Sunny, chilly Sunday

After only enjoying the beautiful weather from inside yesterday, today Inga and I took a walk in the sun. We followed the same route that I walked almost every day last summer (until it just got too hot even in the mornings) but it was quite different. In Rinnebäcksravinen the water level is low and at some points frozen to ice. The ponds by the sewage plant are covered with thin ice layers now and the thistles along the shores are only dry skeletons. But there are signs of the upcoming spring as well.

Time to evaluate

The past weeks I have been thinking a lot about friendship. Now, we only have about five weeks left here in Lund before we move north, to Knivsta. I have concluded that one and three quarters of a year really is a short time to make really good friends. At least under these conditions. During our two years in Switzerland it was much easier, being the "foreign" as well as meeting many others in the same situation as ourselves. Moving to Lund was different though, since we this time moved into already existing sets of acquaintances. Very different from moving to Switzerland as well as from moving to Uppsala ages ago to study.

This said, I feel privileged to have met and got to know so many wonderful persons here. It's surpassed my expectations. However, the closer we get to our move, the less meaningful it fells to further extend our circle of friends here since there simply isn't enough time left to spend socializing. Instead I want to concentrate on the friendships already existing.

When moving away (or having friends moving away for that matter) I think there are three ways to handle it. Firstly, we can let everything continue as normal, seeing each other just like before until the inevitable day of the move comes. Secondly, we can start to distance ourselves from each other since it's "no use" to spend time together with the move coming up. Lastly, we can try to make as much as possible of the time left, knowing that after the move it might be a long time until we meet again.

For me, the first and last approach are the natural ones, depending on how close the friends are. The second way really hasn't got anything with friendship to do according to me, but I can see that it might be some kind of self protection for people who doesn't want to get hurt.

I hope that these last five weeks here in Lund will be great and that when the day of our move comes I can look back at our time in Lund with a feeling of gratitude for all the friends I have.

Five minutes

Since Friday afternoon, Inga's been down with the gastric flu. Now she is recovering and to help her I have to give her five ml of fluid replacement every five minutes until about lunch. So I have prepared a tray for the morning with a cup filled with the fluid replacement, a syringe for measuring, a baby-cup for Inga to drink from and a timer to help hold us to the schedule. At the moment Inga is sleeping though, but as soon as she wakes up it all begins again.

Saukalt!

Ice cold wind outside. A perfect match for my mood at the moment. And a bit refreshing - the thoughts fly away just like the dry leaves from last fall...

What I miss

Today I miss

• my friends in Switzerland - always up to do fun things and never too busy to just hang out.
• a chef in my kitchen - I really don't feel like cooking and Matts is down with a cold.
• a few hours of sleep - when will I ever catch up?
  

Three years ago

Three years ago, Matts and I went skiing for the first time in Switzerland (and for the first time whatsoever for Matts), in Flumserberg. Matts has been complaining a lot about us not going skiing this season, but this year we will take a rain check on carving down the hills. Next year we plan to be back in the slopes, if not in the Alps at least somewhere in Sweden.

Life insurance

There's one thing that really upsets me about some parents. Not all, since many are grown up and responsible as they should be, but unfortunately too many don't seem to understand the importance of this subject.

So what am I talking (or rather writing) about if not one of the cheapest life insurances that exists: the bike helmet! For more than six years we have had a law in Sweden saying that children up to the age of 15 must wear a helmet riding a bike. So far, all is well. What upsets me is the fact that so many parents don't wear a helmet.

What crosses their minds when they decide they don't need one, but their children do? Certainly not the fact that their children need their parents alive. Or that no matter how good a biker they are, not everyone else out there is biking or driving their car with 100% control at all times (even if they of course should). Or that we, as parents, are extremely important as role models for our children. Or that the hairdo really isn't as important as our lives.

What I find most upsetting is parents biking without helmets with their children on the back of their bikes or in a bike trailer, kids wearing helmets. What if there is an accident and the parent gets severely injured and the children watches it all happen? Of course, helmets doesn't protect anyone from broken bones, but it can make a big difference if we get into an accident.

So if you bike and don't already have one, go to the nearest bike or sport shop tomorrow to invest in the cheapest life insurance there is and show all those kids that you are a cool grown up using your brain and wearing a helmet.

Buying vegetables

When I was a child, my parents had to weigh and put price-tags on all the fruit and fresh vegetables they bought. This has long been history in Sweden. Instead, the cashiers learn all the four digit PLU codes by heart (or occasionally look in a table) and all the costumers have to do is to put the apples or onions in a plastic bag. I was amazed to come to Switzerland where the "old" system is still up and running. And when I by mistake forgot to tag my cauliflower or eggplant, the cashier took I run (and I really mean a run!) to the fruit and vegetable department to weigh it in for me. That's what I called service.

But at the same time it's kind of stupid. Because if they had a scale and a catalog of PLU numbers by the counter, they wouldn't have to take that run. And if they had a scale and all the necessary PLU codes by the counter there would be no need for the costumers to do the job themselves at all. In the end, it would mean that the costumers have to wait a tiny bit longer by the counter, but save much more time in the vegetable department since there is no risk of forgetting the cucumber number before reaching the scale (since in Switzerland, every vegetable and fruit have a number, and by the scales you press the individual number for every item). I guess this is what the supermarkets in Sweden figured out long before I bought my first orange.

However, Sweden being in the frontier, the scales are now reintroduced. Not for every Tom, Dick or Harry, but for everyone following the self-scanning trend. So now, we who call ourselves the go-aheaders run around the supermarkets with barcode scanners, fooling ourselves that we are saving time while what we really do is to save the cashiers from work. And of course, self-scanning means that we have to go back to the scales for the potatoes and watermelons we buy since there is no cashier in the end to do the work for us. And to confuse it all even more, even if you are not a self-scanning costumer, you can still use the scales and "save time" at the counter (in case there's an unexperienced cashier who doesn't know all the PLUs by heart) by spending an eternity by the touch screen that goes with the scale to find the image of that fennel...

Some stores in Switzerland also have the self-scanning option, and something tells me that they will completely skip the scales-at-the-counter-step, no matter how costumer friendly that would be.

Happy New Year!

We spent the evening with good friends and good food! We watched the fireworks from the dining room instead of going out in the wind and leaving our sleeping beauties alone...

The pig of 2010