Hey!
Saturday, Oct 4, 2008
No time long blog, and now I have to pay the price; I've got too much to talk about =P So for your convenience, I'll bold out the beginning of a new subject, in case you're not interested in it all 
Still sick: You probably read in my last blog (i think) that I was sick with a flu. Guess what? I still am sick, though the flu symptoms are gone. On Thursday I went to the doctor's, as I'd been sick for just above a week and a half. (if there's any words you don't understand in the following part, hit it up on Wikipedia or something) According to the doctor, I've got some kind of inflammation in some whatsamooey in my throat (epiglottis, maybe? Not sure), which has lead to my eustachian tubes (the canals going between my ears and my pharynx) being blocked. This results in an inability to equalize pressure in my middle ear, which again results in a heavy, giddy feeling in my head. So while I don't have any "normal" sickness symptoms, my head feels really heavy, making thinking too much and concentrating a hard task. And since it's all caused by viruses, it can take some time before one gets well. I'll have to be prepared for at least another week's downtime.
Football: So, the city's football team, Brann, played their return game against Deportivo this Thursday. With a 2-0 victory from the first match, everyone felt confident about advancement. One goal scored by Brann, and Deportivo would've needed 4 goals (because of the away goal rule). However, they were too self-confident that we could protect that lead, which permeated their playing sty-le Too defensive, not willing to attack; a disaster in other words. They didn't even take the counterattack-opportunities, which is where they are so good. Not even when Deportivo got one man expelled could we do anything. We lost 2-0, and with the overall score from the two matches being 2-2, extra time was required. With no goals scored, it ended in a penalty shootout, which ended up as a total disaster. Brann put 2 out of 5 penalties, whilst Deportivo put 3 out of 4 (they didn't need to take the fifth). So Brann ended up not advancing. Now they have nothing left to play for this season -_-
Computer games & LAN: Since I've been sick, I've caught the opportunity to play some computer games. My lack of concentrative powers has been a slight hinder, but I managed to play through a few games without messing up too many times. I completed Assassin's Creed, a marvelous game, with astounding graphics, awesome fighting and even more impressing free-running abilities. The end was pretty cool, with coded messages to solve as well as loads of references to other cultures, historical events and whatnot. Of course, I had to read it all on the Web to understand, due to me being sick.
I've also enjoyed playing Spore these days. it's a game in which you control a creature through evolution, from a small cell to a massive galaxy-spanning empire. I really like that there's so immensely many planets to expand to, I love the ability to create and design your very own creatures pretty much the way you want them, and of course, the fact that it's all mutually shared with other gamers; you encounter the creatures and civilizations other players have made, and they encounter yours. So it's kinda a MSO (Massive Single player Online Game), which is pretty interesting.
Lately I've also found out that one of my friends really loves to play games via LAN (Local Area Network), and he also likes many of the same games as I do. So he often comes over (or I come over to his place), and we square it off against one another in many a game. It's realyl fun, sicne I also like to play via LAN, but no one else I know does so (before I found out my aforementioned friend does, of coruse).
Anime: Lately I haven't been watching much anime (as my MAL profile reveals), because I've just not been in the mood for it. But then I impulsively decided to rematch The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya, a real anime cla-ssic. I managed to watch it all in one go, and afterwards, I suddenly felt like watching other anime series too. It's great, because now I have a series to watch whenever I lose my desire to watch anime =P
Piano: I've also used my sick days to improve my skills on the piano a bit. I thought my concentration problems would stop me from being able to learn any new songs, but instead it kinda helped me, because I've been able to play without any thinking about the notes hindering me; with a kinda subconscious, instinctive understanding of the notes. This is a good thing for me, as I often have troubles playing songs straightforward because I linger on much on the notes. Anyway, here's the songs I've learned these past two weeks.
Scarlet (official piano version of the anime series Ayashi no Ceres' only opening theme)
Tori no Uta [Song of Birds] (official piano version of the anime series Air's only opening theme)
It's not me playing; those are the original versions of the songs. I think I'll record them soon though; while i don't have a video camera, my (electric) piano has a USB hub, so I can probably record the songs straight to my computer.
Marathon: Today the usual movie marathon gang had a Pirates of the Caribbean marathon (the "usual gang" being my brother and some of his buddies, his girlfriend and a few of her friends, and me. I'm kinda like the only one who isn't 20 out of the bunch =P). With lots of candy and snacks, lots of soda, a great pirate-themed cake and good lasagna for dinner, we had a great day gastronomically in addition to the enjoyment of watching the movies, which are great, by the way. Yeah, I know I'm sick, but I'm not a fan of playing half-dead because I am =P
That's all for now, I think. Cheers!
Still sick: You probably read in my last blog (i think) that I was sick with a flu. Guess what? I still am sick, though the flu symptoms are gone. On Thursday I went to the doctor's, as I'd been sick for just above a week and a half. (if there's any words you don't understand in the following part, hit it up on Wikipedia or something) According to the doctor, I've got some kind of inflammation in some whatsamooey in my throat (epiglottis, maybe? Not sure), which has lead to my eustachian tubes (the canals going between my ears and my pharynx) being blocked. This results in an inability to equalize pressure in my middle ear, which again results in a heavy, giddy feeling in my head. So while I don't have any "normal" sickness symptoms, my head feels really heavy, making thinking too much and concentrating a hard task. And since it's all caused by viruses, it can take some time before one gets well. I'll have to be prepared for at least another week's downtime.
Football: So, the city's football team, Brann, played their return game against Deportivo this Thursday. With a 2-0 victory from the first match, everyone felt confident about advancement. One goal scored by Brann, and Deportivo would've needed 4 goals (because of the away goal rule). However, they were too self-confident that we could protect that lead, which permeated their playing sty-le Too defensive, not willing to attack; a disaster in other words. They didn't even take the counterattack-opportunities, which is where they are so good. Not even when Deportivo got one man expelled could we do anything. We lost 2-0, and with the overall score from the two matches being 2-2, extra time was required. With no goals scored, it ended in a penalty shootout, which ended up as a total disaster. Brann put 2 out of 5 penalties, whilst Deportivo put 3 out of 4 (they didn't need to take the fifth). So Brann ended up not advancing. Now they have nothing left to play for this season -_-
Computer games & LAN: Since I've been sick, I've caught the opportunity to play some computer games. My lack of concentrative powers has been a slight hinder, but I managed to play through a few games without messing up too many times. I completed Assassin's Creed, a marvelous game, with astounding graphics, awesome fighting and even more impressing free-running abilities. The end was pretty cool, with coded messages to solve as well as loads of references to other cultures, historical events and whatnot. Of course, I had to read it all on the Web to understand, due to me being sick.
I've also enjoyed playing Spore these days. it's a game in which you control a creature through evolution, from a small cell to a massive galaxy-spanning empire. I really like that there's so immensely many planets to expand to, I love the ability to create and design your very own creatures pretty much the way you want them, and of course, the fact that it's all mutually shared with other gamers; you encounter the creatures and civilizations other players have made, and they encounter yours. So it's kinda a MSO (Massive Single player Online Game), which is pretty interesting.
Lately I've also found out that one of my friends really loves to play games via LAN (Local Area Network), and he also likes many of the same games as I do. So he often comes over (or I come over to his place), and we square it off against one another in many a game. It's realyl fun, sicne I also like to play via LAN, but no one else I know does so (before I found out my aforementioned friend does, of coruse).
Anime: Lately I haven't been watching much anime (as my MAL profile reveals), because I've just not been in the mood for it. But then I impulsively decided to rematch The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya, a real anime cla-ssic. I managed to watch it all in one go, and afterwards, I suddenly felt like watching other anime series too. It's great, because now I have a series to watch whenever I lose my desire to watch anime =P
Piano: I've also used my sick days to improve my skills on the piano a bit. I thought my concentration problems would stop me from being able to learn any new songs, but instead it kinda helped me, because I've been able to play without any thinking about the notes hindering me; with a kinda subconscious, instinctive understanding of the notes. This is a good thing for me, as I often have troubles playing songs straightforward because I linger on much on the notes. Anyway, here's the songs I've learned these past two weeks.
Scarlet (official piano version of the anime series Ayashi no Ceres' only opening theme)
Tori no Uta [Song of Birds] (official piano version of the anime series Air's only opening theme)
It's not me playing; those are the original versions of the songs. I think I'll record them soon though; while i don't have a video camera, my (electric) piano has a USB hub, so I can probably record the songs straight to my computer.
Marathon: Today the usual movie marathon gang had a Pirates of the Caribbean marathon (the "usual gang" being my brother and some of his buddies, his girlfriend and a few of her friends, and me. I'm kinda like the only one who isn't 20 out of the bunch =P). With lots of candy and snacks, lots of soda, a great pirate-themed cake and good lasagna for dinner, we had a great day gastronomically in addition to the enjoyment of watching the movies, which are great, by the way. Yeah, I know I'm sick, but I'm not a fan of playing half-dead because I am =P
That's all for now, I think. Cheers!
Wednesday, Sep 24, 2008
You all probably don't know a lot about Norway, right? The land of trolls and fjords, situated on the northern part of Europe. We're a small country, only 4,7 million inhabitants and a total area that's the size of the states and Texas and Mexico together. You wouldn't think such a small country was anything significant, yet we're one stinking rich country - one of the richest in the world actually - with a GDP of at least 400 billion dollars. The national oil fund - which consists of money Norway's earned from oil and gas - has enough money to buy out eight of the largest corporations in the world - including Walt Disney and General Motors. The GDP per inhabitant is the second highest in the world, at almost 50 000 dollars. I just find it funny that such a small country as Norway is so rich.
Another thing I find funny - and disturbing - is that the politicians of Norway talk so much about how Norway is going to be a big environmental-and-peace nation in the world, giving lots of money to various environment-friendly organizations and working actively for peace in war-struck areas in the world, yet we're the third largest exporter of oil and gas, and the seventh largest weapons exporter in the world. I was really shocked when I found out about the latter of those, but the former didn't come as a surprise.
There's more things that are peculiar about Norway, one of them being our tall mountains and deep fjords. In just a kilometer or two as the crow flies, the terrain can elevate from kilometer-deep fjords to giant mountain plateaus that're from a kilometer to two high.
Moreover, our climate is very warm, even though the southernmost parts of Norway aren't much more south than the southernmost parts of Alaska. We've got warm summers, often with temperatures close to or past the thirties (90s if you use the Fahrenheit scale), and mild winters with snowfall mostly in the inner and northern regions of the country, and only very little of it in the more southern areas, especially along the coast.
And while most of it has its natural explanations, I still find Norway to be a peculiar country.
For fun, here's some pictures from Norway:
On a side note, I've been sick with a cold and slight fever lately.
EDIT: If you can't view any of the images completely, right-click and do either of the following: press 'view image' if using Firefox, press 'open image in new tab' if using Google Chrome, press 'properties' and then copy the url listed into your web browser if using Internet Explorer
Another thing I find funny - and disturbing - is that the politicians of Norway talk so much about how Norway is going to be a big environmental-and-peace nation in the world, giving lots of money to various environment-friendly organizations and working actively for peace in war-struck areas in the world, yet we're the third largest exporter of oil and gas, and the seventh largest weapons exporter in the world. I was really shocked when I found out about the latter of those, but the former didn't come as a surprise.
There's more things that are peculiar about Norway, one of them being our tall mountains and deep fjords. In just a kilometer or two as the crow flies, the terrain can elevate from kilometer-deep fjords to giant mountain plateaus that're from a kilometer to two high.
Moreover, our climate is very warm, even though the southernmost parts of Norway aren't much more south than the southernmost parts of Alaska. We've got warm summers, often with temperatures close to or past the thirties (90s if you use the Fahrenheit scale), and mild winters with snowfall mostly in the inner and northern regions of the country, and only very little of it in the more southern areas, especially along the coast.
And while most of it has its natural explanations, I still find Norway to be a peculiar country.
For fun, here's some pictures from Norway:
On a side note, I've been sick with a cold and slight fever lately.
EDIT: If you can't view any of the images completely, right-click and do either of the following: press 'view image' if using Firefox, press 'open image in new tab' if using Google Chrome, press 'properties' and then copy the url listed into your web browser if using Internet Explorer
Thursday, Sep 18, 2008
So, the city football team, Brann, played a big match against the Spanish team Deportivo la Coruņa in the UEFA cup. Brann was the underdogs by far, partly because they've beaten the star club Real Madrid, and, well, because they're Spanish and Brann's Norwegian. And add Brann's extremely poor performance this season, and everything says: Deportivo > Brann. However! Brann surprised everyone in the match, with a form and quality that was on par with what we performed last year when they won the Norwegian premier league, and maybe even better! We won 2 - 0, which is a good result when we're playing the second leg match in Spain in a few weeks' time. Of course, we could've easily won with 5 or 6 goals, but I won't complain 
I think this match is going to be a major lift-up, seeing as we've lost many matches to some of the worst teams in the Norwegian premier league lately.
Here's a picture of the player of the match, Eirik Huseklepp, in action.
I'm gonna save you of my thoughts on the new tv.com layout...
I think this match is going to be a major lift-up, seeing as we've lost many matches to some of the worst teams in the Norwegian premier league lately.Here's a picture of the player of the match, Eirik Huseklepp, in action.
I'm gonna save you of my thoughts on the new tv.com layout...
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