Muse Concert

I promised my brothers I would put up pictures from the Muse concert we went to last Monday. It was awesome! I have some videos too but decided not to post them since there are much better versions on Youtube now anyway.

We stood in line outside the stadium for a few hours before getting in. That wasn't one of my brightest ideas, since it was raining the whole time, as you can see. As you can also see from the "grumpy old man face," Morten wasn't too thrilled about the rain either.

We got more excited once we were inside where it was warmer.

We were pretty close to the stage. This is before the supporting band ("The Horrors") came on. They were pretty horrible, hardy har har...

Big crowd. Though the stadium, which is Denmark's national stadium, was actually much smaller than I thought it would be.

There were some pretty awesome video pillar thingies, where the three members of the band would each stand on a pillar that goes up and down. That is them in the middle of the pillars in this picture.

Also some very cool green lasers on some of the songs. The picture doesn't look very impressive, but it was more impressive in real life.

More video pillar thingies.

Matt Bellamy on the piano.

Piano again (tried to get a close up but the lights were too intense for my poor lil camera phone).

I don't remember which song this was.

What I liked most about the concert was how they built up the momentum with long intros and effects. When the concert first started, the band didn't even appear on the stage until slowly building music and effects had been going for about 3 minutes. They really know how to get you ready for a good show.

Here is a video showing another long intro, and the green laser effect:


More piano. Though it's sad that this video stops right before they really got going on this song.


Knights of Cydonia, one of my favorites, was the one they ended with.

faldera and fiddle-dee-dee

I was going to start out by saying that the main reason I don't write in here so much is because I don't have cute kids to write about and post pictures of. But then, most of you also don't have babies but you still manage to write pretty interesting stuff.

I have mostly only been interested in updating Camille's mission blog lately. She is doing great and I am so proud of all that she is accomplishing!

Otherwise, life has been good. No I mean really really good, even if I haven't been blogging about it. We love our new apartment and enjoy spending whole weekends cleaning and fixing it up. Now we have everything we need except a couch. Yes I guess that is a pretty basic thing not to have, but we are just picky.

Work is getting a lot more interesting lately. I am finally past the point of learning the basics - a process that has never taken me so excruciatingly long with any other job before. I really was given a rare opportunity by being hired for this job while so underqualified, and even though it took a longer time/greater effort to get up to speed, I have gotten to learn a lot in the process. Sometime in the past month or so I have crossed into the threshold of programming more complicated processes, and I find it thrilling. There is soooo much more to learn still, which is also thrilling. Yes I know I am a nerd.

Denmark is cold. I somehow forgot that over the summer. Today I wore my big winter coat with another light jacket underneath and I was still freezing. But at least the sun is still shining (sort of) for another month or so. And then it's on to the dark, wet, cold, semi-hibernating stupor for a few months. Gotta love the Danish weather.

Well that's it for now.

Signs

There are some funny signs in Denmark.

This one means "in speed / elevator." It makes me giggle. There are also some pretty good ones by the freeway saying "Fart Kontrol" (speed control), but I never have enough time to get a picture before we drive by.

The other day (or more like the other month...in May) we were walking down Stroget, and we found a lovely street exhibit by signspotting.com. Here are some of my favorites.

After the Wedding

We had a good day Saturday celebrating our friends who got sealed in the temple the day before. Alaina did get a culture shock. Because we sat down by the table for like 4 hours, eating, singing traditional danish songs and listening to talks. But it was nice to be there and see the love they felt towards each other.

On the Sunday after about 6 hours of sleep it was time to get up again and go to church. Because of my calling and my counselor being on his honeymoon I had to go to a meeting at 9:15, so I went on my way there an hour before Alaina... On my way there I discover that I have Alaina's bus pass, so I had to head back and go with her. Which was very nice to be with her, but I missed the meeting. Church was very good as usual and we got to learn about Relief Society in the Priesthood Class :)

After Church we went home and got something to eat. I was really tired and had to take a nap, since we'd been going to bed later, but still getting up around the same time. After about an hour nap we were both tired and grouchy and didn't really wanna go anywhere, but we had to get ready and go to the Fireside at night because I had a part in it.

It is always (almost without an exception) to leave when all you wanna do is lay down and relax, but if you do the effort then you get rewarded big time, and so it was with us this time also. My part in the Fireside was to read out some sections from the Joseph Smith story in between the songs. I felt very privileged doing this and as I sat down towards the end and listened to "The Spirit of God" I felt the spirit very specific again renewing my Testimony of the Truth that Joseph did really see the Father and the Son in that sacred Grove 189 years ago.

It is wonderful to be alive!

Celebrating our Anniversary in Tivoli

I actually began this blog entry on Saturday but got didn't make it before we had to go to the wedding and that is why it is a bit delayed, So think of it as I wrote it on the 15th of August :)

Today is actually a year ago that we got married, YAY!!!! I love being married to my beautiful wife. Every day is a wonderful experience with her.

Today we are going to a reception / party for our Friends who got married yesterday in the temple, so we won't be able to go out together today... That is why we went on a whole day date Thursday. We went to Tivoli (an amusement park in the center of Copenhagen).

We started our day pretty slow and slept in (that is we slept till 7:15 and then there was no more sleep in us). We arrived to Tivoli around 11:30 AM with the sun shining down on us, so pretty much perfect!

Us arriving to Tivoli happy and ready to ride a lots of rides!

We bought a "turpas", which is a wristband that indicates you can go on the rides without tickets, and that is the way to go in Tivoli :) We started out fast to try some of the more quiet rides before going on to the roller coasters and other things.

Alaina proved that she has a very strong voice, screaming of the top of her lungs, resulting in getting a semi-sore Throat :). We went on a lot of Rides and after being on the Monsoon and Golden Tower right after each other, Alaina declared that she felt sick and needed food, for which I am very happy about because then I didn't have to loose face, because I was feeling it too.

The Golden tower is a very fun ride that drops about 100 feet... As we were locked in and was about to go up we both looked at each other and said: "Why are we doing this? We're to old for it!"

A funny little thing when we were trying "the Golden Tower", Alaina screamed very loud on the way down, like she did in all of the rides, but the on the 3rd time we tried it, she decided not to scream, so she stopped her scream and burped instead :)

The rides in Tivoli are fun but since they are limited by space unlike other amusementparks then the craziest roller coaster is "The Demon". It is a very fun ride, but Alaina didn't like it to much because she said she bumped her head on the side protectors :)

The Demon

My favorite rides in Tivoli

1) The Demon
2) The Golden Tower
3) Rutschebanen (The Rollercoaster)
4) The Odin Express
5) The Monsoon
6) The Star Flyer

They have som other crazy rides like the new one Vertigo and The Dragon but we didn't really feel like riding them, or in other words we chickened out. Instead we tried some of the nice ones like The Flying Trunk which is a ride that takes you through the H.C. Andersen universe, The Mine, a little boatride into the mountain and The Dragon Boats, that Alaina didn't master that well, which the video indicates :)

The Dragon Boats

As I said the size of Tivoli and the amusements therein isn't the amazing thing about this place but more how good the scenery and the surroundings are, you can actually go through Tivoli without trying anything and still have a good time, as the next couple of pictures indicates.

Alaina in a little Guard-shelter


Me in front of some of the buildings outside of Tivoli


Flowers in the Park in there


More flowers with a Butterfly on it... I really like to take pics of scenery-stuff


The tower of City Hall from a Tivoli point of view


Us listening to some Jazz music


The Copenhagen Big Band plays every night in there


The Park over one of the lakes at night

Inbetween rides and fun, we ate at Hard Rock Cafe, that Alaina calls a little piece of America in the middle of Copenhagen. We really enjoy the food in there (we had "The Legendary Burger"), the atmosphere in there, the music playing (All kinds of Rock music) and then of course the fact that everybody who serves you speak in english :)

One last story from Tivoli we went over to this Pirate who had his head down to take a picture and right as Alaina stood next to it, he lifted his head and started talking, scarying Alaina a billion!

Alaina with The Pirate :)

That was all from over Tivoli trip, but we will soon write more :)

Sankt Hans Aften

A lot has happened.

1. Camille got her mission call. Ogden Utah! She is leaving VERY soon. We are so proud of her. She will be an amazing missionary! We will be maintaining a mission blog for her.

2. We moved. To a much bigger/better apartment in Vallensbæk. That means we are more into the suburbs/countryside and not so close to the city (i.e. farther from work, church, school, etc), but it is WAY worth it. We have gotten so much help from family and friends with finding the place, moving, etc! They are awesome. I will post pictures but right now we don't have all our furniture yet, so I will be vain and wait until it looks nice.

3. Morten had a birthday. He is now 27. That was a few months ago actually. Wow it has been a while since I wrote.

4. We've been married almost a year. Next month. Wow!

4. I passed Danish module 2 and I will be moving on to 3 next month. I'm not really looking forward to going back to class but I am looking forward to learning more Danish.

5. We went to a bonfire on Sankt Hans Aften, the Danish Midsummer tradition. On the 23rd of June, the Danes light very large fires on all the beaches. It is a very old/important tradition in most of northern Europe, and came from medieval times when it was meant to ward off evil spirits. They even put a fake (life sized) witch on top of the flames. At the beach where we went, the fire was definitely the biggest I have ever seen, covering the same amount of ground as a small house. There were fireworks too. These are the pictures (taken with Morten's phone). It was almost 11 PM when this first one was taken. They couldn't start the fire until it got dark(ish).

Stevns Klint

A few weekends ago we took a "road trip" to where Morten's parents were camping. On the way we spent some hours at Stevns Klint - another chalky cliff by the ocean. It was beautiful! Here are some pictures.




The white chalk looked great under the green water.















We loved the rocks. I took some home to add to our random apartment clutter.









A viking grave mound. It's incredible how they are just scattered around everywhere.



During the "road trip" we stopped by "Stevnsfortress," a tunnel cut into the side of the cliff that was used during the cold war years as secret surveillance headquarters for the Baltic area. Naturally I was curious to go inside but we decided to wait until we have time to stay a while and justify the price.

Undskyld!

Yes, I never write in my blog anymore. Most (or all) of you have probably given up even checking it. Things have been crazy! I started danish classes again on tuesday and thursday nights, from 7-9:30, so beforehand I can go to the gym after work. We will see how it works out (haha no pun intended).

Amanda and Matt were in town this last week and we got to see them a few times which was fun! Unfortunately, I forgot to take pictures. It made me think of how annoying it is that all my friends and their respective husbands are pretty much scattered all over the states and Brazil. Not to mention sisters. But I guess that is what the internet is for.

It has started the whole daylight from 4:30 AM until 10:00 PM thing now. And it will just get lighter and lighter until the 20th of June!! For the most part I like it, but I do tend to get a bit disoriented in the morning when I wake up at 5 and still have an hour and a half to sleep even though it's light outside.

Over all, life is crazy but good.

Jiggetty Jig

We are home again. We got home Sunday instead of Saturday because our flight from Dallas to Atlanta was delayed 3 hours and we missed our connection to Copenhagen! But it was actually really nice because Delta paid for a hotel, meal vouchers, and business class tickets for us the next day. I would highly recommend the whole experience!

It was wonderful to be with the family. Especially since this will be the last time we will all be together for a while because Camille is going on a mission soon. I love the feeling of a house full of people I love, of all ages, all making a happy noise and bustle, laughing about silly things.



Living far away from them is something that has always been a challenge for me, because while I absolutely love spending time with my family and I miss them profusely all the time when I'm away, at the same time I crave the challenge of living elsewhere, learning new things, and discovering different ways of life. It is also best for us to be in DK right now from a practical point of view. Morten's school, my job, etc. I'm learning not to analyze and second guess everything (as is my nature) but just to take each day and its challenges as they come, and do the very best I can with that.

On that note, I started my new job on Monday. It's for the same company (A.P. Moller - Maersk) but it's quite a bit more responsibility than the last position, which presents a big challenge for me. It is hard not to doubt my abilities, but it has only been a week so of course I feel incompotent and probably will for several weeks (or months) to come. My colleagues are always happy to help though and they seem to believe in me which is very comforting. What I have been doing so far is basically reading a lot of manuals about the system which I will eventually support. I have already answered a few support requests so far, but only with help from my manager. Eventually I will get to learn some basic SQL programming which fascinates me. The part that is the hardest is that, in order to be able to do my job which is mostly IT related, I also have to understand how the finance departments are using the system, which I'm not very interested in. Except for that though, it is very interesting and I am looking forward to learn more.

Other than work, we have been spending a lot of time outdoors because the weather finally turned nice while we were away. We got out our bikes again and I am trying to slowly get back in the biking habit.

I also got a lot of scrapbooking stuff in the states and am looking forward to have time (and space) to use it. Anja and I are going to a scrapbooking "messe" in a few weeks - it's basically a fair that lasts all day and we have reserved seats at a table where we can bring our stuff and scrapbook all day. There is also a course we will take. Looking forward to that!

Well I guess that's "it" for now.

Freedom Franks

I couldn't write about it before because it was a surprise for my brothers, but we are in the states now!! We got here to my parents house last wednesday which is also Nathan's birthday, so we thought it would be a fun joke to show up unexpectedly. It was fun - we got a classic dumbfounded reaction from both of them which was great.

It's so wonderful being here. We are enjoying ourselves immensely. As such, this is all I have time to write.

Slackerish-ness

Sorry I am a slacker and I never write in my blog anymore...in my defense I have been very busy/tired/sick (but happy!) in the past month or so. Whenever Morten and I are free at the same time (wonder of wonders) we spend our time together, and whenever I am free by myself I usually have Danish homework to do. Thus, blogging kind of went down the drain.

I started my danish class which is very nice but very time consuming - I feel like I can carry on a sort of normal conversation in danish now as long as the person I'm talking with enunciates and doesn't leave any words out (as the danes have a habit of doing).

A few weekends ago we went to Lalandia with Morten's whole family. It is a big indoor waterpark on another island (north, close to Germany). We stayed in a cabin and Morten and I got the loft. It was a bit cramped but we made it work. It was fun to go swimming and spend time with the family.

I discovered that roadtripping in Denmark is different than in Texas.

Instead of this...


You get this...


And instead of this...


You get this!


Here are some pictures from the trip...

This is Alex and Natascha coming out of the biggest water slide. I didn't take as many pictures at the water park as I would have liked to - there was kind of a lot of water everywhere.


We also made a little afternoon trip to Germany. There weren't any cities close by so the main purpose of our trip was to go to the shop where chocolate was about half the cost that it is in DK. The boat ride was fun, though a bit tempestuous.




Translation: if strange people come flying at your family from all sides, go right!


Hanging out...




This is the ladder up to the loft in the cabin where we slept:






Natascha sang kareoke:


On the drive home we took a detour to Møns klint. It is really beautiful there but that day was really foggy so we couldn't see much of the cliff. It was really cool in kind of a spooky way though, and we got some interesting pictures.