things

• It's started snowing. I hadn't planned on this, i.e. I don't quite have suitable clothing.


• I'm slowly learning the important things in Swedish, such as ordering beer, ordering coffee, and thanking people for these things.


• Early mornings are not right.


• There's more american crap TV on the box here than there is at home. I didn't think that was possible. Sixty Minutes was on last night, dammit.


• Beer is expensive, but so is everything else. I think it scales, approximately.

two more things

• Static electricity will be the death of me.


• I appear to have an incredibly powerful weirdo/gay magnet running, and I've no idea how to switch it off. Dammit.

Freakiest example of item two so far has been the guy who sat next to me at the bar with his wife, and by way of conversation repeatedly used the word "gay" and the phrase "fuckyou" (yes, as if it were all one word) and had about him the demeanour of someone who, while not a mafioso himself, has watched far too many gangster movies. He left after a drink, came back by himself, and got pissed off when I switched to talking to the (German) girls next to me in French once I'd established that he didn't understand the language himself.