Madonna in Gothenburg

I am happy to hear Madonna is playing in Sweden this summer. On August 9 on Ullevi, Gothenburg. I would really love to go there, but I doubt I will find anyone of my friends who want to join me. :-(

If I am wrong, please let me know asap. Tickets will be released February 9.

Disturbing Silence

Yesterday night I had real difficulties to fall asleep, which is rather unusual. I could not really figure out why, because there was nothig really disturbing me. Then I realised exaclty that was the problem. It was too silent! It was completely silent, not one single sound.

Now you might say it is good that it is silent when you should sleep, but this is really too silent. When people say the enjoy silence they often refer to being somewhere in the wild, far away from civilization, but that is not entirely silent. There you might have birds, wind and water running, but this place is completely silent. That is really scary. It makes you wonder if you are already dead.

This is nothing new, it has always been that way, but after one week of the wonderful sound of the waves of the ocean, the wind and crickets zirping outside your bedroom I found this silence very hard to stand. I even prefer the distand buzz of city traffic. Can't wait to move away from here!!

Readings of the Hand

On Cape Verde I met this Senegalese man who said he could read your future from the palm of your hand. I am a natural sceptic and don’t believe much in these things, but still I let him have a short glimpse of my left hand and then he said that he saw things that he could only tell me in private. As I just saw this as a very cheap pick-up-trick, I did not care much about it. My friend however, believes much more in this kind of things and she kept reminding him about it and just before we left the island, we passed by his store and then he told me. He told me a lot of things that I won’t write about here, but one thing he said, that came to my mind again when I wrote the previous post, was that he told me to have more contact to my family. He told me to call my mother or my sisters every day. I answered laughing that my mother would probably get seriously worried if I started calling her every day, but considering what I learnt today, maybe I actually should call a little more often.

The No-Information War

It seems my mother and I are having some kind of information war, or rather a no-information war. Today when I called to let her know I am back from Cape Verde I learnt from my father that my mother is in Finland. I had no idea she was going there!! He also told me she is coming back on Tuesday as she is having an operation I never had heard of on Wednesday. He also told me about some other medical issues I did not know about.

Normally my mother and I do speak rather frequently, but I know that she has had some complaints about me not calling often enough. Normally when she thinks I haven’t called in a long time she calls me, but lately I have noticed that she doesn’t. I guess that is where the war started. “I won’t call you if you don’t call me!”

Maybe this is the revenge for me forgetting to tell her that I was going to Afghanistan in June and only remembered to call when I was already on my way to the airport. I know that was probably not so good and most mothers would probably have freaked out! This new year it happened again, albeit less dramatic. I forgot to tell her that I was going to Frankfurt and she only found out when she called on New Years Eve to wish me happy New Year. On the other hand; we are obviously quite alike and it is probably from her that I have this way, so what can she say!?

Back from Cape Verde

So, now I am back from Cape Verde. We got back early Friday morning and it already feels unreal to have been there and now being back in the cold, rain, snow and darkness of The Small Town...
It wasn't very hot on Cape Verde and very, very windy, but at least we got some sun, sea, light and warmth. It was a very nice trip and I will write more about it on the travel blog. Pictures will have to wait though, as we got robbed and my camera got stolen :-(. But my friend still had her camer and once she has sent me some pictures I will post some.

Unbelievable...

Can't believe I did it, but I was out jogging with two colleagues this morning. At six o clock, in three degrees, rain, darkness and hard wind. But it feels good afterwards...

Work Worries

After the two first weeks at the new job I am feeling more and more worried. This far I have had absolutely nothing to do and I have no idea what to to. Fortunately I will only work two more days before my holiday, if not I would have gone mad. Ok, if not I would probably make more of an effort to find something to do, but now I wait till after my holiday. What worries me more however, is that everything I learn about the new job gives me the feeling "this is not what I want to do!!" The new job does not interest me at all and I can not see what I could bring to it and how my knowing and experience could be valuable. That makes me really worried. The only reason for me ever to be here was that I had an interesting job, if not it will be absolutely unbearable. I need to get away from here!! Please!! I hope something good will happen soon!!

Coming Soon!!

Oh!!! I am sooo looking forward to my holiday next week!! Or actually, it is beginning already on Thursday. I am going to Cape Verde with a friend of mine and it will be soooo nice!!
I want some sun and beach and just relax properly. The weather outside my window right now is just terribly, wet, windy and cold ant it is still pretty dark, at 9.45 in the morning!! And work is boring and very unstimulating at the moment, so I just can't wait to get away!!

Don't know very much about Cape Verde though, so if anyone of you has been there, please feel free to share some tips and suggestions. I was getting in the mood yesterday by listening to Césaria Évora. Very nice!!

Small Town Pictures. Nice Ones

Earlier I promised to post some nice pictures from The Small Town as well, but then something happened that made me change my mind... but here they are. Some pictures from a sunny winter day. Idyllic, isn't it!?

My Christmas Tree

Just wanted to show that I did have some Christmas decoration after all!!

What's new?

So, new year and a new job. Well the new job doesn’t really feel very new yet. I sit in the same office and have some new colleagues, but I have been working with them before, albeit not so closely. I have a new boss and will have completely new work assignments but this far I have hardly met my boss and I really don’t know what I am expected to do. The biggest difference was our new network platform and new e-mail and of course it did not work very well the first day everyone was in office, will see how long it takes. It is quite challenging and energy consuming to reorganise this frequently, but that seems the standard story of public administration.

Apart from this, nothing much has happened. Hence the blog silence. Caught a nasty cold the day before Christmas and spent most of the holiday to recover from that. Managed to get to Frankfurt over New Year though, and that was really nice. I will post some nice Frankfurt photos soon, most probably on the Travel blog.

Something that might be new is my early morning jogging. It was easy to get up and go walking or jogging before breakfast during holiday, when I did not get up until 10 or 11. But can you imagine that this morning I got up at 6 and went out jogging!! But alright, once doesn’t make it a habit, does it?!