The worm turns

I remember Mom you are always looking for a chance to say, 'The worm turns'.

Here is my story about the election. Last summer I got a sunburn and laid down on my left side and was able to rest for about two years I mean hours and then I got up and turned to the right side, but I was still unhappy.

Fall vacation

Anders and Fredrik have fall vacation this week. Along with Karin they took the train up to Vallentuna on Monday, and I went to Odense Denmark to be the external reviewer for an exam in Environmental Chemistry. There were 18 students in the class and we gave them each a 30 minute exam - 9 hours of work, a long day. I got up at 4 to make the 3 hour train trip from Lund. They got me a hotel room Monday night in Odense and then Tuesday morning I took the train back to Copenhagen and worked another long day and got back home to Lund late Tuesday night. Wednesday morning I took the train up to Vallentuna and am here now with my family, visiting Margit. We just got back from a walk to the church where Karin put flowers on her father's grave. Its a beautiful fall day today - blue skies, sun on the lake, and there are lots of birds around - a woodpecker, many pheasants, birch thrushes. Tomorrow (Friday) we will take the train back down to Lund and Saturday I will pick up our new (used) car. Lots of travel.

Happy Birthday Anders!

Thanks for the National Geographic Kids subscription, Grandma! Anders is always excited when it arrives - great animal pictures and stories. He is getting better at reading - and reading English - all the time.


Something came over me and I made this fox out of carrot sticks and shredded carrots, with M&Ms for eyes. Its not as nice as the birthday cake Karin made in the shape of a fruit tree, but I did make it myself.


Here is big brother Fredrik - he's been playing with Anders today, helping him with a Pokemon game and building some things out of legos.


Here is the birthday boy - Anders - Seven years old! - when he first got back from his swimming lesson this morning. They swam through an underwater hoop today.

New Car

I went to a used car dealer yesterday and arranged to buy this 2003 Ford Mondeo wagon. We'll trade in our 1997 Ford Mondeo wagon which had too much rust. It seems like a good car to me but I'd like to talk with Dad about it. That was always fun. I'll go pick it up next Saturday - they are going to mount winter tires and have it inspected.

Halloween

We carved pumpkins and sugar beets this afternoon. Carving sugar beets is an old tradition in Sweden - and when you put a candle inside they smell like roasting sugar.


Anders wanted to carve 'a pumpkin in a pumpkin' and this is the result.

I spent three days this past week at an EU meeting in Valencia Spain, on the Mediteranean coast. Did not get to see so much more than the hotel - full of Japanese tourists - and the laboratory where the meeting was held - the 'European Photoreactor'. It was a good meeting and I got to see my good old friend Professor Claus Nielsen from Oslo. We ate like the Spanish - lunch at 3 in the afternoon and dinner around 11 PM. We flew through Charles de Gaulle airport outside of Paris and I was worried that the French labor strikes might affect our travel. The flights were fine, but they lost my bag on the way there so I wore the same clothes a second day until the bag returned.

Went for a nice bike ride yesterday, past an abandoned country church to a manor in the countryside. Had a nice view of the other side of the valley where there is a factory turning sugar beets into sugar. Saw a family of swans, two deer, a few hares and rabbits, and a lot of storks following a tractor harvesting sugar beets. Returned from the ride with beets from the ditch for us to carve.

Pumpkin!

Hi yesterday we dropped Fredrik off for a scout overnight. On the way back we passed a farmyard where they were selling pumpkins and picked up this prize:

Anders went to swim class this morning and came back happy.

Pictures

Here's the view from up top of the hill, looking across the water towards Denmark:


Fredrik is taking guitar lessons and is getting better all the time.