While surfing around this sunday morning I came across microsofts new Songsmith ( microsofts garageband copy) check out the lovely instructional video it is well worth it :)

Songsmith

I hope you all will have a great new year! Please don’t overdo your new years resolutions we know they tend to be tricky to keep. And you don’t want to start up the new year by disappointing yourself!

I think this guy will be on of the biggest trends next year you can try out his job President for the day

I´m back in my apartment in Stockholm since Saturday evening. I came home right in time for the last weekend stress before Christmas. When I sat waiting at the airport in Warsaw I had a strange feeling about not going to work on Monday. Now when I´m back in my home environment with the red Christmas stars in the windows, the Santa´s placed on the stoves it feels like holiday. Somehow it feels like the days before I left Sweden 4 months ago, one experience came to an end but a new one are waiting around the corner!

THE “LAST” DAY AT THE AGENCY?
Friday was my “last” day at Hypermedia before Christmas. It´s not  really my last day at the agency, I´m coming back to Warsaw for my second internship. This means 3 months where I can improve my work and ideas for both old and new clients. There are many new people who started to work for the agency since I got here in September. For next year we will be five people working within the strategy area. We will all be “roomies” so we spent part of the afternoon moving and re arranging. Lucky for me this wasn´t the last day for real, I don´t like saying goodbye…

When I left work it was snowing outside, at last!

In the evening me, Beata and Diana from work went to a favourite place called “Szlafrok” which simply means robe… don´t know why… but it´s a really good place! A nice finnish of my first time in Warsaw.
MERRY CHRISTMAS ALTOWA 4 AND 5 - I wish you a White Christmas Eve and a very nice party tonight!
By the way…, my effort in baking the Swedish Lucy Cats was appreciated as “delicious”, “soft” and “funny….

So this is it. I’m sitting at the airport waiting for my flight home to Gothenburg. I finished Budapest today with a visit at the Central Market, a long brunch at Gerlóczy and then the very last hot thermal bath for this time.

Hopefully I will come and visit the city for vacation some day. I will miss my friends here.

Take care you guys, you know who you are :)

If you get fed up walking your dog in Budapest. Just throw away the poor dog. There are very convenient garbage cans for that.

At least that what the dog people seems to do here, ’cause thye sure don’t clean up the poo after their dogs. .

You might have figured out by now that I’m a huge football fan. During my stay here in London I’ve been to 10 matches, including 4 London derbys, 1 international and 2 Champions League matches.

The highlight was definitely the Liverpool match at Anfield, where the atmosphere contributed to a really special experience.

Here’s a summary of the matches I’ve been to:

20 September, Upton Park
PREMIER LEAGUE
West Ham United - Newcastle United 3-1

27 September, Craven Cottage
PREMIER LEAGUE
Fulham - West Ham 1-2  

11 October, Wembley
2010 FIFA WORLD CUP SOUTH AFRICA QUALIFIER
England - Kazaksthan, 5-1

26 October, Upton Park
PREMIER LEAGUE
West Ham - Arsenal 0-2

11 November, Emirates Stadium
CARLING CUP
Arsenal - Wigan 3-0

12 November, White Hart Lane
CARLING CUP
Tottenham - Liverpool 4-2

15 November, Craven Cottage
PREMIER LEAGUE
Fulham - Tottenham 2-1

25 November, Emirates Stadium
CHAMPIONS LEAGUE
Arsenal - Dynamo Kyiv 1-0

26 November, Anfield
CHAMPIONS LEAGUE
Liverpool - Olympique Marseille 1-0

14 December, Stamford Bridge
PREMIER LEAGUE
Chelsea - West Ham 1-1

Last Friday we had a x-mas party here in Amsterdam with De-Construct. We mt up at Gaper a bar close to the office and then we went for a quick stop at Miami Ad Schools vernissage. Good fun to see the students work.

After that we got up on our bikes and went to the restaurants. It was lots of great food and a loads of laughs since the theme was hats. Everyone had to buy a hat to a certain person. We ended up with several cool cat hats. An american military helmet, an indian chief headpiece with colorful feathers, a really small green doll hat and a fez to mention a few. Great food and loveable people. What else do you need?

Unfortunately I forgot my usb-cable to my camera so I can’t upload any pics until I get back to Budapest.

The first Lucia weekend without the Swedish “glögg”,”lussekatt” and window Christmas decoration. I’ve been talking about this before, Lucia as at tradition is not existing here. So that´s why I went to IKEA last weekend to find Swedish Lucia celebration stuff to bring to work. Of course, I found the “glögg” next to the Swedish meatballs, but without alcohol I think it´s a waste of calories (vodka mix is one solution). I thought about bringing “Julmust” because of a comment I got the other day at work (and since Coke and RedBull is alreday decorating desks at work) that the “Julmust” we have in Sweden was great (!), but unfortenately difficult to find i Poland. Wow, I haven t thought about that. Well, instead of showing people pictures on yelllow “lussebullar” I will  make an effort in baking the stuff instead and bring on Monday. Remember I said “make an effort in”.. this is not equal with a nice result. By the way, I alerady showed pictures of Lucia procession with “stjärngossar” (sorry, don´t know this word in english). But the guys wearing white “night gown” with funny hats… ok I could assure people, no- this is supposed to be beautiful and not behaviours of a sect….

Last time I was talking about the Night of the AdEaters, the 6 hour show of advertising movies from all over the world. The show kept going until early morning. Redbull didn´t quite help me stay awake…. Commercials from all over the world, there were so many I haven´t seen before and many favourites of course (ads for cars and behaviours around driving or combination car + animals somehow are funny, I cant´help thinking that…)

Photos..
Lately I´ve been working with a big portal for the Polish market and this is an experience in many ways. First of all I discoverd I´m somehow stuck in the “community” way of thinking and sharing . This is not a priority for this target group on the portal and the huge mass of information, how to structure this in a good way is not easy. I´ve been working with one of the information architectures recently and we talked a lot about this.

Empty water bottles, they are a quiet installation in the corner of my kitchen. A part of the interior decorating. There might be a possibility I´ve  been a little lazy as well…

Photos..

I’ve put together a little film about the trip to Liverpool Eskil and I did. Enjoy!

Click here to see it.

Maybe some of you photogeeks (like me) know about this already, but I think it’s so f**ing great I have to show it. In September Nikon released their new Digital SLR, the D90 and one of the new features is the possibility to record video! And with the flexibility of a DSLR; low aperture, super wide angle, macro etc, the possibilites are endless. It still has some issues but the benefits are far more. There is starting to pop up some test shots around the interweb from people who have bought the camera and the results are astonishing (at least according to me…)