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!

Johan and Tina’s Wild Weekend Adventures, Part 3

As I got up Saturday morning at the crack of noon, it occurred to me that over the past couple of days, I’d developed a pretty strange sleeping pattern. I’d get the sleep I needed, on average anyways. I’d sleep five hours one night, ten the other, it’d add up to 15 hours of sleep total or 7.5 hours of sleep per night. It seemed a pretty strange way of doing things, but at least I’d feel well rested every other day.

Sleeping till noon did bear some implications on my day. I did initially have rather a lot of plans for the day, the most important of these being that Saturday was the day of Tina’s uncle celebrating his 40th birthday and I had been hired to plate and serve foods and drinks for the occasion. We weren’t leaving for the party until 4 PM’ish, but I’d hoped to get a lot of other things done before setting off.. But what with my deciding to sleep till past noon only to wake up to a fridge completely lacking something suitable to eat for breakfast, most of my plans got canceled in favor of finding food and getting ready to head out. Tina, being the sweetheart that she is, did offer that I could drop by for lunch, but that would have kept me from showering and getting ready which would also have been bad.. So I settled for staying home, running to the store and scrambling around feverishly to get food on the table before showering and getting ready and heading out – all while chatting happily with Tina on MSN, of course, as I still like to pretend I’m good in the whole multitasking department.

Needless to say, things got hectic in the end. My understanding was that Tina would be picking me up at around 4:15 PM and as such I didn’t even consider showering or starting to get ready till some point past 3 PM. I also somehow forgot to consider that I’ve been growing my hair long for three years now and that long hair takes longer to wash, dry and tame.. I don’t know how I keep doing that.. Either way, I ended up eventually doing pretty good time until Tina shot me a message asking if I’d have time to stop by her place and help her pick out shoes to match her outfit.. Which I’d of course love to do, but it also meant that I’d have to be ready and out the door about five minutes after receiving said request. A task I of course managed because I’m simply that damn good.

So, a little before 4 PM I was out the door and on my way down to Tina’s as fast as my legs could carry me and my new shoes and fancy clothes permitted. I’m not one to usually dress very fancy like, so dodging my way down dusty paths, zig-zagging between mopeds, happily newly wed couples and random drunken strangers while trying not to get my new clothes sweaty and dirty was an experience to say the least. But I managed. Barely. Almost. Which is to say that by the time I tumbled in through Tina’s front door, she remarked “Oh, you look good.. But there’s a huge smudge on you right there!” – Well, I try.. And the smudge wasn’t something that Tina’s expert advice and a barely damp paper towel couldn’t fix. Tina, as could be expected, looked smashing and picking out shoes turned out to be only a matter of my confirming that the ones she had already picked out looked great on her.. Which wasn’t much of a problem for me as they were red stilettos, so, umm, yeah.. Duh!

Having thus taken care of smudges and confirmed that Tina did in fact look very pretty, we set off towards the small neighbor town of Vejen where the party was to be held, chatting happily and listening to a bit of metal on the way – as we usually do. Tina eventually dropped me off by her uncle’s place before heading on herself to pick up her grandmother and finish a few things before returning later to take part in the festivities. As she drove off, I got acquainted with her uncle, aunt and their dog Whiskey and set out to explore the perimeter.

I should point out that I have next to no experience in the field of catering and serving at parties, I just somehow once in the past got tricked into doing it by Tina’s parents and apparently her entire family took such a liking to me and my efforts that they’re now regularly requesting my help for such chores. I’m not entirely sure why, but I’m not complaining as the money is pretty good and I do enjoy me a challenge and meeting new people. My lack of experience should prove an interesting facet this very night, though. I don’t know why, but I’d somehow guessed that they were hiring more people than just me for the job so during the tour of the house, the garden, the tent where the party was being held and the various caches of beverages and food, I was sorta starting to wonder when the others would show up but eventually deducted that they weren’t going to show..

As Tina’s uncle, Lars, at this point was on his second beer and aunt Pia seemed a little stressed out to a point where she was uncertain about the contents and stage of the menu she’d ordered and whether or not it would actually be delivered, this realization meant that I suddenly had to start taking additional mental notes and start actually planning things in my head. It also led me to conclude that I’d probably just have to go with the flow throughout the evening and improvise at times.. All in all, I didn’t have time to worry, though, because by the time they were done showing me around and reminding me not to hit my head on the low door frame that I kept bumping into, guests started arriving and the first calls of “where the hell is the food?” were heard.

Luckily, the caterer arrived with the food at around the same time that the last guests made their arrival. So I quickly paid off the man and started carrying the obscene amounts of food into the kitchen while guests mingled and had drinks. I’m not entirely sure how many people Uncle Lars and Aunt Pia had ordered for, but they certainly got their money’s worth. Some of the food arrived on serving platters, some had just been dropped into aluminum trays. Some had been carved, some needed carving. It was interesting.. But by way of an electric knife, whatever serving dishes I managed to pull from various cupboards, and despite of Tina’s dad who had snuck into the kitchen partially to make my life hell and partially to steal food, I managed to get food on the table while guests busied themselves having drinks and getting seated.

The food was being kept and prepared in the kitchen while the party took place across the yard in a large tent situated on the lawn, so I got a fair bit of exercise running back and forth which was all good. When guests were seated and had started to dig into both food, wine, beers and what have you, I was reasonably sure that the worst was over.. Which, of course, was entirely not the case, because now began the grueling task of keeping the serving platters full, the beer supply stocked, all while trying not to drop things, keep myself from crashing into guests who’d snuck outside for smoking and also answering various questions and performing various chores.. All while keeping an eye on the clock and the natural progression of the whole master plan – which had been related to me once, in a hurry. It was interesting, but for the most part worked out, even when people started fighting over whose song or which piece of entertainment were to come on next..

In short, it was quite a mouthful, but also quite fun, even if I didn’t know what I was doing half of the time but still had to pretend that I had everything under control when people dropped into the kitchen to say hi, chill, hang out and talk – which a surprising number of people actually did. Many of whom I’d never seen or spoken to before, but also familiar faces such as Tina’s parents, Tina herself with brother and brother’s girlfriend in tow and of course the dear hosts who most certainly seemed to be enjoying the whole ordeal.. Good times!

I eventually got to sit down and have some food myself at around 10 PM and was also joined by Tina, brother, etc for a beer in the kitchen before I was officially relieved of my duties and told by aunt Pia to go relax, sit down and have a few beers.. See, that was the best part of the whole ordeal: Since I was depending on Tina for transportation and what not and she, given the fact that there was an open bar all night, certainly wasn’t driving anywhere that evening, the plan was that once the food and everything was out of the way, I’d simply join the party, have a few beers and attempt not to make too much of a fool of myself in front of Tina’s family. So essentially, I got paid for the ordeal, got my fill of free food and eventually a party as well. Not an entirely bad way to spend a Saturday evening!

I joined the party at around 11 PM which was about five hours after everybody else and I pretty quickly felt that.. Let’s just say that mostly everybody else but me were in pretty high spirits and there was some catching up to do.. On the other hand, I’d been at it pretty hard the weekend before, so I wasn’t really in the mood to catch up too much. As a result, I kicked back in a safe little corner with the few people that I knew, popped open a beer.. Which eventually turned into a few beers.. and watched the mayhem ensue.. And as far as mayhem goes, I’ll have to hand it to Tina’s family!

Her uncle, the birthday boy, was pretty well liquored up by this time, as was his dear wife and in many ways they seemed to act as the catalysts for the party because everybody else just seemed to follow their lead, resulting in a lot of really drunk, really happy and fucking funny people. I’d barely managed to sit down before I witnessed Uncle Lars receiving the wedgie to end all wedgies at the hand of one of his friends who managed to literally nearly pull Lars’ boxers up over his head, effectively destroying the boxers in the process. Which Tina’s brother, Kim, may or may not have taken as an invitation to break more garment.. At any rate, it wasn’t long before he walked up to me, took one look at my new button up shirt, nodded and declared that I needed to show more skin before grabbing me by the collar with both hands and pulling in each direction, effectively ripping my shirt open, popping two buttons and baring my chest. I suppose it was his subtle way of saying “I’m drunk, welcome to the party!” – and what a party it was! I’m not generally very comfortable about showing skin, but I suppose after Kim’s makeover, I’d have to. Which also meant that I’d have to get some more beers in order to become more comfortable with the whole situation. Luckily, there were no shortage of people willing to drink them with me and no shortage of odd and weird sights and sounds: To name but a few, I saw a moped on the dance floor, a one armed man getting told off for beating people over the head with a small scale flag pole, I saw Tina getting dropped on her back from two meters in the air (poor thing).. And three generations headbanging to AC/DC. Now, I come from a family where parties can get pretty wild, but this was an absolute riot and good times were had by all until way into the wee hours when Tina decided that we were apparently heading out to take a look at the town..

And so we did. Or, well, made it all the way downtown just to discover that absolutely nothing was going on down there, so after a long and grueling walk, we just gave in and called it a night. Kim’s girlfriend’s dad had been nice enough to offer to come pick us up at any hour, so at around 3:30 we gave him a call and being the cool father that he was, he set out on a long drive to pick us up.. While we set out to get some pizza and figure out sleeping arrangements for the night..

Which were an interesting story of their own. Tina and I were too far away from home to sleep in our own beds and  had originally thought that we’d be spending the night at Tina’s parents. Tina’s parents, however, not only left the party early, they’d also forgotten about the arrangements and owing to this and various personal issues, sleeping there was not and option. So Tina had spent the night exploring various alternative sleeping arrangements. It was eventually decided that we’d spend the night at her brother’s house which was all fine and good, though apparently Kim and his girlfriend weren’t spending the night there, too, but were rather going to be staying at his girlfriend’s place. I’m not entirely sure of the reasoning applied here but the result was that we waited for our ride to show up, drove by Tina’s uncle’s house to pick up some stuff, then by Kim’s house where Tina and I were dropped off and let in as the rest of the crew traveled on to new destinations.

Regardless of the reasoning, I was pretty tired at this point and was happy to just have somewhere to sleep, so while Tina got ready and settled into her brother’s bed, I got out a sleeping bag I’d borrowed from her and got settled on the couch. Which proved a little difficult in the pitch darkness of a strange house, but after some bumping into stuff, I eventually managed to find the couch and the sleeping bag and curl up for a few hours of sleep.. The clock had now past 5 AM, but it was still to be a good two hours before I got any sleep at all which I found kinda strange considering it had been such a long tiring day..

Oh.. WOW!

This is officially a first for me.. For the first time ever, I’ll be praising Chris Cornell, a love song AND a cover in one sentence. We all probably know that I’m not usually one to get excited about cover songs. We also know that I consider Chris Cornell ever so slightly overrated. And, we most certainly know, that I’m not usually the guy to get all soft and mushy over a love song. Never the less, I have to share this song.

So, I give you: Chris Cornell doing a breathtaking cover version of what I sincerely believe to be the most beautiful and sincere love song ever written: Led Zeppelin’s Thank You.

Impressive, really..

Master, Master..

I know, I was in the middle of something, a longer tale of last weekend to be exact.. But here’s the thing.. I feel compelled to mention that I just a few hours ago received an e-mail which threw me completely off course and has had me jumping for joy ever since first reading it.

I’m apparently now officially a MASTER of Information Technology! … And apparently a good one at that!

The e-mail I received was from my mentor on the project and read something along the lines of:

Hello Johan,

I’ve spoken with the external examiner on your Master Thesis and we both agree that you’ve delivered a nice, solid effort. It has a few minor flaws, but nothing that keeps us from grading it a well-deserved 10!

You’ll receive a formal piece of paper in a few days containing our official assessment of your work, but as of right now feel free to pop open a beer and order a pizza

All the best,

Lars

I have a Master’s Degree.. For Real.. I can’t believe it!

Johan and Tina’s Wild Weekend Adventures, Part 2

For the record, getting only five hours of sleep is not the best way of starting a day dedicated to cheering up a loved one. While years of sleep deprivation has taught me not to let my mood be affected by lack of sleep and rest, lack of sleep does make the execution of basic tasks such as well laid out, spontaneously generated, fool proof plans for the cheering up of tiny Tinas.. So it was with a bit of starting difficulties that I got up on Friday morning at 10 AM and started on my plan to spoil Tina silly.

The first part of my plan involved going to the store for four remaining ingredients needed for meals and drinks throughout the day. This pretty basic task was made exceedingly complicated by the fact that when I’d gotten up, gotten ready and all, I was entirely incapable of finding my house key.. Anywhere.. I literally spent about a half hour searching through my relatively modest living quarters only to eventually find it laying around under a stack of papers.. Go figure!

Having finally retrieved my key, I set off to the store, thinking that I didn’t need to bring my shopping list, coz well, how was I to screw up when I only had four items on it.. Ahem, well, as it turns out, when I arrived back some twenty minutes later, I did manage to screw up.. Or, well, I did make it back with four items.. Only, they somehow weren’t the items on my list.. Which seemed a bit confusing to me, but then I was really tired and so a second trip was quickly planned and executed.

It all was a bit of a mess, but luckily it ended up somehow fitting into my grand plan because I had Tina on text throughout my entire confuddled attempt to execute the most basic step of my plan and my blatantly screwing up always seems to bring a grin to her face, so in that aspect my grand plan was already working.. Tina was smiling and laughing.. On my behalf, granted, but hey, I’ve gotten used to that. Having finally gotten everything needed for the day, I made coffee, ate breakfast, showered, packed everything up and prepared to head down to Tina.. At which point another major problem occurred: In my grand effort to make everything perfect, considerate, personal and thoughtful, I’d ended up picking out and packing so many damn things that I’d filled up not only my backpack, but also two large plastic bags with groceries, drinks, frozen meals and what have you. Add to that the fact that the weather was actually nice and hot for a change and I had quite the long, tiring haul ahead of me.

Now, I think it’s fair to say that Tina has probably by now gotten used to a bit of slight exaggeration on my behalf in an effort to make everything right. But that’s not to say that she didn’t produce quite a bewildered look and an amused giggle when I crashed through her door, panting and cursing and dropping all my goods on her floor. Giggles turned to laughs and smiles when I started explaining the reasoning and considerations behind my apparent mad actions and I dare say she felt quite appreciated and spoiled once she got over the initial shock. At any rate, she didn’t seem very upset or unhappy during the day, but rather chatty, happy and smiling.. But then again, we apparently have that effect on each other.

After the few initial mishaps, things actually went rather smoothly. Tina worked on her presentation, I whiled away time surfing the web, I cooked her lunch of whole grain pasta with tomato/cream sauce which was immensely enjoyed by all (yes, all two of us) and consumed in portions more resembling dinner servings than lunch, but let’s not tell anybody, eh? Following lunch, we went on a long cosy walk around sunny ol’ Kolding, chatting and part-taking in our favorite activities which include bickering about everything and nothing in particular, disagreeing with each other for the sake of disagreeing, cracking jokes and commenting on the size of Tina’s ass.. Wait, that last part probably sounded wrong, so scratch that.. We also did laundry, a rather simple activity which, like so many other things we engage in together, ended in a feverish shouting battle when Tina dropped some stuff and my gentleman instinct told me to bend down and pick it up, not actually realizing that I was reaching for her.. umm.. delicates.. The resulting discussion was too weird to recall here, but leave it to us to turn something as simple as laundry into a huge argument.

After this first real martial crisis of the day, we decided to go grocery shopping since Tina was pretty much fresh out and even tiny people need to eat now and then, so we got into Tina’s car, drove to the store and went for one of the more entertaining grocery runs I’ve ever been on. Needless to say, it involved more arguing, some pouting, some ordering each other around and, again, a bit of shouting. It also involved a lot of turned heads from random passersbys and a few strange looks.. And why do people think we’re dating again?! Things got really out of control when I started bossing Tina around, telling her to act her age, behave, get out of people’s way and what not. This practice inadvertently got us talking to a chatty elderly gentleman who apparently thought we made a nice, healthy looking, young couple and that Tina couldn’t be blamed (as I was trying to do) for being in his way as he was the one sporting a large gut. I, being the utter asshole friend that I am at times, made some (entirely untrue) comment about it not being entirely his fault as Tina, too, was getting a little chubby. This, of course, made Tina pout and mutter “he’s always teasing me” in her littelest voice, while it sent our new-found friend on a long rant about how we couldn’t all be as slim as me and how he’d just recently quit smoking, gained a lot of weight as a result and was now working out feverishly to get buff and fit.. Which was probably all true, but still a bit of a weird stream of information to reveal to random strangers.

We eventually escaped our new chatty friend and continued on our happy bickering way. We eventually ended up getting a whole bunch of stuff. Needed and un-needed groceries alike.. We even got a chicken! Yes, a chicken! Well, a dead roasting chicken, mind you, but still. I’m not entirely sure how it happened, but we found a whole bunch of fresh roasting chickens on sale and somehow decided that since we were spending the entire Friday AND Saturday together, we might as well complete the happily married couple illusion and buy a chicken that we could prepare together for Sunday dinner. And so we did.. Before realizing that we had probably spent enough money by now and should leave the store.

Safely back at Tina’s, we probably did some more laundry and probably hung out and had a few laughs before I really made her day by presenting her with a homemade Mojito which she happily and beamingly consumed  in what looked like about three gulps while I got started on the Pad Thai dinner, I’d promised her for so long. I must admit I was rather scared by the prospect of cooking Pad Thai for dinner, not so much because I think I make a poor Pad Thai but more because Tina has actually been to Thailand and tried the real thing.. And nothing you can do in a miniature kitchen in Denmark can possibly in any way measure up to the experience of eating Thai street food in the proper settings.

As it turns out, I really had nothing much to be scared about, though. The preparations went more smoothly than I’d expected, Tina did a pretty good job at setting the table and pouring the wine while I stir fried everything to something closely resembling perfection and pretty quickly had a large serving of Pad Thai on the table which was approved by all, including the 50 odd percent of the dinner party that had actually been to Thailand and had had the real thing. The wine, too, was well received and both of us ate till we were about ready to burst. I’ve completely forgotten how filling a dish Pad Thai is.

After dinner, and some moaning and groaning, we cleared the worst of the mess out of the way and sat down to watch a few episodes of The Big Bang Theory before heading out to do the 28th load of laundry that day.. Give or take.. On our way to the laundromat, Tina did what she does best and looked at me with her pretty blue eyes and her sweet little smile and asked if maybe, perhaps, quite possibly, there would be enough ingredients left for another Mojito. There may even have been some batting of the eye lashes, I don’t remember, we all know I have a hard time saying no to cute she already had me pretty well twisted around her little finger.. And, besides, another Mojito? Well, duh!

So, we finished up quickly in the whole laundry department and hurried on back to Tina’s apartment where she got cracking on cleaning up after our Pad Thai dinner while I got cracking on making two more Mojitos. This is the kinda distribution of labor that I can get behind.. And, as it turns out, the amount time it takes to wash off the dirty pans and dishes from a Pad Thai dinner is about exactly the same amount of time it takes to make two perfect home-made Mojitos.. Well, there you go. This second batch of Mojitos were savored over the last few remaining episodes of Season Two of The Big Bang Theory, a perfect combination if I dare say so.

By the time we’d worn out Season Two of The Big Bang Theory, the clock had passed midnight and I was starting to really feel the lack of sleep, so it wasn’t too long after this that I excused myself and we thanked each other for a wonderful day before I headed out the door and home to get some much deserved sleep..

Ten hours of much deserved sleep, it turned out..

Johan and Tina’s Wild Weekend Adventures, Part 1

I’ve been home for 15 hours now. This is the longest I’ve spent in my apartment since, well, Wednesday, I think. Plans for the weekend were initially pretty simple: dinner with Tina Friday, Serving at a birthday party in Tina’s family on Saturday, nothingness on Sunday.. But sometime Thursday, things started getting a little more complicated than that..

I really don’t know how it all started other than I spent most of Thursday having this weird feeling that I’d better not make any plans for the day Friday. My feelings were confirmed on Thursday evening shortly after arriving at work when a text message arrived from Tina asking me what my plans were for Friday other than dinner with her. I told her I had nothing planned and she in turn said that she had some preparations for her presentation of her thesis to do but really wouldn’t mind some company throughout the day. I really don’t know what it is with Tina and I and the bond that we share, but we’re scarily good at picking up on how the other is feeling.. To a point where it sometimes borders on mutual precognitive abilities.. Like this time around where I’d sensed something was up before Tina even took the time to tell me that she wasn’t feeling entirely happy and wouldn’t mind some company.

Long story short, issues regarding insecurity about the future and the shape of things to come has apparently gotten to others than just me and I was only more than happy to rip a day out of the calendar to do what I do best which is make Tina smile when she’s feeling down. And I decided to do so in the best possible way that I know of: by spoiling he silly and treating her to a day all about her, good food, good wine, fun and games. In essence, I spent the next few hours at work trying to cheer her up best as I could from afar and assuring her that I had a perfect plan for making her feel better which involved getting up early the next day, trotting down to her, keeping her company, keeping her well-fed for all meals of the day and generally spreading good vibes.

This, of course, was a truth with modifications. I didn’t really have any plan at all, or any clues what to do. I do, however, have the powers of improvisation and a knack for knowing what pleases Tina and makes her happy. My little white lie worked, though, and tiny Tina eventually went to bed at around 1:30 AM, a little more at ease (hopefully) and looking forward to the day to come. I on the other hand, spent the next few hours at work and the trip home thinking about just what the hell to do about the next day.

Dinner was easy: I had for the longest time promised to cook Pad Thai for the two of us and Friday was supposed to be the day I’d live up to my promise. Pad Thai, prior to final assembly is probably one of the most disgusting looking and smelling dishes in the world, so I had most of the preparations out of the way already. I’d also matched a white wine to go with the dish that I’d already let Tina sample a sip of so I knew she’d approve. So dinner was pretty safe.. But what about everything else?

Well, there’d have to be snacks! No matter how well I feed my dear friend she will without exceptions always get the munchies within a couple of hours after dinner once the movies (or series) start rolling and we start chilling and laughing. Thing is, I’m an idiot when it comes to snacks, so I settled for just popping by the 24 hour store on the way home and buying a bag of a certain brand of potato chips I know she enjoys and that we have a history of maybe sharing one too many bags of. Cheap and easy trick, but hey it works and I made sure to get one featuring various geometric shapes of chips because I know my adorably retarded little friend gets a kick out of sorting the shapes and deciding who gets to have which.

Good, snacks out of the way.. But what are snacks without drinks? Simply put (in my perfect little world anyways): Nothing! Luckily, Tina is super easy to please when it comes to drinks. There’s really ever only one option: Mojito! Or, more specifically, my homemade Mojito. I don’t mean to brag, but it’s really the only thing I’ve seen that can create a true Pavlovian response in her. You mention the word Mojito to her or even just show her one of the ingredients and she knows what’s coming, her eyes light up, she beams at you and starts smiling uncontrollably. It is at the same time both beyond funny and beyond cute and needless to say a perfect reason why I’d include homemade Mojitos as part of my plan to put a smile on her face.

At this time in the planning process, the hour had reached 3:15 AM Friday morning and I’d just made it home and in the door. As I’d decided to get up at about 10:30 AM, the reasonable choice would have been to go to bed and get some sleep. I, however, am not a very reasonable person and still had work to do. First things first, I got a single serving of lasagna out of the freezer. Partially because I’d promised her some lasagna ages ago, partially because I knew her financial situation wasn’t too good and I wanted her to at least have something to eat, and also partially because I’d had a little of badly timed fun on her behalf Thursday.. And, well, in an inside joke that only her and I will understand, homemade lasagna means I’m sorry (really, don’t ask, it’s a long, complicated story).

The retrieval of the “I’m so sorry lasagna” left only one blank step in my plan to spoil Tina silly. A suitable lunch to serve for her upon my arrival the next day. Again, most people would have gone to bed and worried about that the next day. But then again, I am not most people, so my solution to this final obstacle was to put on the newest episode of Ghost Hunters, grab a beer from the fridge and rummage through my pantry and fridge for things to turn into lunch for the next day. I pretty quickly ended up finding some onions, some garlic and some organic whole wheat spaghetti. I also found a whole bunch of really ripe tomatoes and shortly before 4 AM, an idea dawned to me: Spaghetti with tomato cream sauce with fresh basil and roasted garlic. So on went the stove, the oven and the fan and while most of the rest of the world was sleeping, Johan cooked tomato sauce, roasted garlic, sipped a beer and whiled away time.

I’m not sure your taste buds are really up to par at 5 AM in the morning, but I must admit that the end result was pretty good in my eyes and probably would taste even better with the addition of cream and basil in the morning.. It would appear I now had a fully functional plan for the cheering up of one Tina, involving me turning up in high spirits (and obviously tired), finishing the lunch for her, keeping her company throughout her struggle with the presentation, cooking her Pad Thai for dinner and pouring wine on her, feeding her drinks and snacks and doing whatever she wanted.. All I needed now was to write a shopping list for the last remaining ingredients I needed to purchase in the morning and then getting a few hours of sleep before executing the plan..

This couldn’t possibly fail.. Right?

Roll On..

Kid Rock – Roll On

Aww, the Kid is all growed up like and sensitive..

Back in the saddle, more or less..

Whew.. That was tough.. I had an amazing weekend with Tina, Dunkel and our visiting friend Christian from Copenhagen.. I also had a Sunday of extreme hangovers followed by a few days of fatigue and migraines. I’m not really sure what I did to deserve the latter part of these ailments, but there you go.. Lucky me!

It has set me back quite a bit from where I wanted to be, but there’s really nothing to do but to struggle on and get going. And by getting going I mean working on on my resume and some soon to be killer applications. At least I hope so. I am generally a very humble guy so I must admit I find the whole pointing out and emphasizing my good sides somewhat of a tricky challenge. It’s harder than I thought it would be but also entertaining in a strange kinda way. People who read this blog regularly will also know that keeping my utterances brief and to the point can be somewhat of a challenge for me, so the whole process of boiling everything down to a single page worth of application and a two page resume.. Well, it’s an entirely different challenge.

So is determining what I find interesting versus what other readers find interesting.. But I think I’m starting to get a hang of the process which makes me feel considerably better and more secure than I have for a while.

On top of this whole thing, there’s also the matter of formalities regarding my finishing my education, applying for unemployment benefits, finding the right union for my trade (believe it or not, in Denmark, unions are not the devil), adhering to the right set of rules, and most importantly, finding a way of supporting myself for the month or so that I will be without student loans AND unemployment benefits.

Luckily, most of these things are slowly working themselves out as well. I’ve gotten more hours at GLS and they seem keen on keeping me on board until I find something better. Which, truthfully, is a huge relief for me. It means I’ll be able to both make money AND have something to do until I find a proper job. Something I am hugely grateful for. I’m currently working about three four hour shifts a week with an average of about 2-3 hours of OT each shift, so something in the vicinity of 18-20 hours a week. It’s not much, granted, but it’s night time, the pay is good and it’s getting me by which is what is important right now.

So, that’s that part of the equation worked out. Another part of it, a part that’s still quite shaky, is my housing situation. I think I’ve mentioned that our house is supposedly going up for sale soon, and I reckon that’s still happening. I obviously still don’t know if I can stay if the sale eventually goes through, but I’m hoping so. A totally different facet to the whole housing situation (I never said my life was easy!) is the fact that I have a busted faucet that’s dripping quite heavily now as well as (on a more serious note) some apparent water damages in a few of my walls. It’s quite a mess, really, which has the house owner, Brian, and his friends and family scrambling around constantly trying to figure out what is going on and how to remedy the situation. Their efforts have so far included tearing down pieces of a wall and digging huge holes outside to see if water was seeping in from the outside, but still they’ve gotten none the wiser. My main comfort is that experts say that there are no signs of fungi or other health concerns within the walls, so I still sleep pretty soundly and safely at night.

Is that it? Yeah, I do think it is? Wow, I got pretty confused just relating the state of my current situation, no wonder I’ve been feeling a little discombobulated lately. I got this strange feeling today, though, that everything is somehow gonna be okay

Migraine..

Yea, so, I’m still here..

Only I’ve been suffering from a horrible migraine for the past couple of days. Couple that with having to use a computer for 5-6 hours on end at work and I reckon it’s understandable that I’ve taken a break from the computer during the day. Sadly that also means I haven’t had much time for nursing my Web 2.0 instinct and updating the world about my strange undertakings..

Bah, humbug.. I’ll be back soon, promise..

You know you’ve been throwing up the horns of Facebook too often..

.. When tributes such as this shows up:

EDIT: Caption turned out a little hard to read. It reads “This one is for you Johan! “

I may have had a bad habit of throwing up the horns in certain pics, I had no idea it was so bad it deserved a tribute, though. But thanks, really. That’s epic! \m/