Dolphins! Originally uploaded by michiexile

Once upon a time, Neil Gaiman, whom all sane people love and adore, sat down and wrote a Fairy tale. A classical one, with Brave Journeys, Princes, Princesses, Lost Royal Blood, Witches, Pirates, and everything else a Really Good Fairy Tale needs.I read it. I fell in love with it.Not that this is anything but a common occurrence when reading Gaiman, mind you.Then, quite a bit later in time, a film crew produced a movie out of this fantastic book. They did, in doing so, one of the more important thinkable things in such a context: they hired Gaiman himself as a producer.And the result is breathtakingly fantastic. The film looks like I imagined the book to look. Sure, there are some minor plot changes, but they don't -really- matter that much. And what remains is ... WOW.While waiting to enter the theatre, and generally browsing around the surrounding mall, I was quite literally pounced by a very pretty redhead who was manning the Mdecins Sans Frontiers stand in the mall. We chatted about all sorts of things - starting with her seeing my Making Money and asking whether I have read Good Omens, and on the way passing by Pythagoras theorem, the evils inherent in statistics, my not being German and all sorts of various things. I was amazed, not only by the nigh-to-flirty chattiness but also by the shortness of her spiel - once she verified I knew who MSF are she dropped the spiel completely. Not what I had expected!Today, I swam, again, 500m. In just under 30 minutes with occasional breaks and a leisurely tempo.

Today, I went into a bookstore here in Sydney, and asked about releasedates for Making Money.The result was FAR more positive than I had expected. I walked out (mere minutes before closing btw) with a copy of Making Money and one of The Last Continent, which I, given my location, really need to reread. I plan to give the latter book onwards as a parting gift to my landlady - who needs to read more Pratchett.This might have been a bad decision productivity-wise, but it is a wise decision in the large scheme of things. I likes it.

Coca-cola PET bottles are 600 ml. Soda cans can be almost anything. Coca-cola and its likes are most often 330, unless they are 250. And Kirks lemon squash club soda is 375.You Aussies are weeeeeird.On a different note, a Thai restaurant owner thought me to be Kiwi yesterday. He was extremely surprised to hear that I was not a native english speaker.

Today is the last day of the USyd book fest, with cheap books all over the Great Hall.So I went there, and discovered first that the premise is "Fill a box: AU$5" (about 3.50). So I browsed and found a few things potentially worth it, but none really worth it.I did, however, come across an old paperback entitled "How to be a sensuous man", which, I must say, is among the most glaringly objectifying entities I have ever come across. I opened it at random, and found, immediately, the chapter on Virgins, Deflowering thereof. The author starts out by recommending the reader not to do this, based on 1) probability of finding jailbait (sic!), 2) inexperience on hand of virgin women. He goes on to advise the reader for the case of "accidential deflowering", recommending that the sensuous man "acts lovingly" and "goes slow", pointing out that "heavy breathing and poking your cock into their side" might not be the best way to approach a scared virgin.Ewwwww.I know that I do not quite perceive as much as I possibly could of feminist issues - but this.... I feel soiled.

Some of the colleagues here go swimming in the pool just outside the department building every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. So, in order to get my sorry shape into something a bit less sorry, I've decided to join them during my 5 weeks here.Today, I tagged along for the first time. And during about 30 minutes, I managed - with lots of pain, asthma and stubbornness - paddle my way through km. My colleague did 1km in significantly less time than I needed, and padded off to the shower during my last lap.I expect these stats to have improved slightly in a month.

Friday night: I went, with severe jetlag, and after 3 hours of afternoon napping, to the University of Sydney Science Revue. Grandious fun was to be had - and I will try my best to get hold of the DVD. If nothing else, then for the fantastic remake of "Seasons of Love" from Rent with theme recalling digits of π.Then saturday, I decided to try out the bicycle at my landladie's by going to the beach. I brought AU$25 for sustenance and minor shopping. On the way I found out any number of things:The Sydney fish market is fantastic. Sushi, served on a rollband at the Sydney fish market is hands down The Very Best Sushi I Have Ever Had. Really. It might be that Sushi in Japan tops this, but it'd almost only be that then.And they sell all sorts of goodies. Grilled and cheese-topped lobster. (AU$10 per half) Oysters. Fresh fish. Tuna kebab. The place is amazing. Bicycling on 60kmh roads is SCARY. Especially since this was my first time on a bicycle in ... quite some time. We're talking significant portions of a decade since last I sat on a bike.Aussies don't seem to approve of the concept of a map. There were local maps occasionally to be found - covering this particular part of the city. But getting orientation on a more citywide scale was nigh impossible.Bondi Beach (apparently Australia's most famous beach) is fabulous. And the water is pretty nice even now. I spent about an hour in the 16 degrees water, getting battered by the incoming waves, with surf building up all the way from New Zealand.It took me about 4 hours to get from Glebe, where I live, to Bondi. It'd take a skilled bicyclist who knows what they are doing and can endure staying on the bike some 30 minutes. Once I was done with everything, I had AU$2.50 and no energy left whatsoever. It took two tries, and some 20-odd ignored cabs to find a taxi that would take me and my bike home. And I was ready to collapse by the time I did get home.I need to try surfing at some point. Man, that looks like FUN!Also, my landlady is a surfing aficionado, and has hinted that she might help me learn to surf with a boogie board.Apparently I look kinda gay. You know the kind of giggly expression of potential romantic interest that among a particular brand of teenie boys can be used as a weapon against their pals? I got asked, on Bondi Beach, what I thought about one of a crowd of teens, and whether I'd be, y'know, potentially interested in, well, would I?My answer? The boy looked nice enough for a guy, and I'm unfortunately both straight enough and married enough to abstain, thank you very much.Coke is sold in 600 ml bottles. Not 500ml. This is weird.There will be more later.

I had my breakfast at 4am (local time), and was out of the 747-400 double decker airplane at 6.10. Thereafter, the lovely circus of entering Australia commenced - with forms to fill in and soil samples to show. For me - a prudent european with clean shoes (they looked at my walking boots and asked "Are your other shoes as clean as these?") - things were surprisingly painless, and before 7am I was in a cab.Now, I'm showered, slightly more fed, have my accommodation, my money, my banking all done (though I can't touch the money until Wednesday, and can't reasonably transfer it to Europe until sometime the week after next), and got logged in on an ancient Sun Ultra5 so that I can surf to my heart's content.Webcomics, here I come.

Inflight entertainment great. I watched 'Surf's up' and'La vie en rose', and slept for 6 hours.Airport is boring, but I've seen worse. Noone would sell me clean underpants though, and I, of course, didn't realize that I'd need to pack for two mornings, one of which with NO access to my luggage. 1st prio after luggage retrieval: find bathroom.Will write more once I'm at Sydney U.

Celebrating my birthday today. Ordinarily, this birthday would have caused a HUGE party, with lots of people invited and appropriately thematic mathematical themeing; however, since I'm sitting in Inverness, and neither Stockholm nor Jena, the plans have had to be redone a bit.Inverness seems so far to be the city of frustration. Driving here sucks. No internet access (until the Starbucks opened, 1 hours after we passed it the first time) and nuisance galore.But if I ignore this, things are very nice indeed.I have seen Talisker from the inside. Very interesting. I have seen a Real Highland Games - with Cabertossing, competitive highland dancing, piping competition and 19 pipe bands forming up into a GARGANTUAN parade. And my dear friends pozorvlak and wormwood_pearl decided to give me a .7 bottle of 12 yr old Bruichladdich single malt for my birthday. Alas, I won't be able to taste it until Really Late this autumn, since it'll start out by traveling to Stockholm with Susanne as the Australian border control won't let it through.We shall, today, commit tourism in Inverness, sleep here tonight, and then get out by 8.30 and drive down to Edinburgh by lunchtime. And commit tourism for a day and a half there before leaving again.Over and out!

However, I have managed to do the following things while driving:* almost drove off the road* almost hit a rabbit running, literally, out under my tires* break like mad for a pair of sheep leasurely (speling?) walking next to the road* almost hit a pair of pedestrians - they were crossing a FAST road, in pitch black darkness, wearing only dark clothes and no reflexes. I was meeting another car just at the point they were crossing, so both cars had half-lights and not full lights. I saw them from a total distance of ~4m while going quite a bit faster than I could brake in time. Luckily, they were already over the road by that time.Sensmorale: wear reflexes, DAMMIT!(now I need to get some myself, once I started preaching it....)

Still in Glasgow too - though we're leaving for Stirling sometime this afternoon. Driving is weird. The rental business is weird. And the place is filled with scots.pozorvlak and wormwood_pearl are very gracious hosts, and ensuring our time here to be absolutely fabulous.So far, we've arrived. I've met with Glasgowian mathematicians. We've climbed an almost-Munro almost to the top. And eaten both in and out.Some of you may be quite surprised to hear that I went to two churches. You'll be less surprised (possibly) once you hear that both were converted to pubs before I arrived.Other than that, things run kinda smooth aroundhere. We needed to use brutal force on the international connector adaptors to make the EU standardized contacts interface with them. And not all UK contacts can interface with them either. Quite the disappointment.

In ten minutes, I'll walk out the door, go down to the commuter trains, and go to the airport.Off for my honey-halfmoon (pozorvlak - I'm coming for you!) and after that Sydney.Expect spotty presence the coming fortnight.

Wedding portrait Originally uploaded by michiexile

Yesterday was spent in a pretty nice pace. I leisurely got out of bed, ate a brunch-ish thingie, called various people about wedding preparations, gathered the relevant paperwork and then set out to travel. First south, one stop with the commuter trains, to Tumba, where I found the county administration after a few false turns, and made sure we have someone who will wed us at a time where all the critical personnel are available. Then in the city, meeting up quickly with krfsm, and then going to a goldsmith I had spoken to in advance to get my old engagement ring enlarged enough for me to be able to carry it comfortably. After that, I met up, at my brothers insistence, with him at a marvelous cafe, after having bought John Scalzi's second book on the way.We sat, and chatted, and had a marvelous time, up until just after my fiancee was supposed to have quit for the day and was supposed to come and meet up with us. I made to go meet her, and my brother pulls out a letter, telling me it had arrived a while ago.It was adressed to Mikael JohanssonMushroom kingdomGermanyc/o StaffanSwedenand contained a letter from Toad, telling me that my princess Susanne had been taken by Bowzer, and that I needed to collect Stars in order to Break the Spell holding her captive so I could get her back.Simultaneously, Susanne was called in to the guardhouse of the Stockholm Royal Castle (where she works), where a package was waiting for her. It was from the Ministry of Magic, who noticed that a mere linguistical muggle was seeking to marry a mathemagician, and thus risking introduction of new Mudbloods and all sorts of nasty things: with You-Know-Who around, she surely doesn't realize what a bad idea this really was. This much was conveyed to her by Lord John Marbury, who was answering the phone number the package contained.Lord Marbury, failing in convincing her to cease and desist, sent an envoy - our old friend Andreas - to pick her up and deal with her.So, each with a different background story we both set out on the same tasks: 1) A physical test: climb up a "wall". Since I suffer from vertigo, they had decided not to make a real climb out of it, rather allowing us to climb along the floor of a particular seating area on a city square in southern central Stockholm. Points were given, exclusively, for doing it in style; and I won by my decently roleplayed vertigo. 2) Oratory skills: dressed in a deep purple bath robe, a duckish bath hat and holding a yellow obnoxious bathing duck, we were to declaim a rewrite of Hamlet's monologue To bathe or not to bathe, that is the question; whether 'tis nobler in grime [...] for an audience, and preferably garner applause for it. Once I got the idea of asking the people sitting around anyway to be my audience, this wasn't that difficult. 3) Financial security: as the bonus level (for me), the exchange, in 15 minutes, of 20 wet towels for at least 30 crowns (~3 Euro), from passersby on the tourist heavy streak of Vsterlnggatan, was to be solicited. Let it hereby be noted that the money in our marriage will NOT come from the mathematician. I managed to garner 7 pitiful crowns, whereas she easily got the entire 30, and with time and towels to spare. Having failed at my task, I was given a HUGE roll of bubble gum and asked to blow bubbles. I HATE chewing gum, and this hasn't revised my opinion.4) Faithfulness: We were given a call sheet to religious organizations in Stockholm - the catholic church, the finnish/norwegian/armenian/syrian and german churches, the jewish and the liberal jewish organizations, Maranata, the Scientologists, and a handful others, and told to rearrange our wedding to take place in a church setting. We were supposed to align our own beliefs with those of the churches - preferably asking them to perform a completely atheistic ceremony, please? I called three churches: norwegian, catholic and Maranata, of whom the two first were outside office hours, and Maranata quickly responded that they were not, at all, allowed to perform marriages, thus solving the problem. At this point, I was donned a blindfold, and an mp3player with bombastic film music, and led on a merry run through the city to get to my parents house, where the huge SURPRISE!!!-party had been organized since several days back.And out of some weird confluence trick thingie, they had, a few days back, decided on Ethiopian food. Which was weird, since when planning the dinner we were originally planning to go on that day, Susanne wanted Sushi, and I pushed for ethiopian, and I won the discussion. They even got the food from the very restaurant I wanted us to go to.All in all, we both have made suitably huge fools of ourselves, and now seem to have the blessing of our friends to actually go ahead and marry.

I should have stopped reading. An hour or so ago. And gone to sleep.No luck.I should have gone to sleep once I stopped reading, just now.No luck.I just read John Scalzi's Old man's war, and I'm so impressed that I cannot sleep until I tell y'all a little bit about it.It is visionary SF of the best kind. With aliens that are completely incomprehensible, with Technology that's simultaneously plausible and completely unexpected. And with an absolutely lovely plot. It made me sigh at places, almost mourn at places, and it very often made me laugh out loud. Now, I grant that laughing at what I'm reading isn't that uncommon - Pratchett has a knack for it - but here I do not laugh because the situation is bizarre or amusing, but it is, infallible, the sharp wit of the protagonist, not the author, that elicits my glee.I sincerely do believe that the worst I can say about this book is that I feel forced to buy the next one. Immediately. And I'm not convinced I can afford that.

In fact, I have read the book.And my main impression was: "JK Rowling must be subscribing to the DungeonMastering/StoryTelling school of 'Fuck this! Rocks fall! Everybody dies!'"Then, I read the epilogue.And .. well .. Harry is bourgeouise. And Ginny is a bloody pushover who doesn't give a shit about her own family history, but is happy to be "Mrs. Potter". Kinda disappointed, but in no way whatsoever surprised.

I have, recently, * submitted two papers for publication* finalized my bank swap* applied for conference funding* written 17 pages of my PhD thesis.Admittedly, the PhD thesis went from non-existent to the following:2 pages Front matter1 page empty abstracts1 page table of contents4 pages chapter headings without subsequent content3 pages appendix headings without subsequent content6 pages left blank to align the chapter headings on the right side of a printoutfor a grand total of 17 pages. But still! I have now 17 pages of my thesis!Now what do I do?

...since I today got to borrow the new Potter. From someone who's leaving the country on thursday. And wants it back till then.Gotta read it quick now.

As my faithful readers might recall, I have been growing Habaero chiles for a while. Now, one of the pods has ripened, and so yesterday, I gathered a few friends for a chili tasting.It really did turn out that we're far too cold to get the real heat into the chiles. Even so, it was noticeably hotter than supermarket brand piri-piris, but not as much hotter as I had expected habaeros to be. The onset was sublime - more like bell peppers than chiles, and only gradually swept over in a more burning heat that finally faded out, very slowly, and with a very fruity kind of taste.All in all, I like 'em.