Sad, really.
That something with no indication of life,
no soul,
no will,
can control something
as complex as the human being...

It looks innocent enough to me...

nerves

Here I sit...waiting for my class to start. I have to hold a very short lecture today. Most of the time I think it's fun to do that. But even after getting a BA in it, I still get nervous before each lecture. My stomach is gittery. I think I might puke.
I'm well prepared. I have notes to hold my place when I start talking. And I'm going to speak English this time - I'm tired of Icelandic today. The rest of today will be an English day.

I did my first assignment in GIS today. For those who don't know, that's a computer environment to manage huge amounts of data in sucha way as to allow lots of different kinds of data to be pinpointed in geographic space. Anyway, it's not all that difficult. I know this was only he first assignment and that they get more complicated, but I think getting a decent grade will not be too hard.

Not much else right now...just waiting for my class to start...

My car, my friends

Today was another day added to the list of days wasted on the car. Yesterday it decided that the best way to get my attention was to stop the shift-stick somewhere between park and reverse. This was turning the key in the ignition does nothing but produce a click, light up the dashboard lights, and start that annoying damn bell that is supposed to inspire me to belt myself to the seat. These things all lead to the suspicion that a dead battery is not the problem, as they all require a certain amount of energy from the power cells. Of course, the next thought I had was, hmm, didn’t I just change the skiptibarki (I’ve only learned the Icelandic name for that particular part) a year or two ago? That means that I knew from the start that this was probably not something usual.

In World War II, pilots and navy men complained of gremlins in their planes and boats. A gremlin is a little demon- or goblin-like creature that lives in a complicated machine and does nothing but make the machine not run properly. They talked about fixing one thing only to have something else begin to malfunction immediately. There are gremlins in my car. There’s no question about that.

As it turns out, the gremlins have destroyed a solenoid that acts a safety precaution. This solenoid drives a little piece of metal that stops the shift stick from being moved until the break is pressed. The theory is that children cannot press the break in and move the stick, so when the solenoid is working properly, only they cannot change gears. As with so many of the other things I’ve had to replace on my American version of a very popular car, I will probably have to order the solenoid from America myself to avoid the long wait that always accompanies placing an order for a spare part through the Subaru dealer.

All that said, I have to thank all of my friends and my dear wife for keeping me in a good mood despite the fact that I’ve now wasted about 10 full hours on that danged car. I have to thank Grímur, Olga, and Hrönn, especially for all of their help. I know it sounds like I am trying to make this a bigger deal than it needs to be. Maybe I am doing that, in fact, but that’s the way I am. I think it’s a big deal that my car breaks down so often. But I also think it’s a big deal that my friends and wife are so great when anything bad happens.

Booted

Is nothing sacred?! Heh heh, a photo to show the first girlfriend when he brings her home...moowahahaha!

Real Beer

I heard some good news for Americans yesterday. Apparently, some kind of deal was made between Anheiser Busch and the brewers of the real budweiser beer. You see, the good old American Budweiser-which is not worth the effort of opening the can-was named that after the founder of Anheiser Busch went to Europe to taste beers. He really liked the name and in 1919 decided to name his American bubbly sour water-sorry, I mean "beer"-Budweiser. Then he was clever enough to follow the American model and stamp a TM after the name on all his labels, thus outlawing anyone else's use of the name. This occurred much to the dismay of the Czechs from the town of Budweis who'd been calling their beer Budweiser for more than 500 years! Dirty bastard American businessman! Anyway, the two parties have been fighting back and forth ever since and the Czech Budweiser-which is a truly great beer-has been (to my knowledge) kept from the American people. Now that there has been some kind of deal the Czechs can sell their beer to Americans under some other name. This will probably back-fire considering that most Americans are still reeling from the lack fo beer with any flavor since the days of Prohibition. But I still have faith that the culture of beer drinkers in the states is flourishing. Afterall, America was made by Europeans coming acorss the ocean. The Irish brought their Guiness and Harp beers. the English have John Smiths. We'll just have to see what happens.
But to he American people, I say, "Bottoms up!"

Concentrate!

Have you ever had a day when you couldn’t get your brain to do your bidding? This sort of thing happens to me often. Today is just such a day. I’m trying and trying to concentrate on my work. I have fascinating photos to analyze. I have a quiet room with very little interruption. But I cannot keep my mind focused on what I want to do. Take this blog entry, for instance. As I type, I’m thinking that I should really be looking at the screen on which the slide is projected so that I can continue to count up benthic species. But…
I guess that I just HAVE to force myself back to it.

Today's

Follow the link to the best photo of the day:

THE LINK

I may pick a favorite everyday considering that I look at so many each day...

I'm watching!

 

 

The first photo taken with my new 1.7x zoom extension...set on macro...

Icyland

Iceland lived up to its name last night and this morning. Everything was slick with a glass-smooth layer of ice. It was great fun to watch the bus that was to drive me to Reykjavík (at the increased price of 900 krónur ($12.73)-an increase of 100 krónur over last week) slide across the street and onto the sidewalk as the driver tried to make the turn into the bus stop. I stepped on board and trusted to God that I would make it to school. Fortunately, the rest of the country is civilized enough to have seasoned he roads with a good amount of salt and once we were outside of my town (where not a single aura-that's a tenth of a króna for you gringos-is spent on road maintenance). I'm in school now and took a small breather from classification to post a bit.

And now a post that didn't work a few weeks ago...

One of the things that has a great influence on my perception of life in Iceland is winter. I come from northern Massachusetts and grew up loving the cold and shorter days of the winter time. Now I live in a place almost as cold as where I grew up (Boston has a lower average winter temperature than Reykjavík) but there is not as much snow. Actually, if I lived in the north of Iceland, I might actually be able to experience waking up one morning and having to dig my way out of the house…but I don’t. I live in the warmer lands of the south. You might think that living in a place where snow usually either melts quickly or blows past into conveniently placed drifts in predictable areas. Unfortunately, there was a secret danger lurking in the darkness of the Icelandic winter. That deceitful beast is called sidewalk ice. You see, although the roads do eventually become clear as more and more people drive on them (very little plowing actually goes on around here) the sidewalks are left to rot. My theory is that nobody cleans the sidewalk because nobody walks anywhere. I thought Americans were strange because they don’t walk if they are going more than 50 meters ( I say meteres for two reasons: 1. because Americans know that a meter is roughly the same as a yard, and 2. because I believe that everyone should switch to the metric system of measurement). But Icelanders drive EVERYWHERE. I’ve seen people come out of a store, get into the car, drive across the street and park to go into a different store. Aaanyway, the sidewalks don’t get cleaned off when it snows. That means that the snow left over turns to ice.
A couple of weeks ago, I went over to the marine research institute and when I was walking back to my car I slipped on this sidewalk ice and landed on top of my laptop. Fortunately, I’m so thin and light that I did not crush the poor thing. A couple of days later, I was walking through campus and I nearly feel flat on my behind again. Shortly thereafter, one of my weaknesses worked in my advantage. Although I do not count myself a typical man in many respects, I am just like everyone else in at least one thing: I do turn my head when a beautiful woman goes by. I’m happily married and all that…I’m not looking for anything other than the view itself. I suppose it’s like looking at a beautiful photo or painting, only a bit more perverse. But I was paid off for this weakness in that I realized the secret to not falling and cracking my skull open. Icelanders keep this secret like American families guard the chocolate chip cookie recipe. So, for you fortunates – my readers – I will be opening your eyes to the secret to walking on sidewalk ice without falling and crushing your lap top. The trick is to walk around with your bum cheeks pinched tightly together. This restricts your movement and keeps your center of balance centered so that you find that you will not slide. So, try it next when you walk across a sheet of ice covered by a thin film of rain. And when you succeed, do not thank me. Thank the Icelandic girl with the skin tight black pants and waist-length coat. She has no idea that she has saved my wrists, hips, knees and electrical equipment a great deal of pain and bruises.
Of course another benefit of this style of getting around is that you firm up the rear and look better in a bathing suit! But it's the survival of winter that makes this technique so valuable.

beta is apparently more than a fish and a Greek letter

Are there any readers of my blog that can explain to me why I keep seeing things advertising a beta version? What does that mean exactly? Blogger was in beta and now they're all happy about not being beta anymore as though it's a great accomplishment or something. The only change I can see is that now I can (for the last three posts) post to my blog from home. Yahoo email also has a beta version. I've seen it in other software, as well. What does it mean?!

A few recent photo projects

Oops

I forgot to post the smaller version of that sunrays over the mountains photo instead of the full size...and I did a little tweaking of the color and lighting...

We made the drive to the east coast for Christmas this year. Iceland is one of the most visually stunning of places and driving such a long distance is an exciting experience for the eyes-though the old back grumbles the whole way about the comfort of being at home. The in-laws were so glad of our company I feel that the trouble and discomfort of the journey were well worth it. This is just one of the cool things I laid eyes on during the trip east. The ride home was beautiful, too. I saw a grey heron-something I was not aware was part of Iceland's bird life.

A new Year...

2006 is over.

Every year since I was 18 or so has been better than the one before it. 2006 was a good year. I made new friends, finished a second Bachelor's degree and started a MSc (a life-long dream for me). My relationship with my wife developed still further in a healthy direction. I took up serious photography again. I made plans for my immediate future. I travelledto new places. I saw the most beautiful brown trout of my life...though it got away. All this and a whole bunch of other stuff. It was a good year.
2007 has already presented some great stuff for me. Our second son will be born around March 23. I've got plans for some research opportunities. And, judging by the apple.com movie trailer site there is a lot of great entertainment headed our way this year. So, I'm feeling pretty good as the new year begins.

Thanks to all of you who helped to make 2006 a great year and I look forward to making new memories with you this year.