8.15am - Gothenburg.
Took a picture of this Benz at the Lanvetter airport in Gothenburg. The sticker on it says "Drive Swedish". Last I checked Mercedes was german, with a hint of Usa. Who knows, maybe they moved their offices to Sweden for tax reasons now when Sweden isn´t officially the country with the highest taxes (Denmark just past).
Had a mocha at Espresso house. Possibly the best mocha in the world. The day before I bought two within an hour. While sipping on the first one I was blown away by it´s tastyness so I had to walk back to the same place and buy a new one. Totally worth 12$.
11.10am - In Stockholm.
Having a burger at Max. Overlooking the stressed out people trying to check in their luggage with a Scandinavian Airlines computer.
1.10pm - In Umeå.
For some reason SAS thought it would be a great idea to delay my flight for two hours and cancel another flight to a city near where I was going. They were short on planes they said. So we made a stopover in Umeå for an hour. Very strange. Dropped off some people (who´s flight got cancelled and now got to car pool, or is it called plane pool?.. with our Luleå flight). Picked up some more passengers before heading to Luleå.
You´d think the airline would at least give you some soda or food for delaying you two hours on purpose, but no. Tea was still 3$ and you couldn´t get out of your seat for the entire flight. Oh and I got a middle seat since they changed the planes around at the last minute. With three hours of sleep the night before I couldn´t wait to drool on the person next to me.
Our plane had become a gypsy style Greyhound bus. The flight still cost half a students monthly salary and I got to spend half my day sitting in a plane with no food. I did take a bottled water from them without paying, it was funny.
The old Pierre would have freaked out over an incident like this, but over the years I´ve learned to put these hurdles behind me. When you fly over 100 times a year and rent a car every week and each time you get fined for heavy bags and the price of your rental car NEVER ends up being what the estimate was you just have to live with that you´re not going to make it to 40 if you worry about these things. Some wise person once said "Pick Your Battles".
4.30pm - Luleå.
On my way to pick up my sis and drive down south to watch the first play-off game SAIK have played in 27 years.
5.20pm - Piteå.
We were contemplating possibly eating in Piteå, but the smell from the plant was too gross.
8.10pm - Skellefteå.
At the arena.
Spirits were high and I had just eaten my second burger at Max for the day. Before making a quick stop to see 5 week old Ester Burman. She was adorable.
SAIK won the game 2-1 against the highest ranked team in the league. Six more possible games to go.
Made it back to Luleå around midnight. Couldn´t sleep (been happening a lot lately) I finally dozed off listening to Dan Brown´s "Deception Point".
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The Max burger´s restaurant at terminal 4 in Stockholm was voted 3rd best place to eat out of all the airports in the world. Here´s why:
No wonder Mc Donalds have tried to have stores up where I grew up but always failed. I think they´ve tried like 10 times now.., there´s one left. Max just keeps expanding. The only thing they should do is to bring back the cardboard trays the burgers used to come with. And please keep the cutlery visible, that´s right, we eat our burgers (usually) with a knife and fork.
This was the lovely airplane door that got my palms dripping. The noise and air that game through when they started up the engines freaked me out. I was really close to asking them to let me off. But then again, why put all other passengers through that inconvenience just because I was scared of dying, I mean flying? Figured it would be a good view from 2000 meters when the door would blow out. Thankfully that didn´t happen.
Me and sis at the game. She was impressed with the energy at the arena. She´s only been to Luleå Hockey games and they are playing lousy at the moment. The whole team, everyone from the management to the fans are a mess.
It´s funny how a bunch of sweaty jocks can make a city come alive. I think it´s fascinating. I disliked hockey players (and still do to some extent) growing up cause they hated on us who skateboarded and acted like insecure wolfs with no alpha male.
But as long as there are people like Peter Forsberg and Niklas Lidström out there there´s hope for hockey.
What game is complete without some Lord Calvert in the WC?
The SAIK fans. They love hockey, they really do. I can´t think of anything that gets me half as exited as they are at this exact moment.
I´ll probably drive down to Umeå on Friday to watch the swedish snowboard championships. And then go see the third play-off game in Skelleftå on Saturday.
Right now I need to sleep and think about my future.
