Sakes alive, it's hot!

[pengolodh_sc]

So.  Today, it was 30 degrees centigrade (86F) in the shadow here in 
Lofoten.  30 degrees centigrade!  Nearly 200 km North of the Arctic 
Circle!  Temperatures like this shouldn't be allowed.  
Weatherforecast now reports that we have a blitzer of a thunderstorm 
headed our way from the South - yesterday South-Eastern Norway 
suffered 29000 lighting-strikes within a period of 12 hours, which is 
a fair bit over the normal.  24 hours later, large areas in that 
region are still without electric power (so if I grow very silent all 
of a sudden, you know the reason).  Of course, today we also had a 
cruiseship here, so I got to guide a busload of people for 3 hours 
and 45 minutes - wearing red shirt and black, long trousers, while 
sitting right at the front of the coach, with maximum exposure to the 
sun (I have a summerjob as busguide for day-excursions for passengers 
on cruiseships coming to Lofoten).  Yes, it was hot.

Also, one of the regular scheduled stops on the particular tour I had 
today is an old church.  Today, however, this attraction was off 
limits to us, as there was a funeral from that church today (funerals 
in Norway as a rule takes place from churches/houses of worship 
according to the religion of the person in question, or from the home 
of the nearest relation in the case of an atheist).  Thus the routine 
was to just drive slowly past the church, while giving a brief 
rundown of the more interesting details of the church, without 
stopping - to the noticeable irritation fo the staff-escorts provided 
by the ship. 

We were scheduled to drive past the church an hour prior to 
commencent of the funeral-service, and so did - and had maximum bad 
luck with the timing of the arrival.  Just as the buses slowed down 
to a crawl past the church, we see that the hearse has already 
arrived, and members of the family are carrying the coffin into the 
church in preparation of the funeral - while four buses full of 
tourists with cameras and videorecorders are driving by at slow 
speed.  Later, at our next stop, I was informed by the guide from an 
other bus that the staff-escort on her bus still had insisted that 
they should stop, and let the passengers out, even after seeing the 
coffin being carried in.  Some people just...!

Best regards
Christian Stubø