salmon sandwich

Sitting here in the kitchen, eating a sandwich of cheese/tomato/smoked salmon. Oh, and some kind of mayo-like "hamburger sauce".

I spent the last few hours down at the Kopavogur swimming pool. "That's poo'." I said that to myself a few times. It's about a 20 minute walk from where I'm staying. It's much colder and on the verge of rain here today. But the pool was nice - I swam 3 laps (150 m) which isn't all that much but it shagged me out pretty good. Hoo boy, that swimmin' is good stuff. Then I soaked in the hot tubs - they have one where you have to strap yourself in and a jet of water obliterates your back - and went to the steam room. The steam smells like sulfur, cause they just take that shabbas out of the ground and pump it into this plastic room. It's almost too hot for me in there and I can only stay a few minutes. But the pool always makes me feel better about things here... been a little sad today. The weather is the normal grey skies and I'm feeling like an utlendingur (out-lander - immigrant) as I walk to the pool and people stare at me from their car windows, Jacobs-Ladder-ishly.

This morning Magga made American-style pancakes and the syrup container said "Brattleboro, VT" on it. Magga told me that the maple syrup (imported from U.S. and Canada) is so expensive here that she synthesizes her own from some wacko combo of ingredients, so the stuff in that bottle was really just a poor player, strutting and fretting about the maple syrup stage.

Thorgeir and Magga and their daughters all went north to Borgarnes today to go to a combined baptism/birthday party at a relative's summer house. And Amin-from-Denmark got called in to work at his café job, so I have the house to myself.