I was in Reykjavik when I wrote this post. Barely made it there on Saturday 6^th January; the weather wasn't exactly ideal for flying. It was snowing in Isafjordur (very Christmassy weather, two weeks late...) and it was dark and stuff, but there was fortunately only a delay of about a half hour. It was also snowing in Reykjavik - also two weeks late; but hey, it WAS still Christmas. LAST day of Christmas, true, but it was. Cousin Sandra Run picked me up at the airport, and we went straight downtown and took a snowy stroll down Laugarvegur - the main shopping street in the city centre.

Oh, it's nothing like e.g. Princes Street, which is basically a mall stretched out into a strip, under open air - you know, like "main shopping streets" are often in big cities. Well, in Iceland, Reykjavik is big. World standards? It's a mere village. And Laugarvegur is like that - a shopping street in a village. It's long, true, but also small and the shops are all kinda quirky. Well, some of them at least. Anyhow: it's way more fun walking Laugavegur than going to a mall - especially if you're not actually planning on buying anything.

And I was not going to buy anything... But I did end up buying a T-shirt at this shop called Osoma (loosely translated as a noun-ish version of "Inappropriate"), where they sell T-shirts, long-sleeved T's, parkas, jackets, socks, badges and baseball caps with various drawings of sheep, with funny slogans. For example "Be Kind" which seems inconspicuous to the regular English-speaker. However, for Icelanders it has a double meaning; "kind" is Icelandic for sheep. So it also means, to us - especially seeing as how there's also a simple drawing of a sheep - "be a sheep". And of course there's that expression "don't be a sheep and follow the herd" or however it goes. So this could also be telling a person to be like everybody else. Nice multiple meanings... I bought a black T-shirt with a red drawing of a sheep and some instrument stuff, with the words "Rock 'n Rolla". "Rolla" is an Icelandic slang term for sheep. The T-shirt is totally cool.

We went home to Sandra's place at about 3 PM - it felt like 5. It was weird. We watched some Ally McBeal episodes; she owns all five seasons on DVD! That was fun. Especially the episodes in which Josh Groban sings! Gawd, his voice is so beautiful. We had dinner and watched the news, and later in the evening we went to her friend's house, as well as a few other people. I'm not being sarcastic; there were only a few. This was not a party - only a meeting of friends plus a cousin of a friend. It was a bit strange, that there were actually two people there of the '87 model! I thought they were - and they looked it - two or three years older than me, like everyone else there. It just goes to show: It's been so long since I've been around people my age that I can't even recognise them when I see them!

Anyhoo. It was all good. Later we found ourselves, the four that were left, going on a drive around the city in the middle of the night, searching for an open gas station or a shop for ice cream. We ended up at the "Aktu taktu" drive-in, and we all had this thing called "snuningur" or a twist, and it's regular ice cream in a box, with bits of all kinds of different sweets thrown in - you can choose 3; I chose, e.g. licorice, Smarties and Daim-balls. You could also choose from Snickers, Mars, Milkyway and some other stuff, and ice cream sauce as well. Dee-lish.

Having gone rather late to bed, we woke up rather late on Sunday. The day was spent lazing about: I pretty much lay on the sofa with my laptop writing and playing spider solitaire, whilst watching Ally McBeal. Even though I had slept a lohohot, and not really done anything, I was shattered. It wasn't until the evening that I properly woke up, when Sandra and I took a walk outside. My goodness it was cold, but it was refreshing and we had a nice chat. She lives in Grafarholt, a suburb of Reykjavik on the very edge of the city - so far that it's basically in the countryside. Personally I am a big fan of the city centre - having lived there all my life (or what I remember of it); I've never actually lived in a suburb! - but there's one thing that Sandra Run has that I have never: closeness to nature. Seriously, just right outside her block of flats there's the country! We didn't walk there, though; we went in between the buildings - it's a brand new neighbourhood - and somehow we ended up at a place where the view over the rest of the city is awesome. I only wish I had brought my camera. It was dark and the city lights glowed so beautifully. I swear, it was like a postcard. This would have been a perfect place to watch the New Year's Eve fireworks...

On Monday morning I went to school with Sandra; I spent about an hour in the library reading before I walked to the dentist's. It was cold. As in below-zero-snow-on-the-ground-toes-numb cold. But I had my music, and so it was fine. It's always refreshing to take a walk. To my enormous relief my teeth are in mint condition, though the bill was enormous nonetheless. I cringe to think what it would have been like had I had any cavities! But the dentist and her assistant were both nice and told me to say hi to my mum; before the dentist came in, I had a small chat with the assistant, and I told her I'd been in Scotland - of course she asked me if I knew a woman called Vilborg... who's a patient, and alsohappens to live in Edinburgh. I told her that I do know Vilborg; she is in fact my mother.

Another lazy day, but had dinner at Sigrun senior's place, which was very nice. I spent the night at Valli and Sigga's place, and in the wee hours of Tuesday morning ex-stepsis Aldis Maria drove me and Ragga, mum's friend, to the airport. I confess that one of the reasons Aldis and I were so tired - aside from the fact that we got up at 4:30 AM - is that we stayed up a bit late watching the first episode of Heroes on my laptop. I just had to get her hooked, so she can continue watching the series on Skjar1 in Iceland, while I am forced to get my dose off the internet. Which is fine, because it means I don't have to wait a whole week for the next episode...!

Well, I'm back home now, finally! Not that I don't love Iceland etc etc, but I was really starting to get homesick. It's nice to be back. Sigrun Ugla has both binned all her soothers (well, she actually gave them to Santa and got a colouring book and colour pencils in exchange...) and started using the toilet. By her own free will, that is. She now only uses a nappy during the night, and even then she actually sometimes wakes up and tells mum and Bjorgvin that she needs to go to the toilet. She's such a big girl!

If you're Icelandic and know me and my family personally, you can read more on my mum's blog.