well the weekend is over, no more sleeping late nor lazying around :-/ oh well another one will arrive in only five days time ;-) This weekend has been a pretty good one, Saturday Jófríður, one of my many former sister in laws ;-) came for a visit on Saturday morning. Well actually these days it isn´t so much me she´s visiting but rather my extensive Buffy collection ;-) but hey, I visit her mom for the food so I guess one just is what one is :Þ We went out shopping for confirmation gifts. Warning depressing ... can be skipped ;-) I worry for this village I have called home for the last four years :-( Last year my bank was sold so there is only one bank here and now, just this Wednesday actually, the smaller shop here gave in to the big shop and is being closed :-( It´s going to be sorely missed, it was the small, personal shop you see in movies. Where one had an account and I could send my son alone shopping because I knew they´d ask him for his note, and he loved signing for the goods himself ;-) This town is dying .. able and willing people can´t get employment, there is no high school here so the kids leave at 16, most of them never to really return, there just aren´t enough jobs around :-( At least we still have a post office, the next town over just lost theirs "wasn´t enough buisness to justify an outlet" they said. We still have the advantage of highway one (if one can call Icelands only circle road a highway ;-) so everyone driving between the two major cities of Iceland has to drive through. But alas, now theres talk of moving the highway and I think that´d be the death blow to this small community. It´s kind of scary witnessing firsthand the iminnent death of a rural community :-( Pregnancies are also an issue here, I have taught here for four years and in every class so I´ve graduated so far there is now a baby ! With classes of only fourteen persons on average this shouldn´t be happening :-( o.k. enough of this, I´m starting to sound like Björgvin ;Þ)


Saturday we paid a visit to the local police station seeing as it was the 200th anniversary of the Icelandic police, the kids had their fingerprints taken and I got handcuffed ;-) (whatever comment you´re thinking of now I assure you the police officer in question said them all ;-) It´s really a creepy feeling to enter a cell :-/ wouldn´t have thought it beforehand. My kids, being so photgenic, of course (I´m as humble as ever) got their picture taken and put up on the local city homepage ;-) Then on Friday night, after Elena was asleep, I enjoyed watching Goonies again, this time with the commentary! It was great fun, I laughed out loud severeal times and would thouroughly recommend it to anyone who enjoyed Goonies the first time round and who enjoys movies !!! The commentary is done by the kids themselves as well as Richard Donner the director, with the camera being focused on the cast on several occasions and the movie falling in the background.

Today me and Elena went to the confirmation party given by my student/babysitter. Icelandic confirmations are closest in resemblance to jewish Bar mitzwas if movies are anything to go by. Even though it´s a Christian festival it was originally tied directly to the Viking comming of age ceremony, hence it´s at 14 and the kids recieve great big presents! Kids will often recieve overe a 1000 dollars/pounds as well as furniture, computer or something grand like that. The feasts are also the size of a good wedding reception. The best thing though... of course... is all the food ;-) Anyways back to school tomorrow, meanwhilst ran accross this very intresting site (says the supergeek in me ;-) it has a comparative size scale featuring many well known buildings and characters as well as some slightly lesser known and less real spaceships ;-) The other one is food for thought ! US forces allegedly making Iraqi thieves strip naked and walk through town with a message scrawled on their chests... :-( How very liberating ...
Good night and may your dreams be filled with happyness and brightness :-)