New Year?

I cannot believe it. I cannot. I have been working all week and even today, New Year's Eve. Was there actually anything to do? No. Any customers to help? Nor really. The British must be the only Europeans who are stupid enough to have 31 December as a normal working day.
For my part, I hope it's the first as well as the last time.
Happy New Year to all of you out there.

Matthias designed and baked a cake house

Christmas is coming to a place near you

It's the 24th of December. My alarm clock rang 5.25 this morning, because I had promised to drive P, who lives upstairs, to the airport. P was flying home to her parents in Prague, where she is going to spend her Christmas.
After the airport I thought I would do a bit of the last shopping in the big 24 hour Tesco in Corstorphine. For some strange reason I wasn't the only one there at 6 in the morning, and it was one of the strangest shopping experiences ever.
Tonight's menu: Pork loin with rosemary and garlic, braised red cabbage, sugar-browned potatoes and pepper sauce, and Ris a la Mande for dessert.

Meet the parents

Susanne's parents are visiting over Christmas. We have been playing tourists in Edinburgh, and been to Dean Gallery and Edinburgh Castle so far. I have been to our local butcher to collect a piece of pig for Christmas Eve, and Susanne cooked rice pudding for our dessert tomorrow night. It is all well and good.
Matthias went to the optician's the other day to have an eye test, and today he collected his new, cool spectacles. He only needs to wear them when he is reading or playing games, which is most of the time.
Except for the weather and the British banking system, there seems to be little to complain about.
Happy Christmas.

Faster, little mouse, kill kill

I am a killer. The last couple of months I have lured three, innocent little mice into a trap via the cunning use of high quality chocolate. The trap then has bluntly broken their little necks, snap, just like that.
The mice are entering our kitchen cupboard from somewhere only they know. In here they feast on our rubbish bin, soap flakes and other stuff mice are crazy about.
One thing that attracts a mouse nose more than anything else is dark chocolate of the best quality. We use Green & Black's dark organic chocolate, and it has worked every time. One time we only had a piece of shitty Cadbury's milk chocolate, which was left in the trap by the mouse.
Tonight I am going to set the trap again, but I hope we have caught all the mice in our house. It's a bit depressing to get up in the morning, and unload the stiff body of a mouse into the bin while the tea water is boiling. It's really not mice. I mean: nice.

What a wonderful life

Friday evening I left my job as an Adobe software supporter to enjoy 5 days of Christmas holidays. I have been working 9-5 for 5 weeks and I think it sucks. It doesn't leave you time to do anything. Who the hell invented that shit?
Maybe I am just getting old. My last real 9-5 job (I am omitting full-time teaching jobs, because they are, well, different) back in 1999-2000 left me plenty of time to write my own stuff and play games and all. But not this one.
Anyway, it's Christmas, and Mrs Rasmussen and I went shopping for presents in Edinburgh today. We took it very easy and relaxed, had coffee at Valvona & Crolla and lunch at Cafe Rouge, and all in all a splendid time.

Meat

We had lunch. We had all sorts of meat. And beer. And snaps. It was a hoot. There are even photos from the event, complete with read-eyed people holding glasses and smiling. It was a hoot.

The day we have all be waiting for

Today is the day of our Christmas Lunch. Preparations have been hectic all week, and they are continuing as we - well, I, really - speak. The dough for the rye bread has been rising since yesterday evening. The herings are marinating in the fridge. And much, much, more.
Today is also the day when Scottish bloggers, like myself, were going to meet in real life, face to face, in a pub in Edinburgh. Needless to say, I have had to cancel my appearance. I hope you have a good time there.
Sofie was up early this morning to help out in the local Colinton Arts shop just up the street. She will be working until four o'clock in the afternoon.

Whoa

What happened? Time is whizzing by at insane speeds. Mrs Rasmussen started her holiday yesterday, albeit hit by a nasty cold, and my new work eats everything. I have been speaking german to people I don't know for three days now - it's tough and hard work, much harder than I expected. And writing emails in german as well, that's even more scary. I wonder if speaking or thinking too much german is unhealthy? Nah, guess not. Bzzz. Ping. Ddddt.

Banking, training, closing in on Xmas

The days are passing by in a blur. Working 9-5 has a lot of disadvantages. Firstly, you can't get into a bank while they are open. That's a big let-down if you have to pay rent the old-fashioned way. I guess I have to set up another online banking solution - I already have it with our Danish bank and also with my Natwest account, but we never needed it with our Royal Bank of Scotland account. Until now.
I have had three weeks of training now, and I am about ready to go online to provide German and British Adobe users solutions and answers over the phone or at least by email. I've been whizzing through the coming version of Acrobat, and DTP packages PageMaker, InDesign and FrameMaker. FrameMaker is the scary one. It looks like an application from 1989 - and probably is - and it handles huge volumes like dictionaries or thick manuals.
The big Christmas three down by our local church has been lit, and Mrs Rasmussen and I went for a walk tonight to have a look at it.
In a week's time we are having friends over for a traditional Danish Christmas lunch, complete with herring, liver pate and snaps.