finals week

So it's been a light posting period on the Harbor Watch, and here's part of why:

Back last fall I wrote about how living in Reykjavík feels like being on campus, and this has recently come up again, as the pace of work has frothed up to a finals-week style frenzy. Unlike the US working world that pretty much cranks out year-round, Iceland and our more eastern neighbors really chills out in the summer.

Which means that the last few weeks before the looming Summer Vacations begin is a crazed push to finish everything so it doesn't sit around for three months while that key guy you need takes his month-long holiday to the summerhouse over near Selfoss. It's also about the customer side, since the guys you'll need to talk to in Holland, Germany, or wherever, also happen to be gone, lazing in the Portuguese sun or whathaveyou.

I'm even writing reports that have the feeling of final papers, taking classes and summarizing them, and in one homage to college I even decided to finish one off in the middle of the night. It's not hard to do here when night doesn't really look like night, when the sun never sets and my whole apartment is still bright enough that extra lights aren't necessary.

Of course, just like those last few days of the semester always were at my east-coast school, the weather has been heart-breakingly glorious here recently, and ridiculously warm for Iceland. Makes you want to play hooky and "study" out on the lawn just like school time. It's kind of hard to do when I don't have any bio textbooks I can review, so instead I'm inside, admiring Snæfellsnes shimmering across the bay and thinking about that "final" I have in two weeks. Back to the books for me.