Archive for October, 2005

famous last words

October 27th, 2005

Here's a piece of advice. If you're going somewhere, never let me plan the journey for you. Do you see a pattern of hellish travels with me? I hate myself for this bad planning, thoroughly. If you ever wondered why I never chose Ryanair before, this is why. I didn't actually know where the airport is, thought it was about 40 minutes from Oslo. Turns out it's 2 hours (!!!!) by bus from Oslo, 2.5h from the other airport. I had a bit of a panic attack when it dawned on me a few hours ago. I got about 3h in between flights and I just read on ryanair.com that they close the gate at 40 minutes before the flight. So I got no chance at making it there on time. To think I was under the impression I had time to spare. 2 fucking hours, I can't believe it. So the only chance is to get to Oslo earlier. Luckily (!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!), at 11.45pm, although all customer phone services are unavailable, the airline where I booked my flight to Oslo has an option to change your flight (godsend). Otherwise I would be there tomorrow at the airport an hour in advance, trying to do it at their window. So I spent €100 on changing the flight to an earlier one (twice the price of the original flight). In practice this means I take off at 7:30, get to Oslo by 8:35, grab a train to Sandefjord (or a train to Oslo, then bus to Torp) at 9:08, get there at 11:31, then a bus from Sandefjord to Torp, should be there before noon. Flight is at 13:15. This also means I have to be in town around 6:30 to catch the airport express, so I'm walking out at 5:45 (no bus that early). Which is why I decided to stay up (feels like exam night) instead (because I don't fully trust my alarm clock) and I'm typing this now.

my king

October 26th, 2005

King Harald (Harold, I suppose) of Norway, remarked at some fancy dinner party with the presence of Camilla Parker Bowles (whoa there's one name you didn't expect to feature in this blog): "Let's not forget English football. Hundreds of thousands of Norwegians, myself included actually *loud chuckle in the room*, have followed the English teams since Norway started broadcasting Match of the day in 1969" (there's the source of our cancer btw).

FFS man, at least pretend to be cultured. Tell them you read Oscar Wilde voraciously in your teens, that your father taught you to recite Shakespeare when you were 10. I suppose at this point all that is left to say is props for not breaking into "You'll never walk alone".:wallbang:

air travel comfort

October 23rd, 2005

Flying out last Sunday, as I was sitting on the plane, with about 10cm of space between my knees and the seat infront of me, I got to thinking about how the level of comfort has taken a turn from the early beginnings of air travel. It used to be expensive, priviliged transportation, for the hot shots who could afford it. Since the cost of the flight already was so high, they could throw in some "complimentary" food and drinks, which would only raise the price by a few percent. Sitting in a noisy aircraft with dips in pressure and occasional turbulence was never classified as comfortable. But the airlines went out of their way to improve the things they could do something about. The big chairs which fall back are now even found on ferries, adopted apparently because they are so comfortable. And for a good period of time, people did travel on those planes, the priviliged ones at least.

But then came the people's revolution. We are getting better at running our airlines, operational costs are down, meanwhile the demand for travel is booming. Why not sell this to more people? And so the prices dropped, budget airlines joined the race and now there are more airlines than political scandals in a year. So it has become cheap, but at what cost? Airlines still have drinks, but they're trying to retail them now. Air travel has gone for being reasonably comfortable to sitting on a bus. Seats used to be wider, there was more leg space, more space in the overhead etc. As a kid, we had this excercise in gym class where you would crouch down and touch your toes, then jump up so that your knees touch your chest. I was quite good at that and I imagine it will come in handy when I'm travelling with Ryanair next week and I expect to rest my knees on my chest.

interesting satirical piece

October 21st, 2005

http://football.guardian.co.uk/Columnists/Column/0,4284,1597508,00.html

Very nicely crafted, I haven't read anything this good in quite a while.

playing the backhand

October 16th, 2005

Have you ever noticed that whenever men hit women in movies, they always swing the backhand? *watching a James Bond movie* Why is that? Is that some kind of sexist demonstration of power? That "I'm restraining myself and yet I can still kick your ass"? Is that the equivalent for the head butt between guys? "I could refubnish your face with my hands but I'll show you how much damage I can do just with my skull"?

Idiotic macho games.