We spend New Year’s Eve at home. All of the dogs, cats, Paula, and Daniel are at home. We have had treats to eat and nice company in a calm and quite quiet home. There are crackers and fireworks making noise from afar, but when we are all together in our comfortable home, none of us cares.
Happy new year to you all! May 2023 be a better year for all of us, than 2022 was.
The most important part of the Swedish Christmas dinner is the Christmas ham. This is a full ham of pork, boiled and then glazed with mustard, egg, and bread crumbs. Since Paula and Daniel were not going to have their main Christmas celebration here at home, they did not buy any ham. Yesterday, when Daniel was grocery shopping, he did buy one for half the price. He prepared it and glazed it today and it became the main part of dinner. Ham is good and this was cheap and healthy food. It was a good purchase.
The capital of Bangladesh, Dhaka, has about twenty million inhabitants. It is also very densely populated. Up until now, it has still not had a metro railway to ease the congestion in the streets. With aid from Japan, the first metro line is now built and has opened. Fully developed into six lines, the metro system will have more than a hundred stations. It is hard to imagine the difference this will make, but it will surely be great. Japanese aid is good.
Daniel went back to work today. He was at the office for several hours in the early day. Thus, he was back in business after the big Christmas celebrations.
Paula is not at home, so when Daniel is at the office, we watch the house. Thus, we were back in business. It feels good to have a purpose and to make a difference.
Apparently, nobody really knows why this, the second day of Christmas, is called Boxing Day in English.
We have a better name in Swedish: Other Day, which comes from Second Day. It is boring, but we know what it means.
We have mostly taken it easy today. We usually do on the second day of Christmas. Life is nice.
This time when we got food, I guess I ate too quickly. Some of it came back up again. Is this how to celebrate Christmas thoroughly?
I am sorry if my words made you feel sick. It is just that I wanted to write about this, and did not know how to rewrite it in a more poetic manner. This is just the way I write.
The day before Christmas Eve is always a day of preparations and cleaning. We have prepared Christmas gifts and candy. We have also cleaned a lot in the house.
Daniel finally switched the curtains in the kitchen to our Christmas curtains. This is always his job, since he is tall enough to reach up to switch the curtains without standing on a chair. He usually do this around the start of December, but finally got around to it today for this Christmas. This increases the Christmas feeling.
When I logged in to write in my blog today, it looked just like the day before yesterday. The new look of yesterday was gone again. This makes me wonder. Why was there a new look yesterday? Why has the previous look come back? There can be so many questions from a simple change like this, especially when it is changed back again.
I did have an idea for a blog post that did not involve the look of the blog service web page. This idea has now slipped from my mind. It is possible that I will remember it tomorrow and that the blog entry for tomorrow will be about this idea. Stay tuned, and you may find out.
Blogger is the host of my blog. It is a free service and I am quite satisfied with it. However, the look has just been updated, and it confuses me a bit. Where there has been a + sign on a button which lets you write a new blog entry, there was now a lock. I wonder why. What would a lock represent? There is surely some cause behind it, I just cannot think of any cause. Life is full of riddles and enigmas. On the other paw, life would be much less fun, if you would instantly understand everything. I might just have to learn to live with the new look.
We had a little time with temperatures above the freezing point, so snow thawed. Then the temperature droppen again. In the evening, snow fell. It is interesting weather, in a way. I am glad it is not quite as cold as last week.
For the first time since 2002, a South American team has won the World Cup. The score was 2-2 at full time and 3-3 after extra time. Then Argentina managed the penalty shoot out best.
Both teams had been in World Cup finals before. In the 22 World Cup finals ever played, only four countries have appeared in just one final: Croatia in 2018 (silver), England in 1966 (gold), Spain in 2010 (gold), and Sweden in 1958 (silver).
The next World Cup will be played in four years. This is a long time, especially for a dog. I am not sure I am around then. I do wish Sweden will participate and that both Sweden and Japan get good results, nevertheless.
Croatia won the bronze game in the World Cup. This means that Croatia is now equal to Sweden, when it comes to World Cup medals. Both countries have one silver and two bronzes. Croatia have won all medals after the latest time Sweden won a medal, in 1994. The Swedes really have to take up this challenge, otherwise Croatia may pass in the medal count. I would certainly not want that.
Morocco came fourth. This is the first time a team from Africa has gone this far, so they should not be sad. There is still just one country outside of Europe or South America that has won any medal, the USA, bronze in 1930.
Covid-19 surges in China. A Chinese-Japanese environmental conference in Beijing has been postponed. This is despite the plan of having an on line conference.
I wonder how many people in China are vaccinated. The vaccines seem to have broken the virus in Europe, why not there?
The final of the World Cup will be played by two countries which have both been gold medalists before. Argentina won in 1978 and 1986, France won in 1998 and 2018. Both won their first gold on home turf. We will see on Sunday which will be a three time World Cup winner.
Our telephone and wifi at home do not work. This is quite annoying. The operator wants Paula to identify herself electronically to get help, but this is not possible when the net is down. O tempora, o mores.
The web was down for several hours today. It was not until late in the night that I could go online and post in the blog. Now that I can, I lack inspiration. Please come back tomorrow, the blog post may be more interesting then.
There was spaghetti and meat sauce for dinner tonight. I got the task of pre washing the dishes. Unfortunately, there are a LO-tidningen small dogs who love to help. You ask them to do other chores, and they refuse, but if you tell them you will do the pre washing of dishes yourself, they run over each other in eagerness to help. Nevertheless, I got to do most of the work myself. It did turn out fine in the end.
The chimney sweeper was here this afternoon. Part of his job was on top of the roof, this always brings a lot of noise. The Chihuahuas barked at him when he was up there, as if this would make the noise disappear quicker. Viola said, nevertheless, that the noise did stop rather quickly, so the barking was worth it. I do not think it was the barking that did it, but Viola told me: you never know.
It is good to have the chimney swept. Now it will be easier to boost our indoor temperature by a cozy fire. Life is good when a fire gives us heat in the house.
For the first time since the Second World War, Japanese fighter aircraft have landed in the Philippines. This time, it is because of cooperation between Japan and the Philippines. With greater military threats from China, Japan and the Philippines have decided on more military cooperation.
Cooperation of this sort is good. The countries threatened by China have a common cause and can do a lot to counter the threat together. I fully support this.
While Peanut was happy that England went on to the quarter finals yesterday, we were both sad that Japan lost to Croatia today. The game was tied after over time and Croatia won on penalties.
Brazil won against South Korea. So far, only European and South American teams are through. This is how it use to be.
In the last game of the World Cup group for Japan, the team beat Spain, 2-1. Thus, Japan won the group and is through to the final 16.
Spain has won versus Costa Rica and played a draw versus Germany. Since Japan won versus Germany and Germany did not win with more goals versus Costa Rica than Spain did, Spain also got through to the final 16. For the second World Cup in a row, Germany fails to go on from the group. This is a terrible result for Germany, which has won four World Cups and several other medals.
Peanut, Gunnar, and I are very happy for Japan, the home country of our breed. Our Poodle friend Laila, who was born in Japan, participate in the celebrations.
Now we hope for continued success.
