So I had to waste two days on taking the IELTS test in Oslo, which wasn't too bad because Oslo is a beautiful city (regret I didn't take the camera).

On the flight Friday morning I see this group of guys in suits, I thought they were business men. My flight was delayed (they were on it too) so I spotted them a little later playing cards in a café. Thought that was a little funny but fair enough. To pass the time I walked up and down the terminal and listened to the radio, I hate waiting. So as I walk by, two guys in suits are looking at a laptop screen (they put it down on a garbage can) and as I pass them I look at the screen. Almost burst out laughing when I saw it was Championship Manager. :D They looked like they belonged to that group in the café and I couldn't quite make it out... until it dawned on me that this was Malmø FF going home from playing Rosenborg in the "Royal League" the night before. Some of the suits had the club badge on it but I hadn't seen it up close to make it out. As I had just boarded the plane, one of their players passed me and I could swear I had seen that guy before. Finally after about half an hour it came to me, Daniel Andersson (ex-Bari).

Got in to Oslo at about 1pm, my oral exam wasn't until 3.30 so I had plenty of time. It was chilly but not cold, about 1C and I did a lot of walking in the city centre. Very quickly it all came to me, childhood memories, buildings I remember and how I used to love Oslo. I really miss it now, finally a city as opposed to this little town. So many buildings, some old, some modern, the city is dirty, it's charming, it's urban, it's alive, construction sites, malls, monuments, views, parks etc. Walked by the symphony and they had a big poster for a Schubert concert featuring Yo-Yo Ma. Definitely would have gone if I could. I have to move back sometime, it has so many of the things I love about Norway, it's the only place where Norway feels like it's part of Europe.

So then I get into the oral exam, the examiner is this older English gentleman (going by the accent) and I'm supposed to have my passport ready so that he can check it during the test (fine, whatever). So he starts asking me these basic questions, tell me something about your town, what do you like to do in the evenings blahblah. Then comes a section where I get a question and I have to talk for 2 minutes, 1 minute to prepare. I hate those cause I never can think of anything much to say. Then comes the question "Tell me about an incident that made you laugh? What was the situation, who was there? etc" The only thing I can think of is "the mimbo is hot" but I have to consider my audience here.. :mute: So I start thinking Seinfeld and finally I decide to do a paraphrasing of horses. I would do the actual act but that wouldn't exactly fit the question so I do this and try to make it work. The guy cracks up, he likes it. Unbeknownst to me, the next series of question just happen to be about comedy so I'm good from there. Whole thing lasted 20 minutes and that's all I did all day. :wallbang:

So I had time to kill and I went to see "Hitch". It was good, it was funny (finally a "comedy" that makes you laugh), better than I expected. Will Smith and Kevin James are both very recognizable and at their charming, funny best. :cool: And I don't have to tell you that Eva Mendes is gorgeous. I can't bear to go see a movie just cause it has pretty people in it, it's too boring. But if it's good *and* it has them, that's a nice bonus. :party:

Saturday morning I gotta get up at 6.30 to be at the "university" at 8. Of course I wake up at 5.30 so that's the second consecutive nights I sleep a whole 5 hours. I get up, take the train into the city. Oh how I miss the train. Elegant, quick, no hassle, no traffic, lovely. I used to ride that train to school everyday for 3 years, that very same ride. Sun is rising, it's a beautiful day. 7.30 I'm in the city but today was cold so not really in the mood for walking. But since I got time I had to burn those 30 minutes somehow so I took a stroll. 8am sharp I show up for the latter part of my test. Registration is supposed to start at 8 but everyone's just sitting around and no personell is there. 8.30 they do come and we get it underway. First off is the listening test. Wooo exciting, haven't done enough of these in junior high. :rolleyes: Then comes the reading test. Now I hate how they make these tests, I have never aced one because there's always some ambiguous bs somewhere. Worst of all are those "Which of these statements are true according to the text, answer true or false". Every f. time I get one of those, there are more that are true than the amount you need or some aren't even claimed in the text, stuff like that. So then comes a 20 minute break and we start the writing test. Two writing assignments. By now they are tripple checking our id's god knows what for (oral exam 1, registration 2, writing test 3). The final test lasts an hour and we're done at 12.30. All in all, 3 and a half hours of basically bs and I have to waste two days on this and pay 1800 bucks for the privilige. :wallbang:

My flight is at 4, I got plenty of time. Went over to MacD again to eat, lords knows I already paid enough for the flight, the test, the trains etc, I'm not eating fancy. Back to the mp3 player, listening to Oslo radio. I'm not making this up, bad music sounds better in Oslo. I hear these mediocre songs and I think they're quite alright. The music isn't some kind of escape from the world, I'm in a great place and I can tolerate the music if it's bad. Apart from that J.Lo. song, that could kill anybody. Now get this, I'm listening to this show that's on nationwide radio "Are og Odin" which I never liked before. It's two guys pretending to be village idiots somewhere in Trøndelag (the region that includes Trondheim), speaking in the godawful dialect and saying all kinds of dumb shit. I actually liked some of it. In Oslo I'm no longer there, I'm in the cool capital, I'm listening to it as a parody (which it is) and not as some form of regional patriotism. This new air of appreciation should also explain why I'm currently playing the Chemical brothers and liking it.

Oh and I ran into Jens Stoltenberg on the street. :) (Ex-prime minister and in all likelihood future prime minister.)

You've heard the term "everything in moderation". It's cracking good advice too. But it's not for everybody..

To start off in general terms, I have never been normal and I have never wanted to be normal. I'm only being me when I'm not normal. That doesn't mean I have to be different always, but certainly at times when I do feel that need, I won't let down and I don't feel good unless I get my way. This I've known for a long time but lately it's become apparent in more concrete means. I'm not a moderate. I need to exaggerate, to overdo it, to go "too far". And whenever I do, quite often there are people around to say "there's no need to exaggerate". Well not for *you* maybe, but I need to. Needless to say, they never get much headway. :D

Ok so I'm extreme, an extremist. When I played sports with friends, I was always the kid who wanted to play longer than anyone else. I'm still like that. I could have 1l+ of ice cream in one sitting, or 200g of chocolate. In a debate, I can go further than anyone else in applying logical rules to arguments and show that people's statements can be mercilessly twisted to mean completely different things than intended, just because I think there is a truth there worth exploring (people don't like this :D ). A few years ago, I heavily neglected school work to work hours a day on a website just because I wanted to. I've had some of the longest and most intense email exchanges, 2000 words per message everyday. I've done lots of instant messaging, I was in a chat that lasted 12 straight hours (I kid you not!), with just the one person. I've watched all of "Seinfeld" probably about 5 times (180 episodes), I can do lots of comedy from memory because I've heard it so many times.

Is that normal? Is that moderate? I can't do moderation, it's not for me..

Ripped off http://dreamazone2.blogspot.com/2005/03/test-of-time.html

X the ones you've done:

( ) snuck out of the house
( ) gotten lost in your city
( ) saw a shooting star
(X) been to any other countries besides the United States
( ) had a serious surgery
( ) gone out in public in your pajamas
( ) kissed a stranger
( ) hugged a stranger
(X) been in a fist fight
( ) been arrested
( ) done drugs
(X) had alcohol
(X) laughed and had milk/coke come out of your nose
(X) pushed all the buttons on an elevator
( ) made out in an elevator
( ) slept in an elevator
(X) swore at your parents
(X) kicked a guy where it hurts
(X) been in love
(X) been close to love
( ) been to a casino
( ) been skydiving
( ) broken a bone
( ) been high
( ) skinny-dipped
(X) skipped school
( ) flashed someone
( ) saw a therapist - no, but always wished I did :D
( ) done the splits
(X) played spin the bottle
( ) gotten stitches
( ) had an IV
( ) drank a whole gallon of milk in one hour
( ) bitten someone
( ) been to Niagara Falls
(X) gotten the chicken pox
(X) kissed a member of the opposite sex
( ) kissed a member of the same sex
( ) crashed into a friend's car
( ) been to Japan
(X) ridden in a taxi
( ) been dumped
( ) been fired
( ) had a crush on someone of the same sex
(X) had feelings for someone who didn't have them back - if I had a dime :D
( ) stole something from your job
(X) gone on a blind date
(X) lied to a friend
( ) had a crush on a teacher
( ) celebrated mardi-gras in new orleans
(X) been to Europe
( ) slept with a co-worker
( ) been married
( ) gotten divorced
( ) had children
( ) saw someone die
( ) been to Africa
(X) Driven over 400 miles in one day
( ) Been to Canada
( ) Been to Mexico
(X) Been on a plane
( ) Seen the Rocky Horror Picture Show
( ) Thrown up in a bar
( ) Purposely set a part of yourself on fire
( ) Eaten Sushi
( ) Been snowboarding
(X) Met someone in person from the internet
( ) Been moshing at a rock show
( ) Cut yourself on purpose
( ) Been to a moto cross show
( ) lost a child
(X) gone to college
( ) graduated college
( ) done hard drugs
( ) tried killing yourself
(X) taken painkillers
(X) love someone or miss someone right now

I saw the HBO special "The Beginning" and unfortunately it wasn't very good. The material isn't bad but she doesn't perform well. Sometimes she will be so brief about it as to suggest that this stuff is so good, I'll just say it and you'll laugh at that, I don't need a performance. Another problem is being too gentle, if she would push the envelope on some of her ideas, it could be much better.

I'm sure you've seen that commercial a bunch of times. It doesn't even matter what product it's for because you don't notice the product anyway. It's all about the atmosphere.

Let me describe it for you. A person wakes up one morning, in most cases it's an attractive woman, you see a shot of the bed, the clean and slightly curled up bed sheets, the bed has a head board, above it there's a small shelf or a picture or something like that. On both sides of the bed there are night stands with small lamps above them. The carpet is white or at least a very light color, that's what dominates the scene, plenty of white. The walls are white and quite plain but the room looks elegant, like you see in one of those home decorating magazines, the modern look. You can't see the window in the opening shot but there are scattered rays of sunlight protruding the bed and the room, not enough to blind the woman in bed and make the room too hot, just enough to create a nice effect of sunlight entering the room. The cherry on the cake is the soothing music being played over this sequence. The woman opens her eyes, stretches her arms and begins to exit the bed. She goes into the bathroom and takes a shower, the product is usually soap, shampoo, deodorant, perfume, something like that. But the whole point of the scene is to create a decidedly peaceful atmosphere in the room just as morning sets in, not a care in the world, perfect harmony. The woman wakes up perfectly rested, eager to start a new day. It's like a piece of paradise.

I would like to have *one* morning like that. I never get that, even if I buy the soap. ;) My morning looks like that Wella Shockwaves commercial, with the gorilla dragging the guy - who's asleep - through the room by his hair, doing everything to mess up his hair. I also never feel fully rested when I wake up, it happened to me once in years. It doesn't matter if I sleep early or late, if I go to bed early or late, what time of year it is, what the weather is, what the temperature in the room is, it just doesn't happen. Everyday I wake up I feel like I could use a couple more hours of sleep.

If you figure out a way to have that morning from those commercials, let me know.