have heard of and some I not heard of.

There are differences between Asker and Trondheim, saying something else would be lying. Most noticable is it that people drive, bike and walk worse than pigs. People can cross the street at any time, without warning, bikers cannot bike on the pavement because it is so crappy made, and drivers, well, they drive. I find the new interpretation of traffic lights quite interesting. It is valig for young drivers as well as bus drivers. Green means "go", orange means "hurry up!", and red means "you're too late". Not to mention that the green men for walking people crossing the street is extremely short. It is like if I bike over the road, I might make it before the green man starts blinking, and when you walk, you just make it before it turns red again. I have been thinking about old ladies that cannot walk so fast... But the bus drivers are not that bad, they often wait if they see someone running to catch up, and if you ask, they will most likely answer your question in great detail. Some of them are even capable of announcing the next bus stop. I need to get myself a bus pass, I have spent insanely much money on it this motnh. Like I have spent too much money on everything basically, but I will manage. I think. At least for the time being. Books are expensive.

So I jusy came home from three days in Trondheim today, so yes, I got in at NTNU, and am moving very soon. Like, really going to live there now. At Monday, I saw the tiny room where I am going to live. I mean tiny. There is absolutely no way I will be able to get half of my clothes in there and what about all the rest of my stuff? And the two people I am going to share kitchen and bathroom with are still two strangers I have not seen. What if they are messy and unable to do their chores, as the look of the kitchen suggested. I am scared now. What if they do not like me, what if I do not like them? And I will be homesick for God knows how long, at the moment I do not know whether to laugh or cry. Cry, I think, is this what I want? Should I have chosen oceonography in Oslo instead? None of the girls I met on Tuesday where like me in the way I want someone to be like me. Of the two people I felt most alike, one is not going to start at NTNU and the other one is going to study programming, besides, I did not get to talk to her that much and I could be very wrong. Not that the others were not nice, they were, but discussing make-up and things like that I am almost incapable of. There was only one I did not really get too well along with, and she was one of the two people I shared a room with these past ngihts. She had her twin sister there as well, and that might have been part of the problem; they never let each other out of sight and since they knew each other it was a bit difficult to get to know her. I might be mistaken, maybe she'll become my best friend.

The other I share a room with was really sweet, although a bit too "make-upy" and very girlish in that way. We took the same plane home to Gardermoen, but she was going back to the western coast with another plane after that. And there was another girl from Asker there, well, actually there were two but I only met one of them and one of my mom's former pupils. And I have not seen Athene in quite a while, I really want to see her before I leave, and I must say good-bye to the horses, and I will miss them all. Chilla most of all, but she is dead anyway, so I would miss her no matter where I live. I suddenly realized that I might even miss my parents, although I have longed to get away for some months now.

What should I pack, how much, the only thing I know is that I desperately need as many stuffed animals as I can manage. And money, I need to transfer a lot of money, and when shall I have time for that. How do they manage? I mean, I am hardly the only one who have gone through this. Julie, for instance, Anne-Linn, Vilde when she went to Africa, Marie even though that was "only" moving in to Oslo, and I cannot mention them all. And here I am, worrying over something I should only be excited about. It will all happen Thursday or Friday after next week, in the beginning of August that is, then I will move once and for all (at least I will not come back for a few months, maybe not even before Christmas). And off to our cabin tomorrow. I wish I had more time.

A moth into a butterfly and a lie into the sweetest truth
I'm so afraid of life
I try to call your name but I'm silenced by the fear of dying in your heart once again

I see the seasons changing
And in the heart of this autumn I fall
With the leaves from the trees

I play dead
To hide my heart
Until the world gone dark fades away

I cry like God cries the rain and I'm just one step away from the end of today

I see the reasons changing
And in the warmth of the past I crawl
Scorched by the shame

I play dead
To hide my heart
Until the world gone dark fades away

I stay dead
Until you veil my scars and say goodbye to fate
Before it's too late

riddled

cosmic_bambii

Oh, and by the way, Norwegian youths are not as bad as I first thought. I was indexing avtalegiros today, a paper allowing the bank to wihdraw a certain amount each month for someone else, for instance if you tend to forget paying rent, the bank can remember that for you. Or if you regularly give money to an organization for charity. And people do that. First, I came across a man or boy if you will, two years younger than me who had just signed an avtalegiro to give NOK 400 to Médicins Sans Frontières monthly! That is like, imagine having a tight budget while studying and then suddenly that on top! I admire the kid, though, it is a very nice thing to do, of course, no offense. But I am still surprised that he could afford it, or wanted to spend rather a bit large amount on Médicins Sans Frontières when he could spend it on clothes, or computer games or drinking, anything. Noble man. There was also a girl who signed for giving money to World Wildlife Foundations, I think I love her, and actually quite a few others my age giving money to charity. Wow. At least they managed to make me feel bad about myself. I got enough money to get around, but I am not just giving it away monthly even to a good cause... Maybe when I have set a budget for living alone, maybe I could do something then… It would be WWF, that is about the only thing I know yet.

And while I am at it, I want to add a little riddle for you to solve: which number is this? Zero to nine. That is the sort of thing we have to cope with at work, when we are going to type in the personal number for the customer. If this was a person working for Nordea or the customer her/himself is unknown, just, some people need to learn to write!

Now for the train home. I guess it will be most interesting for those with a slight knowledge of local geography from Kongsberg to Oslo. There were a group of young girls, they could be as much as fourteen years old perhaps, somewhere between that and eleven. And they had obviously not much experience with trains. They were waiting for a friend to come on Lysaker, but they completely messed up. Talking with their friend on the phone, one of the girls was telling her to get on the train now, hurry, hurry, they were sitting by the window, she would see them. Then the train left Skøyen (exactly) without the friend anywhere in sight. But she had done as she was told: got on the train. Panic spread among the girls as they slowly realized their friend was on a different one. Oh yes. Oh my God, how could this have happened, would they ever see her again. The one that took charge called the other friend again, telling her to get off at Sandvika, there our train would catch up, she would be waving from the door. Only, as I had realized somewhere between Stabekk and Høvik, the train the friend was on was the train to Skien, and that does not stop in Sandvika. The friend had found out as much; not that it was going to Skien, but that the next stop was Asker. Her friend on my train could not believe her, she must be mistaken, it was ridiculous until the train person man actually told her that not all trains stop in Sandvika. More panic. The friend was told to get off at the next stop whatever it was, just get off as soon as possible. Come to think about it, that was a pretty crappy advice. What if the station had turned out to be the size of Skollenborg, or the like? Tiny, tiny little thing. The friend could be stuck there for hours without seeing a train. Luckily for the girls, though, next stop was Asker. Not a very large station to get lost in, but obviously big enough for them. And when Asker was mentioned one of the girls exclaimed: “Asker! Men det er jo langt ut’ i gokk! (mild translation: “But that is so far away!”) I was staring wide-eyed at them now. Asker is not that far, I thought, I guess these people have never been outside Oslo on their own before. Only then I overheard; they were going to Mjøndalen!

[Pause for dramatic effect]

So Asker is far away, is it? The girl in lead showed some surprisingly bossy skills, along with an impressing knowledge of geography around Sandvika and ignorance. She was not at all surprised that the train did not stop at the small stations between Lysaker and Sandvika or that it actually stopped at Billingstad (oh yes, it did, pretty,) but was quite alarmed when we passed Slependen without stopping. Her brother lived there, after all! I feel sorry for the train personnel man. They never understood where they were, every half minute they would shout for him to ask what the next stop was, even though we had not stopped at all since last time they asked. By Sandvika, the friend had already got off at Asker. But she could not find her way. I honestly started to believe if she could read. I mean, there are plenty of boards and information screens around Asker train station. But their friend was too stupid to read them. So she kept looking around and by Billingstad she had realized she was waiting on the wrong platform. Oh, no, disaster, she would never find the right one in time! Like Asker is so very big and she still had almost five minutes to walk down, read on the screen what platform the train would be leaving from and walk up again. I guess it could take three minutes, top. But the girl on the phone would stick her out the door and shout when they came to Asker, other friend must not worry. Alright, Asker is not that small again. I was almost sorry I had to get off and was therefore unable to witness their reunion. And I still wonder; did they actually manage to get off at Mjøndalen train station? I would have liked to see their faces when they did.

And then, save off at Billingstad, this random man holds open the door for me and tell me to go through first. Huh

Something strange also happened to the writing comments part. Now it is not the classical Live Journal theme, but rather like the entries' page and friends' page look. It looks different, and I am not sure I want it this way. Does anybody know how to change it back..? But more about the user pics. Are they not cute? I discovered the page I got them from randomly, but even though it is childish, really, really, really childish, and like everything else, it gets boring after a time, I think we can say that I am hooked. It is rather obsessive, because once you get started, you cannot just leave the place. It is rather pathetic, you can laugh all you want, but they are so cute. Alright, perhaps I should start at the beginning. I desperately do want a pet, preferably a cat, I have been wanting that for a very long time now, but my parents think pets are just nuissance you have to take care of, we are going away too much and things like that. So I suddenly discovered this Internet site, with lots of imaginary animals that you could "adopt" and had to feed, and play with, you can earn money to buy them food, or they will starve, and things like that. Buy toys, build them a house. Childish things. Butin lack of a real pet, I got my own virual one. And once I got it, of course I had to keep it! Not just run away from it and let her starve, oh no. After a while, I adopted another one, who had been left at the pound by a previous owner who had just given her away. Too sad. Now I just cannot leave them! I know it is childish and weird, but I am not sure I care. If anyone should be interested, here is link:

What I have done today, not much. I packed out my suitcase yesterday, called my boss at AVIS to get a paper, finally put all my IB papers in folders (only took me a year or so). I had four folders, my goal was two, and I succeeded at last. Now I should clean my rooms and the bathroom and the hallway downstairs. But I think I will read a bit instead. Started The Wheel of Time - A Crown of Swords last weekend. Yay! I think maybe Lan is going to make a comeback soon, at least he made an appearance in the last part of the sixth book. I probably should talk to Dmitrij the_dimitrix soon as well so we can order tickets for the Kamelot concert. Speaking of which, anyone else want to come..? They play in Oslo on May 19. It is a Saturday. And we must get tickets for the premiere of Pirates of the Caribbean - At World's End! Norrington is back in his wig, by the way. Sad, yes. Must get good tickets, and I wonder when the cinema starts selling them. Since Anne spastic_banana and Vilde cosmic_bambii are in South Africa, getting thrown out of bars, we cannot rely on them gathering people. What is leftof us, has to get tickets ourselves. By the way, who are going to the premiere? And the Interrail this summer, there is suddenly a lot to plan and even more to look forward to. I think this is going to be a great summer, if I get a job today or not. My fingers are almost aching, but first of all I should clean my room. Which I naturally do not want to, so if I know me, I will end up reading, spending more time in front of the computer or listen to music. Wholeheartedly. Ah.

When working at a rental station, the smaller station, the more often this seems to happen, some people find their own favorite among the rental cars, and avoid renting it, if it is at all possible. The smaller station, the easier that is. For instance, when the guy working Budget Sandefjord Airport almost lost his favorite car that one time he actually did rent it to someone. A maximum of bad luck, and it probably scared him enough to not rent out that car for a while. What happened was the the customer called and said tha he wanted to rent the car a little longer. Alright, people do that, and if he was far away, it would not be that easy to drop by the office. But what should make the alarm bell ring was that he wanted to make the rental into a monthly one. Now, that can be dangerious, the woman with all the fines had the car on tha kind of leasing, almost, and so has her "heir". In general, that is the kind of rental that demands to credit cards and check to see if the customer is worthy to be trusted with a car, if he or she can pay for damages and so on. Many rental sales agents skip this point. That is very silly of them. So, also this time. The time came for the car to be returned, but the customer remained absent. One day late, it happens. After two days, the rental sales agent called the customer and only got voice mail as an answer. After calling again and again and again, he finally spoke to the customer's girlfriend, who promised to tell her boyfriend to call back. Nothing happened. The Budget man started driving past the customer's house to and from work, but he could not see the car. After a week, he said that if the car was not returned before four o'clock that afternoon, it would be reported to the police. The car did not show up. It was reported to the police.

The car is back now, I do not know exactly how, but the main thing is that, empty of fuel and with a few scratches, but without any parking fines, it has now been returned to its rightful owner. That is what you can call a happy ending. My problem is that I hear about the missing car, the stolen whatever-you-can-steel-from-a-rental-car, but rarely the solution, if there is any. Like the e-mail everubody in AVIS received from the station at Oslo Airport; asking if anybody would be driving that street home, and if so, could that person kind of look around and see if he or she saw the missing car; not pick it up or anything, just see if it was there. Customers reporting the rental cars stolen, smashing them to pieces and claim they are innocent, I do not know. Those who think it is boring to work with car rental, are wrong. All these stories about mad or insane customers. No, boring is definitely the wrong word. And to quote a man during lunch, about his thoughts when he first started working for AVIS; "We're going to rent out cars. To customers. I mean, how hard can it be?" He had no idea.

Then I overheard one the women here talking on the phone with a rather angry man who back been denied a car because he had been blacklisted. Now he wanted to know why. It turned out that he had used a rental car as pirate taxi and been caught red-handed by the police who had again told AVIS. When he finally understood that it was illegal, he became furious. How could he know you are not allowed to be a pirate taxi driver? Yeah, wow, he was smart. I cannot help but think about the poor car and all that extra milage it must have resulted in. I am turning into a woman at the Damage Department soon; "Don't bulk my car!" She talks about them almost like they were her babies or pets or something; real ownership. But that is just good, at least she will not let anyone get away with something they should pay for.

Normally, I do not like parking companies, and customers complain about fines all the time. Especially the private ones, because the rent-a-car companies do not pay these, only give the information about the customer to the parking company and then they themselves have to get the money from the customer; they do not like that, at all. But I do have to admit, they can actually be helpful sometimes. When a car is lost for instance. The station at Oslo Airport could not find a car; the customer had said he left it in the parking house (which is the WRONG place to leave a rental car, by the way), but it just turned out to be impossible to find. After about a week, EuroPark called the station and informed them that they had seen a car parked in the short-term parking lot, it had been standing there for quite a while, so they had looked up the owner, which turned out to be AVIS. And there it was, the car they had been looking for a whole week. Standing there for so long, it costs a lot of money of course, I think the customer received a debit of at least NOK 1500 for only the parking, but still. That is what can happen when you are incapable of reading signs. Stupid people. And these private parking companies often find cars that are reported missing. Today, also. The customer had called and prolonged the rental several times, and the station was getting more and more worried; would he return the car at all? CenterPark could report the car as having been illegally parking in the same spot the last ten days, they had in fact been keeping an eye on the car, thinking it might be stolen, so tomorrow someone from the rental station will grab the spare keys and just go and pick up the car. After all, we know where it is, thanks to CenterPark.

What, uhm, inspired me to write this was something I overheard just a few days ago. The police had called. They had stopped an AVIS car on the border with Sweden (Norwegian licence plate). It was full of marijuana and spirits. Not the worst of drugs, perhaps, but still. It is amazing what some people think they might get away with, and do with, a car which is not their own. They think no one can find them. Like the seventy-year-old woman who drove in 173 km/h past a fotoboks. I think she maybe lost her driving licence. The speed limit was 90 km/h, after all. - But smuggling drugs, wow. I am lost for words.

At work the Friday, I had come across an article on the internett about a movie called Jadesoturi, or Jade Warrior if you prefer the English title. The point is, there was not much English over it. This is Kalevala meeting Chinese mythology. Mainly a Finnish production, this movie has not and will not be shown in normal cinemas in Norway, but this movie and another one shown afew weeks ago, are a result of a collaboration between the Finnish-Norwegian Cultural Insitute, (yes, obviously there is such a thing,) and the Finnish Embassy. When I read about the movie, I just knew at once that this was something I wanted to see. Who would come with me?

The only one I draggged into Oslo two days later was Anne spastic_banana, but I think we had a good time, yes? The movie was to be shown at Frogner Kino, wherever that was (I thought), but it turned out that it was well within walking distance of the Oslo we know. But I had no idea if we had to be there very early to get tickets, would it be sold out, or would we be almost alone. I have always meant that "better safe than sorry", so we came early. So early, in fact, that the cinema had not opened yet, one and a half hour before the movie was supposed to start. Well, Anne did not shout at me for insisting on coming so early, (hugs for that), and we took a walk in Frognerparken. It really has been a long time since I was there last. We looked at the tourists, all the people just walking there, and the baby at the bottom of the Monolith and just talked. Then returned to the cinema about an hour before the movie was going to start. Already ten meters away, we could this other guy standing outside, so itobvously had not opened yet. As we could not be bother to go anywhere else,we just stood outside and waited. And waited. And finally, a man came and opened the doors. However, it turned out that he was only running the bar, so we still had to wait for the man who sold the tickets. The room was slowly starting to, if not get crowded, then filling up with Finnish adults. We believe they were Finnish because they did not speak any language I know, and Anne said it sounded like Sami. In other words, Finnish. Finnish sounds like Sami, and has absolutely nothing to do with the rest of Northern Europe. Like Icelandic, Norwegian, Swedish, Danish and even German are all related, Finnish and Sami come from a completely different tree. All who has gone to Norwegian school knows that Norwegian is an Indo-European language. Finnish, Sami and Hungarian comes from a tree called, uhm, Finnish-Ugrian, (alright, it is finsk-ugrisk i Norwegian and I have no idea what it is called in English). Anyway. About half an hour before the movie started, the man with the tickets finally arrived. Anne and me were the first to see him. He opened some doors to further in in the builidng, and we just had to find out for ourselves that we should follow. We were clever. The rest of the people in the room followed behind us.

This is the nice man mentioned in the introduction. Two tickets? He showed us a map of the seats and pointed and explained, and said that if we took those seats, we could take the couch there if we entered early enough. Did anyone say couch?

Of course we entered early enough; we entered at once. And the couch, the couch. This was not some small, hard, uncomfortable couch, this was soft amd nice and comfortable with backs that could be pushed bakcwads, and it was in the middle of the room as well! Nice man for telling us, and letting us know that we were allowed to sit in it.

The movie was beautiful. Chinese and Finnish mythology, Chinese fighting techniques and filming and a fan of iron. The main character was played by one Tommi Eronen, and I cannot say he looked bad with long, black, typical Chinese hair. Or the reddish-blonde he had as a Finn either, for that matter, Anne pointed out after the movie. Yes, we are shallow, but when people look like that we are allowed to be shallow, methinks. Back to the movie. It was beautiful, that too. I cannot, and partly do not want to, describe it too much. The main plot, very briefly, was about the blacksmith's son, both in Finland today and old China. Eronen had to talk Chinese, but the beautiful Chinese woman did not have to talk Finnish. The blacksmith's son was the same actor, fighting the same evil. There were so many small details that I very much would like to watch the movie a few/many more times. When walking home, I just realized something new about the story every five minutes or so. It was wonderful.

I was afraid Anne would not like the movie, I do not know why I was afraid of that. But my doubts were removed when she sent me an SMS a few days later, saying when Jadesoturi would be releasedon on DVD in Norway, all in caps lock. Looking that up was one of the first things I did when I came home. So yes, I am deifintely going to buy that movie. It was so much love. The main character was so good that it hurts. The colors, everything.