Masters of Insanity

Wow, two posts in one week, that was a long time ago since that happened. Anyway, I haven't written much about Sweden or what's happening here, since it doesn't appear to happen anything. Till now that is, and that is not in a good way. During this summer there was five professors or what ever they called themselves that published an article that talked about the necessity to take away the car since it didn't serve any purpose and was just a luxury product. Now, I don't have a car nor do I have a drivers license, but that doesn't mean I understand the importance of having one. The professors (from Karlstad and Umeå, both middle size swedish towns) argue that because the car is an luxury product (they call it that since people have the audacity to want cars that don't just have the bear minimum of performance) those should be forced to settle in a more "strategic position" and everyone else should pay to subsidize the public transportation. More that we already does. I have before written how I as a kid traveled 12 years with the school bus, but what I probably didn't mention was that during the last 3 years my parents had to drive me to the bus since it would take 1 hour to walk or you could go up an hour earlier to catch a connecting bus, then wait till the school bus. F*** public transportation. If that wasn't enough, these people actually argued that the politicians should, without the public support (which they knew they didn't have), force this change upon the people. Nice view on democracy. Anyway, after being more or less hacked to pieces by the public (except some supporters) they changed tactic and now talked about it being more by choice. Of course me and everyone else now know to never trust these five or their organization when it comes to solutions at all since behind them hides the dark face of oppression and despotism to serve their warped ideas of a utopia.

That was that some people thought and we wouldn't here some stupid things from Karlstad and Umeå University, but what happens? Umeå is at it again but not concerning traffic-dictatorship. Now it's some warped orwellian speak about men being healthier when being home more often from work. WTF??? How? How does one comprehend this? It's utter nonsense? Why? Well, we could give benefit of doubt by arguing that the journalist in question didn't quite get it right, if we had had some comments below the article I'm sure someone would have pointed it out, but we don't. Also, the whole thing was about men gaining from a more equal work environment. If that means getting weaker health I might just pass on it. The professor herself argues that it's because men now take sick-leave due to colds compared to before when they still went to work. And then we have those who see no fault in this logic and begin talking about men are no longer that macho at their work environment. If going to work when having a cold is macho my macho-meter probably turned itself to badass, cause I never had missed a day of school or work due to some little cold (except that one time when it coincide with the ordinary german teacher being out of town and that class would turn into a zoo).

Wind of Changes

... God, it has been a while. Well, probably for the best since nothing actually has happened. I don't think you (who am I kidding, it's just me reading this) would have the stomach for each blog-post detailing a downward spiral of depression and lost hopes and dreams. Yeah, unemployment isn't that fun. Time seems to stand still since you can't do anything, you are trapped where you are and hope to escape this black hole of despair by gripping the escape rope in the form of a constant pay. Work may not make you free, but it least give you the means to escape into dreams to endure. The current state I'm in... is just dull. Not only that, it also affect me psychological. I'm mostly a positive person, a happy person, a carefree person, or at least gives the impression of those things. But at the moment, this uncertainty begins to gnaw on the positive spirit I'm trying to uphold. It feels like small needles poisoned with doubt is piercing my soul. Not only doubt, but also hopelessness. Although, being the optimist it will probably turn out for the best. If nothing else, i will clearly have an advantage over the broiler politicians that talk about unemployment *mumble* like they ever been unemployed those nepotistic bast...  *ahem*

Over to some more interesting stuff. Election time in Denmark. Yay! The red team won. Boo! Although, to be fair, I have no idea what their stances are, it just become a reflex, the red team at home doesn't seem to be getting any better. And it's just not as easy to say that the red team won, the social democratic and left party alliance actually lost, but with the extreme marxist left party as well as the social liberal party (funny enough called Radikale Venstre, or the radical left) they are able to wrest power from Venstre (the liberal party, Venstre meaning left) and Konseravative Folkeparti (the liberal conservative party). Gonna be 5 or less interesting years in danish politics (the prime minister can actually decide when he wants an election within a 5 year period, the same system is used in Great Britain). And for you who know your political map, why do the liberals call them self left when they are clearly on or to the right of the middle? Well, that has to do with the fact that the liberals usually are some of the oldest parties and were opponents to the conservatives (called very often the right party, especially in the nordic countries, only the norwegian conservative party call themselves right anymore, Høyre). With time the liberal parties was pushed from the left to the right side on the political scale when usually the social democrats entered the parliaments and the opponents changed from liberal vs conservative to social democrats (and/or communists) vs liberal and conservatives. Liberals usually hold the middle ground but payed the price of being almost destroyed when they weren't left enough for the social liberals that went with the social democrats or right enough for the liberal conservative that went with the conservatives instead. I think Denmark's Venstre seems to be the most successful liberal party in Europe in the 2000's since it has constantly been over 25 % of the votes in recent elections. The Swedish liberal party haven't had that since the 1950's, here they usually are striving to go above 10 % which the last time happened in 2002, but that was because the Moderates totally botched that election.

Wings of Sadness

Today we wake up to a day filled with sorrow after one of the worst acts of terror that has shaken the foundation of Norway as well as the rest of the Scandinavian countries as well as others. An act of violence striking at the heart of my neighbors beyond the forest and mountains to the west. Sadly the hate doesn't end here but poison us all. This poison already took over 90 peoples lives, and even more horrible, the human nature will probably continue to harvest the souls of the innocent. Poison consisting of hate, prejudice and fear. Hope is all that remains, hope that we shall not fall and become savages ourselves. My thoughts and sympathies goes to the victims and those close to them as well as the norwegians I have had the pleasure to know. May this dark nightmare end and the rays of hope shatter the despair that threatens us.

Summer Time

I really don't write that much it seems during the summer. One of the things being that I got a bit addicted when it came to play the Ocarina of Time 3DS, which I cleared twice, 100 % on both. Then I went back home for the midsummer celebration which was a fun time. Then back and try to search for a job. Funny thing happened when one of the municipalities I'm trying to get a job from decided to take a vacation and postponed the hiring process... this makes me want that kind of job even more. Just close down and say "sorry, I'm on vacation, please return in 5 weeks", how awesome wouldn't that be? I heard that there is good to have smaller goals that lead to a bigger one, so one would be this one.

Beside all that I finally got wireless internet via some router or what ever it's called... which has been under my desk for 1-2 years. Yeah, technology isn't my strongest card. Now I can finally have my computer on the web together with my gaming consoles, no need for priority, just use them all... mostly for "tactical and strategic advice" *cough* cheating *cough*. A pity that I must move in the near future (which although it's near is very hard to predict). I also began playing games I have had in my shelfs for a year or so like Resident Evil 5 and Metroid: Other M, but it seems I suck at both of them so I settled for Resident Evil 4, a classic which I'm trying to clear on Normal for the first time (I prefer easy, but they change parts which take away the feeling that you cleared the whole game). On the other hand I noticed that my N64 games I had for the virtual console had lost the save files so I have to finish them once again, which I did for Majora's Mask with Ocarina of Time fresh in mind. Now I got Paper Mario 64 and Star Fox 64 left... although the last one will make it to the 3DS so it might be worth waiting for, the controls are a bit tighter with the 3DS compared to the classic controller, not to speak to my GameCube controller which doesn't work properly (but it is awesome when it comes to target shooting for some reason). 

Ocarina of Time 3DS

As you probably can guess from the title, I've been playing Ocarina of Time for the 3DS the last couple of days, even finishing in the record speed of three days, 100 % completion without looking in a guide... well, except for the last three skulltulas and heart pieces, but otherwise, no help. And to think that when I got that game all the way back in 1998 it took me four years finishing it. With  a guide. All in all it's a very good remake, much better lighting so that you can actually see what happens in dark areas (or that might just be the console it's in now). Also improved graphics that take away the blocky feeling from the original. Nice game, but it's probably nothing I shouldn't have bought since I actually bought every single re-release of that game (the master quest version with Wind Waker and the special Zelda Collector's Edition). The only reason was to have something to play with the 3DS I bought at the same time.

A really fun system. It really feels like a 3D effect when you use it and you get the illusion sometimes that a couple of things in Zelda hovered over the screen when Link picked them up. A pity I only got one game to play on it. The big complaint though is that I can't play my Game Boy Advance game on it. Even my other game boy games would have been nice instead of having to buy them again and load them onto the sd-card (it probably would make it easier to bring the games with you but still). Now I have to keep three nintendo portable consoles, the Game Boy Advance SP, the Nintendo DS Lite and now the Nintendo 3DS. And the DS Lite has the problem that the folding mechanism is broken, but I don't want to throw it away since the backlighting is much better that the SP. I would wish they would invent some sort of converter you put on the back of the console and downloaded the game onto the card. Or maybe just something to play them on the 3DS without any trouble. The Game Boy Series was meant to be backward compatible so why can't they do it here? They even let you play the game on the console so why not give us that option?

He's Back

Playing Modern Warfare 2 again after a break on... almost a year. And I feel a bit rusty, no denying. The highest amount of kills I was able to get today was seven. Otherwise it average around three during the sessions. Of course, I didn't excel on it before so what can you expect. The fun thing with the seven kill was that I had the highest score in my team during that session... so you can pretty much guess we lost big time. But hey, I lost with style at least.

Of course, much depends on your teammates, and frankly, I don't know if they are helping that much. Then again who am I to talk who constantly lands in the bottom of the high score list after every session? But at least I don't kill my fellow teammates (not for lack of  "unfortunate accidents" and a trigger-happy finger). You NEVER drop a crate on a re-spawn spot. What a shame to be killed by that, it's a death only associated with noobs and the first things that happens when I re-spawn is a crate on my head. WHAT THE HELL? Here I just get in control of my body... and my own teammate send me back to another re-spawn spot... with a crate ON MY HEAD. With friends like these, you don't need enemies.

Speaking of enemies, the social democrats seems to have a rough time (which I don't mind). Just recently their new leader had to defend their stance in our military project in Libya. It began with S asking to send planes to Libya with a reluctant government, then when they finally cave in, the planes only shall take photos and uphold the no-fly zone. Planes that the US, France and Great Britain already shot down. Not stopping there, after 3 months the planes shall go back to Sweden, even though NATO and the UN still wanted the planes. Their argument is that we have done our thing and we shall let someone else take over this... that's the Social democratic international solidarity for you, let someone else do this cause we only stand in their way. Of course, that wouldn't do with those who were a bit more international in S so after taking a step back, they wanted to send the marines... that would take 3 months to get over there. And now they speak of keeping the planes and send the marines. The best part in the interview is when the reporter tells Juholt that "it seems that even your party friends have misinterpreted you". This comes back later in the interview when they discuss the problem that the party only attracts older men living outside the big cities while the young, women and people living in the cities ain't attracted by them his answer is "well, maybe it's a bit hard to see what we stand for". When his own party members don't understand him I can hardly see how he's gonna get those outside of the party to listen.

Street of Dreams

Oh boy, last week was a bit hectic. Never have I been out three days in a row, and that was probably the last time as well. But it was fun, it was a walk down memory lane featuring people I've learned to know during my five years here. It was also a regression of some kind since I began with my newest acquaintance in Sociology, onward to those I meet in the project management course back in 2009 (with one person I already know from 2006) and lastly friends I studied together with for four years and some of their friends. A wonderful end to a five year era filled with good friends.

So what am I doing this week? Just finished a paper for the sociology course... I would probably have been finished last week, but as you know, I partied away that. Having written essays on d-level it feels nice just to rush past most parts since it's in the wrist. So now I wait for my opponent to send her paper and it's on. 11 pages max isn't much to worry about and I got five days in front of me so this shall be no problem... if I don't get some invitations to some parties, but that's kinda unlikely. Enjoy the summer that's soon upon us.