Do you really want to know?

Is there anybody in there?

So, it finally happened. It’s an epidemic but not all that dangerous. Essentially you need to reveal 5 secrets about yourself and then request 5 others to do the same. Jonas tagged me, so I guess it’s time to own up.

We’re just two lost souls swimming in a fish bowl

I have four fish tanks at home, totalling about 1 cubic meter. In the biggest, 500L, I have Malawi cichlids. The second largest, about 350L is not so full of the koi carp - only 7 actually - that I decided to give a reasonable chance to survive winter. Summer they spent in my garden pond. The last of "my" tanks, about 150L is very full of kois, about 100, but small ones. They are the spawn of the seven big ones. No, they can’t share tanks due to eating habbits of the big fish. Come summer and they’ll all go into the garden pond which easily hosts all of them. It’s about 4 cubic meters in size.

Since I threw the comb away

I’ve been sporting long hair since the mid 80s. Wanted dread locks since early 80s, but due to various impediments like parents and completely straight hair it never worked out that way. Late 2000 I was about to cut my hair short, but then I noticed it started to be really tangled where I always secured the pony tail. If there ever was a god, and that creature gives signs this was as good as any I figured. I threw the comb away (never liked combing anyway), knotted the hair and since then I have neither cut my hair nor combed it.

Living on a prayer

Not quite a prayer, but noodle soup. During my 4 year sejour in Thailand (1993-1997) I had instant noodles for breakfast for two years straight. For lunch I had mostly noodle soup too (when I didn’t go for the kao pat gong, or fried rice with shrimp). Always the shrimp taste. Not seldom I did some noodles for dinner too. Two years down the road I felt really queasy and lost the breakfast. That scene repeated itself for two more days. Then I realized it was my body’s way to say "thanks but no thanks" to more noodle soup. I couldn’t eat the stuff for several weeks. Now I eat more varied food, but I won’t turn down a quick noodle soup.

Two wheels good, four wheels bad

Like Jonas, I also take the bike to work all year round. I have a motorcycle (Yamaha ER5, 550cc), but I rarely ride it nowadays. Not because of winter - I have taken the motorbike to work for 2-3 winters. That’s a true test for the upper rank jedi warrior. You really really REALLY need to stay focused when you’re in heavy traffic on icy roads in -10 centrigrades. I participated in Vätternrundan with Jonas and two other colleages three years ago.

Incidentally I learned to drive motorcycles in Thailand. That’s another sport requiring focus and concentration. During my 4 year stay 2 of my best friends died in car accidents.

Swimming in the swimming pool

My personal record for swimming under water is about 50 meters (done in a 33m pool). While that was some time ago, I can easily do 30m now (in a 25m pool) and I did 40m last summer (in a 10 meter pool). I always fancied the sub-surface world and I always wanted to do scuba diving. I watched all the underwater movies on TV when I was younger, and read the books by Jaques Cousteau and the likes - but due to circumstances partially outside of my control I still haven’t done it.

So. Now all I need to do is try to find five friends to tag. Not that I don’t have that many friends, but this is spreading like wild fire. Let’s see. I’ll tag Anders, Henrik, Malcolm, David Clegg and Danny Thorpe.

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