heh.

The news from yesterday.

"Singapore has rebuked its national water polo team for wearing swim trunks that feature an "inappropriate" likeness of the city-state's flag.

The trunks, which were designed by members of the men's team currently competing in the Asian Games in Guangzhou, China, show the flag's white crescent moon jutting up from the groin area with five stars to the side on a red background."

USA Today article

"The skimpy trunks sported by Singapore's men's water polo team at the Asian Games are causing red faces back home in the conservative city-state, with many embarrassed by their design."

Reuters

munchkin

This post is dedicated to my little sister.

Sofie is pretty cool, as far as little sisters go. She is 15, going on 16. Man, I'm a little bit jealous. (I wish I was 16 again!) And a little horrified that I am jealous.

Sofie is a dedicated reader of this blog. She is upset and jealous that I have yet to mention her. This is of course not on purpose and it is a horrible mistake.

Sofie likes horses and riding and she likes to read. We like to jam out and sing really loud in the car. We like to watch Harry Potter movies, talk about the books, and go shopping. We share a love for tasty mall chinese food. Sofie thinks I am wierd and gets embarrassed because sometimes I do dumb/crazy things, like bust out dance moves while driving (whoops). She is also super smart, and way better at science than I ever was. She also likes art and doing computer graphicy-stuff. If I ever get married, she is going to be a co-maid-of-honor in my wedding. She claims to not like the color pink, but really I think she just likes to take some distance to the teenage girl stereotype of  wearing pink, being blonde, acting ditzy, etc. I can respect that. Instead, her favorite color is blue, like me! I don't really think we look that much alike, but alot of people say we do. She is really lucky to be almost as good-looking as me. If anyone ever hurts her, I will do bad things to them. Don't laugh, you know I could totally take you.

I like to call her munchkin and she likes to pretend she doesn't like it when I call her munchkin. Sometimes in Danish I call her "stump/stumpen/stumpie." I'm not sure she likes that either. I hope one day she comes to visit me in Denmark so we cna do fun Denmark things together. I miss her terribly when we're apart but we can also drive each other insanely nuts when we're together. I think that may be one of the few normal sibling things we have going for us.

Sofie, you maye be upset that I never mention you.... but what's up with never commenting, anyway, huh?

Personality Test

I took a job/personality test (jobindex.dk)and my personality type is:
INFJ
"The Protector" or "the mystic"

I don't always believe in tests like this, but I always find it fun to see what results they get from the answers. This one is pretty complex.

The site suggests that I should work within:

• Education
• Languages
• Art
• Politics/ministiries
• Architecture
• Medicine
• Psychology
• Marketing

I must say, it is pretty accurate. But really, also very broad. I would say that medicine is very, very different from languages and marketing. And even medicine can be very broad within itself. I can see how psychology, marketing, languages, and art are related. Even to a certain degree I can see it mized with politics and languages. The only odd things are medicine and architecture.

Honestly, I read the site and felt like it knew exactly who I was. A little creepy actually.
http://www.personalitypage.com/INFJ.html

I included a few quotes that I thought were fun and interesting:
"Only one percent of the population has an INFJ Personality Type, making it the most rare of all the types....
INFJs have uncanny insight into people and situations. They get "feelings" about things and intuitively understand them.... "


Interesting fun fact:
Other people with the same personality test result include Mahatma Ghandi, Eleanor Roosevelt, Adam Sandler, Nelson Mandela, Oprah Winfrey

Linking

A friend of mine linked to this site, which has an article about making good powerpoint presentations.

10 tips for designing presentations that don't suck (part 1) and (part 2)

If you are in the business of making powerpoints (and really, aren't we all?) it is definately worth checking out. I am currently exploring the rest of the site as well, since I'd like to get more skilled in the technical/design aspects of communication. I'm finding more and more that it could be very useful. Even though I of course am hoping to work more within strategic communication, I think it is always very useful to have some practical skills as well.We all have to start somewhere, right? I think taking a course in photoshop/Indesign may be in may somewhat near future

Read on to see my little experiment with what I learned.....

Cool Stuff Campaign

A Danish company is currently running a campaign that I think is pretty much genious. A little annoying, but genious.

Background Story:

This website/company sells cool gadgets and fun stuff, basically random sh*t. (Literallly, their name is coolstuff.dk. It sells all sorts of cool stuff, you should go check it out.) As part of entering the christmas season, they are offering bloggers free gift cards to their shop in return for favorable mention on the various blogs. Depending on the popularity and the traffic on the blog, bloggers (ordinary people like me - or you) get a 100dkk or 200dkk gift card, free of charge*
Now, I don't have enough readers to be able to become a blog-tester, but I am seeing blogs pop up all over the place that have been accepted as blog-testers.They are proudly showing off their purchases, and some even bought a few more gifts online in order to make it worth the shipping fee. PLUS! *Right now, if you spend more than 250 dkk, you get free shipping! (unfortunately, it can't be combined with giftcards, so you would have to buy an extra 250dkk worth of random junk)


Here's why it's genious:

It's the same concept as when regular stores have big sales, or Victorias Secret mails out those "10$ off your next purchase of 10$ or more" -- getting the customer into store is the first step. Once you're in the store, you are likely to buy more than just 10$, or more than just the one item on sale.

I'll admit it, it often works on me. I am a total sucker for sales and advertising/marketing tricks and I'm barely even ashamed to admit it. I go into Victorias Secret, trying to find someting to buy that only costs 10$ (nearly impossible) and come out with some new random purchases.

Honestly. I went to the website to see if I was eligible to be a tester (I'm not), and then got curious about what exactly this company was all about. I started looking around, and actually found myself putting things into a shopping cart. I still might buy something from the site,.... like this MAGNET TAPE!!!! OMJ

all images in this post are courtesy of coolstuff.dk

So, coolstuff.dk, I just gave you free advertising to all of my 5 readers in the US (Hi Mom and Dad!). I also may purchase something from your store in the near future. I've always wanted a snuggie. And a fake plastic cup.

I accept checks and all major credit cards.
Just kidding.
Just Cash.


*Don't even get me started on the whole selling your soul (or your blog) for free gifts, which is just a bit icky, kind of, but.... Don't judge, I'm a poor student. I'd do it. I mean, they aren't even paying me and I just plastered my blog with their stuff.


P.S.This is pretty cool too:

It's a scratch off map! So you can scratch all the places you've been!
Just like the lottery, but much, much more satisfying!

on life

Another week gone by, another week closer to the end of the internship, christmas, and moving back to Odense.

It's not that I am excited about ending my internship, because I would love to be able to stay and work longer and get to continue working on some projects (or start new ones). I am also finally getting used to the schedule of getting up early (not that it is easy, mind you, but it is nice to start your day off early). The only downside is that I am getting sick of the whole long-distance relationship - and-friendships. Travelling so much and being a littlebit lonely down south is starting to get to me. Fortunately (and unfortunately), there is now elss than a month left.

My Nanowrimo project is chugging along slowly. I fell a bit behind this past weekend but hopefully I will be caught up by November 30. Winners get a free editing-print copy of their novels so I would like to get one once I finish the story. I really like the story and the characters but I am still unsure of where exactly it is going. I will probably need more than 50,000 words to complete everything.

Lastly,
 we got some really good, excellent news these days. Boy got accepted/cleared for his internship in Tanzania next fall. Good news for him, bad new for me - except for the fact that i can go visit him. Africa, here I come!

There's also another small thing that might be good news (can hopefully be announced next week) so cross fingers for me!

Mission accomplished

This weekend I successfully did nothing, and it was glorious.

Friday after work, boy came to town around the same time I made it home from work. We went shopping for some last minute food-related- emergencies items (apparently we can not live without ice cream, beer, rice, cheese, and coffee. I find that list very amusing)

For dinner we had the classic "Kong Feddes livret" (King Fredericks favorite dish). Boy had never had this before (you're welcome, by the way). We watched dancing with the stars (my first time) and I introduced boy to Dane Cook (again, you're welcome). Also, we ate ice cream.

Saturday we slept in. Well - I slept in all the way until 8:30! I'm not sure I was entirely popular when I got up and started making coffee and breakfast at that ungodly hour on a saturday morning. After a few hours of breakfast, we made our way outside to take a walk.

I forgot my camera, but it was an absolutely beautiful day to take a walk by the water. The sun was shining and there was just the perfect amount of wind, and it was suprisingly warm.



I did not take these pictures. courtesy skovognatur.dk




I did not take these pictures. courtesy visitsonderborg.dk

Basically, you get the tone and the mood for the weekend: do as little as possible, lots of "hygge", homemade cookind, watching movies, etc. Saturday night we bought Ravens tickets! and Watched Wedding Crashers!

Wore this wonderful little dress to work the other day with skinny jeans, high heals, and a black top underneath (it is surprisingly seethrough)



h&m dress - 69kr

From now on though, shopping (with the exception of christmas shopping) really needs to be postponed untill christmas time when I am back in the States.

har-dee-har-har - - Funny

Did you hear the one about the Blonde who called the travel agency and asked,

"I want to know how long it takes to fly from here to Baltimore,"

and the receptionist says, "Just a moment,"

and the Blonde says, "Thanks alot, goodbye"?

I found this little Gem on facebook, where several friends had linked to it, and wanted to share.


Ona a different, only slightly related, note:
It seems there is alot of hatred against Obama for various reasons, including some pretty funny accusations that he is not an American citizen, he is actually muslim, he is actually a communist/socialist, he is actually an Arab terrorist. I mean... really?

If you are going to criticize, criticize something real - and not crazy assumptions about religious beliefs, family background etc. If you don't like him for some reason, that's fine, just don't list "He is only pretending to be a Christian, he is actually a muslim. His dad was an Arab muslim terrorist!" as your main reason.

Also, - don't criticize him on the background of "but the economy is not back up yet." It took time to get where the economy is now, it will take time to get it back.

For the record, I am not saying I am totally for Obama. I also believe that criticism of the government is healthy and keeps democracy alive. Just use real criticism, and not biased rumours.


Also, if you chose not to vote, you also lose the right to complain.


// end rant.

on NaNoWriMo

I am participating in NaNoWriMo (or at least giving it a decenet shot).

Yes, I should probably be working on my internship report, or sleeping, or cleaning, or doing laundry.

But what fun is that when there is a novel to be written?
When different characters are suddenly invading your mind, begging you to bring them to life on a piece of paper (or in my case, on a crisp, clean sheet of MS Word)?

So my blogging may be thin for a little while now again, for however long I can stick out with this challenge.