Oh, those su-hu-mmer niiiights

Sometimes you end up having one of those lovely nights that never seem to stop. They just go on and on and before you know it, it's 1 in the morning.
It starts with a take-out pizza and a glass of white wine in the garden some friends walk by and you invite them to join, and then the kids stop by for an ice cream before running of again, and then another two friends join you and someone brings out more wine, and then the sun goes down and you light tea-candles and bring out fleece blankets and curl up on the garden chair to keep your feet warm and the kids come running again, sweaty and exhausted from all the playing, and they all curl up next to you and you send them to bed and they are so tired they don't even put up a fight, and there are more wine, and suddenly some cashew nuts and a conversation about the salmon risotto that didn't get cooked and suddenly you have covered everything from Michael Jackson to childhood hang-ups and despite the cold you still feel so snug and warm under the fleece blanket.

I do love Swedish summer evenings. You don't really find anything quite like them any where else in the world.

You'll see me when you see me, but you don't if you don't.

Blogging is a rare thing right now, as you may all have noticed. I have gone in to hibernation, plain and simple.

Right now, I am hiding on an island of the east coast of Sweden, access only via a bridge, and with next to no Internet connection what so ever.
It's primitive. Very back to basics.
It's how I like it.
I even went to a book-store to buy books the other day. No www.amazon.com. So very old-fashioned!

In other words: I like it.
I might even take up camping one day.
No I won't.

...and just like that...

...as of today we are happy to announce that we will stay in SF for another two years, confirmed, unless something really exciting and/or unusal happens.
It wasn't too painful. The Amercian embassy in Copenhagen is a nice place.

Afterwards we went to Tivoli.

Nice airport - car rental

We land at Nice airport and go straight to car rentals. Every arrival seem to be waiting in line to get their car. It is hot. I take the kids for lunch in the arrivals lounge and Richard queues. An hour later it is finally close to his turn.

In the blistering heat, we get our car and pack it up with suit-cases, bags, stroller, car seat and booster, strap children in, get in, adjust seats, stick the key in the ignition. Nothing happens. We try again. Nothing.

We go and get a guy who works there. He thinks we're stupid Englishmen until he tries himself. "Oups. Something is wrong with the car. You have to take the key back to the desk."
Meanwhile an identical car rolls up next to us, to a family yet to pack everything in to the trunk. Turns out that we were given the right car, but the wrong key. The key belongs to the other car. Instead of just switching keys we have to unload everything and load it back in to the new car. No idea why. that's just how it is.
In the blistering heat.
It's only ten o'clock in the morning.

nice airport 11.24am

the weather in nice is hot, hqot, hot. we have left london and are embarking on the second leg of our european adventure. the kids are angles, which is incredible considering they have had very few hours of sleep and are hungry and hot. i have the best kids. there, i said it. i have the best kids.

Security in UK vs US

We all head down to the Diana Memorial Playground for the day but as I stall and end up coming along after the others are already there, I enter the gates on my own, only to be stopped by the security person on my way in:

- Adults can't some in with out children, he says.

- But my children are already in there.

- Oh, OK. Welcome in then.

Easy, peasy, lemon-squeezy.

Jet lag

Jet-lag is a curious thing. Right now I crave more than anything, champagne and Burger King. Preferably all at once.

London is humid but there is a cool breeze running through the living-room. I don't miss the amount of people you have to push aside to walk down the street, nor do I miss the traffic, and the dirty streets. But I do miss the long summer evenings and the cool breeze you get from leaving all your windows open.

If I could only have a Whopper Meal and a flute of bubbly, too.

California rules and regulations are a very splendid thing if you don't need to go to the airport

As we are heading for our family summer holiday in Europe, we call the cab company to get a car to take us to SFO, a mini-van with car-seat for a one year-old, I say.

- No problem ma'am, what's your address?

We go through the details, and then I confirm. One mini-van, with car-seat. To SFO.

- Well, luckily, according to California rules and regulations, the receptionist says, you are not required to have a car-seat in a cab so you're exempt from that obligation.

- Not so lucky if we crash on the 101 though, I suggest. Never mind, we'll sort something out from our end. So a mini-van, then, to SFO please.

- Well, according to California rules and regulations, we can only supply a mini-van if any one of you are in a wheel-chair.

- OK, so you can't actually take us to the airport at all?

- No. But I can suggest a cab company that can.

Alrighty then.

Let's make another call.

That's one mini-van, with car-seat, to.....

A goodbye in the Castro

I go out to eat meze in the Castro with my single, British friend. Afterwards we hail a cab on the corner of Castro and Market to go to a bar in the Mission.

- I don't know the name of the place, my friend tells the driver. But it's a dive bar on Valencia. Or Mission. With a blinking cocktail glass outside.
- A lesbian bar?
- No, we both retort bemused. No, just an ordinary dive bar.
After trying every combination of flashing cocktail glass and pink flamingo there is on Valencia and Mission we finally find it, a flashing palm tree on Guerrero, and we pay our fair.

- Is this why I don't find a man? she asks me. Because I look lesbian?
- Honey, we were standing under the Rainbow flag, a day after Gay Pride. You could forgive him for the assumption.
- But really! Is this what it has come to?
- Maybe it didn't help that I straightened out your t-shirt neckline under your cardie as we left the restaurant, I say and we sip our Greyhounds in silence for a while before we start talking about the greatness of Twin Peaks instead. The TV drama, not the area beyond Castro.

UHaul is healthy

When people ask me if I notice the financial crisis on a day-to-day basis, my reply is:
- Yes, because U-Haul's business is booming.

Every day you see a large U-haul removal van outside someone's house or apartment. There are garage sales on every street corner weekends as well as weekdays.
Or a pile with left over belongings, next to a sad sign saying:
- Please, help yourself!

And an non-scientifical observation is: it is young people who are the first one's to leave. Young people who have not been able to get on the career ladder, or who was the last one in, the first one to go. Who have lost they're room-mate and who are struggling to find a new one, and can't afford the rent meanwhile. Who can't keep up with the payment on that first studio apartment they bought. Who feels that it would just be easier to move back with your folks for a while and wait for this whole bad mess to go away.

So, to answer the question, again: we see the financial crises every day, because young people disappear and U-Haul's business has never been better.