This is a test posting to see if the new Blogger works and posts the way it’s supposed to. Räksmörgås.

I’ve started adding Swedish blogs to the ODP again; I’ve had a lot of sites in the unreviewed queue but now I’m making some inroads, listing Swedish-language blogs and sending Finnish- and English-language ones to their respective categories. It’s not a fast process, for I have a gazillion other things to do, but it’s been on my mind almost to the point of being an idée fixe for some time now and even half a dozen added links is progress. (The updates aren’t visible yet, by the way; there’s a delay due to server upgrades being made.)

Maybe I should apply to edit in the English-language blog categories, too, some day, so I can list links there as well. The backlog there is huge, apparently. Not today, though. . .

The exam did go well — amazingly well, in fact. Which leaves me feeling much less panicked about all the other things I need to do; need to have done some time ago, as a matter of fact.

Have read about three quarters of Harry Potter 5. There are a number of books I am more eager to read, as a matter of fact, but I don’t want to find out what happens in this book before having read it myself. . .

And I’ve started singing in another choir. Went to my first rehearsal tonight. Or, not so much a choir as a group; I don’t think you can call 9-odd people a choir exactly. . .

Bonadea tells me it’s bedtime, so that’s enough disjointed thoughts for now. I’m extremely happy about the exam result, though.

Woke up this morning to a snippet of radio history: 45 minutes of interviews and reports by Barbro Alving, one of my personal heroes. This was the war-scene correspondant Bang; her causerie self will speak in the programme next week. I’d never heard her voice before as far as I know; my knowledge of her comes from her books and the books about her I’ve read (I own 24 books by her and have read another half a dozen or so — they are difficult to get hold of. I want all of them. She’s brilliant.) And I wish I could set the alarm for next Saturday morning already; I really don’t want to miss that programme.

I read in the paper yesterday about a young boy who worked in a hotel reception during school holidays. One Midsummer’s Eve, a middle-aged American couple checked in, and asked him what this Midsummer thing was all about. The boy, wanting to give the historical background of Vikings and fertility rites (evinced by the shape of the midsummer pole), groped for words and finally came up with “Oh, it’s a kind of erotic festival. . .”

Oops.

So, it’s Midsummer’s Eve again, and a very traditional one it seems; 11 degrees Celsius and an intermittent light drizzle. We’ll give the quaint festivities a miss this year, too.

Happy Midsummer!

Five years ago, today.

We’ve later found that some other random people chose the same day we did; long enough ago that we can’t really accuse them of copying us, though.

The antidote to Nippits: Nipplets! Equally weird and equally annoying but in the other direction… this is an odd and interesting world, indeed. (Via Jorun.)

I think the exam went well, by the way. I won’t get the results until next week, but I’m not particularly worried. Writing an exam when you’re the only person taking it is rather different from what it was like as an undergrad, when we were usually 50+ people in a large hall; I sat in a tiny room and was free to go out and get more tea as often as I needed to, I didn’t have to sign a sheet of paper when I went to the bathroom and nobody was watching me as I wrote. I much prefer this way. And I rather liked my supervisor’s comment when I handed her the papers after I’d finished, too: “I’m so happy with the questions I wrote that I’m sure I’ll be happy with your answers, too!” Commendable attitude 🙂

Gentle Readeres,

I must crave your Indulgence and begge ye to forgive mee, for I am sore behinde in my Wrytinge / but bee it the Case that the next Daie I must sitt an Examm in Englysshe his Historie from the Yeare 1500 too 1700 / and I amm notte suffycientlie prepaired.

As can be seen from that dreadful travesty of Early Modern English. Keep your fingers crossed for me tomorrow at 10am CEST!

I haven’t seen The Silence of the Lambs, but know a little about the plot and have seen short extracts of it. . . and enjoyed Silence! The Musical. (via Projoy in the Hyperlinks Game.)

Now, then. Nipples. The cause of this post is this web site; don’t worry, it’s not the kind of site that could make company firewalls go KLAXON if you access it from work. They sell a product that helps women conceal their nipples. Correct me if I’m wrong, but don’t we all have them? (Saving those unfortunate people who have had breast surgery, but that’s a very different situation.) So why should they cause embarrassment? I am sure that some people do think it’s awkward when they show, but then again, usually that’s because of the temperature rather than anything else, and it happens to everybody. I don’t mean to belittle people’s social phobias or anything, I do often feel uncomfortable in social situations myself, so of course I can understand it, but selling this kind of product (let alone marketing it as the answer to every woman’s wishes) only confirms that embarrassment is the natural feeling, that having your nipples show through your clothes is on par with wetting yourself or something.

So it’s Shave your legs, Operate on your nose, Hide your nipples, Look like Barbie. . . I’m not outraged, it’s not worth getting all worked up over, but it does make me sigh very deeply.