Monday, December 8, 2008

Rainy Days and Mondays always get me down..

Anyone remember that song? Yes, I am old, but so are you if you can remember that song.

So, I'm alone. Well, as alone as one can be in a house with 2 dogs and 2 cats, but as far as those who walk upright, I'm alone. And, I'm tired...

Woke up at 4:30 this morning to say goodbye to Ole - he and his boss are off to Poland for the next few days. Long drive - bah, better him than me!

It's just me and the 4-legged creatures, 2 of whom are incredibly confused about why their daddy has not yet come home from work! See, in their book, I'm the boring one - the one who is here all day and as a result, am not nearly as exciting as that other one who leaves for soooooo long every day and then takes them to all sorts of fun, smelly places when he comes through the door!

I did take them out for a walk - which is a rather funny site and would look much more appropriate if I had my feet on some sort of sled. They're strong - and they pull - at least if I was on a sled it would look like they were pulling with some sort of purpose!

Long story short.. I now have to feed myself. Since the only time that I normally cook is Thanksgiving Day, or when I find some exciting new thing I want to try, feeding myself is something I consider a bore, and a chore. There must be something oven-ready hidden in that freezer somewhere!

Wednesday, December 3, 2008

Thanksgiving!


Eating the turkey like a true Viking!


 

Yep, we did it, we had Thanksgiving dinner in Denmark!

This was the 2nd year that I decided to do an official Thanksgiving feast - American style. All of my recipes are for more than 4 people so we end up with lots of leftovers, but that's just fine by me.

I pulled out my heirloom china and Ole's wonderful parents, Anny and Bruno, joined us again this year to have traditional dinner - Turkey, Sweet Potatoes (found in Denmark - finally!), mashed potatoes, stuffing, cranberry sauce, creamed spinach and to top it all off.. A real, honest to goodness, pumpkin pie. Yummy!

We all ate way too much, of course!
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Thursday, November 27, 2008

Fall Cleaning

So I decided to tweak my page - I was tired of the old layout. I can't say that I'm in love with this one either but at least it's a bit wider, so it's a step in the right direction!

I want something red - fits the whole 'danish' theme, and I don't want that skinny little writing space that most of the templates offer, so now I'm streched and modified and we'll see how it goes.

I may change it again - be forewarned!

Happy Thanksgiving!

It's turkey day in the US of A! It's not turkey day here in Denmark, but for me it is and so I off to the grocery store in the hopes of finding all of the needed ingredients for my annual Thanksgiving feast - American style. Last year Kvivkly served me well so I'm heading there again and if I don't find what I need then I'll have to go from Herning to Viborg to make a stop at Bilka - I really wish they'd put these two places closer together!!

I'm not actually going to cook the turkey until tomorrow because tonight, I have school. It's okay, this actually gives me an extra day to prepare my feast. Tomorrow evening Ole's parents will join us and stuff themselves silly on foods they only eat once per year.

May the grocery store gods be kind to me today!

Wednesday, November 26, 2008

Dogs gone Wild - again!

As you know we have two incredibly sweet, innocent dogs who never get into any trouble at all!

And, as you also know, I recently traveled to Las Vegas for a week.

These sweet dogs, therefore, had to spend their first whole day 'home alone'. Zoe had done so before but this was a first for Lexi, and the first time they would spend the day together.. by themselves.

Ole put them in the entry way and guest bathroom area with one of their dog beds, several things to chew on, and their water bowl. Apparently the things that were left to chew on either didn't last long enough, or were simply not exciting enough. The following will give you an indication of what he found when he arrived home that first day...

Sunday, November 23, 2008

Driving in Denmark

It was a little over a year ago that I obtained my Danish driver's license and started to really get to know driving in Denmark. One might think that roads are roads but there are a few random things I have come to know about Danish roads. Keep in mind, I live smack in the middle of Jylland, so yes, roads near Copenhagen and other cities are probably a bit different.

Unlike the states, where we have yellow lines that indicate a separation of traffic, all the paint is white here. You would think it wouldn't matter but I have to admit that initially, it was quite disconcerting. I grew up being told that if there was a white line separating your lane from another lane that meant that both lanes were traveling in the same direction. What they do give you are lollipops. No, not that kind of lollipop but a little white thing sticking out of the ground on either side of the road. On one side of the road the pops have yellow reflectors and on the other side, they have white. I can't remember which is which, which probably tells you how helpful they are.

The above refers only to the roads where someone actually bothered to paint lines. There are many, many roads in Jylland where they felt it unnecessary. And, along that same theory, there must have been a pavement shortage at some point because they also felt it unnecessary to make the road wide enough for two vehicles - even though it IS a two-lane road. I hate these roads. Everytime a car approaches from the other direction I want to close my eyes. It's frightening! There actually IS enough space to get past one another, but it definitely doesn't feel that way. It basically feels like you're in someone's driveway.

The roads are dark - VERY dark. While studying for my danish license, the translation referred to the headlights as either in 'dipped' position or in 'main' position. The weird thing about that, to me, was that 'main' position translated to what I had always called my 'high beams'. Now I know why they call them 'main beams' here. Driving in Jylland means you will use your 'high beams' more times in one evening than you would in an entire year in the states. You will have them on ALL the time - you will switch back to 'low beams' only for oncoming traffic - hence the term 'dipped' beams!

Trivia time! What bizarre, outdated driving law still exists on the books here? Get this - by law, when passing other traffic at night, you are to first slow your car to approximately 30 mph and only after you have slowed down, you are to dip your headlights from high beams to low beams. HUH???? In fairness, the law was written back in the days when low beams could only illuminate a short distance - I guess not being able to see far ahead when driving at fast speeds was a more critical issue than blinding the approaching traffic. While this is still law, I highly recommend breaking the law on this one or you'll probably get rear-ended.

For the most part, the Danish roads are designed to keep traffic moving. Perhaps brakes were or are too expensive to fix, and therefore, the laws are designed to never actually apply the brakes. Just a theory.

Traffic lights exist only in the cities, and only because some road engineer hasn't yet figured out how to tear down the surrounding homes and businesses so he can stick a round-about in there instead. Round-abouts are everywhere! Weee... ! When riding in the passenger seat it can feel a bit like you're on an amusement park ride - wooosh to the left... wooosh to the right. Okay, granted, this probably has something to do with the actual driver. ;)

Watch for cyclists in round-abouts. You may think you can just go around in the circle and turn to the right when your street appears. I highly recommend you look over your right shoulder before doing so, as that cycle next to you may need to continue to the next exit of the round-about. Yeah, it's pretty easy to forget they're circling around in the same circle!

In addition to the round-abouts, you will find little patches of pavement on the shoulder wherever there is a place off the main road that someone may wish to turn to the left. This little patch of pavement is there so that you, the driver behind the one turning left, will not be required to slow down or stop because of the one turning - simply swerve your car into the patch and keep going. Remember, whatever you do, do NOT ever stop moving.

Now, in contradiction to the 'keep moving' theory, is probably the most non-sensical thing about the roads here. On the main roads, you are permitted to drive 80kph. However, anyone pulling a trailer or driving a truck may go only 70kph. This is not a road with two lanes of traffic in the same direction; this is a freaking mess! You can just be cruising along and wham, there it is, the long line of cars behind the guy driving to Plant-o-rama with trailer in tow to pick up his 15 bags of sphagnum - everyone stuck behind him until the next really big passing area appears at which point everyone tries really hard to get around him but inevitably, you won't be able to. Why? Because there will always be someone in that line of traffic who just doesn't want to pass, causing logistical issues for everyone else.

And even those who do wish to pass have problems. Cars are small here. Lots and lots of 4-cylinder, 0-60 in 10 min, cars. These are not well designed for passing other cars. These are road cloggers but oooo, they get great gas mileage... grrr.

80kph doesn't really mean 80kph. Ole likes to say that since everything in Denmark is taxed, you can add 25% tax to the speed limit too and as such, you can drive about 100kph in an 80kph zone. Sounds good to me!

The danes like to be prepared and they like to be forewarned. Before a passing section ends, the dotted stripes in the center get longer and longer before becoming a solid white line. Before a traffic light turns green it first goes from red, to a combination of yellow and red - I call it the 'rev your engines' setting. I must admit, however, that I rather like it - quite handy when you're approaching the intersection!

So, there you have it, driving in Denmark. I'm sure there is more, but I'll give you a chance to absorb that first!

Saturday, November 15, 2008

Baking

As the holidays are drawing near, I am back in the kitchen doing some baking. I don't particularly like cooking, but baking I do enjoy! Something about all that good smelling stuff coming out of the kitchen makes the house all 'hyggelig' and makes those dark days seem not quite so dark.

This morning I tried Kelli's sopapilla cheesecake. It's done, but we haven't yet tried it but I have to say it certainly looks good! It just seemed a bit heavy to have immediately after eating our scrambled eggs :)

But, the point of this post is that I wanted to share an extremely helpful site that I found awhile ago. This site is awesome - someone took the time to translate the names of all sorts of ingredients from English to all the Scandinavian languages, and to Russian. So, here's the link:

Multi-lingual Food Glossary

Enjoy!
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