Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norell

I finally finished it. It is a wonderful book but it is not a small one.
I love this book, but I rather doubt I will ever read it again, it is much too large an undertaking for that, being 1006 pages and all. I have spent at least a year at it, on and off. The problem with long books such as this is that because it is the length that it is I find it very easy to get distracted and start reading something else. But I have always returned to it. It is a very complex book, so these returns to it have sometimes been confusing. But since it is a book without a much extensive character gallery, and with scores of wonderful footnotes I always found myself back in the flow of things within a few pages time.
It is highly captivating, and the language in which Susanna Clarke describes the events makes all the highly unlikely events taking place on every page seem almost plausible.
I am not a very good judge of characters, but to me all the characters seems totally believable. Even the gentleman with the thistledown hair seemed real to me.
For anyone with a longer attentionspan than the one I possess I highly recommend this book, and should you be so unfortunate that your attentionspan can rival mine in shortness I would still recommend this book, even if it means you will need a larger amount of will power.
It is a wonderful book in any case. Even if the ending seemed a tad... unfinished... to meXP

Word of the day:
魔法使い - mahoutsukai - magician, wizard, sorcerer, witch

Attacked by the evil door>.<

I was attacked by a door on Friday. I might have gotten a mild concussion, I certainly showed a lot of signs of it (violent nausea, extreme headache, sensitivity to light...), and today, two days later, I still have a slight headache. And a bump on the forehead. Which of course I can't help but poking all the timeXP

My mother is having a pattern giveaway on her first ever published pattern^^,
Go have a look^^,
It's of these adorable little Christmas stockings^^, I told her when she showed them to me that I would like on filled with candy on the mantel piece for Christmas, to which she jokingly replied that she would like one filled with diamondsXD
They are very nice anyway, so go join the giveaway right now=D=D

I am having a Tupperparty Wednesday October 8th, so if anyone feel a need to buy Tupperware products give me a heads up and I will send you an invitation^^, I will be immensely grateful for anyone who will help me sell enough to pay of my startkitXD

Word of the day:
振盪 - shintou - shock, impact, concussion

The curious incident with the dog in the nigth-time

An important book. A really important book.
The story of Christopher who has autism, and who takes it upon himself to investigate the murder of his neighbor's dog, and the places it takes him, and the truth behind it all.
It was a bit scary, because I recognized myself in the things Christopher tells about himself and in the way he reacts to things. My therapist tells me that autism amplifies characteristics that are very common among many people, like responding to things we don't understand with frustration or anger, so that made it less scary.
I think that everyone should read this book, at the very least everyone that is in a position where they are likely to meet people with autism, like people who work in shops, and policemen, and hospital workers, and people who work with public transportation. I could go on and on, it was an eyeopener for me. I knew a girl with autism many years ago, and I just after reading this book understood the way she reacted to things, reactions that confused and frightened me at the time I now understand how I could have avoided.
Read it. Please. It will be good for you.

Bending Water

I don't often write about art. I never have I think, if I need to write about art I usually do so on DeviantArt, but this needed writing about.
Me and fiancé have had the 4 year anniversary for our engagement today. On our way to the train we walked over Tulinløkka, which is a parking lot placed between the national museum and the historical museum in Oslo, and on one of the wall there was this amazing projection on the wall. So me and fiancé went over to the artist and started to talk, it turned out they were doing a test run for this exhibition the are going to run on the wall from October 16th through December 30th. It is called Bending Water and the artist Sven Påhlsson have been working on the thing for two years solid, using the same weather models that NASA uses to predict storms and such.
You can read all about it here: the Norwegian National Museum of Art.
I hope that anyone who has the chance will go and take a look. It's free and I will probably go see it as often as I can, I got this serene feeling from it, like watching the rolling tides or those tubes of water with bubbles traveling up them, so if anyone needs company give me a heads up and we can go together^^,

While we are on the subject of art I would like you to check out this amazingly talented photographer: tiramcsr
I dare say I might be a little biased in liking her work, seeing as she's my baby sister, but she is very talented. And all her skill has been acquired in a year of media school, talk about fast learner ne? I particularly love this picture:
Clicking the picture will take you to the original on DeviantArt.
The model is my cat Tullerusk, and my sister tells me she modeled it very determinately, obviously enjoying the attention. She actually loves being photographed, and she knows all about showing of her best angles^^, My sister captured her gorgeously^^,
So go and take a look, and if you are registered you are very welcome to watch and comment^^,

Word of the day:
芸術家 - geijutsuka - artist

Endless possibilities

So I was at this Tupperware-demonstration today. And I have decided to become a Tupperware-demonstrator. *pausing for shocked exclamations* ^^,
Jupp, I am getting a job^^, And I think maybe I will be good at it too^^, So I will be inviting all of my friends who live nearby (and their moms XP) for a demonstration in the near future^^,
The thing is that with school and everything I have never thought I would be up for a job, but with this demonstrator thing I can regulate it completely myself. I choose when and how much I want to work, meaning I can take time off during exam season, and can I work more when I have more time on my hands^^,
And I can always quit if it doesn't work out.
So if anyone want a demonstration let me know^^,
I am hoping I can earn enough to be able to get my drivers licence and eventually a car. Hopefully^^,

Book report forthcoming:
I have just finished "Er heiss Jan". I must admit that since I am horrible at German I understood about half of it^^, But what I did understand I loved. It is a sad and beautiful story of forbidden love in difficult times. I loved it, and I intend to read it again when I get better at German, so that I will understand it all^^, I rarely like books I have to read for school, because of the simple fact that I have no choice in whether I have to read them or not, and so I develop a dislike towards them during the first couple of pages. I did that for this book as well, but I got over about half way through. I loved it^^,

Shameless self-praise

I just had this overpowering need to brag a bit>.<
A few weeks ago my good friend (and evil tormentor >.<) D talked me into joining this gym, I think I wrote about the evil torture instruments that inhabits this gym earlier. The evil tormentor part refers to him making me lift weights and use the previously mentioned evil torture training machines, he's not actually evil>.<>.< I am terribly proud in anyway thou^^,

Word of the day:
体育館 - taiikukan - gymnasium

The glory of logical learning

I have been struggling long and hard to learn kanji. To me kanji just isn't logical, and I have some problems learning things that aren't logical. That is all changing. Yesterday I made a wonderful addition to my Japanese text-/work-book arsenal: "Let's learn Kanji", (the blue book, number 3 from the bottom of the left pile on yesterday's picture). Suddenly kanji is logical to me^^, Due to the introduction of the radical. I have had a idea of what a radical is from before, because I had to be able to identify the radical to be able to look up kanji in kanji-dictionaries, but up until now I have never understood the significance of the radical on the meaning of the kanji. I have never realized the connection between several kanji with the same radical and the similar meanings of these kanji. But now I do, and now kanji are so much more logical^^, And therefore easier to learn. So if you are having problems, this book is great. I have been contemplating getting myself a heisig book (heisig is a method of learning kanji that bases itself on association patterns), but I will hold of on that for a while to see if this book works better...

Word of the day:
好き - suki - liking, fondness, love
(word of the day is chosen because I like the kanji portion, which consist of the kanji for woman and child, and I like the way it implies that women and children are likeable^^,)

Heavy books

These are my Japanese books (sorry about the huge picture, seems I have removed my image editing program, so I was unable to shrink it). We were talking at the Japanese class about how many books we had, and I just thought I'd find out. Each stack measures about 23 cm. Which means I have about half a meter with Japanese books. There are the ones I have bought on the left and the my notebooks, the box under the binder is full to the brim with cuecards. And of course I had to weigh them>.< The left ones weighed about 6,4 kilos, and the right ones weighed about 5,2 kilos.
That's a lot of paper that is>.<

Word of the day:
多大 - tadai - heavy, much

The Time Travelers Wife

Finishing a book is always kind of bittersweet. It feels good to have read a book, to be done, to be able to read something else, but you have to leave this world and these people behind. People that you have come to love, and that always makes me feel sad. But I seldom feel as sad as I did last night when I finished the Time Travelers Wife. It was a wonderful book. I don't really have the words for it. I almost never laugh out loud when reading, but this book made me laugh, and I never ever cry, but with this book I came extremely close. I loved this book, and I will read it many times in years to come, and I will make all my friends read it.

I have this kind of personal genre that I call neon sugar prose. I read the expression the first time on the back of a Francesca Lia Block book many years ago, and it stuck. For me it has come to mean literature and movies and music that leaves me with a special feeling, which I can't really describe. Happy and sad and melancholy all at once. The new additions to this personal genre are very few and very far between. But if I ever found a book that fitted, this is it, and if I never find a book again, this one book was worth it. And I don't have any more words for it, so I am going to stop here with a wish that you all go read it and love it as much as I did.

Oh! Goody! Hellbabies!!!

So I saw Hellboy with fiancé today. So the title of this blog i a very slight spoiler but it doesn't matter, 'cos you find out in the very beginning and doesn't really matter until the next movie anyway. And there I spoiled you some more. Swowy...

It was very good, and I liked that it wasn't LOTR type epic like it seemed in the trailer. And Doug Jones actually got to talk^^, He would be the man inside Abe Sapiens, the psychic water creature. He talked in Pan Labyrinth, but that doesn't really count, since he apparently doesn't speak spanish, and had absolutely no idea what he was saying, but was reading it all by phonetics. He is really an amazing actor, all he characters portray an amazing array of emotion through their body, and I guess this is natural, since he doesn't normally get to speak, he has to emote in other ways. But I love him, he is gifted, that's the best way I have to decribe it.
But I digress. The movie looked beautiful. I love pretty movies. I wish Liz's flames was blue in this movie too, but she is still an awesome character. They are all awesome characters, and they are all played well.
Apart from some plant gore at the start, and some hinted gore, but really poop, before that, this is a very non-gory movie, which probably means that it appeals to a wider audience. Which I think is good, because it means that the next movie (there will be a next one) will have a big budget, and lots of the essential special effects that this movie depends. Which will probably be aweome (fiancé told me over my shoulder that it will be released in 2017, and these things delevop non-stop).
Long monolog short. I loved it, and I am getting prime seats for the premiere of the next one. I recomend it to anyone that doesn't mind lots of violence (non-gory mind you), kick-ass swordmanship (that elf prince, former boyband vocalist of the eighties, rocked my high heeled boots), and scary-hot-girls on fire^^, It was awesome, and I command you all to go see it if you haven't already. Fly my pretties! Fly! *cackles* (it's 2 in the mowning okay?>.<)

Word of the day:
生き地獄 - ikijigoku - hell on earth

Beetle update

So it seemed I was not the one with the Longhorn Beetle, it seems Microsoft are the ones with the Longhorn Beetle in their last security update. The rest of the bugs, the ones actually on my computer were fruitflies caused by a update needed by my mp3 player. But all is good now that the fiancé got out his über awesome fruitfly landing net and removed them^^,

I am making headway with the kana, I am halfway through the book^^, And I am doing my math. I am so good^^,

Word of the day:
黄色猩々蠅 - kiiroshoujoubae - fruit fly

Can someone please take the moth out of my computer?

So Playground has a bug. Something about the size of a South American Longhorn Beetle I think. I can't seem to find it thou, but Playground keep doing things she is not supposed to do. And quite frankly it is making me rather sourly. On top of that the internet decided it didn't like me and stopped working about Wednesday evening, so I have been unable to put Playground back the way she is supposed to be. But now I am at the fiancé's place and he has internet, and now I am doing me best of fishing out the beetle from the depths of Playground myself, and if that doesn't work fiancé will take his über awesome beetle removing landing net (or as normal people would say: über awesome computer skillXP) and go hunting for it. (Or he ain't gettin' anyXP) I will let you know how it goesXD

I started Japanese class last night^^, The other students are super nice^^, I am so happy about that^^, I migth make friends^^, I'm a tad better than them thou, but that's just becuase I am a super nerdy study geek>.< When I am in the mood I can sit with my precious Japanese books for hours on end, so I am a tad good. We got this chart over verb conjugation (present and past), which ofcourse I knew how to do. But about half the rest of the class found it hard, which is kind of frustrating, because that means the teacher spends a lot of time explaining things that I know backwards. But it's fun anywho. And I don't know everything either, I am not saying I am supersmart in comparison. I have a huge advantage seeing as I have gotten to chapter 13 in the book we are using, and the class is at 11, so I literally read from my notes to answer the questions instead of constructing the sentences. Which showed bigtime whenever I had to construct something.
And ofcourse we had to write out all the kana on this form at the very start of the class. Now, I can write and read fluently, there are about 6-7 characters that I have to look up (a rappidly decreasing number mind youXP), and I remembered tham all the moment I started writing, but I couldn't fill up half the form. *grumbles* I couldn have done it 5 minutes after we were done, when I had started writing thou. We are getting the form again next week thou, and I am going to ace it, damn it! (even if we aren't getting gradedXP)

I have joined a gym. Woohoo........... Thus far all I have gotten out of it thus far is achy arms.... But I am going to get in super shape. Yup... Steel abs comming to a blog near you in the near (or very distant) future^^,
This is not really interresting thou, but I just had to write a short note on the appearance of the gym. It had the feel of a well lit, sleek, silvery torture chamber. Not really because of the pain I knew was in store, but high tech workout machines are really scary looking. They look like if you painted them black they would do very well in a dungeon, and not the BDSM kind, the real mideveaval "I am going to pull your fingers apart joint by joint while you are awake"-kind. The device from training the small of the back would look really good next to an iron virgin. I kid you not>.<

I am going off to perfect my romanji to kanji exelence^^,

Word of the day:
金亀子 - koganemushi - scarab beetle, goldbug

The expetations are killing me...

I start Japanese class tomorrow. The butterflies started a week ago, I am so exited. I dare say I am going to be horrible thou, I have not practiced anything much for... Since school started I think, so about two months I think. But I will get good again fast. I hope XP

I should be doing my German homework, but I am so sick of the stupid book that I only understand about a third of. It's frustrating not being good, seeing as usually master things right away. I know I can be good, but it takes so much effort. Blah... But I am trying my hardest. I anyone wanna help me out by being mailbuddies in German I would hugely appreciate it...=D I have a mailbuddy in Germany already, but we've been writing in English so far. I am gonna ask her very nicely if she wanna write in German, but she has her own life too, so I can't really expect her to write as often as I'd like... So if anyone wanna be my German-learning mailbuddy there's lots of virtual huglings in it for you^^,

I have been writing poetry on and of since, well, since I learned how to spell. Mostly in English, and we were supposed to write poetry for this assignment in English class last year, and being the lazy person that I am I brought all my poems to school and asked if I could choose one of those instead. My English teacher is such a doll, so he let me and he thought my poetry as so good so I borrowed them all to him over summer. I went to pick them up a few weeks ago and he said I should try to get published. And I have been wondering about that earlier too, because it would be kind of fun being a published poet. I am a bit uncertain thou, seeing as I would like to start in Norway, but I am not up to translating, and the few one I have in Norwegian are really bad, and noone gets to mess around with my babies, so I have to find some publisher who will be willing to let me publish them in their original form, so we'll see. I'll be sure to let you know if it comes to anything thou^^, Even thou I really doubt it...

Word of the day:
詩人 - shijin - poet

This is what our past was supposed to look like

This is what we were supposed to dress eight years ago. Apart from the fitted telephone they are a bit... off. Watch it, it's cool, and short^^,

We made it=D=D

I hope you all voted yesterday *looks menacingly at all her minions*
The Battery came in as a very strong second, and we are all very pleased. This means they are going to the Scandinavian finals in November, which will win. I have decided they will so they will *nods*
The song that won was my personal favorite of the ten, I love the Battery's song, but to be quite frank I like the BlackSheeps' song better. It's more the kind of music I listen to normally, might have something to do with that. Plus the singer had this larger than life voice and this amazing stage presence. It doesn't really matter thou, because they are both going to Denmark and the Battery is winning that for sure.
The Battery had a huge crowd in audience cheering for them thou, my mother tells me that Brage's mother, who was in charge of the tickets, had ordered over 200, so it was half of Surnadal there cheering them on. We all had bright orange t-shirts and we were loud. We were so many that they had to place us two places in the concert hall (it seemed that they put all of the family and supporters for the different musicians together, so that it would be easy to point the camera at people who are cheering and waving posters), and we could see each other and were having cheering contests and everything. The supporters from one of the soloartists sat between us and were trying their best to keep up, but every time the started we attacked them from two sides and their cheers drowned in our awesome volume. This was all before the actual show thou, since we couldn't very well be that uncivilized on TV >.<
But we were loud under the show too, and I cheered at everyone, as did most of those around me. I must have been fun to watch thou, because the man with the sweeping boom camera thingy kept pointing it at me, and I think he even put me on the screen (I know a few things about red lights and whatnot XP).
I feel sorry for the little girl who misread thou, she was reading the points the for the artists in the super final, and some blockhead idiot grown up doofus had decided that put the total score next to the score she was actually supposed to read. So halfway through she misread, and said the Battery got 17000 points, and we went through the roof, and then it turns out that was the total, and we only got 4000. Poor thing, an 8 year old is not equipped to be able to sort out which column to read from when she is high strung and nervous and is going to be on national TV. I do not understand what the point of having the totals there at all, since nobody read them, and if she was supposed to read both she most likely would have done it right. She read wrong twice. I feel really sorry for her, it's not her fault that grown ups sometimes are total idiots, but I think she did a very good job, she only looked confused (and slightly very panicked), and did not start to cry, as I bet I would have. I think she did very good and was very brave and if anyone who reads this have any connection to her please tell her so (yes I know it's a one in a million chance, but anyway).
I had a great time, and the Battery did great, and will win the finals, because all of you will vote, and because they are great^^, And I so timing my visit to Surnadal next year to one of the shows (if they still play small shows then...=D)
And if anyone is going be a cheer crowd at something like this: white matching t-shirts are pointless, even if they have printing on them, 'cos you can't see the printing from a distance. But if you wear screaming colours, like orange. Everybody saw us=D=D
But sleepytime now

Word of the day:
次位 - jii - second rank, second place

Vote Battery

My second cousin is playing in the MGP junior today, and I am going to go see it live^^,
So if anyone who reads this blog wanna support me and my second cousin you should vote for Battery^^, (My second cousin is Brage: the one rocking the piano)
Full account of the whole thing tomorrow^^,

Word of the day:
表決 - hyouketsu - vote, voting

Wall-E

So I went to see Wall-E yesterday, and I must say, it was hands down the cutest movie I have seen in a very long time. Love stories are one thing, but love stories written and understandable for children are quite another. It was just so adorable, these two little robots both trying to save the world, each in the own way, who love each other.
I have heard that some people was mortified about the environmental message in a childrens movie, but I think that if we are going to turn around this use and throwaway mentality we need to start with the young-uns, as young as possible. But it won't help just to show them a movie, we need to go ahead as good examples as well.
All in all it is a great movie, and an important one as well, and you all need to go see it. And if you don't like it, the pixeled short version at the end of the movie made it all worth it^^,

Word of the day:
ロボット - robotto - robot

Sniffles...

I am home today with a cold TT.TT I hate colds. It's not too bad thou, it was worse yesterday. I was supposed to go have coffee with M but I just had to skip that. And I was supposed to go see Wall-E, which I think I will do, since it appears R already bought the tickets. I hope I will get well tomorrow *wipes runny nose*

I finally finished the Mao biography, and on time too. It is a well written biography, a bit dry at times, but what can one expect. I think it's a very important story, seeing as it's important to know the history of all the major countries. And lets face it, China is growing into just as important a country for the world economy as the US.
I think that this book should be read in combination with Jung Chang's other book "Wild Swans", because then you get both sides of the story: how it was to live in China under Mao, and why Mao made the decisions that threw his country into wave after wave of terror and hunger.

I bought a new collar for Rusket yesterday when I dragged my sick sorry self to the library to deliver the books I had borrowed. The last one I bought her had a felt lining that didn't agree with her at all, so I bought her a reflector collar with a nifty lock that will release on it's own if she gets caught in something. She never have, but better safe than sorry, right? I have absolutely no illusions that a car would be able to reflect anything on the collar when it's hid deep inside all that fur, but worth a try right?XD

I think I am going to try to get some work done. It's my body that's sick after all, not my brain. I have thus far finished a project for my economics class, and I think I will do some math now^^,

Oh! My lovely dad bought me a new mp3 player, isn't he just the nicest. It's got this cutest little animation with little dogs jumping all over the screen when I listen to music^^, I love my dad *hugles dad*

Word of the day:
吐き気 - hakike - nausea, sickness in the stomach