When I woke up today and looked out the window, I was quite shocked by the sight. While this snowy landscape is beautiful, it’s something you’d expect to see in January or February, not at this time of year. Plus, it means more shoveling, (at least for the car)… I could do without that…
Let’s see how long this lasts…
This is coming a bit late (partly) due to unexpected weekend rush but… This was Friday’s weather forecast until Tuesday, and apparently, according to the latest information, moderately cool weather will continue at least until Thursday.
Pekka Pouta (56), our well-known meteorologist, doesn’t recall ever experiencing such a widespread, intense, and prolonged snowfall in Finland so late in the spring. Additionally, extremely rare freezing rain is forecasted for the beginning of the week. On Wednesday, we were planning to switch to summer tires as part of our annual maintenance…
Where are you, spring? We are eagerly awaiting you here!!
Many bloggers have posted about the arrival of spring, excited about how nature comes to life and the sun shines, so I thought I’d also share some ’springy’ pictures from Finland here, for your enjoyment.
As you can see, spring hasn’t arrived here yet, except according to the calendar and daylight saving time. There’s no sign of spring weather-wise. The only proper indication of spring is, of course, the increasing daylight. There hasn’t been much direct sunlight (although it must be hiding somewhere), but it’s definitely brighter for longer, meaning the evenings are getting later. That’s a good thing, but I really crave the actual sunlight, it’s been constantly so grey. Not long ago, the birds were singing in the mornings, and I thought spring was finally coming, but it turned out differently. We got winter spell. Last friday, it snowed all day, and there were stormy winds. Many had already switched to summer tires, so there were a lot of accidents too. Fortunately, we haven’t done that yet but the weather is still so cool that the snow hasn’t properly melted away yet.
Lately, I’ve been contemplating the consequences if the media’s mentioned signs of the weakening Gulf Stream come true. I’ve feared the possibility of a very cold climate here. According to Wikipedia such an event likely won’t happen in this century (and they say the global temperature first need to rise 3-5 degrees Celsius before this scenario could even occur.) Some sources suggest that this could happen in the near future.
However climate warming might mitigate the effects of the Gulf Stream weakening. Consequently, the outcome for us in the north could be more or less a plus-minus-zero situation. Perhaps there wouldn’t be significant changes in the weather, or only minor ones, (hopefully not towards colder temperatures).
GOOD NIGHT!
Easter is (almost) over (some are still celebrating Easter Monday, even though it’s already over here in Finland) but I still wanted to paint some eggs because I had a good idea for them. We didn’t have any eggs in the fridge until late yesterday evening when we went to the store to buy some. However, I didn’t have the energy to paint them last night, so I did it today instead.
In the photos, you can see the result. The color didn’t seem to adhere well to the surface of the eggs; for some reason, it repelled my watercolors quite a bit. It’s been many years since I last painted eggs, but I don’t remember it being this difficult before. The patterns didn’t turn out exactly as I wanted, but in the end, I managed to achieve something. As you can see from the photos, one of the eggs is mimicked to look like oak, one like green marble, and one like Carrara marble. I learned the mimicking technique (=faux painting) about 20 years ago at a painter’s vocational school. They are at least a bit different from the usual Easter eggs.
GOOD NIGHT!
TERVEISET SINNE TAIVAASEEN
https://lyricstranslate.com/en/terveiset-sinne-taivaaseen-greetings-heaven.html
I stumbled upon this wonderful memorial song made for lost loved ones by chance on YouTube, and I was immediately captivated. It has a truly beautiful message and a very moving video where people send messages to their departed loved ones. I even found the English lyrics for it. This is worth listening to and/or checking out. In the video, there are also a couple of well-known Finnish music creators making appearances. The artist is unknown to me. Perhaps I should get to know him.
GREETINGS TO MY FATHER, TO MY BROTHER (AND ALL THE OTHER LOVED ONES) UP IN HEAVEN!!!
YOU’RE ALWAYS IN MY THOUGHTS!
❤️
HAVE A LOVELY WEEKEND!!
My response for this challenge:
For me, the lovely/precious/memorable moment of the week was this kiss captured in the photo found in my deceased brother’s apartment as I was clearing it out. As you can see, the picture was taken just before boarding the ship, about to embark on a journey and my brother is kissing his former fiancée.
After the picture was taken, a lot has happened. Five years later, the fiancée (”K”) became paralyzed. Several years later, my brother and his fiancée (”K”) broke up (but later continued as friends) and I became K’s personal assistant. We were already friends, (which I guess is obvious). Then my brother passed away suddenly.
K’s hospital stays have continued. Last week, K had to go to the hospital again, and she apparently has another long rehabilitation period ahead. Life tests us, but good memories bring a smile to our faces. Oh, if only I could go back to the summer of 1999, when I had just turned 19. Life was ahead of me, and my dearest family members were close/healthy.
FINLAND’S EUROVISION SONG CONTEST QUALIFIER
It’s that time of the year again, Eurovision song selection time. On Saturday night, Finland’s representative song for Eurovision was chosen. The winner was the hilariously quirky 90s party song: Windows 95 man’s ”No rules”. https://youtu.be/byI2jM_xcjU?si=nidpWIzuxAhAH7qE Looks like we’re going with humor again this year…
PILVI IS THE BEST!!!
However, the best performance of the night comes from the other host of the evening, delightful Pilvi Hämäläinen, known primarily as an actress, with her interval show. Unfortunately, it wasn’t eligible for voting.
Even though this was supposed to be a joke, and to compile all Eurovision clichés, this works better than any of the competition songs. Catchy, melodic, a true old-fashioned EUROVISION!! It also reminds me of my favorite Eurovision winning song ”Diva” from 1998.
And oh my, what a stunning voice Pilvi has. This came as a complete surprise.
At least for a middle-aged woman like me, this is the only genuinely right way to do Eurovision song. This has received a lot of praise on social media too!
Of the actual competition songs, I think the best one was Sini Sabotage’s: ”Kuori mua”, (Peel Me) https://youtu.be/3AHaIe_FQao?si=43BSun8RUMLjQhiL but even that didn’t come even close to this level!
Or well, it might be more contemporary, but not as authentic and interesting.
PILVI HÄMÄLÄINEN, I ❤️ YOU!!
OLET IHANA PILVI!!
This is a really funny sketch (by the legendary Pertti ”Spede” Pasanen) from the 1980s-1990s, where Spede, always a bit ahead of his time, anticipates the arrival of mobile phones in a way.
The ”wife” is waiting for an important call from Stockholm and decides to take the landline phone with her to her friend’s place.
”Lissu promised to disconnect her phone for that time so I can plug mine into her socket”,
the wife explains to her husband. The husband is left dumbfounded.
The sketch is part of the excellent ”woman’s logic” series, which probably wouldn’t be shown on television nowadays because most probably these sketches would be classified as derogatory towards women. However, in this sketch a woman’s logic is presumably considered secondary from a contemporary perspective. The focus is more on the clever usage of the phone, and that’s why it’s particularly amusing to watch now in the era of smartphones.
Buy the way, I’ve heard that when Spede first showed the script for the initial sketch (related to a woman’s understanding of the operation of a car’s differential gear) to Hannele Lauri, who portrayed the female role in the sketches, Lauri asked:
”What’s so funny about this?”
That’s when Spede realized the sketch was working.
I grew up with these jokes and I find them clever. Also isn’t it true that ”men are from Mars, women are from Venus,” as the fantastic old saying goes? We complement each other when we are different. That’s how it’s meant to be. We can be different and still be equal!
HAVE A NICE DAY!
You might also like:
PERTTI ”SPEDE” PASANEN
ADVENT CALENDAR DOOR 14
ADVENT CALENDAR DOOR 15
ENNUSTAJA
A funny cartoon in the local newspaper at the turn of the year.
A fortune teller’s tent with a sign: ’out of service’.
The man says:
”He predicted health and world peace for the years 2020-2023.”
Wishing everyone a wonderful start to the week! 😊
PIPARIJOULUTORTUT
Let’s share one more festive post here, even though Christmas is pretty much over again. I just didn’t have time to post this earlier… On the other hand, Swedish-speaking Finns have traditionally spent Christmas until January 13th (for what we call ”Nuutinpäivä”) so I guess you could still consider this part of the Christmas season in some way…
This year, I tried gingerbread tartlets for the first time using the recipe from the YouTuber ”Kakkumonsteri”, and they turned out well. A delightful combination of the crispiness of gingerbread and the flaky structure of Christmas tarts.
I used Valio’s caramel cream as the filling, which has a delicious taste. However, I found that the flavor suffered from heating in the oven. The best taste was when spooned directly from the fridge. (It could also be that my sense of taste has probably not fully normalized after COVID-19, as it seems that any slightly milder foods don’t taste like anything. Spicy or otherwise strong-flavored foods, like tortillas eaten on New Year’s, taste normal. For some reason, cold foods also seem to taste more intense than hot ones.) I hope that will eventually return to normal, or else I might only be able to eat traditional Finnish foods when they are cold. 😆
Preparation:
Ready-made doughs are convenient to use for this, but you can also make them yourself if you like. First, roll out gingerbread dough (”Kakkumonster’s” dough looks quite small; I rolled it out in few smaller batches), and place tortilla dough on top as shown in the video. Thin sheets of tortilla dough are handy here, and you don’t even need to roll them out much. Divide the dough into eight parts and shape them as desired. After that, you can add traditional jam as a filling, or I recommend trying caramel filling. The caramel cream I used was quite delicious and added something new for these. ”Kakkumonster” made two types of gingerbread pastries: with licorice flavor and with gingerbread flavor. Gingerbread cream cheese is sold ready-made (at least in Finland). For licorice, you’ll need licorice powder, which is mixed into the cream cheese, but it’s probably not sold in most places outside of Finland.
The tarts are baked at 225 degrees Celsius for about 10 minutes.
And now, time to eat!
Tanssitytön blogi 