D is for Deutschland

All hail the cupcake fairy!! (That's me)
I baked roughly 60 cupcakes yesterday, and 3 different kinds to boot. I think they would have been more fluffy if I'd have used a mixer for the batter like the recipe stated, but. I don't have one! So they were a bit flat but most of them turned out pretty great. Anyway, people in the office where so happily surprised to receive homebaked goods that I hardly think it mattered how they tasted.

So. Back from Berlin!! I had a kick-ass time, and I can't believe I only took one day off. It seemed like I was there for a week, and in a good sense. I could try to narrate it but Mads has already done a stellar job in her blog here. With pics and all! In Swedish though, and scroll down a bit as she blogs frequently (yey!). It starts at post 'Deutsche Turisten'.

Some reflections post-visit:
#I miss mullets. Mullets rule!! One thing I miss about BCN, although the demographics of said mullet-wearers was wastly different there.

#Whoever set the standard for toilet-seat construction in Deutschland must have been the German version of Gillian McKeith (You Are What You Eat). I've managed to repress this particular horror at least twice, I shall venture to do so again.

#I wonder what the statistics are for dog-human incidents? No one uses a leash for their dog, it just trots along and a lot of the time it's impossible to tell who the owner is. Odd!!

#All flights, everywhere, should take 40 minutes. You take off, you close your eyes for 10 minutes and oye, stow your table trays for landing!! Also, no tax-free BS. Heaven.

On the one hand, I'm not sure after this visit that I'm dying to go live in Berlin (for one, the place is already swarming with Scandinavians). On the other hand, I fit in so well! People naturally assume I'm Deutsch before I've even opened my mouth. I love the German language! I also love Apfelschorle. On the other hand, I tried some beer and still can't stand it. Also, I can't eat currywurst.

No, I guess it's not meant to be. Still. Heaps of fun!!

The wheel is spinning but the hamster fell off (or is dead).

I'm very fond of these expressions, my favourites being the fairly common 'not the brightest bulb in the xmas tree' or 'not the sharpest tool in the shed'. My sister alerted my to the endless varieties possible. A list of a hundred is here

A fairly entertaining read (on a Friday afternoon) but only three really appealed to me. The post title, which is funny but a bit of a mouthful maybe? Also, hamsters are cute and talking about dead ones could be a downer for sensitive recipients.

This geeky one: "The hard drive is spinning but the OS hasn't been installed."
Would have to be doled out carefully to recipients who can appreciate it.

And finally, what I think is a real contender; catchy and with a universal subject that can be appreciated by all (at least, all in cultures which feature dairy products):
"The cheese slid off the cracker."

It has a difference tense though so I'll have to ponder when to use it. Hmm. I suddenly realize I now bear similarities to Mr Collins. The horror!!

T-minus 1hour until commensement of journey towards Berlin. I blame the itch to get going for this fairly pointless entry. I'm also entertaining the hope (as I always do, futilely) that since I flew from Kastrup last time they will have opened a restaurant/cafeteria/sandwich stand that offers a vegetarian option that does not feature mozzarella and pesto. A particularly memorable one also included a thick layer of butter. Is it just me who shivers in horror at the recollection of biting into a thick layer of butter? *brrr* and Yuck.

Toodles.

Können Sie mir bitte sagen wenn das Zug nach Hamburg geht?

Feeling good, if only the snot would dry up already I'd be more than fine!! I've already got a pre-holiday mood going which is kind of odd since I only have one day off on Monday. But I'm going to Berlin tomorrow and hang with M!! which makes the weekend infinitely more exciting than usual. My plane is at 7pm tomorrow so I'm doing a normal work day and I'm also landing on Tuesday morning and going straight to work. I go through the airport every day anyway, now I just get to go to departures instead of the metro!!

Also adding to my holiday mood - I booked another one yesterday! I'm going to visit sis in Barcelona for a whole week over Easter. I had to stop over in Vienna to get a cheap ticket (completely non-refundable), but what the heck. The fee for re-booking economy tickets with SAS is already half my non-refundable ticket price. And SAS tickets would have been at least SEk4000, I got away with half of that now. So it's all good, as long as I don't get sick enough that I can't fly...
I also had a nice surprise - I'm getting a mini PC, for free!! My PC has been acting real crazy lately, and apparently Dad's job is getting a new IT supplier so even though he just received a tiny PC for his field work he's getting a new one next week, and he can keep the old one. But of course he doesn't need two so he's giving one to me (sis got the last spare one so she can't possibly complain)! I just need to buy a portable DVD-player for it. Yowza!!

Apart from that, it's snowing a lot which I suppose if it must it's good timing - I was sick for like 2 weeks and I didn't want to tempt fate before my Berlin trip so I'm still on a running-hiatus. But I'm hoping to get back at it next week, I'm starting to feel pudgier (I'm fairly sure that's an actual word). Also I was thinking of maybe doing a 5k race this Spring so I need to get back into that lycra!!

Over-analyzing, who, me??

So. Friday the 13th. So far I've only been unlucky in that I was joined on the train this morning by a commuter I instantly recognized as having sat next to me last week - by his smell.

No, it's not a particularly nice cologne. I wish! He has a name in my head now, not very creative but he is 'coffee-farter guy'. Dude would sound better but this guy is not cool in any way. Not obviously mingin, just some suit guy in maybe his late 30s or early 40s who farts stress+food on the go+too much coffee. I briefly clinged to the notion that maybe he's just one of those unlucky ones with really bad breath problems where you produce some kind of sulphur which makes your breath smell literally like shit. But then I realized the smell hits you when he shifts in his seat. Eek.

The story also has a bit more to it - this guy represents the most blatant case of ogling I've ever been on the recieving end of. I'm me and this is Sweden and blatant ogling is not common, but we were on a two-seat and he had to turn his head like at least 15 degrees and kind of down to stare at my chest so it was kinda hard to miss. Also, he has been overly attentive and polite in the 'I'm getting off here can you let me get past dance' which either means he is not completely oblivious to me, or, British (I'm leaning towards both).
Now, as commuters you do have favourite spots where you enter the train but to end up next to the same person twice in two weeks is not common. Wouldn't it be just hilariously sad if just this particular guy happened to be the one and only (to my knowledge) to have one of those 'oh that fellow commuter is kinda cute and not totally out of my league maybe I'll try to sit next to him/her' crushes on me?

OK, I'm gonna do some work now.

Kirk would be so proud

This afternoon I made a noise, that could possibly be described as 'whooping', or even 'elated', during a Smallville episode.

It is so time to go back to work!!

I've actually been sick long enough this time (5,5 days) that I went fairly quickly from cabin-crazy (which occurs sometime between the 24th and 36th hour in the apartment) to complacent with my existence consisting of bad daytime TV-offerings and a diet of risifrutti and ice cream (not as devastating as you might think as I have no real appetite and eat maybe two or three snack-sized (for me) meals a day).

I'm still very very snotty and I've actually only just started sneezing, but I have an office to myself to be disgusting in and I feel fairly energetic (in comparison to just yesterday even). Nothing like an enforced week of laziness to make you appreciate how working makes you appreciate down-time... (oh that so made sense, come on!!)

Anyway. I've now got my hands on the last Twilight book and thank God I'm just a tad disappointed (whether or not this is influenced by recent spoiler-behaviour I leave unsaid). Since it's the last book it's only good if I'm not over the moon since there's no more where that came from! The author has said she sees no need to continue the books as all of Bella's conflicts get resolved (smart girl, that makes so much sense that even if I don't want to agree I can't argue with that kind of logic).

In other devastating news: apart from the stalling, crashing and not starting that my PC has but me through lately, the spacebar has now started malfunctioning at random times. I really wasn't planning on spending my small financial buffert on a new computer so I'm hoping this is just a phase.

Crap. Maybe I shouldn't have done that

Aaaah. Having just found out that the fourth and final book in the Twilight series is not released until the 10th of February, I googled the book for some more info and clicked on the Wiki page and since it was released in the US in August last year they had the whole synopsis there and I couldn't stop reading

and now I know how the book ends.

Whoopsie.

Thank goodness I'm one of those people who re-reads books, ie it's about the journey not the destination yadda yadda. Still. That was maybe a bit stupid, there were several shocking unprecedented things and now they only shocked me for about 30 seconds as opposed to several chapters worth of shock and suspense.

Crap.