News of Norway

Is it me? Is it Norway?

It's probably a bit of both.

Happy Saturday! I'm reading the English language translation of Bergens Tidende, the local newspaper and finding all of the weird parts. There's an opinion piece about some new development on a spit of land that's about half a mile from the place where my grandmother was born. The author seems miffed that the developer is mimicking the shape and color of historic buildings. Around here, ersatz historic buildings are considered somewhat sensitive to the local aesthetic. I used to call them Fictorians, but I've gotten used to them.

Anyhoo -- I'm reading the article and minding my own business, navigating the ads for athletic shoes that keep popping up, when I see it:

I write to my friend and ask "Is this a Norwegian idiom?" I mean, I get it but who expects to read the words "butt" and "taste" in the same sentence over their morning coffee. I told mrguy and he says it is now his favorite saying and will use it all the time.

Then I'm reading an article with the headline "They were waiting to die. Then came the miracle drug." As the wife of a man with a terminal illness, I am drawn to miracle cures of a Western medicine sort. The story starts out as one of testicular cancer in Norway, which in the 1970s metastasized rapidly in patients. Then there was nothing that could be done to help. Then a scientist discovered that bacteria stopped dividing when current was run through it using platinum electrodes. It was the platinum, which was spreading platinum compounds into the bacteria solution. They tested the platinum stuff on animals and people. So was born Cisplatin. Men with testicular cancer were saved by this treatment. My man, also, has been saved by this treatment. Also, if he ever had ball cancer, he's probably cured of that.

Also, this is the only article I've ever read in which a cancer doctor advises a patient to continue smoking.