Blogging off

Hello again ... unfortunately I don't really feel the need to blog these days and when, like now, I do get a chance ... I don't really have anything to say ... so, if you want to keep updated with the goings on I suggest you read Joannas twolands diary at www.twolands.blogspot.com ... other than that I am now resigning from blogging and wish you all a good christmas and a happy new year.
Toti

Happy Christmas

Well, it's been a mighty long time since I've written one of these! We've been in England now for almost two weeks and things are moving forward. Jolyon is really enjoying school although he sometimes feels lonely at home I'm sure. He got 20 out of 20 for his mental maths and no-one in his class has ever done that before.

We've found a nursery for Elijah and he is going to visit on Friday and start properly in the new year.

I've got a job! I'll be managing a team of community support workers who care for carers with an organisation called Crossroads. I'll be working part time, 12-5 which means I get the morning with the boys ... and I'll be starting this coming monday.

Joanna is still waiting for her CRB clearance so she can start but I'm sure it will arrive soon enough.

We've narrowed down the list of potential houses after two days of extensive searching and I'm hoping we can put an offer in on one sometime next week. We're also searching for a second car ... looks like I'm going from the three litre beast to a one litre Citroen Saxo ... :-( ... Oh, well ... they won the world rally championship last year .. or maybe the year before, I can't remember ...

Sorry it's so short ... too much going on ... you might not hear from me now until after xmas so ... happy Christmas and have a great new year!

I love you all ...

Irregular blogging for a couple of months at least!

Yesterday was another step towards leaving Iceland. After work, school and daycare we all moved in to amma Kristíns and afi Freyrs' house where we will live until Sunday, when we leave the country. Amma K and Afi F looked after the boys in the evening whilst me and Joanna went to our house to pack up stuff that we didn't want in storage and Joanna is there again this morning.

I drove to the airport to pick up our removal men last night. Their flight was delayed so we didn't get back to Reykjavík until 2am this morning. That is why this blog won't make much sense ... ha, ha ... no, the old musician is quite used to late finishes and early starts! Just waiting for them to get themselves sorted and start packing really, might phone them in a bit ...

Boys enjoyed being at my parents last night, Jolyon couldn't wait to get rid of us so he could have a cheeky night. Then he was so tired this morning after all his partying. A good day all round and we intend to enjoy this week as much as we can before we go.

One last thing! As I had some annual leave left I am taking it this week. That means that today is my last day at work! That feels a bit weird ... especially as I've not told anyone at work yet ... just plan to bring a cake in this afternoon. This of course means that blogs will become rather irregular for a while again. I will try to blog from my parents but we'll be very busy packing and stuff so I make no promises. Then when we're in England the blogs will be quite irregular as well so for a while now, maybe a couple of months ... I can only keep you updated as and when I get a quiet moment with the computer. Sorry about that folks, just part of the change I guess. Hopefully, once we get our own house, the blogging will get back into a regular routine, although it is unlikely to be as frequent as it has been .. so until next time ...

adios, amigos

Shaken, not stirred

Hello folks,

Saturday evening Joanna and I went to see the new James Bond film, Casino Royale. Daniel Craig is one of Joannas favorite actors and has been in films like Falling and Layer Cake. I'm a fan as well ... but not to the same extent as J. It was a great film ... Mr. Craig made bond into a bit of an unlikeable, nasty piece of work, as you would expect a sectret service agent to be. A bit rougher around the edges. This film is worth seeing! They definately didn't just stir around in the whole James Bond thing ... they picked it up and gave it a good shake ... shaken, not stirred ... did you see what I did there? Shaken, not stirred ... good isn't it ... uhmm ... right, let's continue ...

Debbie has been staying with us all weekend and it's been great. After Saturday school we all had a really nice lunch at my parents (we took the leftovers home and had them for tea). Then the boys stayed there whilst Debbie, Joanna and I went swimming in the open air salt water swimming pool near my parents. That, plus the over-the-counter drugs my parents had plowed Debbie with, more or less got rid of her migraine for the time being. By Sunday the two girls were on a roll, quite literally, around the Golden Circle in Iceland, leaving me and two boys in Reykjavík. Jolyon spent the afternoon with his second cousin, Kristján Geir, and me and Elijah went to visit Amma Sigga, which was really good. She kept saying he must be afraid of her but when it was time to leave, he puckered up his lips and gave her a big kiss ... it was so nice! Joanna bought herself a really nice coat on her travels, would go well with leather boots, a whip ... oops ... right, NEXT!

Sunday evening was cool. Me and happy-shop Árni went to visit our friend Fúsi. 15 years ago we were all members of a thrash metal band called In Memoriam and were quite popular. We tended to nicely battle out the top 'metal spot' with a band called Sororicide, who were good friends of ours. In fact the guitarist in that band, my late cousin Fróði Finnsson, was the one who got me playing bass in the first place and hence was the reason I met the guys in In Memoriam. Anyway we met up because Fúsi is making a documentary about the band. It was great fun! It was one of those where you see burned out rock stars sitting on a sofa remenicing about the good old days. It was all very relaxed ... maybe so relaxed that some of the stories should be edited out as they were never meant to be known by anyone outside of that group ;-) We taped about 40 minutes of us talking and telling stories and comparing receding hairlines and growing guts. There were stories I'd long forgotten about partying in Denmark with members of two other Icelandic rock bands, Bootlegs and Jet Black Joe, run-in's with the local over-the-top christian organisations and the story of how I first got introduced to arguably my favorite metal band in latter times, Pantera ... not personally, just musically. Then we compared stories about our children.

Fúsi had also gathered together about four hours of taped concerts, interviews and other material with the band. Most of it came from our drummer, Stjúni. We watched some of this and it was quite funny. We all had hair down to our waist (which is cool), our t-shirts tucked into our tight, black jeans (which is not cool) and looked like we were 12 years old. Blimey, we were young! In actuality I was 17 when I joined the band and about 20 when we took our extended break. Now you all have to watch out for the In Memoriam Reunion gig ... for which I will fly over to Iceland especially! Date to be announced, and sorted for that matter! This documentary should be cool though! I'll post it on YouTube when it comes out for all to see!

Finally, here is what I know of these five young rockers and their 'crew' now. Árni the singer now runs his own happy shops in Iceland and is a happily married father of two children, a nine year old daughter and an 18 month old son. Bass player me is of course a happily married, soon to be living in England, father of two boys, nine years old and 18 months old. Drummer Stjúni is a happily married father of three (I think) living in America. Guitarist and main songwriter Fúsi has remained true to the rock and roll lifestyle, although he rides the fast lane with a seatbelt and drives at (more or less) the legal speed limit. Franz, our other guitarist, I have only seen sporadically since the band took this extended 'break' and the last time I met him was in 1999, I think. I do know he's still playing in bands around Iceland though. Rúnar, our manager is a semi-pro basketball player here in Iceland and has a partner and no children ... that he knows about anyway. Svenni, our spiritual drinking guide during those years, has a Finnish partner and a daughter who is about 1 years old. How times change!

Rock on, dude!

Celebrity gossip (it sends a chill down my spine)

Is it just me, or does Michael Jackson seem a bit ... umm ... odd? Like ... he named his two sons Prince Jackson and Prince Jackson II ... and then he calls one of them 'blanket', presumably named after an item in his house! I don't know, maybe the other one is called 'pillow'? So, if you think money buys you happiness just look at Micheal Joseph Jackson ... he's rich as anything and he's not happy with himself ... he wants to be a middle east white woman! Shame, I was a big fan when I was a kid ... wore the glove, danced the dance etc. etc. ... Now I just find him creepy ... I did even before his infamous trial.

He's not the only celebrity that has strayed away from reality ... although he's probably gone further than anyone. Another, in my opinion, is Tom Cruise. Now, yesterday me and Joanna had a moment celebrating our last night alone in the house on Framnesvegur. We had a meal and watched TV. The only thing on was Entertainment Tonight ... this is an American celebrity gossip program. Just the kind of stuff that turns me green and makes me feel ill whilst winding me up no end. In it they dedicated more or less the whole show to the wedding of Tom and Katie Holmes ... DON'T DO IT KATIE! .... AHHH ... TOO LATE! Sorry, I'm rambling! My reason for finding Tom Cruise odd is, aside from his egocentric erratic behaviour, is the Scientology bit.

I can understand people would gravitate towards a belief that says people are 'immortal spiritual beings' (called a thetan) and will continue to live past the death of the body. Most people have some reservations about the process of dying and this would be a comfort. And if you go through the dying stage often enough your spirit eventually finds its true form of spiritual freedom and you become an Operating Thetan or OT. In my book OT means Occupational Therapist but hey, I might be wrong!

The bit I don't get is how intellegent people like Tom and John Travolta and many more can buy into things like the 'Silent birth and infant care.' I.e. a woman must give birth to her children without any sort of medication and without making any noise! Now, I'm married to a tough woman who gave birth to our two children without using any sort of medication or pain relief but If I'd have told her she had to remain silent throughout, I would not be here to tell the tale! That's just silly! Also, they mustn't breast feed their children and must cut off all connections with friends and family who critisize the church. Members are also pressured into giving large amounts of money to the church and the church commissions 'operations' to wiretap and infiltrate government agencies and individuals that critisise the church. Check out information on Operation Snow White, Operation PC Freakout and Fair Game. It's scary stuff.

Other scary celebrity stuff is the recent racist rantings of Michael Richards, aka Kramer. You can google it because I can't be bothered to write about it ... all I can say is that if that is the stuff that comes out of your mouth when you loose your cool ... then that is the stuff that is going on in your head, even when you stay cool. Appology or not, Michael Richards is a backward thinking racist who is scared of a multicultural society. He should move to Iceland ... then again, Icelandic society appears racist because of it's ignorance to other cultures. Michael Richards is just racist!

Speaking of Iceland ... I was sat in the lunch area at work the other day and there was a conversation about immigrants going on next to me. These two men were discussing what can be done to help people integrate ... learning Icelandic, teaching the Icelandic customs, learning Icelandic life-skills, learning how Icelanders act ... basically ... learning to be an Icelander. This is fine and dandy except that one thing they never considered was what do Icelanders need to do? How about learning to live in a multi-cultural society, learning to live in an international world rather than on an isolated island, learning to show tolerance, learning that communities can co-exist despite talking different languages and learning that Icelandic with a different accent isn't a bad thing but will take the Icelandic language from being black and white to having colour and tone ... all variations. Think about how dearly the british love all their different accents, liverpool, manchester, cockney, indian, chinese ... it's been the basis of many theatre, comedy and drama scetches. The start to great friendships. It's just what Iceland needs ... they just don't know it yet ...

So, there you go ... my whinge of the day

One-way-ticket

We got a really positive e-mail from Jolyons teacher yesterday saying how he is a completely different boy, so kind and caring and clever and fun to be around ... I could go on and on ... We've definately got the old Jolyon back. He's grown in character and inner strength in the way he has dealt with this negative experience he's come through. I am sure now that the experience itself will no longer take away from his childhood, but enhance it, and his life in the future.

Elijah and his childminder Hulda (or du-du as Elijah calls her) will really miss each other. Hulda, if you and your family want to move to England you've got all our support!

I went to the cinema last night with my parents which was great fun. We saw an Icelandic film called children. As a teenager and young man I always felt that Icelandic actors were very theatrical and that this didn't transfer well onto the silver screen. Just prior to my leaving for England some actors, from the 80's generation, were breaking through (Baltasar Kormákur, Ingvar Sigurðsson and Hilmir Snær Guðnason to name a few) who were really good when it came to less theatrical, more realistic acting.

Since being in England a new generation of actors, my age and younger, have come onto the scene. Since I've lived away for so long I hadn't seen any of these people act and I was blown away by their skills last night. The film was a 'low budget' artsy, black and white film ... very dark, violent and real. It was held together by a group of amazing actors of my generation. I have to say though that in the films I have seen recently the older generation of actors has done no worse than my own generation ... I guess serious cinema is just such a relatively young artform in Iceland. I have made myself a promise now to keep a much closer eye on Icelandic films whilst living in England. So ... lots of Icelandic DVD´s for christmas and birthday!

Yesterday as we were all driving home there was a modern version of an old Stevie Wonder song on the radio. I forget which song. I commented something about the guitar playing being very good in it. Joanna said: 'You'll have to find a band in England to play with.' She's right! All this jibber-jabber and poppycock about giving up music is not realistic ... it's just depressive rambling. Playing music has set such strong roots in my soul that I can hardly be without it! That is to say, it keeps me mentally well and I get more vulnerable when I am not playing and lean more towards negative thinking during those long periods of not creating music ... covers or originals. So just remember folks, when I start talking about giving up music or something akin to that ... it's unhealthy negative thinking and has no place here! I will try to remember that but as Joanna knows oh, so well ... I frequently need reminding!

Love

What have we got to look forward to? ... Plenty!

We sold the Beast yesterday! It's all good and well being all cosmopolitan but we've already done the 'having-a-house-and-a-car-in-two-different-countries' lifestyle, and it's not for us. Much better to tie up all the loose ends and start afresh. My dad is pleased as well because it means we're not leaving the car for him to sell. So we say goodbye to the beloved Beast (I'm sure I loved it more than Joanna did, though).

We seem to be managing to wrap up the last few bits here before moving out. Counting days now, not weeks or months. Two days till Deb comes, five days till we move out and movers move in, nine days till Joy and movers fly out and eleven days until we fly out ... I shouldn't have done that, it seems so near. It's be great for Joanna to start work and stuff. I'll need to get a job and I'll need to get a car ... I've said all this before I know but ... ah, whatever!

We look forward to spending time with my parents and we look forward to spending time with Joannas parents but mostly we look forward to having a house that feels like home for the four of us. We look forward to Jolyon being settled at school and we look forward to Joanna working again. We look forward to me getting more time with the boys and in the long run ... we look forward to having a long, happy life together ... wherever in the world that is!

So for now, adios amigos