Yesterday I spent three hours in a hot and stuffy room watching people buy crap. Well, a few people bought non-crap, including myself (a completely unbiased assessment, obviously). But people were paying serious money for crap. I wonder if maybe I should get into the amateur antiques trade?

Preamble: Saturday I went to a jumble sale at Manglerud school. I bought a couple of good books. I also had a look over the stuff they’d put aside for Sunday’s auction. Most jumble sales organisers in Oslo do auctions now. It’s probably a good idea, as it means they get whatever people are actually willing to pay for an item in a bidding contest rather than whatever the organisers think they can get away with charging. I saw something I wanted, so I figured I’d go back. Nice relaxing way of spending a Sunday afternoon. Yeah, right.

There were a few of unexpected bidding wars yesterday, one spectacular one, a couple that I watched in amazed silence (careful not to wave my hand about too much) and one partly occasioned by myself. A glass serving plate from the first half of the 20th century (30ies? 40ies? 50ies? The sort of thing my grandmothers had, anyway), which was pink, and, I thought, magnificently ugly, started at 50 nok but as at least three people wanted it badly it was sold for 410. A small oil painting was the source of the spectacular bidding war. Approximately 30×25 centimetres, depicting a pair of kittens. Very cute, I’m sure, and signed, but not with a name I’ve ever heard (which doesn’t necessarily exclude the possibility that (s)he frequently fetches high prices at auction). More importantly, to my mind, though a realist painting in the “looks like a photograph” genre, it wasn’t all that good (i.e. it didn’t actually look like a photograph). But what do I know? Not a lot, obviously: The auctioneer started it at a couple of hundred. It reached 3200. So maybe the painter’s name was one I should have recognised? Or maybe there were two mad cat-effect collectors in the audience. Who knows?

I got what I was there for, though I noticed some people were as surprised at my interest as I was at the lady who purchased the pink plate. Incidentally, I had to pay excactly the same amount for my lot, but at least I got more than one item. 25, in fact. The auctioneer called it a supplementing service, which is accurate enough. 25 parts, 5 soup plates, 5 dessert plates, 5 egg cups, 2 large plates, 1 cream jug, 1 small bowl and 6 saucers of a 70ies (? I really need to find out) service from Stavanger Flint called Flamingo. My brother and I have both started collecting bits and pieces of services from this period, I’m concentrating on two patterns (or trying to concentrate), and it’s quite a lot of fun trying to piece together a service this way rather than buying a new one from Wedgewood. Besides, I like the patterns – they’re much more fun than the average pattern found nowadays. I have yet to figure out why this one is called Flamingo, though.

I got the picture from qxl – as you can see it’s got fishes and an indeterminable something, but no Flamingo, and (more importantly) no pink. I had hoped I would be the only one interested, unfortunately I wasn’t. A couple of other services went for much less (and much less than they were worth) earlier on. A pity I’m not collecting those, really. One of them was a coffee service for twelve from Porsgrund Porselen from the 30ies, there was no interest at the starting price of 200 nok, I think it went for 160 in the end. At that point I was holding on to my money, not knowing how high I’d have to go to get the lot I wanted, or I might have bought it myself and tried selling it on qxl. Similarly, another couple of lots went for ridiculously low prices. Unfortunately, as I said, someone else was interested in my lot. A dealer, probably (judging from the number of lots she’d purchased earlier on) – these things are catching on as collectors’ items (nostalgia kicking in for the population in general), but a quick estimate prior to the auction had told me that 400 would be dirt cheap. I’d have gone further if I’d had to, but I’d only brought 600 in cash (sensible precaution), so I would have had to stop there.

Bidding at auction, of course, is adrenaline-kickville deluxe. Getting carried away is easy. The “this is how much cash I brought so this is how much I can spend” rule is good. I really think I should avoid “proper” auctions (the kind where, cruicially, you can pay by card) like the plague. Besides, at a jumble sale you probably still have more of a chance of carrying off a bargain, though people are obviously wising up to them.

I did actually buy one item that I’ve put up on qxl straight away, just to see if I could get a profit. I’ll fill you in on progress (if there is any). In retrospect, I realise I should have bid on another lot, a book that went for 80, and was probably worth 10 times that. Bummer. Hindsight is 20/20, or so I’m told.

Currency guide: 1 USD = 7.60 NOK, 1 GBP = 11.60 NOK (for others, check Bloomberg)

Sound of the moment: I am 16, Going on 17 (from Sound of Music)
Age of the moment: 13 (hey, I’ve grown!)

I’ve been laughed at twice (I asked for it the second time) in recent weeks for knowing the “English books” and “Norwegian books” identifier part of an ISBN number without checking. I also know the identifier for the Norwegian book clubs (De Norske Bokklubbene). If you’ve typed it enough times it sort of sinks in, and there’s a field for ISBN in my book cataloguing software.

I’ve got a longish post coming (to make up for the weekend draught), but I’m off to IKEA now – the catalogue still hasn’t arrived in my mailbox. If you want something you have to go get it yourself, obviously. Hm. Wonder if Linda is home…

Sound of the moment: Always Look on the Bright Side of Life
Age of the moment: 7

Mmmm. Went to The Dubliner and had potato skins with garlic dip and two pints of cider and read my book for a bit.

Ah, life…

Whoohoo! The suitcases have reappeared (insert celebrations here).

Sound of the moment: What Made You Say That (Shania Twain)
Age of the moment: 153 (it’s been that kind of week)

Course continues, and headache is redeveloping, but today I brought Ibuprophen. Yay me.

Linda is back! Whoohoo! (Ok you guys probably didn’t know, because I don’t think I’ve mentioned it, but she’s been on holiday for weeks and been sorely missed – I can finally follow my impulse to phone Linda with an actual phone call instead of following it with a sinking feeling remembering she is out of reach.)

Her luggage, however, is not back. Neither is her friend, Lene’s. It disappeared at some point between, as far as I can gather, Palermo and Oslo. Here’s to hoping it’s just gone on a bit of a wild trip to Kualalumpur or something, and that it shows up. Though getting the money back on insurance is a good excuse for a major shopping spree, have you ever considered how inadequate the “replacement cost price” really is for a wardrobe that’s been built up over years? If you’re just a little bit picky over clothes, in losing your suitcase like that you’re bound to lose some favourite pieces of clothing (that t-shirt that just perfectly matches your eyes, that one pair of trousers that actually look good and are comfy simultaneously). So crossing my fingers that the rougue bags have not been stolen.

In any case, I’m celebrating her return by going for a visit next weekend (30th-1st). Linda will be in the process of moving in in Arvika, Sweden, where she’ll be starting work at the hospital. Cider will be consumed (they have cider in Sweden – and I’m talking about English cider, not Swedish, though, naturally, they have the latter, too). Fun will be had. Whisky will be purchased for the next NMWL meeting (which means I have to figure out how to declare stuff when taking the train across the border – no customs’ booth on the train, so how?).

Ooops, break over.

Sound of the moment: Instructor talking about dlls
Age of the moment: 10ish (in excitement over prospect of seeing Linda)

Aaargh. Headache!

Ok, I think I know why: There’s a glare from the window in the monitor I’m working at and the projected image of the instructor’s desktop is clear as mud. I don’t think my eyes are taking too kindly to this – hence, is my guess, the headache.

Sound of the moment: Sorry Mama (Eminem, it was on in the canteen)
Age of the moment: 3 (I want my mummy – ironic, considering the song stuck in my head)

Getting a headache. And it’s only ten to eleven.

I’m on a course today (on a break right now) – getting a bit of input on QBE Vision, the Visual Basic-like programming language. Probably need a bit of input, too – it’s been ages since I did anything much in Visual Basic. Well, ages in this business means more than six months, at least with a brain like mine – leaks like a sieve. Actually, that’s the wrong metaphor, a leak gives teh impression that the information is semi-irredeamably lost. My brain is more like a library (what other metaphor would I use?) – the information is in there somewhere, but once it hasn’t been checked out for a while, a book get’s relegated to the archives in the basement, sometimes never to see light of day again. And sometimes a book gets put back in the wrong spot and is lost for weeks, months or years, until I go to look for something just which happens to have its right spot next to this wrong spot, and dislodge the misplaced volume and wealths of knowledge I didn’t know I had with it.

Rambling…

Break over.

Sound of the moment: something from Grease, I think, but I can’t quite put my finger on it
Age of the moment: 25 (back to when I first started really programming)

I have had a glimpse of the new catalogue. The new kitchens are not thrilling, but one of them might actually work better for what I have in mind than any of the old ones.

Laying your hands on the new IKEA catalogue is a big deal. Seriously. You will all think I’m mad (well, I expect you all think I’m mad already anyway), but I have kept the last 6 years’ worth of IKEA catalogues. Not only that, in those 6 years I have moved (counts on fingers) 7 times. And 4 of those catalogues are British. Which means I’ve paid £5 / 1 cubic foot x volume of 4 IKEA catlogues to bring them back to Norway…

And yet, for all the excitement: every year the new catalogue is looked forward to with eager anticipation. And every year it arrives, and turns out to be a disappointment. Why? Well, you see, in August 1996 I was sharing a flat with Janne in Trondheim (or, rather, she was sharing her flat with me, as I was renting a room from her). The 1997 IKEA catalogue arrived in the shops (you can get it at Narvesen in Norway when it’s just out – if you live in Oslo you get it in the mail, though), we paid our 10 kr (just over a dollar) and took it home. After having passed it back and forth over the table in the living room (“Just look at that!”) for a whole evening, the next day saw us at Narvesen again, ready to fork out for another copy so that we could have one each. We spent a happy few days (weeks, months?) each sitting in her favourite spot in the living room, browsing. The quiet was interrupted at intervals with: “Check out the rug on page 176” or “Did you notice the legs on that wardrobe on page 234?” Pure bliss.

And so, every year we wait with baithed breath for August to come around. And every year we gingerly open the catalogue and start browsing. And every year the woeful cry is the same: “It’s nowhere near as good as the 1997 edition!”

Maybe it wasn’t the catalogue. Maybe it was just the setting; good friends in comfy chairs sharing architectural plans for mansions in the clouds furnished throughout with good, solid and just cool enough for us, IKEA designs. I don’t know.

What I do know is that when I get my own copy this year and have had the time to look at it for more than I few seconds, I will turn on my computer, and if Janne is logged on, MSN messenger will convey, with a sigh: “It’s nowhere near as good as the 1997 edition!”

Music in my head: 24 hours from Tulsa (yes, I know, you’d like to know where that came from, wouldn’t you? Well, so would I, so: Tough.)

One of the interesting effects of this blogging thing is the way reading other people’s blogs not only gives me ideas but makes my whole being shout out in recognition,even over things that are, seemingly, fairly trivial. The post that occasioned this epiphany today was written by Vaughan Simons, concerning self-storage. It is no secret that I am a hoarder. Not only do I have more books than any sensible person would recommend, at least after being told that I live up five flights of stairs with no elevator. I also have more stuff than you would imagine possible, especially considering the cubic volume of the space I keep it all in (which, coincidentally, I also live in, which means a minimum of breathing space is also required). Not tomention the number of times I’ve moved in recent years, which ought to have given me both opportunity and motive for some proper clean-outs. But no. I have the obligatory school textbooks and notes that I will almost certainly never need again, but that nevertheless seem to be impossible to get rid of. My two maths textbooks from IB, for example, I decided more than five years ago that I really didn’t need. Somehow they still ended up in storage when I went to Britain. A few months ago I unpacked them along with all the other stuff and thought; “Huh? I thought I’d gotten rid of those, better do it now, then.” They’re still in my flat somewhere. I also have my share of old birthday and Christmas cards. Mine go back a lot further than my 18th birthday, however. What else do I have? Well, old toys, certainly. My barbie doll collection, including the masses of clothing that I made for the dolls myself on an old hand-powered sewing machine. If I ever have grandchildren, perhaps it will amuse them? I also have my brother’s old Galvatron (of the Transformers), which I actually paid him for at some point when he was selling them off. It is very cool. It has a laser gun which flashes orange light and beeps when you can get it to work (I think the battery connection or possibly the switch is a bit dodgy).

Still. It’s in my flat somewhere, in a box. Not The Box, unfortunately. Had it been I would have sold it.

The state mine is NOT in.

One going on ebay for (currently) $47. The sentimental value is not that high. In its current state, however, it’s probably not worth much to a collector. And it’s way cool).

Somewhere, anywhere, everywhere, I have the materials for, the half-finished and the complete results of virtually every art project I’ve ever started (and believe me, it’s quite a few). I have the printing block for the book-covers we printed with cut lino in 6th grade (I think it was). I assume I have the book somewhere, too, though that will be in a box with other papers (that I’ll probably never look at again), whereas the printing block is one of those “now where shall I put this?” items which has never found a place, and therefore keeps reemerging at odd intervals when I’m looking for something else. Come to think of it, I have more materials for and half-finished projects than actual complete results, as the latter have frequently been given to parents or grandparents, or even friends, for birthdays and Christmases.

My to-all-intents-and-purposes-non-complete kitchen has it’s share of oddities and well-I-guess-this-might-come-in-handy-one-days. I think I may have one of those nifty-but-cumbersome table-mounted apple-peelers. I certainly have a thingamagig for un-pitting cherries. I have six placemats depicting famous Irish writers (very pretty) that I don’t think I have ever used. They were given to me by my mother, who, incidentally, always gets a pained look on her face when my hoarding tendencies come up in conversation. I mean, really! What does she expect? I have more mugsandcups than you can shake a stick at, certainly a lot more than would be needed even were I to decide to attempt to get into Guinness for getting the largest number of people drinking tea into a flat the size of mine. If we had people sitting on the laps of people sitting on the laps of people and so on to the ceiling, all drinking tea, I would still have mugsandcups left over for the Guinness inspectors and spectators out on the stairs and on the neighbour’s balcony. Problem is, of course, that the ones I can no longer stand the look of, design-wise, are the ones with the most sentimental value. Sigh. Oh, and I just purchased 6 more this weekend through qxl.

Another category of “stuff” which I have a lot of is things-that-are-interesting-though-quite-useless. As an example of what I mean: I have a box of needles for a knitting machine my grandmother once owned. The machine is long gone, but the needles are very interesting, though quite useless, naturally. I suppose the table-mounted apple peeler comes into this category, too.

On that note, I once read a book where the author was remembering visiting his (or was it her?) two aunts. These two women, spinsters, of course, lived together in a big house, and were notorious for never throwing anything away. One big room on the first floor was given over entirely to such never-thrown-away-stuff and visiting nephews and nieces considered being allowed to rummage in there as a special treat. The room, naturally, was full of treasures – or junk, as less imaginative people would term it – but what intrigued the author the most was a cardboard box with a label on the lid on which was written, in a small, neat hand: “Pieces of string that are too short to be put to practical use and which there is therefore no earthly reason to keep.” (I am quoting from memory, but that was the gist of it.)

I love that story. I would have loved that house. A pity, really, that I don’t have a sister.

On my list of personal victories: Items I have recently managed to convince myself that there was really no point in keeping, includes every leaf from several years’ worth of Far Side and Dilbert page-a-day calendars. They have now been consigned to the paper recycling bins, and are hopefully, as we speak, being turned to better use as notepaper or kitchen rolls than they ever were as filler in my cupboards. I guess I should have kept them in a box, neatly labelled. But then, my handwriting is neither neat or small.

The whole point of this, of course, is that Vaughan’s idea is immensly sound. We should all be given a self-storage unit at the age of 18. In lieu of the governments of the world realising quite how sensible this would be, perhaps I should look into finding one myself. As there is absolutely no hope that I will come to my senses and actually throw these things out, surely an alternate way of de-cluttering would simply be to admit defeat and find a permanent, relatively easily accessible, home for some of these items?

On a different note altogether; people are complaining about Blogger Pro on the support mailing list, claiming it’s unavailable half the time and talking about getting their money back. Luckily for me I have had no problems. The mail-to-blog behaves a little oddly occasionally, but this is a function that is still in test anyway, so I’m not too worried. Otherwise, since I upgraded (i.e. paid anything for the service), everything has been stable as a particularly stable rock. No errors. No inexplicable swallowing up of posts never to be seen again. No template wobblys. Yay me. Go Blogger. I’m sticking with it.

Noise in the room: Just Shoot Me (on tv)