It's 10:34 am and I am listening to 2-Pac. I don't know why. I am not really a hip hop fan but I admit I like to listen to it sometimes. It seems weird to sit with my morning coffee in Stockholm listening to songs about drive-bys and brothers converting to Islam and skeezers and bopping to all those slow bumpy bass lines. I have about 2,000 albums in my mp3 collection and I like all of them, even 2-Pac.

The past week I have been hanging out with Monte in Stockholm. Last Friday he went off to Prague for the weekend and I went South for the weekend (Southern Sweden that is) to Jonkopping to visit the in-laws.

Monte and I had a great time taking the Tunnelban (Stockholm subway), walking around the city, sailing around the city (the subway passes work on the boats), and of course drinking on the docked boats and all the cheap bars we managed to find.

The cheapest bar was one called Kellys in Sodermalm, which is the south island of Stockholm (Stockholm is kind of like an archipelago). In Sweden people don't use apostrophes so if you want to say "Kelly's Bar" you would just say "Kellys Bar". This doesn't confuse them because you don't add an "s" to make things plural like in English.

Kelly's has 19 kronor ($2.80) bottles of Tuborg beer which is the cheapest in Stocholm. Salty licorice shots are also available for 19 kronors ($2.80). There is also a mandatory 15 kronor ($2.00) coat check so if you are on a extra small budget don't bring coat. There is a mini casino in the pub like in most Swedish bars. I am against gambling on principal, although I admit its probably a good way to make money to have gambling in a pub.

The theme of the bar is American, vaguely stereotypical, with steer heads hanging from the wall and old wagons and that sort of ghost town cowboy motif. The music in Kellys is Heavy Metal in nature and they play Guns in Roses, Metallica, and all the other hard rock hits of 15 years ago. I was never what you would call a heavy metal or hard rock fan, but I actually like the Guns and Roses a little... I can admit it now... they were like a bad auto accident you just had to look sometimes.

So I admit I am not building up Kellys very much. Did I mention the beer was the cheapest in Stockholm? When the dollar gets stronger or when I get a job I will probably find a new hangout but until then its a great place to enjoy drinking without worrying about the bank account. The fact that its the cheapest bar in Stockholm makes all the crazies come out and its easy to hook up there (Monte managed to find a very Swedish cutie there in less than 2 hours and went home with her).

I remember a comment he made to me while he was snuggling with Angelica at the table. Earlier in the day while we were walking around Stockholm I made a comment that I had a weird dream in which I called Tiger Woods on the phone to congratulate him on his winning his 6th Masters and ask him if he wants to go camping. This is weird because I am not a golfer, and I hate camping. The subconscious is a fucking mystery to me.

So Monte related to me when THIS HOT 20 YEAR OLD SWEDISH GIRL JUST SITS DOWN AT YOUR TABLE NEXT TO YOU AT A PUB AND ASKS IF YOU WANT TO COME HOME TO SLEEP WITH HER that is just as weird as dreaming of chatting up Tiger Woods about going camping. Of course it was me with the weird dream and Monte sleeping with the Swedish girl so some weirds are better than others. But I guess I have a Swedish girl of my own so fuck it. And come to think of it... so does Tiger Woods. So maybe the six of us should go camping after all. I hate sleeping outside but I bet Tiger Woods could buy us a nice RV, a couple eightballs, some Tuborg, and we could have a nice party.

Monte comes back from Prague today. I bet we'll end up back at Kellys tonight.

Hungover in Huvudsta

Linda and I are settling into the pad in Huvudsta, a little residential neighborhood in Northwestern Stockhol. I don't think its hit me yet that I've moved over here for anything more than a vacation. Perhaps it will sink in soon. I've been sick so I've just been hanging around the pad reading Brothers Karamazov, taking long baths, and thanking God I am not at work back in Seattle. I was working long hours for mediocre pay and always arguing with my business partner over stupid shit that one of us did wrong. I am not cut out for the 9-5 grind I tell you and definitely not the 8 to 6 grind which is more typical nowadays on Bush's side of the Atlantic.

Which reminds me... Bush is not my President. I don't even know who my President is. In fact I don't think I have one any more. Wait, duh, I have a Prime Minister. Linda says his name is Göran Persson. No relation to Nina Persson of the Cardigans apparently.

Last night we went to a party hosted by Johan and Anna, two of my new friends. Johan is a tall thin phD student who looks like Bjorn Borg. Anna is of Bengali descent and I don't know what she does but she has been a friend of Linda's for some time.

Anyway, Johan informed me the other night that the Swedes are weekend warriors and normally stay sober in the weekdays and get really drunk on the weekends. I am going to try to do that too. I will stick to the beer on the weekdays anyway. I don't believe in weekend warrioring. It's against my religion (I'm an orthodox dipsomaniac).

I miss McCutcheon. Maybe I said this last time, but it bears repeating and I love to talk to him drunk and I hope he and Danielle stay together and have beautiful children and raise them in Austria so I am not the only cunt who lives in a cold European country. Then Lind and I can visit and we can all go skiing at Zell Am Zee and eat fondue and drink lager.

I miss my bro Lee too, and his 3 beautiful daughters who are my nieces. I hope to visit them often, because they live in Florida. I think the high here today was 45 degrees and everyone is talking about how warm it is. I didn't go outside at all. Linda went out for pizzas and sodas and we watched our Alan Partridge DVD which is one of the funniest things I haves seen. It stats Steve Coogan who played Tony Fucking Wilson in 24 Hour Party People (I think).

Stockholm Pad in Huvudsta

A lot has happened since the last post. We moved into our new studio apartment yesterday in Huvudsta, which is in the Northwest of Stockholm in an area called Solna. Our apartment is a little musty smelling because its in the basement but other than that its pretty sweet. The rent is about 4,000 Kronors per month which translates into about $570 per month. That's cheap even with the shitty exchange rate. Before Bush's idiotic Gulf War II, 4,000 Kronos was about $400.

We went shopping yesterday at (surprise surprise) IKEA and bought a bunch of new stuff for the apartment. I have a little cold and the new apartment isn’t helping while the dust settles. Since I can’t post these messages in real time (I don’t have access to an Internet connection except downtown at the café) so I must write them all down at home which is admittedly a little lame. It has been a month and one week since I had good reliable Internet access. I made Linda promise to call the broadband people today. Things should get back to normal soon. Thank God Linda is Swedish and not a Zulu princess or something. Living in Swaziland I bet they consider dial-up a luxury.

Also, I got a call from Monty from LA. He is coming to stay with us in Sweden to record some music. He has a website but I can't find the link at the moment. It will be fun to have someone to party with. I should be settled in by then.

I really liked the pad out in Drottningholm with all the castles and rich people, but its just not my scene. It's so nice to have our own place!

On the Third Day God Created Jetlag...

It’s now the beginning of my third day in Sweden. I still have not found reliable Internet access so all my Swedish Sloth posts are going to run together. That’s okay however. I really miss the Internet. Norman Cook (Fat Boy Slim) once said that he never partied, drank, or did drugs on a vacation because that’s what he did everyday in his normal life. Makes sense. So on my vacation in Hawaii I too tried to drink less and use the Internet less.

It didn’t work too well. I drank as much as I normally do and sat in front of my computer for hours scanning the airwaves for a potential wireless network I could tap into. Fruitlessly, I tried to use my Dad’s dial-up account, but after 10 years of using broadband (yes I have had broadband for most of 10 years now) using dial-up seems like something out of the 70’s along with Jiffy-Pop popcorn and TV dinners. Call me impatient, but when it takes 20 seconds for a page to load and the damn connection hangs or freezes every 5 minutes that’s not the Internet, that’s the Internot.

Today is a party in Linda and my honor. The family is up from the South and we will celebrate in the Swedish tradition by drinking and eating too much. Fine by me. I wish I wasn't so goddammed jetlag so I could enjoy it.

Stockholm! Wow.

Vi ar in Stockholm nu! (We are in Stockholm now)

Actually we are staying in Dronningham with a friend of the family. They live in a large white wooden house just a few hundred meters from the King’s castle. The house has been to two world’s fairs. I know that sounds weird. Not many houses are world travelers. This one went to the Paris World’s Fair is 1962 and the 1966 World’s Fair in Rio. It was the exhibit for the Swedish wood industry.

We are not staying in the traveling home however, we are staying in a one year old guest house on the edge of the property. There is no Playstation but an X-Box(!), a nice kitchen and a plenty of storage room. It is typically Swedish. Everything looks like it came from IKEA. I better get used to that.

We traveled to the city today to have lunch with Linda’s mother and grandmother. Linda’s grandmother is 85 and she is one of the reasons Linda was so motivated to move back to Sweden. The Swedes are very family oriented people. Linda loves her grandmother and talks on the phone with her for hours every month. I don’t think I’ve ever talked to my grandmother on the phone for more than 15 seconds. What would I say? Linda wants to be around for her. I think she looks healthy. She could easily last another ten years. It makes me wonder what I will look like at 85. Holy shit. That makes me want to save for retirement. A bottle of booze will cost $300 by then.