Still waiting!!!

So I'm still here in Gothenberg waiting for my Sweet Heart. the rain is coming down pretty steady outside and it's cold. After that last post at McDonalds I basically walked straight to Nordstan and froze my balls off. It was a short walk, but man...not fun. So now I'm stuck in Nordstan which is the big mall in this city. It's not that big, compared to American standards, but, come one, not much is, eh eh? And it sucks here. I've walked around the stores with guy clothes and I'm done. It's loud everywhere and I'm still super tired. 

I've been talking with Sara a little bit. She got a 4 on the physical part of the training, which is high enough to get into the air force, which is where she wants to go. She hasn't gotten the results to the logical written test yet. But everything is still a go and looks really well.  I'm excited for her. After that she's gonna try and find me over here.

Oh, and Mats and Susanne are here somewhere. In Nordstan. I think they're gonna call and try to find me. I'm at the espresso house with a cup of coffee and a slightly sore knee. I wonder if they'll try to find me. 

Anyway, still can't wait to go home.

UPDATE:  Oh my word. Seriously. So I'm still here at Nordstan, the same place from the post above. But get this, there: there are two small tables that are next to each other that provides seating for four people. twice, that's right, twice have a couple come and sat next to me. Both were nice and asked if the other small table was "free" but isn't that very un-Swedish? I don't know. What happens is that a complete stranger listens to your coversation. I'm not really listening, but I have been. The first pair were old, with the most interesting thing happening was the wife nagging to the husband to hold the plate they were eating off of so that it doesn't move around when he cut a piece of the cake. They then  were talking about the lovely things that were happening at home that they were going to do. The other pair that sat next to me are "friends" about high school age. Not really listening, very dull things about school, but they are still here. I'm writing this now as something of an adventure knowing that if they were to look at what I was writing might be familiar, but one wouldn't agknoledge what they saw, for they would be admitting that they were looking at a strangers screen. That would be more rude than anything. They have almost left a few times but ended up staying exactly where they are. Jesus Christ. I didn't know that it would be so hard to have some quiet time by myself without a woman nagging

We did Thanksgiving!!!!!!!!!

YaY!!! I cooked Thanksgiving! All by my lonesome. It turned out really good, too. It was a lot of work but I got it done. We had turkey, mashed potatoes, green bean cassarole, stuffing, candied yams, gravy, and pecan pie. We found a turkey farm outside of town and got a nine pounder. It fit perfectly in the small Swedish oven. Oh, and I cooked it way out at Sara's Dad's house, about 20 kilometers outside of Lidkoping. I made sure that I had everything when I went out there the first time, cause there was no running to the store to get anything forgotten. I made the pies the day before and had a good game plan for game day. We celebrated the Saturday before the real Thanksgiving cause they don't get that day off like they do back home. Go fig. But I drove out to the house around noon and kept cooking non stop till it was time to eat. I had the kitchen all to myself, which is how I like it, and with no disasters I got everything done in time, with the turkey coming out absolutely perfect. 

Guests were Mats, Sussane, Jacob, Natalie, Linda (Berto had to watch sick kids at home so he got a doggy bag), Laila, Farmor, Sara, and myself. Most of them showed up at 6 in the evening and had a really nice dinner. Farmor even went back for a second plate, which is the equivelent of an A+. The pie turned out runnier than expected but still really good. We even played board games after the eating. It turned into a really fun evening.

What I miss, though, is how we do it at home. I know that is pretty much impossible, but I'll express my feelings. Back home family would be gathered, people helping in the kitchen with the rest of the people waiting or their holiday favorites. No football on TV here in Sweden. No excitement, not much anyway. It was a nice dinner party where I fed the family food they don't normally eat. That's about it. I'll do it again, but I'll try harder to bring the Thanksgiving holiday magic next time.

Here we go again

So once again we here in Sweden, this time in Gothenberg. Sara is off to do her tests to join the military. Over here joining the military is more of a job than a status symbol like it is in the states. I'm not sure if I mean "status symbol" but the view of it as more of a job is much more accurate. In the states I think of it more like how I would view a police officer, where both are separated from the general population in a sense. Joining here is also not quite the same as the states either. Right now Sara is taking the written and physical tests and depending on how well she does is where they will offer her a job. For example, if she does really shitty she will be offered a position as a soldier where all she has to do is learn to fight and be ready to do that, I guess. But if you're smarter you get offered more of the thinking positions. Sara really wants to be part of HR for the special forces. If not that, she wants to be a weapons technician or something cool like that. She needs to score pretty high for those types of positions so we're really wishing her luck right now.

But these tests couldn't have come at a worse time. Let me explain: today is the last day that one can take these tests to be in the running for these jobs. We found out about these deadlines  a few days ago. We also were blessed with some severe colds as well. Sara even tried to postpone the tests for a later date, but the only positions that she wants need to have the tests completed today. So that sucks. We had to get here early as well. It's 9:30 right now, in the a.m. and she had me drive. Jacob and Natalie were kind enough to offer their car. Yeah, it's a manual, but I'm getting better at it. I really hate driving in the dark though, and it's dark here in the mornings. I had a little bit of a melt down driving over here, but we made it. We're okay.  Another thing. because we're both unemployed we have sleeping patterns that don't coincide with a normal working schedule. But we tried to go to bed early last night with very little success. I must have slept only a couple hours last night with Sara doing about the same, maybe less. So right now Sara is starting the tests that will determine her career for the rest of her life with almost no sleep and a strong cold.  We're really wishing her all the luck we can muster.

So while she is doing that I'm here in Gothenberg to do whatever I can to pass the day. Of course I found a McDonalds for the free internet. It took me about 2 hours of walking to find it. Because we only have one smart phone in the family, Sara has it so she could navigate to the army base. I tried to follow the light rail tracks into the center of town. I made some wrong turns but eventually found it. Damn, I gotta get a real phone. So here I am. I have no idea how long I'm going to be but I'm damn tired and mostly want to go home and sleep. And of course it's a rainy day here. The rainiest city in Sweden, am I right? 

One thing that I really want to do is find a brewery place that sells stuff to brew. The problem is that I can find it on the net, but finding in real life is a whole other thing. Thinking about it, I could probably leave it on the screen here and do my best. We'll see. I really want to get some cider yeast so I can brew some hard cider. At some point I'd like to get a nice set to start brewing beer but that'll have to wait till we find a more perminent place to live. Sara thinks she'll be stationed in Halmstad which I think is a couple hours south of here. So she's started applying for apartments here. I think she's applied for five of them so far. I think they're in really good parts of the town. We got the lure in, let's see what bites.

And I'm still lookinf for work as well. There was a position for admin assistant to some yoga place that I applied for that might be fun. They're just starting out here from the UK. It's a small job, just a few hours a day, 5 days a week. But it sounds fun. I sent them an email and they asked for my CV and stuff, which is at least an answer. I don't get many of those from the emails that I send out. We'll see.

Anyway, you're just about up to date. Oh, the next post I'll let you know how Thanksgiving went here.

Me brewin stuff

Okay, if you've talked to me face to face and we're friends you might know that there is a hobby that I've been wanting to break into, and that's the world of home brewing. A couple of reasons I want to do this is, first, it's cool to make stuff. I love cooking and looking up recipies and pouring effort into something that I can really enjoy. Another reason is from my older brother's example. He and his bestie have assembled this bad ass brewery that's worth over ten grand. Those buds are serious for beer. They also made some damn good beer too. Reason number three is that alcohol is stoopid expensive here in the nordic. The wife and I were bicycling around Europe for awhile and the stuff is way cheaper in other countries. The Swedish government loves to tax things, and while living here is pretty great, you can hardly pee without getting taxed for it (although most public toilets make you pay before you pee, but that's a whole other rage topic). So I'm ready to jump in. The first road block is needing the stuff to start. I don't having anything like that in my kitchen, and the closest home brewing store is in Gothenberg. The fact that I don't have a car doesn't help with that either. Some day.

In the meantime I've starting with something other than beer, well, it's ginger beer! way different than normal beer. Technically it's more of a ginger wine, I think. Anyway here is what it looks like:

It didn't ferment very long cause I was just experimenting. This was my first attempt at making a fermented beverage and I wanted it to go as low risk as I could. And you know what? It was awesome. All it was was shredding ginger and throw it in a pot. Add water and suger, and I think some baking powder. Boil. And when it cooled down a bit, you add some yeast and stick it in a 2 liter soda bottle. It sat there a few days and got all bubbly. It seriously took like five minutes to be able to open the cap all the way without it exploding out. But it tasted great, and I'm excited to try something else. Ginger beer was good, but I want something a little less new mom hipster. Which means I'm going back alley hobo and try making hard cider. I just need to get my hands on some cider or wine yeast.  Wish me luck!

Pic of the wife

My wife told me today that in a hundred years people would think that I was famous and no one would have any idea she existed because of the number of pics we took of each other. So here she is:

Swedish High School Graduation Day

Hey peeps. You wanna know the different between high school graduation in Sweden compared to that in the states? Well, I'm gonna write about how they do it here. So today is grad day. What I've heard is that first there's a bunch of pics taken by the family in the nice clothes that you get for graduation then you have a small meeting with your classmates and teachers, think. No family in there. Just something small. Then you're let out to the school grounds where your family is waiting. Lots of people there, so the way you find your family is that they are holding a sign up with your name and picture and possible other info. Usually an embarrassing photo. The sign is like what you would see on a picket line. with your family you get presents I think. I've only been apart of this thing once and it was a few years back cause Sara had some cousins graduating. We gave some candy leis. Some people give them alcohol, money I think is given? Not sure. After that, well, in this town, they gather with the group they studied the same program together and pile onto a trailer being pulled by a big ass tracker and get pulled around downtown and everyone lines the streets and watch. The students decorate these trailers with banners that say with program they are, some have pics, but most of them have huge sound systems blasting techno. And they're all drunk. It's still illegal for those kids to drink, but this day its okay. So it's a parade of drunk teens on trailers and it's fun. Then after that's done, they all get into comfy clothes, gather again, and visit everyones homes in turn, drinking and partying the whole time. And that's how it's done.

Today was I saw the tractors go by downtown.  Just thought I'd mention it.

Otherwize, we got more bike gear in the mail today.  Still planning on leaving the first of next month to be on our bikes for the next few months, or even longer.  If we can get jobs and stuff on the road we may stay out longer.  Sara's been playing around with the idea of getting winter jobs in the Alps. I'd have to learn to like the cold, I guess, but its still sounds fun. We're obviously not ready to settle down. And it's awesome that we have each other to do this kind of shit.

Hey internet. So Sara didn't get that job in Stockholm. Sucks. So we've been helping Sara's mom move her ELON store to the other side of town. Good thing that town takes 30 minutes to walk through. Isn't that how crocodile dundee measured distance? I digress. So by car it's a sub 5 minute ride. But moving a store is hard. Especially one that's been there for decades with a bunch of old stuff everywhere that no one has any idea why it's there. So it was a lot of work, no days off for a month, and the store finally opened. On to the next adventures then. NOW we're planning a trip. Not just any trip. A bike trip. Around Europe! Yeah, so for this special adventure we're setting up another special blog. A big apology to all those faithfully reading this stuff. I'll be diverting my time and effort towards that story. You can follow it here: http://theericandsaraadventures.blogspot.se/

First one in Sweden

Okay. Not really sure what happened the last time I wrote something here and I'm too lazy to look up the last thing. So I'm gonna just get going with this and update stuff a little and hopefully they don't overlap too much. So I'm happily married to Sara Anna Fransson. She's awesome. She's my best friend and we have shit loads of fun together. We lived in the States for a few years and helped with my family while my went through the process of having cancer and eventually dying from it. It was a sad time. Got to see my family though. My older brother, Nick, was down in Salt Lake City for a month. Which is super cool cause he hardly ever gets down there. My Mother died on September 11. And if was aweful. The night before was one of the most tramatic in my life. Not going to talk about it but it was hard and life changing. Any way, not long after that we decided to move back to Sweden and start a family and take advantage of what Sweden has to offer. Sara moved sometime during the fall. I moved back to parents place where Aled and Blair still live. It was cool to be with family a little bit before I move across the ocean. It gave me time to save up some money and get things ready. After I quite my job I went to Vegas with Greg, Seb, Nick, and Wade for 5 days. Best Vegas trip yet. Those guys know how to have a great time. So not long after that I moved to Sweden. I've been here for a little over a month now, living in Lidkoping, and so far I really like it. I now have time to really ride my bike with is great cause I gained a bunch of pounds around my body. Rode my bike only like 6 miles a day and ate microwaveable food for four months in a row. Not quite the picture of health that we were living before. I'm also meeting Sara's family again, which is fun. Although they all have their own ways of talking. Sara's dad has a hard time hearing and talks really loud. Jacob talks really fast and mumbles. Berto is by the far the worst. I should say hardest to understand. Telephones scare me to death. It's not easy to get going with a new language. I have to think of everything twice, if not more times to make sure I understand. Sometimes it doesn't go at all. Anyways, it can be hard. I did want to mention some things that I've noticed that are a bit different than the great United States of America. At least I wanted to try to remember what I had been thinking of. I've been wanted to write this shit down but just haven't. Lazy I guess. So here in Sweden the humidity is very high. Okay, so went for my first ride outside on my bike out to a small castle that was 25 kilometers away. It wasn't rainy out there but it was cloudy and the roads were wet. I figured that they would dry up. It was fucking day time. But Sweden was a different beast. I didn't put my rain pants on. So I go out to ride and the wind is pushing me away from home. Nice and fast ride out there. On my way back the wind was pushing hard and my ass got soaked with the freezing water off the road. This ride was goes up on the wall as one of the most miserable rides that I have ever done. It was so so hard. I was wishing I was home at the 2/3 part of the ride and the rest of the way was fucking hell. I was cold, tired, not sure how far to go against a relentless wind that did not want me to get home. Eventually I got there, which felt like an eternity. and stipped off all my clothes. while I was riding my bike my ass hurt but I thought that it was because it was cold and wet. It turned out that somehow it broke the skin. Not really sure how that happend. Maybe it was a small case of frostbite or something. When I was showering my ass hurt really bad. The hot water stung like a bee in the sape of a the saddle on the bike. After the shower I got to see in the mirror and I could see there was a white mark on my ass in the shape of the saddle and on the lower left and right sides there was some scabs on the outline. The white marks cleared up the day after, but the scabs took a week or so to go away. So my point to all this is that the humidity in this country sucks when you want to ride your bike and it'll bit you in the ass. I've also noticed that I have yet to find a bar to hang out at. Here they like to have nice places were you can feel a bit of luxory. So the places that I have been to so far aren't that expensive, have been nice places, but not the type that you would sit with your friends and really laugh. It's sort of hard to explain. I guess one way to explain it is that you would feel the need to dress sort of nice to go to these places. Where at a normal bar you could just go cause you wanted a drink with your friends and relax. So here you have to choose between a fancy bar which I feel is for adults of all ages, or a dance club if you wanted to pick up on people. No place in between. So if you don't want to do those two things then there are dinner parties. I got to cook for one of these not long after I had arrived. I made some kick-ass general tso's chicken and noodles. But these seem formal in a way. I'm at my own place (our own place) and I have to put on a nicer shirt and serve people. What the hell happened to just relaxing with people. I feel things here are a little too formal. We'll see how I deal with this or how crazy I'll become. Who knows. An update might be written here. Who knows indeed. I can't think of anything else at the moment. I had lists in my head, but now it's too late. Laziness strikes again. You may be wondering how I finally took the time to start writing these things now. That is a great question. the answer to this is because I'm sitting in a cafe at the moment waiting for Sara who is now undergoing an interview for a job a little ways down the street. I'm here in Stockholm now and it's March now. And no one told this place that it can stop snowing. For reals. Come on. Winter sucks, and I know I moved to a nordic country, but really? Back in Lidkoping it's about spring now. No snow and the weather gets up to 10 degrees Celcius. I was going to walk around Stockholm a little but all that damn snow pushed me into this nice little cafe with internet access. So yeah. If Sara gets this job we'll be moving to Stockholm, which I am over the moon over if she gets it. Firts of all, it's a bit more international here so I would hopefully find some North Americans. Also I would have a better chance of finding a job. And there's just more shit we could do. There's also the public transportation here that rocks. We wouldn't have to buy a car for the foreseeable future. I hate taking care of cars. They cost soo much and the expenses never seem to end. I love bikes. They're simple, I can fix them, great exercise, you can never take life fast and strenuous, and life seems more fun and enjoyable on a bike. Unless it bites you in the ass, which it very well can do. Be careful. The company that she's applying for is called Fritiden, which is one of those places that provide labor for companies. The place people in jobs for companies. I can't for the life of me remember what they're called right now. But what she would be doing is to get companies on board with them. Say a company needs an architect to architect stuff or a butler to butle. They could go to this company and say what they need, get the peronel that they wanted for the project, pay the Fritiden for what they got, and Fritiden would pay the wages, the benefits and all that paperwork to the proper authorities. Which replaces some of the stuff that HR would do, including the interviewing time and advertising the empty slot, etcetera. So she's in a unique position where she's a swede who hs some good selling experience. Hard selling experience. Sweden doesn't really push stuff on customers so much. So whe n they are asked to, I don't think many swedes would be comfortable in such a position. Sara's good on the phone and knows how to get to people, on a personal level where she can convince people of stuff. Anyways, she'll be great at this job if she gets it. I'm really hoping she does. It'd be nice to get going with life a little bit. Things would be going a little faster here. Here at this cafe Total Eclipse of the Heart is playing and it's the second time I've heard it today. I havenb't hear that song in years. Just wanted to mention it. Also I'm seeing some spelling errors on here and that's partly due to the thing in the corner that where I can't see what I'm typing. It just covers it up and sometimes I make mistakes and I can't see them when I'm writing and when I get passed it I don't want to go back and fix it, although it does piss me off a bit. So I think that may be good for now. I feel that you are a bit caught up now. Ask away if you have any questions.