How NOT to prepare for a rock show

Friday November 13, 2009 was a day I’d been looking forward to for months and months in advance. It would be the day where I (along with my partner in crime, Tina, naturally) would finally get to experience one of my favorite, if not my favorite, up and coming metal bands – Five Finger Death Punch – live on stage in a rather intimate setting in nearby Aarhus, Denmark.

Now, there are a lot of different ways of preparing for a much anticipated concert experience. Coming down with a case of the H1N1 (aka Swine Flu) is NOT one of them. Which is why I, as I think you can imagine, got more than a little worried and pissed on the evening of Tuesday 10 November when I was sitting at work and suddenly started feeling heavy headed, queasy, sore throated and dizzy. Long uneventful story short, I went home, crashed on the couch which right now doubles on my bed and stayed there for a solid 60 hours straight, during which the flu hit full force and started a battle of wits and determination with my bodily defense systems.

I wouldn’t say that the whole H1N1 experience was that tough on me physically, I was mainly just tired, heavy headed and completely drained of energy. What was probably worst was the whole mental aspect of not knowing whether I’d be up and about on Friday or whether I’d have to call Tina and tell her that I’d have to cancel the date we’d so been looking forward to. Luckily, as it turns out I needn’t have worried as my determination to rock helped my immune system beat the last remaining germs and so, on Friday morning, I finally emerged from bed, nice healthy, well rested (after having slept most of two and a half days away), and ready to rock!

This fact seemed to really please the Tina as she herself hadn’t really know whether to get excited about the show or whether to fear that the entire ordeal would be canceled. Now that we knew it was on, we spent the morning (which is to say the early afternoon as morning to me is now generally somewhere in the 11 AM – 12 Noon area) making the final plans and arrangements for the day. Our plan ended up being reasonably simple. We’d meet up at Tina’s at around 3 PM, hang out a bit while she more than likely got the last few things done, walk down to the train station, catch the 4:20 PM train towards Aarhus and spend the one and a half hour train ride drinking a few beers. Then find something to eat, hang out a bit, go to the venue, get in and rock out.. Pretty simple, really..

And, of course, it turned out reasonably more complicated than that. For starters, I kicked things off being late to get out the door, when I finally did make it out and a few minutes down the road, I had to turn back as I realized that I’d gone off WITH my glasses on but WITHOUT my ear plugs in my pocket. Which, in the case of a hardcore metal show, is not the way you want to go, doubling back, returning on my way and sprinting a bit now, I made it down to Tina’s only fashionably late.. Only to realize that she, naturally, wasn’t ready either.. See, Tina was in the process of giving herself a decidedly more “metal”-like look for the occasion.. Ahem, yes, granted, a metal-like look isn’t really something you’d expect from a pretty, little, blue-eyed, innocent looking platinum blonde girl.. But as with so many other things in life, Tina went at it full force with loads of determination.. And a rather alternative approach.. Which, as with so many other things she does, you wouldn’t really expect to work.. Yet somehow it does.

So, when I found Tina, she was in the bathroom, applying her 20th layer or so of mascara to finish a prominently dark and smokey eye-makeup scheme which she claimed to be very metal and fitting for the occasion. I’m not quite sure I quite followed her, but I deducted that she looked great as always only with considerably darker (and albeit slightly scarier and more overwhelming) eye-makeup, so I didn’t argue. Having finished that, my wonderful and slightly deranged sidekick then launched into what must probably be the first ever heavy metal related clothing crisis in recorded history.. Yes, dear reader, I didn’t think that would be possible either. But apparently there was a lot of confusion as to whether the outfit of the evening should be all black, as pink a possible or a combination of both.. And what, pray tell, f’ing shoes should the poor girl wear?

I mean.. Honestly, babe, you know I love you.. But sometimes, just sometimes, I think you may be part of the reason why I’m losing my hair

After many considerations, a fair bit of teasing on my behalf and a lot of chasing about the house, trying various things on Tina’s behalf, we finally settled on a suitable outfit of black and pink. After I convinced Tina that heels probably weren’t the most suitable choice in a mosh-pit, we even decided on a plair of flat, pink (of course) Converse shoes.. And were about ready to head out the door.. Which was good considering we were now running so late that we pretty much had to head out the door in order to catch our train and such things.

Walking to the train, we chatted merrily, an activity we kept up through the ticket purchase process and subsequent wait for the train to arrive. We even kept up our conversation on the train, only this time with the added benefit of a couple of cold beers to keep us company.

The first leg of our journey ended in Fredericia, a near-by small town and major train hub where we changed trains and boarded an Intercity Express train for Aarhus. A very packed Intercity Express Train to boot. As such, we spent the first part of the journey standing up which left me more than a little queasy as I was standing right in the connecting joint between two train carts, so I was pretty happy when eventually Tina spotted a place for us to sit down for the remainder of the journey. The remainder of the train journey went without any major discomfort if you disregard the fact that I had to pee for most of the way.

We eventually arrived in Aarhus with a few hours to kill and since it was a pretty rainy, cold Friday evening, most of this time was killed in a major shopping mall located conveniently adjacent to the main train station. Here we spent a lot of time gazing at things that Tina really wanted but that she, thank God, couldn’t purchase as we were going to a rock show and had no way of bringing our things. As curtain call time grew closer, we eventually made our way from the comfort of the brightly lit, air conditioned shopping mall into the cold, rainy Aarhus night and, by way of a local Burger King, made our way towards the venue for the show..

And this is where things really started getting interesting..

WWYDOARWM?

The above, in case you may be wondering, is short for “What Would You Do On A Rainy Wednesday Morning?” My answer to the above question has turned out to be something along the lines of: “Why don’t I get up three hours earlier than normal and go blow about DKK 4,500 on clothes and shoes?”

Right? Yeah, granted, that doesn’t sound very much like your usual Johan-like behavior.. And it’s probably not, but when you haven’t really shopped for clothes other than the odd band shirt and pair of jeans for the last couple of years, and a local store goes out of business.. Well, what better excuse do you need to go crazy?

Of course, me being the kinda guy that I am, I still haven’t quite gotten into the power shopping habit, so a bit of help was called for.. And, as with so many other of life’s bigger or smaller problems, I turned to my beautiful and trusty sidekick Tina for help. A lot of guys would probably frown upon the idea of having to go shopping with a girl, but I happen to have spotted quite a few advantages. For starters, the girl has taste, she’s quick at picking things out, she knows what fits and what doesn’t.. (Come to think of it, why isn’t she making money working at a clothing store?) And, far more importantly (and surprisingly), shopping with her is a TON of fun.. There, I said it, I know it sounds weird, but I just gone said it.

I know what you’re saying? How can shopping.. With a girl.. Possibly be any fun? Well, probably because for starters we really don’t take anything too serious when shopping together. We’ll look for any excuse to go at each other’s throats and launch into long extend arguments about anything or nothing in particular, we’ll bitch, we’ll gripe, we’ll moan and grab any excuse to offend or scold each other, while still taking the time out for the odd sweet comment or sincere compliment and suggestion.. Basically we’re the old married couple that never were a couple.. Or old for that matter.. And we’ll still feign shock and surprise when people draw the somewhat understandable conclusion that we are, in fact, a couple. It’s led to some pretty funny incidents over the years and left many a frustrated or bewildered store clerk in our wake.. Like the poor, little lady who nearly had a nervous breakdown when she thought our shopping for a new coffee maker for me was turning into a marital crisis.

Anyways, for these very reasons, I’d hooked up with Tina for this Wednesday’s spending spree and since Tina preferred meeting up in the AM, I cut her some slack and agreed to meet up at 10 AM when she just happened to be downtown on other adventures as well. Not so much because I enjoyed going to bed at 4 AM and getting up at 9, but rather because it fit both of us (sorta) and at least that way I’d have the chance to get out of the day for a change.

So, at the ripe, ungodly hour of 10 AM, Tina and I found ourselves knocking on the door of a downtown Men’s clothing store, very appropriately named “MEN”. The store manager greeted us with a smile of the “Oh, good, you again” variety as we trickled in and started searching about. Main priority was to get a new suit for me, a process which was made inherently complicated by the fact that neither of us knew anything about sizes and shapes and both of us were suffering from caffeine withdrawals (i.e. no morning coffee). We eventually enlisted the help of the store manager who not only found a suit with a nice fit and the proper size, but, on my request, also provided Tina with a cup of coffee to pick her up.. And pick her up it certainly did.

I’m actually not entirely sure what happened, but we went from all being rather slumped over the counter and un-energetic to Tina chasing about the entire store, pulling everything out, gazing it over and going “this one, this one, this.. and this one..” – highly strange, highly effective and highly damaging to my bank account.. Fast forward about an hour and I’m DKK 4,500 poorer, but up a new suit, two pair of shoes, a hoodie shirt, a few t-shirts, shirts, gloves, socks.. And other stuff as well! Ouch!

We ended up leaving the store at about 11:30, considerably weighed down by my purchases and entering into a sudden, but predictable, November shower, through which we moved as quickly as possible down to Tina’s where I’m now stuck sipping coffee, listening to Nick Cave, updating the old blog and trying to find some job openings to apply for.. Currently reeling quite a lot and think I might have to head home and catch a bit of shut eye before work tonight..

Yup, still not digging working nights, but as always, it’s better than nothing.. And I had a long positive day for a change.. Yay!

By popular demand..

I’m back! Back in a bloggin’ groove! (For those already staring in bewilderment, that was a very old, very vague KISS reference)

It’s been a while, eh? Actually, it’s been longer than ever, I do think.. And I’m sorry, real life, real stuff and real thoughts and feelings sorta took over for a while there.. But owing to increasing demand, frequently repeated requests, my own need to spew out random rants and slurs of profanity every now and then, and last, but certainly not least, my complete utter inability to look a blonde in the eyes and tell her no: I’m bringing weirdness back to the blogging world!

So, my trusty followers, it has been a while, I hope you’re all still more or less here and are doing well. I myself have been reasonably well, hella busy and quite about. In the weeks that have passed, I’ve:

- Learned to laugh in the face of rejection (I didn’t get the job I really wanted, despite them really liking me, they went with someone with more experience)

- Bumped heads and knuckles with rock stars (Tina and I saw Shadows Fall and Five Finger Death Punch live)

- Realized I hate when celebrity chef Alton Brown is right (Coffee does taste better with a pinch of salt and chili con carne does need a splash of supermarket salsa)

- Figured out that I CAN in fact produce a five course dinner with wine pairings that make my awestruck dinner guest state that life probably could not get much better than this.

- Had an epiphany at 4 AM on a Tuesday morning which involved a single glass, a single ice cube and a single shot of Russian Premium vodka.

- Taken on the swine flu and lived to tell the tale.. And all I got to show for it was a lousy stack of extra paper work at work!

- Learned that Steel Panther is the funniest thing to happen to metal since Tenacious D.

- .. Oh and I’ve gotten some applications out as well!

One or more of the above will more than likely turn into stories in the near future, as for right now, I’m off to send another application and continue on the quest towards landing a job.

Big day tomorrow!

I feel like I hardly ever update this blog anymore, which is probably a lie.. But still, I know I haven’t been as active as usual. But then, life has been keeping me pretty busy..

Wow, life.. Life suddenly just got very real for me. After struggling through five years of university and a MA thesis, I finally have a job interview tomorrow! As a community and customer service representative at a local expanding internet startup. I’m beyond excited as the job appears to involve large parts of web based communication and focus on Web 2.0 and various emerging and booming web technologies. Basically the exact same thing that the last two years of my life have revolved around.

I’m really proud that my application seems to have peaked their interested and am so stoked to hear more about it all tomorrow. As for right now, I’m really busy prepping for the interview and getting the relevant papers (and myself) all sorted out for the big day. It’s been a while since I’ve had a real job interview, so I’m also slightly nervous, but I have a good feeling about it and am ready to give it my best. Wish me luck!

It’s better now to be alive..

Wow, I never would have thought, but apparently complaining over the internet does pay off every now and then. No sooner did I star complaining about being sick but not sick enough to take the day off and start feeling better before I got hit in the face with a full on frontal attack of the sickies which knocked me off the feet and kept me entirely incapacitated for an entire day..

Which isn’t really half as bad as it sounds because while I do hate being sick, at least it forced me to take some time off. So, in a completely unprecedented move, I called in sick Thursday evening – on my own account and without facing any kind of external pressure or threats. Granted, Tina did let me know in no uncertain terms what she thought I should do, but I think even she knew I was gonna make my own mind about what to do. Luckily, though, and much to her approval. I ended up making my mind up in favor of her recommendations and calling in sick.

It wasn’t pretty, I wasn’t enjoying it and, to be entirely honest, there was quite a lot of whining and bitching involved on my part. Especially when I started really feeling better at around 9 PM Thursday and was more or less just lying around, feeling bored and thinking that I should be putting my time to better use. But for once, I fought through it, stayed in bed a full 24 hours and got over my spell of.. Well, whatever was bringing me down.

As a result, I got up Friday morning feeling better than I have in quite a while and actually felt ready to face the day. Even more so when I checked my email and found a reply to an application I recently had sent out. A very favorable reply, that is, asking me to call and schedule a time for a job interview which I did. And as a result I now have a job interview next Thursday at 11:30 AM for a really interesting sounding job for a local web company.. Yay! Needless to say, Friday soon became the best day in a long while..

But more on that later. I’ve had, and am still having a crazy busy weekend full of work and good times with both family and friends, good food, good wine, a few good beers and some DIY projects.. More on all of these crazy adventures later. For now I’m off to enjoy the rest of the day with my dad and his family in Nyborg. I haven’t seen them in ages, after all, just thought I’d let the world know I was doing a hell of a lot better and having one hell of a weekend

Can’t ever do anything right..

Not even get sick properly.. Huh? What?

Yea, in case you’re wondering, I’m apparently sick again.. But not like really sick.. Just.. The average Johan kind of sickness. Which involves being sick enough to feel generally crappy, fatigued and miserable.. But not really sick enough to be properly knocked out and just ride off the storm for a few days.

As a result, I keep telling myself that I can keep up at least some of my daily chores including going to work.. And I do manage to get things done. Just in a much harder and slower way than usually.  Well, I manage to get SOME things done, mainly work. The days, in turn are spent sprawled out on the couch, recovering and resting, not really getting anything done around the house.

Strange as it sounds, I wish I’d just get really sick for a few days, be completely floored and get it out of the system in a matter of days. It somehow seems better than the deal I’m currently getting where I’ve been feeling slightly queasy for almost a week now.. Blah, careful what you wish for, I guess.

I apologize for the short post, but I’m off to make some more chicken noodle soup with borderline insane amounts of chili and garlic as garnish. It seems to be my best weapon against whatever it is that ails me at the time being.

Equilibrium has once again been achieved!

Something utterly weird happened last week. I received a large stash of cash from Tina, and a pretty significant bank transfer from my ex-girlfriend Louise.. Which means that I not only gained DKK 1600 in an afternoon but was also in a strange, unfamiliar situation in which, for the first time in years, no one owed me any money what-so-ever.. Well, none that I know of anyways.

You may think this is a good thing, and indeed it was. But to me, it was also a very unfamiliar situation because we have, literally for the past couple of years, been in a situation where Tina constantly owed me at least some amount of money and where I’d be able to cash in on her debt with me whenever we were going somewhere or doing something.. And then, all of a sudden, this nice, familiar comfortable situation came to an end with her paying off her debt and changing everything.. Clearly something had to be done, because the prospect of her not being financially dependent on my just wasn’t very appealing.

So I did what any reasonable person in my situation would do and lend her some more money! A much smaller amount this time, granted, but it served the purpose of not only bringing things back to normal, but also allowing for us to have more than one concert to look forward to in this year. Long story short, I bought two tickets for us to go see the Five Finger Death Punch + Shadows Fall show @ Voxhall in Aarhus on November 13. Which is cool for a myriad of reasons, the first being that Five Finger Death Punch is one of my absolute favorite bands right now, another being that it’s been a while since we saw any live acts, and yet another is.. Well.. Just the plain awesomeness of it all!

I mean, look.. Most guys my age have female best friends whose idea of quality time together on a Friday night is probably something along the lines of sipping tea together while watching Dancing With The Stars or America’s Next Top Model. Me, I’m blessed with Tina who’d take a beer with a Jägermesiter chaser over a cuppa tea any day and would all but love to spend a Friday night leading the charge with me in the front row at a thrash/metalcore show.. Hah! How awesome is that? I mean.. really!

But I digress, I guess, but you’ll have to forgive me on account of me being just a wee thrilled about the fact that I’m seeing one of my favorite bands live in a month in a small and intimate setting with good company. I really could think of worse ways to spend a Friday evening..

In closing, things are better now than they were just a few days ago. I have more concerts to look forward to, Tina once again owes me money, and rumor has it that Denmark beat Sweden in footie this past Saturday and is now heading to the World Cup in South Africa next summer

Oh Dunkel, where art thou?

A lot of really monumental and life-changing events have happened over the course of very little time lately. Some of them expected and well-planned. Some of them less expected and not so well-planned. Into the latter category falls a sudden change of heart and a very brisk move away from Kolding by a certain young man known amongst friends simply as Dunkel.

“WHAT?” I hear one or two of you yelling. And incidentally that’s the exact same reaction I managed once I heard the news. See, it’s not like I was given any further notice than the rest of you lot.. So, over the course of a Wednesday night, I suddenly had to adjust to the fact that one of my best friends over the course of the last four or five years had picked up his things and left in a drunken panic, more or less over night.

Here.. I’ll try to explain: I pretty much knew that things hadn’t been going too well for Dunkel lately and that he was feeling less than happy about things and the way that they were working out for him.. Consequently. I actually got a little worried when suddenly I did not hear from the guy in like half a week or so.. Or well, I didn’t actually hear from him and he didn’t actually return any of my messages and calls. When I found out that people at work had not heard from him either and that he’d called in sick a few times, well.. I started to suspect that something might be up.. And something was indeed up, but not in quite the way I’d expected.

When I finally did hear from Dunkel, it was by way of a single message stating: “If I told you I was in the middle of a huge moving mess, would you be willing to trade shifts with me at work tonight?” Incidentally, this message arrived without warning right as I was in the middle of picking up an order at a local sushi place, so needless to say it left me more than a little confused. I gathered myself, grabbed my raw fish and set out the door, phone in hand, as my finger pushed the dial button on Dunkel’s number.

The resulting phone conversation didn’t leave me much the wiser. I got a hold of a grinning Dunkel who very matter of factly proclaimed that he’d spent the last couple of days moving half way across the country to move in with his girlfriend of a couple of years now. When pressed for details and reasoning, he stated very little and was only willing to offer an apology for not informing me based on the fact that he was drunk when it happened. As improbable as this may sound, it’s actually pretty standard logic on Dunkel’s behalf in some situations, so I didn’t really press him further on the matter as I could hear that I wasn’t really going to get more info out of him. Thus, I concluded that at least he sounded happy and I’d probably get a more detailed explanation at some other time. I then hung up and subsequently called Tina to tell her our friend had moved, offering her all the facts that I knew, knowing that this way I at least wasn’t going to be the only one to spent the rest of the day in a boggled state of confusion about the matter.

It’s been two weeks or so now since the move and I’m not sure how much wiser I am on the whole issue. I’ve gotten so far as to understand that Dunkel wasn’t feeling well and needed a change of climate and perspective. In his relatively impulsive mind, that apparently translates to picking up his tent and moving half way across country to live with his girlfriend. Whatever his reasoning, I can tell that he’s sounding and looking a lot happier now so it probably was all for the better.. Even if I’ll miss having the weirdo around.

I took some time out of the calendar today to go down to his old apartment and help him move some of his last items, including his grotesquely large fish tank, and to see with my own eyes that he was actually doing well which seemed to be the case. I don’t know about you guys, but to me there’s always a sort of somber feeling involved with helping friends move away. Especially when it’s people you’ve know well and have spent a lot of time with. In my case, I’ve probably split my time pretty evenly between my own apartment and those of Tina and Dunkel.. Which is to say that we were clearing out a place where I’ve spent like 1/3 of the last four years and now won’t be spending any more time at on account of it being all empty-like and Dunkel not living there anymore.. I dunno, it just gives me a weird feeling. Thinking about the good times had, the silly things done, and I’m starting to sound more and more like a sensitive old sod.

So, anyways, somber times, but still good times, Dunkel looks well, and I’m still not sure what the hell is going on, but we did get most of his stuff out save a bed and another few items and he now seems ready to move on and make a new life for himself and his girlfriend. An endeavor in which I wish him well. And I hope I can still visit and crash on the couch over there or something coz I do believe we still have a few beers to be had and a few laughs to share.

I’ll miss you, my brother in fuld! \m/

Guess what *I* did last weekend?

No? Nothing? Well, I’ll tell you just what I did!

In a rather drastic move, I went from looking a little something like this:

To looking a little something like this:

“Wow, Johan,” you might be thinking, “isn’t that a little drastic?” .. And yes, dear reader, you’d be right in thinking so.. But, really, there’s some degree of reasoning behind the madness.. Or, there’s a hint of an explanation at least.

You see, some three years ago, about a month after my last haircut at that time, my friend Emelie started complaining that my hair was getting a little long and asking if I wouldn’t be needing a haircut any time soon. “In due time,” I answered the dear girl, “and I promise you then when I will in fact be needing a haircut, you’ll get to cut it whichever way you like!”

Well, as you may have been able to figure out by now. The day of my, in Emelie’s mind, much needed haircut did not, in fact, arrive any time soon.. In fact, it took me a couple of years to muster the courage to let her have a go at me with her scissors. Eventually, I decided that the day of my earning my Master’s degree would be the day that the hair would finally go.. Or a day close to that anyways.

Which is why I grabbed the chance last weekend when the entire gang – Tina, Zascha, Emelie and I plus others – were gathered at Zascha’s parents’ house for an extended fun-filled weekend. I told Emelie to bring her scissors and have a go at the untamable mange my hair had become. She gladly accepted the offer and set to work according to the rules: “Do what thou willt shall be the whole of the haircut” … Err.. I mean.. “Do whatever you want with the hair..”

The result is visible above and I’m actually pretty well chuffed with it. And also having one hell of a time enjoying the reactions to my recently amputated head of hair.

The fact aside that getting a haircut has actually been a pretty traumatic positive experience, the best thing about the whole ordeal has been me actually managing to keep the whole cutting of my hair a secret and subsequently returning to Kolding, not saying a word to anyone, and just watching the reactions on the faces of others as they discovered that I had lost about a foot of hair over the course of a weekend. Reactions have ranged from absolute indifference to very posiitve indeed. From joy over shock to sheer appalled horror.

I’ve received compliments, rude remarks, jokes, begging questions and just plain weird looks. I may even have been left out of my father’s will. Here’s a short list of some of the more entertaining reactions I’ve received over the course of the last few days:

“But.. But.. YOUR HAIR!!!” – Poor, shocked, middle-aged lady at the checkout register at my local supermarket as she nearly fainted in shock.

“No.. No.. No.. No.. No longer heavy metal!!” – Said in a thick accent by a Polish worker at GLS.

“Looks great! – Miss Pakistan 2003.

“HOLY SHIT!!” – Niels, Nis, Christian and others at work.

“Oh wow.. Looks amazing.. So, your girl..thing.. Tina made you do this? Good girl!” – Lene, my former supervisor at work. (notice, by the way, Tina being referred to as a girl..thing.. It would appear that people still aren’t quite getting it )

“Eh.. Heh.. Heh.. Hehehe.. Heh?” – Tom, my former foreman at work.

“Wait, where’d it go?” – Tanja at work in reference to my signature ponytail.

“I thought you’d gone a little bald over the weekend” – Zascha’s grandmother.

Johan and Tina’s Wild Weekend Adventures, Part 4

Our sleeping arrangements may not have been all that we’d bargained or hoped for, but it pretty quickly turned out that the weirdness and uncertainty regarding these were nothing compared to the weirdness and uncertainty of our Sunday.

I didn’t really get a good night’s sleep from Saturday to Sunday. For starters, we got to bed at like 5 AM, moreover I was actually cold and freezing for a change and lastly, I’m not really good at spending the night on couches in unfamiliar homes, but that’s just me. Consequently, I took ages just to get to sleep and when I did, I only enjoyed a few hours of constantly interrupted sleep as I had a weird habit of stirring awake about every five minutes.. Boo! Eventually, I heard the welcome sound of Tina stirring and starting to get up and a few minutes later, she popped her head in to see how I was doing.. And thus began a long, strange waiting game that lasted most of the day.

See, we did find ourselves in a bit of a predicament. Having had to change sleeping arrangements in the middle of the night and having borrowed Kim’s house with him and his girlfriend driving on to sleep at her place meant that, well, that we were essentially stuck in the middle of nowhere without Tina’s car and without any way of getting to it other than Kim getting up and driving home (as promised) and giving us a ride back to Tina’s car.. This had been the plan all along, but it was also a plan that was coined long before Kim got completely off of his ass drunk and started thrashing around making little to no sense.

Having had the night to sleep on and ponder this fact, we then realized that we might be running a little late on this particular day, but we had no idea how bad things were to get.. And when we got up, pretty much everything we could think about was breakfast and coffee.. And Kim of course had neither in the house! So, first things first were to call Kim not only in an effort to wake him from his sleep, but also to get directions to a nearby bakery where we could get some food – and hopefully coffee, too. To his credit, Kim did reply, not feeling too good, obviously, but he did give us directions towards the bakery, so into the cool morning air Tina and I went to get some food while, we thought, Kim got up and got ready to go pick us up.

For the record, I’ll advise anybody against getting stuck in tiny Danish villages without food on hand, it’s not that you can’t get food, it’s just that it’s hellishly expensive. We ended up taking a long, nice brisk walk to the nearest bakery and then blowing about DKK 1oo of Tina’s hard earned money on a loaf of bread, some cheese and a small canister of freeze dried coffee. Ridiculous! But we were hungry and happily returned “home” to brew up a few cups of freeze dried coffee and chomp down on a few slices of walnut bread with cheese while watching Disney’s “Cars”.. Aside from the fact that it was really rather cold without central heating, curling up on the couch with crappy coffee and overpriced breakfast was actually surprisingly nice like.

By the end of the movie, which was surprisingly good by the way, we were kinda starting to wonder where the hell Kim was at. The clock had now passed 1 PM and Tina had a football game at just past 2 PM which it was now becoming clear that she wasn’t going to make. We therefore decided to place yet another call to Kim only to discover that he had actually fallen asleep again rather than getting up.. Lovely! Tina scolded him a bit and told him to get his ass in gear while we settled down to watch yet another movie in the form of Ice Age 2 which I thought I’d seen, but apparently hadn’t. Upon having watched this movie and watched the clock progress even further, Tina and I were now starting to get downright grumpy. Not only had we both missed an appointment that day, we were also quickly running out of things to do in a rather empty house without central heating and a working TV signal. So, after placing more frantic phone calls to a still sleeping Kim, we got up and went for another walk around the village, covering all of it at least twice in the half hour or so we walked around for while trying to get Kim off his ass.

Following several failed attempts and angry phone calls, we finally managed to get him on his way at around 5 PM and returned to the house to wait for him and his girlfriend to arrive which they did without much splendor some time later. Upon seeing Kim, it was pretty obvious why things had taken some time. The poor guy looked completely beside himself, shaking, pale and absolutely not looking fit for fight and I was actually kinda surprise that he’d actually made the trip back to the house. It also became clear that he wasn’t driving us anywhere that day so while he settled down to rest his poor, beaten body, his girlfriend, Karina, got us into her car and drove us back to Tina’s uncle’s place where Tina’s car was waiting. Here we made our quick goodbyes with her and got ready to move on, but not before checking in on Lars and Pia..

Who, surprise surprise, also looked more than a little worse for wear on this bright Sunday. We hung around for a while chatting with them and sharing impressions of the night before heading on on our quest to find our way back to Kolding.. Which we did by way of Tina’s parents whom we wanted to just drop in on to say hi while we were in the neighborhood anyways. We only managed to get hold of Tina’s mother, though, since her dad was out, but we did manage a cosy little talk with her before once again jumping in the car and heading back to Kolding.

On the way, we actually managed to (not literally) bump into Tina’s dad who was in turn on his way back home, so we created a nice little road block for a few minutes while parked on a country road chatting with him through open windows.. Good times!

By the time we were nearly back to Kolding, both of us were growing extremely hungry and since we were planning a whole roast chicken for dinner which, all things being equal, takes one hell of a long time to cook. It didn’t take much convincing for either of us (even me) to stop by Mickey D’s drive through on the way and get a few cheeseburgers just to keep the hunger at bay while the chicken cooked.

We finally made it back to Tina’s at around 7 PM, I think, and sat down to devour our Mickey D’s which we managed to do in about five minutes total and I must admit (don’t tell Tina) that I actually enjoyed it for a change. While we ate, the oven preheated and once we’d finished eating I got to work on gutting and rinsing the chicken. I really wanted Tina to do that part as she has much smaller hands and would have much easier access to the cavity, but I’d kinda guessed her answer in advance and as thus refrained from asking. Once clean, I stuffed the chicken with some quartered lemons and a whole bunch of garlic and shoved in in the oven for what was to be an unidentifiable amount of time. We then sat down to watch some CSI while the chicken cooked and all was good for a while.

Neither Tina nor I had roasted a whole chicken before so the timing on the chicken, sauce and potatoes went a little askew. Or, a lot really, but we survived and managed in the end. One important lesson learned is that you should really check if a chicken is done on both sides before starting to carve it because raw chicken juices spilling all over a small kitchen equals not only a righteous mess but a bit of a biohazard to boot! So, note to self, do that next time.

Once the chicken had finished its second trip in the oven and the potatoes and sauce had been kept warm for about half an hour, we were ready to once again carve the beast.. Which, again, was something that neither of us had attempted before, so I just sorta improvised.. And I’d like to say that it all went rather well. If you disregard the fact that I accidentally tore the leg bones off, snapped a few other bones and never managed to cut through the carcass. So, really, I didn’t do very well at all, but since it was just the two of us, we settled for a mess of boneless, shredded and roughly chopped chicken pieces, served on a community plate. Oh well. The important thing was that the bird was surprisingly juice and tasty, so despite having made an ungodly mess and nearly infected the both of us with food borne illnesses, we couldn’t help but sit there, eating our 9 PM dinner and patting ourselves on the backs for a job well done. It had been a long, tiring day that didn’t go anything like planned at all, but sitting there eating roasted chicken at way too late in the evening, it didn’t all seem so bad at all.. And, of course, we both ended up eating much more than we should have, resulting in the familiar sight of both of us giving two fucks about the dishes and just collapsing into Tina’s most comfortable chairs and laying there in a food coma for a few hours.

I quite honestly didn’t have the strength to get up for what seemed like at least two hours and when I finally did, it was only to clean up a bit of the remaining mess, wrap up the carcass of the chicken, thank Tina for a wonderful weekend and give her a big hug before dragging myself and the bird down the stairs, throwing the bird in the dumpster and then dragging myself on home. It really had been a most awesome and partially spontaneous but cozy weekend and thanks to my new work schedule and job hunting ways, it has taken me more than a week to actually relate all of it.. But there you go, we appear to have come full circle!