Greetings from Sweden!

As you are starting out your day, I've just finished putting my little ones to bed, while Drama Teen is competing in the IBM ICPC IDOL contest. It's a spoof on American Idol, but she's having a blast. Nothing like getting up and singing in front of 200-700 people. Better her than me!

Since we are here for the annual international IBM ICPC programming contest, we havent't been able to do all the sightseeing that we would have if this had been a pleasure vacation instead of a busman's holiday. Plus, we got stuck in the Oslo airport for 4 hours coming in as our flight was late leaving New Jersey and we missed our connection.

We have, however, found the Seven Eleven and McDonalds, so the kids are happy. While Mr. Scott took the boys to the practice session today, I took Drama Teen shopping in old town. It's truly lovely...narrow, winding cobblestone roads and shops galore. I picked out a few souveniers, then we were going to eat lunch and buy a troll on the way out. Well, we took a short detour as I spotted a bookstore (all the books in this one were in Swedish, sigh). Instead of backtracking, we forged ahead. Now, did I forget to mention the roads wind? Well, I forgot and thought we were traveling parallel to the way we came in. Wrong.

Lost. We were only six or so blocks from our hotel, but we were lost. Boy, does that suck the fun out of shopping. We did eventually make our way back to the hotel, tired and a bit footsore. Tomorrow, Mr. Soctt and Drama Teen will be working at the contest, so the boys and I will foray back to the shop. I'm NOT coming home without my troll!

So far, my most memorable aspect of the trip is that I'm tired. Youngest boy is on a self-maintained schedule and so far has been waking up at about 2 am and wanting to stay awake until around 8 am (midnight our time) and then sleep until noon. We kept him up all day today, so I'm hoping not to spend 3 hours in the hotel lobby with him.

The weather has been fabulous...but I'm amazed that at 40 degrees, the most popular street vender here doesn't sell hot drinks...but Ice Cream! Glass shops abound and the Swedish folk can be seen bundled to the gills in scarves and coats eating cold, creamy goodness. Oh, and they eat outside too (take away is a few krona cheaper than Ata Har (eat in, i think it means). And it's not because they are cheapskates, it's because everything is expensive here. I figure the Swedish krona is about 16 cemts. So, a burger at McDonalds for 85 krona works out to be 13.60! Ouch!

It's our last full day tomorrow and then another travel day. I'll try to post pictures when we get back.