A few years ago, it may even be a full decade ago, time goes so fast that I can’t really be sure just off the top of my head like this, so I’ll just say that it wasn’t “recently” which is a word Wife uses often to describe any event she can remember, it seems, most often when she talks about movies that she’s seen even if I it’s been, say, three years, or so, although in this case, I’m not even trying to say it was recently, and now that I think about it, it must have been a good ten years ago because Sister-in-Law was probably single and since Wife and I celebrate – every day, mind you – now eleven years together, I was in the picture ten years ago, too, when, and I am slowly getting to the point here, she, Sister-in-Law, had this Sunday tradition of having brunch, or afternoon tea, I can’t be sure, with this one special fellow.

Continue reading →

Ever since I was five, Dad and I have been going to sports events together, mostly hockey and soccer games.

My earliest memories: the smell of the arena, a young boy selling popcorn by yelling “pooooooooooooop cooooooooooorneeeeeeeeeeee”, goalies looking weird, wooden benches, ads being projected onto the ice during intermissions, a huge cloud of cigarette smoke hovering close to the ceiling that was supported by thick cables, and a friend of Dad’s buying, and eating, ten sausages.

Ten.

Continue reading →

Lately, I’ve been playing a lot of old Finnish pop in the car. So much so that the other day, I heard Son and Daughter sing one 1975 song in their rooms. This song, to be exact. And I can’t say I don’t like it, because I do. I remember exactly how funny I thought that song was myself, back in, well, 1975, when I was the same age Son is now.

Continue reading →

”The bike sure is a great invention. It may just be the best of them all.”
– Son, riding his bike

Wife and I have a fairly long list of movie quotes that we use in our everyday conversations. When she shows me an ad for wonderful cruises in the Caribbean, I reply in a dreamy voice, “Someday, Jennifer, someday” just like Marty McFly told his girlfriend in “Back to the Future”.

Continue reading →

In Finland, each day is associated with a name, a custom that’s apparently a leftover from the Catholic and Orthodox calendar of saints, when people celebrated each saint’s feast day.

Today, August 7, is the name day of Lahja, Finnish for “present” or “gift”, a name that is mostly a female name, especially these days. According to the statistics by the Population Register Center of Finland, no baby boy has been named Lahja since the 1960s – and only a little over 500 baby girls, of the total of over 12,000 people.

My paternal grandfather was one of 97 Lahjas born in Finland in the very late 19th century.

Continue reading →

Frankly, amusement parks don’t give me much amusement. I can see all the happy people running around, sprinting back to the end of the line to ride the same rides over and over again, but like Steve Butabi told his brother Doug in “A Night at the Roxbury”:

I can’t taste it, Doug! I can’t! I’m so scared right now I don’t know what to do!

Of course, I never say that out loud. That’s just something I tell myself when I’m leaning against a wall somewhere, guarding everybody’s bags, clothes, cameras, while updating my Facebook status, looking as cool as I possibly can.

Continue reading →

“What an honor that the amazing Markoolio was born in my fatherland”
– Son, July 15, jumping up in joy

You can take the boy out of Finland, but you can’t take Finland out of the boy. Even if the boy sometimes does everything to keep Finland deep, deep, deep down in the dungeons of his soul. All you have to do is trash talk Finland – or tell the boy everything you know about the country – and the boy will come to the country’s rescue, or answer in mono-syllable sentences.

Unless you’re a Finn, of course, in which case the boy will join you in trash talking Finland.

Continue reading →

Don’t know much about history
Don’t know much biology
Don’t know much about a science book
Don’t know much about the French I took
– Wonderful World, Sam Cooke

Yes, I do know that I love her – and since it looks like a wonderful world to me, she must love me, too – but still, I can’t get over the fact that I really don’t seem to know anything.

Well, I have no problem with that, it’s been a slow but steady process since the day I laughed when our high school biology teacher told everybody in the class that we’d be at our smartest when we graduate.

Continue reading →

I guess that just like we all like to think of ourselves as great drivers – or at least better than average – we all probably think we’re the ultimate neighbors. Because – realistically – who wouldn’t want to live next to me, right?

Continue reading →

Of all the superpowers, invisibility is my favorite. I used to love the 1970s show, The Invisible Man. There’s a Finnish children’s book I adored in which the protagonist eats some invisibility powder and walks through walls. I was a fan of another 1970s show the name of which escapes me, but in which the star, named “nobody”, would tug on his scarf, and turn invisible.

Continue reading →