First times...

...can be embarrassing and weird because you don't really know what you're doing, or where stuff are. Or it can be embarrassing for real. In a way where your bare ass gets caught in a Kodak moment, and circles among your friends, and friends' friends, and friends' friends' friends (and so on) for months thereafter.


He felt the bladder getting more tense after the beers and drinks during the paryting. It was a house in a wodden area, and lots of people had gathered to celebrate three friends' birthdays. He only knew the one birthday guy, but it was a fun party and lots of nice people. He got up and went to the toilet. When coming out of the toilet he ran in to three girls, and they started chatting. They were nice and fun girls, giggling, and probably a bit tipsy as well. One thing led to another, and suddenly one of the girls started making out with him. After a while she and one of the other girls left the toilet area, leaving him and the third girl alone. Now they started making out instead, and decided to sneak out of the window.

They left the clearing surrounding the house, and went off a bit into the woods. They came across a few simple wooden houses, intended to keep wanderers dry on their hiking excursion nights. Behind one of the houses was a nice patch of green grass, and they lay down and continued making out. They got out of the lower parts of their clothes, and continued. After only a minute or so, they could hear voices, probably outside the house. They ignored them, and kept on.

A few minutes later though, they could not longer ignore the voices. Suddenly someone in the acute vicinity said out loud; "there are some people doing it here!". An even louder and more intense voice exclaimed "But that's Olof's girlfriend" and a flash went off.

The moment of intimacy was over in more ways than one, they quickly got dressed among the small crowd of people that had gathered by now. The sweet young boy that had finally found someone to do it with for his very first time, had gotten frustratingly interrupted. Moreover, he was informed that this Olof, whose girlfriend he had just gotten it on with, was apparently one of the birthday boys hosting the party.

Now that's a mood killer! Aouch!

A while back in at the continued party again, the first girl walks past him and pinches his arse. He now realises that she should have been the girl to stick with, she was much more pretty, and not a girlfriend to Olof, or anyone else for that matter.

Weird cat.

After coming home from a double-class workout, I found little one sleeping in this position.

When I petted him and kissed him, he flipped around and chose this position instead.

What's that about?

Far fetched bean

It started with me going to Costa Rica early 2003. I bought a few kilos of the excellent small red beans 'Don Frijoles'. I sent a few of the bags to my sister, residing in Tokyo at the time. She saved a few of the beans, brought them back to Sweden, and our mother grew a few of them this summer (7 plants).

Those plants turned into about 800 g of lovely beans.

Furthermore, I bought a small habanero plant early this summer. It hung out on my balcony all warm excellent summer, and gave me 7 very hot habaneros.

So what can you do with this? Care to make a guess?

(obviously: very very homemade hot beans for the Soup!)

Toilet or playground?

That has been the question for the last few weeks. How does Cute Cat really think of my bed? Is it an extension of his toilet box, or is it an area where he plays? I have recently lifted the bed off my floor, and it is now sitting in a frame one feet or so over the floor. This has given an extra 2 x 1.20 m area for him to roam (i.e. under the bed).

Before, the bed was just something he ran across when playing (with or without me in it), but now he actually runs to the bed to play. It is covered with old sheets, over the thick construction plastic. So if he pees, all that is ruined are one or both of the sheets. I put them in the washing machine, and clean off the plastic. And then I am good to go again! Or rather (?), the bed is good for him to go on again.

But he hasn't peed now, for more than a week! That is touching previous record since his bed-peeing-period was initiated a few weeks ago. He is laying on the bed for at least a few hours every day, playing, sleeping, biting his tennis ball, hiding under the sheets biting my hands.

I prefer when he only bites the sheets though, it doesn't hurt as much.

Stupid jogger!

So I came to the gym 20 min early yesterday to have time to go for a quick run on the treadmill, before starting lifting weights with my sweet friend. It is always very busy around 6pm, and it is always extra busy now in the beginning of the university year (everyone buys a card and goes there a few times, naïvely trying to improve oneself - this slows down after 1.5 months or so after school start).

There are four treadmills in the main gym room, and they were all taken when I got there. There is a rather sizeable sign hanging over the treadmills, stating "jogging max 10 min". I looked at the timers on the machines, and one of the guys was up in 10 min and 36 seconds *me rubbing hands*.

I went over to him and asked him if he was finished soon (a fairly diplomatic way of saying, "your time's up, get the hell out of here"). He was panting heavily, running quickly, so I imagine only replying to my question was quite exhausting on top of the running. To my very diplomatic question, he answers "I still have 5 minutes" while holding up 5 fingers emphasizing his statement.

Ok, so pure manipulative diplomacy didn't work. I took it to the next level; i.e. stating the obvious, but in a friendly way. So I go "you know you're only allowed to run for 10 minutes, it says there on the sign". He continues running very quick, and I am not getting the impression that my disturbing him helps at all. For me, there is no answer to my question, but to remove yourself from the treadmill. But to him, apparently, this was not true to him. He had an answer.

Or should I perhaps say "answer".

He replied "but the clock is not showing the right time, since I walked the first 5 minutes".
I didn't quite know what to say to this stupid comment. Does he really think that he should take the "jog"-part of the sign so seriously, instead of realising that it means "whatever you choose to do on the treadmill, we don't care about, as long as you make yourself scarce when your 10 min are up". Does he interpret it as he would be fine with the four treadmills being taken by four people having walked on them for 2 h and 30 minutes? Or say three of those walkers, and one person having walked 10 minutes, been running 10 minutes, been strutting for another 10, and doing cardiopulmonary excersie for an additional 10 min, and THEN gone for a jogged for 7 minutes - can he still stay another 3 minutes.

After this my options were:
1. Take the discussion to the next level, i.e. tell him in plain words to get the hell off my treadmill
2. Get one of the instructors to throw him off
3. Go find myself another treadmill in one of the other gym rooms, and blog about it later.

I was not in the mood of getting angry with him, and I didn't feel like being the "bitch" that got the instructor to throw him off. I just felt like giving him an off glance, relying on him knowing that what he did was wrong (and hopefully feeling bad about it, having thrown such an innocently looking pretty girl out of there), and find myself another treadmill. Which I did shortly thereafter, but now with 5 min less time to spend on the machine, and me being annoyed.

Ah well, I had an excuse for only running 15 minutes (this was allowed on the treadmill that I found), instead of my planned 20. I was planning on using one of those 10-min treadmills, you see, and then taking another one for the next 10 min. But now I know I don't have to do this, you can just redefine the pace you choose to use on the treadmill, and get away with it on a technicality. Thanks a lot stupid runner!

I need more synonyms for "jogging"...

NOW!!

Now he peed, now! At 6.40 am, almost 24 h after last time he peed. He produced at least 1.5 dL urine.

I tried my final trick on him. I filled up the toilet box with all the sand again. He ran up there and started digging for a while. Finally he sat down, and I casually lifted him a bit by his tail and inserted a chocolate sufflée bowl under him. He looked slightly insulted, and I just looked like nothing happened. And after a few seconds, I hear the very welcome sound of the bowl being filled up!!

Sorry for giving you detailed toilet information for my cat. I have just been preoccupied with this for the last 20 h or so, and finaly I have gotten the result I longed! And now I don't have to give Cute Cat away to the animal hospital, and get him shaved on the tummy, stung with needles and drugged down without me being there reassuring his safety holding his paw. Now I can just give them a vial of urine (and an ex-tacosauce bowl with the same content). I very much prefer just giving the urine, instead of the whole cat. Which I think you can all appreciate!

I can't believe he held it in for so long!

Why can't he just pee?

My dear Cute Cat has started peeing inside. It is not like he is marking territory by horizontally spraying a wall (as you know, he became an 'it' over a year ago now), but instead, plainly sitting down in my bed emptying his bladder.

I have spent many hours reading about this problems in various forums, talking to others with cats, etc. Finally, after extensive empirical studies by excluding various changes in Cute Cat's environment, my current bet is on that he is frustrated for not getting to be outside more. My solution has been to deprive him of outside visits for the time beeing. He is always very agitated and annoyed when coming in, having met lots of other cats outside (he hates them all). By not letting him go out at all, I hoped to regain default state in him, letting him realise that he is an indoors cat, and always will be. I expected him to continue peeing for a while, maybe even more now since he wasn't allowed outside at all. He kept on peeing infrequently, and I was under the impression that he had gotten me to understand the problem, and hopefully I had found a way that in the end would come to solve the issue.

My aunt (she's a nurse) gave me these urine sticks that you can dip into the urine and check for various things in the urine, like proteins, leukocytes, pH etc. He kept on peeing, and once after producing a puddle on my bed (this is the place he always goes) I dipped several of these sticks into the urine and they came back positive for protein and leukocytes. I was surprised, since I had already to myself excluded that he was ill, since he was happy, didn't seem to feel any pain, and no apparent changes in other behaviour. But after the sticks-thing, eventhough I realise they are not exact, I decided to take him to the vet.

We were there yesterday morning. We decided that the best thing was to get a urine sample from him, since you can tell and exclude so many things from a simple urine sample. I decided to first try to collect the urine on my own, trying to spare him (and my worriedness, and wallet) staying a whole day at the veterinary clinic and finally getting drugged down and extracted from urine by a huge needle through the belly. The nice vet woman gave me several ideas how to get him to pee in a place where I could collect the urine.

I went home, optimistic. I emptied and cleaned out his toilet box, and put in some small pieces of paper, hoping he would pee in the box still. I also removed the top sheets from the bed, exposing the thick plastic covering that has been in place for the last few weeks, hoping (for once) that he would actually pee on the bed (i.e. the plastic).

I went to the vet at 9.30 am, and now 3.45 am the follwing day (i.e. almost 24 hours after he last went to the toilet) he still hasn't gone. He is just keeping it in! He has peed normally before, so I try not to worry about his total lack of peeing, but still. Why is he being so annoyingly stubborn?! I have put him into the box several times, but he just walks out. How long can he hold it in for? How often does a cat pee normally (I would think at least twice a day)?

I am starting to stress about it still. Apparently, since I am not sleeping at 4 am in the morning. At 7.30 (3.5 hours from now) I have a deadline at the vet. Either I go there with Cute Cat's urine sample, or I go there dropping off Cute Cat for the day.

I don't want to drop him off. Him being in a strange place a whole day. Some evil people showing up in the end, with needles, drugging him down and extracting his urine. Why can't he understand that it is really better for him to go to his toilet box now, and pee!

I can't believe I have spent a whole day just sitting at home waiting for my cat to pee (the sample needs to be chilled instantly). What a non-productive day. But it was an attempt at least. I still have one trick up my sleeve, which I will try to fool Cute Cat with one last time before 7.30. I will fill the box up with his sand again, hoping it will feel familiar to him again, he will dig his whole, and once he starts peeing, I'll be there with a little cup collecting it.

Fool proof, right?

Arachnoid window

I have a guest. Just outside my window. I am not a huge fan of it. I don't like spiders very much. And this is a big spider. Not big compared to how big some spiders are, but big compared to how big the swedish spiders normally are.

And I have to look at it every day. It has made an impressive web. Of what I have seen, it has so far eaten two bees and a small moth.

Although it is disguisting, it is simultaneously very beautifully patterned. And it is intriguing watching it prey, web the victims up (alive, living for several hours, moving in the web ball, yuck!) and eat them.

But my evolutionary inheritance still makes me shiver and my hairs to stand erect when I see the spider move.

Star Wars?

No, well I've never really cared much for Star Wars and such, too dark for me. I prefer Darth Vader the paler version...

Or is it just me playing around in my robe, making whizzing noises.

With the the hard cup from boyfriend's karate jock strap over my face.

The team

Cuddling in my new bed!

The hairy thing

Caterpillar nibbling away. However, unable to flee my macroobjective. And my wrath. The stupid larvae are just not caring about the immense care I've spent on my flowers. It was not to grow food for them.

Promise to self

I went to the dentist's on tuesday last week. I hadn't been for two years. By tradition, one ought to do that once a year. Since I was there last time, I have been on constant medication, which has the rather annoying side effect of drying my mouth, which of course in turn alleviates cavity formation. So to say the least, I was expecting cavities and other complaints, like dental plaques and that she would notice my sparse use of dental floss (like always).

It cost me 588 swedish crowns (~60 Euro, or 85 USD) to find out that it was all fine. It was worth every penny, or rather every öre (as the small coins are called in swedish). She took several pictures, and none of the suspected beginnings of cavity formation had changed, they were all still miniscule. My cool titanium screw holding my front tooth prosthesis, was also that unaltered. She did ask me to use dental floss regularly though, obviously not to my surprise. By definition I am actually already using dental floss regularly, like every fortnight or so. However, this argument I decided to keep to myself.

You might not believe me when I share this piece of information with you (based on my reluctancy to floss and visit the dentist), but since my visit there, I have kept the promise I made to myself; use dental floss everynight. You know, it is not all that hard to do, what's hard is to change your routines. But once you set your mind to it, and decide that you really should do something different, it bloody works. I am very proud of myself for flossing, I have to say. It has always been something I thought I should do, something I have kind of wanted to improve, but apparently not been ready for, or truely and completely set my mind to it. Do you really believe I can keep this up until my next dentist appointment? Do I believe it? Do you think she'll notice, or is that floss-phrase just standard dentistry talk? What if I next time have cavities, should I then stop flossing again?

I guess I shouldn't get ahead of myself. I have completed a mere 8 days of flossing, still 348 to go until next appointment...

Note to self

Do not take matters personal. Accept and let it slide off.

How do people manage not taking things personally? I think I am an expert in taking things personally. But is that a blessing or a curse?

The cats in the picture are the sweetest ones, my sister's. They love to cuddle. They are by no means part of the 'Note to self', however, the girl in the picture is the same as in the text, i.e. me.

Hysterical

If you are ever thinking about getting married (again), jewish is the way to go! I have only been to a few weddings before, but this latest wedding was the most fun I have ever had. Being a Swede, I am used to people being rather boring and dull on an official occasion, but linear with the amount of alcohol going in, the fun increases (until the obvious return to dull baseline upon consuming too much alcohol). But this wedding was different. Even before people had had more than a glass of bubbles, they were crazy. Everyone! From the youngest to the elderly! Dancing around in spontaneous rings, clapping their hands, singing along to the "shalom aleichem", jumping about. There was a jewish band playing, and they continued the 'Shalom Aleichem' over and over for something like 20 minutes, until people were lying on the floor grasping for air, sweat dripping.

Just check out my hysterical laughter (and the groom's sweaty back). I swear, this is the way to go!

The wedding dress

Isn't she the most magnificent bride you've ever seen? This is the dress I made. It might look like it was difficult, but how hard is it to make something pretty for such a pretty girl!?

Swede-austrian porno, part 2

Now, I wouldn't really call this porno, but I think it fits in perfectly in my series of alternative naughty sightseeing. Again, unfortunantely, this post goes out specifically to the swedish readers.



For you others, in swedish "kuk" is slang for the male sex organ. Although in Austria, or rather, in this specific case in Salzburg this is probably an abbreviated something. But that's no fun, is it?

If there are no real sights nearby, find your own! Feel free to cite me when needed.

She should not...

...be wearing those pants. I thank the writers of the excellent series 'Friends'. Chandler comments that about a kind of 80's girl on the tv, when their tv suddenly (monkey involved) has all channels dubbed to spanish.

You might not be able to see it perfectly, so i will describe it to you. This woman on the picutre is 50+, I am guessing a tourist (in Vienna) judging from her bag (Hallstatt being a cool cute city in Austria). Maybe you can discern some dots by the upper-thigh to ass-region. Those are not dots in the fabric, those are holes in the fabric. What you see is her skin. And all across the ass, the dots had the same colour, so either thongs (which it didn't look like), or no panties at all.

My scientific heart wanted to know if she was wearing anything under, and by viewing her from the front I guess I would have been informed.

Then I realised, I don't want to know, do I?

I hate my job today!

Last week my previous project ended. The manuscript was submitted, and the planning of the next project started. We had a meeting last week, to decide between two different ideas. We all agreed on one of the ideas in the end, and went off to heavy individual planning. I read a couple of papers, and wrote a protocol about how to analyse some stuff. Today I spent 3 hours setting up the surgery room for tomorrow, filling out forms, printing stuff, gathering tools I needed etc.

All to be handed a paper an hour before I was to go home. The new protocol. That aparently some of the seniors had decided on was what we should do. It was not the one idea we had decided on, it wasn't even the second idea that we decided not to go for during that meeting last week. It was something completely different. And this I just "find out" the day before my surgeries are about to start. I feel so insulted, so fooled, so useless, and so not part of anything. Just fucking omitted.

It sounds so nice, and looks so nice on the stupid surface. "Oh, all students are allowed to be part of planning and decisionmaking, bla bla blurt blurt blurt". ("Yes, but then we just throw that in the bin, and decide on our own anyway, and just let them know what has been decided for them"). I hate my job! I hate when stuff are just decided for me (especially when the outgoing message still is that I am so much part of everything). Bullshit, fucking bullshit!

I have been crying most of the afternoon, but now I am mostly mad. So MAD! I need to talk to my supervisor, but I need to calm down first. I feel like such a fool. So useless. It is so obvious what part of my work environment I have a problem with, and why I again am in serious doubt if this is really something I should continue with.

I love science. I love to think about science. I love to find answers to questions I put. But I hate the environment it is done in. Can I cope with the environment, in order to do the stuff I like? Or is it just better to do something different.