Another day of survival

So another day I have survived!

And it haven't been any day either, me, joining Medibank Private on my visitors insurance (almost practicaly and stuff makes me an Australian), my (technically Mikes, but he's not here atm) car got a new CV Shaft and Boots (not sure what a car need boots for, but they mechanics now best) it also got some oil, some workshop supplies and some care! Oh, and I got two CD's, thank you Aaaalissssoooon! For your edification I'll tell you later (further down in this post) what CD's I bought, hm, I may even put a picture or two in! Then you'll already know what CD's I bought when you read this but I won't know that you know yet, as I haven't put them in yet, and I can still choose not to put them in and then you'd be all confused!

Appart from that, well, WE ARE THE CHAMPIONS! WE ARE THE CHAMPIONS! ok, it was the B division and the b final (fifth place) but we still won it and got medals! And me getting football medals don't happen very often (planning to get another on this year, just so you know, watch out Beenleigh!)

And, apparently, there are another team that call themselves "The Champions" (or something) that can't really do that anymore now can they? You need to reach a final to win something, right? I guess Mel played awesom as always though, so no blame on her (ps. this has nothing do do with me having a be nice to Mel week)

So, deciding that I should put the images of my newly acquired CD's at random places in this post, you will, off course, already know that as you have seen them, but they are not there now, kinda weird actually. I mean, I'm doing this post and I don't know that the images are there, yet, but you, who reads this post and have nothing to do with it, you know they are there and you sort of see them before I do, hmm, strange world we live in!


Упование вы будете иметь большой день!

PS: There are two new links you could check out.. pretty good ones, just have to remember what the second link is supposed to be so I can put it up there, so, if there are two new links, I did remember it, if there is only one new, I didn't

PS2: Want to draw your attention to the newly reopened mpcsocial.blogspot.com that is one of my lame tries to get people to try a new way of organise things..

PS3: Oh, and check out the new SECTION (located where the old "interesting fact" section was)

mio ventisettesimo compleanno!

So, another year in my life.. Has it been good? Well, for the most part it actually has, nothing really bad has happened (always good) lots of good things has happened. I have had many many issues with many different things as always. I have finished another Master degree (hopefully my last!).. I have been in the sun, I have played Football, I have spent time with friends, I have made new friends, I have been in "love", I have stuffed up, I have done things I had never done before, I have been angry, I have been sad, I have spent my forth consecutive birthday in Australia (which, is somewhat weird as I have only been here for 31 months and 12 days [give or take a day], and last I checked that would be about 2.6 years), I have lost a loved one, I have missed a few weddings, I have made a fool of myself, I have been impressive, I have been mean, I have been nice, I have sinned, I have been forgiven, I have prayed, I have argued, I have listened, I have talked, I have written a blog, I have been responsible, I have ben irresponsible, I have been working, I have been looking for work, I have done what I should, I have not done what I should, I have written a really really long paragraph with lots and lots of commas that nobody will read as it is way to long! I have ended this very long paragraph.

Yesterday Steve organised a birthday gathering for me, that noboday said they could come to as they all had other things to do.. So, me going there thinking it would be a crowd of about 5 of us.. But it turned out Steve had told everyone to say they couldnt come, even if they could.. So.. when I got there there where, like a crowd of people there! Made me feel very special indeed!

So, All I want to say isto all of you for showing up, and a special thanks to Steve for organising it!

To wrap this little post up... here's a "Trivia for the Toilet" just for you:

In Somalia, Africa, it's been declared illegal to carry old chewing gum stuck on the tip of your nose

Hope your having a sorprendente day and all that all of you will battersi per una causa legittima!

Fear

So, PR application have been lodged (or is it has been lodged?), anyways, lodged it is.. And $2k stolen from my account (which now gives me a total fortune of $180.. mr wealth, that's me!) and no promises at all given, except that I need to send in a lot of papers, which I think I should send in when they contact me.. but it's all confusing. Don't like this applying for VISA things, it only makes you feel like some kind of criminal and makes you nervous (and poor) for a while.. Would be so much better if you just had to go and talk to someone for a little bit and they'll say "I like you mate, welcome to Australia!", or "Sorry, chap, we don't want your kind here, p**s of to where you belong". Quick and painless, but no, insted you have to send in a billion papers and answer questions stating that your not a criminal and that you should answer everything truthfully, or else!, but at the same time you should make some judgement and stuff.. BAH! I say, Bah again! Inefficient!

About two things that worries me (at lest two thing I can see that worries me);

1. The English test I did on Saturday.. should be ok, only need 6/9 on all 4 sections, but you never know... Thinking that unless you have some idea of what your doing you'll always thing you did OK.
2. Two years study requirement... Got told to (byt dimia) to ask QUT if I met the requirements, they didn't have a clue (QUT that is), but as far as they were concerned I had been a full time student for all bar one semester (the last one, and out of 5) so.. Me thinks that is two years.. But will the person that handles my application think that or is there something I have missed??

Hm, maybe should add a third one.. Job.. Nah, I'll be positive.. Job won't be a problem, who wouldn't like to hire someone as amazing as I am?

Last day of my 26th year today.. Your still invited to my little birthday celebration (read previous entry for details). Although I know most of you who read this wont come as you have more important things to do *cry like a little 3 year old who got a blue bike instead of a green*

Anyways, how you'll have a day flabbergasting day (although it would be more flabbergastingly if you came to my birthday thingy)

Si la tengo, no te la doy,

y si no la tengo te la doy.

That was a spanish riddle just for you!

When the Rhinocerote caprioles

So, tomorrow is a biggish day for me... (bigish, may be the correct spelling, but looks better with two g's) .. it's of to the Sunny Coast Uni to write/listen/speak/read an english test!

Kinda important this test, as I need to get 6/9 in all of the 4 different sections (well, if I get 7,8 or 9 that is ok as well, but not below 6 in any of them), and all this just so I can get "competent" english.. which gives me 20p for my little PR application (as opposed to 15 as I have now). And, offcourse, I do sadly lack those 5 extra points and, hence, my going up early as in the morning..

Now getting up early in the morning isn't all that bad if you can go to bed early... Guess I still technically can go to bed early.. just pretty hard falling a sleep when there are lots of people having a party at my, not so amazingly sound proof, house (sound proof house... hm, wouldnt have helped much if the outher walls were soundproof as the people are mainly indoors.. but anyways!)...

Hm, there was something I intended to say.. hm, can't remember it.. So, instead, I'll tell you all that your invited to come to the Kookaburra Cafe, 280 Given Tce on Monday night at 7pm to celebrate (or mourn) my coming of the ridiculously old age of 27... If your coming you need to RSVP to Steve(eyboy) before Monday, I think, as he needs to know how many are coming.

If you cannot come.. well your very welcome to suprise me on Tuesday, nothing that stops you! Not hinting or anything, neither am I commenting on a previous posts comment made by someone.. no no, not I, why would I do such a thing?

Oh, another thing Gilligan, eh, Jill, wanted me to write about the best thing that has ever happened to me.. Been given that one a little (sorry Gill, eh Jill) and can't really figure out what "The best" thing that ever happened to me is, maybe getting born? If that is such a great thing.. maybe getting my first bike? Think you appreciated things more when you were young.. as opposed to todays kids.. they just want and want (spoken from my capaciously, prodigiously, whoppingly, vast experience on the subject)

Anyways, time for me to do something, like talking to some of the people that are here, brush my teeth, finding my earplugs I bought at the pharmacy next to Mel's, and somehow manage to fall a sleep... (not at the same time, obviously)

Have a stupendiously peachy day!

Memories and Friends

I'm getting old, or atlest my memory is getting old.. Went to watch Over the Hedge the other week.. (kinda liked it too) Had to go back there the next day and ask "have you seen a grey old Nokia mobile phone, it have an ugly (not that I think that) image of a "sheep" as screen saver", which they did (ok, theh phone was on silent so the sheep wasn't there... So I had to say the first number in the phone book (being Aaron, but didn't know that, should have figured), couldn't do that but it was ok to say any number.. managed to do that..

Then last Friday I went to watch Superman Returns (kinda not liked that one.. unless the idea with it was to make me sleepy and want to leave), and had to walk back there after two days and ask "Eh, I think I left my wallet here on Friday...", "How does it look like?", "It's black...... and it should have a drivers license in it..". Sure, they did have it there and she looked at the drivers license (probably the photo) and said "Yepp, looks like you"...

So, last two times I'v been to the movies I have forgotten something.. getting bad.. Planned to whinge about me getting old and my memory deserting me, but rememberd that I have always had a tendency to forget things everywhere.. So instead all I can say is:

I LOVE LOST AND FOUND SECTIONS!!!

But not as much as I love friends though. They are good to have (not that I tell them that very often, I'm mainly being mean and saying bad things to them), for instance, on Saturday (when my wallet was hiding in the L&F section at Southbank Ciniplex) we went Bowling (oh, I worked on Saturday morning, after sleeping 5h because I watched Superman... well spent time that, I then played football [no s-word here] against the top team of our div. Drew 1-1, but we were way good me think. Then got home, played some UFO: Aftermath [very fun game me thinks] intending to stay at home being lazy all night [That didn't happen {as usual..}]) . Anyways, Bowling.. (had dinner at Matt's place first to! [one or two o's in that?]) we happily drove away to play bowling, and offcourse I had no money, so what did my nice and loveable friends do? They made a little Matt fund, and sponsored my Bowling! (I then managed to win a beer as well [type bear first.. would have been cool, but then maybe not, beers are pretty cool.. guess bears are pretty warm? And they'r supposed to have a very bad breath])

Bowling was fun, although I lost to both Ali and Mel... But that was ok, I mean, what don't you do for your friends? Eh...

Anyways, after we had been bowling (being the last ones there [disco bowling it was as well!], for a long time) we got hungry.. So off to HJ's we went (still me being money less) and another Matt fund (Me almost teary eyed [on the inside {deep deep on the inside}] at this point)!

While eating, I get two phone calls at the same time (around 11:50pm) one from Steve, wondering where we were and if we had fun, one from Pete, sitting in his car outside his house with his keys down in NSW... So, time to go home and dust of the Air mattress and spend a couple of hours talking about lifes deep mysteries (maybe not so deep, but who knows?) with Pete (and another 5 hour sleep).

That's how weekends should be, busy busy, and spending them with your friends!

So, a big thank's to you all for making my life much more interesting than it would be if I had no friends and had to spend all my time sitting and writing on my blog without anyone ever bothering to read it because I hah no friends that knew it existed and hence went there to read something and write some comments and Trav if you happen to read this and havent run out of breath because there are no commas I know there are no commas or stops in this sentence

Oh, almost forgot, Smiley, what do you like my usage of (), [], {}, almost in your league?

A charm of goldfinches!

So, I'm not a criminal either (at least they don't think so, they couldn't positivelly identify me as they didn't have any fingerprints) which is always good me thinks. Only thing to worry about now before I can apply for my Permanent Residency is the English test I have to do next Saturday... Have therefore stolen two books from the back of my car (Mike's car, and those books should have been given away to charity ages ago, if you happen to read this Mike, they will be, very very soon, hopefully today), they are called "English Power Book 3" and "Year 7 Spelling Activities".. Did you know you can say "a gaggle of cheese"? I didn't, so I'm learning heaps of stuff by reading these books made for 12 year olds...

Anyways, I'm also done with uni! Got my results today (not brilliant there wherent, but I can live with them), now all I have to do is getting QUT to say I'm done with my degree and I'm done with uni, forever and ever and ever, Ahem.

So, short post today, gotto go away and do some grocery shopping with Steve.. You need to eat I have figured, you also need to sleep.. Sleep.. brings me into why I haven't slept much tonight, watching the $@%@#$%$ Italians win against the Frenchies in the World Cup final.. Wonder what Matzeratti (or howerever he spells his name) told Zidane to make Zidane headbutt him in the chest... Some controversy it was in the decision to send of Zidane as well.. the 4th official watched a tv monitor and told the ref, not supposed to do that apparently.. but maybe they should start to do more of that? What do you think?

And for you not-so-interested-in-the-beautiful-game here's a question for you:
What would happen if we took the letter P and replaced it with ^.^?

Have a nice and happy day with some sunshine and lots of charming goldfinches!

I am an Engineer!

"I am pleased to advide that the competencies you have demonstrated taken in conjunction with your qualifications from Blekinge Institute of technology, Sweden awarded in October 2002 have been assessed as meeting the current academic requirement for standing as a Professional Engineer in Australia"

That, my friends, is a very good thing. Offcourse I was fairly confident that I was and Engineer before I got told this, but that Engineers Australia thinks the same is a very nice thing indeed. Now, all I have to do is to somehow get my police records (that I seem to have stuffed up somewhere) and do well on the english test on July 22... And I can atleast apply for Permanent Residency (and have a chance of success). Oh, almost forgot, have to get QUT to give me my results and say my degree is finished. I only need results from one unit (would be good to get from both) and I already know what I got in that unit.. but it is, by some reason, not official yet...

Anyways this is a very good thing! Me, the Professional Electronics Engineer, has spoken.

As to my dentis thing, went there this morning, with a bit of fear and trepiditation (and trembeling), got there and he looked at my mouth for a while and said something about the bone where they should put the screws in were deep enough, but it didn't look that brilliant, as it was to narrow.. So to make it look good I should do a nother bone graft. And as I look so good generally I thought my mouth deserved the same... So now I'm off to see some other dentist to talk about doing a bone graft.. More waiting! But.. this time they will put me to sleep when the do the grafting (the did this the last time they grafted as well, but not generally at the dentist), but they will also put the screws in while I sleep!!!

Gill (with a J, so not actualy Gill, but Jill, but doesn't make as much sense saying "with a J" if I spell it right, as you can see for yourself it is a J and you may get confused..) said I should talk about something positive, something that made me happy.. Kinda did with this first bit, but my next post will talk about my most favourite moment of all time! ......

God Bless and grant you some of his 5 different loves!

Post Worldcup (almost)

Hm, haven't written a new post for ages, but nobody gives me any topics! So what do I have to write about? That last week I played goalkeeper for our church's football (soccer) team and let in 6 goals in one half? Man I rocked! I was diving everywhere (witout getting to the ball), running around in the pentalty box (not where the ball was), distributing goal kicks (to where my team mates werent). In short I rock!

Appart from that, well, Worldcup is kinda over (if you don't know what Worldcup I'm talking about your not worthy of knowing!), Sweden went out, Australia went out, England went out, Spain went out, Holland went out... Basically all the team's I support a little (by different reasons) are out. Ok, there are only 4 teams left and they are all Europeean teams (Europe rock!) so I guess I could support one of them.. maybe France or Germany then.. This is all non interesting stuff though, what team I would support of the last 4 in the Football World Cup (giva away!) so I'll stop writing about it!

What else? Hm, I have about 26 days to apply for permanent residency before my visa runs out.. And ofcourse I do not have all the papers I need.... Well, 26 days is a long long time.. I mean, I'll be 27 by then... and that is pretty old so I hope that is far far away in time, I can't be that old, I mean, I just go born and stuff, can't be that long ago, surely?

Other not so interesting stuff happening in my life is that I have to go to the dentist to be drilled in (in the bone.. not in a tooth... no such wuzziness...) and then they will put two screws in there, oh, forgot they'll cut a bit in me first... this is all supposed to happen tomorrow (should have happened last wednesday but then my dentist was sick) and can't say I look forward to it at all.

Anyways, that is that, another pointless blog, this time without any pictures, proudly brought to you by mattiac.blogspot.com!

Nothing much to write about

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@$-<=|
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What have I just tried to draw?

Well, that kinda sums it up... I got nothing to write about hence I'm reduced to try and make ascii art... Terrible, I could offcourse write about the fact that I have done my last ever exam two days ago... At least I hope it is my last ever exam, will know that soon I guess.. hmm, brb, gotto check my results..... nah, not up yet, should have been up late last week according to my teacher but such is life (not the exam I did on monday.. that would be weird).

Another thing I guess I could have written about, if not my ^%$@#^%$ alarm clock (read phone) hadn't decided that it wanted to sleep in and not wake me up at 4.15 as I so kindly had requested of it, is the game between Sweden and England.. 2-2 it ended after a late goal by Henrik Larson.. (and 3 other goals as well, among other thing a cracker from Joe Cole). But as I didn't see the game, being sound asleep because of my phone being grumpy, all I write about is the goals.. Oh, and that Matt said that both teams played crap.. don't think I would have cared much about that as I would have been chewing on my jumper until the end of the game (unless I somehow knew the result from the other game).

A third thing I could write about is that I sometimes wish that God would have made us guys a little more like women in that it isn't enough to see a woman to think she is really great and I would really like to know here.... Would be good if it required a little more than that, but such is life and it only to get over it.. but man where she cute... bah!

Got a dentist appointment today, where they want me to sign some consent form... Scares me abit..

Hope you have a good day and all your wishes about smurfs and christmas trees will come true!

Pets

As the plagiarism/copy stuff seemed to tough a topic for most of my readers I have decided to keep it a bit lighter from now on (unless I get some though interesting topics to write about that is). So, todays posts it about Pets!

I could have written about football (soccer for the uneducated) and say that Australia pulled out a rabbit of the worn out old green and gold hat, but that would only lead me to writing about how Sweden managed a magnificent draw against 10 men Trinidad and Tobago (T&T). Now 0 - 0 against T&T is a result to be proud of! It set's up us beautifully for the game against Paraguay, they will be believing that we suck and cannot score even if they would go and have a coffee break (or fika as we would say) but Oh are they misstaken! Oh, forgot, I'm writing about pets, not football.. Rosicky seem like a brilliant addition to the squad for the Arsenal though.. eh, ok, pets!

"Are you a cat or a dog person?" is a question that people often ask's, I generally try to reply whatever I think would benefit me in the specific situation when the question is being asked, but less devious people than me may actually have an oppinion in this case and may take it seriously. So, here's a little something for you dog lovers out there..

What is generally a reason for having a dog? (except them being rather stupid and being very happy every time you get home) Generally it would be that they can protect you, if a burglar comes in they will bark and hence save your life. Cat's as we all know do no such things, unless they want to be patted and walks around the burglars legs, tripping the poor burglar. But! What would your dog do if a Bear enters your backyard? He would most probably make some whingeing noises, roll over and say "Bite me, I'm not threat to you Oh great master" a little cat on the other hand..... He would get pissed (pardon my language) off and thinking "Hey, who does this bear thing think it is? Coming into my turf!" and then chase the poor bear up into a tree, no only once but twice! And sit there and guard the bear he would as well.. Don't believe me? Take a look at the picture (you'll need to enlarge it a bit) and click on this link.

So, currently the score is:

Cat 1 - Dog 0

Btw, what do you like my newest addition to my blog? A random joke just for you (instead of an add for young campbell... got to many emails)

Plagiarism (sort of)

So, got like one topic to write about and that is Plagiarism...

What can I say about it? It get's you suspended from uni if they catch you doing it! So dont!

A more interesting topic that is sort of like plagiarism is copying stuff.. like music, movies and things like that. Have you ever done said thing? If you have, well, criminal!!!

They had this big site in Sweden (very popular and I won't give you the address) that got shut down a week or two ago. Consequently the Swedish police's website and the government website got DOSed (Denial of Service). Apparently the US government had put some preassure on the Swedish police/government to shut the site down and that was not popular at all.

The thing is though, that it took the site a couple of days to get up again, in a different country (actually a few of them for some redundancy) and all the effort spent to shut it down was wasted. Now if I were an artist och movie maker or something I would offcourse want money for the stuff I make so I would therefore be against all kinds of copying.. But, there is always a but, is making it harder to copy, shutting down sites, making stacks and stacks of people into criminals, putting out fake files with messages (Madonna) and tracking devices in them, the way to go?

I don't think so, take the Madonna example, there they put out this fake song that had the name of the real song but instead of music they got an angry Madonna telling them "What the F*** do you think your doing?!" now had I been someone that wanted to listen to a song and figure out if it would be worth buying the album... I would have said ^%#^%$ you Madonna and never bought anything of hers in my life. Now I'm not a Madonna fan and would never even go through the trouble of downloading a song of hers, but that is beside the point. So I don't think this is an especially brilliant thing to do... Unless you want to loose customers (fans?).

Neither do I think putting all this effort and money into copy protection is especially brilliant either as there will always be someone that manages to crack it and the one's that generally get hurt by it are the ones that actually go and buy the CD (or whatever it is).

And buying songs online? Well paying almost as much as you would for a CD, without getting a cd case, an actual nice looking cd or a little book with the lyrics? On top of that you can only copy the song about 3 times (depending on where you buy it from).

Why not try and find the REAL problem? The real problem is not that people copy things, it is WHY people copy things...

My theory (most probably flawed but still a theory) is that people copy because:

1. It is cheap (can't competed with $0)
   
2. It is convinient (you can get any song)
3. They don't want to give money to the record companies (artist ok, record company bad)
   
4. There are more smurfs then there are smurfettes (?)
   

So, in my world, the best way to go around this is to

1. Organise some kind of organisation that may be run by all the record companies around where almost EVERY song that is or have been released is available. Now places like napster (which is a pretty good online music store) or any other onine music store, can use that DB and for every song people buy they pay a certain fee to the main company.
2. Not putting any restrictions on the files
3. Selling them rather cheap (better to sell many cheap than a few expensive as a famous artis will get more people on their concerts)
4. Reward people for buying stuff (if you buy 50 songs you get something cool)
   

What do you guys thing about this?

Suggest a Topic

I have been approached by some certain someones (!#:) that I should have "suggest a topic" section.. Now I think that would be very much copying nathans idea but who am I to say no? So here it is...

My Own: "Suggest a topic and there is a small (very small) chance that I may write something about it" section!

To make this a bit easier let's use this post's reply section to suggest topics (at least it makes it easer for me to figure out what to know what you suggest I write about)

I'm wondering if there should be some rules about what topics you could suggest, but I'll figure that one out later (when I get topics that are , as Sara would say, "inapropriate")

So, feel free to let your creative juices (stole that one from my lecturere) flowing and gimme some interesting topics to shed some Swedish light on!

Lift Me Up!

Hello to you bloggreader!

When you are feeling low and the world conspires against you to bring you to your knees and push your head into the gutter while laughing in your face with spit flying everywhere while your loosing your breath while reading along meaningless sentence with no commas or stops, what music do then put on?

I'm now talking about music that lifts you up and convinces you that, no matter what, you are still Gods gift to everyone on this planet!

I have two songs that I like to listen to then (both of them being by Swedish bands, but in English):

• Biggest & The Best By a Swedish band called Clawfinger
• Carry On By another Swedish band called Insania
  

Click on the link to go view the lyrics (the Insania website is pretty crap...).

So, now when you know my "lifte me up" songs, which are yours?

Found a website with songs that "make your heart sing" although not exactly what were looking at here (as were more looking at ego building songs) still close enough and has it's place in the world...

Another site I just must share is Launchcast, pretty awesome site I think. It makes you create your own radio station.. Not working perfectly, but still quite ok. Only downside is that it is American, so most music is from the US or the big artists. But still is pretty awesome though.

Tickle Me!

The fact that you're a smart person who is more able to understand complex concepts than many other people are really draws people to you! But that's not the only thing. Your answers on the test indicate you're great at expressing myself and can be at my best when articulating my ideas or communicating with others. You are a calm, relaxed person who tends to take life in stride, too.

We've found that your particular combination of qualities is rare — only 3 in 10,000 people share the same general mix of traits. Those are great odds if you're trying to show a potential employer, colleague, friend, or date why you're exactly the right person for them.

Finally! After doing about 20 different tests there is one that tell's me something positive about me! Ok, this is not entierly true, tickle tests generally tells me something good, even if I do really badly on the tests. They like to encourage you I believe, but still it's a good thing! Always nice being told nice things me thinks, what do you think?

Don't really have anything interesting to write here again, well I guess it depends on who reads it though, someone may be wery interested in reading about me saying I have nothing to write about. Or just reading my rambleing.. (?) which is good, I like writing about nothing, just sitting here with my keyboard and typing whatever comes to my mind (after some censoring and spelling correction). It tend to be rather blank at times, and at other times it just flows on and on and on and... oooooooooonnnnnnnnn.. Huh, gotto find something interesting to write about! (sorry you who think nothing special is interesting, your wrong) Pringles maybe? I could tell you a story about how they came about, that they were sitting and thinking about how to make more money and make the packages more efficient.. They then looked at leafes (leaves? things that grows on trees, green things [unless its autumn]) and then they looked at chrushed leaves (looked it up in a dictionary, but liked my previous sentence..) and figured they were still leaves even though they where crushed.. Hence they thought, hm, if we crush potatoes, they will still be potatoes even when they are crushed! So they crushed potatoes and then made chips from the crushed ones! And that is how pringles as you know them came about!

So, I'll leave(s) you with that interesting piece of knowledge to go about your day with style and mozzarella flavoured pringles chips!

Lawn Mowers!

How much can I fit into a grass catcher?
Answer : The volume of most domestic grass catchers is 43 litres. Grass catchers used on Master Series models for professionals can hold 55 or 60 litres.

Now you may be wondering where I'm going with this.. Nowhere I'm afraid, had I been my dear friend Smelly, I would be telling you about some interesting thing that had happened in my life that were loosely related to lawn mowers and may or may not have some reference to how much grass you can put in a grass cathers... But I'm me and I won't do such a thing!

Instead I'll tell you about how you can spend a friday night and even show you some pictures and give you some [more or less accurate] quotes.

Steve (my housemate owning the machete) like to come up with new things, and the latest new thing he's come up with is that you invite a bunch of people over for dinner (although it generally resorts to being desert as everyone already have eaten when we get around to inviting them) and when they get here we head of to the shops. At the shops our dear invitees are given the task of buying stuff (food items that have been changed to desert items) where the names make up the entire alphabet.

Last friday we had some people who had already done this new thingy, so there had to be a new element for them.. Hence he gives me the task of writing up a bunch of things in Swedish. So I do, nothing fancy I'm just thinking about a fruitsalad and adding some basic baking stuff to the list. So when people get's here it's off to the shops (except that I'm staying back and waiting for some late come.. but those latecomers happen to see the car convoy going to the shops and decides to follow them.. leaving me waiting).

As we have a few newcomers (not done the alphabet thing before) as well as oldies (done the alphabet thing before) there are two groups, one Swedish one and one Alphabet one. Must say that the Swedish one were much more efficient than the Alphabet one (maybe due to their experience).

Then when everyting is bought it's time to head home and make something! Whatever you want! (which is a little bit of a worry for some people as they tend to prefer being told what to do [Dont worry if this happen to you, just appeal to their creativity and you'll be set, if it doesnt work, just tell them to make pancakes])

There is a lot of fun you can have making pancakes, you can make jaffa pancakes, chocolate jaffa pancakes, chocolate jaffa pancakes with plastic number on them, chocolate plastic pancakes with plastic numbers and some butterflies on them.. the list is endless!

But.. eating all this dessert stuff (we also got fruit, ice cream, chocolate, drinks, corn chips and some other stuff) is not to healty for you, and well it can be noticed in the conversations... Just take the conversation below for instance:

Jo: "What about breasts? You can make implats of drugs"
Trav: "I like breasts"
Jo: "That is good"

All these dessert can also make people do funny things like spitting when they are talking..

Anyways, hope you have been hooked on the "go to the shop and buy random food (changed to dessert) things" idea!

The facts, although interesting, are irrelevant.

Change Me!

Hello Dear blog reader!

Have you ever done a Myers-Briggs test? Or some other test that is similar to it? I have, a couple of times actually, that what you have to do when you do management subjects.. In some subjects this is THE thing, it lets you as a manager select the right people for the right job, and helps you understand why different people behave in different ways. I figured I'm an INFP, but the second time I was a ENFP (I think) and the third time I was an XNXP.. For you who don't know anything about what these letters stand for here's a little description:

• First letter can either be E (extrovert) or I (introvert)
• Second letter can be either N (intuitive) or S (sensing)
• Third letter can be F (feeling) or T (thinking)
• Fourth letter can be J (judging) or P (perceiving)

I you want to know more about it just follow this link and if you want to do a little online based one click on this link. Btw, the X is not a real letter it is just that the test coldnt figure out what type I were...

Anywas, last week in my "Understanding Leadership" unit I got told that this test isn't all that brilliant as it tended to put everything in black and white.

Example: Let's say you score 48 on the J-P scale and below 50 is J and above 50 is P (I'm just making up numbers) then the test would say that your a J and you would then be as much a J as your friend Judgoman who scored 1 on the test.. And well, let's face it your not nearly as organized as Judgoman, the guy organizes everything before he comes to some conclusion...

So, lo and behold, there is another test that is emerging, and this is called the Big Five (or Five-Factor personaility model) and this one have 5 different "Buckets" each consisting of 6 characteristics and you score on a continous scale (but the divied you into 3 things in the end anyways to make it easier).

So, I headed over to this site and spent about 40 mins or so answering 200+ questions (they do have a shorter one as well) and with some trepiditation (?) pressed the final button to get the verdict on who I am (hoping it would tell me how amazlingly great I am)...

Well, this is who I am:

• Yore on Extraversion is average, indicating you are neither a subdued loner nor a jovial chatterbox. You enjoy time with others but also time alone.
  
• Your level of Agreeableness is average, indicating some concern with others' Needs, but, generally, unwillingness to sacrifice yourself for others.
• Your score on Conscientiousness is low, indicating you like to live for the moment and do what feels good now. Your work tends to be careless and disorganized.
• Your score on Neuroticism is average, indicating that your level of emotional reactivity is typical of the general population. Stressful and frustrating situations are somewhat upsetting to you, but you are generally able to get over these feelings and cope with these situations.
• Your score on Openness to Experience is low, indicating you like to think in plain and simple terms. Others describe you as down-to-earth, practical, and conservative.

This is what I thought about it:

• Extroversion don't have any problems with really except that I told me that I wasn't very cheerful (19) but I was very gregarious (95%)....
  
• Agreeableness is ok, I care about people but not as much as sometimes would be good, by some reason I'm pretty crap at coopretation (31) which is what I thought I would be good at as I much prefer working with people.
• Concientiousness (8) this one is pretty strange got an 8 (out of a 100) in total on this.. 0 in self-efficiacy (*despair!!*) 7 in orderliness (....!!) and 0 in cautiousness... Hence I don't believe I can achieve anything, but that's ok because I don't care if I fail and I most certainly will make a big mess while Im at it...
• Neuroticisim (62) fairly balanced on this one.. so not much to say more than that I'm rather vulnerable.. so don't hurt me!
  
• Openness to Experience (27) here's where I'm thinking this test is weird, I love testing new things! Ok, it tell's me I'm rather adventurous (76) but not overly imaginative (46) neither am I very intellectual (16) and my artistic interest is amazing at 1.... Hence, I would really like doing something adventurous but don't expect me to come up with any brilliant ideas, play with any ideas and count me out if you intend to go to some art gallery....
  

"Meh!" I say, "Change me!" i say as well and not to forget "I am not a hamster!" I also say (although I can't understand why..)

If you read through this long as post here's a reward for you:

Dyslexic child receives present from Satan, news at seven...

This is supposed to be a religious joke, got it from this (Something for Matt?) site, but can't figure out what it says.. so let me know if you do

its me

Simon Says

This is a note from my dear friend and colleague Simon.

i smell like poo poo and pee pee yes i do yes i do!!! don't leave stuff logged on at work !!! ie. note to self

I assume this is something we all need to watch out for: forgetting to log out of things, I tend to forget to log out from msn and that is not always a good idea.. Mostly my name changes into something like "i smell like poo poo and pee pee" and it's generally by named colleague.. (hence the somewhat similar post on this blog)

Not that I'm complaining, it does keep me on my toes and I have to remember things (which for me is a rather tricky business as my memory seems to have gone on a vacation about 20 years ago and havent got back yet) which is somewhat good (that I have to remember things, not that my memory is missing).

So, let this be a warning to all of you's: "Always make sure you log out of stuff!" (or for web stuff, atlest close the browser, not just one window or a tab, but all of them).

And to Simon: I know where you letterbox lives!

Can't figure out a good enough title

So, Sweden won the World Cup in ice hockey last night! Strangely I don't feel to excited, even though they won 4-0 against the Chechs and we were the first country ever to win the world cup and the olympics the same year. I'm thinking this may have something to do with the fact that I haven't been able to watch a single game (either of the world cup or the olympics) and as such haven't had any reason for biting my nails and swearing at the referee (not that I do a lot of swearing, just a figure of speach). And for meet I seem to need to do that, getting emotianally involved requries a bit of effort for me (mostly) and some external stimuli (....)

The second article (on my favourite swedish newspaper) that caught my eye (after the hockye one) today was (freely translated): "The home, the most dangerous place for women" apparently, ladies, the place where you should be the most afraid is at home. And be especially vary of the guys you know, if you have or have had a relationship with them you should be extra vary. This is a rather serious issue (have to be serious sometime) and I cannot understand why guys would assult or try to rape their girlfriends, exgirlfriends, or friends' girlfriends, stupid.

A bit later when I were at uni (doing my "understanding leadership" unit) I learned something that may (and may not) offer one explanation as to why this is the case: When you are at home you feel safe, you feel that you can do anything, nobody sees you. so you drop your inhibitors and become the real you. And I think this is a true thing, think about yourself, when your at home do you do things that you wouldnt do if you were at someone elses place (like mine)?

Not saying that that is any excuse whatsovever for doing stupid things (like bashing someone up) only that it may be one explanation why people that seem really nice can be totally different. They are acting! Scary though, how do you know a person for real? What if I meet this amazing young lady that seems so perfect and we end up getting married and when we get home and she get's settled in the house and start to feel secure she turns out to have this obsession with hitting me in the head with cutting boards...

This post isn't working at all; can't work under preassure....

Back in Europe..

So, last night was the Eurovision Song Contest back in Europe... Think it is possible to watch it down here somehow as well, but that would require some effort. And as I cannot say I'm overly interested in watching it that won't do (spending energy finding out how to watch the ESC that is). So I'm quite happy reading about the thing on some swedish newspapers (as always Sweden is favourites to win the contest, in Swedish news papers that is, before the contest).

But one interesting thing is that Finland won this year... and as all Finns they are very good looking (as can be seen from the picture above). If you want to listen to the song click on this link.

But a much more interesting piece of news is that Sweden won thir semi final against Canada! This is in the world cup of ice hockey for you guys who don't know. So, now were in the final.. playing agains the Chech's. We haven't won the WC since 1995... and NO ONE has won both the WC and the Olympics the same year before (we won the olympics agains those good looking finns earlier this year) so that will be interesting. Not that I can watch it down here, no no, I'm limited to watching rugby or another type of rugby or a third kind of running around with the ball and tackle eachother a bit and call it football...........!!!!!

Anyways, hope your day is full of roses and good food

Talk to me!

The meaning of this post is to figure out one of lifes great mysteries:

• How to get people to start talking to/with me

I mean, there are many people out there that I don't know that I potentially could become very good friends with, but only if we happen to start talking to each other, but how do you get them to talk to you? Anywhere, online, at the pub, down at the corner at the place selling roasts but doesn't take efpos, at the gym, you meet people every where (oh, forgot, uni and work) but very seldom the just randomly start talking to you (and if they do they are most certanly not that deadly hot young woman that they eyes seem to have locked on to but some one wanting to get 50c for "a train ticket"). Why is this? And how to change it?

I'm already working on the problem of getting people to CONTINUE talking to you as I went and bought this book called "How to have a beautiful mind" that starts like this:

There is this beautiful woman at a cocktail party. She has flawless skin, elegant clothes and a perfect figure. Surprisingly, she seems to be much on her own. People come up to her and quickly drift away. Then there is this short, balding and mousy man. He is always surrounded by people in animated conversation with him. What is going on?

The book then goes on to say that the woman has a boring mind and the man has a beautiful mind and that is why everyone is talking to him and not here (for any long time anyways). It then says this:

But there is much more that you can do to make your mind more beautiful. That is exactly what this book is about. This book tells you what to do to make your mind more beautiful

So basically I have that part figured out (when I finished the book that is, a couple of times) so when people start talking to me they never want to stop because my mind is so amazingly beautiful (may be some flaws in this but I can't find any obvious ones)

But... there is always a but, how to get people to start talking to me? The above example confuses me a bit, people come up to this lady and start talking to her, they probably do this because she is hot. So one theory could be "Look hot and people will start talking to you". But people start talking to the balding mousy man as well, why is that? Is it because a lot of other people talks to him? Is it because his mind is so beautiful that it radiates come-talk-to-meness? Or is there something else?

I am at a loss here, so if you have any suggestions please typ a comment or two and enlighten me... oh, and if you know how to get people on msn to start talking to me as well... Maybe it is about having a beautiful symbol and a witty text?

Other news from around the world: Smileys blog is not updated today.. What is going on young Campbell running out of things to write?