Am currently trying to do all of this before very late tonight:

* Finish a revised version of the manuscript of The Paper From Hell (the one I've been whining about from time to time) and send it off to my Dutch colleagues so they can do their bit while I'm in France and we can submit it to another journal once I'm back (and before the Dutch guys go on their nice long summer vacations, the bastards).

* Pack up my office since it's going to be moved while I'm away. (I suppose I ought to be grateful I don't have to do the carrying myself, but it's hard enough even without that.)

* Pack up for the trip.

* Watch the last episode of Angel, season 4, so I can return all four season boxes to their rightful owner (myntti) in Tampere tomorrow. (I'm taking a train to Helsinki via Tampere and meeting a whole bunch of bookcrossers there while I'm at it.)

I hate the revising too, but all the packing is almost worse. I'm doing my darndest to manage this trip to France with hand baggage only, because it's a short trip and the airport in Paris (which I have to go through both ways) is notorious for sending baggage in any old direction or just plain losing it. But that means having real fun staying within the limits for liquids that you can take in the cabin, and leaving my Victorinox pocket knife behind. I'm probably slightly neurotic, but just the thought of several days without any sort of nail scissors around is putting me on edge, so to speak.

Oh, and Grandpa is fairly ok, he's out of the hospital but currently in a care facility since he definitely can't manage it at home for the time being. The back hurts a lot (only to be expected), so strongish pain meds, and he's pretty tired. I go see him every day, twice if I can manage it, but I'm going to be away for a week now of course - fortunately, Aunt P is in town.

Right, back to work...

I haven't seen him yet (will do that tomorrow morning), but Aunt P the practising doctor of the family has talked with the hospital and shortly with Grandpa too, and apparently the back operation went well. *phew*

Now on to hoping that recovery will go smoothly and his walking and so on will get better.

( And on a more personal note )

Not crazy about the artwork (no one really looks like themselves), but otherwise, LOL.

(That's it - it's pretty short. Also, although it says Page 2, that's the first page of this little comic.)

Dear members of the male population out there;

I don't care if it's a hot day and you consider the sight of your tanned upper body God's gift to (wo)mankind, still kindly follow these simple guidelines while, e.g., shopping downtown:

#1 Wear a shirt.
#2 Go easy on the aftershave.
#3 Keep your friggin' distance while standing in the line to the cash register.

Thank you.

(The offender today was neither young nor gorgeous, but that's actually neither here nor there. The beach is one thing, grocery stores are another.)

Grandpa is going to have his back operated tomorrow.

I'm fairly nervous and worried, as it's a big operation not normally done on people as old as he is (90), not nearly. Even if everything goes perfectly, he'll be a long time recovering - could easily be months before he gets to come home again.

On the plus side, if everything goes well (including recovery), his walking and so on will get a whole lot better.

Sigh. Here's hoping.

I took him fresh strawberries this morning and will spend the evening at his house. I keep telling myself not to think so negatively, but it could easily be the last time we ever spend time together at home. I really hope not.

When editing a document, let's try and learn to save it every once in a while, eh, shan't we?

I feel pretty heartless, but my reaction to the news of Michael Jackson's demise was pretty much "Oh," then, "Could we now get into what else is in the news today, already?" Yeah, early death, very sad for the family and friends of course (not disputing that), but otherwise: whatever. Really.

As far as I'm concerned, the world (and even the world of pop music) would be fine off with Madonna dropping dead tomorrow, too. I've never been able to see the appeal of these so-called icons or royal highnesses of pop music - their music may sell well but is, pardon me, totally uninteresting.

</venting><trying to work>

I guess this isn't funny if you're, say, a worried wallaby parent, but LOL XD!

(Read the comment section, too.)

Everybody else probably already knew this, but let's share anyway:

Got a smallish stain on a festive clothing item and no time to take it to a dry cleaner's before you need to wear it?

You need:

* hand-washing dish detergent (wash-up liquid)*
* some tissue paper
* a clothes brush

Remove physically (without harming the fabric!) as much of the stain as you can, using a brush, a very sharp knife (for careful scratching), or whatever works.

Mix a liberal amount of detergent with some water, then whip up a good foam. (You don't need a lot.)

Dose a small spoonful of the foam (no water!) on top of the stain. Let be for a moment (and I mean a short time - seconds, not minutes), then wipe most of the foam away with tissue paper, and brush off the rest. Repeat once or twice if necessary. Let dry.

I doubt this will satisfactorily remove a tomato stain from a white dress, but it works pretty well for dark-colored clothes.

In other news, yesterday in a second-hand bookshop I found a first edition of one of my favorite youth novels out there (from 1979). All I've seen before is battered ex-library copies of later editions (or the recent omnibus edition), so this almost brought tears in my eyes. Only cost me one euro, too!

*Do not try this with a detergent intended for dishwasher machines unless you want to risk a hole in the fabric or something.

Trying to fend off a Babylon 5 nostalgia attack here for two reasons:

* I need to work.

* When I'm done watching Buffy through for the second time and Angel for the first, I'm kind of hoping to find something healthier to do for 1/24 of my each and every day than sitting around watching TV shows. I could, say, exercise. Or sleep.

(I can't afford buying the DVD boxes. Nobody please offer me theirs on a loan.)

(I don't habitually burst into tears just reading the summary of Sleeping in Light, oh no I don't...)

I'm traveling to France for my little nephew's baptism (my sister is cooking up quite a party) for the second weekend in July. Since there's not much hope of friends or relatives putting me up in Helsinki at that particular time of summer, and I'm going to have to leave on an early flight and will come back on a late-night one... well, I'm currently wondering whether to treat myself to a Fancy Airport Hotel that would be comfortable and maximize length of sleep on two travel nights. It's literally on the airport (in the international terminal) but reportedly has good soundproofing, the rooms are airconditioned and so on. Breakfast included. If I make the reservations and payments now and accept the condition that I won't get my money back in case I have to cancel for some reason, it's not terribly more expensive than the other, somewhat less comfy and practical options.

Humph.

Edit: Reservations made! The reservation system got on my nerves, what with weird error messages at first and inconsistent pricing on subsequent tries, but I ended up with two hotel nights at the (relatively) low price I was expecting. The right nights, too. :-)

Behold the baby magpie that I spotted at once as I opened my parents' front door last night in order to start packing up the car. He was huddling next to a bush, looking fearful and miserable. He continued to huddle there as I had to walk back and forth right past him, carrying stuff.

Fortunately, while Grandpa and I had a cup of tea before leaving, mommy magpie showed up and took him away. (The little guy was lucky there are no cats in the neighborhood these days.)

As for the rest... The weather was pretty cool through the weekend, but it's been getting a little warmer all the time and there only was any real rain on Saturday. We spent Friday pretty much doing garden work (I mowed the lawn), then going to sauna. The water in the lake was cold (14°C/57°F) but I took a swim anyway - a very short one though. On Saturday, we were going to the countryside to spend the day with Aunt P and Cousin H & her family at Aunt L's summerplace. The distance was about 60 kilometers, and since Dad has biked there several times already, he and I decided to try riding there together. What happened:

* About 500 meters from home, I took too steep a turn and fell over. No significant damage, but we had to turn back and clean the wounds on my knee and finger. (We had almost taken bandaging materials etc. along, but not quite.)
* A few kilometers from home, after an admittedly toughish uphill stretch, I was out of breath and requested a water break... and had to lie down as soon as I got off my bike, because everything was going black. I had to sit down on the ground twice more and drink lots of water and some coffee before I could safely stand up again. (While this may sound dramatic, Aunt P the physician just said it's my low blood pressure and not dangerous as such - certainly much less so than high blood pressure would be. I could use getting myself in better shape though.)
* Some 13 kilometers from home, it started raining in earnest and we stopped at a gas station to wait for Mom and Grandpa to pick us up.

At the summerplace, it rained and there were about a gazillion mosquitos out there, but we had a nice sauna and ate lovely new potatoes and pike-perch, then tiramisu. Not hugely Midsummer-like, but nice.

On Sunday it was sunny and warmer, and we took a walk on Väinölänniemi, a cape that sticks out into the lake from downtown Kuopio, contains a nice park, a beach and a sports stadium and is on pretty summer days very much the whole town's living room. Then back home for lunch, packing up the car and baby magpie.

About halfway to Joensuu, Grandpa recalled a place close to the main road where he had often stopped by to buy smoked salmon in the past. We saw their advertisement sign on the roadside and turned off road to look for the place. And sure enough, they were there and open too (I'm not sure I envy an operation that seems to be open to customers from 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. every day). We bought a smoked salmon from them, then had it for dinner at home - delicious!

Now back to work. Sigh.

Given that it's cold and has been raining cats and dogs since yesterday and the weather doesn't seem to be improving by a whole lot through the weekend, I'm pretty content with the plan to spend yet another Midsummer in Kuopio with my parents. Grandpa is coming with me again, we're driving there tonight.

I don't even remember when there last was nice warm weather for Midsummer over here - cold and rainy seems to be it these days. And that's not the weather for going to our nice but rather Spartan summerplace on Lake Päijänne. So the option of bathing in a lakeside sauna and grilling stuff outdoors, yet also staying in a big, warm and dry house and having a decent modern kitchen and a chance of watching movies doesn't sound too bad.

Happy Midsummer, everyone!

(Talking about books, television shows, movies and such works of fiction here. Fans of actors, musicians and such have a slightly different set of potential vices.)

#1 Worship a certain character. Be unable to accept any criticism of him/her or anything he/she ever did, by either other characters in the book/show/movie or fellow fans of the same. Passionately hate any other character who dares even question anything he/she ever did.

#2 Hate a certain character with passion. Be unable to see anything positive whatsoever about this character or anything he/she ever did. Hate the author/writer(s) for ever introducing such a character.

#3 Hate the fact that the author/writer(s) ever has any main character act in a stupid or misguided manner. Why can't they just all be absolutely perfect in every way and live happily ever after?!

#4 Hate anything or anybody in the book/show/movie ever changing since the initial setup.

#5 Be fanatically invested in a romantic relationship between any two characters, whether explicit (canon) or, uh, less than obvious. Use the words "true love" a lot.

#6 See slash everywhere. Point it out constantly and loudly to everybody else. Insist on it actually being canon too, no matter if it's, er, less than obvious. Tell everyone who disagrees they're obviously in the closet themselves.

#7 Be totally obsessed and proud of it. See it as a sign of disrespect to your beloved book/show/movie to ever think or talk about anything else. Lose all sense of proportion when it comes to anything to do with the object of your obsession, while you're at it.

...to be continued... (or comment and add your personal unfavorite).

I feel like I'm turning into a Brit or something, with all the weather talk, but still somehow feel the need to point out that neither tomorrow night's plans for a BookCrossing picnic here in town nor my Midsummer plans for the weekend are exactly supported by the weather forecast. There's heavy rain to be expected just about every day, and it's pretty cold too (max +15°C, or 60°F).

Well, I don't even remember when we last had a warm and sunny Midsummer in this part of the world, so...

...OK, back to work.

Weather forecasts for the weekend were anything but promising (basically, it was supposed to be cold and rainy), but Saturday ended up being a most beautiful summer day for a funeral. It took place in the countryside close to Joensuu, where my late uncle lived. Mom and I went, the rest of our family couldn't make it. What with the deceased being Mom's youngest sibling and a fun and universally well-liked person, and dying quite suddenly without warning in the middle of a workday, it was a pretty sad occasion. His wife (his second, he never had any children) is pretty devastated, I'm glad at least that she has children from her first marriage and isn't completely alone. But Mom and her brothers (she has three left now) had some nice remembrances to share of the deceased, and I was glad to be there. It was nice to see quite a number of my cousins, too.

I'm glad of the short videos I took at another uncle's birthday party last May - that's the last time Mom and her brothers were all together, I guess, and they were all in great form that night.

This morning, I woke up to a thunderstorm and went to the window to see the pouring rain but fell asleep again and only got up at 11 a.m. (Mom stayed overnight at Aunt P's, what with Grandpa having a flu and me living in a tiny apartment.) It was insanely humid and quite warm out there as I walked to Grandpa's to have coffee with him and Mom - reminded me of summer mornings in North Carolina. After coffee, we decided to see if Grandpa's hedge was dry enough to be cut after the morning rain, and amazingly enough, it was. We ended up both cutting the hedge and mowing the lawn (which Grandpa actually started doing himself, apparently feeling all better already, but I put my foot down), then having a delicious meal of steak and new potatoes (kindly provided by Aunt P) and mushroom sauce (false morel; mushrooms kindly provided, fresh, by kindly neighbor), prepared by Mom. And not a drop of rain after the morning.

The nice day was suitably rounded off by sauna and evening tea with Grandpa - sadly, Mom had to drive back home and missed this part.

Back to work in the morning. Sigh.

This is going to be the last weekend for a while that I'm staying here in town (as far as my plans will hold), so I was kind of hoping to have time, e.g., to cut Grandpa's hedge. But what with my uncle's funeral on Saturday that I'm going attend with Mom, weather forecasts being quite tricky and Grandpa having a flu, I wonder whether it's going to be late July and an absolutely monstrous hedge to cut, after all. (The hedge has grown to an impressive height already.)

The weekends after this will be reserved for the following activities: Midsummer (in Kuopio with parents), my godfather's funeral in Karhula, a religious summer happening in Seinäjoki, and a quick trip to France for my nephew's baptism. After that, I'm free for now, but we'll see. I'm going to miss Finncon once again since I'll be in France that weekend, but I'm sort of glad there's not even a chance of going this year - the less weekend traveling the better is the way I feel about it, at the moment anyway. Just looking at that travel schedule makes me tired.

In spite of everything (i.e., Grandpa's youngest son, my godfather, dying two days before the big day*), Grandpa's 90th birthday was a success. As usual for this family, the party wasn't very thoroughly thought through beforehand and everything was just a bit chaotic, but the right sort of guests, good food and good cheer made the day. (Not to mention that since we were indoors, no-one froze to death.)

We had a daytime party with food and coffee (served by a catering service, thank goodness), speeches and music (Grandpa's choir, band consisting of my cousins and their children, sing-along) in a very nice old wooden house in town which is owned by Grandpa's choir and in which we've held family occasions before. Then we just put the word out that anyone staying in town overnight could come to Grandpa's house to carry on - and boy, did they come. I haven't seen the house so full of people in years, and I feared for a bit that it would all tire Grandpa out, but he seemed perfectly happy to party late into the night (although in his case it mostly involved sitting around opening presents and talking to people - and late into the night meant until 10 p.m.).

I took my rocking horse, Alarik, both to the daytime party and to Grandpa's in the evening in order to provide some fun for the kids (four of them, my godson/nephew Bear Cub who's almost four being the eldest). They played a bit rough with him - after all the mini-cars and stuff, today's kids just don't seem to get the point of a toy horse that's just supposed to be rocked on place, not ridden all over the floor - but he's sturdy and seemed to be well liked. I was glad to give him an actual job for a change, he's pretty much an ornament these days and actually lives under the table (very little space in my bedsitter) so not much of one of those, either.

Grandpa's house is full of flowers now, which is nice. We're going to have some fun figuring out where to put all the new books since the shelves are full as they are, but since Grandpa's finally going to have that back operation in July, I'm glad he has new stuff to read while he's in the hospital.

*My godmother and their sons came after all, I was glad they did.

My godfather (Dad's younger brother) died at home last night. It wasn't exactly unexpected given his state of health for the last few years, but sudden nevertheless. He and his family were coming to Grandpa's birthday festivities tomorrow, now none of them probably are coming.

Half the other family are here already but there's not much of a festive atmosphere. :-( The weather at least is appropriate (cold and rainy).

Powerfully windy out there. Yesterday morning I knew it was going to get cooler (and rain) so I put a long-sleeved blouse and jacket on in the morning, but walking back in the evening, the wind and the coolness had my fingers frozen, the rest of me not exactly warm and cozy either, and my eyes streaming before I even reached the market square halfway home. Matters were not improved by my carrying a large plastic bag (Grandpa's black suit back from laundry) which the wind was grabbing and almost tearing out of my hands all the time. I decided I was not going to try and cross the long bridge over the river on foot in this weather, and hailed a taxi instead. Sometimes it actually is worth the ten euros.

It's just about equally windy today, and I ended up borrowing Grandpa's car. Which I then had real fun trying to park for the day near the university - I ended up putting it in a slot between two cars which barely allowed me to open the door enough to get out of the car. But I got plenty of experience of that during my years in Italy, so no big problem.

The weather is not going to get all that much better before Sunday, so here's hoping the relatives arriving for Grandpa's 90th birthday festivities (which will be on Saturday) will have the sense to dress up warm.