Dansk

I had a very long frustrating day writing a 20 page document in Danish yesterday. I spent 11 hours doing something badly that I could have done will in English in 2 hours. On top of that was the humiliation of sending someone a document that you know is full of errors and not very good because you are trying to make it as short as possible.

I went to bed tired, frustrated and in a bad mood expecting to get yet another spanking at work today. It's not a bigu surprise that I then didn't sleep very well.

It turned out that the recipient of the document was more understanding than expected (more than he usually is anyway) and I have so far escaped any harsh criticism.

On top of that I managed to get lots of healthy food for lunch including the improbable combination of liver and seaweed.

Test plates are ordered for Saturday and the weather forecast is still looking iffy for a maiden voyage though. I guess I can at least deliver the boat to the sailing club.

What's in the kit bag?

There is a good chance that I am romanticising my childhood, but when I think about the equipment that was required for various sports 30 years ago, the list of specialist clothing and equipment for most sports seemed to be limited to trainers or football boots.

I don't remember having indoor and outdoor trainers, I don't think I owned any kind of helmet and my sailing gear was limited to a waterproof and a life jacket for most of the year.

These days one can't ride a bike without special shoes, a complete change of clothes and a helmet that costs more than a kids bike.

I fear (as MK has already foreseen) that my predictions of not needing any extra sailing gear on the grounds that I have a wetsuit and a life jacket may well prove to be incorrect.

This is what Gil Marine think you need for all weather sailing:

At least there isn't a sailing helmet yet!

Sale on and Sail on

I am having a bit of a clear out to help off set some of the costs of the new boat. The carbon bike wheels are going along with some skiing stuff that we no longer use (too big or too small) and some other bits and pieces like push chairs.

There are some pretty good apps that you can use for making small ads these days. I gone are the days of post cards in the post office. You can just walk around the house with your phone and take photos of what you want to sell and then post them directly to eBay or the free ad paper in Denmark - Den Blå Avis.

Then this coming weekend I am hoping for my first trip in the new boat, but at the moment it looks like it may be a little too windy (not to mention cold) for my first trip out...

Plumbing the depths...

Of the freezer.

We are considering buying a 1/4 cow in the coming week or two but that will take up a LOT of space in the freezer so we need to make some space.

We have already eaten some odds and ends this week including the liver from the whole lamb we bought and tonight will be a luxurious mixed grill including a 2 T-bone steaks and a rack of lamb. We then need to figure out how and when we will cook the beef rib bones, the smoked big fat and other odds and ends that are kicking around in there.

How much space does 65-75kg of beef take anyway?

Punctuality

I, like most people, have two parents. One of them is painfully punctual and other has generally taken a more relaxed attitude to time keeping.

One might expect that the Danes are obsessive about time keeping, they certainly like to think that themselves, but the reality is somewhat difference.

They are 5-15 minutes late for almost anything and that drives me a bit nuts because I am somewhat OCD about timekeeping.

Cozi Calendar

We have been testing out Cozi as our family organiser since the start of the year (we use something else for family planning!) and I thought I'd do a little review.

The application can be used directly on the internet at cozi.com or via an app on the ipad/iphone and MK's Android phone. The calendar, shopping list and to do list is kept up to date each time any of us make any changes so that we can see if anyone has done the shopping or made plans on our behalf.

It seems to work really well, MK has made friends with her smartphone and we have avoided both doing the shopping on the way home from work more than once.

I particularly like the shopping list that you tick off the items when you get them and then un-tick them when you need to get some more.

We just upgraded to the gold version (which you pay for rather than the free one described above) so that we get a better monthly view on the mobile apps, no adverts and a birthday calendar function as well.

Out of office

I'm off out with some people from work tonight. Steak and driving home.

Skiing

J on his way to ski school with me on a sunny morning

self shot on our morning trip over to ski lessons

Pancake afternoon

J tries to be in every photograph taken

J and Christiano the ski instructor

DK showing off his excellent snow plough technique

Home

We got home from Italy at 01:00 this morning after a long long drive. We left the apartment at about 05:30 and then spent several hours in various queues for car trains and tunnels.

We had a great week, I'll post some pictures and some more details in the week...

It's done

Before:

After:

I can see where DK gets his wonky head from when I look at these pictures!

When life goes up

The blogging tends to go down.

I have been really busy at work recently and home life has been filled with the usual cooking, washing, putting kids to bed stuff with little more than painting to fill the spare minutes. It's fun to be busy, but it does tend to lead to rather dull blog posts describing painting and driving too and from work.

Yesterday I spent 5 hours driving to the middle of Sweden and back to present to a potential customer. You always do your best at these things, but on the way home through the dark, snow and busy traffic, I couldn't help but wonder if I really wanted to make that trip every week for 18 months to run a project there.

In the end, the decision will not be mine, but none the less, it was a long dull journey.

Tomorrow, I am working from home for the first time in months and will take advantage of the opportunity to get all of my hair cut off.

I promise to post before and after pictures.

Brush in hand

It's been another 10 or 12 hours painting this weekend and now the living room walls are sparkling white which contrasts nicely with the discoloured formerly white ceiling. I suppose that can be another project for another weekend.

A result of the time spent getting up and down from the step is that I was unable to do any exercises this morning. I could feel straight away that my back wasn't up to anything strenuous so I hung the washing to dry, did some stretching and then put the living room straight again. That involved removing the tape from the switches, putting the blind back up and returning the furniture to the edges of the room.

Next up is the dining room and the grand finale will be the hall hopefully all before the end of the month.

Prison Haircut time again?

The summer before last I cut all of my hair off. I decided that it was getting too thin so it was easier to just chop it all off.

The home hair cut is also quick, cheap (free actually) and open all hours. I personally couldn't see any downside to it at all.

However, it turns out that I am not the only one with an opinion on my haircut. MK also seems to have something to say about it and my mother seems to have trouble keeping her feelings to herself at times as well.

So I let it grow back to some extent and return to the hairdressers along with the inconvenience of booking appointments at least a week in advance and paying too much. Now that the boys seem to want their hair cut by a hair dresser, it is beginning to cost us a fortune.

Now the hair is even thinner and it seems like a good time to chop it all off again. I am sure that at least the two mentioned above will not be all that pleased, but it's getting embarrassing having so little hair on your head that you either look bald or trying to hide behind a comb-over regardless of what you do with it.

I think I'm inclined to head in the direction of the Statham crop