quick

First of all I would like to say some stuff:
I havent updated for a long time now but If you didnt read my last entry, here is my new address and phonenumber:

Address:
Joakim Engfors
Årbygatan 23
63345 Eskilstuna
Sweden

Phone:
Home: +46 (0)16 54 10 848
Cellphone: +46 (0)76 09 11 090

Antonia and I are making a calendar (actually she made it, her design ftw), so please IM/email/comment your birthday-date to me (and year of birth).



lets get started

This update will be quite long, probably, which is one of the reasons I havent updated in a long time - I have so much to tell and show but so little time!
The 20th of July Antonia and I started our roadtrip towards Denmark. We woke up quite early, had a nice breakfast downstairs with her mom and Petra, to our surprise also JT came by to say farewell, we all cried some but eventually we were on our way!
Since I dont have a drivers license Antonia had to drive all the time herself, we made plenty of breaks though, Antonia took a powernap at McDonalds at some point ;D
We were basically on the same highway ALL THE TIME till we arrived in Denmark, but the fact that we had a GPS was making the trip so much less stressfull - no stress with maps & no worries about not finding our way, its such a great little device and it has really been to alot of use also after we set foot in our new apartment.
We made up some games while driving to keep ourselves awake, we were doing alot of variations of the game when your supposed to say a name/movie/game/show/etc that starts with the letter that the name/movie/game/show/etc the other person said ended with! That game gives you such a headache after an hour ._.

Umm.. <Asking Tonia to write something about the roadtrip because I want to fastforward to when we meet N!ckchanger>

Anyway - after many many hours we were closing in on N!ckchanger's place! It was a very very beautiful area and we were very exhausted!
After parking outside his place we rang the doorbell and he came and opened - The first thing Antonia said was -REDHAIRED!? I didnt expect that!- Or something like that xD What a weird girl I have! Love it <3.

We entered, he showed us around, and we sat down to eat something together. It was really nice food, very tasty :) They live really beautifully, awesome nature around them and inside everything was very clean and neat (even though they were renovating) :) They were all very friendly and nice to us even though Antonia and I are pretty nooby at socializing. Well, we were also very tired, especially Antonia after all the driving, and she also suffered from the absence of The Sims which she was somewhat addicted to at the time ^^.
"After dinner we went on a small car drive through Svendborg, over the bridge to Tåsinge where we saw Troense, Valdemar Castle, Landet church and many houses with thatching roofs which" (<-- quote from N!ckchangers blog because I didnt know what the places were called, but i'll finish the sentance myself!) LOOKED LIKE HOBBIT HOUSES! Just google "thatching roofs" and look on images. Weiiiird danish people. But nice! Then we went to eat some icecream, it was quite late already and I was freezing soo much, but the icecream was really nice, liquorice, they dont have it in Germany for some weird reason. I missed it.



Oh my.. The way I write. Its my mood I guess, and lack of sleep :D But its so full of smiles, exclamationmarks, weird stuff and whatnot. The way my sentances are built are completely strange but whatever - I've got alot to write about, if Im gona try to write it nice it will take the whole week.

The next day (I think, it might have been the same evening actually) he showed me a game, BRAID, it looked so extremely cool! I'll write more about it later on.
We also watched Monty Python's And Now For Something Completely Different. A super weird movie, sometimes kinda fun, sometimes very fun, but most of the time just weeird ^^

It felt good to finally meet the guy I got to know as Franzy - He has been helping me so often with all kind of things, I learned alot from him and it was cool to be able to thank him for all of that in person :) I am sure he will have to help me alot in the future too lol, I hope I can also be of some use for him some day :)

Btw - he has a cat, but it doesnt listen to any name so they just call it "The Cat", amazing!

Oh, hold on a sec - Toni is done so I'll just paste it all in here:

Antonia's Take on the Road Trip:
--------
It is hard to describe the feeling. The feeling of leaving behind everyone I grew up with and everyone I love - except for Joakim. For a long time now I knew that I would move so Sweden on July 20th. But reality didn't quite catch up with me until it was that day. That day it hit me, and it hit hard. I hadn't cried that bitterly in weeks.
So I drove north, away from my life in the direction of a new one; a new language; new people. The trip was very exhausting. Especially in the beginning, because J0k3 was so tired all the time, so he couldn't really keep me any real company. I got bored quickly and I looked forward to every little break we took, simply because it meant a change of scenary.
We packed a lot to eat, so as to not spend so much time on the road. Guess what the first thing was that we bought? - Food. Of course. But that was the fun part of the road trip as well: allowing myself to eat whatever I wanted for 3 days.
After each break we took my feet hurt. I hadn't realized the pain before, but as soon as I stopped driving and relaxed my feet they started to get used to that and complained extra much whenever I ordered them back to work. After driving 7 hours the pain was almost unbearable. Luckily by then Joakim was wide awake (he better - slept enough, that lazy creep) and we played some games - like for instance: one would say a Swedish word and the other has to say the next word, which has to start with the letter that the former ended with. Of course J0k3 owned me in that particular game, but it was good practice for me.

In the end we arrived - safe and sound - at N!ckchanger's and we relaxed. After having some interesting dinner he drove us around in his car and showed us around. All this kinda went by in a blur, because I was so exhausted. But it was a lot of fun nevertheless and I got to taste licorice Ice-Cream. Very very nasty shit, btw.

Next day we went to Zacker's. Fun Fact: his shower is in the kitchen. Very nice guy, very cool. Would gladly have him as a friend, because I am sure, that he would be a great one. Together with him we ate Pizza and he asked me the most straight-forward question I've ever been asked: "what did you do with your arm?". After two hours of knowing this guy he asked me this. I was completely caught off guard and very very happy. The fact that he didn't tiptoe around the subject or made any weird faces - no - he just asked me what I did there. I'll allways remember that, I think.

The next day we drove over two bridges and into Sweden. There I didn't really want to get used to the speed restrictions, so i just ignored them and drove as I was used to in Germany. I later regretted that, because I found out how the speed cameras at the side of the road look like there - I also realized that I had driven past many of those already and that I hadn't gone at the allowed speed then at all. I felt pretty shitty then and ever since then I haven't driven above restriction anymore - at least not on purpose ;)

After getting home we unpacked the mattresses and went to bed. Maybe we stayed up a little, but I didn't pay enough attentionen then.
It was the longest I've ever driven and I've only had my driver's Licence for roughly two years.

I think I did pretty well considering. :)
--------

BAH! She says I should finish writing my thing before Im reading hers! I am so curious u_u.
Oh well ~ We left from Nickchangers place later on after copying alot of stuff from his harddrive and headed towards Copenhagen where we were gona meet Zacker!

The trip was alot shorter than what we drove the day before, which really showed, when we arrived at Zacker not long after we left from Nickchanger, we were in alot better mood than when we arrived at Nickchanger (sorry Franzy! but all the drama about leaving everyone + crazy long drive is quite exhausting). Also - Zacker's apartment was very interesting, I instantly felt at home - It wasnt dirty or anything, but it wasnt as neat & perfect as at Nickchangers parents place, gives a more relaxed and home-like atmosphere - and his shower is in his kitchen! HAHAHAHA! That is soooooooo cool.

Well well, after some talking and such, we went to eat pizza together, we sat down and ate at a really really nice pizzeria and it was all feeling very good, he is a very interesting person and he is also good at making conversation - which is good for us since we're not xD The pizza was so good that I even ate it after it got cold (ppl who know me also know how seldom that happens).
Then we went for a walk, we walked in a park that had some insight to a zoo where we saw elephants. We also saw some crazy people who were jogging.

When we arrived in his apartment again I managed to flirt with him enough to borrow his PC and watch the Starcraft games I had missed :P I love to watch the Korean pro's duke it out, and it was really nice to do it together with Zacker.



We were then talking about the good old times, the Sands-of-War days and I asked him how it feels to work at IO Interactive. I am soooo proud of him, for all that he has accomplished and I also envy him - he is so smart, talented, successfull and we have learned alot from eachother. It made me glad to hear that the team-feeling we had in SoW was quite uniqe, and it was also cool to hear about his projects in IOI and how he had people working for him with graphic design and whatnot!
Auww. I feel like I cant write anymore right now, I'll continue tomorrow. Ill just finish this up quickly - In the evening before we went to bed we watched a movie, Tropic Thunder, it was pretty good.
The next morning we woke up very early (poor Zacker lol) and ate some breakfast and prepared the Harry Potter audiobook that he got for us, then we returned to the car to carry on towards Sweden.

--- next day (well, actually night: 00:06) ---

Oh well, I just got out of the shower and I have some energy to continue now :)
So when we arrived in Västerås in Sweden we were met by Ias & fyrk0 (and a present from fyrk0!), and together we went to my moms work to pick up the keys to our apartment :)
Then we went to IKEA together and looked around for stuff we wanted to have, our plan was to have all our stuff delivered but in the end we didnt really get anything xD

So, we went home, Antonia was all scared and crying because of fyrk0's "You know your gona live in a ghetto right?" ^^, I dont know for sure what she expected after that but it must have been really bad because she was really scared and sad, but she got very relived when we arrived :)
Our apartment was reaaally nice, we really liked it! The area is far from the best but its not too bad. So eventually we went to bed, very exhausted.
I'm not sure now in what order we did everything, but in the comming days we did alooot of stuff! Paperwork regarding moving, insurance, rent, university, komvux, phone and internet providers, etc etc etc. We also contacted our landlord about some stuff not working properly in the bathroom. We really worked our asses of with the apartment aswell, we kept it real nice and worked hard with the furniture we bought, assembled it etc. Even had to return stuff because we got the wrong colors by misstake, a whole lot driving back and forth and here and there, we bought alooot of small things, food etc.

And I say again - we worked sooo hard, and it paid of, our apartment is SEXY!

The people here are very nice to us, many times people asked if we wanted help with carrying things up the stairs, showed us the right directions and even paid our parking-tickets. Speaking of parking tickets, when we were unloading the furnitures we parked outside the entrance for 10-15 minutes, and we got a parking ticket for 600kr (60euro)! I called my mom and she called the people in charge and yelled alittle and in the end we didnt have to pay anything :P What the hell are we supposed to do? Carry everything from the parkinglot?
Anyway, one day, when we were looking for the garbage-room, we asked a girl who walked by if she could point us in the right direction - she walked with us to the door but we couldnt open it because an old key was required, and we were only given a new one - so she offered us to borrow her key and make a copy, when we explained that we dont really find our way around here so we wouldnt know where to do that, she said she could make it for us :D Later that day she rang on our doorbell and handed us a key, very nice!

the marriage!

The 25th of July was a very special day! My sister Kid and her boyfriend (husband) Angel got married!
It was a very beautiful and unique ceremony, they wanted it to be special and it really was. Angel was wearing a kilt and they had hired musicians with bagpipes to play the music.
The day was great and we had a good time. I am very proud, because the night before the wedding I wrote (with alot of help from Antonia - but no online-shit) a very very nice speech! It was a huge hit, everyone loved it, especially my sister and Angel so I am very glad I did it.

Here's a first edit of it (not the final one, and its in swedish, soz - dont have the final version on my PC but this is pretty much it)

-------------------------------------

Jag minns även hur vi som barn byggde en koja i ett nedfallet träd i våran sommarstuga, hon var så himla liten och lättlurad då, hon ville ju såklart alltid byta sina papperspengar mot mina guldpengar. Nu har många år passerat och hon är fortfarande lika lekfull men som tur är inte lika lättlurad.

Jag minns när vi var yngre så brukade jag och Kid alltid bråka om vem som skulle sitta vid datorn, när jag satt vid den så kom hon alltid in och började föra massa oväsen med kastrull-lock och allt möjligt, hon tänkte att om jag blev tillräckligt irriterad så skulle jag gå därifrån så att hon kunde sitta där. Det är verkligen tur för Angel att de har två datorer nu.

Idag har vi samlats för att fira Angel och Kid, de har verkligen haft tur som hittat varandra.

Men vi alla vet att man kan inte hålla ett äktenskap vid liv enbart med tur, så vad är det som gör att det fungerar för dem? Vad är deras hemlighet? Det vill jag att de ska visa för oss idag.

Eftersom Kid älskar att baka så var det för mig en självklarhet att be dem beskriva deras äktenskap som en bakelse.

Den här skålen representerar er, som familj, den är just nu tom men nu vill jag att ni fyller den med vad ni två anser behövas, I RÄTT PROPORTIONER, för det perfekta äktenskapet.

MJÖL - Basen av alla bakelser, det allra viktigaste, precis som VÄNSKAP i ett äktenskap.

SOCKER - Sockret gör att allt smakar så himla gott, precis som KÄRLEKEN gör att man mår så himla bra i ett förhållande.

SALT - Salt behövs i bakelser för att förstärka smaken. Om man aldrig GRÄLAR, så uppskattar man inte tiderna man har det bra tillsammans lika mycket. Men om man har för mycket av det så går det åt helvete.

VANILJSOCKER - Man behöver inte mycket, men det gör en stor skillnad, precis som när man känner sig ledsen och den man älskar lägger armen om en och TRÖSTAR en.

JÄST - Gör att bakelsen växer, precis som att DELA UPPLEVELSER TILLSAMMANS gör att man växer tillsammans som familj.

MARGARIN - Gör bakande lättare, det gör det lättare att ta ut bakelsen från sin form, precis som HUMOR gör äktenskapet lättare.

ÄGG - Vad som gör att bakelsen är fast och håller ihop, precis som FÖRTROENDE och FÖRSTÅELSE gör att äktenskapet håller ihop.

DEKORATION - När du dekorerar en bakelse visar du din PERSONLIGHET, ATT MAN VARA SIG SJÄLV är viktigt i ett äktenskap.

VÄNTAN I UGN - Man kan inte ta ut en bakelse från ugnen för tidigt, ibland när man delar med komplicerade bakelser så faller allt ihop om man ens öppnar ugnen för tidigt, man måste ha TÅLAMOD, precis som man måste med den man älskar, man måste ha TÅLAMOD med varandra och ge varandra UTRYMME och FRIHET om den behöver det.

Nu återstår det bara att vänta och se vad framtiden har att erbjuda, alla bakelser är unika, precis som alla förhållanden. Jag tror och önskar att ni aldrig kommer att tröttna på den här bakelsen.

-------------------------------------



Preeeetty damn good I know!
So yes, i was a great day and I am very happy for them!

school

So, I applied to two programs at the University, both of them leading to the "Kurator"-career which I wish to do. Unfortunately, since my Högskoleprov is 2 months too old (it expires after 5 years) i didnt get in. I am however on the reservlist (number 9) on a distance-study program, lets hope I get in. I really really hope so, but if I dont its not exactly game over, because luckily the Behaviour-science program starts twice a year, fall and spring, so I can apply again to start in january (after doing högskoleprovet again).
We have also talked to a student counsellor regarding what Antonia is gona study, so she has her plans straight now and is gona go for "Informative Illustration" after she studied swedish at Komvux.

It really is alot of paperwork and waiting for Antonia, but we're doing very well and have everything under control :) We first had to get her a personnummer and stuff but its all done now (they dont have personnummer in germany!?)!

gaming - braid

The best game I've played since Portal, BRAID - introduced to me by N!ckchanger!
When I got online in Sweden I really wanted to get my hands on it ASAP, and after hearing that Dake already bought the game I clicked "BUY" aswell. I dont buy games very often, but after meeting Zacker I've got more respect for the game-industry and that game is really worth the money anyway.
The game is very very interesting and alot of fun to play, I played it all together with Antonia and we finished the game in two days.
The story is weeird and interesting, the puzzles are genious and the game is just fantastic! There are some hidden extra struff that we have not figured out yet though.

gaming - heroes of newerth

Before I left Germany I was given a Beta-key to Heroes of Newerth, I wasnt at all excited about it TBH - It is a clone of the Warcraft3 map DotA, with permission from IceFrog - S2 Games created Heroes of Newerth which is basically DotA with a few tweaks and new graphics.
When we were in Sweden Antonia and I installed it to play it with her brothers. At first - I really didnt like it, the graphic is in my opinion not at all better, only more confusing. Some things were really annoying, the tree-models were quite hard to click at for example so a simple thing as eating tangos became a challenge ^^ Which made imba-juking quite hard.
There are very few new heroes introduced, the ones I've tried so far are actually very cool. Anyway, we played more and more and I got more and more used to it, we are now playing alot with all the old Dota guys and with the brothers and friends of Antonia, its really alot of fun!
I would not say its better than DotA though, but atm I enjoy it more since Antonia plays it with me :) There are a few very very good features about HoN thats worth mentioning: you get a penalty if you leave a game, you are able to reconnect if your getting disconnected, the game-list is alot easier to browse, hosting games in general offer more options, the item-hotkeys are actually placed at a smart and usefull location.
Its a good game, who knows, maybe I'll keep playing it even after the beta-period is over. Oh and if you want a key just email me, we've got plenty.

gaming - tibia

I've played quite abit of Tibia since I got here too! I have finally managed to finish my citizen outfit in rook, it was very costy, stupid and useless - But now its finally done!
I have also killed quite alot of Necromancers lol, it seems like my bad luck have taken a major swing and I've been very lucky lately. I looted a Soul Stone and then finished the task so I got another one, so I got two Soul Stones in a few days - 600k profit!
Last week fyrk0 came to visit and we played alot of Tibia together that day, we did the Blood Brothers & the Cooking quest.. Tibia is sooo much more fun when your sitting next to someone who plays it aswell. And to have fyrk0 around makes everything alot better in general so it was pretty perfect :D
When he were here we also ate some nice bread and watched Mental together, it was pretty good so since then we have been watching it every once in a while ^^ Now done with the first season ^^

socializing - johan, madde & elliot

Johan, aka Dake/6pool/Pesse came to visit us together with his girlfriend Madde and their son newly borned baby Elliot. Elliot was soooo tiny! In two or three years I bet he will be alot more fun to play with :) When the babys are so young they are not really alot of fun, only cute xD
I like to play with kids, so I am looking forward to visit them more in the future :D

So together we went to a flea market to see if we could find anything nice, but we didnt, so instead we went home and watched stuff together. At some point Johan and I drove to the store to buy something to eat (Antonia made her imba-lasagna!) and it was really nice to get some time to catch up with him. Its alot different to do it face to face than online, because first of all he is never online because of Elliot :P And second of all, when he is online im surely ingame already and cant talk xD

So things are going good with them and I hope we will meet again soon, maybe at the Zoo or at the basketball course?!

socializing - ias

Since we got to Sweden I've met Ias only a few times, our schedual has been quite busy etc. But we met at the beach the other day (fyrk0 also came by), the water was cold as hell but it was nice nevertheless :)
We also planned on going to the cinema together, but a series of unfortunate events occured so that has been postponed for now ^^.
Its nice to play Tibia again, since because of that I spend more time with Ias and many other friends.

Gaming = hanging out.
Oh and Linn, if your reading this, GOOD LUCK ON YOUR DRIVERS LICENSE EXAM!

Ias is king!

Roadtrip & first weeks in Sweden 2009 (click on the images, they are cropped)




movies and shows

Since we have a huge-ass screen and both love to watch stuff, Antonia and I have watched a couple of more stuff the last few days in addition to the stuff mentioned previously.

Waking Life
A movie that Rullis recommended to us. It is a very strange movie about life and it was quite interesting, a few things they said were really eye-opening but it was often times just weird.

Radio
A movie that I have seen many times, I showed it to Antonia because I knew she would love it. And she did. One of Ias favourite movies :)

Adventureland
Recommended to us by fyrk0 - it was a nice movie! Not much to say about it really. Pretty girl :D

The Fountain
A movie Antonia have seen many times and she wanted me to see it with her, so we did. A cool movie. Complex and weird, but cool. Wow we have seen alot of weird movies lately.

Leverage
A show that has a feeling of "Burn Notice", but not quite as good. Still entertaining though.

random outbursts

- I cut my Dreamhack wristbands off :o
- It has been VERY VERY warm. Unpleasantly hot. Dying kind of hot.
- I really hate putting up ceiling lamps - I suck at it. Luckily Antonia saved the day <3
- More pictures have been added to the Image gallery
- I have been fighting with an evil virus lately that infected my homepage. Solved now though! (hopefully)