My second Saturday this weekend is over and I did get a lot of things done actually. I did laundry, I studied for quite a while and I even cooked dinner when I wasn’t planning to. I also had time to watch the last couple of episodes of True Blood and a few of Revolution. And of course a bit of GW2 playing! Tomorrow will probably be a similar day, but hopefully with more studying (I did two problems and six theory questions today, it’s not too bad!). Goodnight!
Not much happened today except some Guild Wars 2 until Dzejna asked me if I wanted to go to Heden and play some beach volleyball. I wasn’t expecting it to be warm out, but playing for an hour in this heat was barely bearable. It was nice and fun anyway. I miss the warmth and sun!
After that I went to Ica Maxi where I met mom. We bought hair color for me. Now and then I get impulsive and it was time for a change. I can’t afford going to the hairdresser at the moment so a change of haircolor was what I could do right now. It was really blonde highlights, but we put it in all of the hair. It turned out like highlights anyway since I had most of it left since January. It is very lighter now and I like it. It looks a bit uneven on top, but I don’t think that’s a bad thing. It looks more alive and “real” I think. Hair is never one and the same color. If too many people tell me it looks weird though I am gonna redo it.
I got home pretty late from mom’s and have been playing more Guild Wars 2. I have played for so long now and I still don’t have 100% of the map explored. I am getting there though, 75% now!
The difference is much bigger in reality. I blame the lighting in the kitchen!
Chip chillin’ on the balcony in the late warm summer evening.
I am so glad I didn’t work today. Last day of Partille Cup, many people’s first day of vacation, a very warm Saturday in July = a million people at Liseberg. Instead I went with mom out to the cliffs that are the Swedish West Coast. In the middle of Gothenburg it was so hot today it was unbelievable. But as soon as we got out to the ocean it wasn’t that warm at all. So we just stayed for a couple of hours, read, ate vanilla buns, cherries and strawberries and then went back home. We ate baconcovered meatloaf with feta and beets inside it with sweet potato/potato/carrots/mushrooms on the side. Mom baked a vanilla cake for dessert. A good celebratory dinner for a completed thesis! Chip, one of the cats seemed to be very happy to see me. I will probably see him tomorrow again when I am thinking about getting new highlights with the help from mom.
I don’t know why I am so sloppy with the blog right now, so many things happen all the time. Yesterday at work anyway I had to call the guards again on a ~12 year old kid who disturbed me on Uppswinget. I am too tired to go into the details, but I ended up calling the guards and they got there right when I had to go to AtmosFear. The rest of my day went on and I forgot about the incident. But when I have 20 minutes left of the day (about two hours later) I got a call from a colleague who told me the guards wanted to talk to me about the incident and that I needed to talk to the police. The kid refused to talk to the guards for two hours and because he was a minor they had to call the police to get something out of him and I had to give them my side of the story. I was nervous but it worked out fine, the policeman was very nice and so was the guards I had to talk to for a while before the police showed up.
I don’t have any plans for tomorrow. I might go to Liseberg with Dzejna, or I might stay home to study, or be out in the nice weather (if that is the case, you never know with the Swedish summer), or get new highlights. A mini vacation can be full of surprises! But now, time for bed!!
It was all cloudy today. No wind in the city, but out on the island Öckerö it was windy and not that warm at all. So weird. 28C in Gothenburg and windy and cold just an hour outside.
It is time to update the blog again. I just haven’t been in a writing mood at all lately, strange! But here comes an update of what’s been going on in my extremely interesting life
First and biggest; my thesis got approved today!! I am done with it!! I so wish I could say that I now have a bachelor of science degree in building and civil engineering, but that post will have to wait another year. Tomorrow before work I will go to school to get the papers signed, return literature and ask our examinator to put the result in LADOK right away (our result system that CSN relies on) so CSN will give me a happy message telling me that I will get money next year. I am thinking about changing my application and take an extra loan. My rent is gonna be bigger over there and I have some trips I really want to do. I am saving as much as I can already because I don’t want to miss out on the Caribbean, Cancun or Coachella.
What else is there more than work? Nothing really. Work has been taking up a lot of my time lately. The big handball cup, Partille Cup, has started and that means a fuckton of youths at Liseberg. They are from all over, but especially Norway and Denmark and what is really bothering me is that they (the Danes) expect me to understand what they are saying! I can’t understand Danish at all so I mostly just smile and nod.
There are actually a lot of things that grinds my gears right now except for all the foreigners (who by the way behave better than Swedish people!). There is something at Liseberg called “ledsagarband” which is a ride bracelet for people going on rides with disabled people. I totally support that system. But what I don’t support is when young and stupid (okey, they are apparently smart who figured this out) kids go to Guest Service and tell them that they get anxious when standing in line or whatever lies they can come up with so one of them doesn’t have to pay for a normal ride bracelet. This also means that they can skip lines and go through the exit of each attraction. We who work there aren’t supposed to question these bracelets. But when a gang of ten 12 year old boys who look perfectly fine want to skip the line and take the exit in, I just get pissed off! Or when you have three normally functioning kids (14 year olds maybe) who comes back ten times in 30 min, something is not right. Guest Service shouldn’t be handing those bracelets out like free candy…
Another thing, that I’ve already written about, is when people kick me on the chin on the attraction. How hard is it to stop swinging your legs when I am checking your safety restraints? It’s a good thing I don’t get bruises easily. And it is also very annoying when people refuses to let go of the restraints when I am about to check them. It’s kinda hard doing that while someone is holding it down…
And then there is the problem I face hundreds of times every day. People who don’t want to go on a ride if they can’t sit next to each other. I understand what they are saying and it makes the ride a tiny bit more fun to sit next to a friend. But when half a handball team wants to sit next to each other or people with Guldpass (who has free entrance and rides for a whole year) does it, it’s too much. I am considerate if it is a young kid with a parent, but 17 year old guys who HAVE to sit next to each other and are holding up the line because of it is just so stupid! It is also very rude of people to assume that they can skip a ride and wait for the next whenever they want. It’s not their privilege to do that. They could ask nicely instead. I can’t just let half the spots on Höjdskräcken go empty every ride!
And on AtmosFear people are obviously extremely afraid of sitting next to a person they don’t know. So instead they leave an empty seat so a lot of people late in the line has to split up. So selfish of them! We often use the microphone to ask them to not do that, but they very rarely listen…
I really needed to get that out. I love my job and most of the time I just laugh and sigh quietly at people. And most of them are actually very sweet and appreciative. They understand that this actually is my job and when they are happy, it makes it so much more fun for me, and I can give it back to other people. I wish everyone understood that.
Today the weather was very weird. First it was nice, then it poured down but the guests were as happy as always anyway. It wasn’t that fun though working in it. Completely soaked even with the huge black raincoat and three sizes too big boots.
Friday tomorrow and my last day of work before my four-day weekend! On Saturday it is supposed to be very nice weather, up to 27C, so I am planning on working on my tan. I am getting very pale… I am also invited to a celebratory dinner at mom’s because of my approved thesis and then I guess I will study Structural Engineering and read a lot.
(By the way, I have a very hard time realizing it is already July!!)
A lot of thunder this past week (more than I’ve been through in the past couple of years in total). The dark clouds with sun shining through is very beautiful. And very typical Swedish summer!
Yesterday morning when I was on the tram to work something weird happened. I was standing up, listening to music and texting with mom, when all of a sudden I feel someone kick me on my shin. I look up and on the seat in front of me is an old lady who seems to be wanting my attention. I gave her a very questioning face and listened to what she had to say. She was telling me that I should sit down instead of standing up. The trams do a fast and hard stop and when it does I could easily fall on her. That’s everything I registered from what she was saying. I think she actually had talked to me for a while and sat there for many stops without me falling in her lap.
The only things I said to her was that it is very rude to kick people (it actually was a pretty hard kick) and that I can stand up if I want to, I am young and won’t fall over. Then I just plugged my music in again and ignored her for another 20 seconds before getting off.
This is the second time in a very short amount of time that an old lady yells at me. Do I look provocating to old ladies? Or are they just jealous because I am young? Annoying nevertheless.
At work yesterday I called on the security guards for the first time since I started four weeks ago. I was at Höjdskräcken and a bunch of annoying boys came to go on the ride. They didn’t listen to me when I asked them to calm down, they totally ignored me and showed no respect at all. I don’t think some guests at Liseberg understands that we actually work there. Anyway, I told them that I was gonna call the guards if they didn’t stop, they didn’t. So I put them on the attraction and pretended the safety restraints were troubling while I sat down and waited for the guards.
My heart was beating like crazy and I almost felt a little bad. But they were making my job harder than it should be and I just couldn’t focus on them and operating the attraction at the same time. It was hard calling the guards actually, but from now on I don’t think it will be that hard. I mean, the security’s job is to take care of disturbance in the park. And those guys were definitely a disturbance.
I got off at 8pm last night and my last half hour was on AtmosFear. After letting people in to the attraction my colleague told me that there were some famous people on the ride. They were from America but she had no idea who they were. So I went up to them and asked them who they were, and it turned out they were Avenged Sevenfold! I haven’t listened very much to them so I apologized for not recognizing them. They have good music though and I probably should have listened more to them when I was more into Hard Rock. I was very starstruck when I talked to them and checked their safety restraints. They filmed with a GoPro camera while I was doing it. I hope I don’t look too stupid…
When I came home I cooked two dinners, Korv Stroganoff with quinoa and feta/pesto salmon with root vegetables. Both were really good and I got 9 lunchboxes.
This morning I went to the dentist with my all of a sudden tooth ache. My upper left wisdom tooth has started hurting and is now growing into my chin. Two months ago it wasn’t. Weird. The dentist told me he could extract it right away, but I had a ten hour day ahead of me at Liseberg so that wouldn’t be a very good idea. Instead of getting it removed today he cleaned it and gave me an appointment in August! I don’t wanna wait until then. It hurts now. I want it gone now! I don’t want to go through this shit again. I hope it will start hurting again on July 7th so I can call the emergency dentist and ask them to remove it on the same day so I have a couple of days at home to recover.
At work I had three hours of Höjdskräcken. Like almost every day. I think it is okay though. I like that attraction, even if I am working there alone. But that means I talk to the guests instead. I both opened and closed it and my last hour, between 10 and 11pm I had fun. Just a few guests and even fewer rides. When they did show up there though I asked them how many times they wanted to go and just pressed the go-buttons right when they came down. Happy guests = happy Alexandra.
I told myself today that I was just gonna go home, brush my teeth and then go to bed. As usual, that didn’t work. I feel that I need to calm down after work and before bed. And if that is between 1 and 2 am, then there’s not much I can’t do…
This Midsummer we actually had sun and it was a nice day. I spent it with Chad and his friends in Vebgy which is a small small village outside of Borås. It was a small house right by the lake. The guys made the Maypole while the girls made flower wreaths. Mine was okay, but not pretty enough to wear. We had the typical Midsummer food with herring and potatoes and snaps. We sang stupid songs, danced around the Maypole and had a penthalon with stupid games. It was a typical Swedish Midsummer.
Except for the weather. It was sunny! Normally you just know that it will rain on Midsummer, but this year it was sunny and with some clouds. The biggest problem was that it actually was cold. And as soon as the sun disappeared behind clouds it got really cold. But when it was out it was really nice. I have proof that it was out, I got burned in my face. Now it’s a nice brown tan and I got complemented at work today.
Late in the evening on Midsummer the guys went wakeboarding and after that we spent many hours in front of the fire we had made in the firepit in the backyard. It was too cold to be anywhere else. At 2am I went to bed in the tent we brought. We couldn’t fit in the small house. But since it wasn’t raining and we had eachother to keep warm it was okay. But it wasn’t. It was extremely cold anyway and in the early morning it started raining. We didn’t get wet, but everything else did. Gross…
At 12:30pm the day after we hurried home so I could go to work at 4pm. I just got there in time.
Yesterday I only had 6 hours at work. I wasn’t that tired, today was way worse. I had 8 hours today and 3 hours at Uppswinget. One of those hours it were on break because of some technical faults with the “byglar” (I really don’t know what it is called in English, it is the things that keep you in your place on an attraction). But I sat outside the attraction with one of my colleagues and told everyone that a bird had hit one of the swings and that the mechanics had to remove like a lot of feathers and make sure all the cables and stuff were okay. The bird was in the booth and were waiting for a veterinary. Everyone bought the story. So fun!!
Have I mentioned that there is a huge problem with people stealing other peoples bracelets? Yesterday evening there was a gang of people going after a family with a mom, dad and two kids. One of the teenagers threathened the dad, and then he took up his police badge. KARMA!!
I feel really sorry for the kids who get beaten because someone doesn’t want to pay for their bracelets. The thing is that it is not only kids who cheat with the bracelets, adults do it too! My colleague at Uppswinget the last hour of the day today caught a dad with his son. The dad had a fake bracelet. What the fuck is going on with this world??? I thought Liseberg was a safe place. Yesterday one of the people working in the entrance got beaten up too beause she didn’t want to let some kids in for free. She got bitten and had to get a tetanus shot. This is all so upsetting!!
My plan for this evening was to try and play som BioShock Infinite, but I don’t think I can stay up any longer. I got 10 hours of sleep last night, but I am still not okay since the horrible night on Midsummer… Another day!
A bad thing that happened today was that one of my two remaining wisdoom teeth started hurting. I thought it was just the two bottom ones that were problematic, but now the upper ones started too. I am gonna call the dentist the first thing tomorrow and ask what I should do. I don’t wanna go back to the US with another tooth ache. Maybe this one should be removed as soon as possible.
This day was pretty sucky. Like my last two weekends. In the morning I went to the gynecologist office to ask about my situation. They told me they could give me a new test in the beginning of September and the gynecologist would tell me then what would need to be done. So I don’t know yet if that will affect my second year in the US.
After that I went to Nordstan to buy round stickers and white nail polish to try and make a french manicure on myself. I tried but it didn’t work. Well, it will when I am patient enough to do it properly.
I hung out in Brunnsparken for half an hour before going to Liseberg for a luxury breakfast with my coworkers. It was very nice!
Then I went home, and pretty much slept the rest of the day. Watched a lot of The 100 episodes and waited for Chad to come. But because of a headache I was left alone at home, again, and decided to buy some Ben&Jerry’s and watch Mr. Peabody & Sherman. It was an okay movie, but I couldn’t really enjoy it. It really sucks that something always comes in the way when I have my days off so I can’t see Chad…
Tomorrow’s midsummer and to be completely honest, I have to say that I don’t look forward to it. I will be with people I don’t know and there will be alcohol. I don’t like alcohol anymore. But being sober on Midsummer with young adults isn’t an option. I hope the weather will be nice at least so I can work on my tan by the lake and maybe go swimming for the first time this year (in Sweden).
I have watched the whole first season of The 100 in the past three days. And I learned today that is is based on a book. Another one to my extremely long to-read-list.
I don’t understand what our examinator is doing. Today we got our thesis report back again for like the sixth time with new comments. This was supposed to be done two weeks ago but since they are too lazy to read the whole thing through every time they just give us a few comments here and there every time and completely new things every time we get it back. I am so sick and tired of this now! I don’t have time for this bullshit, I have a full time job with shitty hours, I have an exam I need to prepare for for the fourth time, I have to get this precancer thing under control and after all that I don’t have any freetime. In our examinators latest email she said that a full time job (40h week) should give us plenty of time to still work on the thesis. What she doesn’t know is that one of us is working in another city and the other works late evenings and can’t get up early to work before work. I am not a machine!!
So, here we are again, tons of comments to change and the examinator goes on vacation now to come back for four days in July. If this doesn’t get approved soon I won’t get CSN next year and that will probably mean I can’t go back to the US…
There is not much going on right now more than work. Yesterday I was at Balderado again and had Spinrock most of the day. What’s so boring with Balderado is that all my three attractions down there are single manned. Spinrock is supposed to be double during the busiest times of the summer, but not quite yet.
Today I was at Berget and had a very chill 8-hour day. A lot of AtmosFear and Lisebergshjul. 1,5h of Uppswinget (I like that one) and closed Höjdskräcken for the third time in a row. That one is very nice to close. Today there were hardly any people the last 30 minutes.
Tomorrow is my Friday and I so look forward to having some time off. I will most likely be at Berget again since I start 12:50 and none of my attractions at Balderado are open at that time. Nice for me!
I tried once again to call the gynecologist I went to do the PAP smear and they are still unreachable. So I called a central number, made an appointment for a second PAP smear on September 2nd. But I need to get into contact with someone who knows about this, and not just administration. The woman told me it was very important that I know what I need to do. So at 8am on Thursday I need to go there and physically talk to the gynecologist. I hope they know what I should do because of my upcoming year abroad. Maybe I can do all the necessary things over there?
Time to go to bed, I need to get up at 9 to study some…
Even with the relief of not having cancer I am still tired. The honeymoon phase of working at Liseberg is over and I’ve started to see it as a job. I still enjoy it a lot, but it’s easier to get tired. 6 days in a row, long and late hours. You definitely feel that.
I had the test at Uppswinget today and passed it galantly. After closing Höjdskräcken today again I found out that I will have the test at Ponnykarusellen tomorrow, which means I will be at Balderado. Maybe I will get Balder as well? I had 3,5 hours at Höjdskräcken today, which is A LOT. You are always alone on that attraction and with few guests at Liseberg it was pretty lonely. I was surprised, it was a Sunday and amazing weather. But the day went by pretty fast and now I will watch the second episode of The 100 and the sleep like a rock for many hours. Tomorrow morning before work I will start studying for the reexam in August. Yay…
Bemm 