Well, there *was* snow for my birthday
Dec. 13th, 2011 06:35 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kareinaMany of you who know me know that winter has always been my favourite season, and that for me "winter" means that there should be snow on the ground for months on end. One of the things that pleased me about moving to northern Sweden was the concept of Winter. Indeed, when I arrived last January I was greeted with perfect winter weather: a good coating of snow on the ground, tree branches also covered with snow, making them lovely ice sculptures, temperatures consistently below freezing. It was perfect, and I loved it. Sadly, all too soon the earth continued in its journey around the sun, we got too close, and winter ended, much sooner than I was ready for it to.
Not long after I returned from Australia this year we hit a rainy patch of weather--many days in a row were cool, wet and drizzly, and by mid-September I was READY for winter. But winter didn't start in September--the temperature stayed above freezing. OK, I could accept that--it rarely starts that early. But hopefully in late October or November things temps would fall below freezing, snow would come, and all would be well. Nope. Not in October. Not in November. There were a couple of cold days, just cold enough to freeze the wet on the roads a little and make them slippery before melting again, but no real winter.
I was getting worried, but still hopeful, December was on the way, perhaps we would have decent weather then? I really, really wanted a good snowfall before my birthday. And I got it! My birthday was last Saturday, and on Friday we had a good snowfall, which continued on through much of the weekend, and everything was beautiful, snowy, white! I was happy! Sure, the temps were only just below freezing, but I was hopeful they would hold on and that winter had, at long last, truly arrived. Monday was even more encouraging--it got to -12 C (around +10 F), which is a good temp for keeping snow looking nice until the next layer is added. I relaxed--winter had arrived, and life is good!
And then today happened. We got up early because today is the big celebration for Sankta Lucia, and our choir was to preform at the uni at 07:00, which meant leaving the house at 05:30 to walk over there for rehearsal. Given the nice, cold, temps of the day before you can imagine my shock and dismay when I went out this morning to discover it was raining! At 05:30 in the morning! If it was that warm that early it did not bode well for all of my lovely snow.
The walk in was slushy, but not nearly so slushy as the walk home from work this evening, after all day of temps above freezing. The one season that holds no interest for me is spring--I don't care for the transition from beautiful snow to no snow--slush and mud don't do it for me, and today was as wet and slushy as the worst of spring. Sigh. Rest in peace my beautiful birthday snow, I shall miss you.
In other news, my birthday was delightful for more than just the weather--I actually had some friends drop by to help us celebrate and eat cake.![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
lord_kjar and I spent Friday evening baking--I mixed up a yummy almond pound cake (I have been wanting to try that variation: in addition to the one pound each of flour, sugar, butter, and eggs also add a pound of almonds. Yum, did that work well! Though, in fact, I used only 3/4 lbs each of everything because a full pound each wouldn't have fit in the pan), made my favourite gluten-free coconut-almond cookies, and started a refrigerator roll dough. In the morning he baked a sweeter, fluffier cake and I baked the rolls and made a couple of loaves of a multi-grain bread with sunflower seeds and started a pot of vegetable soup. We served the almond pound cake plain, but he did a layer cake with the other--filling made from banana and raspberries mashed together, mixed with cream, and the cake was frosted with cream and decorated with more raspberries (we used frozen) and some orange segments. The rolls were very popular, as were both cakes and the cookies (the latter were especially appreciated by the guest who can't eat flour/gluten).
We had one batch of guests early in the day, and just as they were leaving another couple arrived. In the evening we had a small group over for gaming, and we did a play-test of a game thatlord_kjar wrote, which turned out to be quite fun.
Ever since I entered my second childhood on my 13th birthday (to avoid becoming a teenager) I have counted my age a bit differently than normal. I count my age as high as 12, and then I start over again at three. By that count I turned five this year. But when I realized that I was doing so for the fifth time I was every bit as excited as one would expect from one who was doing it for the first time. fifth fifth! (does that make me also 25?) However, I also managed to prove that I have all of the grace and coordination and ability to comprehend cause and effect as a typical five year old. Saturday morning I decided that I wanted the pretty platter from the top shelf. Rather than callinglord_kjar to come lift it down for me (yes, he is tall enough to reach), I decided to be self sufficient, and get it myself. So I grabbed a nice, solid, wooden kitchen chair, tipped it onto its back two legs, and dragged it over next to the shelf. Then, being in a hurry, I started to step onto the seat of the chair, before actually fully returning the front to legs securely to the ground, but after letting go of the back of the chair (timing is everything).
Gravity being an unrelenting thing the inevitable happened, and the chair tipped over backwards, landing with the hard wooden upper back of the chair striking the top of my foot (the one which hadn't yet left the floor), while the other foot came down on top of the chair just where the seat and the back intersect, adding a bit of extra weight to the chair, all of which was transferred, painfully, to my poor left foot. I now have a lovely, very blue, bruise on the top of that foot, just below the base of the big toe, which covers the whole width of the foot. It was necessary to tie a bag of ice to the foot to continue the baking.
This turns out to be the most painful bruise I have had in years. Fortunately, nothing came into contact with it at all on Saturday, since I run stocking foot at home. But when we went to leave the house on Sunday for the joint performance of our choir with the one in which our folk dance teacher sings I found out that shoes hurt. My winter boots are nice and big, so that when standing they don't touch the top of my feet at all, which is a good thing, because the top of my foot was not happy with any sort of touch at all. However, it turns that a normal walking step causes the top of the foot to come into contact with the boot. Ouch! It took some experimenting to discover that it was possible to modify my walk such that my left leg bent only backwards at the knee, permitting the top of the boot to fall even further away from the top of my foot. In addition to that I have taken to wrapping a chunk of scrap wool around the non-bruised part of my foot so that if the boot does come in contact with the foot it hits the fabric first and the bruise is safe.
Luckily by today (Tuesday) the bruise, which is more colourful, also hurts far less, so I was able to walk home from uni today without the extra wrap, and it didn't hurt (but if I actually poke the bruise or bump it into something it reminds me that healing is not accomplished yet).
That joint choir performance on Sunday was fun! We did some songs with just our choir, some with just theirs, and some with both groups singing at once (both choirs share the same teacher, so she made certain that we knew the same songs and had been trained in them in the same manner). Having more than twice the number of voices added a huge richness to the sound, and having people with strong voices singing directly behind me, straight into my hearing aid microphone, probably helped me actually sing the notes I was meant to be singing.
Today's performance was also fun--it is amazing how many people are willing to be up, dressed, and at uni at 07:00 to watch a holiday performance. Sadly, my hearing aid appointment didn't happen today--I got a call yesterday saying that the doc is sick and they had to cancel--they will send me a letter with the new day/time later.
Yesterday eveninglord_kjar commented that he kept thinking of turning on music, but hadn't gotten to it because his choices while sitting at the computer were his headphones, which have good sound, but cause me to comment that I wish he would share, or the crappy computer speakers. so I suggested speaker shopping. A few minutes later we found a guy on line locally selling a decent set of speakers along with older, but still good, stereo and blueray player. So we bought them, for less than a decent pair of computer speakers. Now we have lovely music emanating from his computer, and all is well.
Thursday during the day this year's Noble Laureate in Chemistry will be talking at our uni, and I plan to attend. It should be interesting. That evening is the Julfesten (holiday party) for our division, and on the weekend we will head south to visit a friend in Umeå.
Not long after I returned from Australia this year we hit a rainy patch of weather--many days in a row were cool, wet and drizzly, and by mid-September I was READY for winter. But winter didn't start in September--the temperature stayed above freezing. OK, I could accept that--it rarely starts that early. But hopefully in late October or November things temps would fall below freezing, snow would come, and all would be well. Nope. Not in October. Not in November. There were a couple of cold days, just cold enough to freeze the wet on the roads a little and make them slippery before melting again, but no real winter.
I was getting worried, but still hopeful, December was on the way, perhaps we would have decent weather then? I really, really wanted a good snowfall before my birthday. And I got it! My birthday was last Saturday, and on Friday we had a good snowfall, which continued on through much of the weekend, and everything was beautiful, snowy, white! I was happy! Sure, the temps were only just below freezing, but I was hopeful they would hold on and that winter had, at long last, truly arrived. Monday was even more encouraging--it got to -12 C (around +10 F), which is a good temp for keeping snow looking nice until the next layer is added. I relaxed--winter had arrived, and life is good!
And then today happened. We got up early because today is the big celebration for Sankta Lucia, and our choir was to preform at the uni at 07:00, which meant leaving the house at 05:30 to walk over there for rehearsal. Given the nice, cold, temps of the day before you can imagine my shock and dismay when I went out this morning to discover it was raining! At 05:30 in the morning! If it was that warm that early it did not bode well for all of my lovely snow.
The walk in was slushy, but not nearly so slushy as the walk home from work this evening, after all day of temps above freezing. The one season that holds no interest for me is spring--I don't care for the transition from beautiful snow to no snow--slush and mud don't do it for me, and today was as wet and slushy as the worst of spring. Sigh. Rest in peace my beautiful birthday snow, I shall miss you.
In other news, my birthday was delightful for more than just the weather--I actually had some friends drop by to help us celebrate and eat cake.
lord_kjar and I spent Friday evening baking--I mixed up a yummy almond pound cake (I have been wanting to try that variation: in addition to the one pound each of flour, sugar, butter, and eggs also add a pound of almonds. Yum, did that work well! Though, in fact, I used only 3/4 lbs each of everything because a full pound each wouldn't have fit in the pan), made my favourite gluten-free coconut-almond cookies, and started a refrigerator roll dough. In the morning he baked a sweeter, fluffier cake and I baked the rolls and made a couple of loaves of a multi-grain bread with sunflower seeds and started a pot of vegetable soup. We served the almond pound cake plain, but he did a layer cake with the other--filling made from banana and raspberries mashed together, mixed with cream, and the cake was frosted with cream and decorated with more raspberries (we used frozen) and some orange segments. The rolls were very popular, as were both cakes and the cookies (the latter were especially appreciated by the guest who can't eat flour/gluten).We had one batch of guests early in the day, and just as they were leaving another couple arrived. In the evening we had a small group over for gaming, and we did a play-test of a game that
lord_kjar wrote, which turned out to be quite fun.Ever since I entered my second childhood on my 13th birthday (to avoid becoming a teenager) I have counted my age a bit differently than normal. I count my age as high as 12, and then I start over again at three. By that count I turned five this year. But when I realized that I was doing so for the fifth time I was every bit as excited as one would expect from one who was doing it for the first time. fifth fifth! (does that make me also 25?) However, I also managed to prove that I have all of the grace and coordination and ability to comprehend cause and effect as a typical five year old. Saturday morning I decided that I wanted the pretty platter from the top shelf. Rather than calling
lord_kjar to come lift it down for me (yes, he is tall enough to reach), I decided to be self sufficient, and get it myself. So I grabbed a nice, solid, wooden kitchen chair, tipped it onto its back two legs, and dragged it over next to the shelf. Then, being in a hurry, I started to step onto the seat of the chair, before actually fully returning the front to legs securely to the ground, but after letting go of the back of the chair (timing is everything). Gravity being an unrelenting thing the inevitable happened, and the chair tipped over backwards, landing with the hard wooden upper back of the chair striking the top of my foot (the one which hadn't yet left the floor), while the other foot came down on top of the chair just where the seat and the back intersect, adding a bit of extra weight to the chair, all of which was transferred, painfully, to my poor left foot. I now have a lovely, very blue, bruise on the top of that foot, just below the base of the big toe, which covers the whole width of the foot. It was necessary to tie a bag of ice to the foot to continue the baking.
This turns out to be the most painful bruise I have had in years. Fortunately, nothing came into contact with it at all on Saturday, since I run stocking foot at home. But when we went to leave the house on Sunday for the joint performance of our choir with the one in which our folk dance teacher sings I found out that shoes hurt. My winter boots are nice and big, so that when standing they don't touch the top of my feet at all, which is a good thing, because the top of my foot was not happy with any sort of touch at all. However, it turns that a normal walking step causes the top of the foot to come into contact with the boot. Ouch! It took some experimenting to discover that it was possible to modify my walk such that my left leg bent only backwards at the knee, permitting the top of the boot to fall even further away from the top of my foot. In addition to that I have taken to wrapping a chunk of scrap wool around the non-bruised part of my foot so that if the boot does come in contact with the foot it hits the fabric first and the bruise is safe.
Luckily by today (Tuesday) the bruise, which is more colourful, also hurts far less, so I was able to walk home from uni today without the extra wrap, and it didn't hurt (but if I actually poke the bruise or bump it into something it reminds me that healing is not accomplished yet).
That joint choir performance on Sunday was fun! We did some songs with just our choir, some with just theirs, and some with both groups singing at once (both choirs share the same teacher, so she made certain that we knew the same songs and had been trained in them in the same manner). Having more than twice the number of voices added a huge richness to the sound, and having people with strong voices singing directly behind me, straight into my hearing aid microphone, probably helped me actually sing the notes I was meant to be singing.
Today's performance was also fun--it is amazing how many people are willing to be up, dressed, and at uni at 07:00 to watch a holiday performance. Sadly, my hearing aid appointment didn't happen today--I got a call yesterday saying that the doc is sick and they had to cancel--they will send me a letter with the new day/time later.
Yesterday evening
lord_kjar commented that he kept thinking of turning on music, but hadn't gotten to it because his choices while sitting at the computer were his headphones, which have good sound, but cause me to comment that I wish he would share, or the crappy computer speakers. so I suggested speaker shopping. A few minutes later we found a guy on line locally selling a decent set of speakers along with older, but still good, stereo and blueray player. So we bought them, for less than a decent pair of computer speakers. Now we have lovely music emanating from his computer, and all is well.Thursday during the day this year's Noble Laureate in Chemistry will be talking at our uni, and I plan to attend. It should be interesting. That evening is the Julfesten (holiday party) for our division, and on the weekend we will head south to visit a friend in Umeå.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2011-12-13 07:40 pm (UTC)I note your interest in listening to a chemistry speech. I was going thru my book case the other day and found a chemistry book (from 1955), which Terry apparently used during his education. It was quite interesting for me to skim through it, even though I have no memory of any chemistry that I took in high school. Do you want the book? If so, let me know what address you would like me to mail it to.
Love you
Mom
(no subject)
Date: 2011-12-15 11:14 pm (UTC)I don't think it is worth shipping a book international, no matter how interesting. You hold on to it, but thanks for thinking of me.