Saturday, September 13, 2008

Reese's and other updates

Okay so, the gas station where I found the Reese's peanut butter cups.. at the time that I found them it was some weird combination of letters, like XL, or YL or something like that. But, since that day, the old sign came down, new sign went up, along with an announcement that the shop will be closed for the next 3 weeks or so. New sign? "Shell/7-11". Yeppers, Viborg's getting a 7-11. Yeehaw!

The day I bought those Reese's, I was chatting with the clerk about how shocked I was to see them. And he kept saying, we have 'gaadaaaraaada' also. Having no clue what he was actually trying to tell me, I just gave the little grin like I knew. It was at that moment that my classmate said to me "He said, 'gatorade'". Woah - when good pronunciations go bad! I hope that's not what my Danish sounds like to them.

Anyhoo, I'm babbling and probably making NO sense at all, blame my cold. And about that, I dug through every single suitcase we own, unzipped all those little hidden pockets, and managed to find packets of Dayquil stuffed in one my suitcases. Whew! "Vaek I Morgen" was a big fat lie! The cough syrup was okay, but a bit of an odd taste. The vapo-rub stuff.. well.. it basically made Lexi want to lick me - which wasn't really the plan and probably not good for the pup!

Am I healthy? Nope, wouldn't go that far. But, I'm alive, and I'm feeling a wee bit more human, so it's a start! And, oh yeah, took my module 3 test in this condition so we'll see if I managed to write an 'opslag' and 'svar et brev' well enough to actually pass the darn thing. I'll find out Tuesday.

And now I must go find something to do with myself (which will probably involve downloading some new game from BigFish and using up the free hour in well, an hour).

p.s. Please forgive the most non-sensical post I've ever written.

Monday, September 8, 2008

Jeg er syg

Yep, I'm sick. A cold. I hate having a cold. And I really, really, hate having a cold without a full supply of NyQuil - the "coughing, aching, sniffling, sneezing, stuffy head, fever, so you can rest medicine" (I probably got that in the wrong order, but my head is a bit cloudy at the moment).

I am married to a man who doesn't do pills. He suffers through the cold. I don't like to suffer through it - I whine.. alot. Knowing that I wouldn't be able to drop into the local gas station or supermarket for any cold medicines, I knew I had to get myself to the local apotek before closing time. So, when Ole got home, I convinced him to go with me so he could help me pick something. Well, there isn't a whole lot to choose from.

The only 2 things I recognized on the shelf were Benadryl and Visine, neither of which really fit the bill. I asked about cold remedies and/or cough syrup. The first suggestion was something you dissolve in water, like alka-seltzer, but for your throat - or something. That didn't seem to be quite what I was looking for. I asked about cough syrup again, there was some chatter in danish and a gesture from the apotek woman running her hand up and down from her throat to her chest and I nodded thinking maybe we were getting to what I was hoping for. They had a small bottle and a big bottle, so Ole, fearing my whine, chose the big one. I whined a little and asked her if it was cherry flavor - no such luck. I took the bottle anyway.

So, from there, we stopped into Rema (it's next door). Now I wanted some fruit juice. I really wanted grape juice but it appears you can't get that here, which I find odd as I always figured that to be rather universal. So, then I chose some other berry juice product that came in a milk carton. Well apparently, it's a concentrate (1 bliver 5!). Found that odd as well - I'll get over it.

As we were leaving Rema I was commenting on the fact that I was missing the full aisle of cold remedy choices typically found in a US grocery store. We then noticed a couple things in the toothbrush section - one called "Vaek i morgen" (gone tomorrow) and the other was a mentholated rub (like Vap-o-rub!) so he grabbed one of each of those.

So here are my defenses against the common cold for the next few days. Maybe one of them will make me feel a bit better!

 
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Sunday, September 7, 2008

Saturday.. in the park...



Is it some kind of enchanted forest? Nope! It's a hundeskov in Ikast and we spent a really nice afternoon meeting some new friends - Kelli and Mads, and Albert too!

This is what happens when you attempt to photograph 3 dogs who won't stop moving!



The white dog is Albert - and he was attempting to fend off the very forward advances of a couple of over anxious females, Zoe and Lexi.




Lexi doing her best tricks for the camera...



We made our way to what was supposed to be a picnic table with benches - except one bench was broken and laying in the forest so we all stood around and chatted for a couple of hours. This appears to be a very serious discussion, but I have a feeling it was probably just soccer talk!



And this is how two extremely tired pups on the ride home look after spending 2 hours in a Hundeskov...(not so easy to get a picture from the front seat!)


It was tons of fun finally meeting Kelli and Mads! Hopefully we can all get together again in the near future. :)

Tuesday, September 2, 2008

Am I seeing what I think I'm seeing!?

My sprogskole moved to a new location this fall and we're all slowly adjusting. The building itself is far nicer, however, the old school sat right next door to Netto - and we're all missing that wonderful convenience. Nothing like speed shopping while on a 10-15 break from class!

The new school is in a more industrial area but I had noticed that there was a gas station a short walk away and that the gas station had one of those little markets. So today during break I decided to go check it out and much to my delighted shock, I found something that I thought I would NEVER find in Denmark. Ladies and gentleman, I present to you.. REESE'S!!

 


Ahh, a little piece of heaven in my Danish world. Don't get me wrong, I'll be the first to admit that European chocolate is much better than what we're used to in the states. But, this is Reese's, and for me, this is the equivalent to Ole's obsession with Anton Berg marzipan bars. I love these things. But.. I'm scared to open it. Hvorfor?? Well, Reese's peanut butter cups can be really good, or really really bad, depending on how fresh they are upon purchase. Old Reese's cups are disastrous, the peanut butter gets all dry and gross. But a fresh one? Det er dejligt! If you're ever in the US in October, when the stores stock up for Halloween, this is the absolute best time to purchase Reese's - all those special Halloween packages were made specifically for that shopping period, so there's no risk that it's been sitting on a dusty candy rack for too long.

Probably more than you needed to know. Time now to open that package - wish me luck!
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Dogs Gone Wild

Zoe and Lexi regularly play tug of war with whatever toy happens to be in close proximity when the game begins.

I now buy stuffed doggie toys ONLY when they clearly state they are designed for dogs tough on toys, etc. I have found that the animals sold under the 'American Kennel Club' name in the states are by far the most durable. Zoe has had a stuffed duck from them since she was 3 months old and it still does not have any ripped seams. Compare that to a stuffed pig purchased at Super Brugsen - it was torn to shreds by Zoe in a matter of hours.

I digress. When we picked up Lexi they were nice enough to include a stuffed toy that all the pups had been playing with so she would have a familiar scent to take home. It was a very cute dolphin and it was holding up rather well.. until this weekend, when we found this in our living room...


 


The fabric carcas hanging from Zoe's mouth is what used to be a dolphin, now visible inside out :)

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Saturday, August 30, 2008

New News

While scanning the Copenhagen Post this morning, I came across an article regarding a new newspaper website designed specifically for those who have difficulty reading a standard Danish newspaper. The article can be found here.

I took particular interest in this because I am still at a level of Danish that makes it quite difficult to read the 'normal' news. Having a newspaper that's a bit more simplistic may just be the perfect solution.

And, the best part is, the new site does have an RSS feed! If you're interested, you can find it at
http://www.ligetil.nu.

Thursday, August 28, 2008

Fest!

Saturday evening we attended the birthday and retirement party for Ole's Aunt Ellen and had a fantastic time. These types of parties are always a bit daunting for me because of the language issue, but each time I attend I know a bit more Danish and understand a bit more of what's going on, so that's progress!

The party had a bit of a theme. The invitation was written much like a personal ad would be stating that Ellen was seeking a 'date'. Each person was to wear a hat of some kind to the party, the crazier the better. I would've been happy to be part of this bit of the party but alas, my husband failed to read and explain the invitation to me, so we were hatless, but that's neither here nor there.

There were 8 tables and each table had to nominate a person with the best hat at their table, and another person to 'introduce' the hat wearer to Ellen, ultimately ending up with 8 folks adorned in crazy hats, from which Ellen would choose a 'date'. Even though I had trouble following the introductions and understanding them all, I still was able to catch on to some of what was being said and to laugh at the hats and enjoy the antics.

I tried to get pictures of some of the craziness but it was tough to get a decent shot inside the party and by the time I started taking pictures, most people were no longer wearing their hats, but I did catch some of them during the nomination process.



This hat is adorned with little balls of yarn around the brim and knitting needles on the top of the hat.



A Danish army winter cap. She left this one for the entire party explaining that her hair was a complete disaster underneath this cap - needless to say, she was a bit warm!



This guy had the good old American style beer cap "thirst aid". He originally was wearing beer cans in the cap but apparently when he finished those off, he switched to the plastic cups. I just kept thinking.. "hope he doesn't have to tie his shoes". While this nomination was taking place, a very funny joke was part of the nomination - I missed it entirely but everyone else at the party thought it was the funniest thing said all night - as you can clearly see from the reaction!





And finally, this was the winner of the 'date'. If you can't see the picture clearly, it's a chicken hat. Absolutely hysterical. When he was introduced he came around the corner bent over bobbing his head so that it appeared that the chicken was feeding; he then produced an egg. His prize? Two bottles of champagne and a box of chocolates, which he then shared with those around him. :)

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