I posted a link to Cake Wrecks once before, but I just love this blog! To make it even better, the daily update seems to show up in my RSS feeds sometime in the afternoon Oslo-time, so the daily Wreck is often a much-needed afternoon pick-me-up. Anyhow, I felt compelled to repost today’s cake for all [...]
Before work and deadlines managed to completely drain my holiday spirit, we squeezed in one last weekend jam-packed with Christmas cheer. On Saturday, we went with one of our friends to the Christmas Market at the Norwegian Folk Museum, where we froze our toes while shopping through the myriad of handicrafts and watching the folk dance [...]
We’re getting close to the winter solstice, and it’s getting darker and darker every day. Yesterday, we went to a Christmas party and stood in the snow drinking Glühwein by candlelight. It was pitch black by 4pm. This morning, I dragged myself out of bed before dark, but I’d still hit the snooze button long enough [...]
I first saw this Gudbrandsdalsost (brown cheese) advertisement on the T-bane a few months ago. It’s part of a very clever marketing scheme that created subtly modernized versions of Norwegian traditions (I believe there was also a bunad with a flame pattern, and a few others). I had always been a little disappointed that I [...]
This week we received the first issue from our National Geographic Traveler subscription. I eagerly thumbed through the pages and read it nearly cover-to-cover. In doing so, I came across something rather unexpected. The magazine’s current cover story is a rating of historic travel destinations, and the ratings criteria focus mostly on historical preservation and [...]
Today was not the best weather I’ve seen in Oslo. The dark days are upon us, and with an overcast sky, it’s dark even earlier than usual. Today it was dreary all day and pretty much pitch black by 4:30 in the afternoon. But sitting inside amid the glow of computer monitors and gas fireplaces [...]
The other day I realized that I’ve now lived overseas long enough that there are some things I’ve come to take for granted. The little differences that I should have posted about when they were new and different, but because there were so many other new and different things, I tended to forget about them. [...]
At last year’s Christmas party, the office next to ours won the “Coolest Office” vote. They certainly deserved it, because in addition to a myriad of snacks and toys they also have color coded lava lamps hooked up to the network that change when we break the build! However, we decided that we wanted the [...]
The days here are starting to get very short. The sun is setting around 5:00 pm, and by 6:00, it’s nearly dark. However, what the sunlight is lacking in quantity, it’s making up in quality! You can almost forgive the winter months for being so dark when they produce sunsets like this: (These photos were [...]
EDIT: RyanAir has changed their policy since this was written and now allows passengers with all passports to check in online. However, if you hold a non-European passport, make sure you take your printed boarding pass to the check-in counter at the airport for the mandatory passport check, or you may be denied boarding. The [...]