Ready. Set. Pool!

It's Memorial Day weekend and the pool is open again. A couple of kids have been very excited about this. Especially Luca, who made sure to have his hair cut so it won't get stuck in the goggles

Synchro synchro synchro

We are headed North from Cincinatti after 2 days of synchronized swimming regional meet. It has been kids from Michigan and Ohio only, and I must admit that the Ohio kids were jaw dropping good. They were light years better and could to things I have never seen before. Especially the Sherlock Homes routine, where the intro was to drop a "dead body" in the pool!

Teresa told me that these kids are homeschooled so they can practice 6 hours per day. And that they are the ones getting chosen for the Olympic team. In the program booklet there was even a 12 year old swimmer being congratulated on her 10 years of synchronized swimming😳

That's not quite the level we see in Ann Arbor.......

Still Teresa won medals in her age category (where there were not any Ohio fanatics):

And she got to wear a sparkly suit:

And most important: she LOVED it and had an amazing time.

Kristian, Luca and I did not see the whole meet but took some time off to go explore Cincinnati:

We did not know what to expect of this town, but it surprised us positively. From what we have been told there has been a lot of improvements going on including establishing tram lines and wiping out crime. But the humidity? I could just not live with that. Ever.

Oh the places you'll go.......

Living in the US has brought us to many amazing destinations. To mention a few: Niagara Falls, Bryce Canyon, Lake Superior, Las Vegas, Chicago and Toronto. And today we are going to a place we have NEVER been before! What could that possibly be? Drumroll please.

Cincinnati Ohio. Weeeeee.

And the weather forecast looks amazing, right?

Luckily we'll spend most of the time inside a sports complex by a pool to watch legs sticking out of the water for hours. Teresa is going to Regionals synchro swim meet and she finally got one of those sparkly bathing suits.

We also went to get the gelatin for her hair. Unflavored gelatin smells really bad so we were looking for a little "umph" to add to it. Like lemon aroma. Or vanilla aroma. But lo and behold - look what we found: anise aroma. So as a Danish touch to a Midwest regional swim meet, we bring the licorice smelling child!

and suddenly it was over

I am in the airport. Unexpected. Sort of. I checked my ticket Friday to discover that I was not going back Monday as anticipated but early Sunday morning. I should have stayed with my sister the last night and I should have visited friends and I should have done some shopping for Kristian and the kids. This scenario ended up being me rushing to Frederiksberg Saturday afternoon to get my suitcase, with a a quick pit stop at Føtex to get leverpostej/remoulade/lakrids/snøfler/pålægschokolade etc etc.

And now I am here in the airport enjoying the wonderful view you get from the frosted windows (but why?):

Besides "conferencing" - which has been one of the really good conferences when it comes to science, professors that can not agree (and then make sure to let everybody know that their opponent should not be allowed to do science - LOL), networking over beer, and awesome food in awesome surroundings #gottalovetivolihotel

this trip has also been busy with visits and lunch dates.

I have strolled through Copenhagen on feet and by boat with my sister

There has been truffle dinners

Trips down memory lane:

And I even got to go to places where I have never been before:

And I have talked and talked and talked with those friends where 3 years apart feels like a few weeks.

And maybe - but only maybe - there are quite a few kids in the Copenhagen area that have discovered the joys of slomo filming while acting crazy (I apologize to all the parents😬).

Are you from Denmark too?

I am back! For the first time since we moved to Michigan almost 3 years ago I have had the chance to visit Denmark. I am here on business as my professor is hosting a conference in Copenhagen and I have of course made sure to spend a few vacation days before and after. Honestly it feels very much needed to have a break from everything right The rest of the Frikke family has been quite jealous but are good at not showing it too much (while they come up with endless lists of candy I need to bring back......) and there were no tears in the airport - hrmpf . A very different scenario from when my sister leaves!

Here they carrying my stuff. Including the much dreaded poster tube. Bringing scientific posters on travel is a royal pain in the a.. and usually I print on fabric so I can fold it up and put it in my suitcase. But I have some pictures on there this time, that will just do better on glossy paper.

Sigh.

Here we are in the airport. Poster and I. Enjoying each other's company:

The flight was uneventful. As in really truly boringly uneventful since the entertainment system would not allow any movies to be played on any screen! Yikes. I had carefully picked out "captain fantastic" and "the girl on the train" from the long list of movies. And then - nothing!

But the most important part is that I arrived safely with no delays, and right now I am in Ørestaden, with the same wonderful friends that let us stay with them the very last days before we left for Michigan. Berit and I took a walk last night and she showed me how the part of Ørestaden, that was just grass and nature 3 years ago now is booming with new apartment buildings, hotels, schools and even a giant concert hall. And we also went to Ismageriet - the best ice cream store on Amager! They still had their lemon/licorice/white chocolate icecream❤️

But I just cannot get over the price range of everything here in Copenhagen! Do people grow money on trees?

Also I keep getting super amazed that there are Danish people everywhere! I really have to restrain myself from not walking over and start conversations like "wow, are you really from Denmark too?". I guess that sentence will play in my head a lot over the next 10 days!

What's next?

The clock is ticking and my original contract with university of Michigan runs out in less than 5 months. Then what? Well, I had always anticipated that by now we would know for certain, but truth is that we don't. Biotech is booming in San Francisco and I have been there a few times for all day interviews and seminars, but I have not landed a position. Apparently the supply of scientists wanting to get into the industry exceeds the demand manifold. Or maybe God wants us to stick around in Michigan a little longer and closes doors in our face to make us stay. I don't know.
What I do know is that my two big projects at work are finally lifting off ground after more than a year of animal breeding, protocol trouble shooting, and technical obstacles of keeping a pancreas functioning in a sedated open mouse. I also know that Randy is more than happy to keep me for another year. I know that my kids are in amazing schools right now and that Ulrik gets to graduate high school next summer. But this will also mean one more harsh winter in Michigan, one more year of Kristian commuting to Detroit every day, and countless sleepless nights worrying about if we will ever settle.
"No one said it would be easy" - but does it really have to be THIS hard?