This is the blog of a Norwegian (Marianne, aka 'M') who moved to Australia in 2007 to be with Roger (aka R) and feels lucky to have escaped a comparatively communistic country with ridiculous weather!

Macca's has a NameItBurger contest. Read the truth about it here.

Some of you might have noticed a lack of update in my blog. I don't really know what's happening, I just don't feel very inspired these days. So instead I'll give you all an update on what's happening in my life at the mo, just because I know everyone must be dying to know;)

I'm still living in Oz with my soulmate Roger. He is still the perfect boyfriend. He's so considerate and caring and always makes me laugh. He's simply irresistible:)

He's sick of living so far from the shops and the city tho, so we've started looking for a new place to live. We currently live a 20 minute drive from Brisbane, and about 10 minutes from Aspley, where the hypermarket and other interesting stuff is. So we're moving to Carseldine, which is in walking distance from Aspley. Might help me lose som weight too. In Norway I walked everywhere I needed to go, but because nothing is in walking distance of here, we keep driving everywhere:/ We have a couple of houses we're looking at tomorrow. But I tell you this - it will have to be a dream home to compare to this one. I love this house, and I'm not downgrading.

Roger and I had a chat with Camilla's boyfriend Rory last night, just to test that he's good enough for her. And even tho R thinks all men are massive pervs, even he had to conclude that Rory seems perfectly innocent.

I spent about 8 hours a day every day for 4 weeks learning Photoshop. I now know enough to design websites and anything else I might wanna do, but I'm sure there's still heaps left to learn. Photoshop is a great tool, and I'm loving it. R has informed me he wants to use one of my website designs, which pleases me:) I'm also gonna make an art page where I can show off all my stuff.

Winter is pretty much over and it's getting warmer. I'm very happy about that, because they say this has been the coldest winter since 1941, and R kept insisting it wasn't cold and left all the doors open all day:/ Anything below 25 degrees is cold!

We are going to the Ekka in a few days, which you will be able to read all about in my oz blog.

All the cats are fine and are getting along great. Apart from Odo bullying Thomas occasionally...

Camilla is home from England, and is hating Norway. She wants to go back to stay with Rory, but I'm not so sure that's gonna happen...

So that's what's happening here at the mo:)

R got the flu, and now that he's getting better, I got it. And exactly the same symptoms as him: Backache, stomachache, headache, no energy and pain when I move my eyes. But the worst part is the constantly itchy and runny nose. So annoying. I have to stuff paper up my nose at night. Fun.

And we're supposed to go to the Ekka tomorrow.

Norwegians have no email manners. I have set up gratisnettsted.com, which allows people to set up and edit their own websites, almost for free. I must have had at least 10 signups for it, which is pretty good considering how new it is. But I still have no paying clients. The first person to sign up, I couldn't withdraw the funds from her bank account, so I emailed her and asked her about it. She said 'try again tomorrow and it will be fixed'. A few hours later she emailed me again and said she needed to reconsider the domain name and she would get back to me. Which she never did. What would she have done if I was able to process the payment and already registered the domain? Think before you sign up perhaps?

But I digress. The next person who seemed serious about it, also requested a custom design. So I wrote him an email and asked him to email me his logo and the addresses of a couple websites he likes, to get an idea of what he liked. He replied with what I needed and also asked me a couple of questions. Which I answered of course. I also let him know I was unable to process the payment due to lack of funds in his account. He never replied to that email and I never heard from him again.

Since then I've changed the payment system, and I now send out invoices instead. Several people have signed up and received an invoice. The thing is, they never bother to pay them. I've emailed one of them, because he signed up just as we changed it, and asked him if he still wanted his website. And surprise surprise, no reply! Not even a 'thanks, but I've changed my mind about it'.

I'm trying to run this site in a serious and professional way, and all I get is people ignoring just about every email I send. You don't just sign up and then forget all about it. And even if you change your mind, you'd wanna let them know, cuz with the old payment system, the site woulda been set up anyway and the money withdrawn from their account. Obviously there will be some people like that, but every single one so far?? Norries have no manners.

I have recently had the flu, and relied heavily on Strepsils. In Norway Strepsils are known as Repsils, and after googling it, I found out that it's prolly because the Norwegian version doesn't have any antibiotics in it. You used to be able to get Strepsils on prescription. You needed a prescription because it had antibiotics in it, but honey is nature's own antibiotic, and you don't need a prescription for that...

The Repsils packs are identical to Strepsils, apart from the two missing letters. Here's a pack of Repsils:

And here's Strepsils:

I get that they've changed the name, seeing as Repsils are basically just lollies (containing only sugar, glucose, colour and aromas), but what I don't get is why they haven't changed this bit:

Isn't it glaringly obvious that that's an 'S'? Doesn't anyone ever wonder what it stands for? It bugged me every time I saw the ad in Norway.

There's even a Repsils called 'double action', which you can get at the chemist. I thought maybe it contained something helpful, but nope, it's just a lolly.

I can kind of understand why they've taken the antibiotics out of Repsils, because people take far too much antiobiotics these days, resulting in resistant bacteria. When you are on antibiotics you need to keep taking it for as long as the doctor tells you to, to make sure the bacteria are all dead. When 80% of them are dead, you'll feel fine, but if you stop taking antibiotics, the 20% that's left will become resistant to that form of antibiotics. When a sick person eats Strepsils, they'll only keep eating them as long as they have a sore throat. When 80% of the bacteria are dead, you won't have a sore throat anymore, so you won't be eating Strepsils anymore.

There is one kind of Strepsils which would be really useful in Norway tho:

That's why you're eating Repsils/Strepsils in the first place isn't it? To fix your sore throat. It still has antibiotics in it, which I don't think it really needs. Your body can take care of the bacteria while you're comfortably painless.

I just went for a walk around the neighbourhood with R and Q, and a woman was walking in front of us with her dog, and in the other direction another woman came along with her dog. The dogs got all excited and wanted to sniff each other, and they were both obviously friendly. The owners just dragged them along and didn't even pause. I just think it's weird that people take their dog out for a walk, and then they act as if they're not doing it for the dog.

When I walked my dad's dog I let her stop and sniff ever 2 steps, because we went on the walk for her. If it was just me I woulda stayed at home, because it was pretty cold and wet.

Dogs need more than just physical exercise, they need mental stimulation, which they get from sniffing the ground and meeting other dogs.