The last night of the vultures

My dear husband and I may not be the most eager skiers, but we are surely good at one thing - overall "gemütlichkeit". Sunday was spent mostly at the hotel, as my dear husband had caught a terrible cold, and I had some work that I needed to finish (cyber-commuting is awesome). But, to get the perfect end to a perfect mini-week, we crawled out of our Austrian nest for a rendez-vous at the local fondue place in the evening. After close to a week of long lunches followed by five-course gourmet dinners back at the hotel every night (with short guest performances at the aprés-ski in-between), you should think that we could handle a simple three-course on the last night. Yeah, right.

At the Montjola we were greeted by the "jättetjusiga Gunilla". Which is, of course, not her real name. Still, most attractive blonde Swedish girls happen to go by this name (as opposed to her not-quite-so-attractive friend "Ulla-Brit"). It was quite surprising to be served by Gunilla wearing the local Tyrolean dress at this quite modest establishment, as rumour has it that most of her fellow countrymen in St. Anton work at the Krazy Kangaruh, serving belly-button shots. So I guess this was the one respectable exception. Or, maybe I am just not able to tell the difference between a real "Gunilla" and an "Ulla-Brit", as the latter would most probably never get a job working at the Kangaruh.

Anyway. We started off with the Fondue Paysan. Veal, beef and chicken in oil. With fries. Then we followed up with a huge serving of the local cheese fondue. This was when we started to feel our limitations. But, as yours truly is known to have the will-power of a daffodil (only living thing I could think of without ANY at all), chocolate fondue soon followed.

It was a good thing the restaurant was up the hill, and our hotel was at the very bottom of the hill. So we went with gravity and almost rolled "home".

Although we have had a great time, it will be good to be back home. Without any of the "apfelstrudel" temptations lurking around.

And I will NOT miss the smell of the ski/boot depot. Oh. My. God.

Beware of the flying deer

Getting close to the end of March, the skiing conditions are not at their best, even above 2000 meters above sea-level. Snow is scarce, and the little that is left is artificially made during the night. Fortunately, there are other options. As soon as you have made it down the mountain through the so-called "Happy Valley", you are in "après ski" heaven. With each place catering to their very specific audience. As I am neither a fan of Austrian "ompa-ompa" (Sennhütte), nor watching "The Swedish Bikini Team" have body tequila shots off each other's boobs (Crazy Kangaruh), we have found our "home turf" at The Mooserwirt.

Take-off is at exactly 1530, to the sound of "The Final Countdown" (Europe). And - BOOM - you are on a different planet altogether. Suddenly it makes perfect sense to be downing a shot of the local specialty "Fliegende Hirsch". Followed by another. And another. And - before you know it - you are dancing on the table to some obscure Austrian song which mostly goes "lalalalalalala". Or something about polar bears ("Wir haben die Eisbären so gern"), or the truly annoying song about Anton (so schön/so toll/aus Tirol). While still enjoying this terrible concoction consisting of a mini-bottle of Jägermeister submerged in a glass of Red Bull. A typical proof of the mathematical rule that two minuses multiply into a plus, I guess. Because, separately, I hate both of them.

Another weird thing about this place is that it is perfectly ok to wear the pathetic souvenir t-shirt that you once thought was so hilariously funny, but NEVER wear. Like these, randomly selected from our very own household collection:

"Pimp" - Sydney 2000
"It does not suck itself" (with arrow pointing downwards) - Crete 2007
"Pornstar Professional" - London 1999
"Take me drunk I'm home" - Kos 1998
"Ten reasons why a beer is better than a woman" - Kos 1998

Oh well. I found some very wise words on the first page of the hotel wine list:

Bordeaux makes you think of silly things,
Burgundy makes you talk about them,
and Champagne makes you do them.
(Jean-Anthelme Brillat-Savarin)

Hm. It really says it all, doesn't it? Now I know why it made perfectly sense to buy that stupid hat resembling a cow's head. AND wearing it walking all the way down the Dorfstraße back to the hotel.


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Location:Arlbergstraße,Sankt Anton am Arlberg,Austria

Winterurlaub

My ski boots. Must be more than ten years old, but I hang on to them as they are the kind that adjust to your feet after a while, so they are kinda comfortable. To the extent that ski boots could ever be comfortable, that is. I just bought a new pair of skis, and there are matching boots available for those. So I am afraid these old faithfuls will not see the end of this skiing season.

Time to brush the dust off my German language skills again. Among the many stupid mistakes I have made in my life, studying German throughout business school must have been among the biggest ones. I truly suck at it. So, my dear husband, who also made the same stupid mistake back in business school, never misses a chance to make fun of my less than laudable oral German grade. Getting a grade 3 on a scale that goes all the way up to NINE is not my proudest achievement, no. Funny though, that I am the one speaking German to the locals here, while Mr. Incredible (who got a five) sticks to English. Could be the glühwein giving me the courage, I don't know.

I once heard that "you take your wife to St. Anton, and your mistress to St. Christoph". Yesterday Mr. Incredible took me to St. Christoph for lunch, so that must mean that I fall into both categories. I do believe this must surely be a good thing, right?

Austria is perhaps not known as the gourmet country of Europe (Mozartkugeln, anyone?), but it works for me. And there is nothing like getting some "knödel" every now and then. They also make amazing "schnitzel", not to be confused with this terrible frozen version served anywhere else in the world. Apparently the tuna season is on in the alps at the moment, as tuna seem to be included in any meal. And lobster. Apart from tasting delicious, as lobster always does, I have FINALLY found a word in German that is a "keeper". No more boring "lobster tail" here, from now on and in there will be "hummerscwhanz" all the way. Bitte sehr.

Location:Arlbergstraße,Sankt Anton am Arlberg,Austria

An anatomy lesson

Flew down to Zürich on Wednesday evening for our annual skiing trip to the alps. Although the flight from Oslo is just over two hours, it was a living nightmare. It all started during boarding. When I suddenly realized that we were in fact boarding the ego-flight to Switzerland, more specifically the first leg of a trip to Zermatt (oh-so-posh). It was just packed with finance people greeting each other in this obnoxious nasal manner that seem to follow getting a job in their line of business. A simple "hi" or a brief little "hello" does not do it for these guys. Ohno. It is all :"aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahloooooooooooooooooooooooo" and
"eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeihsaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaann" for two hours straight. LOUDLY. Followed by gin and tonics, enjoyed STANDING in the aisle of the plane.

Some of them where traveling in the company of their luuuuvly wives. Mostly blonde women wearing a lot of expensive jewelry. One of them had three - 3 - of the lovely Cartier bracelet that I have my eyes on. So, we are talking SERIOUS high maintenance here. For some reason these women just smile, they barely speak.

Just for the record. I am completely aware of the fact that being a blonde (although artificially, which may be even worse), and married to one of the guys in this business, I am sort of throwing diamonds in a glass house here. But we do not tend to be part of that "thing". So husband nodded back to the ones he knew, and introduced me to the guys that came over to talk. Funnily enough, the other wives were not introduced. Hm. Perhaps it was not the wife after all.

Anyway, enough about the ***holes. Let us get to another body part. If you have read about my previous mid-air ordeals, you know that I do have a strong opinion AGAINST people getting "too comfortable" on planes. Guess what, on this flight I hit the jackpot! Sitting in the first emergency row, I had the pleasure of having the only guy on the plane that would not need skis on his arrival sitting in the row behind me, with his feet in the open space to the left of me. He kept kicking into my extra serving table holding my extra mini-bottle of champagne. Jerk. Then, on the other side of the aisle, I got a guy with a serious thing for his feet. He took off his shoes to reveal his stinky socks as soon as we reached cruising altitude. Yuk. If that was not enough, he kept stroking and caressing his feet all the time. I suspect a serious case of fungus. Double-yuk.

I have never been more happy to feel the landing wheels touch ground.


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Location:Arlbergstraße,Sankt Anton am Arlberg,Austria

Barking up the right tree

Good news! Spring is in the air. And we are starting to see some ice-free sidewalks, at least in the city centre. I am still in boots, as our house is on the top of a small hill, perhaps the most ICY hill in all of Oslo, so I still need to wear SAFE shoes. Boring - yes, but now I have a glimpse of hope. Soon I will be able to dig into my shoe-wardrobe and wear PROPER shoes again. And, in time, maybe even SANDALS. At least after Easter?

There is nothing better than walking home in the sun after a fun day at work and then opening the mailbox downstairs to experience the most surreal of all. The receipt of A REAL POSTCARD. For YOU.

The mail we get mostly includes:

• Bills (almost too obvious)
• The monthly magazine from the Book Club(s), telling you which totally uninteresting book you should be careful and cancel within a far gone deadline.
• The book(s) you forgot to cancel from the Book Club(s) last month.

Receiving a postcard is a very welcome change from the above. Sometimes the postcards are from friends or family telling us about how awesome their previous trip to "xxxxxx" was. (Please feel free to fill in some "übercool" destination of your own choice). Most often, however, it is a very nice postcard from my mother (Dad of course says "Hi!" as well). This time she found the greatest card, just look!

This could have been our wedding photo, looks just like me and my "luuuvly" husband! People that know me well, are quite aware of the fact that I have always had this thing for cows. Cows just seem so kind and innocent. There are no mean cows. I do have a strong preference towards the black and white spotted ones, though. So, needless to say, this card really made my day. It is now waiting on the kitchen counter for Mr. Incredible to come home from work.

Inspired by this card I finally got the courage to sit down and write a card myself. Our upstairs neighbors have recently bought a dog. A dog that does not appreciate being left alone in their bedroom for hours. Something it expresses by barking. Continuously. Being not only a cattle person, but very much a dog person as well, this breaks my heart when I hear it. So I got this card for them (the creative one-dimensional sound effects have been added by yours truly). Sound wise, it does not bother me that the dog barks, I just turn on our tumble-dryer to drown out the noise. But the dog sounds pretty bothered.

I hope they leave the poor thing at home with the radio on or something from now on. Or - if necessary - with a dog-grade valium or three.

Monsieur Perignon strikes again

Ooops. Found these at the back of the closet this morning. My burgundy boots, from Marina Rinaldi. This color is now getting back in fashion. And as the boots also happen to be more than five years old, I guess they are on the verge of being VINTAGE. Which I guess is waaaay cool.

Got back from France again yesterday. We left Oslo and the whole "World Championshit" hysteria behind late Thursday night. Time for the official signing of the purchase contract for the house, or the "Compromis de Vente". French people do not play around with contracts. Ohno. So half of Friday was spent at a notary's office in a small village by the sea, being read the first version of the contract. In French. Including all the detailed clauses related to sewer, termites, lead and asbestos. I guess what we ourselves are more worried about, is the fact that our pool looks like shit on Google Earth. Anyway. To my big surprise, I actually understood quite a bit of what was read to me. Even though my French is level with that of a local two-year-old. Hm. Hopefully the kid would not be quite as eloquent in the field of "boissons alcoolisée" as yours truly.

This is what it looks like when the snow stays where it is supposed to be. 

Up in the mountains. A truly fantastic sight.

We got to visit the house again after the contract was signed, and we were happy to see that it exceeded our memories from the first visit. It is always very strange going back to see a place again a second time. Most often everything looks smaller, but this was not the case. And the bathrooms looked better than we remembered. "Monsieur Incroyable" even got to try out the facilities, so to say. A bit short-sighted when you are visiting a house that has not been lived in for eight months. So, now he knows how to turn the water supply back on.

Another fabulous dinner at our regular in Cannes, Astoux. Giant "crevettes" and the best sole you can think of. Paired with a nice Mersault. After which our old friend Monsieur Perignon decided to pay a surprise visit to join in the celebration of the big property transaction. Must have been fun.

Some mornings you simply do the world a favor by wearing sunglasses. On such days it is a good idea to leave your rental car safely parked, and instead take the opportunity to explore the local public transportation. Like, for instance, the train from Cannes to Nice. Very convenient. And when you bring a bottle of diet coke and get to hold the hand of the one you love, it is almost bearable. I even picked up another important French phrase. When it says on the train ticket that you should "composter" your ticket "avant" something, it does not mean that the French are so extremely eco-friendly they kindly ask you to COMPOST your ticket AFTER it has been used. Nope. Now you are warned.

 

These next few weeks, waiting for the house to finally be ours, are going to be VERY long. The contrast between heaven (left) and hell (right) is just too obvious these days.