We have house

Well, ok, so not quite yet, but we had our offer on this flat accepted this afternoon. We’ll not actually get to move in for another two months, as the current owners obviously need to move out first (and they only get the keys to their new place mid May).

But. We have found a flat! We can stop looking! Yay! I will have somewhere to put my bookcases! Yay!

I’ve just realised there’s another one for sale in the same building – want to become our neighbours? Now’s your chance…

Aargh

Ayn Rand is totally pissing me off. No, not because she’s a reactionary b**ch (though I’ve heard it said). No. It’s because the stupid book (Atlas Shrugged, that is) is actually kind of interesting. Not interesting as in “I think I’ll become an objectivist” (or wtf they call themselves), but as in “I’d really like to finish this”. But it’s so bloody loooooooooooooooooooooooooooooong.

I don’t, as a rule, mind long books. In fact, I mostly think huge, weighty tomes A Good Thing. However, not if most of it is waffle. Or not waffle exactly, but certainly spending 1000 words saying something that could be said in 10. I’ve only read about 300 pages in about a week, and I’ve got 500 pages to go (this copy has 1100 pages of TINY print). That means another week and a half of my reading life spent on this.

Of course, I could just put it down and not finish, but then it IS actually kind of interesting.

Urk.

Addendum: I’ve finished. Also, a point needs to be cleared up: Personally I don’t, as a matter of fact, think Rand is a reactionary b**ch, I’m just quoting hearsay. On the evidence of Atlas Shrugged she seems like rather an interesting person. Her philosophy or politics do not annoy me at all – her verbosity, however, did.

Oooh, book-meme

Banned book meme, in fact.
(Via)

Right. Bold out the ones you’ve read, italicize the ones you’ve not finished, and ** the ones you own, but haven’t started on yet.

#1 The Bible
#2 Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
#3 Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes
** #4 The Koran
#5 Arabian Nights
#6 Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain
** #7 Gulliver’s Travels by Jonathan Swift
#8 Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer
#9 Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne
#10 Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman
Read More

Thump

With a very soft sort of thump I think I may have come back down to earth after having been in some sort of levitated state after the bidding on the flat closed. For a few brief moments when we get the payment for the flat and before we close the current mortgage I’ll actually be a millionaire. It’s a pity a lot of it technically belongs to the bank. Still, we got 150000 nok (that’s somewhere around 19000 usd, 12000 gbp) more than I had ever dared to hope for, which can’t, in any way, shape or form, be bad.

Juhuuuu!

Ok, so perhaps I’m not quite back down to earth just yet.

Uæææææææææææ

People ARE actually bidding like mad. Crikey. The Champagne is coming out – we just need to get to the end of the bidding war first.

I’m supposed to be working right now, but can’t see much chance of getting anything sensible done until it’s all over… And Martin’s at work, so I can’t talk to him – I had to call my mother instead. I think I’m going mad.

Help!

U

People ARE actually bidding like mad. Crikey. The Champagne is coming out – we just need to get to the end of the bidding war first.

I’m supposed to be working right now, but can’t see much chance of getting anything sensible done until it’s all over… And Martin’s at work, so I can’t talk to him – I had to call my mother instead. I think I’m going mad.

Help!

Jippi

Det er alltid grunn til å feire når man finner bøker man har lyst på i prikkfrie førsteutgaver til en billig penge. I dette tilfellet fant jeg Jon Bings Flod, illustrert av Thore Hansen (flinke mannen), på markedet i Birkelunden i dag. Mannen sa “Hva er dette, da? Barnebok?” Jeg nikket entusiastisk “Ja” (det er forbausende mange som synes barnebøker automatisk skal falle i kategorien “billig”, nemlig). “Ti kroner?” sier han (tydeligvis var han ikke noe unntak), og jeg gidder ikke prøve å prute. Ti kroner? Latterlig.

Nå skal jeg feire. Hvordan? Med å lese Flod, selvsagt.

Flat for sale

If you happen to be looking for a bedsit flat in the Sinsen-area, I suggest you have look at this one. It is a very good flat, in all possible ways, and it has served me faithfully for over three years. I would quite like it to go to a good home – so to say… Besides, I’d also quite like someone to pay an exorbitant amount of money for it, naturally. It would come in handy.

The first viewing, btw, was yesterday. Seven people signed up to be kept informed, which isn’t all that bad. We’ll see. Second viewing today, at two thirty, at which point I am planning to make myself scarce and go visit Solveig and see the new baby which isn’t quite so new anymore (getting on for 8 months now).