Doin' The Omoralisk Schagerfestival '10 (7)

It's over for this time and thank god they didn't start the damn search for next year artist directly after the final. Germany won anyway, as I predicted. So it will probably be in Berlin for the first time. A congratulations to all germans for winning the contest. And apparently we just lost out for the finals with 3 points, so the singer should be happy to be best of of the worst. She could have ended up the worst of the best.

Now talking about the Marabou polka... it's marvelous. A minty chocolate without the crisp that get stuck i your teeth like the Marabou Mint Brittle. It's good and well worth a bite. Yes, I broke the chocolate absence streak at around 5 weeks. Well worth it though. Also, I feel like just resetting the timer and redo it, before I get stuck in it again. Probably no problem as I soon will send in the essay (after finishing it of course) and will be done with the stress and need to artificially keep myself on a good mood. Now I wish I just could fix the damned TV so I could relax with some horror Video Games, Resident Evil 1 and 5 (might even do a replay of 4). Or Mega Man & Bass or some Castlevania... or just let the TV be so I don't waste so much time on it.

Snowblind

Have I mentioned a lot of politics lately? I have? No, cause you can't get enough of it. It's addicting, like chocolate. You read political outburst as an injection in your vein, opinion polls you snort up your nose. It's a drug I tell you. It keeps you in ecstasy for every change in the numbers, the closer the election day the faster your heart beats. Constant euphoria. No, I'm not eating any chocolate but I have 2 chocolate bars in the fridge for some other time. You might wonder why I bring this up and the answer is simple... the Alliance is in the lead again. And Sweden's economy is on the right track. Really, as it looks now they shouldn't be able to lose. Unless someone does something stupid, right? No, I don't have anything to put up a "what the hell" moment for now. Feels good does it not?

About the essay it seemed to be fine according to my "instructor" (or whatever it's called) so all I need to do is finish it before Friday and I'm finished. Onward with that. Also, today I actually meet an old friend that I haven't seen since I was in Washington. Completely shocked to see him as he haven't studied in Karlstad since, I don't know, I never saw him here. Fun meeting actually. Sad thing is that it reminds me of all my other friends from that time.

Doin' The Omoralisk Schagerfestival '10 (6)

What shall I say? It was a bit better. I liked Lithuania, funky and a catchy tune, unfortunately it was not as good live as the pre-video. Sweden was okay, but I don't like it. We should not be qualified for the final so that I can gloat in the fact that the Swedish people don't have a taste of music and have chosen the song 2 years in a row proving their failure. Democracy is a LIE bwhahahaha *ahem*... where was I? Oh, Slovenia was fun, liked the guitar sound. And then it was Turkey... GOD MY EYES! I almost got seizures from it, all the blinking. It must have damaged my eyes cause I only see stripes... no wait, that's just the TV.

Is it just me or was those who made the voting entertainment act with the choir on drugs? What the HELL? It must, or at least something influenced by someone's nightmares?

So it's over, the Swedish people have miserably failed in giving us a reason to let them have a say in this contest, haha. I like being an elitist smug person. Only sad thing is that neither of my favorites ended up in the final. Pity, I really liked Lithuania... what? Common, it is good, funky and everything and the clothes... yes, they had silver shorts, and yes, it looked stupid, but I still liked the song. So I have no favorites from the songs voted in the semi-finals which would leave... Germany. My money is on Germany. Cross fingers... yes, I know I'm hypocritical about this whole thing, but that's my business.

Doin' The Omoralisk Schagerfestival '10 (5)

We can agree that the songs in the first semi-final wasn't that good, I don't actually remember anyone special from that show. Didn't watch that much either, it was just on the TV while I was trying to finish the essay. I even have to check the wikipedia page to see who played yesterday. So Greece and Belarus was 2 of the countries going to the final? Alright, they wont win, Greece can't even afford it so it doesn't matter and Belarus is just... to perfect. And apparently the Swedish pianist Robert Wells is sitting behind their piano... behind the piano for a dictatorship! TRAITOR! Why have you cast the liberal values we stood and fought for, you cast it away for 3 minutes, being broadcast toward over 500 million people...? It was nothing. Probably done the same if I could play the piano and they asked me.

The essay you wonder? Lets forget about that for a while. It's more then a week left and I've sent it in for first evaluation to see if it will seem to stand up to the next evaluation. So I'm fine for the moment. Unfortunately they couldn't have the semi-final today so we could have ended this misery a lot faster. Oh, well, can still enjoy Agatha Christie's Poirot.

All The Clowns

I should probably write on the essay as tomorrow is the first deadline for the essay, but I think I will manage and this post is something I must tell the world both as it is hilarious stupid but also completely insane. You who have read this blog for some time knows I voted for the Social democrats in the election of 2006. I agree with some of their policies and they have done good things for Sweden, until 30 years ago at least. I will not deny I will vote for the Alliance this time, especially the liberal party as I find myself agree a lot more with them this time as the situation has changed since last time. It doesn't help that the Red-greens releases statements and ideas I can't even touch without feeling nauseated. The social democrats then makes themeless unvotable from my side.

What have they done you might ask? Well, OK so MP and V first of wants to lower working time between 5-10 hours a week. To my economic education that is just plain to much for our economy to handle at the moment. And it's not a common platform so S have said no and probably can keep them in check and so on. Then in their shadow budget it was the kilometer tax on all transportation that will heighten inflation and a tax raise on petroleum. Meaning the whole non-cities of Sweden will be left empty as it will be to expansive to live there. Also inflation means higher rates that will slow down the economic recovery together with heighten taxes. Summary they don't know anything about politics even though one of them has ruled the Swedish economy for 75 years. Okey, this is workable from my side as they like big government and I'm educated for that which means more jobs for me and I could probably manage the tax raises, but does it end here? F*** NO!

This is their outline for a new foreign policy for Sweden. What does it say? It says that Sweden should demand that the US leaves its military bases abroad and get their troops home... everywhere. Not only speaking about the ridicules idea that we have anything to say since we doesn't even have a base or even are in an unstable area IT'S JUST COMPLETELY INSANE! They want to destabilize the whole world. Alright, Europe might not be such big of a problem with 2 nuclear states (France and the UK) and the majority of the modern weapon systems in the world although how small they may be. But we are talking about delicate regions in Asia and the Middle-East. In Asia we have Taiwan and Korea protected by the shield of the US military, especially now when the North Koreans are rumbling on the horizon.

And then there is Japan. Did they forget the 2:d World War? The whole of Asia fears a Japanese military resurgence. The only reason the region have been stable is because the Japanese lived under US protection so they didn't need soldiers. Therefore the others didn't need to have an arms race involving probably nuclear weapons. If the americans leave Japan, they need to get some combat ready troops, the North Koreans answer with even more nuclear threats, South Korea builds up, China feels insecure with more armies around them and spend more money on the military. India feels threatened and invest in their army, Pakistan feels threatened by India and don't get me started on the Russian reaction to the Chinese arms race, trying to match them. Then we are in Europe again and then we need the Americans so they can protect us and then we need to arm us again, but that doesn't work since the red greens lowered the military spending with 2 billion SEK ($250 000 000 or €200 000 000) from todays levels of 41,4 billion SEK ($5 175 000 000 or € 4 140 000 000) almost 2,4 % of the Swedish budget (if I'm calculating it correct). Ending in a big bang. Did anyone of them study international relations or even global history?

Sadly I think I know why they go for that. There is no secret that the Left party is strongly against the US (it's something with the left, I don't know) and probably been one of the stronger advocates for this policy. MP then, why would they be behind this insane piece of c***? Mostly due to the lobby organization Swedish Peace and Arbitration Society being behind them. Pacifists that don't see longer than their noses. Yes, I don't like them. So all in all, I can't vote Social democrats, probably never again. Cause if I do, this will be the result:

Hungry For Heaven

Again, I should probably not write this as I got 11 pages left before the 45 page mark, not speaking about what I've written. Only wanted to share my stress and angst with whoever read this. You got angstroll'd. Old I know. Anyway, it's the ESC week with semi-finals tomorrow and on thursday and the grand final on Saturday. Might give something on what I think on these, but as Wednesday is the day I must send in the essay for evaluation I got to finish that. Unfortunately for me, probably lucky for you. I would not probably enjoy the whole show cause my damn TV decided to blow some fuse or something and now the picture consists of stripes in normal, blue, red and yellow or something dissolving parts of the screen. Now I have to take it back to the store and get it fixed (thank god for 5 years insurances) and that means I need a car, either to get it all the way back to the original store in Södertälje or to even get to the closest store of that brand. Work, work work.

Oh, and I haven't had chocolate for 4 weeks. That's amazing, I haven't pulled something like this of since last year that went over the whole of April till the beginning of May. Of course, when I finish this damn essay I shall drown my throat in sweet, wonderful nectar of the gods! Fill myself with beautiful artificial induced euphoria together with the relief of having this lifted from my shoulders, emerging as a god from the sea taking my place among the political scientist of the world! A GOD among MAN!!!... *ahem* Where was I? Yeah, chocolate... Mmm Marabou...

Denial

Should probably not write this as I have an essay to write, but I'm stuck at the moment and still need at least 14 pages, but no worry. Tomorrow I fire out 9 pages and then there is no problem what so ever to finish this until Wednesday next week, no problem at all *longingly watches a chocolate commercial*... Where was I? Oh yeah, the essay. No problem, I've told myself that when this is done I shall have myself some of that new Polka Marabou chocolate. Then it's been over 4 weeks since I got some chocolate and that's pretty amazing in this stressful period as I used to eat one bar every second day last year and the C-essay. Feels good, but I get the feeling my hair is thinning out when I look in the mirror... must be my imagination.

Anyway, you notice that the election is drawing near. Now the newspapers are putting out test to see which parties you stand closes to or which block and whatnot. Here it is, but it's in Swedish so not everyone might understand it. It got 10 parties taking in both SD, PP and F! besides the 7 Riksdag parties. But as always, nothing is perfect. Apparently it was really hard to get S, C and even impossible for PP for those party members who even read the manifest for those people to get them. The problem seemed to be that S and C didn't have clearly defined politics as they either, in S case, ended up as V or in C as FP, KD or M. No clear line that is. PP on the other hand can't get any high score as they only care about 3 questions (that they themselves feel represent so much more) and are therefore not measured the same as they have said that the block that gets their votes decide everything beyond their core questions.

What did I become? Well, I agreed with FP 73,5 %, KD 72.1 %, M 67,1 %, C 62,8%, SD 55 %, MP 26,4 %, S 22,8 %, V 22,1 %, F! 20,7 % and PP 5,7 %. Unexpected? No, since I know which party I would vote for and could manipulate the result to their favor. Strange thing is why SD got so high which some people also complained about. As someone said, populistic party and you say what people likes to hear. The most scary thing though was that KD got so high up. Am I really a conservative?

Long Live Rock 'n' Roll

Busy day today Yesterday while spending a lovely day in the library writing on my essay, reaching about 12 pages (for a minimum of 45) I get a message from my instructor that it's 1 1/2 week left. I'm missing over 30 pages. So after a rush in writing I ended at 16 and today reached 20. And its really 20 pages without any blank fillers just for the numbers. Of course that was the easy part so now I have to think about what I write. And I haven't had chocolate for 3 weeks. I'm turning into a nervous wreck here I tell you and the damned sun is gone. It's grey and cloudy every single day. It will not be long until I snap and devours all the chocolate in the store. I need it, it's supposed to be mine, I want it... Mmm Marabou gahhh...*ahem*

On to a sadder note, yesterday was also the day when famous hard rock singer Ronnie James Dio passed away in stomach cancer. He was a singer for bands like Heaven and Hell (More or less Black Sabbath) and Rainbow before starting up his own solo band just entitled DIO. When did I first discover his songs? It must have either have been the album Ritchie Blackmore's Rainbow or the song Neon Knights from a Black Sabbath compilation. I guess the Black Sabbath song as that would have lead me to Rainbow, but I'm not sure. I would recommend any song with Dio, but the best must still be Stargazer from the Rainbow Rising album. The strength, the melody and the rhythm in the whole song is just enchanting. Never saw him live which is a shame.

The question is now what happens to the Heaven and Hell project, what will the others do? One thing I would be happy to see is a reunion with Tony Martin. We know he can sing Dio's songs and it would be nice to hear some classic Martin material or Tony Iommi could continue with his own solo project and tour some with Glenn Hughes in another Black Sabbath era. Or there is the Faustian collaboration between Black Sabbath and Ian Gillan. That would be awesome, but also the most unlikely reunion of them all as he is the only one that has had some kind of reunion with Iommi and released more materials to fill out the Sabbath material. Martin has 5 albums alone with Sabbath while Hughes has 1 Sabbath album, but 2 Iommi solo album. The future will tell, but now we will mourn the loss of one of the greatest voices in history.

Graphic Violence

The day before the Ascension of Jesus and it's a red day, meaning a day of from writing on the essay as the library is closed... Damn. I have nothing else to do then take the day of, curses what a cruel world we live in. Have 10 out of 45 (two of them is mostly blank pieces of paper, but that's for later) and it's 3 1/5 week till it must be done, meaning around 10 pages a week, 2 pages a day(not counting the weekend). Lets hope it all goes well, but it's hard to stop reading the online news all the time. Especially as it happens stuff all the time.

At the moment the most interesting thing is the outcome of the election in Great Britain and the forming of the Lib-Con coalition (or the more fun Con-Dem Nation). What I say don't actually have any meaning as I don't know what the different parties want (except the LibDems as I found their politics interesting and read up on them) or can't even relate to the Swedish politics as they are a bit shifted. Right out of my hat I would say that a liberal and conservative coalition is perfect, we have it here and it works fine, but I acknowledge it's a bit different as we are used to coalitions and they never have had a Thatcher. If anything goes wrong here it's usually the Social Democrats that caused it but they blame the other parties as they somehow always are in power when it breaks lose.

Continuing in the Swedish politics we have at the moment very interesting opinion polls circulating the news showcasing the fall of the Red-Green coalition that has been in lead constantly since the Alliance victory in 2006 with exception in 2008 during the break out of the financial crisis. From Demoskop we have this, telling us that the Alliance leads over the Red-Green with 1,8 %, a large change from last month when the Red-Green had a 8,8 % lead. Good news indeed. Even further strengthen by todays poll by Novus, that the Red-Green only has a lead by 1 %. Last month it was 5,8 %. Also a clear indicator on that the Alliance is gaining in popularity while the Red-Green momentum is finally over.

By the way, you have to excuse me for the poor and boring way these numbers were presented. In an attempt to visualize it I tried around with the excel program in hope of bringing a chart, but I didn't get it. First it was impossible to get the lines to represent the percentage, then the months was flipped and then finally the colors was all wrong. I can't represent the socialistic bloc in blue and the non-socialist in red, it's totally messed up, like the US color scheme for the Democrats and the Republicans, it's switched. So I gave up in frustration instead. With some training I can dish out the most amazing graphs for you until the Swedish election (*everyone screams in horror*). What? What did I do?

Democracy Day

Democracy day at Karlstad municipality. A day full of interesting workshops and speeches about the history of democracy, where it is today and its future. A lot of people from Karlstad University and the biggest name being a political scientist famous from the Swedish program Boston Tea Party (a show based like a debate with two host and five experts in different areas discussing all the weirdest things). Very good coffee was served with some cinnamon buns. Unfortunately you couldn't see all workshops so I participated in the Democracy and its antagonist based on this book. I think if you read my earlier post you get the idea what I see the dangers to democracy is (*cough* stupidity *cough*).

Also it seems to be both Europe Day and Mother's Day. So play some Ode an die Freude and say congrats to your mother, which I've done by accident. I called my mother due to shutting of my mobile during the Democracy day in an attempt not to appear having a hangover as it is Sunday. I didn't first understand why she sounded so happy that I called (except that I actually called, which I haven't done since 2008, she calls me if you wondered), but then I saw it was Mother's day so that's probably it. Or she was happy because she actually forgot about me as she does every other week.

Dancing With Desire

Yesterday was birthday celebrations for a friend of mine. At 19:00. You know what that means, leave home 17:45, fill up the bus fair card before the bus goes at 18:04. After arriving at the Town Center it's time to get to the Systembolaget before they close at 19:00. Then grab a hamburger at Burger King for some food. Now the tricky part, it's 20 minutes before the specified time and the bus only takes 3 minutes to get there. So taking a long look on the wonderful digitalized time schedule determining which bus to take so I don't get to early (think about embarrassing if that would happen), the host couple actually arrives at the bus station. Talk about lucky, now there was no way I could get there to early.

Even funnier was that when arrived at their apartment they let me get in first, just for the fun to say I was there first, definitely first. Reminds me of someone else I know actually. Otherwise it was a fun gathering of friends having a really good time. Also REALLY good chocolate cake, mmmm... it doesn't count against my soon 2 weeks stop of chocolate so don't try to pin it on me. The night ended at 23:30 when I got to the last bus home while the others went out. Mostly I didn't feel up to it, we can blame it on a very low level of "artificial encouragement" and then that it was the last bus until 5 in the morning. I know I could get a taxi, but I'm somewhat of a cheapskate when it comes to that.

Today more or less a wasted day so I will have to be at the library tomorrow to do some studies. Time is running out and I just seems to stamp at the same spot as usual. On the other hand, the political landscape in Sweden seems to change. For the first time the governing parties has the lead in an opinion poll over the opposition. My favored party got 9 % of the votes which is better then the election result in 2006. Now, I know it's 5 months before the election, but it is always fun with good news. On the other hand, the LibDems in Britain doesn't seem to get the number of seat that was foretold. Of course, they seem to still be able to be the kingmakers of the election, but not with the strength as before, but I still agree with Nick, except on the nuclear issue, otherwise it's good. Now excuse me while I try to avoid some chocolate desires. They released some new taste called Polka. It's not fair I tell you.

Doin' The Omoralisk Schagerfestival '10 (4)

Watching the second pre-program of the Eurovision Song Contest. Not much to remember. Greece and Belarus the only ones that stood out to me. Greece with a fast song and nice beat and Belarus with a very beautiful song, but it is to sugar sweet. I want to puke for its perfect scenery and voices, ghaa. What is it with dictatorships and their polished surfaces? And Greece, good god. I wished the hosts could have made some witty comment about the greeks wish to win again. Think about it. They win in Oslo and suddenly realize that they have to pay for another big party... with no money. Like the IMF or EU would pay for that haha... wait, what? What do you mean EBU pays half? My tax money goes to this crap? What the F***?

Virtual Console Weekend

So Walpurgis night and May Day are now over for this year and everything can go back to normal. And no, it didn't get out of hand. Walpurgis was very fun actually. Somewhat bizarre even. First of all I was the first to arrive to the champagne breakfast (no surprise here actually) but I was also the first opening a beer and I was always one bottle before the others. Not surprising when my friends had been out the night before. Awesome day all in all. Ended around 20:30. So that's an 8 hour day without any accidents.

The day after, the working mans day and the demonstrations for justice and whatnot lead by the most hypocritical persons in Sweden, I spent the day at home. Doing what you might ask and the answer is video games. First some FFXIII and finally I moved onward till the next stage and it is an open world... and I lost interest as I don't know where to go. Ironic is it not? So I changed game, even game console to my steadfast Wii and all nostalgic memories. Mostly due to finding Castlevania: Rondo of Blood and getting hooked directly. Nice cinematics, good graphics, music worth dying for and fun gameplay. Unfortunately I can't get past the second level. Yeah, I'm lousy at those games. Played some Super Castlevania IV instead and fared very decent until the third stage which I have beaten before but not now for some reasons. After a dose of Castlevania I played The Legend of the Mystical Ninja from the SNES, missing Mystical Ninja Starring Goemon for the Nintendo 64 that doesn't exist on the Virtual Console... yet, hopefully.

After that my eyes landed on the game that inspired the Castlevania games gameplay after Symphony of the Night... Super Metroid. Hunting space pirates at their own turf with only my fast button mashing fingers to keep me alive. Unfortunately I get stuck as I don't know where the hell I'm going even with a map over the damned planet. But it is so addicting, it's even so addicting that I stopped thinking on chocolate... Mmm, Chocolate... ahem, I need to play some more games, see you later.