Melodifestival 3 in Leksand

I thought the standard of performances was a lot better this week, although I failed horribly at choosing the winner. My two least favorite acts were the ones that went through; Molly Sandén with a turgid ballad, and the bizarre pairing of the orange-tanned sexagenarian Björn Ranelid speaking about love over a Europop dance refrain led by Sara Li.

A good summary from one of the many specialty Eurovision fansites can be read here.

The Snow Moose

A friend visited the Sapporo Snow Festival recently (as you do) and sent along a photo of Sweden's entry. It's a moose in a box.

The moose is cute but not that sophisticated snow-wise; however, the detail of the cardboard box is amazing. The box flaps and the crease in the corner are all rendered delicately out of snow. The moose placed second to Hong Kong's dragon entry.

Click on the photo to see the moose's charming caption.

Melodifestial part 2

Last night's show from Göteborg was disappointing, frankly. The level of singing was even lower than usual and all the bad acts were just bad (not good-bad and therefore funny).

The two acts that went through were Ulrik Munther, a folk-Bieber type, and David Lindgren, who I can describe best as "Swedish hip-hop meets Don Draper".

I am sure we won't be seeing either of them in Baku.

UPDATE: Margaret sent me a blog of an American ex-pat living in Sweden who posted an excellent summary of the show.

Webcams

I really get a kick out of looking at webcams around the world. I have two on this blog, a Sandhamn camera run by Waxholmsbolaget, and a Stavsnäs cam run by a resident in the apartments next to the local ICA. I also have a couple of my own in our house in Texas to keep an eye on Ollie.

To be honest, I would love to have a webcam out on Aspö so I could keep an eye on the house, to see the weather first-hand, and maybe to catch a moose snapshot or two. I found a blog run by a gentleman who owns land in Wales, and set up a solar-powered webcam to upload regular pictures onto his website. To be honest, I have been looking at it most every day.

For me, it'd be easier to set something like this up. I at least have electric power, rather then relying on a solar cell as this gentleman has to. I would have to keep my internet connection on full-time, so I'd be paying about 200kr a month while I am away, so that would add up.

The biggest thing keeping me from doing this, though, is the distance. It seems pretty certain that during the months I am away, something would stop working.
And therein lies the problem. If I set up a webcam and it stopped working, that would drive me crazy. I would be far better off not having it in the first place.

The melodifestival is back!

The first tiny stirrings of Spring are beginning, ironically on the coldest day yet of this Swedish winter. Yes, I'm talking about the Melodifestival, the six-week contest on SVT to decide the country's entry into the Eurovision song contest.

The Swedes really like to stretch it out. Most countries have chosen already; all but a very few will do so over the next few weeks. Sweden is last, as the grand final won't be until March 10. A good chart of each country's entry can be found on Wikipedia.

Saturday's first show was from Växjö, a town of about 65,000 people in south-central Sweden. It had the usual selection of sexy, execrable and kooky performances. The first winner was Dead By April, with a Lincoln Park-esque dual-vocal hard rock ballad.

More intriguing was the second winner, Loreen, a young lady with a fantastically shaggy haircut, mysterious lighting, a costume with some sort of reverse cleavage, but most importantly, a pumping Eurodisco ballad, "Euphoria", which really hits the Eurovision hot buttons in my opinion. She's one to watch, and you can see her here, at least until SVT puts out a copyright notice.

Snowy photos from Annika

It's darn cold out on Aspö this weekend. The Stavsnäs webcam said it was -24°C this morning! It appears most of Europe is in an icy grip right now.

Annika sent along a few new wintry photos from this weekend and they are added to her gallery.

The Arthur Murray Dance Party

December 29, 1957.

I especially love the introduction.

RIP Buddy Holly.



Another funky island house

Marcia was watching a TV show the other day about "odd or dream houses" in Sweden. She saw one by a Dutch architect, Boris Zeisser, that she was compelled to tell me about. One of the most interesting elements of the house (besides its being built by a Dutchman) is an extendable room which can be winched out over a stream, in the style of Fallingwater, and then pulled back in for the winter months.

Because of this extendable room, the architects call it the Dragspelhuset, or "Accordion House". Details can be seen on this blog entry. Good catch!!!

Another reason I love Sweden

Sweden's big daily newspaper, Svenska Dagbladet, is bucking the trend of major dailies around the world and actually increasing its readership.

I read it online in a futile effort to improve my Swedish, although I admit I dip into Google Translate much more often than I should.

A little sidebar caught my eye recently. Apparently, SvD is holding an introductory course on modern design. I was able to get the gist of this one on my own, but an English translation of the page is here.

For 3000kr ($425), the interested student can attend five lectures on the history and future of modernism and Swedish design. How I would love to attend those. Sadly, I haven't seen any courses like that yet in Texas!

Prefab skyscrapers

 

I've written previously about pre-fab houses, especially as they are so well suited for building in Scandinavian climates. With such a short building season, it's a huge advantage to be able to maximise building time in the summer.

Our own house- and our shed- weren't really pre-fab, but rather kit houses. All of the parts and pieces were supplied, but there was still significant assembly required. A true pre-fab simply requires connecting large pieces to produce a fully finished product. And a pre-fabricated house is by can be quite luxurious, with the Huf House being a well-known example.

The video above shows that idea taken to its extreme. A 30 story hotel was built, start to finish, bare ground to occupancy, in 15 days! An article on treehugger gives details. Each floor is finished, down to the floor tiles, light switches, window shades, etc., and is assembled on a single pallet. A crane lifts it up, the floor is laid, the windows and walls are put up, and the next floor arrives to be installed above it.

It appears there aren't any corners cut, either. Modern energy-saving technologies are built in; its earthquake resistance has been tested, even furnishings and light fixtures are ready to go. This system is said to be accurate to 0.2 of a millimeter, which is about a hundred times more accurate than my own building efforts!

I liked the comment that these kinds of systems mean that even construction can be exported. Today we buy iPads from Chinese factories; perhaps soon, we'll be buying our houses there, too.

Yet another fireplace

This one's a bit different. It's not a wood- burning fireplace, but it runs instead on ethyl alcohol. So there's no need for a flue, or really ventilation of any sort.

It is made by Cocoon Fires, and they have a number of models on their website.

Although it's supposed to give off some heat, it's really cosmetic. I like the looks of it, but our fireplace would need to be more practical. In Sweden, it's quite common to burn one's waste paper in one's fireplace to cut down on trash. (I remember Rutger making a cosy fire out of Christmas wrappings last year!)

And of course, there's quite a wealth of wood for burning right outside our front door. If we do end up spending much time on Aspö in the colder months, we would need a proper fireplace for sure.

The last strike against this funky fireplace is cost. It's about $3500 (or 25,000kr) for the stainless steel model pictured here. That's an awful lot for cosmetics!!

Deck Lights

I've found a company that sells a recessed deck light kit which I find pretty interesting.

The kit is quite simple; the lights are LED, so they're low voltage. They sell a special drill bit which makes installation simple. Extra lamps can be purchased. Up to 20 lamps can be run on one transformer. Remote controls and dimmers are even available.

Best of all, I called the company, and their kit works on 220 volts as well as the 110V common in the USA.

I reconnoitered the deck when I was at the the house in December, and I think installation would be quite straightforward. On the other hand, we're not there very often during the dark months, so maybe such a setup is superfluous. Still, it's fun to think about.

A dispatch from Annika

She and Ole reported they had a wonderful weekend on Aspö, -1°C and sunny. In fact it was so nice, they're taking this Friday off, too, to spend another long weekend. I told Annika I was jealous of their doing that, and she said she was jealous of our warm Texas winters!

They also added that our house and its surroundings looked fine. I appreciate their looking after it like that.

She sent 5 more beautiful photos, which are on her gallery now.

Stairs

One of my projects next year is to build a new set of stairs for the little house. Janne helped me build a landing for its front door, and now I have about a 2-meter wide leading edge. This will be perfect for a broad set of stairs to come off the path, up to the little house.

I want to make these stairs myself, so I have been reading up on the subject. There's a wealth of information out there on the mathematics and mechanics of stair-building. I've bought a book, and also watched videos on You Tube. (I've found you can learn how to do most anything on the internet these days. And I mean anything.)

The most important thing is to calculate the 'rise' and 'run' of the stairs. This simply means how high the stairs have to rise up from the ground to meet the deck. The length (or 'run') of the stairs is calculated from how many steps are needed to complete the rise.

There are lots of variations on how wide and steep each step should be. Standard building codes specify the maximum rise (not too steep) and minimum run (not too shallow). The steps I have now are fiarly broad and shallow; I initially wanted that to make life easier for Ollie. But, as Margaret pointed out, broad steps make a great perch for having a bowl of cereal in the morning and watching the scenery.

When I was at the house in December, I made a bunch of measurements. My local building store in Texas had simple angle finders and other stair-measuring tools for me to bring along, so I have a pretty good idea of what I need to do.

I've made a sketch of what the stairs will look like. I have a bunch of photos and measurements of my current stairs, so I'm confident about what needs to be done. I'll run it all by Janne when I see him next, to make sure I've thought of everything. I'm looking forward to the project!

Stockholm Marathon

I mentioned a couple of months ago that I planned to run the Stockholm Marathon this year. I've run it twice before, in 1990 and 2000. I have the finishers medals in my office even today. I used to run quite a lot a decade ago; in fact, I was running at least one marathon a year. Recently, though, I've just been running half-marathons, and since I came back to Texas, I haven't been running much at all. (I use the heat as my excuse.)

The 2012 Stockholm Marathon is on June 2, and the timing is perfect as we were planning to change our calendar for visiting Aspö this year. We're going to visit in late May and then again in late July. Typically, we visit over my birthday in midsummer, but we're changing for two reasons. First, we'll be able to link up in July with Ann and Dave, as we've always missed them with our earlier visits. Secondly, we can avoid the awful Texas heat.

I start training in earnest next month. I'd like to beat my 1990 time of 4:23, but we'll see how my legs have held up in the intervening 22 years. I'll update on occasion over the coming months, but don't worry, this won't become a running blog!

Gott Nytt Är!

I received an email from Annika and Olle, out on Aspö for the holiday. She gave me a link for an iPhone app that makes it easy (and free) for us to send messages and photos.

I installed it and we've been chatting all morning. Annika sent me 5 new photos, which I've put up on her gallery. There's no snow at all, which is quite a contrast to last year.

Happy New Year to everyone!

Farewell to SAAB

It appears Saab, that quintessential Swedish car company, is no more.

I always thought a SAAB 900 convertible was a great blend of fun & safety. The Shelby, on the other hand, is not practical at all. Just fun. Lots of fun.

But I digress. Farewell, quirky little Saab.

Kalle Anka och hans vänner önskar God Jul

Even though we're far away from Sweden this Christmas, that won't stop us from enjoying the long-held tradition of watching Donald Duck at 3 in the afternoon.

Through the magic of the internet, and although I know it goes against tradition of watching only live, we'll be revisiting last year's broadcast (which doesn't change all that much year to year).

Margaret sent me a Slate article about the tradition, and all my previous posts over the years are here.

God Jul till alla!

Filmjölk

I thought I had blogged before about my favourite Swedish breakfast treat, but it appears I haven't. So, to rectify my oversight:

Filmjölk is a traditional soured milk, somewhere between regular milk and yogurt in consistency and taste. I think it's delicious with granola and/or fruit in the morning, and it's my big breakfast treat on Aspö.

There are a whole host of similar soured/fermented milk products in dairy-consuming cultures all over the world. I don't mind sour cream on my baked potato, but that's about as far as I go here in the US. No buttermilk or whipped cream for me. But in Sweden, I can't get enough fil in the morning!

As I was looking up info on filmjölk for this post, I stumbled across a website that sells the specific starter cultures to make my own. This, I couldn't resist. I ordered a packet, and now Sooz and I have followed the video instructions and made our very own filmjölk.

I had my first bowl this morning, topped with fresh Swedish granola, courtesy of Marcia. It was damned good! The taste was exactly the same, and I had a tasty, if nostalgic, breakfast. It was funny to enjoy such a Swedish-specific treat here in Texas.

If I manage my culture right, I'll be able to enjoy a Swedish treat all winter long. I'm looking forward to it.

I'm back in Texas

72 hours after I left, I'm back in the Lone Star state. Thanks to the on-time performance of a number of global airlines, the public transportation systems in London and Stockholm, and above all, the cheerful and efficient chauffeur services of my good buddy Rutger, everything worked out fine.

It was nice to visit the house of course, but a little strange, too. Being on the island by myself on such a dark, wet, and cold day gave everything a melancholy, if not slightly threatening, air. I also had the constant reminder of being on the clock. I was there for about 5 hours, about twice as long as the Apollo 11 crew spent walking on the moon, but still.

I took photos for some future projects I'll blog about later. Everything else seemed in great shape, with the exception of our little shed, which is settling a bit. We'll have to jack it up a bit next year.

A batch of photos are up on a new webgallery. It's still hard to believe we won't be back until Easter at the earliest...!

Hello from Aspö

I'm here, in the middle of a breakneck visit to Europe. It is grey and raw here. I'm having a hard time not imagining myself as a character in a Wallander book. I'd much prefer snow. But no matter bleak it is here right now, it's still beautiful in its own way.

The house looks good and the bathroom and water closet are both properly warm. I seem to have misplaced the key for the shed which is an annoyance. I'll find a weatherproof combination lock for my next trip.

I'll have a few photos up when I'm back in the US, which is tomorrow, believe it or not.

St. Lucia's Day

It's Lucia's Day today. I haven't found much of a Swedish community here in Texas yet, as I posted last year. But I will try to get Sooz to make some saffron buns!

Chicago Wolves Hockey

I have mentioned in the past that Wille's son, Eddie Lack, is a goaltender in the hockey minor leagues here in North America. You may recall that Wille hails from Leksand, the hockey-mad region in northern Sweden.

Eddie is now with the Chicago Wolves in the AHL. I've been following his exploits closely.

Recently, Eddie was featured in the Wolves' online magazine, and it's fun to read about him. Wille told me he was planning to come to Chicago this winter, and we'd love to join him in my hometown to watch some hockey.

Another Summer house

Dwell has a slideshow of a very simple and chic house in the Skåne countryside.

It's a bit too precious for me, I think. But it is beautiful and worth a look.

More photos from Annika

I received an email from Annika this past weekend. She reported:

"This weekend we visited Aspö again and it was very windy. However – everything looks great around your houses. No damages or anything unpleasant seen. Not a snowflake in sight and we are glad for that!"

She also attached a few wonderful photos from her iPhone. I've updated the webgallery.