Tagged: culturalquagmire

08
Jan
2019

TRAVELS, PART THE FIRST

I’ve been clubbed by the hard hand of jetlag. I’ve been meaning to write a post since Saturday, when we arrived but due to countless factors, this is the first time I’ve actually gotten started. Reasons for not posting, besides jetlag: too many other things to do, sleeping, working, constant computer crashes, reading, catching up on other more important stuff, procrastination, and also, feeling as if the amount of things I have to write about is overwhelming. Despite all my good intentions, my road to posting is paved with excuses. It’s crazy how fast a 3-week vacation can go, but...

23
Aug
2018

LEFT OF CENTER, PLUS POTATOES

Karin is leaving in the morning (really more like the middle of the night, since her flight from Copenhagen leaves at 6 a.m.) for Greece on a last-minute cheap ticket deal with a couple of friends. They are going to Kos, which I know nothing about, but the name was vaguely familiar, a brain-remnant left over from years of Humanities and Art History classes, one presumes. She came home after work to finish packing and requested “a nice dinner” so I had the inspiration to drive to Eslöv to an excellent butcher that we patronize on occasion and buy something...

31
Mar
2018

GRADUATING FROM HIGH SCHOOL, SWEDISH-STYLE

High school graduation in Sweden is probably a bigger deal than getting married for most Swedes. Many Swedes, in fact, don’t bother to get married. They live together (sambo), have kids, and sometimes get around to getting married, and sometimes not. No one seems to care that much about it either way. But studenten (which is what high school graduation is called in Swedish), THAT’s a HUGE deal. Swedes typically go to school with the same set of friends for nearly their entire undergraduate time. In our little village school, as in most, kids stay together for grades 1-6, changing...

15
Jan
2017

VICENNIAL

Last week, I passed a major anniversary. It wasn’t my birthday. It wasn’t even my wedding anniversary. It was the anniversary of the day I moved to Sweden…TWENTY YEARS AGO. I was planning to write a post that day (Wednesday) but work was crazy and I clean forgot when I came home, even though I wasn’t doing anything special that evening. So it went by unmarked. Twenty years ago. When I passed my 10-year anniversary of living in Sweden, I wrote a post about it, because of course I did. I wrote a similar post when I reached my 7-year...

07
Jan
2016

THE GOOD COUNTRY

I had made a comment to Anders some time ago, that my VW Jetta seems to want to go around 140 k/h, and he agreed…his VW feels the same. He said it was because that is approximately the speed you drive on the autobahn and the cars seem to be engineered to that comfort zone. 🙂 During our road trip through Germany, I got to drive a couple of times on the autobahn, and I’ll tell you what: I loved it. Drivers in Germany drive like you’re SUPPOSED TO DRIVE. They go fast, they stay to the right except when...

13
Jan
2015

THERE’S NO NEED TO FEEL DOWN

This past weekend was my 18th anniversary of moving to Sweden. 18 years! Every year I am equally boggled by how long I have lived here. If you add on the 6 years I lived abroad as a child, that makes 24 years total I have lived abroad. Considering my age, which no one should be considering, that means only 2 more years and I’ll have lived half my life overseas (note to skeptics, I checked the math with my husband). Half my life! Martin: Why are you using Firefox and not Chrome? Liz: Um, I don’t know Martin: *under...

05
Nov
2013

IT’S OVER

Martin and Anders and I all watched the last episode of the last season of The West Wing tonight before he and the kids went off to the gym to work out. I was tucked into the end of the couch (my spot, much like Sheldon’s) where I get good support from the back and side. Martin was snuggled up against my left, hunkered down in the pillows, with a throw over his legs. He came home tired but wouldn’t admit to grumpy. I can’t believe we are done with 7 seasons, 22 episodes each, of my favorite show. I...

10
Nov
2012

GOOSE CHASE

I feel like writing, so here I am. Not that I have anything particular to talk about, but so what? That shouldn’t ever stop a blogger, right? I look at the little calendar at the top right hand side of my blog and see that I have only blogged twice this month: pathetic. It seems to be a good month if I manage to write once a week. How will I remember anything if I don’t write it down? I already have plenty of evidence about how threadbare the net of memory has become. We ate a Mårtensgås dinner at...

25
Nov
2011

KICKING ASS & TAKING NAMES

I got the rhythm. I am rocking the joint. I am powering through my to-do lists like a champion productivity QUEEN. I am getting things done. As Megsie said, I AM ON FIRE. Yee-ha! In front of me on the desk are 5 little slips of paper. One is the list of people coming tomorrow and what they are bringing. One is the list of people signed up for the cookie exchange on Monday. One is a nearly done to-do list of things that needed to be taken care of this past week: 2 things are not yet crossed off...

02
Nov
2011

NOT EVEN 15 MINUTES OF FAME BUT I’LL TAKE WHAT I CAN GET

I had a phone call early this morning as I was getting ready for work. Karin had spent the night at a friend’s house (she & Martin are on Fall Break) and Anders had just left to go pick her up and drive her to an all-day soccer tournament somewhere. I figured it was Anders calling to remind me about something. It was Sveriges Radio, the local public radio station broadcasting from Malmö. They were wondering if I would be agreeable to being on the program in FIVE MINUTES to talk a bit about Halloween and trick-or-treating, since I’m apparently...

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