Notre Petite Maison

My brand new beige peep-toe espadrilles from Enzo Poli. Could not decide on which color to get, so I got them in black, too. Perfect summer shoes, and the wedge heel makes them wearable throughout a long day. Only drawback is that they make me taller than Mr. Incredible.

Spent all Sunday doing nothing but lounging by the pool on the roof terrace of our hotel. Ouch, sunburn! My last night in a French hotel in a while, I guess, as we - as of today - are the insanely happy owners of a villa 10 kilometers north-west of Cannes. My usual "yay!" does not quite cover this. I hear that people say that the greatest moment of their life was when they had a baby. Well, I wouldn't know, would I. So I guess I would have to say that owning (well, technically, there IS a bank involved, too) a house in Southern France also feels pretty awesome. It is somewhere up there on the top of my list together with marrying Mr. Incredible seven years ago. In case you were wondering.

Met up with the French real-estate agent this morning, at the house. The owner then explained to us all the technicalities of the house. Like the heating, which I did not think we would need to know much about, but it turns out that this is also the source of hot water. And it might be that we would want to take a shower at one stage.

I was also introduced to our gardener / pool boy. I hate to disappoint you, but real life is nothing like you see in the movies. Ours will hereby go by the name of "Quasimodo", although that is not his real name. But I guess you get the picture. And he does not wear tiny bathing shorts. He wears tired old soccer shirts. Today he was Figo. The most frightening thing about him, though, is perhaps that he does not speak a word of English. Or Norwegian. So, I have a very good reason to start taking my French lessons very seriously again.

Long flight home now. With Luftwaffe via Frankfurt. Our travel habits seem to be changing from now on. The normal thing for us is leaving home with two pieces of luggage. And returning home with five-ish. Now we arrived in France with five pieces, returning to Norway with two pieces. Being two EMPTY suitcases. Weird.

Still, it feels ok to have a second toothbrush permanently stored in a different country.

Yay.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Location:Ankunftbogen,Frankfurt,Germany

Gonflable

My last pair of Stuart Weitzman shoes. And, the first really expensive pair of shoes I bought. For a wedding in June 2000. Good party shoes, not so good walking shoes. As my feet were still a bit swollen after Friday's flight, they were good for the walk from the hotel over to Astoux for another seafood massacre. But as the wine drained my body of water, they kept falling off on our way back. So, I ended up walking down the Croisette barefoot last night. Very hippie-chic, I guess.

Today we spent all day shopping for stuff for the house. Unbelievably enough, we managed to get through this without any major discussions. Mr. Incredible hates shopping, but when shopping for things we actually need, he somehow manages to stay calm. I, on the other hand, has been known to love shopping. But not really for stuff we truly need. I worked hard not to fall into the optimization-trap, where I need to evaluate every single item I buy thoroughly to make sure everything I buy is perfect. No time for that with a ticking bomb husband in tow. You know perfectly well that he will only last for a limited number of hours before he has had enough. And then the shopping spree is over. Period.

In five hours we managed to purchase: a washer, a dryer, a Nespresso machine, a regular coffee maker, two hairdryers, an electrical toothbrush, an iron, a vacuum cleaner (nothing sucks like Electrolux), a refrigerator, a wine cabinet (important), a tool box, a hammer, a Weber gas barbecue, a barbecue cleaning brush, barbecue cleaning spray, an apron, a set of barbecue tools, a barbecue cover, an electrical screwdriver thingy, bits for that one, a wrench, pliers, a water (is that the actual word?), a measuring band, four sun beds, two small tables for the sun beds, two sun umbrellas, covers for those, an outdoor dining table, ten outside dining chairs (with armrest = optimal), a Fatboy buggle-up for lounging in the garden or in front of the TV, an inflatable extra bed (since the beds I have ordered do not arrive until the end of the month), and very importantly, an electrical pump for my inflatable toys.

Now, that last item I think I should elaborate on, as I know that certain in-duh-viduals will surely - ON PURPOSE - misunderstand what sort of inflatable "toys" we are talking about. Yes, I know you are out there.

The people that have been on vacation with yours truly before will, however, know that I love these huge silly inflatable toys that you can float around on in your pool. Precisely. The bigger, and more silly, the better. The last few years I have preferred this huge island with a palm-tree on it. Not easy to float around on, but looks amazing. The drawback with these toys is that it takes some breath to inflate one of them. Now, however, we do not need to take that issue into account when purchasing new ones.

The sky will now be the limit. Or, rather, the size of the pool.

Location:Rue Frédéric Amouretti,Cannes,France

Paper, rock, scissors

My second pair of Minnetonka moccasins. Soft suede shoes was perhaps not the best choice in rainy Oslo this morning, but there was a plan behind it. I saved these specially for today, as they make really good driving shoes. And - we were at one stage worried that today would be the day that we had to take to the road. And DRIVE down to France for the weekend. The volcano ashes floating around Europe earlier this week had us scared for a moment there. So, when we got stuck in traffic out of Oslo this afternoon, we just laughed. As we could easily have been stuck in traffic outside Copenhagen by that time. Knowing that we had 21 more hours to go.

A day of great achievements. Finally took the second car to the garage and had the tyres changed for the summer. Then, I had to go to the police station to pick up copies of our non-existing criminal records. Having a thing for (certain types of) uniforms, this was, of course, a highlight of the day. I do not know what it is, but certain types of uniforms can make someone that - in reality - looks like S. H. I. T. look quite hot. It does not work with all kinds of uniforms, though. Airline purser? No, thanks. Pilot? Ok, maybe.

Lost my concentration there for a bit. Ok. Next on my agenda was dropping the police documents off at the child welfare centre. Their report recommending us as adoptive parents was completed this week. And the papers from the police was the only piece missing. The process took us about six months. Which I guess is not too bad. Not particularly fast, but not very slow either. We have heard of worse.

Our application will be forwarded to the main adoption authority in Norway on Monday. Which hopefully will end up with a "yes". I do not think I could handle anything else, to be honest. But I do not dare taking anything for granted.

So, big day for us today! And that was even before I got to work. Where I struggled with an update all day, finishing the upload two minutes before Mr. Incredible came to pick me up. I still feel like I have a small knot in my stomach as things went a bit fast there in the end. Well, I will be back to fix any discrepancies next week, anyway.

Now I am enjoying the great people-watching in the business lounge at Oslo Airport. Or, perhaps even more, listening in on all the VERY LOUD phone conversations around. We just lost one of the better ones, a guy that was flying to HOOOONG! KOOOONG! On business. And he was calling everyone in his phone book to keep them updated. As if they would be interested. Well, he is off now. In case you wondered. To Hong Kong, I think it was.

Was a bit bummed out that there were no hotdogs being served in the lounge today. But for once they served bubbly wine. Which I could only take a small sip of, as I will be the one picking up our rental car tonight. Bummer.

I know, I should have followed the advice I got during lunch today. Having two glasses of wine BEFORE being picked up today would easily have eliminated the possibility of me driving at all tonight. Instead, I ended up loosing a stupid game in the car.

Superwoman

My "I-wish-I-was-young-(or-at-least-born)-during-the-1930s" shoes. From Bianco. Fits well with the current retro trend following "Mad Men" and "Boardwalk Empire". But they are actually quite old. I think I bought them during the previous round of retro-glam, following the release of the movie "Chicago". In 2002. For some reason I haven't used them that much, but for heels they are not too bad. Although I must admit that I brought back-up shoes for today. Just in case these got painful.

Things have been kind of crazy since I got back from New York last Wednesday. Funny thing, apparently I am not supposed to take time off from work, because what happens is that I have to put in TWICE the hours that I take off - before I leave. And then the same amount of hours after I get back. How can that be? I guess the true answer to that question is that having fun motivates me. Work hard, play hard.

Still, the result is that I now feel like a dish-rag. A very tired dish-rag. That some dog has been chewing on for a good while. All day I have been looking forward to getting back into bed, and sleeeeep. In fact, I really feel like hiding under a blanket. And maybe cry a little. I know it is just stress. Because, really, I have nothing to be sad about. At around 9 PM tomorrow night I will be somewhere in the air above Germany, sipping a glass of champagne. Yay. On my way to France to close the transaction on the house. Finally!

But before that - I should really build some automatic reclassifications of intercompany transactions for a client. How terribly exciting.

I put a spell on you

Comfy flat working shoes from Rizzo (again!). They were almost ruined this morning, when I decided they needed a little polish before work. I managed to mistake our "quick polish" sponge in a plastic box with CROCS BUTTER. Yup. The yucky grease that you perhaps did not know existed, but which is a must if you want to keep your Crocs in shape. Does NOT look too great on leather shoes. Trust me.

What a morning! It did not end with the Crocs-butter episode, ohno. I do not know what it is. Whether things like these also happen to other people, or whether this is all just me. Me - the walking disaster area.

On my way to the tram stop, I happened to look down. Just to discover that my blouse had very conveniently unbuttoned itself. In a very strategic area. Leaving approximately 50% of my décolletage on display. Just terrific! I closed the button, only to discover that it had slid open again as I was leaving the tram. Being in a hurry - and on my way out  to see a client - the issue at hand had to be fixed. Immedately. I instantly thought of "The Larry-bag"*. The bag I in a moment of desillusion decided to leave at the office a couple of weeks ago. To celebrate the fact that I finally have an office again. Or at least a designated desk that I share with the rest of my team. Accompanied by My Very Own Locker (it even has a lock and a key!). Which was depressingly empty. And screaming to be filled with SOMETHING. So I left my precious Larry-bag in there. Very stupid decision, yes. I see that now.

Ok. What now. No time to run into the office to fetch my emergency kit. So I entered the nearest pharmacy. Hoping that they would have something, anything that I could use to keep my stupid blouse shut. I was even willing to go for TAPE at this stage. As you know, tape - or more specifically DUCT tape - will fix ANY problem, just look at MacGyver. Fortunately, the pharmacy sold safety pins. So I did not have to walk around with sports tape covering my front all day. Genious!

So. I enter our client's office. Very careful not to upset the misbehaving button again. I did not even dare stopping by my client's desk. I just popped my head in - very quickly - saying "Hi" and "Can I use Roberto's office today?". Which turned out to be a very wise decision. Because, just as I entered the above mentioned office, I hear a sound.

"Pop."
The sound of a button. Coming loose.
Then...
"Click. Click-click-click."
A loose button falling to the floor. And then bouncing away.

No. This is NOT happening! I dropped all my things, and started searching for the stupid button. Which was nowhere to be seen. A consultant crawling around the floor looking for a button does not look very professional. So I soon had to give up the search. Safety pins really are a great invention, though.

My 12 safety pins got me safely through the day at the client's office. Our office meeting in the afternoon (at which time I carefully picked up the Larry-bag and put it safely back in my back-pack again). Dinner with my sister. And FINALLY. The highlight of today. Rocking with a 65-year-old. Bryan Ferry.

By the way, do you think Lady Gaga will still be touring, selling out her concerts, when she turns 65? Just wondering.

* http://dayinshoes.blogspot.com/2010/12/larry-bag.html

The King of Smalltalk

Shoes from Rizzo again. Swedish brand that has a flagship in my neighborhood. We are talking SAME BLOCK. Located less than 100 meters away from my bedroom. That close. It has been brought to my attention on several occasions that WHITE SHOES are a big no-no. I do not really care. I like white shoes in the summer. Today, however, I guess I went a bit over-the-top as I wore them with a skirt, a white shirt AND my NYC Women's Yacht Club "blazer". "Heeeeel-loooooo?" I should know better than dressing like the queen of preppy for a full day session of training close to where I grew up. Really, I do. If you dress like a presumed a-hole, you will most certainly be treated like one. Nobody, I mean NOBODY, talked to me during lunch. I guess I did not look that approachable. Even though I wore my "approachable" glasses today. The pair without frames. Will definitely go for jeans tomorrow.

Stopped by the local grocery store to pick up some lunch on my way in this morning, as the variety of "no-carb" food at the client cafeteria is pretty limited. Unless, of course, I would dare go for the buffet with the fillings for everybody else's sandwiches. Which would not be a polite thing to do, being sort-of a guest at this place.

It is always nice walking into our local grocery store. It is now run by a guy I went to school with. Who now looks exactly like his father did when we grew up. AND - he has - after being brought up to be "The perfect shop-keeper", attained some skills that I truly envy. He can talk. To ANYONE. About ANYTHING. I do not know how he does it, but it surely is a special talent. That runs in this guy's family. Strangely enough, this guy was quite shy in school. (But then again, so was I. I guess you grow out of some things.)

Mostly, I appreciate this smalltalk. It is nice coming into the shop and being asked how you are doing (not in the "American way", where they do not really expect/want an answer). But, sometimes, sometimes it gets a bit too much.

There are a few things I have learnt from (years of) experience - NEVER to purchase in this particular store. As you do not always need conversations like:

- TKOST: "Oh. Buying sugar and yeast? Gong home to bake bread, are we?"

- Customer (not me!): "Eh, NO. We are actually setting up a batch of MOONSHINE."

- TKOST: "Ohohohohoh! Condoms, ey?"
- Customer (SO not me!): "Pssst. We are going to fill them with cocaine, swallow them and smuggle it to Honduras."

 - TKOST: "Aaaah. Buying sanitary napkins! That time of month again, is it?"
- Customer (me!): "!?"

In retrospect, I see that I should have used the CLASSIC phrase from Monty Python / "The Meaning of Life" / The restaurant scene, where one of the female restaurant guests exclaim:
"Gotta dash. You see I am having a raaaaather heavy period. Bleeeeeding all over myself!"*

I never tend to handle awkward situations like these right. I always do come up with the PERFECT reply. About SIX MONTHS later.

* http://youtu.be/BlK62rjQWLk (around 3:08)

On the road again

My Adidas ballerina shoes. Bought during Easter 2008. The year that Mr. Incredible fractured his ancle and we could not visit the "cabin-in-law". Took the ferry to Kiel. Shoe shopping (my record - six pairs in ONE shop), beer and pizza. Before we took the ferry back. Often referred to as a "cruise" to Germany, but - no. It is a ferry, only - with a spa. Back to the shoes. Not on the top of my list. Very comfortable, although they are part of a strange range that Adidas refer to as H.F.F. Or handbags (!) for feet. Really? I looove handbags, but I could never imagine wearing them as shoes, no. Does not make sense. I wish these shoes did not have the white idiot plastic toe. If they had kept the whole shoe in that cute black fabric they would have gone up at least forty places on my shoe ranking (still well below the hundreds, but hey).

Staying with my parents for a few days. Drove up this evening, as I have two more training classes left with the client from last week. Starting tomorrow. Which means that I have spent most of today, and a lot of this evening (so far) working on a monster spreadsheet to get it in shape for tomorrow morning.

And - OF COURSE - I forgot thar this particular client does maintenance on their IT network on Sundays. So, I am working in an offline spreadsheet, with heavy links to Hyperion. A bit like working in the dark. Or without glasses. Or something.

Hopefully everything will be up again early tomorrow. As I will be. Need to test this properly before the class starts at ten. So have my alarm set at 5.30. AM. Yikes.

What a life.