Sleeping Rough.

Ug, I'm having a solemn, reflective time at the moment. As one is wont to do when leaving such a great place. Coming home. The Rat Race. Rejoining such pursuits. Frankly, I can't imagine it. I just came from some farewell pints with 'The Old Boys', a group of 'Founding Father' hockey players here...who I should have been playing with the whole time. More my speed, on all levels. Less testosterone & pressure, more relaxation & casual drinking after an hour of skating. I even scored two goals, one of which was on an end-to-end rush where I was looking pass the whole time, but saw no options, so just had to go Roof-Daddy.

Anyhow, fookkit, I'm coming home for a spell.

This is my favourite cafe in Akureyri. Kaffe Kolt. The owner, Magnus is what I would consider to be a Kindred Spirit. What he thinks is nice atmosphere (coffee, apple crumble, vinyl records & candles), I also consider to be Most Excellent. Yesterday, he gave me a free smoothie. The closest thing they have to Booster Juice here.

I will work at Kaffe Kolt if I come back to Akureyri. Magnus has assured me of this, for my post as Senior Contributor on TripAdvisor.com shot Kaffe Kolt up to #2 of 14 restaurants in Akureyri. Magnus was overjoyed.

Switching gears...

Josh & Lars at a pretty stellar supper/Wii night on Saturday. Lars & Helgi drank a litre of Reyka vodka. Ugh. I took it easy, as did Josh, for he had an important exam the next day. Egyptian Hieroglyphics.

Chef Helgi. Taking a swing at golf. We played Augusta National. 9-holes. Casual, you know. I shot 50. Josh shot 38, and won. Helgi and Lars both shot 52, but they were partaking in the vodka, as described above.

2-tie, all tie, I say.

Jola. Christmas. They do it so damn well here.

As a North American, it is odd to see multiple Santa's in one place. We are raised to think there is only one. He lives at the North Pole.

Here, however, there are 13. These two were singing at the local mall yesterday. It was pretty cool.

This chap. The Mailman, as he's known locally. Only other guy who regularly sports a mustache, regardless of time of year.

According to Chef Helgi, he got the name "Mail Man" a couple of Christmases ago, when he was hired as an extra worker at the post office to deliver the large volume of Christmas mail. Trouble is, sometime in February, the police opened his trunk & found 10,000 pieces of undelivered mail. He went to jail. Several months, I'm told.

I don't know his real name, but every time I went out here, he would eventually find his way into the establishment I had chosen to give my custom to that particular evening.