An erudite dumb dumb post

I've had to make a mad dash for the airport - I've only just arrived with three hours to spare. One thing that is systemic of the Hellberg clan is its aversion to being prompt, especially in airports. Hopefully living in Germany for a few months has taught me a thing or two about being "punklich" and I can kick the "fashionably late" gene.

Anyhow, what brings me to the airport is a mission to London that I'm making tonight. I've got to take care of some such racy tasks like the tax department and banks; should be a hoot. I do have some work to do also, but it's pretty low key.

Anyhow, what bought me to Sweden were the worldwide rumours of beautiful women, and a city that is supposed to match Paris for its metropolitan X factor. The list has checks against all of the above (and can I check the box labelled "Other" too?) - great nightlife, fantastic shopping, friendly natives and gorgeous women. After finishing with a customer project in Oslo last weekend I had to find something stimulating to do and Norway wasn't really up to snuff, so I headed to Gothenburg for the night and the train the next day to Stockholm.

Speaking of snuff, I'll take a little diversion to explain this curious trait that I've only seen in Scandanavia. For reasons known only to Google/wikipedia, a hundred years or so ago Sweden invented little pouches of nicotine/tobacco crud. These fingernail sized bags are placed under the upper lip and release, through its permeable membranes, a good dose of the same cruft you find in cigarettes. Its proponents say that it doesn't give you lung cancer and is more sociable. True enough, but under more scrutiny, they do admit that it does give you cancer in other places anyway.

Anyhow, on Monday, I later found out that there was a RIPE meeting (European network hooligans) in Stockholm, which I was thinking about travelling to a while ago. So at least could legitimize my Stockholm sojourn. I met up with Hannes Viertel (from Juniper) and we toured the local bars at night after the conferences; good times.

I bought myself an iPod shuffle for about 160 euro (1400 Swedish Kronor) and love the thing. I'm undecided whether it'll premanently replace my 15 GB clunker, but I can sense the force is strong in this one.

Stockholm is about 800 years old and has plenty of old stuff to wander around and look at. One noteworthy one is a huge three-masted boat, which on its maiden voyage didn't even manage to get out of the harbour. Instead it capsized a couple of times and sunk, to remain on the harbour seabed for over three hundred years before it was raised up and installed as a museum. Doh!

I'm not sure where I'll be after next week - maybe in Ireland or Dubai, but where my destination ends up to be is as predictable as the weather.