A story about traffic safety and childhood

Look! I got childishly excited when I saw these the other day. They are one of the things I completely forgot about while away, which means I haven't seen these since the nineties. I remember these from when I was a kid. And I hated them, then.

Well, as a really small child I first have vague memories of chewing on them, but please don't hold that against me - I would not dream of putting these shiny bits of hard plastic in my mouth now!

I remember these because I used to find them in my pockets. God knows who put them there - but especially during the dark season, they would just magically appear in the pockets of my jackets, with the string and safety pin all fastened: then all I had to do was to whip them out of my pockets and they dangle down my side and supposedly they'd stop me from being hit by a car.

Well, they were just bits of plastic! And they get in my way and they'd look stupid and none of the other children wore theirs with pride... and they could be quite hard if you were running at a speed and suddenly stopped and they hit you on the hand. And the dog, if I had the dog with me, would sometimes find it funny to chase it. So really. I hated them. And hello, I'd think, being all of seven years old, it's not like the cars won't see me, I am a big girl!

But no matter how much I hated them they kept reappearing in my pockets. (It must have been my mum putting them there...)

Then at some stage, probably at some stage in the nineties, they ceased to appear in my pockets, and I never thought of it, and I got a flashy thingy to tie around my arm instead which I also never thought of because who'd want the obstacle of being shiny and yellow when you are running the risk of turning thirteen without having had your first real kiss?

And now. Many years later, I return to Norway. And it is dark here. And I see someone walking down the streets with these familiar shiny-plastic-yo-yo-look-a-likes hanging out their pockets. And it looks so darn sensible! I mean, it's proper dark here: and walking to work in the morning there is this woman walking well in front of me with this bright, white plastic piece dangling next to her, like a really shiny star: and all the cars know she's there.

I need to get one of them, I think. But I am no longer seven years old and they no longer grow magically in my pockets.

I guess they can be bought.
Not sure where, though... and in the meantime I have another reason to be grateful that the solstice is only about five weeks away.

Spam Poetry #3

Guess who I am
I tried a new receipe for you
enjoy the result

Deeper penetration is possible
Happy anniversary

November Blues (London -Oslo, 11-10)

It's November, and London just gained one on Oslo.
It's November, and it is exactly as dark and depressive as I remembered it to be, and because I've only been in town for 4 months, my spontaneous "let's-go-for-a-hot-chocolate-and-a-pick-me-up"-network hasn't quite developed.
It's November, and I want to go into hibernation until spring equinox, or at least I want to go to London.

Oslo is quiet. It is quiet when it is supposed to be quiet, and it is quiet when it's not. And when, really, it's weekend and you could do with some ignition of life and light somewhere, Sunday arrives, heavy and dull and dark. (I want to be in London).

N sends me a text message from his language course. He asks me what the Norwegian word for "breast implants" are. That kind of day.
N says "go home and write!".
I say "No" because it is so dark and dull that there is no point. Because with the darkness, the energy just drains. I have a great understanding for animals that hibernate, but alas, I cannot.

You know? I blame on the fact that I arrived to late this summer. I arrived to late to properly get my Half Year Of Light before the Half Year Of Dark set it. I blame it on July. (I have to blame it on someone, after all).

But. Then I remember the time when I decided that Positivity Was Important. So!!
At least I got google wave! And an entertaining story by CookieMouse in which I have been morphed into a droid.

The search for light and life continues. (It's only November 2nd, it is too early to be defeatist).

London - Oslo, 10 - 10

I was on a training course, the other day. A different part of town than the usual, a different route home than the usual.

Delays on the transport system is absolutely nothing new, having spent 5 years commuting through London. I have done some rough maths, based on the fact that I feel I have gained 4 hours per day by moving here. It's a rough estimate, but that's the equivalent of approximately 208 days. Enough to make anyone think "well, at least I left before it hit 365, right...?"

This doesn't, however, take into account the multiple times there has been delays, the multiple occasions where Waterloo is, quite frankly, messed up, the amount of times there are signal failures, people running drunkenly on the tracks (yes, that would be the 11.02 pm train...) power surges, suicides or simply just "bad traffic for no apparent reason".

Travelling home from work in London, on a day with transport problem could well look like this;

• London Bridge station is closed. Darn!
• Walk to Waterloo (20 minutes) or take a bus (? never did that) or wait it out or buy a new ticket to take the overline train instead. (You soon learn to upgrade your ticket simply because... well, it doubles your connections to waterloo).
• Waterloo station; trains are cancelled and delayed. (50 minutes ; you might as well have dinner nearby, not too bad; there is The Canteen with smoked haddock, there is Feng Sushi and there is Wagamama)
• Waterloo station; trains are still cancelled and delayed. You decide to bite the bullet and use the dreaded Northern Line. Months later I can still hear the voice "THERE ARE SEVERE DELAYS ON THE NORTHERN LINE" and I think " of course there are! It's the Northern Line!"
• You are literally like sardines in a tin on the tube for an eternity. You get off. It's... late. Walk to the bus stop. Wait.
• Get on the bus. Peer out the window with your marvellous sense of directions, think "I remember that cementery, so I am at least on the right bus... or is this the same wrong bus I took last time?"
• Get home.

Realise that you left the office 2,5 hours ago.

Anyway. Let's rewind. I was on a training course, yeah? I was on a training course in Oslo. Went to the tube. There were delays. For the first time since I moved here, trains were cancelled due to a fire. So I get this mini-London-feeling of "transport is buggered up! So I must, actually, be in a city, after all! Yay!"

Here is the difference;

Delayed in London; 2.5 hours with multiple types of transport.
Delayed in Oslo; 20 minutes. By foot.

Obviously, size has got something to do with this. But still. That's over 2 hours saved, and I'm not complaining!

spam poetry 2 : Will your partner go too?

I made a blog
your blood will boil again
want to get together tonight?

Hackers destroyed my PC
made a new one
isn't it worth trying?

Learn where your friend is.
Guess who I am?

A few reflections on having swapped OS to Ubuntu

I am not sure that I have quite entered the geek scene, not yet, anyway. Ubuntu is having some teething problems, you could say. Mainly - it beeps. In a very, very annoying way.

("That's so typical for girls," someone said to me this summer, after I had been reflecting about the fact that after space, it is backspace that is the most commonly used key on my keyboard. Now, if you hit backspace say.... three times on a two-letter word, Ubuntu beeps me. Loudly. In a very annoying way!)

Secondly, it doesn't easily switch off the computer. Which means that I navigate to switch it off, and crawl into bed for the night - or start cooking - or whatever - and when I come back, the screen is not black, but blank - and the battery is dead and nothing has been saved, which is my own bloody fault for not hitting Ctrl + S nearly as often as I do backspace.

Thirdly?
It crashes. Gwibber works now, which is great, but the browsers crash a lot (Chromium more than Firefox). And IT-crashes combined with people with a very low patience threshold do not make a peaceful Sunday.

Still.
I could always go back to using Windows. It just doesn't seem like an acceptable option, so: HURRY UP WITH THE NEXT RELEASE, WILL YA?

Go Open Source or Go Home

Geekiness for Dummies! :)