I love hearing about others’ reactions to Norway, a place I once knew intimately from being born and bred there. Until I could take it no more and fled. And this post (as well as some of the preceding posts on the blog) describes so well why I no longer live there. I have a sort of love-dislike (can’t say hate — no, hate is wrong) relationship with my country of birth but can’t adequately explain either without becoming boringly long-winded and detailed. So I shall leave the topic for now.
Thomas and I are very much in the process of combining two households into one. Because we have had two rather large flats for the past three years, one each, this is proving a challenge. I have managed to chuck out a lot of stuff, especially clothes, but am suffering anxiety attacks at the thought of getting rid of shoes and any of my Danish belongings. Don’t ask. It’s an early childhood thing. Thomas is having palpitations over trying to change his very male flat into a more female, less garage like, environment. Simultaneously, we are attempting to change the tip of a boys’ room into a bedroom that happens to also be the room of a teenage boy. I am not sure this task is not beyond what is humanly possible.
Weather wise — we’re having the kind of winter that suits me to a T. NO SNOW. However, I could live without the rain. Thank you. In the meantime I read about Norwegians relishing the huge amounts of snow they have in areas while chastising long-distance lorry drivers for arriving at the border without proper tires for the conditions. Who can blame them — they live in hope, good people! Like me. I rarely have the right tires either.
Speaking of tires, it is time to take the dogs out before they drive me nuts.
Speaking of nuts: I think Orion is slightly nuts. He’s gone from being this difficult, skinny dog who would eat sometimes and sometimes not, then have diarrhoea for three days then eat again and then… Then he had this bloat thing in September last year, and since then he has started eating like a horse. Huge amounts almost continously. He is still very slim as he is so active and because of his breed — unable to gain fat — but he is far more solid and healthy than back then and I am no longer afraid that he might be blown away in a light breeze. And we don’t get ugly looks from bypassers who think we mistreat him. Instead the bouncy, healthy dog is admired and people refuse to believe he is nearly 12 years old. He also rarely has runny poop any more, which is a great relief to all. For a while the gas attacks he regularly subjected us to also abated, though last night they were back with a vengeance keeping me awake most of the night and yes, that is entirely my own fault as I could have made him sleep in the living room instead of next to the bed but he is so cute! when he looks up at me with that sleepy, deer-like face and how can a person with a heart chase such a cute dog out of the bedroom? Which reminds me that I should really air out the bedroom.
Now, where was I? Yes, Norway. Among the headlines in Aftenposten online today are that two have died in a helicopter accident. And that people should try to avoid driving over the mountains for snow-reasons. Want to know what the helicopter was out doing? Collecting reindeer. What did the Sami do before they had helicopters?
Sorry. Have waffled enough. I think it’s time to watch something brainless on TV to find out if there is a world outside Norway (and Austria) where the news are free of the word “snow”. Perhaps there will be a tsunami or two instead somewhere.
