We all live in a fluffy submarine

Rest day today, and, like all normal people, when I rest, I clean the flat. As anyone who's ever dropped by our place without calling a week in advance to tell us they're coming can tell you, I don't like cleaning. But I do like having a clean place to live in, which poses a terrible existential dilemma that keeps me up at night. What to do, what to do.

Like all normal people with a healthy aversion to cleaning, when J and I were deciding what kind of cat to get to keep our older one company, I, the person most blessed with the gift of foresight in this relationship, suggested getting a long-haired, fluffy cat. That sheds. A lot. So cleaning is even more fun! Because not only do you have to vacuum clean all his hairballs off the floor every other day, you also have to vacuum clean the sofas. And the chairs. And the bed. And your clothes. And everything that can produce static electricity and attract fur. If you drop by our place when we haven't vacuum cleaned in a week, you'll be forgiven for thinking you've stepped into another, magical world, where people are really really small and live on the skin of woolly mammoths.

When I do clean, however, I do it with conviction. I'm thorough. I go all in. I get so committed in my task that I am willing to sacrifice body parts to get that rug clean. So I managed to get my little finger jammed on the vacuum cleaner hose (not in it, thankfully) and now have a nice little bruise there to go with my sore thumb. Which I, by the way, contracted while doing the other thing I love apart from cleaning: skiing down a hill. Or falling down while skiing down a hill, to be exact.

Something I forgot to mention in this blog is that I'm currently doing a challenge. No, not to thoroughly clean the flat every week, although I'm sure that all its current inhabitants would appreciate that. Except maybe Sote, who's obviously been trying to clone himself by shedding his weight in fur. Or knit a sweater for a planet out of it. Maybe for one of the outer planets of the solar system, the ones that are freezing because they're so far from the sun? Like Pluto! Poor Pluto. Not even a planet any more. Here's a sweater made of cat fur for the cold, lonely days of your existence, while you're orbiting out there all alone, wistfully looking at the cool kids. Jupiter. Uranus. And that temptress, Venus. You're not one of them any more. But maybe, maybe if you were wearing a cat fur sweater, maybe then they'd see you for the cool guy you know you are and welcome you back into their posse.

No. I'm doing Pasi Salonen's 100-day challenge (sorry, in Swedish only), which means abstaining from eating sweets and chips, and drinking alcohol and soda for said period of time. Now, I'm doing this in my own way. I don't eat chips anyway, neither do I drink soda. Alcohol consumption is at a very low level already. So there's no challenge there. Sweets on the other hand are, like the airbags I developed on either side of my bottom will tell you, more of a challenge to quit. Like a lot of people, I've put on a few extra kilos over the holidays, mainly because I've been FORCED by mysterious powers to consume a big batch of failed cookies all by myself, but I don't believe in diets and forbidding yourself to eat certain things. I believe in eating properly, indulging in some chocolate from time to time. Eating properly is especially important for me, not least because I'm a vegetarian, since I run a lot and need good energy to keep going. But there is an exception to every rule. Cookies, sweets and chocolate need to go, at least for a while. At least until I shed those extra kilos that do nothing but strain my knees when I run.

Well, alright, they're not completely useless. They do provide some protection to my body when I tumble down all those hills while pretending to know how to ski.