I've finally received a letter today verifying that I will receive a passing grade on my Master's Thesis, which means I can now officially tell people I have a Master's degree in Information and Media Science. I've waited for that letter for a month (and eight years before that), so it was with a slight tremble I opened the letter. I was positive I would pass, but there's always a little doubt with these things, so I was getting nervous because it took them so long to write me with the confirmation. But now it's a done deal and I can look ahead towards the future. And it's looking okay for once.

I've promised several people that I would make my thesis available here at some point (it is about weblogs after all), so now I have to figure out a smart way of doing that and then I'll let you know about it (it's in Danish btw, but everyone should feel free to check out the grotesquely long list of literature, which has a lot of strange entries in it).

Anyway, that's it I guess. I just came back from work where I've made cookies all day (I kid you not), so it was really exciting to come home and find that letter. And obviously I wanted to let you know about it right away.

When you work all the time sometimes you neglect to blog. But when blogging is your job sometimes you just neglect blogging on your own weblog. I still have that 8-14 job, but as soon as I get home I start writing entries for our new music weblog, which we launched last week. So honestly, inbetween blogging there and working I haven't done a lot, which has been worth writing about here.

But I will mention the Short Film Festival we went to this Sunday. I had booked tickets for two collections of short films called Int7 and Int9, because they were international collections as opposed to the collections of Danish shorts. When I studies Media Science we had a short film class, so we got a chance to make our own short and watch a lot of them as well. And I think the two series we saw Sunday gave a good impression of both how different short films can be from each other, but also how different they can be from feature length movies. A lot of them were mainly about style, but a couple had really good stories, which really hit home because of their simplicity.

The one I liked the best of all the movies was called The Chinese Wall and was about an elderly woman, who eats alone in a Chinese restaurant. She looks at the other guests and imagines what their lives must be like. She's a bit depressed, so her bleak outlook on life spills over into the way she imagines the lives of these people, which makes the movie depressing and a little annoying. But the brilliant part is that towards the end of the movie she tells her waiter that it's her birthday (a lie) and the waiter then brings her a large birthday cake. It's too large for her to eat alone, so she invites the other guests to join her. As they join her it is revealed that none of the things she imagined about them were true and then they all sit happily together and eat cake. The movie ends with a guy entering the restaurant to pick up some take-out and as he waits he looks at the large group of guests sitting together eating cake and starts imagining (erroneously of course) what their life as a large family must be like.

I really liked that movie because the whole thing about making up stories about the lives of strangers is something I usually do, when I'm in a café or some place like that (it's even more fun if you can ping-pong the story with someone else). And I thought the way the movie went from depressing to uplifting towards the end (with the koda of the newcomer continuing the story) was very nicely thought out.

The short At Dawning featuring Jenny Agutter about a woman trying to leave an apartment, while a man is trying to commit suicide in front of the bedroom window was very good as well. And so was the Swedish short Malcolm about a guy, who's life has fallen apart.
But the funniest one was Tomatoheads, which didn't really have a story. The thing that made it funny was that the actors were hanging upside down throughout the whole movie, which made their faces rather red (thus the title), but the camera was flipped so it looked like they weren't upside down. They just did everyday things, but it was fun watching them trying to pour red wine and eat spaghetti while gravity messed with them.

Unfortunately, these movies are hard to find and aren't available online, so I guess if you want to see them (or movies like them) you'll have to try a seek out a short film festival in your area.

This week will have a bit more to offer entertainment-wise as I'm going out to see a bunch of stand-up comedians (including Lasse Rimmer) at Gaz Station Tuesday night. I haven't seen comedy there before, but it's a good line-up, so it'll probably be quite good.
And Wednesday we're headed out to see local team AGF, who have lost the last five games, play AB, who have lost the last eight (talk about your clash of titans). AGF have just hired a new coach, so hopefully he'll be able to turn things around.

We launched Frekvens.dk today, which is the non-profit project I've mentioned I've been working on for a while. Frekvens (which means frequency) is a music weblog written in Danish by me and the plan is to add a lot of entries about concerts, albums, and general music news every day. There aren't a lot of good music websites in Danish, so we figured we could use our knowledge of music and weblogs and create something interesting. I've written entries since the first of October, but the design wasn't ready until today (we still need to do a little tweeking, though), so there's a lot of stuff on the weblog already, which we thought was a smart approach. That way people won't just come to an empty weblog, but will be able to get an impression of what we're trying to do. So if you're interested in music and can read Danish (or if you're just curious in general) you should check it out.

One of the news items on Frekvens is obviously the news of Elliott Smith's all to early death. I have his last three CDs and I think he was a brilliant songwriter with an extraordinary voice. It really made me quite sad to hear that he wasn't going to be around to make records any more. There'll probably come a posthumous release of the album he was working on, but it would have been nice if he could have been one of those guys, who kept on making records until he was 70.

In more uplifting news I finally got around to watching X-Men 2 the other day and I thought it was absolutely brilliant. The story was cool and there were a lot of things that surprised me during the movie. All the morphing stuff Mystique did was cool and storyline involving the Cerebro machine was cool as well. This is one of the few times where I think the third movie is actually a good idea.

I've been lucky enough to get handed a new job already after having been fired this Thursday. Monday, I started work in a kitchen where they make food for senior citizens, so I now work six hour days where I help out with things like peeling apples and keeping the kitchen clean. It's not exactly the way I'd like to spend my time, but it's a helluva lot better than a lot of the other jobs I could've been given.
Hopefully, this week I'll get a confirmation that I'll recieve a passing grade on my thesis and from that day I only need to work for a month before I'm elligible for benifits from my union. So I only need to hold this shitty job until I start getting paid by the union, which is nice to think about, when you've been asked to peel fifty eggs.

I finally got my copy of Madden 2004, but I haven't really had time to play a lot yet. But there's no doubt that it's an extremely cool game, which I'll probably explore further this weekend. If you have any interest in the NFL you need to check out this game. And don't just take my word for it. Everything you need to know about the game can be found in the article The best game in series history? Yes it is.

Another thing which is taking up my time is one of the non-profit projects I've been working on. We hope we'll be able to launch this week, so I'll write more about it then. But I think it'll be something you could get excited about if you know Danish (and to the rest of you I'm sorry, but I don't have any exciting English language projects in the hopper right now).

I've started buying new records again and have bought the new albums by The Cooper Temple Clause and Super Furry Animals. Both are different from their most recent records, so none of them have really made a huge impression on me yet. But Golden Retriever is a fun single and I think I'll spend most of my afternoon tomorrow working on my project and listening to new records, so hopefully they'll make more off an impression on me then. And I'm really looking forward to finally get a hold of the new album by The Strokes, which should arrive any day.

Also, this weekend I'll be attending the annual short film festival, where I'm planning on watching miscellaneous short films for about four hours Sunday afternoon. It just seems like a nice way to spend my Sunday.

Man, did we play some Hipster Bingo tonight! I was a star tattoo and a ski-vest away from yelling Bingo! at innocent bystanders. And here's a tip for you: If you're white and have red hair the afro is not something you should go for. Shaved head or wollen hat pulled down to your eyes are probably things you should look into before you decide to go for the one hair style which makes Carrot Top look kinda normal.
But it was cool to see so many kids come out for the Figurines/Tiger Tunes show tonight and I think everyone there had a brilliant time. I've mentioned both bands before, so I'll just say that I consider them the best Danish bands around right now and I thought they delivered excellent performances tonight.

Several people have asked me how my first day as a service worker went yesterday and I have to say that it was a strange experience especially since the day ended in less than four hours with me getting fired. Yeah, that's right. I got canned on my first day.
The thing was that the people there had no idea what to do with me and didn't really know I why I was there. So after trying to pass me off to other departments they decided that there was nothing for me to do and sent me home. So I didn't go to work today and I have no idea where I'll be working next week. So this whole thing has turned from stupid to ridiculous and I have a bad feeling about what will happen next week.

It's not easy following baseball here, but if the World Series is on here like it was last year I think I'll watch it again. Unfortunately, it won't be the Cubs against the Yankees, which would've been cool. But thanks in part to this shlemil the Marlins won game six of the series and I guess what little luck the Cubs had pulled together ran out around this time, because they lost game seven as well and that was the end of that.

Is it just me or does Jack White look like Mike from American Movie in the video for Hardest Button To Button?

People who've followed this weblog for a while will know that I used to write about movies all the time. But lately I haven't written about movies at all, because basically I've stopped going to the cinema and I've rarely rented movies (I was quite the serious student for a while there). But I haven't lost interest in movies, so now I've signed up at a Danish DVD rental service called Digitarian, where you can rent as many movies as you want a month.

The first movie I received was One Hour Photo, which I thought was somewhat disapointing. The acting was pretty good and the cinematography was beautiful (but then Mark Romanek obviously knows what he's doing), but I thought the story was weak and it took way too long to get to the exciting part, which turned out not to be that exciting after all.
But the great thing about a service like this is that you can just add any movie you're remotely interested in seeing to a wishlist and then at some point they'll send it to you. And if it totally sucks then it's not a big deal, because it's not like you went out and stood in a shop somewhere thinking about which movie to get, then stood in line to get it and paid a king's ransom to rent it. It's a lot more casual this way and as long as they have enough movies available I guess I'll keep using it. Otherwise I'll just subscribe for a couple of months and then unsubscribe until there's enough of a backlog of movies that it makes sense to sign up again.

I haven't bought a lot of records either lately, so it was cool finding the Athlete record Vehicles & Animals dirt cheap in Copenhagen the other week. I've listened to it a lot since then and I think it's really cool. It's kinda like Coldplay, but a lot happier and bouncier and tracks like El Salvador, You've Got the Style, and Westside are definitely worth checking out.

You've probably noticed this already, but I thought I'd mention that The Modern Age is no more. I can understand Miss Modern Age's reasons for (temporarily) closing down the site, but I think it's a damn shame nonetheless. I got a lot of tips on new bands through that site, so hopefully one of her peeps will start picking up the slack. My weak attempt at filling out this huge void is to echo her recommendation of the band Elefant. I honestly haven't heard the entire record, but Now That I Miss Her is a killer single.

And speaking of 80s inspired rock acts - you've got to check out the new video by The Dandy Warhols. The video for You Were The Last High is basically a re-enactment of Duran Duran's classic Planet Earth video. I say basically, because I don't remember there being a naked, black chick in the Duran video, but I could be wrong. Either way, the video by the Dandys is fabulous and the song is pretty good as well, so go watch it already!

How much more ironic could I be than reading Oliver Twist at the welfare office? The answer is none. None more ironic.
Here's a quick introduction to the Danish welfare system: If you become unemployed and you don't qualify for money from your union or as in my case have to sit out a one month long waiting period after graduating you can sign on the dole. But if you think that means you can just pick up a check and then go back to bed you're sadly mistaken. In my case I've had two meetings and waited two weeks to get any money (which I haven't received yet) and been told that I have to be activated.

I'm not sure it's like this all over the country, but here there's a law which states that if you sign on, you have to enter an activation program no matter how old you are or which education or former job experience you have. So Wednesday morning I'll have to report to some office on the other side of town for some kind of introductory program, which will qualify me for holding down some crap job until my waiting period runs out.

I totally believe in having to work for my money. I just find it incredible that our local politicians have found it necessary that in order for me to receive a menial handout, which will barely pay my rent, I have to work 30 hours a day in an old folks home or somewhere equally depressing.
The original point of the activation program (which has a real Ray Bradbury ring to it btw.) was to make sure that high school students didn't just sign on and then turn into slackers. Instead they were asked to work for their money, which in turn motivated them to go to college or apply for better jobs. But forcing a 29 year old with a degree out into work for a period, which will probably be less than six seems ridiculous to me. But there's nothing I can do about it, so for the time being it's crappy work if I want to get payed.

As announced we went and saw David Bowie Tuesday night and it was pretty great. Unfortunately, the drummer from much anticipated opening act The Dandy Warhols has appendicitis, so they played without a drummer. That meant all the songs were in half the normal time, which made them sound even more drug ridden than usually. So that was a bummer, but what are you gonna do?

Bowie went on, the crowd went nuts, and he played for almost two and a half hours. Basically, everything you need to know about the show is available at davidbowie.com including pictures and setlist, so definitely check that out. The only thing I'll add is that I thought it was great that when he played the older stuff they sounded like the original versions. I saw him five or six years ago, where he played a version of The Man Who Sold The World so it sounded like it came of the Earthling album, which I didn't think was that cool. But except for Rebel Rebel he'd only made minor adjustments to the songs, so that worked out brilliantly.

Everybody was supposed to sit down for the concert, but as soon as Bowie came on stage people went nuts and stood up and nobody sat down for the rest of the show. We were fortunate enough to be seated in the middle of the last row before the mixing booth, which meant after a couple of songs we could climb up onto the fence, which was around the booth and sit there with a perfect view. Actually, to imagine how perfect a view just visualize being the girl in the bottom right corner of the picture above. I'm almost positive that head belongs to one of the girls I went with to the concert.

He did play way too much new stuff for my taste, but I guess that's to be expected. And his new record has sold really well here, so I guess the real fans don't want him to play just old stuff. But the highlights for me were definitely songs like Ashes to Ashes (my favourite), Ziggy Stardust, Under Pressure, and also songs like I'm Afraid of Americans and Hallo Spaceboy.

Now that I'm back home I have a couple of hurdles to cross before I can begin getting back to a normal everyday life. I have a couple of meetings I have to attend, which I'm dreading, and I have some decisions to make about jobs, money, and my life in general. I also have two non-profit projects on the backburner right now that I can't talk about yet, so we'll have to see how that goes in the next month or so.

So these are tumultuous times to say the least and lately I've been a complete wreck. Not so much because of the money and job situation, because although they're serious issues they're more annoying than something to be really depressed about. It's more the knowledge that some things have changed and other things will have to change in my life soon or I'll go nuts. I have to figure out what I want and how I get it and the sooner the better. I keep postponing certain things till after a trip or a meeting or a concert and at some point I'll have to grow up and get on with my life. Otherwise, I'll walk around like this forever, which is not healthy.

It's day three of our excellent Copenhagen adventure. We came over Sunday and went to the Fray Day event, where we met several of the local bloggers. However, we didn't get to talk that much with them as the whole point of the event is that you sit around and listen to a bunch of storytellers. But it was nice all the same and interesting to suddenly be able to put faces to names.

Monday, we headed out to the Louisiana museum to see the Roy Lichtenstein exhibit. I thought it was very impressive and substantial and it was especially interesting for me to see the very early and the very late works, which I wasn't that familiar with. There were some really odd charcoal drawings of Disney characters, which I didn't know and there were some really beautiful paintings of Japanese landscapes from around 1996 that I hadn't seen before either, so that was a nice surprise. The weather was really nice, so it was also nice to be able to walk around the nice sculpture park they have there.

Today, we went and saw the Verner Panton design exhibit, which was nice, but rather small. I think the biggest impact was made by a cave-like contraption you could crawl into and sit inside, which we did for a long time. But it was also fun to look at all the funky 70s furniture, a lot of which was a real James Bond-like quality to it. And in about an hour we're meeting for dinner and then we're off to see The Dandy Warhols, who've been kind enough to drag that David Bowie fellow along with them.

Tomorrow, it's the Helmut Newton exhibit and then we're leaving, which is probably the smartest as all this eating out, shopping, and general hanging out is costing us a fortune. This also means that I'll have one normal day back home before my high school reunion and my transcendance into life as a regular, unemployed member of society.

I'm officially unemployed now that I've handed in my thesis and registered at the unemployment office. That means I have some thinking to do in regards to what I intend to do with, if not the rest of my life, then at least the next couple of years of my life. So far the best I have been able to come up with is this: I don't want to sell anything, buy anything or process anything as a career. I don't want to sell anything bought or processed or buy anything sold or processed or repair anything sold, bought or processed as a career. I don't want to do that.

Ideally, I would like to write for a living. I would especially like to write about music and movies for a living and although working for a magazine probably has a higher status I think I'd prefer working for an online media. Another cool job would be working for a web portal and helping them add new interesting things and help them develop their community features. And these are things I honestly think I'm qualified to do, so if I could be offered a job like that I'd really love it.
The problem is that besides those two areas I'm a bit in the dark in regards to what I want to do. Because jobs like I just described aren't exactly hanging on trees anymore. Those trees were chopped down a couple of years ago during the whole dotcom implosion and have rotted away a long time ago.

So I really need to look through some papers and get an idea as to where one might be able to get a job these days. But at the same time I want to send out letters to companies where I'd love to work hoping that they need someone like me, but just haven't had the time to look for me yet. And that's the tough bit.
Because looking through papers and replying to wanted ads is easy enough. It's sitting down and deciding for yourself what your five dream jobs would be and then going after them. I mean just look at Rob Gordon's list, which included impossible jobs like NME journalist (1976-1979) and film director. That's the kind of mentality I have and since I can't get a job managing The Dandy Warhols I have to figure out what realistic jobs I want. And where's the fun in that?