Los Otros

Yes, soon the “hoards” will descend on us, and a riotous 7 days of eating, talking, marrying, sightseeing, driving, arguing(for the Spanish contingent), discussing(that’s us, ha ha),laughing, playing, photographing(at least 6 cameras at once), eating more, sleeping(not), driving more, explaining, translating, musicing(is there a single word for this?), laughing more, joking, farting(only Icelanders), burping, o.s.fr. Needless to say, there won’t be a dull moment, most likely. So, at the moment, we breathe easily, safna kröftum, and try not to think too much about it.(sort of like when you’re pregnant....except we know the date). We are in the process of readying the house for what’s to come. That entails things like once more moving the tv up into the living room(had our cable guy come, Georg, who lies all over the floor in order to reinstall the cable connections—this is the third time he comes to us and he is an artist in his ability to fine tune our reception), putting away everything “extraneous”, buying more sheets and towels(yes, when your towels no longer dry you as they are more holes than mass, and your sheets tear at crucial spots, then you know you’ve been living together for a loooonnng time....28 years in fact), buying a new matress(our third one), packing away books in discrete places(like Freysi’s room......he won’t notice, teehee), removing doors(soon), making a batch of spaghetti sauce(soon), buying tons of chips(soon!!), stocking up on coke and crystal(Mundi’s aqua con gas), paying all bills(can’t count on memory after the 7th of Aug.), buying toys for those under 3 feet tall(shhhhh....I bought some for myself at the same time!), ordering books for Freysi to bring (oh..., that doesn’t have anything to do with “events-to-come”...duh), having Darri try on his suit (if he doesn’t grow at all between now and the 10th, then we’re ok..), have the car(the Nissan) souped up so it will survive all the driving (that’s been done—even had new drifskaft put in so that it remains a 4-wheel drive), have the front handrail painted finally(soon, hopefully, by Elli’s son), and what else?  Right now I’m entering my usual evening comatose state where I’m no longer responsible for what I say (“have you ever?”says my better half and various appendages), and so I will end this soggyblog with a little story of the car we’re renting:  So, last Saterday, after dropping off Mr. D. at Nexus(the place where Heros Clix!! and like minded masters share arcane knowledge, and where moms with magic cards are always tolerated), we went to Hafnarfjörður to a place that Mundi found on the net—Hasso—that seemed to offer something at a more reasonable price (we were up to 150,000kr on some sights, and no less than 90,000kr. It was beginning to look cheaper to just hire a big cab full time!). So, we arrive shortly after they open and yes there’s the car we wanted to check out—a Nissan Vanette that holds 8 people and uses diesal. So, in we went and there were a bunch of foreigners with one Icelandic woman talking both íslenska and þýska obviously their guide, and obviously someone who is a regular customer, and so we waited, looked at pamphlets and listened to all her small talk chitchat (blahblahblah....social grease), not feeling rushed. The place was a true “shoestring” affair in that the service counter was in front of a very large open space that looked as if it had been a showroom for cars or a dance studio, but now had little in it except a few chairs around a coffee table, lots of half opened boxes, a black snowmobile, and paintings lined up all along the walls as well as on them, all mostly the same sort of organic stainglass window variation, and we waited. Finally the people get their cars, one being that Nissan, and now it’s just us, not needing anything today, rather in the future. Uh oh, the couple realize that they forgot their date book at home (there is a computer there, but it’s not on.....this is Icelandic shoestring remember). So the woman calls home and tells whomever answers to find the book and open it to the pages she needs(“fljótur!”)and tell her whether or not  a name is written by that car....well, she has to repeat this a bit and then it turns out that there’s a wasp at the other end and that person is rather upset....(that person, as it turns out, is their 12 year old son), and he’s having such a hard time avoiding the wasp that he faxes the wrong pages to her. When she calls again, it works that time (and the wasp is no longer a big problem), and he gets reminded that he is being paid for this. Well, alls well that ends well, and we get the car reserved (and yes it is the same one that had just driven away), and it’s “cheaper” to take it for 8 days instead of 7, so there you go. All handwritten on her fax sheet, going over the dates 3 times(literally, with the pen), taking our card number, and being told that later it gets put into the computer and we’ll receive a confirmation by email. And lo and behold, it was there when we arrived home after shopping! All fancy and official-looking. Yes, there are still real down-to-earth people running businesses here in Techno-(ice)-land, and one can get deals that even feel personal! You realize that these people are doing it all, that even though they have others working for them, they still do whatever is needed at any one moment (the man, a former policeman according to stuff on their wall, was out back cleaning another big car, Kea Carnival, while showing it to us as an option). So, not a “big” story, but a cute one. Moral? Wasps rule. 
 

Hey you guys, well, I´m finally back, and now better and more strongly equipped, ready to take on new internet/computer worlds with my new weapon, the new computer (no offence to Freysi´s trusty little laptop, that has been my link to the outer world the past two years)!!! No, just kidding, but we finally have our new too cool computer, and I can´t get over how big the screen is, it´s absolutely humongous! (I try to write as Mishka jumps up to investigate the new member of the family, I have to fling her onto the floor, since she´s exactly like her mother, not respecting authority at all) I have the internet on fullscreen, and my vision is filled, I see nothing other than the screen (before I had to almost squint to find the screen in the first place, haha, another joke). It´s great. Thanks mamma and pabbi, for this great gift, that is very well appreciated after my almost month´s exile, and will be used widely and wisely in the future.
Anyway, here I am, enjoying my days of not having anything that I have to do (or they make me do) and doing whatever my heart requires in each moment. I read mostly, hundreds of books stacked up waiting for me (yes, pabbi, my bookobsession is on the leash, just like mamma´s), all so juicylooking that I start to read really fast to get to the next one, only ending up with a big headache (which is also due to reading in three languages, my brain sometimes has an overload, depending on what language it is, and the degree of work that it has to do to stay attentive). I play the piano, I clean up (minimally) and take care of the two krazies while Manu finishes up his summercourses. Actually we are slowly turning into the three krazies, seeing that I live with them all day, all alone, without human company, and they´re not much for chatting, more like driving me up the walls.
Mishka is turning into a little devil, she heeds none of our warnings, staring at me with a blank stare whenever I scold her, I brush her off the table, and she does bounces up again, as if she were made of rubber. This she repeats until finally she finds something else that interests her, normally Kisa´s head bobbing by, which she throws herself at, usually ending up sprawled on the floor or getting clobbered by Kisa. I try to pick her up to pet her or spend a bit of quality time with her, but it´s impossible. She starts to squirm and squirm until finally she wriggles free, and goes shooting off, normally falling over herself several times. It´s like she can´t stay still too long, and while she´s still her energy starts acumulating until finally it explodes in an overload of energy and hyperactivity. She is hilarious though. She has an affinity towards water, comes and sits on the edge, staring at us in the shower. Of course one day when her paws were already too wet, she slipped in while I was showering and got absolutely soaked only to go shooting out into the apartment, her legs scrambling all over the place. I had to jump out to wipe her off so she wouldn´t soak the bed, only to find her after I finished my shower drying off in a sunbeam (in a Garfieldish position).
Well, love our new computer, thanks again guys, we´re going to take a picture of us with it and send it to you, with a big bow on top. It´s good to be back :) úlla

No, this family has not been much of a blogging family lately.....it’s summer (always a good excuse) and the weather has been pretty good most of the time up here under the arctic circle (the temperature in the “hálendi” here one day last week was actually 20 degrees C!!...practically unheard of), and even here our pollen count has skyrocketed this past month. But I can’t use that old excuse, because my allergies aren’t anywhere as bad now as they used to be, no no. What has been taking up my and Mundi’s (mental) time is the trying to figure out if/when/where we’re going to or might move to.....i.e. trying to find another place that better suits our needs space-wise that also is still convenient for the things we do (esp. Darri) and that would hold all our stuff and give us a more open space and thus enable us to always have extra space for “visitors”(kids and family).....and still be able to afford it.:þ And that’s the clincher.....what we can afford is not as close by, thus would entail me having to drive twice as much in each day, and what is close by is either too small or too expensive. And everytime we go out and look at something, we always come home realizing that we actually own a “valuable” piece of property(mostly because of location, but also because there aren’t many larger places in this area). If we could only build out into the back yard, extend our living room..........?. But even then it’s on 3 floors which won’t be “clever” in about 10 years maybe, and it really is too narrow, and we just can’t squeeze anymore book or cd shelves into this house as it is. (complain,complain!!) Actually, if we decide to stop looking for another place and stay on here for at least 10 more years, then we will hire professionals and redesign the insides, streamline it all, put in built-in shelving that uses space efficiently, etc.,etc. Which would mean having to literally move out for however long it takes to do such changes!!(hey there, Úlla, when will you have another bigger place yourselves, so we can come for an extended visit, help babysit K&M?)
But all of this has actually been put “on ice” for now.....a week and a half ago our real estate agent wanted to get going and put our house on the market, and after one anxious evening, we saw that it wouldn’t work right now, as we’d only be able to show it for a couple of weeks and then not at all until Sept. because of the up-and-coming events. So, we decided to wait (pheew!), and just keep on looking for now. And then we did make one more call to check on a house on Fannafold we thought was a possibility as the owners were looking for an exchange (the couple are on their way to Sweden for a couple of years with their youngest kid as the Dad is going into a Master’s program in Psych. and they’re leaving their 20 year old daughter behind in a potentially smaller place with their stuff......)so they all came by yesterday to take a look, 5 adult size people(also a son and his girlfriend) and one kid, and we all trapsed around with me yapping away like I do, saying too much....and the house looked even good! Hey, I scrubbed the moss and dirt off the balcony rail, and sanded off the rust spots on the bottom of the front door, and even scraped off the moss growing on our front steps, not to mention the top of our trash can!!(shows you how damp its been here recently....moss everywhere!) And we straightened everything, and had all the windows open, and so forth. It was all very friendly, and the 20 year old girl really seemed to enjoy it, especially commenting on how neat it was that we had books everywhere......So, when they left, we had plans to go back and take another look at their house later that afternoon, but when we called, then they’d decided to not sell after all, but to try to keep their house. So, that was that, which is always a feeling of relief (“don’t have to think about that one anymore!”). And this week we’re going to take a look at a couple of more places, and then that’s that for now. So far we’ve looked at 24 places in the past year, most of them since this spring. I think we’re pooped!! (now if I could only take this kitchen and that living room and add them to those bedrooms and add a BIG garage....and put them all right here on Otrateigur.......). Actually there are all kinds of interesting things one sees when going into peoples’ homes to take a look.....and I often make the mistake of looking at all their stuff, esp. pictures and paintings, and forget that we’re there to look at the house....but those are vingnettes for later-lovers. So, stay tuned.....(as my brain fizzes into the scrambled ether......zzzzzzzzzz......(buenos noches mis amigos)