Random Thoughts

Normally my posts are well articulated, thoughtful descriptions of experiences that we have had recently. Well, NOT TODAY – today I’m just getting rid of a few things that have been “filling up my notebook” as the writers say. Who knows, maybe one or two of these will be fleshed out a little more, but as of now -

Fashion – I’m used to b-school style rules, where we had “business formal” (suit), “business casual” (sports coat/sweater), or casual. Out here, though, NO RULES. Folks are wearing jeans to meetings, button up shirts are decidedly NOT buttoned up (chest hair is so hot right now), and some folks could go right from the office to the nightclub. Eye glasses make folks look like they just stepped off the set of Zoolander. To make it even stranger, normal colors need not apply. It’s not odd (anymore) to see someone in a green sportscoat with red jeans. It kind of feels like an SEC football pregame – and I really need to stop giving a “go DAWGS!” yell every time I see red pants….

Snow removal – When I woke up the other morning to walk the dogs (6:30am or so), it had snowed about 1-2 inches overnight. Nothing major, but I was prepared to do a little more trudging on my walk than normal. NOT SO. While I was kind of expecting the roads to be plowed, I was not expecting that each sidewalk would have had plowed as well. I was able to walk the dogs in the middle of the sidewalk, down a freshly “plowed” aisle – it was very nice! I’m not sure what time the sidewalk plower works, nor what he uses for it, but I definitely appreciate it

Tech socialism – I was reading an article in Wired the other day and I couldn’t believe the list of top-tier startups that were founded in Stockholm. For a country of 9 million folks, they have founded Kazaa, Skype, MySQL, The Pirate Bay and Spotify among others, which is why some big-timers in the industry have tried to explain how Stockholm “hits above their weight”. The REALLY interesting part is that NONE of these companies are still in Sweden. Evidently, due to the tax laws here, it is almost impossible to retain top talent and grow a successful firm. My amateur hypothesis is that the strong social net in Sweden allows entrepreneurs additional safety / freedom to play around with interesting ideas, but once they catch on, they need to leave to become truly successful.

Pay day monthly – Obviously, I am used to getting paid bi-weekly, but here it’s a monthly salary. Not a big deal if you budget well, but if you come into the country with X amount of SEK, and you notice quickly that you haven’t been paid yet. Also, we showed up in Sweden on the 25^th of January, which is the day of the month that almost everyone gets paid. The HR lady told me it gets crazy in Stockholm the weekend after payday, the restaurants get packed, the shop cash registers are slammed and it just gets nuts. Looking forward to next week!

Plumbing – Stockholm is very eco-friendly and terrified of global warming (because Stockholm is a series of 14 islands, any rise in the water levels would flood the city pretty quick). We have blamed this ideology for why every toilet we have seen has two different flushing options – to minimize water usage if at all possible. The odd thing is that all of the urinals I have used here flush almost CONSTANTLY. When I step up to one, maybe twice while in use, then once more when I am washing my hands. They all have the laser sensor, and I do not think it works too well, to say the least. The discrepancy here is odd to see.

Zed – they call “Z”, “Zed”….weird!

Summer houses – I know that in Europe it’s common for long vacations, and Sweden is no difference. Evidently the whole country pretty much takes off all of July. I didn’t give much thought to this, except when I wondered what we would do for that time off. Hotels would be expensive for that long! That’s when I found out that almost everyone in my office has a summer home in the country that they go to. Makes sense because of the costs, but just surprising that second homes are not a luxury for the 1%’ers here…

Finding a place to live – We have 6 months of a company apartment, and so I wasn’t nervous about finding a place to live in July yet. Evidently, I am OUT OF MY MIND. Everyone I work with has already asked me multiple times where we will live in a few months, and from what we hear, the waiting list for a “traditional rental” in town, is 30 years. A lot of folks recommend we buy, but after our Atlanta experience, that doesn’t sound so fantastic. The only other options are to go to the ‘burbs, or to get a sublet, which could have us living somewhere for just a few months…obviously, I blame socialism and the rental rules here for clogging up the whole system.

Dog Friendly! - Dogs are able to come on public transportation and into most stores! At first, I thought it was just the little paris hilton-style pups that were allowed on there. But last week I saw some bull-mastiff looking dog hopping onto the subway, so there are obviously NO RULES. Now tomorrow, we will be taking both dogs on the bus to go to the really big park across town. We’ll see how it goes!

That’s about it right now, but I’m sure that more random things will pop in my head.