There aren't enough days in the weekend. ~Rod Schmidt

 It's blurry and should probably be deleted.... but my nephew is cute whether blurry or not... I think that this was his "oh my God, my first myspace photo... - face palm"

 He and his dad turned out not as blurry..... very cool persona in S'krok

 This is a thought for an ad for Gæðingur Öl, the local brew... even Henry wants to have a hand in it.

 Eating graut... fruit compot.  Henry liked it - Amma liked that he liked it.....

 The weekend was spent on and off at the local business show.  A place for all the local businesses to showcase what they do... Basically it was a good excuse for a chat with people you sort of know but don't meet on a daily basis, my company had a small corner, where we offered a taste of bread made from local wheat and barley.  The bread was made from wheat and barley from my cousins farm.  We also had a few mink skins to show people...  those minks skins that you see there... worth a bundle (and I mean a bundle)

Rosa and Svanhildur at the booth for local tourism

My cousin Herdis was promoting her café at Áskaffi.... here she is discussing things with a local member of parliament..... She is a total hero... baked pancakes in situ the whole weekend!

In other news I went to a mini concert thingy at Mælifell on Thursday night with a band doing Leonard Cohen covers... I was sort of in a mixed mood about going to see a cover band, they can really be really bad, but, I was pleasantly surprised.  What I wasn't happy about was the lack of people attending..... a band of six played for an audience of 5.... kinda sad.  But they were fine, it was nice to get a bit of Leonard back into ones life.

Friday night was another mini concert thingy at Mælifell, this time locals - Contalgen Funeral, and this time there was a far better attendance - 69 is what I am told.   They were quite entertaining... the evening moved on to the bar across the road... then an after party at my place... not the best thing to do when one needs to get up the next day...

Saturday night, after my stint at the business show, was good, I had dinner cooked for me...( mum was on a trip with the choir).  Foal steak, twas very good, especially since I didn't have to cook it myself.  It really is nice to be spoiled.... and I was.

Today I took mum to the show, where she met up with her sisters and they all went up to Tunga together to visit their brother.  I did my stint there and took the stuff back to the office with the help of the amazing Brynja... I really need to do a post about Brynja... an amazing human being.

Freyja obviously was a tad pissed off with my absence this weekend... All was made good when I took her for a walk tonight and we met Nina and Kristinn on the beach...

Oh people, it's amazing that I am feeling so happy about life when I know that I am soo sooo soooo far behind at work.  Nah, am sure all will be well in the work front - it usually is.  I trust that life is being as good to you as it is to me.....

There shall be eternal summer in the grateful heart. ~Celia Thaxter

It's the first day of Summer in Iceland.  It's one of those old traditions dating back to God knows when - before the other traditional holidays and dates came into play.  The third Thursday of April is always the first day of summer, and on this day one hopes that summer freezes into winter - ie that there is frost over night but that it goes with the morning sun.  Today was one of those..... Bodes well.  Oh I forgot to say - in  case you didn't know - the first day of summer is a public holiday!!!!  Yippeeeeee!

Here's the cutest kid on the block.  Such a cute dude.

 See, he even knows how cute he is!

He also has the cutest parents in existence!

 Henry's uncle Kristinn is visiting at the moment, we had a nice one on one the other night - I always like talking to Kristinn, he makes you think about what you are saying and why you are saying it.  Sometimes it's a challenge - but even then it is thoroughly enjoyable.... Thanks Kiddi, twas good.

 Here we are at mum's enjoying this first day of summer....  it is truly amazing what a difference a sunny day makes!

 The dudes....

 The dog

 The fam

 The dog ... again.....

 Ross looking extremely tough.... Olga and Henry exploring the mess in mum's garden.

 The madams made pikelets today - they had a bit of a problem with the electricity - but I have a key to the museum where the power board is so was able to help them out.

 The fjord.

 Our grassy stretch along the sea road

 Our mountain - Tindastóll - mountain chair

Looking back to mums

Happy summer everyone and again - thanks for the winter!

Men fight for freedom, then they begin to accumulate laws to take it away from themselves. ~Author Unknown

Went on a road trip  to Reykjavik today, left around 8:30 and got home at 8:30, the reason, to try and find out if the Environment Agency in Iceland is really as boxed in to the unreality of the regulations that they need to uphold.  The answer: yes.  I can understand where they are coming from, but ..... sometimes you need to communicate and not dictate and if you are dictating then the commands need to be clear and an indication given as to the correct actions.  We here in the North are pretty good at our rubbish sorting, collection and disposal, we have one problem - one we would like to eliminate - it will take time, which they feel they have already given us.

We currently have a rubbish tip just outside of town that has been in operation for over 30 years.  At the time that we opened the pit we got an open ended permit – these no longer exist, but ours is there - legal and all, but they want us to renew it under the new regulations....  Since this tip opened a lot of legislation and regulations have been introduced in order to reduce contamination of ground water etc.  Which is all well and good.  Our tip is on the side of a cliff, if there is any ground water contamination it goes out to sea... a very big sea... it has till now had no effect on the wildlife on our coastline, no one fishes there.... it's also near the river mouth – with the currents from the river taking all debri out to the fjord, which is to all those that have ever been on it, is very clear and very clean.   However, we need to upfill 7 directives, otherwise day penalties will be enforced.  Now, my question is – why, (when they know that we are doing all we can to reduce rubbish, recycle more), are they doing this?  I just don‘t get it.....   It would be cheaper for us to stop recycling and send everything to the rubbish dump in the fjord to the west, but oh no, we recycle, sort etc and send stuff to the fjord in the east for mulching, to Holland for further recycling, pick up dead animals from farmers and do what we can to make this a clean green fjord.  

Yes I am pissed off.... I have always viewed myself as a bit of a greeny – I want a sustainable way of life, where we respect nature and try not to have too much of an influence – but the environmental agency in Iceland has totally lost the plot in regulations and in creating jobs for young lawyers, who have never ever ever experienced the realities of life nor care to help in  finding solutions.... Yes I am pissed off......

Sunshine is delicious, rain is refreshing, wind braces us up, snow is exhilarating; there is really no such thing as bad weather, only different kinds of good weather. ~John Ruskin

This has been a busy week or two.  The biggest news in my life is that I am now the owner of a new fridge, this is the old fridge - it was a good fridge and is still functioning and will go to a good home...  The fridge was forced to go as I got offered a new one for a good price, downside, the new fridge has no freezer - upside... mum has both a chest freezer and a very good fridge with freezer.... we can share.

 Goodbye old fridge and thank you!
The weather has been very strange, spring is springing but winter won't let go.

 I once did a photo blog of my trip to work when I was at Hólar.... this is now my trip to work, taken from outside mum's (house next to mine) looking down the street that I walk every day.  My office is in the green building on the left at the end of the street.

 Looking back to mum's and Ólafshús

 the only road that I need to cross.

 The view from my desk - not bad hey! I will update this photo as progress is made on our new small boat harbour which will be where that grey shack is at the moment.

 Then it snowed.

 Last night Orri came over - he lives across the road from mum (guy on the right), we have been talking about setting up a district group for the old town - to pressure the council (me) into doing stuff for the old town.... We went on a walk around to check out what is going to be done, what should be done and trying to prioritise.  We dropped by my second cousins house (Rúna - on the left) and also to see their cellar.... so nice - they have done so much work and it is just the greatest, I would love to own this house - especially now that they have done all this work!

 Then it started to snow, this was taken just after lunch as the snow was starting to melt away.  I went with Árni to check on his dad's sheep, one ewe had lambed the other day, so we went to check on the rest to see if any other new lambs had arrived - none had thankfully.

 As you can see it was really foggy too.

 Aren't they just beautiful.... Sheep are great.

 So are horses...

 Driving back to town the fog had lifted, but you could still see it over the middle of the fjord and then the mountains to the east towering over the remains.

 Freyja was pissed off - she didn't get to go to the farm... but I did let her stay outside in the sunshine!

Oh... and here's my new fridge.

There's something in every atheist, itching to believe, and something in every believer, itching to doubt. ~Mignon McLaughlin, The Second Neurotic's Notebook, 1966

I know that this really had nothing to do with me... but I did ask for it - demanded it - road signs in our town of Sauðárkrókur.  I used to drive out of town to the main sign (that had a map on it) to find out the names of streets and where they were....  Now all the streets in town are well marked.

 My little grand nephew Henry - such a cutie!  Had another great weekend, started on Friday night with Foal curry, Saturday night back of lamb with Olga, Ross, Henry, Ma, Maggi and Árni (complete with a late night out - which was probably not a good idea) and today the confirmation of one of my cousin Gunni's children - Hrafnhildur.

 The confirmation took place in a church at the southern end of the fjord, mum and I were a tad early so we went for a little walk.  It had snowed a little last night, but the weather was quite balmy, it actually felt like spring, there were lots of swans on the paddocks along with a few geese.

 I didn't take any photos during the confirmation - which was a beautiful ceremony and reminded me of my own confirmation 37 years ago.  Icelanders are mostly of the Lutheran religion, our confirmation occurs on our 13th year.  It's all about confirming your baptism in the faith and also is the first holy communion.  Hrafnhildur was confirmed on her own today - I think that there were 24 of us when I was confirmed.  My religious beliefs fluctuate a lot.  I don't like what the church has done in the past or what politicians have done using Christianity as an excuse, but, I do like how I feel in church, I like having a chat with God, - for the atheist just call it my imaginary friend - there is nothing wrong with that is there?  I don't like how it f´´ks people up, makes them doubt themselves and their worth.  Enough ranting, today was a nice day - spent with the nicest of people.

 Hrafnhildur's grandparents are Siggi and my mum's sister Maja, here she is wearing the Icelandic national dress.  Siggi is almost blind - but you can still see the admiration in his stance.  They had 9 children - I have no idea how many grandchildren and now the great grandkids are arriving by the handful.  The majority of them were there today.

 Such great kids, they had a long table to themselves, it was so nice to see how well they all get on - these kids aren't just related - they are friends.  So nice.

 One of the lovely ones is Kristin Maria... such a lovely person.

 Here is Hrafnhildur and her mum Svanhildur.  Hrafn = crow/raven and Svan = Swan  and according to the dictionary hildur means battle.  So here we have ravenbattle and swanbattle.

 After the confirmation dinner - we went to another - this time at my nephew Maggi's place, he grilled a leg of lamb on the barbie..... see the snow.... it started snowing while we were at the confirmation.... Winter is back in Iceland.

And... to finish off... the most charming man in Skagafjörður... Henry with his great gran.