There were tons of stress when we first was informed about the fact that we had to move. Mostly because it came a bit like a surprise on us. We knew that we were going to have to move sooner or later, but what we didn’t know was that it time would fly so fast in Stockholm. When it was three weeks left, we started thinking of emergency solutions in case we didn’t find anything. I think we settled with storing everything at a storage facility and finding a hotel room that was cheap enough to live in for a month. Then, all of a sudden, after sending tons and tons of mails to various apartments, we got invited to come look at an apartment. And it actually turned out being a really nice one! And the best of all, the landlord for the apartment was a total geek and we ended up talking more about servers and work then the actual apartment. I think that’s made us get the place.

So, new apartment, and opposite side of town. This time we’ll be living in Rågsved,which is actually just about 20-ish minutes from my work, and about 30min from Alinas job. Really perfect placement, and the apartment itself is really nice. Not as big as what we had, but we never managed to fill up that apartment with things anyway. We have arranged for friends helping with the moving this weekend, and have a whole week to clean out the old one.

This time I will try to take some photos of the new place and post them here. For some reason I never got around to posting pictures of the old one.

And of course, the apartment has 100/100 fibre connection. Priorities, I know!

• We are heading over to Stockholm this Friday. There we will be looking at apartments that we have arranged meetings with.

• Stockholm HQ will be paying for our hotel room for the weekend.

• We have made an advert announcing that we are looking for an apartment and t hat we are going to Stockholm this weekend here, there has been some response, but nothing interesting yet. One was too expensive (8300,-) and the other sent us a link to an advert that wasn’t correct. Seems the person had pasted the wrong link or something.

Hopefully by the end of this week we will have an apartment to move into. We are also going to be working on getting a deal with a company to move our things to Stockholm. This will probably also be covered by my company.

It also seems that we are having progress with our current apartment. The landlord have had several people over to look at the apartment, and we have about 3 people interested. He will be showing more people the apartment this Friday, which means there will be someone taking over the apartment when we move. We had some problems with the landlord regarding this, but it’s been sorted out.. We’ll see how that goes.

Next week will probably consist of packing up everything, getting rid of trash we won’t need (so if someone will be able to drive us around and get rid of some junk, please let us know!)  and arranging for pick-up/drop off. If everything goes according to plan, we will be living in Stockholm from 01.09.2009!

That’s why I thought this post could contain a bit of information on how we are doing with the whole moving to Sweden thing.

“I wish I had some more information” I’ve been saying this over and over to myself (and others) for the last couple of months. People keep asking if I know anything more about the moving, and my reply has been “Only that we are moving in the end of August“.

However this time I know a bit more! Yesterday I received a mail from one of the people in charge of human resources at our Swedish office, asking what kind of apartment we would like.  If we wanted with 2 rooms or more, how much rent we would be able to pay, and what kind of job Alina might be interested in. I hastily replied that we would love at least a 2 room apartment, with 6500,- NOK as max rent, and Alina would prefer NOT to work with cleaning, children or old people. Other then that she would be cool with more or less anything.

We are yet to receive a reply on this, but I was told they are two people working on finding us an apartment, which means we should be receiving a mail soon about the details. I’m quite excited to see what they find and if we will be able to see photos of it. What would be even better, would if someone from our office in Stockholm would be able to check the place out, and OK it for us.

As for moving our things from Trondheim. We have been informed that they will pay for a moving company to drive all our things to Stockholm. How we will get there, I’m not sure of yet, but I’m guessing it’s by plane, sponsored by the office. If not, we’ll just find some way to get there, all tough plane would probably be the best option.

What’s even cooler, is that our company have started a separate department just for our 1.line support, and it will be located in Överkalix in Northern Sweden, this means I will probably not be taking any more phone calls from old ladies wanting help with their E-Mails accounts anymore. Currently there are 7 new people starting with full 1.line support there, while us in the Stockholm office will be focusing on 2/3.line registry and technical issues. Just the way It’s supposed to be.

As we get close to moving, I can’t stop from feeling a bit sad about it. Moving away from all the people I’ve come to know and love in Trondheim. I have been living here for roughly 6 years now, and gotten to know some amazing people. I’ve grown to love this city and how relaxed and pretty it is, I’ve found a job I enjoy doing and a girl that I would gladly spend the rest of my life with.

Hopefully I might move back some day, and settle here, but for now, I am willing to move where ever I am needed, In order to improve my career. Seeing as my education is rather slim, I need all the experience I can get. Even if it means moving from loved ones.

As some might know by now, me and Alina have moved to an new apartment. It’s about 28square meters (all tough the ad said 38, but It’s big enough for us either way), the rent is at a 6000kr a month + electricity and Internet, and it’s pretty close to town (about 10minute walk). First of all, I’d just like to thank the following people for helping out the Wednesday previous week: Sonja, Stian, Inger-Lise, Helen and Alinas parents. You guys were great and I’m really happy that you could all make it. It would have been hell without you.

Now that we’re a bit more settled, I figured I was calmed enough to actually sit down and write something. It’s still a bit messy here. Things needs to be moved into the attic, there’s still garbage that needs to be taken out, but most of the stuff has now been set up. It still looks a bit “thin” in the living room though, seeing as we still don’t have a couch, but hopefully we’ll get that fixed shortly.
There’s still allot of stuff here that needs to get fixed by the landlord though. The sink is slightly cracked and the pipes are leaking, the washing machine is leaking, the sink in the kitchen is leaking, but thankfully not enough to make it a problem. Hopefully he’ll be able to check it out and fix it soon.

Economy wise, moving has been quite the black hole though. We’ve bought quite allot of stuff after we moved in, and seeing as I’m poor as always, Alina has been loaning me the money so we can buy stuff together. Now I owe her quite allot of money, and we’re going to England… No doubt my next paycheck will also be dried out pretty quick. Still, I’ll manage though, and Alina is so kind and gives me the time I need to pay her back.

And for those that didn’t know, yeah we’re going to London this easter! I’m so looking forward to it. We’ll stay at a hostel in town, and be hardcore tourists, seeing the sites, eating the food and just having a great time over there. Hopefully Ste and Kelly will come down from Birmingham and spend the day with us as well. We’ll probably be staying there for about 1 and 1/2 week before we head back, so we’ll have plenty of time to see stuff. I’ll try to keep the blog updated as a sort of travel blog if anyone is interested. Also, we’ll be in Skien for a couple of days as well before we head to London, so if any of the ol’ Skien gang is present, please let me know and we’ll hang :p

Computer wise haven’t been much happening to be honest. I’m dying to get a server up and running, but there’s no point until we got ourself a Internet connection. For now we’re using our dumb neighbors unsecured WLAN net, but we don’t know how long it will last until he figures out there’s about 20 or 30 people on his router at all times, so better wait for our own before setting up anything. I’ve done some scripting though, and done quite allot of changes to the Ninja Monkeys forum. Now it’s got quite allot of hacks and tweaks to make it look pimp. I love setting up stuff like that.

Well, best be off now I guess. I’m hungry as hell, and I really should send a text to Alina and check how her medical examination went. I should also tidy up a bit here and get a shower…

For now, ta ta!

This all means that I finally can rest a little. Not having the thought of having to pay 8500,- by the first of February really eases things up a bit. I still have an electricity bill and a small rent to pay, but all in all, I think I’ve come out of all this pretty good.

Which means, my paycheck the 20th of February will probably be more or less spent in London. Me and Alina are going for a trip to London this easter see, so I need to save up some cash for that. As it seems now, I’m more then covered.
(This means btw, that I’d really like to have a chat with Ste, Kelly and Matt, to know if they want us over for a quick visit. We might be considering taking a trip to Birmingham while we’re over, just to say hello and maybe stay for a couple of days)

So, there’s not much else up these days really. I’m working every day this week, from 15:30 until 21:30, which is as I’ve probably stated in about a dozen other posts, kind of sucky. Still, It’s money, and the work isn’t really that bad, so I managed. And besides, all that work is for a good cause. Going to London, and moving together with Alina :)
Yes, we are moving together in case you didn’t allready know. We’re currently looking for a place, but can’t really move in anywhere until I’m done with my contract at GKV59 and got the deposit money for moving. Once that is settled we’ll start looking for something. Alltough for the moment we are kind of picky as to what we want, so I’m not sure when this will happen :p

Today I’ve tried to get a hold of a counselor, to try and figure out what I need to do, to finish my school stuff. I can’t seem to get a hold of her though, I’ve tried calling several times, but alas. Hopefully I’ll get a hold of her and at least get an appointement. I need to get this done as fast as possible, so I might be able to finish some courses before the summer.
Right now I’m on my laptop at the library, which is kind of cool, seeing as they’ve got power outlets, and an open Internet connection. So I’m downloading, surfing and doing everything I want on the net, for free.

I should probably finish this post of though, seeing as time flies when you’re having fun, and I should try to get a hold of the counselor one more time before I need to get some food and prepare for work.

As I always say, I’ll try to blog more, and as it seems now, I might just do that. Bringing my laptop to the library, and sit here posting was very comfertable, and It’s not that long a walk from Alinas so. See the Internet at her place haven’t worked for 4 days either, and I doubt it will be fixed any time soon.

Yesterday me and Alina had a quiet evening alone. The plan was really to have a combined birthday party for me and Elin, but we didn’t really get to setting anything up, so it ended up being postponed until next weekend, presumably.
So Alina and I just had some snacks, watched American Beauty, then made some fajitas and watched Apocalypto. Then I got a back rub and we went to bed, comfy =)

Today we’ve more or less spent the entire day in bed and in front of the computer. It’s probably about time we get a good shower, some breakfast and have a Sunday hike, just to not feel the entire day has been wasted.

Tomorrow is my birthday by the way :D So I’m not working (took the day of) and will just spend the day with Alina and hopefully(?) friends. We’ll see. The rest of the week is work work work, just like the forthcoming weeks will be.
See as some might know, and some might not, I’ve moved out of gamle kongevei 59 and moved in with Alina in her small apartment complex, but sadly I’ve still have to pay rent on gkv for another month before it’s all done with, and that’s 5500kr… Still, it’s partially my own fault though. I might get someone to rent there for a short period, so I won’t have to pay full rent, but I kind of doubt people would be interested in renting for only a month.
The plans ahead are that me and Alina will live another two months in her place, before we find an apartment and move. If we get to do that before or after we go to London I’m not sure, but we’ll see how it all goes.

I’ll try to keep this place more updated from now on :)