Woke up at 7am, at 7.30am, at 8.30am. Then got up, had breakfast, took a tram to the bus and the bus to the office.
Finalized our report of yesterday's workshop. Took shower. Had lunch. Wrote a mindmap for another report. Took a bus
to customer's office. Presented a report, did some sales talking. Took a bus home, had dinner with S in
Weeruska (fried vendace and mashed potatoes), spent 1.5 hours struggling
with my internet providers strange systems, wrote a 8 page report for one customer. All done at 11.30 pm.
Not bad. Some exercise would have been nice to have. But did not.
The ministry of education here in Finland has mandated very detailed work hour
recording. Each employee in the universities, from lowly assistants to the tenured
professors, must record exactly 7.25 hours each day, with accuracy of one hour.
What a way of making sure that inventions, innovations, and great results flow
freely. We will be more efficient in scientific research than the USA in no time.
I have a piece of advice for university staff. Just report as required, but
spend as little time as possible on reporting. Reporting the same hours each
day should be easy. This is how we did it at Nokia. The reports were always on
time but had nothing to do with reality. Everyone, especially the Excel-managers
was happy.
Or goals for 2008.
I won 12 euros in the lotto. On Saturday. On Friday, I won quite some larger amount in Sofigate's
annual personnel election for the most active person in company development. Sure, I like the money,
but I like the recognition even more. Quite different from Nokia, where my activities and energy were
appreciated only in limited circles. I am now very happy, and somewhat proud as well.
On Thursday, the semi-monthly sauna party again. This time only Olli, Ismo, Aaro and me made it to the
Kotiharjun sauna, the best public sauna in Helsinki. The sauna was good, hot and full of merry, and drunken,
bathers. Afterwards, we had a nice Chinese dinner in Dong Bei Hu and some pints of beer elsewhere.
At work: rather quiet, putting some finishing touches on some assignments, chatting, enjoying the
company of talented colleagues. After work: the above and today some Christmas shopping. I did not buy
anything but a lunch. I hate shopping.
My seat was in the very first row. It is a bit problematic as one cannot really hear the whole orchestra from
there. But the strings and the singer were very much audible.
Oh, music help in inventing novel systems architecting methods, both design and presentation.
On Monday, some work at the office. Later, visiting PG in Maunula, returning via Kinopalatsi.
No luck nor skills with pinball on Monday. On Tuesday, work but no results at the office. Slight desperation
arising. In the evening, listening to Circle. I received Miljard, Meronia, and
Catapult, all of the exceptionally good. Meronia, the debut album, shows it age, but is still
full of interesting things. I like Miljard most as it is minimalistic, close to Arvo Pärt.
Sometimes dreams become nightmares, hope vanishes, living is too hard, and some of us just cannot go on living.
Whenever that happens, those left behind are filled with sorrow, with helplessness, with desperation. And at loss of words. Today is a day of sorrow. The memories remain and our lives go on, a little
poorer than earlier.
I have not spend the whole autumn in Finland since the year 2002. It is terrible. The lack of light,
the perennial darkness, wet black street, punishing wind. I just cannot take it anymore. Drinking does not
help, eating does not help, exercise might help but I am not in the mood most of the time. This time
of the year is just too much for me.
Some snow would help a lot. Facebooking does not.
Some concerts I have been to lately.
I have not woken up the whole week. Still, I have been out and about somewhat. On Monday, though, I stayed at
home the whole day. I managed to do some real work, but felt sick the whole day. Cannot remember anything much
having happened then. On Tuesday, I was able to take the bus to the office, meet some customers at their office
in some other suburb, then returning back home, and mostly idling the rest of the day. On Wednesday, a productive
day at work, commuting bus by and Menno's small Jeep, in the evening the Rosebud party (many friends,
free beer, good music, enlightening discussions, etc), then to Gloria, etc. On Thursday, sleeping late,
reading, not doing much. It was raining the whole day and it was pitch dark. Oh, and it was the independence day,
the official day of remembering all suffering, all wars, and calling the Russians names. You see, we do not
celebrate our independence happily, we compete in whipping up the most miserable memories. Whatever, we did not
follow the official guidelines, the national routines. Instead, we had fun with S's sister and her family.
Drinking Italian brandy, of course. On Friday, not that productive day at work, the RSO concert, then at home.
On Saturday, the sun shone for 15 minutes. We happened to be walking outside then. How lucky! Coffee at
Espresso Edge, for lunch Baltic herrings in the Market Hall, a nap, later at Vanha, listening to the
Valkyrians. Today, breakfast at the Cafe Ekberg with S (luxury pure and simple, the best brunch
in Finland for sure), the concert by Soiva, idling.
Last weekend, nothing much took place. Some cycling, playing pinball, taking trams to nowhere in
particular, having an idle brunch with S in the cafe Luft, more tramming around, more pinball,
more idling. Not too bad.
This week, Monday was just work, Tuesday cycling (1,5 hours, in the cold darkness) and in the evening a good movie
2 days in Paris, Wednesday more cycling and not that good classical music by RSO, Thursday more
cycling, some work, even a piece of cake, and dinner with Maunu, Heikki, and Kristiina
in Dong Bei hu (the best Chinese restaurant in Filand the the cutest owner), today Friday was taking
public transit here, there, everywhere, drinking some Christmas drinks in Voima's party.
Nice wekk, so far. Tomorrow I am off to Tampere for some fun.
I have survived another November in Finland, the first since 2002. It was not as terrible
as I was afraid. Cycling, being out and about when the sun shone, attending concerts lectures
movies, and working just a little helped a lot. Great. Tomorrow it will be December, and the
Christmas party season will begin for good. So many parties, so much beer to drink, so many
friends to meet. I can hardly wait. Cheers to that!
I wonder how facebooking and other socialising in the Web 2.0 will affect our civic life.
The false sense of community, the very ease of taking virtual stands, of making statements,
will just erode participation in the real political process. No revolution, no lasting
change will take place because of even millions of us joining a Facebook group. The only
way to change the world is the change the structure of power. The only way to change to
structure power is to take it away from the powerful, to take the power. And those with
power, with real interests in the status quo will not cede their power just like that.
We have to take the streets, even in the very real and old-fashioned sense. And write to
still existing magazines and newspapers.
I am afraid that the globalised virtual networking will destroy local political processes.
I stayed at home today. S returned from Madrid. She really made my day. It was certainly
out of question to leave home for office today. So, I did today's work at home — quite good
progress, a nice set of slides. Something is wrong with me. I enjoyed working with MS Powerpoint.
A consultant fever. Should I change my medication?
Terrible inflation is aloof. Beer will be 20% more expensive in pubs next year.
The yellow press ran a story about it today. So, a pint will cost some 6 euros or
even more in the bars in the centre of Helsinki. It is way too much. The bar owners
say, according to the yellow press, that they have ask for higher prices as
raw material is becoming more expensive, etc. That is true, but for customers
beer has some value. I think 6 euros is more than the value. After all,
with 6 euros one can buy 2 litres, or 4 pints, of beer in any supermarket.
This is how inflation (due to more expensive energy, population explosion,
erosion, climate change, etc) starts. It will become much worse very soon.
I took the bicycle to work today. It was so hard, the new studded tyres create hills where
it used to be level, and force me to pedal downhill. Quite enough to cycle to the office
and back, no need for any longer trips anymore.
By the way, why are zipper jams so frequent? I almost had to cut my jacket to pieces today,
the jam was so tight.
Now, a vice mayor gave speech. He said that some kind of toll zone is necessary in the greater
Helsinki. He would make all motorists pay public transit fares, which is even stricter than
a simple traffic toll.
The vice mayor is not a right-wing conservative. He is a left-wing one.
I think I will fly anymore, at least not very often. Or even annually. It is time to cut down
my energy consumption even further. Everyone should do so.
Next summer, I will travel by bicycle. To Venice and maybe back.
I was not easy for me to be in the office in time for a meeting at 9am. Somehow I made it, just
to find out that the meeting was cancelled. What a bummer! 9 am is definitely not the time
for me to do anything much. So, I spend a few hours fixing typos in a document I have
written. After lunch, I got my brains back and wrote some new text.
Waking up before sunrise should be against the law.
I cannot decide what to do next. There are many tempting projects waiting, or starting.
And then there are books, movies, plays, art exhibitions. And all the people I know.
Maybe the best thing is to do everything as much as possible. At least I do not have
to choose. Good.
This never happened when I still wore a T-shirt.
I decided to stay at home today. Working at home is quite nice, for a change at least. I get more things
done, can take a nap, there are better restaurants close to my home than close to my office, and
I can listen to experimental music as loud as I like. Excellent.
The best thing, of course, is being able to have some outdoor exercise during daylight.
But it is too easy to laugh at the mistakes of the US government. As if we would be
less stupid. We are not. For example, we repeat the mistake of building more road when there
are more cars. We should have understood by now that building more road just makes space
for bigger traffic jams. Etc.
I missed all movies on Friday (was too tired and they decided to do some long overdue domestic chores). But
I made it to the Äänen lumo consert in Kuudes Linja.
(Musicnaut was there already.)
I saw three performances. First, Petri Kuljuntausta mixed some noise and sound from the outer space
together with some atonal sounds from his quitar. It was somewhat strange, not vary varying. And I got to
know about the outer space sounds only after the performance, which was a pity. Next, Tape played
some quiet, simple music. Not that interesting. Finally, Pain Jerk hit the floor. His noise was
very powerful, very impressive, and even his stage performance was something to look at. And his long
hair something to envy. Very good noise, very professionally played, no problems with the machines.
On Saturday, first some Russian contemporary experimental movies. Some of them were excellent, puzzling,
philosophical. Some not, some were not to my taste. Maybe they were too difficult for a novice like me.
Zidane was one of the best movies I have ever seen. It was beautifully shot with 17 different cameras,
all of them focused on Zidane for a whole soccer match. We could see the concentration, the movements,
everything. It was so moving, especially with the music and with the words of Zidane on the screen.
I would like to see the movie again. The last movie was Circle about the band called Circle. It was a bit
too long, the last 30 minutes it was going in circles, and in not-so-creative ones. But beginning was interesting.
The band use the method of creating artificial, ad hoc rituals for enhancing their creativity.
A good point — we all should give up the normal routines and rituals every now and then. It would makes
us see the world and our lives in new light.
Later on Saturday, in the club Gloria, Alan Wilkinson and Eddie Prevost played maybe the best jazz
I have even heard: such sizzling energy is impossible for me to describe in writing. Alan plays
saxophones, but in a way that I have not even dream of ever. Eddie's drumming has a rhythm, but
the rhythm is just a minor part. He plays his drums as a pianist plays piano. I bough a CD
Along came Joe. It is so explosive that one can only listen to it when one has a lot of energy.
One cannot listen to it late in the evening. It is too much then.
On Sunday, later.
Make love, music, paintings, video, art, children, pottery, or even reality TV, but do not make war. Please.
