Adventures in Taking the Bus Just for Fun

It's been a super busy week for me here on the Lava Rock, pretty much all good stuff. For starters, I was on BBC World Service again last Tuesday. I was sitting in my kitchen nursing a rare cold brought home by my son from school and feeling a bit blue the way colds make you do, when an unlisted number called. I don't know who I thought it would be, but definitely not a producer from an international radio program! She introduced herself and asked if I'd be willing to go live on World Have Your Say in two hours' time, and I said yes.
The next two hours were spent getting my voice smoothed out  with tea and lozenges, and then the Skype call from them came in and we went live. You can hear the episode, which focused on women in politics, here (I'm introduced at about 10 minutes in.)

Secondly, my first shipment of my book 88 arrived last Thursday, and it's more beautiful than I dared to hope. I have to admit that I'm in love with how it came out. Whether readers will love the content isn't up to me, but I hope that most people will at least find something that inspires them inside. 

And then there's been the normal holiday meet and greet, with those who are leaving the city for the holidays being replaced with those coming home to celebrate with family and friends. Both of my children are with their fathers this Jól, one in London-town and the other in Akureyri, so it's just my parents and I for our traditional hamborgarahryggur (which I found translated as 'smoked pork rack' - not such a sexy name, but very delicious!) This will only be my second Christmas without my kids around, but they have their own siblings on their fathers' sides to spend the holidays with (my daughter has two little sisters, and my son has two little brothers!) so of course I'm way happier for them than I am sad for me. 

Finally for this post, I had promised on the Facebook fanpage to share photos of the bus ride that Óðinn (my son) and I went on last week. He wanted to take a random ride somewhere, so we walked down to Lækjargata and jumped on the first bus that came up, Line 13 into Seltjarnarnes and up past Kringlan. It was actually a very cool little adventure, and the bus driver was so sweet and helpful to eveyone. Ticket prices have gone up since I last rode (350 krónur for everyone) but he gave me a discount for Óðinn, which he really didn't have to do. I grabbed this cool shot along the ride. 

Oh, and tonight is Þorláksmessa, which I'll let this older post explain. We've had great weather these past few days which means that downtown filled up with suburbanites over the weekend, and I think the locals boutiques and stores must have done great business. We are, though, expecting a storm in this evening (an arm of the Canadian ice storm system?) which might mean that the tradition of coming into town for last minute shopping could be hindered a bit this year. 

P.s. Please be careful out there this holiday, and remember to hug the ones you're with!