And snooki-punch emoticons rained down on the masses

Snooki Punch Emoticon

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Good Morning America!!

Being Kyle’s roomies for the past four weeks, we have eagerly anticipated any movement on this blog. And now, finally it is time for us Norwegians to share our thoughts on Kyle’s European adventure.

When Kyle first showed up at our doorstep with his baseball cap and a bottle of Maker’s Mark, he seemed like a stereotypical American. However, during the recent weeks we have witnessed a remarkable transformation, as he has gradually adapted to the Parisian lifestyle. Now he dresses like a Frenchman (sixpence and scarf), eats baguettes and stinky cheese for breakfast every morning, and has even picked up some of the French vocabulary (foux de fafa). As I’m writing this, Kyle is actually on youtube being enlightened on French techno by Gautier, our French friend (alarm bells are ringing…).

Being the globetrotter he is, Kyle has also showed an extreme interests for Norwegian customs and habits, which we are happy to teach him. Especially the Norwegian foul words seem to have caught his attention, and even though he probably never will be able to make conversations in Norwegian, he can now almost say complete sentences consisting of obscene words. Way to go Kyle, Fit Adrina ta av deg buksa!!

Kyle has also inflicted some American culture up on us Norwegians. Dice has been a very popular activity in the apartment recently, and if we are not out drinking you will probably find us in the kitchen playing. Also he introduced us to chocolate pillows, which are amazing when coming home from drinking at 8 in the morning.

Talking about drinking, being out with Kyle is always fun. In order to save money at the bar he usually brings his flask. In theory this is a good idea. However, when Kyle gets drunk from his flask he often think it’s a good idea to buy shots for the whole group (very grateful to that btw), and suddenly he ends up spending a lot of money.

All in all living with bad Kyle isn’t really that bad (wordplay). And we are looking forward to hear his upcoming adventures from the Alps.

Love from Norway

PS: Erik says hi to mom (remember to wear your scarf when its cold)

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We rode our first day today and it was amazing. There was a ton of fresh snow. It has been snowing since we got here. In addition, WE ARE POOR!!!! Now that we are here and have been budgeting for lift tickets we decided that we should probably stop spending money. Once again we have made stew to feed ourselves, we are watering down our juice, and of course we will be taking our flasks to the bar.

Get ready, now for the story of Thursday morning. Lindsey got up and took her last final at 9am while myself, Magnus, Adrien and Gutier slept at the house. Lindsey got home from her test at about 10. Shortly after that I hear the voices of two French women in the apartment. Instantly I knew it was the landlord giving a tour to a possible renter. I shot out of bed, threw my bed under Lindsey’s and put a shirt on just as they were walking into the room. We had had a few people over for drinks the night before so there was a bit of a mess in the house. Luckily Gutier and Adrien (they speak French) came into the kitchen just as the landlord was leaving because she informed us that the Architect of the building was coming in a half an hour and we should probably clean up. The Architect was good friends with the owner of the apartment. At that moment we all FLEW into action. Putting away empty bottles, clothes, fixing couches, hiding beds, and making the place look somewhat well kept. Just as we were finishing the Architect and several other people came into the apartment. All of a sudden there about seven Frenchmen in the Apartment discussing the storm shudders and walking all over the place. Somehow we did and AMAZING job cleaning up. It looked way better than it did before.

Just as we thought we had passed the inspection one of the people came in and told us that we should probably clean the egg off of our window before it dried. What we failed to tell them was that we had nothing to do with the egg. Two weeks ago when there was a party that lasted until 6am one of the neighbors egged the windows to let us know they were angry. What we did think to tell them was that it is a Norwegian tradition to break eggs on your window when you move into an apartment and clean it up on the day that you leave. Which, of course is not true but it seemed to help get them out of the apartment.

And now I must go. But you will hear from me again soon. As well I just want you all to know………I’m a PC and I snowboard.

She can’t be out until 7am. bummer.

Well now I am going to pass out. In upcoming posts I will give great detail about the gala party and hopefully soon the Norwegians will be posting. I love you all and thanks for reading. I need sleepy.

For starters, last Tuesday night…..my oh my what a night. Lindsey, The Norwegians, myself, and many others went out on the town. For some reason The Norwegians decided that they were going to get me drunk…..and that is what they did. We are all out drinking and it was normal until about 2am. That is when Lindsey left. I was going to leave with Lindsey until The Norwegians recruited three of the girls in the group to stay. And as you all know if a group of girls asks me to do something….I will most likely be able to ablige. Needless to say, I stayed. That is when they started feeding me drinks and I started buying rounds………..I woke up at 3pm the next day with a pounding headache. It was terrible. I haven’t felt that bad in a long time.

On to the big gala on Friday night. We all got dressed up, Lindsey and I made dinner for 15 people. We made a fantastic stew. We did a damn good job. (by the way as I am writing this Lindsey, Damir, Magnus and I are all laying in Lindsey’s bed) At about midnight we headed to the party. When we got there, there was a HUGE crowd of people outside the hotel. Once we got into the hotel we had to deal with terrible french organization. There was one hallway that was a bottleneck of three different hallways. They were only letting a couple of people in at a time. There was a giant crowd that were all crammed together. You couldnt move an inch. We were stuck there for at least 45 minutes. I was irate. By the time I got in I was ready to fight anybody that looked at me. After about 30 minutes of being there I calmed down and got ready to party. They had cheap drinks and there were two dance floors. The upstairs dance floor was a little bit calmer and the downstairs had an insane techno party. You can guess where I was. We finally left the party at about 6am. We partied so long that the metro had turned back on and was taking people to work again. They were riding to work and we were coming home from partying. Its a good life.

In other news Lindsey and I have booked our ski trip. Since the French Alps (Chamonix) have no snow, we will be going to Austria! We found a ski resort in Austria with good snow and some moderately priced lodging. I will be completely broke afterwards but it will be worth it.

Soon I will be letting the Norwegian guys write a blog post. I hope you enjoy it.

Lets jump at this from the start. All we knew for sure at the beginning of this trip was that we were taking the train to England, we were visiting Peter’s parents for a night (parents of Lindsey’s english ex “man friend”) and that we were then going to London for a couple of days to accompany Mike (friend of Peter and Lindsey) to his company party. All we knew of the company party was that it was a black tie event and that it had an open bar. We were sold.

From the beginning Lindsey and I found out that we are in fact, GREAT at catching trains! I am going to put this new found skill onto a resume. For one reason or another EVERY time we had a scheduled train to catch we found ourselves being escorted by a member of the train staff and RUNNING down the platforms. They would scold us for not being early, check the radio to see if the train has time to get two late people onto it, impatiently tap their foot while we scurried thruough customs and then run us to the train. Yes, we were THOSE PEOPLE! Running thru train stations, dipping ropes, skipping to the front of security lines, and literally jumping into trains as the doors closed. I don’t know why the trip ended up like this but we were damn good at NOT missing the train.

The very beginning of the trip was rather disappointing. When I realized the train was going to take us under the English Channel I was hoping it would be like the moving walkway at Sea-world. We would pass under a lit up glass tube and get to look at all of the fish and sharks. This of course, was not the case. The tunnel was dark and boring. Minus one point for England.

When we arrived in London we immediately jumped another two hour train south to Angmerang. When I first found out that we were taking a two hour train south, to visit his parents for the night, and then only to jump another train back north in the morning, I thought Lindsey was crazy. Once we got there I figured out why. They were GREAT PEOPLE!!!! Angmerang is a cute little village just on the coast of England. Peter’s mother is a fantastic woman who made us a great dinner and Peter’s dad is absolutely batty and is EXACTLY what Pete will be like in 20 years. They were really fun. Their neighbor has a thatched roof. Ya, you read that correctly. In the morning we went and saw a real castle, with a real moat, that had a real Duke living in it. As well I saw the old GT40 that Peter’s dad built years ago. It was amazing. Apparently he went to somewhere around Everett 30 years ago and bought a big, bad ass Ford V8 to put into it. He got the block of the engine home on a crate and the rest he got home in two big suitcases. Like I said, he is nuts, but apparently also a genius. Oh, and I touched the English Channel. Go me.

Almost missing our train, we went back North to London. Mike just bought his flat and moved in two weeks ago. As you can guess it was really empty in need of quite a few things. However it is a nice place with tons of potential. He just needs time to get set up. Lindsey and I toured around London for a day. We saw Buckingham Palace, Big Ben, Beefeaters (the guards that dont move), all of that touristy crap. On to the good part…..The Party.

On getting more information from Mike, we found out what was really going on. The company Christmas party was being held at Legoland! It was a Moulin Rouge theme, and we would be sitting at the big-wigs table. Our table had us, Mike’s boss+wife, his boss+wife, and HIS boss+wife. That’s right, somehow Lindsey and I were sitting with the president and VP of the company. Apparentlly Mike is more important at work than he claims. And the the President and his wife are Norwegian. As you remember, I have been doing a lot of Norwegian cussing. You can see where this is going.

So to sum up what has happened…Lindsey and I left Paris (where just days before we went and saw THE Moulin Rouge theater) and the Norwegians to go to London to go to a French themed party to get drunk with Norwegians. Small world.

The party is in a huge tent in Legoland and no expense has been spared in the decorating (pictures below). Unfortunately, the only legos we saw were at the entrance. Bummer. It starts in a common room with two open bars and then we are invited into the dining room that features dancing girls and a trapeze girl!!!! Lindsey and I started off very slow and quiet. I must say we did quite well with the dinner portion of the evening. Our manners were fantastic and luckily I had been practicing my European style knife and fork etiquette. We looked and performed fantastically. And then then we got a little more friendly with the President and VP. They got the story out of us that we were just party poachers. However, I did promise them an onstage performance to pay for my attendance. We wowed them with our minor Norwegian skills. When Lindsey broke out the formal “thank you for dinner” the president’s wife attention shot over and she inquired how she knew Norewgian. She was impressed. Lindsey also knew, “turn out the lights” and I used my only table appropriate saying, “give me a drink”. There were periodic trapeze and dancing shows over the span of the night. Since I did promise an onstage performance to pay for dinner, I did end up on the stage with the dancing girls doing the can-can. My high kicks were good but my splits were a little lacking.

By this time everyone at the table is having a great time and we are like old friends. Then came the moustaches. There were little party gifts and gags at the tables and somehow Lindsey and I acquired two fake moustaches. They didn’t come off for the rest of the night. That is about the time when the dancing and dodgems started. Everyone got up for dancing and music and they opened up the wall behind our table and they had Dodgems!!!! (known as bumper cars here) This is also about the time that Lindsey and the President became friends. He was quite fond of her. They raced over and made it into the very first round and hopped into a car together. From then on, most of the time if you could see Lindsey, Ruma was probably not far away. As well that is when we started doing shots. After the first round of shots we got kicked off the stage by security for doing the Cowboy Macarena. After a second round of shots, with Ruma (the president), we broke out our Norwegian cussing. It was mayhem. We were in full form.

By the end of the night I was dancing in a cage, with the presidents wife. It was the funniest thing I have ever seen. Pictures below.

And that was our trip to Legoland.

The next day in London we slowly got up, went for a walk, stopped at a pub so I could have my fish and chips. Everyone knows you can’t go to England without getting fish and chips. And Lindsey and I narrowly made out train.

It is now Sunday. In a couple of days we are going to go to Spain. I think we will lay low until then. I hope you have made it this far in the post, because now, its time for pictures!!!

Public urinal in Amsterdam.

BJ and Conor were too big of sissies to use it. I RULE!!!

To BJ and Conor……Fit Adrina!!!!!!! (I have no idea how to spell in Norwegian)

My awesome bruise!

Thanksgiving dinner was had at a little pub in the a surfer town just outside of Amsterdam. Lindsey had a Thai style of saute and I had a fillet o’ fish. I must say I miss Green Bean Casserole a lot. Our hostel was the “Flying Pig Beach Hostel”. As you can immagine a surfer hostel just outside of Amsterdam has more stoners and hippies then you could have ever imagined. The guy runninng the counter was Leo and Leo had dread locks down to his butt. Leo served us shots for a Euro. He is ok in my book. Oh, and a lot of the people are HUGE. They must put something in the water because we saw more gigantically tall people there then I have ever seen in my life.

Ahhh Amsterdam. There are more bicycles in Amsterdam then I have ever seen in my life. They aren’t nice bikes either. Most of them are old and rusty. We saw the coffeeshops, we saw the prostitutes and man oh’ man………………

Apon arriving back in Paris Conor rushed to the airport to catch his flight home. The rest of us have had a nice relaxing weekend touring. The highlight of our touring was the catacomb. A brief history, back in the 1700’s the French were having trouble with too many cemetaries and needed a solution. They decided to build a huge underground catacomb and deposit all of the old remains there. Now you are able to go and tour these catacombs. We were SURROUNDED head-to-toe with the remains of over six million people. It was cool, and yet a little creepy. The hallways were build up with femur bones and trimmed with skulls. It was very creepy. On the way out you have to go thru security and be checked to be sure that you haven’t stolen any bones. On the way out we saw several bones and skulls that had been taken from people who were trying to steal them. As far as I am concerned stealing bones from a catholic grave is as good as paying for a one way ticket to hell. Pictures to come.

And now for what is planned for the next couple of days……NOT MUCH. I have been spending a lot of money so I am going to lay low for a couple of days. On Wednesday we are leaving for London for four or five days. It will be a ton of fun but super expensive.

PS…..stinky cheeses make stinky poops. That is all.

Two nights ago we were walking home. It was about two AM and I had been drinking, but was certainly not wasted. All of a sudden, I was on my back looking at the stars. The pain was ridiculous. My left ankle and my lower back were competing to see who had the most damage…..let me explain. As I walked down the sidewalk the curb changed without me noticing. I rolled my ankle off the curb, which is normally no big deal but I had been drinkng and I didn’t have the reaction time to adjust accordingly. I simply fell strait to my back, hands still in my pockets and all. Imagine the scene from the movie Home Alone when the burglars fall on the ice. It was BAD. I didn’t brace the fall at all. My lower back went strait to the curb. It was the type of pain that causes you to go into a cold sweat. No fun at all. Now it is two days later and my ankle is fine but my lower back still screams to the heavens when touched and has a huge bruise (pictures to come).

On to more recent activities. Tonight is the first night that Lindsey and her roomies have been off of school. It was great. I liked the Norwegians already but they have gotten even better when drinking (who doesn’t?). I am learning a little Norwegian as well. I would tell you what I have learned but it isn’t exactly politically correct. The only two words that I can safely say in public are “you” and “face”. I will leave the rest up to immagination. OH! I can’t leave out “snus”! It comes in a pouch like chewing tobacco but is a little less potent and you don’t have to spit. They love the snus. I can listen to their conversations and pick out the curse words, movie quotes and snus. It is actually pretty fun. The other day I was taking a nap and heard norwegian norwegian norwegian “stoner bashing time” norwegian norwegian norwegian. (the stoner bashing time is a movie quote). I was super excited that I heard it. They are great. On to the bad news….. Snus is only sold in Norway and they are running out. They seem to be a little stressed about it.

The GREAT news about tomorrow. It is BJ’s birthday and we are going on a road trip. Lindsey doesn’t yet know the plan but we are going to AMSTERDAM!!!!! Conor, BJ and I have rented a shitty little European car for a couple of days and reserved a hostel in Amsterdam. The name of the hostel is “The Flying Pig Beach Hostel”……sounds pretty crazy. It should be a crazy good time. Of course we will be ABUSING the rental car. Burn outs, e-braking. The whole nine yards. I am super stoked.

I will have more to tell you after the trip but no matter what, it will be an epic journey. We have made sure to be driving during the day so that we can experience the country that we are passing.

Oh as well, to explain the bubble bath. I was being teased for going to the fruitiest country on earth so I did the fruitiest thing possible while here to show them. I took a bubble bath with wine and candles. Ha ha, I win cause your at work!!!!
Adios….

Sidenotes:

Josh…the booze I got from the store is called “Famous Grouse” as close to Wild Turkey as I could get.

TicTac…we will be doing burnouts in every country we pass.

Mom and Dad and family….come on, show some love on the comments or guest book. I love you guys and want to know your reading.

Stuck. Much love and thanks for the site.