Snow and salt / Black coats / On WLAN / Notes from Finland / How to stay enthusiastic?

Freethinkers are those who are willing to use their minds without prejudice and without fearing to understand things that clash with their customs, privileges, or beliefs. This state of mind is not common, but it is essential for right thinking; where it is absent, discussion is apt to become worse than useless. Leo Nikolaevich Tolstoi

Snow and salt

It snowed maybe 3 cm today. Snow is the enemy number one in Boston, and must be removed and melted away by liberal use of salt. I just do not get it: why is it not enough to shovel the snow away, why is it necessary to melt all the snow and make all places wet? If the reason is some stupid law, which makes the property owners responsible for all accidents the snow causes (??), I have a simpler solution. Just place those "wet floor"-sign on the sidewalk. If there is such a sign, the property owner has no responsibility. Actually, just attach such a sign to all fences and there is no need to buy any more salt.

Black coats

I came to wonder why so many people wear black coats (long ones) in the winter. It seems stupid, since it is dark anyway and having a little color could cheer us all up a bit. Then I remembered, that in the past, when more coal was burned and there were no filters in the powerplants etc, wearing dark coat was a clever move - or, actually, any coat would have become dark in no time. So, I think that wearing dark coats is a tradition. All traditions are meant to be broken. Now I just have to find an orange coat with black seams. That would cheer up other commuters in Finland.

On WLAN

Using WLAN at the Helsinki airport costs 8 euros (10 dollars) per hour. It is way too expensive. It seems that the traditional telecom operators (Sonera in this case) are again pricing their services in such a way, that there will not be any real opportunities for creating novel business models on top of their bit-tranfer. I do not understand, why the airport does not provide free WLAN for passengers. They could develop service on top of the WLAN and make a lot of money. But maybe creativity is not in vogue.

Notes from Finland

Boring notes for myself, for the future use.
Sunday: at Olli's.
Monday: an interview. Later, meeting with Maunu. Discussing work and life. Way too much coffee.
Tuesday: visiting Aaro in his office, later visiting Masse, Merja, and the kids. Discussions on architecture and other important issues.
Wednesday: the intelligence etc test. I did it, once again, in 5 hours instead of 7 while reading 80 pages of a book on the cultural history of coal. Great fun, but more or less useless test - no need to really take it.
Thursday: another interview. In the evening, Thai-food with Tuula and S at Kok-Thai. Surprisingly good food, nice company, as it is always such a joy to meet Tuula.
Friday: train to Tampere at 11am. Selling my investments to get money for tuition. Visiting my father's grave, later having some beer and others intellectual detergents with my brother and watching Dirty Harry at his garage/clubhouse, until 4am.
Saturday: at my mother's with my brother. Idling, chatting, and of course eating smoked fish. Later, meeting Kö and foor beer and coffee at Cafe Europa, train back to Helsinki (napping until Kalkamo woke me up). At home, S cooked way-too-spicy fish balls.
Sunday: flying back to Boston. The taxi was waiting me, as they always are, outside my door. It takes 20 minutes from Helsinki to the airport. No queues at the airport, normal security checking, but they did not clean my laptop. Waiting, reading Energy at crossroads by Smil.

How to stay enthusiastic?

I have been so full of enthusiasm, joy, happiness and energy this year. I know that much of it has been because of living in a new environment, studying, not having to obey any empty authorities, and having had freedom to do things when pleased. Next year, I have to go corporate again. I like to do so: I can apply my new skills to new things, and I need to get my financial situation a bit better. But I am worried, though, whether I can manage to remain joyful, happy, enthusiastic when working full time. I need to develop some strategies for coping. Some simple things: not watching too much TV, not reading the yellow press or similar materialism enticing BS. Having enough exercise, and limiting working hours. Being unreasonable in everything, participating in politics, opera, theater, concerts, all these will keep me in good mood and surprisingly productive and happy. Or so I hope.

Alun perin julkaistu kuukausikoosteessa "Blogs December 2005".