what passes for a sunday around here

fucking fat stains

Last weekend, while on Gotland, my mother gave me some hard bread to try. Very tasty and crunchy. But when I bit into it, some pieces fell off and landed, butter side down, on the cheast of my hoodie.

Last night I washed that sweater but the stains are still there. Over the course of my long life, it has come to my attention that no other kind of stains cause me to throw out more beloved clothes than fat stains. What the fuck is up with that? How come we accept that our expensive detergents don't get one of the most common kinds of stains out? We pay plenty of money for washing mashines and chemicals that seem to do little more than wet our clothes and give them an artificial flowery scent.

Thanks a fucking bunch for that!

late night pasta

I just boiled two deciliters of macaroni and ate it with some ketchup. Just like that, despite the late hour.

I'm crazy.

a car

We went to Gotland over the weekend. We bought a car. It looks like this: http://195.54.155.205/bilder/stora/Ford/Ford_Focus_5d_K_ny_0305.jpg.

Maybe it's time I got a license.

deadlines

Today was another deadline for my comic strip. For those of you who don't know, my school themed comic is being published in a government branch magazine for teachers in Stockholm.

I draw three strips for each issue, and out of the three they choose one to publish. Since I got that "job", I have found it hard to keep up with production. This can most clearly be seen on my comic blog, which hasn't been updated since Christmas. I haven't had much trouble with making those three strips I have to, though.

As I was going home yesterday, I had two sketches on my desk. That was it. So this morning, I got to work early, made another sketch (two actually, but I cautiously rejected one that was a bit morally questionable) an then drew all three comics. Then I copied them down to the right format and went to Kungsholmen to drop the strips off at the office. I made it back to school in plenty of time for my first lesson.

I'm not planning ever to live on my drawings but I love having little artistic side projects all the time. It's stimulating!

the place from which i blog these days

view in reverse

After a very long day, Marta and I needed a walk to calm down and stretch our legs. We took a walk around Lake Threesome where we live. About halfway through the walk, I decided to take some pictures of our house from different perspectives. The pictures are taken from places we can see from our window, so they are, like the headline for this entry suggests, our view in reverse.

tradition

Tomorrow is Good Friday. I have a very nice Good Friday tradition. I put on Paul Westerberg's Good Day. He sings "a good day doesn't have to be a Friday". I like that.

spending money shouldn't have to be this hard

Ever bought anything online? Sure you have. I have too, lots of stuff. Go to any site, like www.amazon.com or www.onoff.se and check it out. They have shit loads of stuff, and they know almost exactly how many they have in store and where, etc. Wanna know a business that doesn't work like that? The bicycle business.

I decided it was time to get a bike. The sun came back from its winter vacation a few days ago, and I'm sick of public transportation anyway, so I figured it was time to replace my last bike (that was stolen in November 2007). I went online to see what was available. That turned out to be trickier than I had anticipated. Most bikestores (in Sweden anyway), it seems, are not online. You can e-mail them but they don't have a website. That leaves a few small stores and the major chains. Very few seem to want to display what they have in store on their websites. That means that in order to find out if they have a particular model you have to do one of the following things:

a) Write them an e-mail, and wait (possibly forever) until you get an answer.
b) Call them and hope they pick up.
or
c) Go there and see for yourself.

I have done all three today, ladies and gentlemen. And I am not happy about it. The e-mail is still unanswered.

Anyway, the thing is that I eventually found a bike I really liked online last night. It was at the manufacturer's website, but I couldn't find any store that carried that model. So I walked around, e-mailed and called. The phonecall came last. I had finally given up and called one of the smaller stores listed on the website of the manufacturer (I found today that chain stores employ young idiots, whereas the smaller stores are run by some experienced old dude who doesn't like to talk much but who knows what he's doing and has oily hands). The old dude who answered the phone knew the model I was after. He said he didn't have it but that he'd call the central storage and ask if it was available. When I called back half an hour later, he told me there never was such a bike. The manufacturer didn't receive enough preorders and hence, the bike was never made.

So I gave up. I'd wandered around town all day looking, and when I came home I found out I might as well have been looking for a unicorn, the Holy Grail or Jesus himself. When Marta called me as she was leaving work, we arranged that we'd meet up at Hornstull so I could go by two of the stores again, this time looking for an existing bike. So we did. And I found one that was slightly cheaper, if not as cool. Now I'm just holding my breath until it gets stolen. Shouldn't be too long... I hate that about this town.


Ps. There's a new EELS album out in June. You can listen to the first song at www.eelstheband.com.

where all my willpower goes these days

Last summer, while in Bangkok, my stomach got a bit upset (not entirely uncommon in Thailand, I know). Don't worry - I won't go into details. Anyway, Marta suggested that the fact that I had had Coca-Cola with every meal for nearly two weeks may have been at least partially responsible. I agreed to stop with coke then, for a while. A couple of days after, at Pizza Hut, I had a Sprite with my pizza. That was the last sweetened drink I had. After that, I switched to natural juice only. I can't make exceptions. With me, it's all or nothing. I have an addictive personality combined with an addiction fobia.

That worked out pretty well for me. I missed coke with some meals like pizza, or of course, my favourite: chicken tikka balti at Indian Garden, but orange juice took its place. By december, I started to realize that I was about as addicted to orange juice as I had been to Coca-Cola. On New Years Eve, I had my last glass of o.j.

It's been ok. It was much harder to quit drinking orange juice than coke. For a long time, any time I tried to think about what to eat, I found myself thinking of things that would taste good with juice. Then I'd realize I wouldn't be having any and I'd feel empty. I know how it sounds. I don't feel like that any more. These days I drink water with everything. It's not tasty, it adds nothing to the meal like the other drinks did, but I feel better.

Only the other day I found myself in a dilemma. I like the idea of saying I only drink water. But I was having raggmunkar (Swedish potato pancakes) and I would normally drink milk with that. It seemed totally stupid to have milk with cornflakes every morning but not allow myself a glass or two with the food, so I had some. Luckily, milk only works with a few selected foods and it won't replace water.


My name is Linus. I drink water.

i have to push the pram a lot

Today is a lovely day. Trust me, I've been outside already. I went to buy milk so I could have my breakfast. I had the last when I came home from playing at Mathias Kärnlunds vernissage last night. Nothing fancy, just me and a guitar. I still don't know why anybody would like to hire me to play, since I just play relatively obscure songs and tell people I don't know Hotel California if they ask. Ah, well... Going for milk before, I was overwhelmed by spring. It's there, outside right now. Isn't it swell?

In a few minutes, Marta and I are going into town to shop for a pram. Our kid will be here soon and I don't think either of us is keen on the idea of carrying her around in our arms the whole time. Sweet but impractical.

Finally, ten points to anyone who can tell me what movie the headline is from.

wake up light

We installed some blinds in our bedroom a few days ago. This is now necessary, since the mornings are very light, a bit like my sleep these days. I wake up very easily. Usually around 6am. On weekends, I can go back to sleep eventually, if I eat something. It's rather curious that, especially since I'm not particularly hungry when I wake.