St. Svithun

St Svithun's is just steps from my flat and you can see the work being done on the church so they had the only English mass today in the schools small auditorium.  Very large and diverse crowd. Stnading room only.  Not sure when this church will be done but probably take a while.  All went well.  Got there 15 minutes early and no seats left - at our Houston church the rush to get in usually starts about 3 minutes after mass starts! 
PS  I think Svithun refers to Swithun Wells, executed in 1591 in England.

Old Stavanger

Went walking thru "Old Stavanger" today.  Nice wooden homes, all white, there since 18th century.  Very tidy and almost like gingerbread man village.  Lots of little gardens and cobblestone streets - but those are in many places. I could've pasted a thousand pictures here but will just do a few..

Here is the old tower used from 1850-1922 overlooking the water and town.  They used to get up here to keep a look out for fires and "suspicious activity".

I just found it interesting to see a car stuck to the side of a building. Not sure why it's there.  Perhaps some nuanced artistic statement commenting on the perils of over-commercialisation in coordination with fossil fuel use in the post-modern world rendering society into a future of disarray represented by the car on the wall....Or it could just be a unique way to advertise the bank inside the building....

Picture of me in front of the 1,000 year old chuch near my flat.

There's something going on there Sunday (sign out front is in Norwegian - I think it might be some type of musical - I don't think it's an active church.  Also hope to get the lowdown on St. Svithuns on Sunday - the only Catholic church here.

Vanity question - don't I look like John with the hat on?

Euro Pricing Moment Quiz + Joke of the day

Here's a pop quiz to think about over the weekend, or not.  Which of the below shocked me the most regarding shockingly priced items in Norway:

a)  One month gym membership for $130
b)  A Burger King whopper meal for $16
c)  Some small strange type of definitely non-American snack resembling chips in a vending machine for $6 (with Snickers bar costing a paltry $5 next to it).

Answer:  Well you know it's all of the above.  And this is just tip of the iceberg. I'm sure more stories to come on this topic. 

On a lighter note - all this multiple choice stuff reminds me of an old joke - You've just been assigned to produce the gala called "Night of the 99 Stars".  You've just signed your 98th star when in walks Eva and Zsa Zsa Gabor.  What do you do?   a) Sign Eva   b) Sign Zsa Zsa   c) change the name of the show to "Night of the 98 Stars"....

Other famous blogs

Just a thought exercise to have fun with.  As blogs are everywhere now not to mention tweets, etc, it's a lot of peoples stream of consciousness.  Wonder what Cristopher Columbus would've blogged about?  I've read Reagans diaries which comes close to historical person blogging - but he was pretty straight-laced.  What would Hitler have tweeted about?  Better not try to give examples of that.

What about the disciple Peter?  "Saw the empty tomb today. Angry the other guy beat me to it!"
Little did he know that story would be repeated each year for eternity!!!

View from one of my balconies

Of course the sun came out this afternoon (first time this week) so I took this picture from my balcony.  The open sea is at the left but it's mainly blocked by a building or two so this lake will have to suffice.  Realized this blog needs a little more "color" and saw Theresa's comment re photos at same time.  I'm on the 13th floor....not superstitious or anything.   But it just crossed my mind  tomorrow is Friday the 13th.  Jus' sayin'. 

Brutal Weather

It's April 12 and you'd think things would be better even this far North but about 42 and light rain each day.  I know in the Texas and Kentucky it's been warm and sunny for most of Spring - I'm sure on Derby week it will go to 45 and rain though...

My flat is in great spot and is much larger than I thought (you know Europe - everything is small). There are no Starbucks in Norway - they say hard to be profitable given all costs involved. They are learning more about convenience though - when I was here in 90's everything closed by 6pm now there are many stores open till 8 or later.

Rebecca says the washer at home is having issues.  I leave home for two days and the whole place is in shambles...