DrPeppar is actually named Peter Parnes, and is currently enjoying life!
Idag var jag och Oliver på Monster Truck Stunt Show i Luleå. Det var Aranis Klaas som är på besök! idag och imorgon på Örnäsets IP. Vi hängde på låset 1745 och fick de bästa platserna, översta raden och mitt för planen. Sedan var det mindre roligt att vänta i 70 minuter på att det skulle komma igång men jag och O hade skoj i alla fall!
Här är lite bilder och filmer från spektaklet!
Idag när jag var på väg för att äta lunch ute vid Tjuvholmssundet så "snubblade" jag över lite akrobatiska övningar vid varvet. Ett gäng killar hade byggt en ramp för för att hoppa ut i vattnet med snöskoter och motorcykel. Det tog väldigt lång tid innan allt blev färdigt så jag åt min lunch uppe på bron istället för på stranden. Här är lite bilder och två filmer!
Jag orkade inte skriva om vad jag gjorde på kalaset så jag tog med en sekreterare som skrev ett blogginlägg åt mig! Tack Bea!! :) Highligts:
Idag drog jag ut familjen på en cykeltur, först till Bensbyn och sedan vidare genom skogen till kanten av LV7, Hertsön och vidare ut till Lövskär. Gamla hamnen i Lövskär var mysig och där fanns en hamnkrog som verkade ha mat av lite elegantare slag som såg riktigt god ut! Får prova den någon dag. Totalt blev det 46.7KM cyklat med båda barnen i kärran vilket märks så fort det blir den minsta lilla uppförsbacke. Pust! Så här fint och symmetriskt blev det:
Det var fiskebåtar inne som sålde färsk laxöring som jättegod ut. Får cykla ut dit och handla någon dag men jag undrar vilka dagar de är där.
Olliver och en kanon!
Fiskebåtar!
Hamnkrogen!
Mer hamn!
Allt som allt en trevlig tur!
Sitter här och planerar en cykeltur och det är ju pinsamt att man skall behöva använda en onämnd konkurrents kartor istället. Pinsamt....
Fast å andra sidan så kanske det inte spelar någon roll eftersom det ser ut som om det skall börja regna när som helst! Buhu!
Misshandel på Porsön skriver Kuriren nyss. Bläää. Jag gissar att det skedde nere vid centrum eller universitet men det är ju ändå nära där jag bor.
och ett stort grattis till Johan Kristiansson som fyller 30 idag. Hipp hipp hurra!!!
Fick följande från vår marknadschef Pål Kastensson:
Denna text har tagits bort på marknadschefens förfrågan! (Men den finns i Googles cache ett tag till ;))
Dagens första insikt. Det heter tydligen hållit. Jag har skrivit "hållt" i många år :)
Airborne troops led the D-Day landings in a combined parachute and glider assault, to throw a net of protection around the Normandy beaches, where a massive invasion force would sweep ashore and advance into Europe.
Among their initial objectives, the British airborne units were to destroy a German gun battery that threatened the lives of seaborne troops, and protect the left flank of the sea assault by seizing strategic points, which would prevent the enemy from reaching the beaches.
Preparations had been going on for three years prior to the invasion of Normandy, with new roles being created and units formed, including the 6th Airborne Division on May 18, 1943. The number 'six' being chosen to hoodwink the enemy and fool them into believing that Britain already had five airborne divisions, when in fact it had just two, the lst and 6th, under General Browning.
Operation Overlord 'D-Day' on June 6, 1944, involved the massed troops of two Allied armies pouring into France to drive the Germans out of the country, after the 6th Airborne division had dropped and captured key points, including a heavily fortified gun battery.
The division, which had been bom in 1943, was under the command of General Gale, and included glider and parachute troops from many different regiments, all wearing the distinctive red beret of airborne forces.
There were now ten glider squadrons operating under the control of No. 38 group RAF, and today, at the end of the old runway at Harwell, now the Atomic Research Establishment, a memorial marks the spot where the first gliders left for D-Day.
Bad weather had delayed the invasion by 24 hours, but late on the night of June 5, the force of Dakotas and Horsa gliders towed by RAF bombers took off for the invasion of Normandy.
First in were the pathfinders of 22nd Independent Parachute company, with Lt De La Tour being the first man on the ground. They were tasked to mark the drop zone and guide the parachute and glider units in using special Eureka beacons.
Few were dropped accurately, as the Germans had flooded the low-lying ground around the Orne and Dives rivers, destroying many identifying features which had been given to pilots as 'markers' during the intense pre-flight brief.
Unit planning had been very detailed, especially by the 9 Para, who had been tasked to silence the Merville gun battery before the landings started. If they didn't succeed they would be shelled themselves, by the warship HMS Arethusa.
The huge guns at Merville were just miles from the beaches of Sword, Juno and Gold, where the seaborne assault was to take place and posed the greatest threat to the invasion. Buried under 12ft-thick concrete, the four 75mm guns had the capability to engage Royal Navy warships out at sea and sink landing craft heading for the beaches.
RAF bombers had tried several times to destroy the concrete bunkers at Merville, but their precision bombing made no impression; now the task had been given to the Paras.
The 6th Airborne division was 8,500 strong and included the 3rd and 5th Parachute Brigades, as well as the 6th Air Landing Brigade of glider borne troops, who had been training at Netheravon. Their role was to seize or destroy several bridges over two rivers and the Caen canal, silence enemy positions in the area and secure the eastern flank of the beaches. Here the British Second Army was to come ashore, just a few hours later.
The 3rd Parachute Brigade had to land in the very heart of the enemy's defences and destroy the Troarn, Varaville, Robehomme and Bures bridges across the Dives river, while its 9th battalion hit Merville. At the same time, their colleagues in the 5th Parachute Brigade were given a similar task and briefed to hold the bridges north of the village of Ranville spanning the River Orne and the Caen canal, as well as preparing a landing zone for the glider troops.
More than 200 gliders were towed up into the skies of Britain during the night of June 5, along with a huge force of Dakota aircraft heading for what should have been, the most planned military action of the war.
Flak started to hit the aircraft and as pilots took avoiding action weaving across the sky, some Paras already hooked up and waiting to jump, were tossed out of the doors.
The entire force of 9 Para had been dropped off their DZ and Lt Col Otway could only assemble 150 men to commence his attack. He ordered his men to paint a skull and crossbones on the chest of their smocks as an identifying mark to recognise each other in the heat of the battle, which along with their blackened faces and helmets, served to scare the Germans.
After more of the battalion had arrived, one of the unit's officers sounded his hunting horn to start the assault on one of the most vital features of D-Day.
Para casualties were very heavy, but the Germans surrendered. Then just half an hour before the Navy were to start shelling the Merville guns, Otway fired a yellow flare to signal his unit's success.
Glider troops had been ordered to capture Pegasus bridge, which they did despite heavy enemy fire and constant counter attacks, which lasted days.
Arthur Brock, a Royal Engineer serving with Airborne Forces, was in one of three gliders which landed directly in the area of the bridge and owes his life to his Army pay book.
He was sent in to deal with mines, but instead, found himself in the thick of the fighting. He was showered by shrapnel from a shell blast, sending splinters of metal flying into his chest, but luckily, not him. His Army pay book took the blast and saved his life. 'I was very lucky, but others weren't so fortunate. The shelling went on for hours, I will never forget it, or my pals.'
Just four days after D-Day, the Germans attempted to push through the divisional area at Breville. A battle raged for hours and the enemy lost 200 dead and 150 prisoners to 13 Para, but still maintained their position, threatening to break through to the invasion beaches.
In the days that followed, 153 Infantry Brigade launched an assault on Breville, but were beaten off, suffering heavy casualties.
On June 12, the Germans launched two major attacks with armour support on 9 Para. The Battalion held its ground and beat off the assault, but by the end of the day, the unit was reduced to just 200 men.
Finally 12 Para with a company of 12 Devons and 22 Independent Parachute Company, were ordered to capture the village of Breville, in order to secure the division's sector, in defence of the beach head.
At a cost of 141 men, Breville was back in Allied possession and proved to be one of the most important battles of the invasion. Had it been lost the beaches could have been attacked and the war lost.
virus_norway.txt
DEAR RECEIVER,You have just received a Norwegian virus. Since we are not so technologically advanced in Norway, this is a MANUAL virus. Please delete all the files on your hard disk yourself and send this mail to everyone you know. Thank you very much for helping me.
Ole Hacker
Is the NASA Spirit rover broken? It has failed to transmit data for over 24 hours now :-( :-( I really feel sorry for the guys and gals at NASA :-
SUn, lot of sun today! I like the sun :-)
After a week of really nice weather (sun +5 - +10) we are now back to winter again. A couple cm of snow came today and I can no longer bike (without risking getting killed). It is supposed to snow for another week according to weather.com.
It is a bit windy tonight, and according to weather.com it is "Wind: From the South at 47 gusting to 66 km/h". I am rather worried about the roof over my new patio that I built last summer. It sounds like it is no longer attached to the wall!
Mikael Drugge wrote this small poem...
"The Wheel of Time turns, and Revisions come and go. What was, what will be published, and what is PA7, may yet fall under the Reviewers."
It seems like we got summer time (daylight savings time) during the night?! Is usually advertised over TV and radio for days before the event but this year I haven't heard a beep about it. I had to go out on the net and search for confirmation (and found this that convinced me).
A tip all graduate students and others writing papers out there!
It is always a good idea to have correct grammar and spelling in papers. For some strange reason it increases the acceptance rate ;-)
When working with Latex it is very simple to spell check your files. Just run 'ispell *.tex'. Grammar is harder but what I do is to open the file in MS Word and let it use its grammar check mechanism to tell me what is wrong.
I strongly urge all that submit papers to do this!!
Got a message that my friend that is fighting cancer (mentioned two days ago) is feeling better after a few days at the hospital! I feel so helpless in this situation. You want to do something to help but you cannot really do anything directly. It is very frustrating!!!
It is now rather clear that the extra "tax" I mentioned two days ago will affect the department and not my division directly. That is a relief but it will still influence the department result this year. The sum is 2.5% of the whole turnover of the department.
I can now also say what it is all about as it has been all over the press. The cost relates to Dick Schefström leaving the University after making enemies with many researchers and management at the University. As a "punishment" he had to leave resign and for that he got 2.5 million SEK (about $/€ 260000). I have a hard time seeing that as a punishment though. Perhaps, I should make some real enemies as well and get forced to leave with 2.5 million in the pocket ;-)
I just got word that the close friend I mentioned yesterday is in stable condition after the surgery! A real relief!
Can't Telia ever make anything right? That is a slogan I hears quite often and Telia hasn't earned it for nothing. The latest thing not working is their Unified Messaging system where they are supposed to connect their fax/phone system with the web allowing to e.g. see my incoming FAX messages on the web (and even to get them as emails). This system was rather reliable until about 2 years ago when they redid the whole backend and since then it has been very unreliable :-/
I am sitting here waiting for a fax I have in my fax box to appear on line and in my mail box but it never seems to show up. The fax is actually a recipe for waffles from the hotel I stayed at last week in Umeå!
I am currently taking part of 18 months long management education as part of my employment at Luleå University of Technology (I am an assistant professor). The first part was the whole first week of February and the main goal of that was to get to know yourself better. I have to admit that the week was very tough and very intensive, I was "dead" all of the weekend after I got home.
Today, was the first follow up with the organizers (Personal Management International - PMI) and I sat down for 1.5 hours with Freddie Lyngeraa and it felt really good to discuss all the issues again. Doesn't it always feel good to be the total focus of a conversation ;-)
The real challenge is to apply everything one has learned in the process to ones daily life, both professionally and at home! I am convinced though that I have taken some clear steps in the right direction towards becoming a better being. Have you noticed a change? Please, let me know!
If you get the opportunity to take a personal development course, take the chance, it might be your best experience in your life!
Just wanted to write that I am very proud of my graduate student Mikael Drugge. I just read a draft of a paper he is writing on and it is very good. This is the cyborg I mentioned yesterday!
I just saw the movie Sällskapsresan aka The Charter Trip. This is one of the best Swedish movies ever made but if you are not a Swede you would probably not get the humor :-) If you haven't seen it, see it, if you have see it again! I must have seen it at least 10 times and it only gets better each time :-) Plot summary from IMDB:
"Stig-Helmer Olsson isn't the fashionable, jet-set type, but for the first time in his life, he's gonna travel abroad. He takes a trip to the Canary Islands over the christmas. Before leaving, his doctor asks him to bring a package to a friend of his. Without Stig-Helmer knowing it, the package contains 50,000 SEK, which of course is illegal to take out of the country. However, Stig-Helmer's bag with the package disappears at the airport. Dr. Levander's friend believes that Stig-Helmer has stolen the money and is anxious to get them back."
Going to Umeå and need a hotel? I can very highly recommend Comfort Hotel Uman on Storgatan 52. I have traveled quite a lot in my life (that makes sound really old ;-) and I have to say that this is one of the best hotels I have ever stayed at. The welcoming I got from the lady in the reception was really overwhelming and I felt "at home" immediately.
The hotel is rather small with 89 rooms but it offers large nice rooms, sauna with free beer, free dinner buffee (simple but very tasty, salads, "sill", bread, pasta and meat sauce) server until 22.00, normal size breakfast buffee with fresh waffles. On Mondays the manager offers a free glass of wine. And if you enjoy movies, I know I do, then "Filmstaden" is just 100 meters away.
The Blog wave finally caught up with me and I have started yet another journal type service over. The first I ever started was actually a service I called "news" where I reviewed ALL new websites that appeared on the WWW. How did I manage to do that you might ask? Well, this was back in 1993-94, before Internet was invented ;-). Back then everybody that created a new site (or modified it heavily) posted a message on a Usenet news group (also known as Google groups) and I checked it out and wrote a short review. I kept this up for about 1 year (updating it daily) but after mid 1994 it just became to much work (to many sites to review). Unfortunately, I don't have any copy of these news pages anymore but if anybody out there that was around on the WWW 1993-94, and have a copy of this pages I would REALLY appreciate an email!
My family and I will be adding "interesting" blogs about what is happening in our lifes in Luleå!
