h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Hi Bx4,

"'horsesforcoursist' of the midstream changeist tendency. I had noticed."

Just call me Zelig...

Marina Lapeeranta

Hi psi

'Just call me Zelig'

OK. You are the 'Blessed One'.

http://www.germanculture.com.ua/german_names/german_names_boys_z.htm


Into the wilderness, where there is no 'cyberspace' to see (possibly) bears, wolves and a flying mammal whose name escapes me but it is not a bat. I may be gone for some time or possibly longer if the fauna is peckish.....

vasta myöhemmin

hey Bored,

apologies for absence, though i do read everything on this thread. ok, maybe i do currently skim over the deeper exchanges between you and psi.....

life here is mighty hectic. main agenda item is my father in law (yes he the Uber Bigot) is having some major medical challenges. at the xtreme end he nearly had to have a foot amputated last week, but it's safe for now. we will be having mum-in-law staying here all of next week as she has dementia and can't be left alone, he's in hospital for at least another 2 months, my sister in law has been doing most of the caring the last few weeks etc etc. all in all, a nightmare of familiar proprotions to anyone with elderly relatives. but we will get on with it with a fixed grin and drink in hand!!

sounds like Finland is better than expected, especially like your mate Jaws (i imagine him now eating cardboard, but then that's how my mind works...)

http://dudesvanyacouldtake.files.wordpress.com/2009/09/jaws.jpg


so definitely, all tales/anecdotes welcome! and the notion of you cycling such a distance is still making me smile. well done. for those distances i'd have thought you'd borrow a motorcrosser or summit...

not sure about the Glasgee Gurl logic. may just ask it outright to set the record straight, but i thought he'd mentioned his missus in another thread...?

so have you managed to have a go at windsurfing yet? i've been going like the clappers when there's been enough wind. may even be improving, though slowly it seems. something about old dogs and tricks...will be out in a couple of hours if the wind keeps building.

have also joined by son onto my membership, and he's already got his sailing cert 1, and can get around on a windsufer on the Lagoon. my wife took a taster sail/surf session last weekend too. as you can tell my 1 escape to Nirvana is being surrounded and gradually invaded by my nearest and dearest. i may have to take up golf**...?!

as for your playlist, i can see 1 vital piece of music is missing. this is, no joking, one of my favourite all time tunes. it always makes me smile. sure you know it too;

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7rwc3VGvlRY


take care, geniet ervan!




**of course this will never ever happen as it is the most evil passtime known to man. unless it includes the words "mini" or "crazy", in which case it is transformed instantly into The Game of Kings.

hey Bored,

hope trip is going well, hoping radio silence is not due to any troubles..?! (sorry for the Yiddishe Mamma approach)


all's well in Brighton, though wind has been either too weak or from the wrong direction. for top times i need SW force 4 or 5 to improve. today all that appears to be on the cards is N 4 at best......... still, in just over a month me and mine will be in Spain, and the windsurf school nearby has perfect conditions most of the week!

the other day there was a program about the evil midges rampaging through Scotland in greater numbers than ever. reminded me that Finland has an even greater problem at the wrong time of year. you being eaten alive, or are the skies free of these nasties?

het aller beste!

hi jank

I hadn't realised I'd been of piste on this conversation for around for weeks. I have been posting a trip diary to the conversation with a fellow biker rg (who was royalgrounded on the Delusion thread so the detail is there but I'll post a summary here over the next couple of days.

In the meantime here is some humppa music to keep you entertained:


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M3ZJEQQkVZE&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8EkJmL1NFOY&feature=related

I'm currently in Helsinki (with the SO) but I'm on the road early in the morning heading north to Oulu.

vm

Hi jank.

Today Started out early (0600hrs) did a fastish run up from Helsinki through (mostly) Bothnia to Oulu), by roads less traveled between the Lakelands and the Bothian coast from where I plan to head back south tho catch the Vaasa-Umea ferry into nort-east Sweden.

Took a side trip to Raumi, one of the few places with traditional Finnish wooden buildings still in situ.

North to Seinajoki ( sadly too late for the Provinnsi rock festival and a fortnight to early for the Tango Markinnat Festival )arriving around lunchtime. Little else to say about Seinajoki except that it has the worse Kauppahalli I've encountered so far. Not even grillis which (apart from one that did a memorable reindeer kebab) I have avoided) so I bought a 'samburger'.

Then Oulu where I rented a cabin on the local campsite, had a sauna went for a meal.

I hadn't realised that 'Finland, Finland' was a Monty Python song although I knew it was authored by Palin. I came across it when he sang it in his post-Python re-incarnation as an Ingerish Broadcasting Corporation funded tourist, crossing I think from Sweden into Finland and being amused hat the quaint 'furrin' border guards didn't want to see his passport. He then proceeded to Rovaniemi to see the 'real' Santa Claus. V.jolly

Otherwise the nearest I have got to a situation where a Python song was appropriate (always excepting the never inappropriate 'Always Look on the Bright Side of Life') was when I pitched up at an ex-lumberjack camp outside Kuopio which featured traditional Finnish evenings involving a smoke sauna (to which since my SanktPeterburg banya experience, I am becoming re-addicted) a pit roast and an exhibition of lumberjacking. I gave the last a miss but nevertheless cue:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VQOMxz-O7Sc&feature=related

I don't know if you can send up a country musically which has come up with hummpa, embraced the tango and had the the sheer genius not only to put to put a band like Lordi into the Eurovision Song Contest but actually then to win it:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XDcpQcUsgqI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xzbxizbc0bQ&NR=1

and 'Sir Tel' was practically apoplectic. Sad that this Scottish contender didn't make it:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tceMc_AEErY

Light winds in Brighton: I had assumed something was wrong given your continuing frequent flier status on the religious boards. The conflict with Mr. Twisty, with gonnagle as his claque, seems to be jumping boards though I am more entranced by the maundering of the scientismologists. Cod Spencerian interpretations of evolutionary fitness and the even more bizarre Ventner debate ( He hasn't (and is not even near) but what would it signify if he had? The creation of life by an 'intelligent' designer hardly seems good news for scientismological atheism).

Sadly, I have failed to gain any direct experience of the wind levels necessary for windsurfing. I had assumed that since training was available on a lake in Karelia that it would be readily available in the Lakelands (where some of the lakes are the size of small inland seas but apparently not. I have high hopes for the Bothnian coast and this time it will be carpe diem.

I nevertheless had some waterborne fun pottering about in a rowing boat ( having mistakenly assumed that 'canoe' meant 'kayak' rather than a repro 'birch bark' design which I failed to master in the time allowed) an actual kayak (which I know how to use although in more extreme conditions), shot some rapids and sailed on a variety of lakeland ferries.

Rather than doing windsurfing in Karelia I did some ultralight backpacking in the national parks. I failed to see any bears , any other large mammals on the flying not-bats though I think I saw. I spent a couple of nights in leantos on the hikes. The area has a lot of military emplacements from the continuation war though these are fading into the landscape. A part of one walk was, on raised duckboards, through some pretty boggy country surprisingly there were no midges. Though apparently they, and, mosquitoes can be found further north.

When riding neither would be a problem and I have an aged mosquito hat purchased in a shop in Glasgow that supplied kit to intrepid global explorers (which I am not). I has been tested under field conditions though 'midgie days' are, because of local wind conditions, rare where we live on Lewis

Anyhow I have just had a relaxing sauna, an excellent meal in a zakuski resaurant (with a quite enjoyable Alsatian 'bubbly) and I am sat outside my cabin drinking a cold local beer while noodling away at this and watching the sun go down at 00.09. The Land of the Midnight Sun!

What was that line from Finland, Finland again?

vasta myohemmin

hey Bored,

glad to hear you're in top shape. will respond at length soon and after i've watched those clips. at Satan's Towers we aint got no Youtube.....

hoi!

hi Bored, funny thing has happened with one of the regulars, Incendiarist Minor no less...... (sorry in advance psi, i think you don't approve much of the poking as entertainment approach to blogging...) the little fella has had a full "toys out of the cot" moment, and of spectacular proportions! if you happen to have a few moments when sipping industrial strength vodka waiting for the sun to set, put on y'r laughing corset and start here; http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/mbreligion/F2213237?thread=7544889&skip=620&show=20#p97651953 i responded this morning to it and then scarpered for the beach with my lot. had a great day 'n all. but whilst SUP'ing and generally having some good old family fun, that thread erupted with another 70 posts added.........!! just thought i'd share. am off now with Mrs Jankers as we're celebrating 13 years of wedded bliss....... de mazzel! :-)

hi jank:


Yes, I had noticed the latest ploy of Mr Twisty™. Rather strange to mount an appeal to the nomenklatura of Pravda-in-Wen rather than getting his dad to you

Given his behaviour on 'Aggressive' and elsewhere Luke6:41-42 would seem to apply though of course we should remember that he is one of the Chosen ('I /know/ I am going to a better place with nicer people') so such rules do not affect him.

Otherwise, the ongoing summary. Despite failing to see any large mammals, bear elk and reindeer on my wilderness jaunts I have now eaten all three (and wild boar) often with mushrooms and berries. Neither reindeer or elk meat is as tasty as red deer venison, imo. I arrived to in Oulu too late for an encounter with this 'deluded'elk.

http://www.65degreesnorth.com/content/view/1520/54/

Aquatics: While I have now been on lake steamers, rowboats, kayaks, Canadian canoes (not wholly successfully), an (engined) tarboat, shot some city rapids and disported with two Ouluan nereids of the Ostrobothnian coast, I have made little (as in none) progress with windsurfing. Aside from Karelia the I have only found two schools both in places that I bypassed. Apparently /the/ area for windsurfing in Finland is Pori just up the coast from Turku from which:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WN8SgC5sGRs

Music: Despite Finland having more music festivals (blues, jazz, rock tango humppa) I continue to arrive to early or too late for these. This trend continues, I arrived in Oulu to early for the Music Video Festival (with World Air Guitar Championships).

Also there is a group from Oulu who as I understand it shout (something I have only come across with the world famous Spivey Corner Hollerers). Unfortunately I have not so far found a Youtube video.

I'm off to the Hoga Kusten so I leave you to fight the good fight with Mr Twisty™ but be careful because it is Lordsdag and his 'Father' may be about.



Var ser du

hi jank

Sorry forgot.... Congratulations

vsd

Hi jankaas.

Guess you were't aware I was on this forum, eh? Pity others aren't aware that you just post on the Religion Forum to poke fun at people..

And your earlier reference to "pug-ugly women" won't look too good when the the dear ladies know.

Still, musn't keep you from your practising, I'm sure you need it!



Ps. My toys are well and truly back in the cot!!

PPS,

Hope the Mods aren't too hard on you, but it's your own fault - chickens coming home to roost, I guess!

Happy birthday!

Bash (aka Mr Twisty)


"your earlier reference to "pug-ugly women" ; what on earth are you on about?


"Ps. My toys are well and truly back in the cot!!" ; i don't believe you.

Mr Twisty


"Happy birthday!" ; as ever you are so wrong it is sad & pathetic. i was being congratulated on my wedding anniversary, nothing to do with birthdays.


perhaps it's best if you slope off now. you have no business on this thread.

"
"Happy birthday!" ; as ever you are so wrong"

Didn't realise you don't have birthdays - how sad!


"you have no business on this thread."

i'll go where I like,chummy - I don't need your condescending permission.

Checked a few of your past comments on here: quote: "I just pop over to the religion Boards for a pop at the Christies." Then the reference to ugly women - hope the ladies you so gallantly championed don't get to hear all this. Then after failing to lure a poster with your taunts you had to admit, quote, "I'll have to get my cheap laughs elsewhere." Cheap is a good definition for you! Or maybe superficial troll would be more apt.

Still to show my innate generosity, I have a little prize for you: a new book; a rather sad one, for you to try and read:

"The little drummer boy:a study in failed dreams," by Lew D. Cruss.



Have a good day.

PS. Nice to see the "Women" thread closed - hope you're not next!!

dear both,

just to share my utter utter overexcitement at getting to the final for the 1st time since 1978;


HUP HOLLAND HUP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Oh they won then...well done!

hi jank

Inari, Finnish Lappland.

I'm sure you'll appreciate that as a 'strong asportist' your overexcitement is matched by my utter indifference but I am glad that your glad.

Good to see that psi has defended you against the misrepresentations of BA who clearly is unaware that a 'Chrispy' is a Christian incediarist troll. (and we all know who those are!)

Brief trip update.

Headed from Oulu down the Swedish Bothian Coast to spectacular Hoga Kusten with its one time fishing villages of red painted wooden houses. Sadly these are now mostly the second homes of urban tractor drivers. The area is now marred by shed like architecture, golf and mini-golf. The latter two can are uktimately to be laid at the door of we Scots and you Netherlanders. The inevitable Oirish themed pubs were accompanied by 'Scottish' themed pubs of dubious provenance.

After that followed the E45 into Swedish Lappland which parallels the Inlandsbanan rail line through some spectacular sceneery and attractive. Long stretches of open traffic-free road, where I may occasionally have very occasionally exceeded the speed limit, A risk only to myself and the curiously elusive reindeer.

Only one incident of note, I was refused entry into a restaurant because I was wearing leathers. Somewhat strange since outside there was a 3m. high statue of what appeared to be a badly sunburned Santy Claus wearing a headband and loincloth made from a somewhat garish Hawaiian shirt.

Contrariwise the Sami I have met seem curiously fascinated by my boxer and we have had many somewhat mutually incomprehensible exchanges about it and/or reindeer (or possibly the breeding habits of blackflies).

I have also become a fan of Rekorderlig pear cider. Magners? Pah!

Bad weather trapped me in Jokkmokk for a couple of days. A pleasant little town with a large museum on Sami culture. Fopund a pleasant cafe/bar to hang out in which featured live music in the evening. I heard a gig by a guy called Max Mackhe a reindeer herder turned musician. Plays acoustic guitar and sings his own compositions in Sami and Swedish. Quite big hereabouts. Not usually my thing but I quite liked him.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sv6rnlY2QII

Also found a shop which sold CDs of Sami music. Bought a couple of Sami drumming (no sticks) and joik (just the there is humppa and heavy hummpa, there is joik and heavy joik). Also came across music by a Norwegian Sami, Msari Boine Persen which I rather liked

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aYevBLUtuLc&feature=related

I a also now the owner of a pair of reindeer hide boots and very comfortable they are.

According to the never wholly reliable wiki the name jokkmokk inspired the name of a Japanese biscuit manufacturer:

Ever the techonerd I braved the weather for a side trip to Porjus where the first hydroelectric plant in Sweden is to be found. Also a rather spectacular exihibition of photographs in the old railway station by an British photographer who now lives here. Curiously there was also an exhibition of pin, Shades of Going Postal.

Once the weather cleared I headed back to Finland. Crossing the border further nort that Rovaniemi where Pali had his Santa Claus moment.

A trip into norther Laplan at this time is considered ill-advised as the heavy season for biting insects is about to begin. However protected by gloves, boots, leathers and helmet and travelling a speed I am a greater threat to them than they are to me.

I am writing this in the combined supermarket/booze store/ tourist office in the Sami village of Inari befoe riding along the shore of Inarijarvi into Norway.

Btw, have you a come across copy of the text of Steve Jones lecture. If it is as reported in the Daily Wail it is faintly worrying as it seems arrant twaddle.

psi- apoligies for the complete absence of filosofickal discourse. I just can't work up any interest at the moment. Even Rorty remains unread.

vm

Bx4
"Good to see that psi has defended you against the misrepresentations of BA..."
I got modded for it too. Baffling.

"psi- apoligies for the complete absence of filosofickal discourse. I just can't work up any interest at the moment. Even Rorty remains unread."
No worries, I thought it might be the case given such trips aren't really treacle friendly.