It's the last official day of Summer tomorrow, since it ends the final Summer month August. I can feel the Fall coming soon, day by day. Some of the leaves have already begun to fall, morning dew lasts until afternoon and there are mushrooms everywhere. The winds blow a bit harder, a bit colder.
What a Summer we had! In weather-wise I mean. It has been better than two previous ones put together. There has been nearly no mosquitos at all, which has made it pleasant for me to walk around in the forest, picking berries and mushrooms. I have some kind of love-hate relationship with mushrooms. Sometimes it's more like treasure hunt, which in itself is rewarding. Preparing good food with mushrooms is another thing. Being no chef, the challenge is there. Definetely.
Some of the time I have been relaxing in our new terrace. We bought an outdoor sofa there and I've been daydreaming there ever since. Taking a nap in fresh air is underrated luxury. Especially when there's no irritating insects around. That's where I read most of the paperback by the late Stieg Larsson.
The Summer hasn't quite given up yet. The forecasters have promised warm days ahead. Next Wednesday it should be even +23 degrees, which sounds almost too good to be true. We have have our share of rain as well, and we haven't heard the last of it yet. Exceptionally little of thunders and lightnings have been among us, which is good. I hate them nowadays, and being a man living in a wooden house I'm also afraid of them.
The two biggest setbacks of the Summer must be (outside the obvious being laid-off) missing the Brian Setzer Orchestra concert in Pori Jazz and missing the a to Stockholm to shop around. I really would have liked to mingle again in Stockholmian second-hand record stores, breathing in the atmosphere of the city and the wonderful scenery. All of a sudden the money got too tight to mention. Otherwise it would have been alright, but the lead time to get the compensation money from being laid-off takes an awful lot of time at the moment. I guess I'm lucky to get them by Christmas. Well, good things are worth the wait, and there should be some of them in horizon already.
The Swedish King and the Queen visited Tampere, my hometown. It was 30 years since they last did it (LOL), when the city of Tampere celebrated its 200 years of existence. This year has been some kind of a 200-year anniversary for Sweden and Finland too. I don't know what there is to celebrate. I also wonder why the same type of anniversary hasn't been celebrated with Russia. After all, it's them who "saved" us from the Swedes. Between a rock and a hard place, I know...
August in Smekland
Finally I have had the time and the motivation to start this monthly series in my blog. I'm planning to draw a comic strip or something like that every month from now on. These are drawn with my Bamboo tablet digitally, so bare with the quality please. I have the jokes ready for the rest of this year, so no worries. The finishing of them is yet going to be handled later on.
Originally I bought the tablet to draw my bird character which I have already began. It only happens that some of the 'jokes' I have come up with don't fit in my bird's mouth. Some of them would be lost in translation, especially the punchlines. So, in a way, this is a side product for my blog readers to enjoy. Beware of weird sense of humour also in my drawings. So be warned and prepare to be confused!
Originally I bought the tablet to draw my bird character which I have already began. It only happens that some of the 'jokes' I have come up with don't fit in my bird's mouth. Some of them would be lost in translation, especially the punchlines. So, in a way, this is a side product for my blog readers to enjoy. Beware of weird sense of humour also in my drawings. So be warned and prepare to be confused!
I'm a fly, eat me
We have taken a few steps further when it comes to be environmentally conscious. Since July we have received electricity that has been produced by wind and water power. So no coal, oil or nuclear based electricity anymore. Well, it was the cheapish price that had the most saying in it, but I don't mind getting green electricity from now on.
Since we started collecting bio waste into a separate basket, a bunch of small flies have moved into our house. I take out the garbage as soon as the bucket gets full, and it gets full in a little slower pace when we have two baskets. Those flies irritate me. They don't settle with the bio basket, it's suddenly the fresh food they are after. Especially the fruits of course.
This week we welcomed two carnivorous plants (lihansyöjäkasvi) in our home. Basically I don't cheer when new plants arrive at our house, but this time I was enthusiastic as well. Yup, they should eat small flies. In the kitchen the plants are having a front row seat, so to speak. It would be interesting to find out, what is the Greenpeace man's opinion on this. I'm feeding a plant and yet killing flies. Should the carnivorous plant start being a veggie or something? Or should I buy more bananas to the flies? Or quit eating healthy fruits myself? Tricky, LOL!
Since we started collecting bio waste into a separate basket, a bunch of small flies have moved into our house. I take out the garbage as soon as the bucket gets full, and it gets full in a little slower pace when we have two baskets. Those flies irritate me. They don't settle with the bio basket, it's suddenly the fresh food they are after. Especially the fruits of course.
This week we welcomed two carnivorous plants (lihansyöjäkasvi) in our home. Basically I don't cheer when new plants arrive at our house, but this time I was enthusiastic as well. Yup, they should eat small flies. In the kitchen the plants are having a front row seat, so to speak. It would be interesting to find out, what is the Greenpeace man's opinion on this. I'm feeding a plant and yet killing flies. Should the carnivorous plant start being a veggie or something? Or should I buy more bananas to the flies? Or quit eating healthy fruits myself? Tricky, LOL!
Gays, Bolts, fiasco and romaniacs
While the other countries were sporting in track and field, Finland was diving. Low. No medals for us. Here's my (in)different summary of the world championship held in Berlin 2009.
The US athletics wore a sticker "JO" in their shirt, referring to the legendary Jesse Owens, who kicked a nazi ass big time at the Berlin Olympics in 1936. Being a black man, Hitler refused to shake his hand. When Jesse came back to the US, the behavior was not that much different. He was still regarded as a second-rate citizen. Like all afro-American back then. Maybe this was a way of rehabilitating him, who knows, but I guess that the most of the athletes were just honoring his success in Berlin.
Usain Bolt was amazing, again. The envious Swedes were spreading rumors that some in Jamaican team or related had used steroids or such. Pretty vague. I really hope that Jamaicans are clean, like the others too. Tyson Gay was running super-fast for an injured man. Maybe his injury was more like between his ears?
The Finns were a bunch of loosers. Olli-P***a Karjalainen was a disappointment in hammer throw. Tommi Evilä tried hard but didn't quite reach the final in long jump. Jukka Keskisalo did alright, being number 8 in 3000 m steeple chase final - as the second best European. Female javelin thrower Mikaela Ingberg was as bad as she has lately been. I wonder why she gets chosen to race every goddamn time, although she hasn't been in shape for ages. Maybe her coach, the ever-respected gold-medalist in Söul 1988 has too much to say who gets to throw in major tournaments. And maybe they both like to see the world for free, see the champs for free and feel the atmosphere for free?
It's very noticeable that Kenian top runners acquire citizenship of other countries just to get to race and earn money. The competition is so tough in Kenia that a lot of talented athletes have no other way to break through. Finland has not been that attractive a choice for many, and what we have got has been a group of has-beens. Edward Hämäläinen, Wilson Kirwa and Franz Kruger had already reached their top before they became Finns. Now they are or should be retired.
What about men's javelin? It was the first time ever that Finland had 4 men in the WC javelin final. What happened? Not much. Positions 5th, 6th, 9th and 11th were not actually what we were expecting. And this time it should have been almost a child's play to grab a silver and a bronze medal. Gold went deservedly to a Norwegian, who was according to my modest book-counting the only medalist coming from Nordic countries. Yes, the Swedes were not much better either, but that wasn't my headache. In fact, I almost hoped that ANY athlete from Nordic countries would have made it. Not necessarily Thorgildsen, though.
One female runner looked like a man, gathering a lot of headlines in media. Because she won, the headlines got bigger. And I thought it wasn't a beauty contest. It's kind of politically incorrect to criticize anyone's appearance, especially women's. Although I must admit that there were a lot of beautiful women in the Olympic stadium. One of the women, an Australian sprinter Sally McLellan, had small boobs - compared to the others who had none. And when she kneeled down to start the race, the camera man tried to peep inside her shirt. It happened EVERY TIME! In the first and the second round, in semi final and the final! It felt like an obsession. Granted, she was a world class athlete and therefore one of the most photographed. But still, zooming into her cleavage - was it necessary? Every time?
When the world championships were over, I didn't have to change my mind about which country had the most beautiful women. It's the Romanians. Not a beauty contest, like I said, but a fairly comprehensive sampling still. It has nothing to do with the sports, I digressed once again. Sorry about that. Also I do think that "Who's the sexiest athlete in Berlin" type of voting polls are clearly out of line. And I did enjoy watching it, the results and records were satisfactory per se. Apart from the Finns obviously. Alas.
The US athletics wore a sticker "JO" in their shirt, referring to the legendary Jesse Owens, who kicked a nazi ass big time at the Berlin Olympics in 1936. Being a black man, Hitler refused to shake his hand. When Jesse came back to the US, the behavior was not that much different. He was still regarded as a second-rate citizen. Like all afro-American back then. Maybe this was a way of rehabilitating him, who knows, but I guess that the most of the athletes were just honoring his success in Berlin.
Usain Bolt was amazing, again. The envious Swedes were spreading rumors that some in Jamaican team or related had used steroids or such. Pretty vague. I really hope that Jamaicans are clean, like the others too. Tyson Gay was running super-fast for an injured man. Maybe his injury was more like between his ears?
The Finns were a bunch of loosers. Olli-P***a Karjalainen was a disappointment in hammer throw. Tommi Evilä tried hard but didn't quite reach the final in long jump. Jukka Keskisalo did alright, being number 8 in 3000 m steeple chase final - as the second best European. Female javelin thrower Mikaela Ingberg was as bad as she has lately been. I wonder why she gets chosen to race every goddamn time, although she hasn't been in shape for ages. Maybe her coach, the ever-respected gold-medalist in Söul 1988 has too much to say who gets to throw in major tournaments. And maybe they both like to see the world for free, see the champs for free and feel the atmosphere for free?
It's very noticeable that Kenian top runners acquire citizenship of other countries just to get to race and earn money. The competition is so tough in Kenia that a lot of talented athletes have no other way to break through. Finland has not been that attractive a choice for many, and what we have got has been a group of has-beens. Edward Hämäläinen, Wilson Kirwa and Franz Kruger had already reached their top before they became Finns. Now they are or should be retired.
What about men's javelin? It was the first time ever that Finland had 4 men in the WC javelin final. What happened? Not much. Positions 5th, 6th, 9th and 11th were not actually what we were expecting. And this time it should have been almost a child's play to grab a silver and a bronze medal. Gold went deservedly to a Norwegian, who was according to my modest book-counting the only medalist coming from Nordic countries. Yes, the Swedes were not much better either, but that wasn't my headache. In fact, I almost hoped that ANY athlete from Nordic countries would have made it. Not necessarily Thorgildsen, though.
One female runner looked like a man, gathering a lot of headlines in media. Because she won, the headlines got bigger. And I thought it wasn't a beauty contest. It's kind of politically incorrect to criticize anyone's appearance, especially women's. Although I must admit that there were a lot of beautiful women in the Olympic stadium. One of the women, an Australian sprinter Sally McLellan, had small boobs - compared to the others who had none. And when she kneeled down to start the race, the camera man tried to peep inside her shirt. It happened EVERY TIME! In the first and the second round, in semi final and the final! It felt like an obsession. Granted, she was a world class athlete and therefore one of the most photographed. But still, zooming into her cleavage - was it necessary? Every time?
When the world championships were over, I didn't have to change my mind about which country had the most beautiful women. It's the Romanians. Not a beauty contest, like I said, but a fairly comprehensive sampling still. It has nothing to do with the sports, I digressed once again. Sorry about that. Also I do think that "Who's the sexiest athlete in Berlin" type of voting polls are clearly out of line. And I did enjoy watching it, the results and records were satisfactory per se. Apart from the Finns obviously. Alas.
Talk about cheeses
Our daughter likes to read Nalle Puh, which is Winnie The Pooh in Finnish and Swedish. It's mostly wathching the pictures for her. It's alright with me, those characters are sympathetic and kind. No evil villains like for example in Aku Ankka's (Donald Duck/Kalle Anka) cartoons. As a matter of fact, I just cancelled the order of the duck because it doesn't seem to wake any interest in her. And I haven't been able to read it for ages. It's too daft for me.
Why I'm writing about Winnie The Pooh? The answer lies in the pictures. The comic book of this week has a cover that got my immediate attention. I got irritated. That doesn't take much, LOL! I made a blow-up of the detail where Piglet hangs cheese on a rope. The practical joke in itself has nothing to do with my post. It's the label "Edam" that aggravates me. It's so easy to see that the cheese in the picture is Emmentaler cheese, not Edam. Ok, those characters are not educated and can hardly read or write but still. And I was just in my previous post writing about how fairytale characters don't do this kind of faulty information sharing!
How about the educational side of Winnie The Pooh? Edam and Emmentaler are not the same. They taste very different. They also look very different (Edam in the right in the picture beside, for those who can't separate them). What is the IQ of the editors there? I just can't quit dissing editors - I have my personal reasons which I may even have blogged about sometimes before I moved back to Finland. The fact that "Emmental" wouldn't have fitted in the small room it was given can't be a believable reason. Neither that "Edam" is more familiar a name or brand to the children than "Emmental". Since it obviously looks like a piece of cheese, the tag is completely unnecessary there. It's not wise to fool children. Adults should have some responsibility. Even in the case of Nalle Puh!
Hippy Hippy Gumbo Millennium Shake?
I just finished reading a book in English, "The girl with the Dragon Tattoo" by Stieg Larsson. Some of my older, say 'advanced', readers may remember my personal challenge of reading through the whole Millennium trilogy. Not only that but in 3 different languages. Last year I finished the second book of the trilogy, not knowing about the other two when purchasing it. It was in Swedish, the original language. Not a good way to read in that order, I don't recommend. The first one was equally exciting, and now I'm beginning to chase the third one, in Finnish. Basically any Finn could do the same challenge, but I doubt if anyone has ever done it before.
I must admit that reading in English was much easier. Unfortunaly, the English used in this book gave me pain. It was mostly poor. The translator, Reg Keeland, must be a Swede who thought that he knew English. There's no other way. I can find dozens of small errors and a few gross ones. First of all, why were 'herr' (mister) and 'fröken' (miss) left untranslated? The same with 'tunnelbana' (subway). In addition, there were sentences that didn't seem to make any kind of sense. If herr Larsson were able to read this, I bet he'd roll over in his grave. Then again, there were quite a many strange words to me - making me wonder what they were doing amongst all this pigeon-English. I was content with the Larsson's Swedish, as much as I could cope with it, so I really can't blame anyone else but the translator. Though I must admit that I surely couldn't have done a better job myself. But someone could have. Should have.
One interesting point came to me while reading this. In one section some character mentions The Finnish War, which happened in 1808-1809. However, the character claims as a fact that it began in 1940. Of course the character could lie or remember incorrectly, but normally these historical facts are always true. And no other character at the scene suspected it to be an incorrect year. Global disinformation, eh? Instead of Finnish War he must have referred to The Winter War (1939-1940), but still the starting year is erroneous. Either the author didn't know the real starting year, or he made a silly little mistake. The Continuation War took place in 1941-1944, it can't be that either. I don't remember any writer to have made a character give falsified information on true events on purpose. Although in real life many characters do.
I don't want to spoil the fun by telling about the content of the book. All I can say is that it's more captivating than the Da Vinci Code I also read last year. This really ties you up on a chair (read: sofa), so be warned. That's why I might take a long break before continuing with the third part of the trilogy. All of a sudden my wife agrees with me on something. I must do something else too. For example blog.
I must admit that reading in English was much easier. Unfortunaly, the English used in this book gave me pain. It was mostly poor. The translator, Reg Keeland, must be a Swede who thought that he knew English. There's no other way. I can find dozens of small errors and a few gross ones. First of all, why were 'herr' (mister) and 'fröken' (miss) left untranslated? The same with 'tunnelbana' (subway). In addition, there were sentences that didn't seem to make any kind of sense. If herr Larsson were able to read this, I bet he'd roll over in his grave. Then again, there were quite a many strange words to me - making me wonder what they were doing amongst all this pigeon-English. I was content with the Larsson's Swedish, as much as I could cope with it, so I really can't blame anyone else but the translator. Though I must admit that I surely couldn't have done a better job myself. But someone could have. Should have.
One interesting point came to me while reading this. In one section some character mentions The Finnish War, which happened in 1808-1809. However, the character claims as a fact that it began in 1940. Of course the character could lie or remember incorrectly, but normally these historical facts are always true. And no other character at the scene suspected it to be an incorrect year. Global disinformation, eh? Instead of Finnish War he must have referred to The Winter War (1939-1940), but still the starting year is erroneous. Either the author didn't know the real starting year, or he made a silly little mistake. The Continuation War took place in 1941-1944, it can't be that either. I don't remember any writer to have made a character give falsified information on true events on purpose. Although in real life many characters do.
I don't want to spoil the fun by telling about the content of the book. All I can say is that it's more captivating than the Da Vinci Code I also read last year. This really ties you up on a chair (read: sofa), so be warned. That's why I might take a long break before continuing with the third part of the trilogy. All of a sudden my wife agrees with me on something. I must do something else too. For example blog.
Anal sex free sauna in Stockholm area discovered
You can only imagine why there has been a reason to put this kind of warnings on the wall of Skogåshallen. Skogås, south of the Stockholm center, is one of the places I haven't visited. And it seems that I probably won't either. I didn't see any of these hanging on the wall of Vasalundshallen, so it would have been alright to do it there? TIC, but still."Thanks for not having anal sex in our sauna. Kindly, the personnel." So it's not forbidden but worth thanking if not exercised. Strange. I remember a lot of children in the shower room and sauna too. And furthermore, it kind of says that you may practise it in other saunas, but not preferably in "our" sauna. The personnel really is kind, thankful and everything. I wonder whether the fathers do appreciate the poster, when their kids ask: "Dad, what is anal sex? Why isn't is proper to have it here?"
This is once more another evidence about the Swedes going too far. Maybe that Skogåshallen is a known gay swimming hall, I don't know. But still having sex in general places should be considered as breaking the law. As it is in Finland, and maybe in the rest of the world too. Thanks to my friends for sending me the picture, it's a gem. I only wonder what they were doing over there, and with a camera, LOL!
Remembering Diana, 52 years later
Last night I went to see Paul Anka with my wife. It was more than satisfactory. To hell with Madonna, LOL! Well, I still like Madonna a little bit, but it never occured to me to see her in Helsinki this week. Not even because it was the biggest concert in the Nordic countries, or the her first gig ever in Finland. Perhaps if I had lived in Helsinki... well, too many if's (one too many). Back to Paul, and back to the 50's. I can't really explain why, but I'm slightly hooked on late 50's/early 60's teenage pop. Kind of B-files (B for Boppers). Especially I have been interested in Paul Anka's early material. He's a kind of an odd ball amongst all those Bobbies. Coming from Canada for a start. Being so young, writing his own material, singing comparately well, being... well, a gifted, good-looking guy. An all-around entertainer, if you will. Maybe it's the kitsch-type of songs, Crazy love in particular, that somehow appeal to me.
It seems beyond comprehension why Mr. Anka lost the touch in writing songs in the mid-60's, and started to record other people's songs. He's done a series of hits since then as well, but t
hey are different. Maybe he started to dislike those teenage ballads of his own. To me, they represent a perfect way of escape to my deepest feelings. Diana, Put your head on my shoulder, You are my destiny, Puppy love, Crazy love, Adam and Eve (the original In a gadda-da-vida song, LOL!), Lonely boy and My hometown to name some of those we heard yesterday night. And the man created them all before he was twenty! Today, heading for 70, Paul has still got it. Hair? Um, well... I meant talent, but he's got some hair. Again. He has probably used that same infamous millionaire's shampoo as Sting, but it's alright. I don't mind - it doesn't affect his singing voice, which is still in good shape. It was such a joy to see him move and interact with the audience so smoothly. It felt like he had brought a piece of Las Vegas to Tampere for more than two hours.
I haven't thought about buying Anka's Rock Swings CD, because it contains old rock classics from the 80's/90's newly arranged into swing. Van Halen, Bon Jovi, Nirvana, ... I bet Kurt Cobain would have been angry, had he heard Anka's arrangement of Smells like Teen Spirit! Then again, Kurt had enough problems of his own to look around what's happening outside his head, or something like that. Whereas Paul Anka has always been a chameleon in music industry, seemingly aware of what's going on. And I was pretty pleased to hear these swing versions. Not because they were better than the originals (they weren't), but because they sounded great! It was not that far from Brian Setzer Orchestra's music. Sadly we had to skip B.S.O.'s gig in Pori Jazz festival, but this was balsam treatment for us as well. Besides, this was more jazzy swing than Setzer's group ever has been.
It occured to me that syncopated rhythm has been in original swing since the 30's - and funk rock isn't that different from it after all. Now I even consider of buying that Rock Swings record, if it's on discount and crosses my path. In the meantime, my lazy but productive search of Anka vinyls continues. Stockholm was and is a good source for that.
It felt good to hear Paul salute Buddy Holly, the man whose number one record It doesn't matter anymore he wrote in 1958. An acoustic version of that song was heard yesterday at Tampere-talo, with Anka also featuring in guitar. The man played some piano too, telling semi-dirty jokes every now and then. Well, the audience was old enough to hear them. Maybe too old sometimes: we saw some old guys with a hearing aid there. Yup, a lot of past 70-year-old ladies were in the front rows. Acting like teenagers again. A good nostalgia trip for them I suppose. There were multimedia shows on screen from time to time. Sometimes Paul sang a duet with a performer doing a show on video, e.g. with Sammy Davis Jr. and Frank Sinatra (yes, it was My Way). I wasn't too keen on that, but the man needed the rest. Paul showed a picture of his current wife. It seems that the first line in Diana has turned upside down.
The only thing that really bothered me, was that I didn't bring a decent camera with me. It was alerted there not to take any pictures during the show, but yet most of the audience shot as much as they could. Hell, Paul Anka even encouraged people to take pics of him by grabbing the camera and taking a picture of himself by himself. And of the band. A very old but professional band, I must add. Now I had to settle with taking photos with my oldish N73, which isn't that great when it comes to shoot in the dark. See for yourself. Or instead, you can picture this: a combination of Mr. Putin and Mr. Berlusconi. I reckon Paul and Silvio share the same barber these days, LOL!
It seems beyond comprehension why Mr. Anka lost the touch in writing songs in the mid-60's, and started to record other people's songs. He's done a series of hits since then as well, but t
hey are different. Maybe he started to dislike those teenage ballads of his own. To me, they represent a perfect way of escape to my deepest feelings. Diana, Put your head on my shoulder, You are my destiny, Puppy love, Crazy love, Adam and Eve (the original In a gadda-da-vida song, LOL!), Lonely boy and My hometown to name some of those we heard yesterday night. And the man created them all before he was twenty! Today, heading for 70, Paul has still got it. Hair? Um, well... I meant talent, but he's got some hair. Again. He has probably used that same infamous millionaire's shampoo as Sting, but it's alright. I don't mind - it doesn't affect his singing voice, which is still in good shape. It was such a joy to see him move and interact with the audience so smoothly. It felt like he had brought a piece of Las Vegas to Tampere for more than two hours.I haven't thought about buying Anka's Rock Swings CD, because it contains old rock classics from the 80's/90's newly arranged into swing. Van Halen, Bon Jovi, Nirvana, ... I bet Kurt Cobain would have been angry, had he heard Anka's arrangement of Smells like Teen Spirit! Then again, Kurt had enough problems of his own to look around what's happening outside his head, or something like that. Whereas Paul Anka has always been a chameleon in music industry, seemingly aware of what's going on. And I was pretty pleased to hear these swing versions. Not because they were better than the originals (they weren't), but because they sounded great! It was not that far from Brian Setzer Orchestra's music. Sadly we had to skip B.S.O.'s gig in Pori Jazz festival, but this was balsam treatment for us as well. Besides, this was more jazzy swing than Setzer's group ever has been.
It occured to me that syncopated rhythm has been in original swing since the 30's - and funk rock isn't that different from it after all. Now I even consider of buying that Rock Swings record, if it's on discount and crosses my path. In the meantime, my lazy but productive search of Anka vinyls continues. Stockholm was and is a good source for that.It felt good to hear Paul salute Buddy Holly, the man whose number one record It doesn't matter anymore he wrote in 1958. An acoustic version of that song was heard yesterday at Tampere-talo, with Anka also featuring in guitar. The man played some piano too, telling semi-dirty jokes every now and then. Well, the audience was old enough to hear them. Maybe too old sometimes: we saw some old guys with a hearing aid there. Yup, a lot of past 70-year-old ladies were in the front rows. Acting like teenagers again. A good nostalgia trip for them I suppose. There were multimedia shows on screen from time to time. Sometimes Paul sang a duet with a performer doing a show on video, e.g. with Sammy Davis Jr. and Frank Sinatra (yes, it was My Way). I wasn't too keen on that, but the man needed the rest. Paul showed a picture of his current wife. It seems that the first line in Diana has turned upside down.
The only thing that really bothered me, was that I didn't bring a decent camera with me. It was alerted there not to take any pictures during the show, but yet most of the audience shot as much as they could. Hell, Paul Anka even encouraged people to take pics of him by grabbing the camera and taking a picture of himself by himself. And of the band. A very old but professional band, I must add. Now I had to settle with taking photos with my oldish N73, which isn't that great when it comes to shoot in the dark. See for yourself. Or instead, you can picture this: a combination of Mr. Putin and Mr. Berlusconi. I reckon Paul and Silvio share the same barber these days, LOL!
Berry picking
After a few years really, we went to the woods to pick blueberries. If you find a good place, it's almost fun for a while. Until my back starts to hurt, that is. And until the mosquitos find us. We found a decent enough place to do some old-fashioned berry picking. We are not using machinery mainly because we are old school. It took less than two hours to gather more than 5 litres of blueberries. Not bad. The weather was great, like it has been for some time now.
Let's move on to the Smek twist in the story. When we got home, it was my job to clean our berries and remove any dirt discovered among them. That's a boring and troublesome job; the Swedes would say 'jobbigt'. Anyway, it has to be done. Like with fishes and mushrooms, it's by far the most annoying task of the process.
When my wife made blueberry pie, it was served to our invited guests. My wife was telling how she had done it etc. but there was no mention about who had cleaned them. I thought to myself that my job is invisible as long as everything is okay. Suddenly she found a piece of plastic in the pie. And it only took a second for her to announce who had done the cleaning of the berries! I couldn't be silent but stated that the cleaner is never mentioned unless someone finds something that doesn't belong there. That's gratitude.
I began to compare berry picking to SW development. Developers do the picking, it may be of good quality, or bad. If they use machines to pick berries, it's like they'd use some scripts or other tools in sofware creation. Tools may create errors on regular basis - in berry picking tools gather dirt, leaves and green blueberries.
Then a SW tester comes and tries to sort it out. Find the shit and remove it. In SW world they'd just ask someone to fix it. Because the cleaning up requires human eye and touch, it can't be automated. The more lines of code, or litres of berries, the slower it gets. No show stoppers, i.e. spiders and worms are allowed to pass the test.
The application is released. The pie lies on the table. It's time to use it. The developer gets praises how delicious the pie is. At least courtesy praises. If nothing wrong is detected, the application/pie has passed the end-user test. But, if something weird is found inside it, the focus moves instantly from a developer to a tester. The poor cleaner. "The tester should have found it!" is echoing in my ears while I'm feeling an undesirable deja vu all over again. Tester's job isn't appreciative, but nonetheless critical. I have yet to meet another profession which is more important and yet as dissed broadly.
Let's move on to the Smek twist in the story. When we got home, it was my job to clean our berries and remove any dirt discovered among them. That's a boring and troublesome job; the Swedes would say 'jobbigt'. Anyway, it has to be done. Like with fishes and mushrooms, it's by far the most annoying task of the process.
When my wife made blueberry pie, it was served to our invited guests. My wife was telling how she had done it etc. but there was no mention about who had cleaned them. I thought to myself that my job is invisible as long as everything is okay. Suddenly she found a piece of plastic in the pie. And it only took a second for her to announce who had done the cleaning of the berries! I couldn't be silent but stated that the cleaner is never mentioned unless someone finds something that doesn't belong there. That's gratitude.
I began to compare berry picking to SW development. Developers do the picking, it may be of good quality, or bad. If they use machines to pick berries, it's like they'd use some scripts or other tools in sofware creation. Tools may create errors on regular basis - in berry picking tools gather dirt, leaves and green blueberries.
Then a SW tester comes and tries to sort it out. Find the shit and remove it. In SW world they'd just ask someone to fix it. Because the cleaning up requires human eye and touch, it can't be automated. The more lines of code, or litres of berries, the slower it gets. No show stoppers, i.e. spiders and worms are allowed to pass the test.
The application is released. The pie lies on the table. It's time to use it. The developer gets praises how delicious the pie is. At least courtesy praises. If nothing wrong is detected, the application/pie has passed the end-user test. But, if something weird is found inside it, the focus moves instantly from a developer to a tester. The poor cleaner. "The tester should have found it!" is echoing in my ears while I'm feeling an undesirable deja vu all over again. Tester's job isn't appreciative, but nonetheless critical. I have yet to meet another profession which is more important and yet as dissed broadly.
Sporty thoughts by Sporty Smek
This is a kind of warm-up post for the world championship games in track and field to be held in Berlin. Yes, it's Smek, the couch potate in action again. But this time exercising himself as well. Great?
To start with, I like numbers. I also like Numb3rs. Although I'm not convinced that anyone could actually calculate and solve crimes using those never-really-shown-completed formulas. I don't buy it, but otherwise it's splendid waste of time for me. Anyway, we have some old, doping-smelling Finnish records existing. They date from the 70's and early 80's. One of the oldest, if not the oldest, Finnish record in track and field is in 3000-meter steeple chase. The holder of the record is semi-legendary Tapio Kantanen. Today we have a good contender for the record, Jukka Keskisalo. He's in good shape right now. Two weeks ago he tried to challenge the old record. It was exactly 33 years ago when Kantanen's record was set. On the dot. The run was progressing as planned, almost. When Keskisalo reached the finish line, his time was..... 33 hundredths of a second over the record time! It must have made him frustrated. As far as I'm concerned, I was delighted. See the play with number 33. I must admit that it would have been even greater a joy if Jukka had managed to improve the record 33 hundredths. On the other hand, it's good to leave him a bit hungry for the big games. He's missed two major events in a row due to injury, let's hope he'll be in shape this time.
Our kid has been attending to a track and field training this Summer. They practise in Nokia's athletic field. Stadium, if you will. That's a good place to exercise. In my childhood, I would have done anything to get there, but those days it wasn't possible. At least for us in our family. They get instructed while jumping and running. They also throw javelin, discus and shot. Sometimes they measure times and lengths, but it's basically more like a play. The young adult girls do the instructing, and to me it looks quite sloppy. Every once in a while there is a male instructer who usually gets more done. A little bit of army style but it works neverthesame.
One time our family was there by ourselves, simply having fun. I tried to inspire our daughter by exercising myself on the side. We had a watch and a measure with us, so it sounded more "official". I also wanted to see how I'd do today. I hadn't done anything like this in 25 years, at least. I remember my top score in long jump was something like 5,10 meters. I promised myself to jump at least 3 meters. And what happened: When I reached the plank, my feet kept on running! I tried again, and the same result. My head says "jump!" but my feets say "hell no!" I couldn't trust that I wouldn't hurt myself in landing or something. I was both confused and disappointed in my performance.
I also tried to run 60 meters. I figured that 100 meters in full speed might give me a heart attack, so I settled with this indoors sprint race. I ran it twice, both times in 10,2 seconds. The result was pretty good. While running, I felt like falling forward most of the time. My mind wanted to speed it up while my legs had a hard time coping with it. My wife stopped me from trying another time, and after a while I agreed with her. In my pre-teens, when I ran my 60 meters record, the clock stopped at 9,8. Never under that. Later, we changed the 60 meters to 100 at school, so I have no better time measurement for 60 meters during my most sportly active period. By the time I got to high school, I had dropped all exercise. That's something I regret today, but those days I just wanted to concentrate on music, music, music.
It will be interesting to see Michael Schumacher does, if he gets to race in F1 once more. In case he will be positioned amongst the top 10, I think it would be almost scandalous. I mean, how could it be possible that someone who hasn't raced seriously in three years could do such an impressive result? And how bad is the level of the other racers then? Of course, Schumi is a legend who won't ever give up, but Ferrari hasn't had good cars this year. But, like I said, it will be interesting.
To start with, I like numbers. I also like Numb3rs. Although I'm not convinced that anyone could actually calculate and solve crimes using those never-really-shown-completed formulas. I don't buy it, but otherwise it's splendid waste of time for me. Anyway, we have some old, doping-smelling Finnish records existing. They date from the 70's and early 80's. One of the oldest, if not the oldest, Finnish record in track and field is in 3000-meter steeple chase. The holder of the record is semi-legendary Tapio Kantanen. Today we have a good contender for the record, Jukka Keskisalo. He's in good shape right now. Two weeks ago he tried to challenge the old record. It was exactly 33 years ago when Kantanen's record was set. On the dot. The run was progressing as planned, almost. When Keskisalo reached the finish line, his time was..... 33 hundredths of a second over the record time! It must have made him frustrated. As far as I'm concerned, I was delighted. See the play with number 33. I must admit that it would have been even greater a joy if Jukka had managed to improve the record 33 hundredths. On the other hand, it's good to leave him a bit hungry for the big games. He's missed two major events in a row due to injury, let's hope he'll be in shape this time.
Our kid has been attending to a track and field training this Summer. They practise in Nokia's athletic field. Stadium, if you will. That's a good place to exercise. In my childhood, I would have done anything to get there, but those days it wasn't possible. At least for us in our family. They get instructed while jumping and running. They also throw javelin, discus and shot. Sometimes they measure times and lengths, but it's basically more like a play. The young adult girls do the instructing, and to me it looks quite sloppy. Every once in a while there is a male instructer who usually gets more done. A little bit of army style but it works neverthesame.
One time our family was there by ourselves, simply having fun. I tried to inspire our daughter by exercising myself on the side. We had a watch and a measure with us, so it sounded more "official". I also wanted to see how I'd do today. I hadn't done anything like this in 25 years, at least. I remember my top score in long jump was something like 5,10 meters. I promised myself to jump at least 3 meters. And what happened: When I reached the plank, my feet kept on running! I tried again, and the same result. My head says "jump!" but my feets say "hell no!" I couldn't trust that I wouldn't hurt myself in landing or something. I was both confused and disappointed in my performance.
I also tried to run 60 meters. I figured that 100 meters in full speed might give me a heart attack, so I settled with this indoors sprint race. I ran it twice, both times in 10,2 seconds. The result was pretty good. While running, I felt like falling forward most of the time. My mind wanted to speed it up while my legs had a hard time coping with it. My wife stopped me from trying another time, and after a while I agreed with her. In my pre-teens, when I ran my 60 meters record, the clock stopped at 9,8. Never under that. Later, we changed the 60 meters to 100 at school, so I have no better time measurement for 60 meters during my most sportly active period. By the time I got to high school, I had dropped all exercise. That's something I regret today, but those days I just wanted to concentrate on music, music, music.
It will be interesting to see Michael Schumacher does, if he gets to race in F1 once more. In case he will be positioned amongst the top 10, I think it would be almost scandalous. I mean, how could it be possible that someone who hasn't raced seriously in three years could do such an impressive result? And how bad is the level of the other racers then? Of course, Schumi is a legend who won't ever give up, but Ferrari hasn't had good cars this year. But, like I said, it will be interesting.
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