Working...

After a surpricingly calm weekend, I'm back in the game here in London. Good to se the lads again! Not so good to leave Elisabeth again. But I'll be back! The hard work with moving out the furniture was carried out by family and good friends. Thank you all! My dislocated shoulder made me feel really bad about the whole thing, and I suppose I deserved all the jokes... :D
Anyway, I really feel that I have a lot of catching up to do with the studies. I feel that I miss a piece or two in the puzzle, but hopefully I'll be updated during this week. Harald, Robert and I have begun working on the assignment in Shipping Economics. the task is to calculate a number of different different voyages and present which ones are feasible and also to find the most profitable option. It's really interesting. And I think we will do just fine...

Dislocated shoulder part 3...

OK, this is weird... The first two times I dislocated my shoulder, it was due to external shocks. Tonight, while asleep, I was obvioulsy lying in a bad position. Suddenly I woke up, and looked at my arm. And oh yes, deja vu - again.
However, after experiencing Norwegian health care at its most insecure last time it happened, I decided to tend my own business... I laid down on my back, and pulled the shoulder back in position. The weird thing is that it worked! So I guessed I've learned the trick. The sad thing is that it seems I've gotten a talent for dislocating it also...
The bottom line today is: HELP! I'm moving out of the apartment, and could use all the help I can get! Embarassingly convenient, isn't it..

SOLD!

This morning I have sold the apartment for 900 000. And I feel quite good about it! :) So now I'll probably come home for the weekend and move all the furniture out! Helpful assistants may apply below... ;)

Who am I?

What are my skills? And of course: why the heck should someone give ME a job? I never thought writing a brilliant CV would be so difficult. I guess Pareto's 80/20 law is fitting here as well. To do 80% of a job requires 20% of the work. The last 20% requires 80 % (I think Olaf Thommesen calls it the 70/30 rule, but who's counting... Besides, I'll bet all my money that good old Vilfredo is more reliable!)
That was a small detour that really was intended to clarify my point... It's easy to punch down work experience, education, interests and so forth. But to present it in a way that sells. THAT's difficult. And that's when the real job begins.
I have also a small confession to make. Remember Sunday when I said I wouldn't go out, just sit and read? Well, I was wrong. Leif Olav and I went to see a movie at a Vue theatre up at Angel. The film was called Domino, and starred among others Kiera Knightley, Mickey Rourke (Whose role in Sin City cancels out all his previous crappy movies) and Christopher Walken. Quite amusing film, if you fancy a fist fight and dodgy morale. The plot is about a young girl who wants to be a bounty hunter, Domino Harvey.



What else is new? Not much. The days go by in amazing pace. Today (well, it's Tuesday for me...) I came home around 10.30 PM, after a long day with school work. OK, I admit it! I saw the second half of the Man U game.

Oh, just before I go to bed... I got my first bid on the apartment. 870 000.. Is that enough? I doubt it. We'll see tomorrow. Cross your fingers! Here's just a quick reminder of what's at stake.

Shame on me!

The updates on this blog has been few lately, and I apologise for that. I'll try to increase the update rate... The days fly by here in London, and I really like the city. This week Elisabeth came for a visit, and I hope there's still some shops in Oxford Street she hasn't been to yet. Me talking about her shopping is likely to backfire though, as I bought more than her!
I'm awaiting the arrival of my new digital camera, a Sony Cybershot DSC-P200. This week I have also bought two suits, a finacial calculator, some shirts and books. I really don't wanna check how much is left on my account... Anyway, once the camera arrives I'll take photos of the surroundings here.Life at school is good, I feel I'm quite in control at the moment. However I must work hard, because the lectures will become increasingly complex.
Yesterday we went to see Chelsea-Bolton at Stamford Bridge. In the first half, Bolton was mainly in control, and deserved the 1-0 lead they ended up with in the first half. However, Jose Mourinho must have spent the break well, for the Chelsea-team that entered the pitch in the second half was like a new one. They rolled over Bolton, and 20 minutes out in the half the score was 4-1. And the atmosphere was electric! We sat at row 30, which means that the air was a bit thin... The match ended 5-1, and MOM (Man of the match) was clearly Didier Drogba. He was a constant threat to the opponents, and showed great skills in heading, shooting, dribbling.



Before the match I sat in my room and listened to Fram Larvik vs Vard Haugesund. And Håkon. :) That's right Håkon, I heard you loud and clear.. Probably the referee did as well! :D Håvard also shouted a couple of times... Of course Vard won, but in my opinion it's almost about time to face the fact that next year also will be in division 2. Sad, but true. To cheer myself up, I have spent the morning today watching the greatest goal in history 200 times. Yes, I'm talking about Marco Van Basten's unbelievable bicycle kick for Ajax, pinpointed in the right corner. It just is THE ultimate goal... You can find it on soccerclips.net. Enjoy!
Today I'll just sit and read, I suppose. The area here is completely deserted in weekends.

Wining and mingling

The social Network (With a capital N). As fresh meat in the shipping business, everybody in the shipping course (and all the other master courses as well) need to establish a social network, people to have a beer with today and maybe work relations with tomorrow... The event this time was at The Brewery, a very nice place with a huge reception area.
The establishment is located approximately 200 metres from Cass Business School, and as we started to circle around the place like Fins around a sauna (No, I don't mean naked, whipping each other with birch branches...) we were greeted by a well-dressed bowlerhat-wearing gent. Good first impression. Then we aimed at the reception area. For those of you who bother to click on the link in this post, the room was The Porter Tun, I believe.
So there we were... Mingling, drinking white wine, beer and of course tasting canapès. A brief speech by the Business School Dean, David Currie, were followed by even more networking. The session lasted about three hours, from 5 to 8 PM. Really crowded, lots of great people there. And the favourite two words of the student vocabulary: FREE ALCOHOL.
Of course we all found out that this brilliant evening was too nice to end, so we moved on to SOS (See previous posts...). Great! After spending a couple of hours there I went home and into what they call "The blue lagoon" in the Norwegian Army. (For those of you who has avoided this broke institution: I'm talking about my bed) About 2 seconds before I was about to enter Dreamland I heard a knock on my door. Pavlos had returned as well, along with a couple of other guys from our course. And before I could say Nachspiel I was sitting with a beer in the kitchen.
So there we were, chatting about the very nice evening when suddenly a person approached. Security! Our pleasant conversation seemed to bother some of the other habitants here. I suppose that's fair enough. It was Monday (or rather Tuesday..) after all. So we reduced the volume and were just about to break up the party when the security guy returned. This time slightly less happy, and he started questioning about our room numbers. Great! :)
So I woke up today at 9 AM from the phone ringing. "Excuse me Sir, could you please come down and have a word with the Hall Manager?" Fair enough, I suppose. Still I couldn't get rid of the feeling of being a 12 year old kid who were sent to the Principal's office for making too much noise in class... :D
Downstairs I hooked up with the rest of the guys, and we got a verbal warning from the Hall Manager... So that's me... The troublemaker!
Well, anyway! The next time, he threatened to send Lance Armstrong's twin brother to deal with the noise:



After what I've heard he's a mean cracker.