Updates

Sunset outside my sister's house in Elk River, Minnesota

I was back in Swedish class this morning, happily so. Only two of us showed, unfortunately. It's the third tier of the beginning level course. Tier two was bruising for a few class members who seemed not to study save for class mornings. They were just frustrated, I guess, and didn't sign back up.

Otherwise, the timing was just poor. People are traveling for March or have schedule conflicts during our weekly Tuesday morning timeslot.

So we have officially 8 people in the class--I think--but it seems we'll only have 5 or 6 each session. Today we only had two. Alas, that's not so bad. I pick it up quick enough and never mind making an ass of myself by revealing how much I don't know. That's really the secret of studying a foreign language. Just accept you're going to look foolish and enjoy it.

It's a lot like living with someone.

(I'm the foolish one, in that scenario, dear Muse.)

TOO CLEVER?

* The Swedish word for married is gift, pronounced "yift."
* The Swedish word for poison is also gift.

Han är gift. So is he married? or poison? I suppose it depends on whether one asks him or his spouse.

An ornament Suzanne gave us after an
excellent Easter dinner at her place.

iPHONE IT IS

I'm getting an iPhone. I'm hoping dearly they ship it this week by Wednesday, as I'll be away next week. I don't know why I paid the extra $10 for 2 to 3-day delivery. I certainly would not have done so had I known they might not ship it for a full 10 days from the time of order. Why didn't they give some warning?

For all of Apple's vision and for all of their intuitive technologies that really help people along, the company fails to understand that most of us expect shipments for online orders to ship quickly. Like, 24 or 48 hours later.

That's really standard now. C'mon, Steve Jobs. At least tell us upfront the delay in shipment might be a week or two.

THAT REMINDS ME

I know the casual office thing is big, and I really like that. But Mr. Jobs you really should wear a suit ONCE. The black turtleneck scene is starting to get very Sprockets. True, the thought of receiving my iPhone makes me happy as a little girl, but no sir I do not want to touch your monkey.

Now is the time on Sprockets when we dance!

THE SAFETY DANCE

One of my all-time favorite lyrics misunderstandings is for the song "Safety Dance." In it, Men Without Hats sing, "And I can act like an imbecile." But someone--I won't say who, E____--heard as "...act like I'm in Brazil."

Not only is that line funny, but as 1980s' songs go, it fits. Why not act like you're in Brazil? After all, I've never once given thought to how or why "Motorin'" becomes a fitting refrain piece for a song called "Sister Christian."

Undoubtedly someone has studied all this. It just seems that the pseudo-poetics of a mid-1980s' song's narrative made sense within its time, if only that it attempted to tell a story even if it didn't make a lick of sense. Whereas, the songs of the 1990s seemed oppressively self-aware and embarrassed about it all and used mishmashes and nonsequitters as a way to destroy meaning. For example, that whole "aqua seafoam shame" in Nirvana's "All Apologies." Or anything by Pavement.

The 1990s, I think, wanted to be meaningfully unmeaning. Whereas the 1980s were unmeaningfully meaningful.

I think I just made up words. So that must be what the oughts are about: absolute, unimpeded bullshit.

How else do we explain Gwen Stefani's lyrics? How else do we explain having such a crappy president?