tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-96081182008-06-21T12:56:47.765ZJBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12108948350959912207noreply@blogger.comBlogger407125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9608118.post-81828821144291043942007-08-22T18:39:00.000Z2007-08-22T18:46:18.818Z

A good friend of mine, a guy always full of jokes, witticisms, commentary, and wacky ideas, was undergoing cancer treatment last year before Christmas. About that time he suggested jokingly that I organize a one-man "cancer walk" for him, then send him half the proceeds I collected and keep the other half for myself. I decided to take the idea seriously and so I sent him a map of the route I

JBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12108948350959912207noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9608118.post-50360887945372488972007-07-20T00:37:00.000Z2007-07-20T00:48:07.872Z

It's 12:30 a.m. and a week ago at this time it was still post-sunset and light outside and there were some girls eating pizza below my balcony at the rotary, big white cardboard Dominos boxes spread out on some rocks. But tonight it's pretty dim at the same time, and after months of nothing but light here it's a little shocking and a relief all at the same time. It won't be until next month that

JBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12108948350959912207noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9608118.post-69713443708732245372007-05-23T09:23:00.000Z2007-05-23T09:25:20.362Z

Many mornings on my way to work, walking down the final cobblestoned hill to Ingólfstorg (the path that freezes over into a kind of ice-slide in the winter), I hear a brass player working his way up and down the scales, major and minor. It's usually very quiet in that area of town, and the smooth brassy tone carries its way on the wind, working a half-block radius among the corrugated-steel

JBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12108948350959912207noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9608118.post-40902564154757657022007-05-21T10:19:00.001Z2007-05-21T10:19:59.378Z

This morning both Esja and Akrafjall were powdered with snow. And now outside it is alternating between sunshine, flurries, and serious "wintry mix" type stuff, the kind of thing guaranteed to cause miles of backup on Route 128. But here people are just going about their business. After such a beautiful, sunny few days this weekend, a little May snowshower can't really get us down. The downtown

JBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12108948350959912207noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9608118.post-41842881445576317322007-05-18T11:51:00.000Z2007-05-18T11:52:47.374Z

The flipside of the "little Fridays" phenomenon is that of little Mondays. Yesterday was the last in this year's crop of obscure midweek Icelandic spring holidays (Uppstingingardagur, or Ascension Day: Áfram Kristur!) so Wednesday was a little Friday par excellence, with its full complement of nighttime mania downtown. And today feels like a little Monday, the beginning of a tiny one-day work

JBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12108948350959912207noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9608118.post-1124626340413939142007-05-16T06:45:00.000Z2007-05-16T08:07:04.478Z

This one has been sitting in my "future post ideas" box forever, back from the early days of the Iceland Report. And I guess its time has come. So the gist is, what if America's and Iceland's positions in the world were reversed? What would be some of the implications of that? Tourists from Iceland expecting Americans to speak fluent Icelandic, Americans having been raised on a steady diet of

JBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12108948350959912207noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9608118.post-81372460850685722282007-05-15T09:54:00.000Z2007-05-16T06:27:52.757Z

Last night was the opening game for KR, my local soccer team in the Icelandic premier league (Landsbankadeildin). The opponent was red-shirted Keflavík, those airport-service mofoes from Reykjanes. They may know about changing a tire on a 757, but they don't know too much about kicking a soccer ball. By comparison, my local team is the most hated (and historically the most skilled) in Icelandic

JBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12108948350959912207noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9608118.post-83418219499986661272007-05-09T10:03:00.000Z2007-05-09T10:04:10.913Z

My sister-in-law sent me a book as a birthday gift from Amazon. When it arrived the mailman wanted me to pay VAT on it. I told him I didn't know what it was and I hadn't ordered anything. I told him it was probably a gift. Sure enough, it was marked "gift" on the customs form. He told me I must have ordered it. So I opened it in front of him and took out the invoice. It was marked clearly with a

JBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12108948350959912207noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9608118.post-89935070955783599702007-05-08T08:14:00.000Z2007-05-08T08:21:53.865Z

Icelanders can't wait in line. It sounds like a vicious stereotype, I know. And really most of them probably can quite well. To my knowledge, deCODE hasn't found any gene in the mixed Nordic-Celtic pool that explicitly makes orderly line-standing impossible. But there is still something subtly Mendelian going on: if there's a sleazy way around a line, many an Icelander will try to finesse his way

JBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12108948350959912207noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9608118.post-68917443432067132092007-05-07T13:37:00.000Z2007-05-07T13:55:42.757Z

So, my last work and residence permit ran out on April 30th. I applied for the latest one-year extension two months ago, but the opaque and impenetrable one-two punch of Útlendingastofnun-Vinnumálastofnun still hasn't issued an extension or indeed any acknowledgement of receipt of the application. And there's not much I can do besides hassle my HR department to in turn hassle the weary workers at

JBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12108948350959912207noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9608118.post-48312935753944040552007-05-06T19:21:00.000Z2007-05-06T19:23:50.215Z

I am still not entirely sure what it is about the Land, but once it got under my skin (something that took all of a half hour on a sunny spring afternoon five years ago), I couldn't keep myself from going back. I went to Iceland as a tourist three times in 2002, and by the end of yet another trip in 2003 I had a tentative job offer. I moved "over the stones" at the beginning of autumn 2004. I

JBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12108948350959912207noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9608118.post-55027717351524869282007-04-30T10:03:00.000Z2007-04-30T14:01:48.432Z

The Icelandic spring calendar is a smattering of holidays. You have the five-day Easter smackdown, yes, but then a whole sprinkling of one-offs besides: Sumardagurinn fyrsti (the first day of summer, a Thursday in mid-April), Verkalýðsdagurinn (Labor Day), Uppstingingardagur (Ascension Day), Annar í hvítasunnu (the Monday after Whitsun), and Lýðveldisdagurinn (better known as 17. júní, the Day of

JBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12108948350959912207noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9608118.post-17298952870765824112007-04-25T08:09:00.000Z2007-04-25T08:14:29.315Z

For a whole pack of reasons relating to my new joerb, my swimming routine has moved from after work to before work. And it's a whole new world out there. On my first 6:30 a.m. trip out to the pool at Laugardalur, just past the predawn "roll 'em out boys" unveiling of the yellow Strætó buses from their big, sad bus yard, I pulled into the parking lot to find a whole new crowd of old men, too. They

JBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12108948350959912207noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9608118.post-19317972782414979172007-04-20T16:39:00.001Z2007-04-20T16:41:26.828Z

...if you're still there, that is. Well, here it is: the Peeps are demanding a continuation to the IR, but I find myself at a crossroads. Much of what I thought was fresh and new when I came to Iceland has now become just part of my daily life here. So the perspective of the outsider has shifted as I've become more and more an insider. Things that used to strike me as 100% Wacko-Jacko (like

JBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12108948350959912207noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9608118.post-79935014677831878332007-03-11T19:42:00.000Z2007-03-16T13:15:28.286Z

I came home today from a trip to the country to find a giant pump truck parked in the entrance to the apartment garage, pumping water with the high-pitched whine of an accident scene. Apparently while I was away the big storm-water pumping station down the road had a computer malfunction and, well, the storm runoff flooded our parking garage with around 2,000 tons of water. They were towing the

JBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12108948350959912207noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9608118.post-30378245552035818792007-02-25T20:37:00.000Z2007-02-25T20:41:16.761Z

My new job has completely changed my view on the neighborhood in which I live. Since I now walk through the ole 'hood every day on the way to and from work, I feel much more in touch with the place, its people, and its legions of school kids trekking stoically down the icy sidewalks in the pre-dawn hours. Here are some of the great things about Vesturbær, the West End of Reykjavík. Pétursbúð

JBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12108948350959912207noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9608118.post-75173576057893953372007-02-10T20:00:00.000Z2007-02-11T19:10:58.373Z

I'm staying the Saturday overnight in a little cluster of summerhouses, owned by my employer. It's a little ways out of town, far enough so that no city lights interfere with the stars. Just now when I went to the car to get a pen, the size and brilliance of Orion in the southern sky was almost shocking. I can't imagine how a good hit of the norðurljós must look from out here. It's cold outside

JBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12108948350959912207noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9608118.post-77981129122014681142007-02-02T08:13:00.000Z2007-02-11T23:14:02.610Z

Walking down the hill to work this morning a beat-down-looking character in a hoodie, drinking something from a Coke bottle and holding a lit cigarette, flagged me down. Even though it was nearly 8 a.m., it was still pitch-black. So, not the walk-to-work scenario you're probably picturing. I decided friendly but fast-walking was the best option, and he struggled to keep up with me, as he told me

JBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12108948350959912207noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9608118.post-30911615578623193802007-01-29T21:05:00.000Z2007-01-29T21:15:28.676Z

I met with NPR's Eric Weiner again on Friday after work, for a followup interview on happiness in the Land. He's not doing a radio bit on this, but he is coming out with a book on the happiest countries (and he wants you to buy it!). The second conversation I had with him was much better as he seemed to have settled in to the laid-back ways of Reykjavík after some more days here. The

JBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12108948350959912207noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9608118.post-4232197814339912612007-01-20T20:17:00.000Z2007-01-20T20:18:42.224Z

Gleðilegt nýtt ár! Happy 2007, and a belated one at that. Sometimes, as I learned this past month, the muses just stop singing for a little while. Indeed in the deep dark of an Icelandic winter, it can feel like I haven't really been fully awake for weeks. This year I feel like I've been dozing at least as far back to when my American readers were celebrating Thanksgiving. It's been a long, dark

JBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12108948350959912207noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9608118.post-43336009197406168762006-12-12T11:57:00.000Z2006-12-12T12:01:38.178Z

It's just a shade before noon and out my office window I see the first direct evidence that there is, indeed, still a sun. It's lighting up the clouds over the mountain range to the southwest and casting a wan light over the smattering of snow and brown grass below and the Lego-block rooftops of Garðabær beyond. Iceland in December is surely not for everyone, but the beauty is all still there if

JBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12108948350959912207noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9608118.post-40517782957558385912006-12-08T14:39:00.000Z2006-12-08T14:40:11.628Z

I got an invitation last Wednesday, the 29th, to a big-time Christmas feast put on by my future employer. I was very excited, as it would be a good chance to meet all the peeps at the new job. Plus it would be plates and plates of smoked puffin, and who doesn't like that? Not to mention the likely probability of free wine, which is a bit like a handout of gold bars here in the Land. So, the

JBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12108948350959912207noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9608118.post-68846630200188804552006-12-08T09:47:00.000Z2006-12-08T09:48:59.489Z

María wins the fish platter this year! Til hamingju, María!

JBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12108948350959912207noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9608118.post-42044903513191861802006-12-01T11:19:00.000Z2006-12-08T10:01:37.000Z

Today I'm taking my car to the KEF Carwash. It is, I believe, unique in the world: a multi-day car wash and wind treatment. You choose the time span: the longer the wash, the more you pay. While you wait for your car to get cleaned, you have the option of several places to travel. So while trusty old RZ is getting blasted by the wind and rain of southwest Iceland, I'll be living out my childhood

JBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12108948350959912207noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9608118.post-19786460053218896802006-12-01T00:06:00.000Z2006-12-01T00:09:11.075Z

Longtime readers know a little something about the colorful characters who frequent Laugardalslaug. Well, today I saw for the second time a fine new addition to the forthcoming Regulars of Laugardalslaug Trading Card pack: the groaning lady. The groaning lady looks rather normal, or maybe even slightly attractive in a timeless somewhere-between-39-and-65 kind of way. Her modus operandi is to sit

JBhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12108948350959912207noreply@blogger.com