Workpotato

Easter is fast coming up, in T minus 10 minutes to be exact (5.p.m is the end of the workday in Denmark - generally speaking). Except - I don't have time for that. I'm working on an article, and I have a delayed videoproject as well.
Work is really fun though, I finished an article yesterday where I interviewed danish chef Kille Enna. She just released a cookbook about potatoes, and when I had to write picturecomments to the dishes we use in the magazine, one of my peers handed me 'The flavour Thesaurus'. It's such a funny book (and good-looking) for all food-afficionados out there. With urban foodlegends and recommendations and such. It made writing so much fun - and Kille herself is such a sweetheart and a maverick in the kitchen - why not use potatoes in pastries and other desserts? Among many others things.
If I find the time these next days, I'm dying to make her gnocchi or potatopancakes with cucumbersalad. Yum yum.

(Exhausted, but happy) Love,
Ida

Salut Dreams

Every day on my way to work, I pass an autoshop that has this old beauty just waiting to get painted and pretty again.
I'm usually not a carperson, but I have a thing for old american cars - this one reminded of the one on the cover of my favorite book, Jack Kerouacs 'On The Road'.

I wanna take a roadtrip in the states right now... following in the footsteps of Sal Paradise has always appealed to me.

Inside the cover was a few treasures.
1. The receipt from when I bought the book (April 25th 2002)
2. A newspaper cut-out of a wolf - the picture won a world press award, if I recall.
3. A postcard from my friend, when she was in Paris. Salut Paris - salut dreams...

Love,
Ida

Book bargain

Yesterday I met with a dear friend, and we went out in our beloved Copenhagen, eating lunch, shopping and having cake. Perfect!
I found two books at the amazing price of 25 kr. Total. That's about 3 € or 5 $. Score!
'Skygge-Baldur' by Sjón has actually been a blog-favorite of late - at least in Denmark. Both Spirrevip and Bogfinkebloggen (note - they're in danish) have made a post about it. So I'm just following suit.
I ended the day at another friends place where she gave me a singing lesson. And she was so good, I'm really proud of her, becuase suddenly there was a wholelotta volume coming out of this girl (me), I tell you.
Today - my ear has been aching painfully. But I managed to do all things on my to-do list. Except washing clothes. Now I'm having dinner...

I'm just not that hungry. But bloodoranges are a hit, and these are especially sour, just the way I like them.
Drinking grapefruit juice and tea, and then - the books.
Hope I'm feeling better tomorrow. There's bandpractice!

Love,
Ida

Fairytales...

Some day before New Years Eve I took a walk in Kings Garden, a park near where I live. There is a statue of the great writer Hans Christian Andersen.
Today I was walking home from an appointment on Nørrebro and went through the Assistens Cemetary. It serves as a park as well. In summertime people lay on the grass, reading, playing... it's a wonderfully, mysterious place with a great atmosphere.
H. C. Andersen - as we call him in Denmark - is buried there, so I went by his tombstone, and someone had put a tophat in front!
It got me thinking about his fairytales, and which ones I like the most. For me it is The Nightingale, The Ugly Duckling and The Wild Swans.
But I really like his poetry, maybe even more than his fairytales. His lyrics to 'I Danmark Er Jeg Født' = 'In Denmark I Am Born' is so beautiful. I will not try a crappy translation, because it won't show his legacy justice.

Which of his fairytales is your favorite?

Love,
Ida

P.p.s. I just realised that my favorite fairytales all have birds in the title. What a great coincidence. 

P.s. To danish readers I will share the lyrics to 'I Danmark Er Jeg Født'. The rest of you can go nuts with google translate if it has your fancies, hihi.

I Danmark er jeg født, dér har jeg hjemme,
der har jeg rod, derfra min verden går.
Du danske sprog, du er min moders stemme,
så sødt velsignet du mit hjerte når.
Du danske, friske strand,
hvor oldtids kæmpegrave
stå mellem æblegård og humlehave.
Dig elsker jeg!
Danmark, mit fædreland!

Hvor reder sommeren vel blomstersengen
mer rigt end her, ned til den åbne strand?
Hvor står fuld månen over kløverengen
så dejligt som i bøgens fædreland?
Du danske, friske strand,
hvor Danebrogen vajer, -
Gud gav os den, - Gud giv den bedste sejer!
Dig elsker jeg!
Danmark, mit fædreland!

Engang du herre var i hele Norden,
bød over England, - nu du kaldes svag,
et lille land, og dog så vidt om jorden
end høres danskens sang og mejselslag.
Du danske, friske strand,
plovjernet guldhorn finder,
Gud giv dig fremtid, som han gav dig minder!
Dig elsker jeg!
Danmark, mit fædreland!

Du land, hvor jeg blev født, hvor jeg har hjemme,
hvor jeg har rod, hvorfra min verden går,
hvor sproget er min moders bløde stemme
og som en sød musik mit hjerte når.
Du danske, friske strand
med vilde svaners rede,
I grønne ø'r, mit hjertes hjem hernede!
Dig elsker jeg!
Danmark, mit fædreland!

Great gifts

What I most wanted this christmas isn't something that you can wrap and give as a present.
It didn't come to me, but it may still fall into my arms at any time to come, so I'm still dreaming.

But I did get some wonderful presents. My mormor gave me a Bjørn Wiinblad jar that I'm gonna store tea in. My godmother gave me some mooomin-porcelain to my ever-expanding collection, and my parents gave me Murakamis 'The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle', Miyazakes 'Ponyo', a howling wolf (love it!) and a beautiful deer-couple as earrings. Way too much. But I love it all.

Love,
Ida

P.s. I need a haircut!

Howl

"I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked,

dragging themselves through the negro streets at dawn looking for an angry fix,

angelheaded hipsters burning for the ancient heavenly connection to the starry dynamo in the machinery of night,

who poverty and tatters and hollow-eyed and high sat up smoking in the supernatural darkness of cold-water flats floating across the tops of cities contemplating jazz..."

Excerpt from the mindblowing poem by Allen Ginsberg, a poem that helped define the beatgeneration.
The movie about the poem, it's immediate consequense and the man behind just premiered in the movietheatres. I want to see it!

Love,
Ida

I'm on a road to nowhere

Me and my cold went to Jutland yesterday. I'm still here, working = filming. The cold is feeling better, maybe because I drank vitamin induced lemonade? Yuck.
I started reading some sci-fi novels - my friend and guitarist in SPEkTR lent me the book. I love the cover. It has a very SPEkTR-ish vibe. Did I ever link to my bands Myspace? No. So there.

Love,
Ida

More treasures from the basement

I found some cool books hidden away in boxes in my parents basement. I love the Knud Rasmussen book, and the pages are still uncut. Why didn't anybody read it?
But it'll be a while before I get through this bunch. Too much going on. And I have to finish 'Kafka on the Shore'.

Love,
Ida