39 Degrees

This morning the alarm clock woke me from a dream that I was certain was real. I dreamt we were having breakfast with the Obamas at our house! How funny is that? The girls were playing with Kaleb and asking what type of dog they should get, and Kory and I were talking with The First Couple about what it means for America that they are now in The White House. I told them about the prejudice I grew up with and how far things have come in my lifetime, like they didn’t know that. In the dream I felt so comfortable with them, like we were good friends, and in real life, I didn’t even vote for the guy, so go figure. But that dream has been on my mind all day so I’m not sure I have been well focused on much else.

Kaleb had a sore throat yesterday which morphed into him feeling sick all over this morning. When I took his temperature with a Norwegian thermometer, I had to figure out that 39 degrees Celsius equals 102 degrees Fahrenheit and he really did have a fever. (I’m thankful for websites that do that kind of math because I was pretty groggy and math isn’t an area in which I’m “gifted”.) Poor Kaleb, he stayed home from school with Kory and just laid on the couch watching videos and playing his Nintendo. He was miserable all day with a headache, sore throat, cough and runny nose. I hope he doesn’t share his germs with us.

I slept in a little too long and had no time for my most cherished cup of coffee this morning so my brain was barely functioning all day. I felt like I was in a haze as we were being taught things that I wish I could have understood better. One thing I partially understood was when The Good Teacher Inga told us how to write short notes. Apparently, when Norwegians write notes, they use a cryptic version of proper Norwegian which eliminates the “I” and “you”s and the obvious verbs. The verb endings change to identify who is doing what. “Husk norsk” means “Remember Norwegian” (implied YOU need to remember), but if you write “Husker norsk” (and add that “er” to the end of “husk”) then that means I am the one that must remember to speak Norwegian. ” It’s not necessary to write the word for “speak” because that is an assumed action verb. I think this type of writing must have been invented after the 3M Corporation invented the sticky note pad. Norwegian’s, being the tight-wads that they are, had to invent a whole new language that could fit an entire sentence on one little scrap of paper so they would save money, because Lord knows it might take more than a two inch squared piece of paper to write “Du må huske å snakke norsk i dag.” (“You must remember to speak Norwegian today” – a note I should write to myself.) I hate all these little variations on the theme as I’m still struggling with just the everyday ordinary version of Norwegian. Take note: Hate it.

Kory spent his day drawing yet another scene from this beautiful land. Today’s photo is the drawing he finished a few days ago of the dog sled trip we took in December with the view from my sled. What he’s working on now is a mountain/water scene that he’s making up from four different photos. Ever since he started drawing, he has stopped complaining we don’t have a TV. I however, am an artist-widow as he cannot even carry on a conversation with me about anything when he’s drawing – so then I sit in front of the computer after Kaleb is in bed and watch a TV show on the internet. (Life has all kinds of interesting twists and turns as I’m the one that hates TV.) Kaleb still had a fever of 39° when he went to bed tonight. It’s now 39° outside, which converted, is 3.8° Celsius. It’s hard enough to try and learn the language, but learning this whole Celsius/Fahrenheit conversion might be the end of me.

We missed seeing Tobias today but the other day I tested a word out on him that I heard at school. I asked him if it was a swear word or not (my pal Vestina said it’s NOT, it’s just an expression), so I said it to Tobias. He immediately blushed and had a horribly shocked look on his face, shook his head and said, “I’ve never heard an adult say that word before. I’ve heard kids say it when they are being mean but a grown-up would NEVER say that word.” Kaleb immediately tried to cash in on the deal we have that if I say a bad word he gets a dollar (I don’t really swear but I do say some words sometimes that Kory doesn’t like so we call them “bad” and they cost me a dollar.) I told Kaleb “no deal” as I didn’t know any better. I then had to apologize to Tobias for being so rude after he told me what it meant. And today I told my pal Vestina she shouldn’t say that word anymore because it really is a swear word. She then said THAT word in response. So much for trying to make the world a better place.