throw another bear in the canoe

Last night, we had dinner in on the sidewalk outside an absolutely awesome Italian cafe. OMG teh fudz. There was no night last night: I went to bed at 12:30 and it was twilight, and when I woke up briefly at 3 am it was morning. (I pulled the covers over my head and went back to sleep.)

We saw a runestone yesterday, and one today, and practiced our Futhark.

The hotel we are staying in has a hysterically terrifying antique elevator.

NB elisem: There was squeeze fish for breakfast.

Today we were tourists, walking all over Stockholm, including Scanden, which is sort of Old Sturbridge Village meets zoological garden, except for Scandinavia. We saw bears and owls and baby wolverines. And embarrassing genital graffiti. And peacocks.

And a goose on a roof.

There were bunnies with tiny hayracks.

There were also moonbeasts with children playing on them. I lost san.

Here is the giant eagle that will carry us from Mordor.

Stockholm's underground is hewn from the living fiberglass by no mortal hands.

Now my feet hurt.

Stockholm is lovely, with many trees, and is in fact composed chiefly of islands. It is also a maze of six-story pastel buildings, all alike. Except about half have cupolas. I want to live in a cupola.

Also, Sweden has a design aesthetic, and it sticks to it. Even the trees are gently rounded cubes. Out hotel room feels like living in an Ikea. Not in a bad way. And there are all sorts of very nifty energy-saving measures in place everywhere we go.

There are beautiful parks and huge skies full of gorgeous weather and very nice people. Most of whom speak better English than I do, which is good, because my Swedish is limited to six words. I learned a new one today: Utgang, except it has diacriticals I am too lazy to type right now.

Also, we saw Thor. He had a seagull on his head.

I love this place already. Now we're going to a pub.

Here's what Amanda had to say.