New Conversations

Christmas was a bit different this year - with Norway right before it, me in and out of bed (mostly in) but the one constant that has not wavered is (since Jessie moved out to a group home) is having Jess here for 3 days. OK, really a half day - Christmas Dinner, Christmas Eve, Christmas Day ... survive, survive, survive, and then on to the day after Christmas when we take her home - sometimes in the morning - sometimes later than that - but it SEEMS like 3 whole days ....

This year was no different. I may go back and fill in the blanks from my beautiful evening on Karl Johan's Gate to sitting here on the day she is leaving the day after Christmas, or maybe not - we will see how the week goes.

But one thing I wanted to write about (enough to get me out of bed a 4:30am after finding my notes on the conversation) was my new conversations with Jessie. She seems a bit more mature in her conversations with me - this is an

INDESCRIBABLE,

IMMEASURABLE

joy to me.

To ACTUALLY have a conversation with my daughter! Not some back and forth .... whatever ... with someone with a three year old mentality.

There are still the "Thank you so much for the clothes, Mom", and "Thank you so much for Aladin, Mom", and "Can I have "x", "y" or "z" food item?" but we reached a new level in conversations and an understanding of sorts on Christmas Day ....

Jessie: "Mom, sometimes you get mad at me. You were mad at me last night."

Lori: "Yes, Jessie - sometimes I get mad at you. But I also get frustrated with you. Last night at 2:00am when you got up and wanted to see Daddy - I was frustrated with you - do you understand that? I was not mad right then."

Jessie: "But you get mad at me."

Lori: "Yes, Jessie, I do sometimes and I am sorry. But last night when I told you that you couldn't go see Daddy and you started with that screaming and fake crying (that you can totally turn off in a second) that woke everyone in the house and probably the neighbors houses? Yeah, I did get mad at you. Mommy does not like it that you just throw a huge ... very loud ... fit to get your way. And it makes me mad. Does it make you sad when I get mad at you?"

Jessie: "Yes"

Lori: "Then why do you throw fits when mommy says no?"

Jessie: "I don't know, I'm sorry Mom."

Lori: "How about this - I will try to not get mad at you if you will try not to do that screaming, head spinning 360 degrees thing where you wake the neighbors .... is it a deal?"

Jessie: "Deal"

Jessie walks away, stops and turns back around to me: "I love you Mom ..."

Lori: "I love you too Miss Jess" (whispering as she watches her beautiful, grown daughter walk away from her "oh, so, so much more than you will ever, ever know sweet baby girl ...")

Karl Johan's Gate

To those of you who have never heard a Norwegian pronounce the most famous street in Oslo - it is pronounced: "Carl" "Yo-hans" "Ga-ta" (Gate = Street and they always put an "a" sound when the word ends with an 'e' - there you go - your trivia for the day ...)

I got up - rather leisurely and noticed that it was raining ... hard.  So I went back to bed.  Very tough day.  But after I was actually up and had consumed my 2 croissants with approximately 1 cup of raspberry jam, and back down in the room - I was feeling a bit of 'cabin fever' and had wanted to walk Karl Johan's Gate today and take photographs of all of the marvelous old buildings - but ... ick.  I could go out, get a bit wet - which I don't mind, but my camera would also get wet and the pictures would be crap ... so what would be the point?

Went downstairs (I had been thrown out of the room by Housekeeping) and shot the crap out of anything and everything that looked the least bit decorative in the lobby while Norwegians stared, spoke softer when I approached their comfort zone, and rather quickly wandered to another part of the lobby.  Why?  Me: a wild looking woman who had been thrown out of her room, not particularly dressed for that (but not buck naked either ...) hair uncombed in an unruly ponytail and a bit of a crazed look in her eye with a couple of cameras and shooting a TON of photos of basically nothing (I'm pretty sure some of them were convinced that I was mentally unstable bad / or mentally handicapped. Hmmmmm ... that talking to myself probably didn't help anything either ...) if I ran into myself I would saunter off quickly too.

So - I went back to the room, was laying around surfing the web when a good friend from here in Oslo called.  We were going to meet up some time this week and she was calling me to tell me that she was stranded for a few days and this would have been the only day we could have met for her.

She lives about 45 mins out of Oslo (made driving in to church fun ...) and up more north where it was also raining - but, unfortunately turning to ice as it hit what ever it landed on since the temp was a degree below freezing.  So no electricity yesterday to look up my phone number to call me or to write me a note, and today - sheets of ice on the roads so no toodling on down to Oslo to meet an old friend.  So we spent a few hours on the phone catching up - which was about the same - so that was good.

It was getting dark when I hung up with Turid ("Turrrr" roll that 'r' "eed") it was about 3:00pm but with the rain and all ... I decided that I would play with the focus of my big camera and set it up on the tri-pod.  

It never ceases to amaze me that I can shoot a photograph through a rain covered window, focusing on something in the distance and the raindrops almost disappear!  So I thought I would set my focus on some fun spots and waste some time ...

This is a series that I shot at a street light down the road a bit.  My 'infinity' setting was not infinit-eed enough to focus very well on the setting, but it had to work for my other shots and by this point I was not very picky ...

The other shots are just as the street lights and car lights start to blur and the raindrops come into focus - makes a funky bokeh circle!

The last shot is the raindrops with the lights behind them.  I only moved the focus - not the lens or the tri-pod - so what is showing in each shot is exactly the same.



That took up an exciting half an hour!

Since it was dark and since it had gone to bed rather late the night before (which was about 2 hours ago as I type - I'm in trouble ...) I decided that a nap was in order!  Lay down and fell asleep!  

JUST LIKE THAT!

No muss, no fuss, just fell asleep!


DAMN!!!!


Why can't I do that at night ... oh, say EVERY NIGHT?

Oddly enough - it was still dark when Gary showed up after his meetings to find me asleep in bed.  And ...



GUESS WHAT?



IT HAD STOPPED RAINING!!!

So off to dinner and to take night shots!

Pretty little church on our way to Mamma Rosa's - an Italian place off of Karl Johan's Gate and EXCELLENT:


The one above was taken with my smaller camera with a wide angle lens.  The one below is an HDR composite I took with my big Canon:

A pretty building with the most wonderful snowflakes all over it ... they were huge!

Statue of some dude that wanted to be in all my photos so I let him have one of his own ... don't know who he is (didn't look).

We turned onto Karl Johan's Gate and I set up my camera and took this shot down the street (a pedestrian street for a bit right here):

Another shot down the street, just up the street a bit further:

A BEAUTIFUL building that this photo does not do justice (an aside:  all my photos in this blog are CRAP!  Just sayin'  I don't have all my 'tools' just a scaled down version of Photoshop and Gary told me to go to bed even before I had finished choosing which photos to use, so I spent probably - no exaggeration - approximately 30 seconds on each - so .... yeah crap and throw aways.  I will re-edit the originals when I get home).  There are pretty little cherubs above the door - wonderful decorations.  Hopefully it won't be raining tomorrow and I can go and get all my photos:

A building - not as pretty as the last.  As we were walking towards it all the fairy lights were lined up 'just so' and they seemed to be one continual set - but from this angle they aren't that impressive.  But I guess since I decided to take a photo of the building ... I would take a photo of the building ...

Pretty Christmas tree on the street (OK,a real tree PRETENDING to be a Christmas tree ...):


And - the street dead ends at the Palace where the King and Queen live.  We were not going to walk down that far and night is not the best time to be taking photos of stuff a ways away - so ... crap:

An HDR one from my big camera ... also crap:

Here we have a ABSOLUTELY WONDERFUL building - called "Stortinget" and is their Parliament building. Lovely, yes?


And off to the left of Stortinget is the lovely, old 'Grand Hotel'  I have walked through it and it is simply divine:

ABSOLUTELY, without a doubt, the largest, most hideous sign on Karl Johan's Gate!  It is HUGE!  On top of a beautiful old building and is in every freaking photo you take of the area.  A serious eye-sore - and EVERYONE hates it.

But they make REALLY, REALLY GOOD CHOCOLATE ...

We ate dinner and decided to take the subway back.  We tried to buy subway tickets, but after purchasing one with coins, Gary tried (as did a helpful Norwegian) to feed in a Fifty Kroner bill for the other and it refused to take it.  He only had 2 50's and then only 500's and it did not take such a large bill - so we were out of luck.  It is basically on the honor system - with periodic checks by the 'subway police' and if you are caught without a ticket - it is a hefty fine.

So Gary decided to walk and I was to take the subway:



Gary had said to go one stop East - handed me some money should I suddenly become mentally dense and get lost for Taxi fare back to the hotel (I have no phone so we make sure we know EXACTLY what is going on since we cannot communicate).  I also did not have a key to the room, having left with him I didn't take mine.  I told him if I beat him there, I would wait in the lobby.

Went down into the subway (going East) and looked at the maps - and sure enough - all the lines would take me there so what ever showed up first, I could get on and take it back.  The map showed where I was (the 'Stortinget' stop) and various other stops along the line heading east, but it bothered me that it did not label them - or show me where the central train station is - since THAT I knew was where I was to get off.

But Gary said one stop, so I didn't worry - hopped on the next train and took it one stop.  Walked out of the subway tunnel and was staring at the Church we had been taking photos of!  SO NOT THE NEXT STOP ...

Good thing the Radisson is tall and labeled!  So I started trudging back and found that I could not cross a very busy street - there were no lights and it was fenced off.  But the subway station was right there - and so was the mall that I was at the day before.

I decided to go into the mall and find where I had left the mall the day before to orient myself and (if you read my blog from yesterday ...) sure enough!  There was the deli where I had bought my dinner the day before!  Headed down to it and out the doors to run smak dab into a very concerned looking Gary!

He had been to the room and waited, and waited and got nervous - so assuming I would be coming out of that station - he headed down there ...

So A VERY GOOD THING that I couldn't cross the street and A VERY GOOD thing that I decided to go through the mall to find my way out ...

because if not,

I am pretty sure that we would still be wandering around looking for each other - passing one another on different floors, too dark to see ....

You name it - it would have happened - these things just like to follow me around so


VERY LUCKY TONIGHT!!!


Well, I had better get to bed before the sun comes up ...



Oh! Wait - that does not happen until 10:00!



I'm fine!


** Disclaimer - if you read this ... say sometime Tues evening - you will be reading it before I have even read it through - so probably some mistakes and rambling ... Yeah - like that's going to go away with me reading it again!  But I WILL proof it in the morning ...

Night ....

Lazy Days and Mondays ...

I was going to say that I woke to dreary, foggy, gray, rainy weather - but I never fell asleep, so that just won't do ...

But the weather really did look crappy. All the snow from last night had melted and it was just raining lightly.

I decided to head to the hotels breakfast. As I left my room I thought that the hallway looked cool - so I took the camera that lives in my pants pocket out and snapped some shots. Here are three of those photos - notice how they all are different looking ... partly because of the settings I used on my camera and partly due to some rigorous photoshopping!



Got to the room where you eat and this little beauty was there:
Norwegian 'buffet' type breakfasts are ... complicated! Everywhere we stayed in Norway = if they served breakfast at all had quite a large selection of things to eat.

Here we have the bread selection. My favorite choice since their bringebær jam is TO DIE FOR! (You would quickly notice that it is raspberry jam if you saw it ...). I grabbed a few rolls, stole a small coffee cup and filled it with some jam - some pats of smør (butter) and I was set!

There is the 'Cheese & Meats Area' which has a HUGE assortment of cheeses to choose from - with crackers. In addition to the cheeses there is a large assortment of things to top it with - sardines, other fish, some pasty looking stuff, and a lot of varieties of sliced meat.


They have the fruit area with a very large assortment of fruits to choose from:
In addition to all this, there was a section of cereals, granola's and yogurt. Granola with a soft yogurt poured over it is a common breakfast here. There was also the 'Traditional' American fare - eggs, bacon, but with that comes - a 'pork and beans' type of bean, mini hot dogs instead of sausage, and some other hot items I cannot remember ...

Absconded with my bread and jam (Norway had the MOST DELICIOUS 7 grain bread I have ever had. When my sisters (4 of them) and my mom came out for a 'Sibs Week' (minus the brother) I had bought a few loaves of this bread and went upstairs to change. I came down to find that they had gone through a loaf and a half! It really is wonderful! Headed to my hotel room.

Decided to take photos - it was nine O'Clock and still dark so I waited a bit, then broke out the tri-pod (finally) and started snapping away:


This is the overnight ferry to Copenhagen, Denmark that we used several times. You drove your car on - had a room with two sets of bunk beds and it had a couple of 'Cruise' type floors with movie theaters and dining rooms and such. It was a relaxing (as relaxing as you can be with Jessie on a boat ...) way to get to Denmark.

Here is part of Oslo Fjord:

An older section of town is out my window - and the central train station! It is not noisy at all so that is nice, but not much to photograph - I gave it my best shot!


I don't know if this is still their building but the Aftenposten is a newspaper which I read online all the time - now I only refer to it from time to time:

Cute something with a light house looking thingy on it:


I am not sure, but I do not believe they had these triple buses when we lived here!


This beautiful red building is right front and center out my window and is on one side of all the train rails. It might be a station type building, I cannot tell from here:

But look at the beautiful detail on this treasure:




The sun, having only been up a few hours was waning and the room was getting dark. That was my indicator that it was time to shower and head to the mall for some shopping!

Took this photo at about 2:00 in the afternoon. It is of part of our hotel room pointing towards the window - rather dark for 2:00 ...

Put on a coat, loaded my cameras and wallet in my backpack and off I went - to the mall! Right across the street ... EXHAUSTING!!!

Love that they have these fairy lights strung up all over everywhere:

Passed a brick building that had the most unusual artwork projects cemented right in with the brick - some were hideous, some ... not so much:


And I'm at the mall! Looking for a few things - soap and a TON of juice. I have been craving juices for the last few days and thought I might as well go for it ...


All dressed up for Christmas ...
A shot of the deli where I bought my dinner (Gary was eating out with the work people this evening). I SO KNOW YOU CARE ...

Then home to a very dark hotel room. I decided to practice my night shots. A ways in I decided to practice my HDR night shots. I think they are coming along rather well, but I think HDR is a matter of preference ...


This is a photo at night of the beautiful little building far away up the hill a bit (WITHOUT HDR):
Here is my HDR version using 3 bracketed photos and building it in Photoshops HDR feature since I don't have my other HDR software with me (boy - I am REALLY missing my photoshop plug-ins!):

I like the HDR one better - don't know if that is normal or not ... don't care ...

Again - a non-HDR shot:

And my HDR version:

And I saved the best for last - my favorite - the pretty red building. The non-HDR shot (it is pretty no matter what!):

And a two-fer! One of just the red building and one with the funky white bridge, the railroad tracks and other stuff with it. Both also made with three photos each, but the bracketing I used was spaced much further apart than I have been doing - I like it better like this: (if that didn't make sense and you want to know what I meant - since I am too lazy to write the explanation out, call me - I will explain ...)


And that's it!

All I did on this lazy, hazy, doozy of a Monday!

Off to bed rather late ... NOT good when I am under the weather - but doing SO MUCH BETTER THAN YESTERDAY!


Wonder if I will fall asleep?