Yet another fireplace

I've written a lot about fireplaces in the past. It really is silly to install one right now. We're pretty much going to be at our house only during summertime, so there's no need. The installation needs to be done by an expert and is therefore costly. Having a fireplace also raises my insurance significantly.

All that said, I still want one. Every proper Swedish house has a fireplace and my house is surrounded by free fuel. I came across a Swedish company, Contura, who have a big range of wood burning fireplaces, many of which would look great in our house.

Maybe not now, but one day for sure...

Took this shot of my TV set this morning

Yes, it really says that. City 6, United 1. At Old Trafford. Surreal.

A little slideshow

I found an interesting slideshow on the Dwell website about the ubiquitous Arne Jacobsen model 3107 chairs. These chairs are everywhere; I would think a week doesn't go by without my seeing one somewhere. These chairs are shorthand for 'Danish' all over the world.

I don't have any of these models myself, but I am the proud owner of a pair of similar chairs, the 3130, known as the 'Grand Prix' chair. Mine are the originals, from the late 50's, with the old-style wooden legs. They're still sturdy and comfortable today.

Toilets on Mt. Everest

I read in the news about plans to provide toilets at the Mt. Everest base camp. Apparently the whole mountain has become a dumping ground, with climbers leaving behind all sorts of discarded equipment, not to mention their waste!

Instead of just cleaning up, the plan is to introduce waste management to the mountain. That is the right way to go. As any camper (or island resident) can tell you, reducing the amount of extraneous stuff before you start is most efficient. In fact, that concept has coined a new word: precycling.

When we bring stuff out to Aspö, we remove as much packaging from the items as we can. It is amazing how a few shopping bags full of stuff can compact way down with a bit of judicious unwrapping. That allows us to carry more in, and carry less out. A win all around.

Dual visits

Last weekend was an episode of synchronicity. Sooz and I were in Florida, visiting Margaret and Janne in their new home, while, at the same moment, Rutger, Marcia and her mom, (plus Archie) spent the weekend at our place on Aspö!

The most remarkable thing is that we all enjoyed perfect weather all weekend. Well, perhaps not remarkable for those of us in the Sunshine State, but a weekend of nearly 80° on the Archipelago in early October- now that's worth writing about!

Rutger did a couple of small jobs at the house for me. On the handyman scale, with Janne a 10 and me (generously) a 2, I'd rate Rutger a 7. He's a handy guy to have around. I think Marcia's mom had a good time, although obviously they put her to work washing the dishes.

Now the house is closed up until the spring. I may not be able to make it back to Aspö until then, but Sooz and I certainly plan to visit Margaret and Janne again!

RIP Steve Jobs

Like many millions of people in the US, I saw Apple's now famous "1984" commercial introducing the Macintosh. Being fairly geeky, I was impressed and curious.

About a week later, I was in Dallas at a training course, and Sooz came down to visit. We stayed an extra night downtown, and went for a walk before dinner.

An office-supply store had a new Mac in its window and I went in to see one. It's hard to explain how quickly and completely that little computer found its way into my heart. I remember that moment in perfect detail; it's no exaggeration to say it was one of the significant moments of my life. It's a good thing my girlfriend was with me, otherwise I might have stayed there all night. I might have quit my new job. I might have moved to California. It was that powerful.

I bought one, of course; it cost $2500 and I had to take out a bank loan. That little guy traveled all over with me for the next few years, even to Stockholm in 1989. I sold it then at a good price to a banker on Tomtebogatan. It was hard to let go but I had moved on to the ridiculous Mac Portable, which I happily dragged all over Europe in the early 90's.

In the late 90's, Apple was struggling as a company and its existence was in doubt. I was making plans to buy the most powerful Mac I could, just in case, to tide me over for a few years. Instead, I made a totally emotional decision to buy Apple stock, as a form of solidarity I suppose. Today that stock is worth nearly a hundred times what I paid for it.

But that financial gain is nothing compared to what I've received from Apple over the years. I'm a different person, I think a better person, because of that little Mac I saw all those years ago.

Thanks for everything, Steve.

Another iPhone app

I mentioned an iPhone GPS app in my previous post. In that vein, I have another app to share: Star Walk.

This app is like something from a science fiction movie. Just hold it up to the sky, and the iPhone knows exactly where it is and gives an annotated view of the stars above. That's how I was able to see that my star trail photo was focused on Arcturus.

If you have an iPhone (or iPad), I highly recommend downloading this program.

Surveying the path

My sister recommended an iPhone app to track my walks with Ollie. It works amazingly well in my neighborhood.

It never occurred to me to use it on Aspö, however, until Tony mentioned it at dinner one night. The next morning, I turned on data roaming, and Sooz and I walked the whole path.

The app worked just as perfectly out in the archipelago, and it produced the map above. The starting point is our house, which is close to the junction of the main path. The walk from home to the Waxholms dock at the south end of the island is exactly a half-mile, making it an even mile round-trip to drop off trash or pick up mail.

The circumnavigatory path is 1.75 miles around, making the total length of the pathways two and a quarter miles. The elevation information was also interesting:

The first mile shows the big drop down to the dock from our house, with the corresponding steep rise on the return (which I braved many times with our wheelbarrow crammed full of goods).

Back at our house, there's a gentle rise until we drop back down to the shore at the northeast. Then it's a pretty long uphill, past Janne's house towards the center of the island, and a downhill stretch past Tony's house, back to our home. The little app calculated the tallest part of the path is 78 feet above sea level. Pretty darn cool for an iPhone!

Star Trails 2

I've been playing around in Photoshop with all the star photos I took.

Here's the best so far, it's a composite of 304 photos taken at 30-second intervals, starting at 10PM on September 9.

My favorite part is the little shooting star I captured, just left of center.

I'm pretty sure the brightest star in this image is Arcturus.

Unfortunately, it may be a year until I can do another such set on Aspö, as it won't be dark enough in the summer to take photos like these.

Back in Texas

It's been a whirlwind week but we're safely back in the US of A and our little stuga seems far behind. We arrived into 106° heat but mercifully that broke the next day and it is about 20 degrees cooler now.

There are a few things going on over the coming months, including, but not limited to:

• Painting
• Electricity to the shed and new lights
• New stairs for the little house
• Perhaps buying a boat, halfsies with Rutger
• Training for the Stockholm Marathon!

We also have a few home projects here in Texas, too, which I'll blog about if they have any relevance to living in Sweden.

Our next firm plan to return is in late May, which I have a hard time getting my head around. We'll see if I can hold out that long!

Sorry for being offline

Sooz and I have been too busy doing things, or too busy not doing things! I have managed to put up a selection of photos, at least.

We're closing up today, going back to Stockholm on a 5:30 boat this evening.

Lots to write about over the coming days, so stay tuned.

A really lazy day

Tuesday started out with the excitement of a moose sighting. We saw the young one about 25 feet uphill from our deck. I managed a decent photo for the web gallery.

It was mostly sunny, so we just putzed around and enjoyed the nice weather. I managed to extract the hornet's nest with no difficulty, and I installed a few LED 'party lights' above the couch, just for fun.

We saw lots of apples and plums on our walk in the evening, and Sooz is going to try a bit of cooking with the local ingredients. I also tried to take a star trail photo last night, but my first attempt is a bit underwhelming. Friday night is forecasted to be clear so I will have another crack at it then.

Today is rainy, so we're going to paint in the little house, and Tony and Ann-Catrin are joining us for dinner tonight.

Greetings from Aspö

Our morning trip out was fine, albeit early. Marcia lent us her car, so we cruised through the rush-hour traffic to Stavsnäs just in time. The house is in great shape, although I got a heck of a fright when I opened our water cabinet and was eye-to-eye with a giant hornet's nest!

We're getting pretty used to recommissioning the household. It was nice and sunny most of the afternoon, so Sooz worked her sudoku and I got out my trusty circular saw to build a little cabinet in the little house.

We took an evening walk, and checked on Janne, who has a bit of the flu, so we didn't stay long so he could recover for dinners with us later in the week!

Photos are up on the latest webgallery.

Greetings from Stockholm

We're here after a typically whirlwind weekend. I met up with Sooz as planned on Saturday morning and Rutger picked us up as usual. We went straight into the yearly neighborhood party, and both of us were up past 1AM! We had a great time, but frankly, the next morning, it became apparent that I had been overserved.

Nevertheless, we managed to summon the strength to shop for supplies, and prepare for an early departure Monday.

On our way!

I leave tonight for a day of work in London, and Sooz joins me the next day. We'll fly to Stockholm together Saturday morning, spending the weekend at the Wilhelmis, and then on to Aspö Monday morning.

Besides visiting our good friends, and staying on our little island, an extra bonus will be to escape the terrible heat we've been blighted with here in Texas. As of this writing, we have had sixty-six days of temperatures over 100°F (38°C). In those 66 days, we've had a streak of forty consecutive days over 100 degrees. And of course not a drop of rain.

Even our pool brings no relief. The water temperature is 96°F (35°C). It's like taking a bath! We thought  Ollie could cool off in the pool, but the only thing that works for him are pre-dawn walks, and laying prone on the tiled kitchen floor by an air-conditioning vent. Welsh farmers never bred their Corgis for heat like this.

The forecast for our arrival in Stockholm is 16°C/ 61°F with a chance of rain. After the summer we've had, I'm so looking forward to that.

Star Trails

I'd like to try some star trail photography when we're on Aspö next week, as seen in this example. I feel I should take advantage of the wonderful dark nights out there.

One of my colleagues is an accomplished photographer, and she lent me a number of articles about the technique. I now have a bit of software on my mac, along with a star tracker app for my iPhone!

We'll see how successful I am (weather permitting) in just a few days, and of course I'll share any decent photos that I may come up with.

Birdhouses

I found a website with a bunch of cool modernish birdhouses. They are also pretty pricey but it gave me the idea to perhaps make one of my own. I have plenty of scrap wood and I might give it a go.

What we really would like to do is to make a bat house; we've seen a few bats on Aspö and they're threatened in Sweden. I looked into plans and kits but that seems a more complicated project than I'm willing to get into right now. I'll give a birdhouse a try for starters!

Labor Day

I realized that I haven't posted about our next trip to our house.

It will be pretty soon, just over two weeks from now, as we're going to spend the week of Labor Day on Aspö. We don't have a big agenda this time. Getting away from the Texas heat will be nice. Seeing Rutger, Marcia and Janne is always great.  We'll have dinner with Tony and Ann-Catrin one night. And we plan to meet with Krister the painter and Janne the electrician too.

The only building project I have is to make a cabinet for the circuit breaker box in the little stuga. I also want to try to take more time lapse movies, should the weather permit. But that's it. Just island relaxation.

We will also be closing up the house for the winter which is bothering me a bit. We're not planning to be back until next spring, and I find it unsettling to be away for 7 months. Also Janne won't be on Aspö this winter, although Annica and Olle have said they'd keep an eye on our place.

You may ask why we'll be away for so long? It's a good question. It is because of the different policies  regarding vacation time in the US and UK. Interestingly, the United States is the only industrialized country that does not have any legal requirements for vacation time. Vacation rules are up to one's employer. New employees joining my company here in the US earn their vacation during the year to be used in the next year.

For various tax and legal reasons, my return to the US after so long in the UK caused me to be treated as a new employee, and as such, I have no paid vacation at all this year. This became clear to me only after I had already spent three weeks in Sweden and bought tickets for a fourth.

Fortunately, my employers are reasonable, and a fair solution was reached. The big downside to me is that my September trip will use up my last vacation days this year. I'll have my usual 6 weeks next year, but it doesn't make much sense to go all the way to Sweden for a limited trip in the wintertime. So it looks like perhaps Easter next year for our first trip back, which is why there's a 7 month gap between visits.

Sooz and I are talking about changing our travel calendar for next year, in any case. That will be a subject for us, and for this blog, in the coming months.

Other Homes

I've been flying a lot recently, and on a trip home the other day, I read about not one, not two, but three interesting houses. The first was in the New York Times about a home near Death Valley, built for an Italian couple. I love its interior, and I share the owner's admiration of their night sky. Seeing a huge field of stars is one of my favourite things on Aspö.

The second house was in Dwell, a simple little cabin, but with the ability to literally crank the deck up and close the house away from the elements. I looked at the architects' website about the cabin and found another house I liked even more. I spent a lot of time reviewing all their projects and I highly recommend a look.

Dwell also provided the third house, a funky blue number on Quebec's Magdelen island. I like the way a simple house, which reflected a simple way of life, can be restored and updated so charmingly.

Box Wine Redux

I posted almost three years ago about the phenomenon of boxed wine. The logistical appeal of an easily transported unit of wine is very strong for island dwellers. On the mainlands, box wine is increasingly popular, especially on the lower ends of the wine market.

Things seem to be changing these days, however. The New York Times ran an article last week which points out that some pretty good wines can be had in boxes these days. I just might splurge and bring a special box from the USA out to Aspö next summer!!

Paint colors

Sooz went through a huge number of options when we repainted our Texas kitchen. Being color blind myself (and a fan of primary colors), I found the process a bit difficult. Sooz would show me a selection of paint chips that all looked pretty much the same to me, yet I felt compelled to provide some sort of input.

In the end, the kitchen island was painted "Moose Mousse", the walls "Apple Blossom", the breakfast room "Raffia", and the living room is in "Cliff". The dining room is now covered in "Sheer Pout" and our office is "Morning Sand".

I mention all of these color names because of an amusing article in the New York Times about the trend for obscure paint naming. It's worth a read.

As for our stuga, I've spoken to Krister, the house painting expert on Nämdö. He's seen our place and he will be back in September to talk to us about the best way to go forward. After talking to a bunch of people and researching a bit, we know we need a specific type of paint called slamfärg (literally "mud paint"). The traditional red color of Swedish houses comes from the copper mines in Falun, commonly known as Falu red. Slamfärg is a derivative of the standard Falu red; it contains more linseed oil, among other things.

Red is by far the predominant color, but yellow and grey are also popular. The good news is that we can get slamfärg in most any color we want. The bad news (see my previous post) is that we can get just about any color we want. We had chosen a medium grey which just about matches the non-darkened exposures of the house. I have to say I'm wavering on that now. Perhaps a darker grey would be better. Maybe even a greenish or brownish grey?

We will talk further with Krister when we see him and of course we'll have to think this over thoroughly before choosing, as I assume he'll be painting next spring.

Other house work

Sorry for the lack of posts. Things have been pretty busy on the Texan front. We've just had our kitchen here refurbished, which went pretty smoothly, overall. Having a huge building store down the street and a bunch of eager tradesman in the neighborhood makes it a lot easier than building on Aspö!

In some ways, though, it was more difficult, for two reasons. First, this is our main house. We were able to gloss over things to some extent in our stuga by thinking, "it's only a cabin". We also didn't want anything too nice out there because we want the rustic lifestyle, and pratically speaking, we will only be in the house a month or two a year. That doesn't apply to our house here. We're living in it most every day, and we also have resale value to think about.

The second problem is that, frankly, we had too many choices. There are hundreds of kinds of countertops to choose from, just at our local store. What material? What thickness? What color or texture? Sooz must have looked at fifty different sink/faucet combos. Our new fridge, stove, and dishwasher were each winnowed down from dozens of candidates and vendors. (The issue of paint colors will deserve its own post in the coming days).

Recent research is finding that having too many choices actually lead to stress and dissatisfaction. When one has many possible choices, it's easy to think "did I make the right one?" Having fewer options makes one much more likely to be satisfied with one's decision. After our kitchen project, I can say the theory does indeed work in practice. Nearly three years ago, Sooz knocked out our whole kitchen (plus a lot more) in one day at IKEA.

The good news is that we're happy with the way it all turned out, and our experience of building on Aspö made us far more educated clients this time around.

All back in Texas

Sooz & Grant made it back to the US with no problem and Ollie was thrilled to have us all back together. It's hot as Hades here; we had become used to the Swedish weather!

There's a bunch of updates coming, so stay tuned while we acclimate to the sunshine.

Winding down....

So. It's just Grant and Me left out here enjoying our last day at the stuga for this summer.

The sky is overcast giving the day a melancholy feel. To combat the mood, Grant and I just went out for a walk: specifically to collect some wild blueberries that are just coming into season. Here are some photos from our stroll, including a nice little bowl of our harvest. Wish you could smell them! There is enough for one pancake.

I'm back in Texas

It was fairly cool on Sunday. Sooz and I attended the annual meeting, which was in Swedish of course. It was great fun to watch. Obviously a lot of care goes into running an island association like this one.

Then it was time for me to leave in the afternoon, on to Marcia & Rutger's and then the long trip today from Arlanda back to the 100° heat here. Ugh.

Sooz and Grant follow on Thursday so it's just me and Ollie for a few more days.