Ain't never been to Spain- oh wait I just went!

I have been so lazy about blogging and I really have no good excuse besides the usual- I was busy line. But I have been busy as I went to Spain for a week, got back and then had to prepare for a Danish halloween party, and have fun with my fellow U of M students from the Netherland exchange that came up to visit.
Now that I made the obligatory sob story excuse, time for the much needed update:







Spain- what can I say about Spain that hasn't been said before? Apparently a lot since this was once of the coolest places I've been. Seriously, the place is set up to be easy as possible for tourists- the metro is great and inexpensive, there are signs everywhere, in short I loved Catalonia. The language is weird though- a strange mix of spanish and french it seems but I'm not quite sure. It didn't help that about 1/5 of the North American spanish words mean something completely different in Spain, and that Spaniards speak with that horrid lisp- it was good to dust off the spanish again though.



I loved Gaudi- SO much more talent than Dali- this is at Parc Guell


From a nook in La Sagrada Familia which is THE most impressive building in the world.


Resting on top of the Batilo House

Roof of Casa Batilo, weird gnomes used to dwell there.
(Danish tip of the day: Nissa is Danish for gnome, and it is pronounced Knee-sah)


The tree of life montage, YES I used montage!, on La Sagrada Familia


Me at the awesome and totally free water show that happens every friday and saturday night in front of the Catalan Parliament


Sagrada Familia Back Facade


Sagrada Familia Front Facade

So go to Spain and enjoy the siesta/manana attitude, good weather and warm, sandy beaches.

København

So last week I went to what we call Copenhagen to visit with a group of exchange students here at Aarhus Universitet. The group included: 9 Italians, 1 Dane, 1 French, 1 German, 1 Belarusian, 1 Chinese, 2 American and 1 Kingdom of Bhutan-ish student. Talk about an odd assortment. What I learned most was that Italians are consistently the latest people I have ever met. They have literally no concept of punctuality or time- and remember friends, this is me speaking! They are also really fun because it was non-stop goofing around so I am glad I was able to meet them.

Some interesting points to Copenhagen- 1. Copehagen tobacco is incidentally not at all Danish, nor is it even sold here I am told
2. Christiania is a dirty hippy sector that is more reminiscent of Jamaica than Europe
3. The statue of the Little Mermaid is extremely overrated



To get to Kobenhavn which is situated on an island from Aarhus you can take a Jet propulsion ferry, they are pretty sweet and pretty fast...these jets of water were about 50 feet high and 300 feet long..pretty impressive!



This used to be the whore part of town for old sailors but now it is the trendiest of streets because the bourgeosie have gentrified it and made it "quaint and cute"



My group in a shameless tourist pose....



A small Cherubim reminiscient of the pure soul of Spencer..........

Viborg

So Danish people have this really complicated dice game they like to play, and well what can I say, it's their form of poker and is entirely confusing but pretty fun. If you lose you get sent to Viborg (a danish city) and if you lose twice you get sent to hell. So you'd think there would be a reason for picking a specific city right? Like Viborg is crap or industrial or something to be hated. Nope. Ask any Dane why and they really have no explanation whatsoever. Many things are like that...for example: the danish word for "for example." It is "for example." Why? No one knows. Why are the christmas gnomes little arsonists that burn down your home at christmas if not fed porridge in the attic? Who knows...Why do they have a halloween type holiday where a cat is placed in a barrel and then the barrel is smashed like a pinata? Well actually that one has a simple answer: evil spirits in the cat. But then why do you have a holiday where you build a bonfire, in the summer mind you, to roast an artificial witch while singing carols? No one seems to know....but THESE are the things that I came here to learn- I'll keep you posted. In the meantime here is another postcard for you:


Women are evil and/or deadly....

Danish Findings

Ah Danish products, devoid of clever marketing logos, descriptive information and any hint of graphic design, yet still outrageously expensive. This "skum" is a popular word. I have found dairy skum, grooming skum, cleaning skum and even beauty supply skum. I think it means cream or something like cream.



So this is a sign that was at an aquarium I visited. I found it really funny because I think it may underemphasize the importance of not putting your hand in the shark pool by giving it a funny and quite happy cartoon look. I almost stuck my hand in just to see if sharks really do have a sneaky devious grin on their face right before they bite your hand off. Come to think of it I have seen a lot of funny signs here- the exit sign for example, it is an image of a stick figure man running toward a door-ish rectangle. Very literal and once again, not a hint of sleek graphic design, unlike this Japanime inspired danger sign.



This little postcard gave me hope though because it is quite funny and quite sleek, but then again the words are in English not Danish so maybe it was not designed here....but I like to think that it is Danish because 1- It is risque and 2- I found it on my apartment bulletin board. It brought me back to those days when I was Joey and Tom's neighbor!

Danmark

So apparently that is how Denmark is spelled here...it got me to thinking- Was it so hard to say "Danmark" that we had to change it to Denmark, or Spain instead of Espana or even Deustchland for that matter- who is the bum that decided to call it Germany instead...sure it was Germania but it was Germania before english had even been invented so what's the deal?! Anyways there are a lot more difficult Danish words than "Danmark" so I've come to learn during my month here so far...

It has been a good month, at first i was sad because i had literally zero friends and nothing to do and because I thought I had forgotten my camera cord and therefore could not blog pictures like I had planned. Then I made some friends and simultaneoulsy realized that my computer had a slot for picture cards. (Lest you mock, this IS my first computer I've ever owned) Denmark is a pretty relaxed country, the people are cool- a bit introverted - and very knowledgable about world politics, history and they speak amazing english so I am so happy about that because like I said, danish is literally the weirdest language I have ever heard. So if any of you out there would like to visit just let me know!

Gweners

So I have a niece....she is pretty cute too I must say and I don't even think I'm being biased. She came to visit me, her favorite Uncle, this summer and taught me that babies, although smelly and deficient in communication skill, can be pretty fun to have around. She is learning to sign and I think she caught on to the sign that I tried to teach her although I think she did the opposite of what I was trying to teach....look closely at the hand and think inverse! Actually I would never teach MY niece anything like that, she's way to sweet.....and stinky!

Guatemalaaaah

So I was way lazier than even I could predict...which is pretty lazy. This summer I went to Guatemala to do some third world clinic work- fun stuff. I've posted some of the pics on flickr so check them out!

Conan is the Johnny Carson of our generation....

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My little brother's quirks explained

So I was perusing the web and came across the following article: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/13555604/

This led to me to some serious thinking about my little brother and his "quirks." Bug has always been the "diffrent" brother, from the days of his enfascination with pogs and x-men, right up until his enfatuation with The String Cheese Incident. Now don't get me wrong, these quirks have never before made me question his orientation...BUT we all know that science is God and not vice-versa and that scientists, being founded in science of course, are never wrong and consequently Gods in their own right. So therefore my brother's "quirks" will now be exploited as homsexual undertones by his four older brothers in all future familial discussions; my poor brother... exploited completely by the same biological forces that caused his homosexuality. Now that's a real Catch 22.

So how often do you use.....crack?

This is a question I have found myself asking real people ever since my initiation into the clinic system. I never thought that at some point in my life I'd be sitting in a chair asking people how often they smoked crack and then listening to them say, with a straight face, "oh not that often- just twice a week." What makes it worse is that I've seen way to many Chapelle show episodes at this point in my life to hear something like that and not want to start laughing inappropriately....so I take it in stride and respond as straight faced and serious as possible: "Oh only twice a week? We can deal with that, it just may interfere with the pain medication should we decide to use it today." All in a days work...

School's out for Summer!

Oh wait. It's not. As a Grad student I actually pay more to go to school in the summer as well. Lucky me. Now for the remaining two years I have left, Alice Cooper's classic song will be nothing but a bitter reminder of my decision to double my educational experience by tacking on another four. BUT the hardest of my years are done officially as of Wednesday, when I take my final and end my years of book work that ultimately consumed a small forest in powerpoint printups and many hours that would have probably been wasted on the likes of Morrowind. (Oh where doth the Morrowind blow? It blows you Joey.) So from now on I plan on blogging and reading blogs more often so be prepared to be made fun of from this point forward....
Oh- I also decided to jump on the bandwagon and joined Flickr as well. Thanks to my tech saavy friends for doing all the leg work for me and just showing me the best of the best for web gadgetry.

Oh Man....

So I guess in hindsight that Nate's idea to dress up as the twin towers and fall down wasn't as bad as I thought...

Oxymormom vs. Oxymormon vs. Oxymoron

OxymormoM- The unintended title of my page, due most likely, to the close proximity of the 'm' and 'n' keys on your standard QWERTY keyboard. I justify it by the fact that MOM exists in it and I pride myself on the use of 'your mom' series of jokes but had I realized my folly I would have probably gone for oxyYOURMOM.blogspot.com

OxymormoN- My clever, original, and ideal name for my blog. It was so clever, in fact, that I was only the second person on blogspot to think of it! It was already taken when I realized that my lack of effort in the elementary school "Typing Tutor" program had led to the deficient skills that cause my "m" error. Damn I knew I should have paid more attention to those magical white hands typing those silly sentences on my Apple IIG McIntosh in brillant CGA graphics. Though looking back on it- The Oregon Trail had way more relevant life skill applications.

Oxymoron: the root of my cleverness, evidentally only the latter part of the word has any significance to this post.

Halloween- the perfect holiday: evil, costumes and pumpkin bread. I ask you, is there anything else worth living for?

I love Halloween. First of all, it is a Holiday celebrating the exact opposite of what is was originally intended to celebrate- religion and goodness. Second of all, it is one of the rare Holidays that inspires even us lackluster, culturally deficient Americans to band together and actually go out of our way to avoid working and even festively dress up as our favourite things/people/criminals/whores etc. Finally, Halloween contributes to our world monopoly of obesity which is something to be embraced if you ask me....A small sample of a great Halloween in Minneapolis, Minnesota this year:

The Cave Woman, All-Star Snork, Flapper girl
Jack is the cowboy which if you knew him is hilarious...trust me.
Beuckens is a former gymnast- hence the ripped legs!

There's my girl, Persephone- Goddess of the Underworld
"she who destroys the light"

Compare her to the real deal:

http://www.pantheon.org/articles/p/persephone.html

My Favourite costume however was Bailey's, simply because of the effort involved in hiding her hair under that ridiculously small wig, and of course the elf ears, who isn't a sucker for costumes involving elven features?

Before:

After- With no hair modifications:

One small step for man, one giant leap for bloglandia.

I have made it to the promised land- blogspot. This is the place. I have decided to abandon without remorse my home @ MySpace due to that undeniable fact that Microsoft is evil...and terribly user unfriendly. So hello friends, ahoy pirates and (insert obscure klingon language or geek dialect) to all you trekkies out there. I am "in" the proverbial "house!"