The book meme, finally

In the spirit of Christmas, I will finally answer the book meme Dan tagged me to do. I know, I know, you have all been holding your breath until now.

1. One book that changed your life: Dragons of Autumn Twilight by Weis-Hickman. The first fantasy book I read, and the beginning of many.

2. One book you have read more than once: Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban takes the lead, I presume.

3. One book you would want on a desert island: Takaisin Muumilaaksoon (Back to Moomin Valley) - a collection of Moomin books. This doesn't have all of the books, as there are two collected volumes. But as long as I have Taikurin hattu ("Finn Family Moomintroll" - the original name is actually "The Magician's hat") and Muumipapan villi nuoruus ("The Exploits of Moominpappa"), I'm okay.

4. One book that made you laugh: Naiv. Super. by Erlend Loe. Gods, I can't get over how funny it is.

5. One book that made you cry: Test of the Twins by Weis-Hickman. First experience of the death of a loved fictional character.

6. One book you wish had been written: Mine.

7. One book you wish had never had been written: Don't feel that strongly about any book I've read. Can't really say for the ones I haven't.

8. One book you are currently reading: Mosaiikkilintu by Ulla Viertola. My aunt's first novel, published last autumn. It's a fantasy book, for about 10-12 year olds. :)

9. One book you have been meaning to read: Foucault's Pendulum by Umberto Eco. Borrowed it once from the library, read the first page. Had other things to read, and so it goes...

10. Now tag five people: Not going to. Everyone is tagged already anyway. Tag yourself if you want to.

I'm off to the holidays - spending 4 hours in the train tomorrow and then it's Christmas. So Merry Christmas to everyone! (If you didn't know, Finns celebrate Christmas on Christmas eve, 24th's the day. Santa comes during the evening and says hello, instead of sneaking about at night. :D )

Of missed emails, work, Kalevala kung fu movies and stuff

Hi everyone!

I thought I should finally make my return. Not the least of the reasons for this is that Vishal, I think I just accidentally deleted a Happy Birthday mail from you, since Yahoo thought it to be spam and had placed it in my bulk folder. So I never got to read it, but thanks and feel free to send the mail again or just comment here if you feel like repeating yourself. I had a fun birthday, Juri made me gingerbread animals and other stuff, and I got cake at work.

Getting the internet was actually quite easy. The same place that provides our TV connection also sells internet connections. So after buying the connection we just plugged the net cable in along the tv cable and voila, instant internet access. The reason I haven't been writing here is work - I sit at the computer all day there and don't feel like doing it at home, too. I also developed a neck problem thanks to the sitting, but now it seems to be subsiding, thank gods.

So what have I been up to? Going to work, playing Kingdom Hearts 2 (haven't finished it yet, so no spoilers, please). Not that much. Here's how I get to work: I wake up at seven, leave to work at half past eight or so. First I take the bus (the stop is in front of our house) to the subway station, then I take the subway to the city and walk to my work place where I arrive a little before nine.

My favorite part of going to work is when the subway travels over the sea, when it goes over two straits. Or it was my favorite part when two weeks ago I still could see anything. Thanks to the Finnish winter, now it's dark when I go to work and dark when I come home.

It also snowed the first of November, but it melted away and now it's just rainy and dark. Snow would help some since it would reflect light and so everything wouldn't be so dark and black. (Try to tell us Finns that there is no such thing as global warming when winters have steadily come with less snow and minus degrees around here. When I was small we got 20 cm of snow that stayed in November, when now the snow arrives around Christmas, if even then.)

What else should I ramble on about? Oh, I went to see the Finnish movie Jadesoturi (Jade Warrior) in the theaters. It was said to mix Kalevala myths with Chinese myths and kung fu movies. Actually it had very little Kalevala in it, except for the inclusion of Sampo (Wikipedia: a magical artifact that brought good fortune to its holder). It had some kung fu style fighting, and a lot of Finnish and Chinese people speaking Chinese. Weird watching a Finnish movie with subtitles, but hey, we Finnish are used to our subtitles. The movie was the first Chinese-Finnish co-production, and the first Finnish movie to get a theatrical release in China.

The movie was actually a decent movie. Nothing that special, but I didn't once feel bored watching it. A two-and-a-half-to-three-star movie. The story's about this modern day Finnish smith who is the reincarnation of this mythical ancient Chinese warrior. It actually has two storylines, the modern day one where the Sampo is found again and the ancient one where it's gradually revealed what happened in the past with the Sampo. My favorite character in the movie was played by Markku Peltola, who I know nothing about except that he's been in a few Kaurismäki movies. (It was also fun watching him fight.)

Okay, that's about it of me rambling. I have one question: How many of you also have Livejournal accounts? I've been thinking about switching my blogging there and making at least some of the posts 'friends only', so you'd have to have an account to see my posts. Sound good or stupid?

(Oh, and I didn't take part in Nanowrimo, as you might have guessed, but would love to read your stuff.)

Forgot to say: The new show Heroes soooooo rules my world.