Ladies and Gentlemen, please welcome Mrs. Bowness!

Well, that's gone and done it hasn't it?!

"Sherman, set the Wayback Machine to December 23rd 2007...". This is when Linda and I had a little chat on the train from Gothenburg to Trollhättan, ready for our Christmas celebration. Our original plan was to get engaged before the year end (which we did on December 10), then get married on Linda's birthday in March. Our little chat, however, went along the lines of "can we wait that long," the answer being "naaaaah!"

We got to Trollhättan, and off to the local supermarket to buy the Christmas food. When we got to the shopping mall, we saw that the jeweller's shop was still open... so we popped in, found a pair of white-gold rings we liked and ordered them there and then! After Christmas, Linda subsequently sorted out the times for the ceremony itself.

We also decided that we did not want a big Event with pomp and circumstance; rather, it would be just us two with two witnesses - Slagge and Cicci in our case. I'm lucky in that Linda agrees that marriage is really down to the two people it's for.

Anyway, onto the event itself: Saturday January 19th 2008 at 15:15 was when we were ushered into the registry office in Gothenburg, in which we were read a very nicely worded set of vows (in English, by Linda's request I might add). We both said "I do" in the appropriate place and, less then ten minutes later, we were legally married.

Then, after checking in to the hotel (more on that later), we went to Heaven 23, a bar on the 23rd floor of Gothia towers, to drink champagne while looking out on the Gothenburg landscape. Very nice it was too!

Back to the hotel. We checked in just before going to Heaven 23, and we had ordered a room with the bröllopspacket (Wedding Package). The room had a chilled bottle of champagne waiting, with chocolate-covered strawberries and other fruits, rose petals on the bed and a "jacuzzi" style bubble-bath. We also had breakfast in bed the next morning. Bliss!

Anyway, back to the evening, as it was just before 6pm by this time. We had booked a table for four and we had a six-course meal, consisting of duck foie grois, veal, venison, creme caramel and sorbet (not in that order, and I'll have to come back and edit this when I have the proper names!). Beautifully done and very "posh" - lots of forks and knives and other weapons, washed down with copious amounts of alcohol.

All in all it was a beautiful - albeit seemingly quick - day; and thanks to the late check-out of 3pm (which was also part of the bröllopspacket) a restful Sunday too.

Here's a picture from the actual event (click on it for a larger version). You can also have a look at some more photos by clicking here.

So now we are Mr. and Mrs. Bowness. And if you read this Linda, jag älskar dig min ängel. Du är min fru och jag är mycket glad.

And so this is Two Thousand and Eight

The Christmas season has come and gone, so it's time to catch up with what has been going on.

First off, Linda and I went to England for a vaction early in December, to see family and friends. It was at my mum's house on December 10th that I decided to take the plunge: I got down on one knee and asked for Linda's hand in marriage. Thankfully she said yes ;)

It was great to see the folks and some of my closest UK friends again, as it had been a year since I had seen most of them. That's one of the bad points of living in a different country of course; but Sweden isn't that far away and, in an emergency, I could take a flight that would take less than two hours. Plus with all this internet and new technology, we all keep in touch in one way or another.

Christmas was spent in Trollhättan with Linda and a couple of friends, where we celebrated it in the Swedish style - a julbord on Christmas Eve (julafton) followed by opening the presents. Christmas Day in Sweden traditionally is when they meet up with friends and family, so all of the eating and presents are done the day before.

New Year was spent back in Gothenburg with a nice dinner party followed by watching the fireworks going of all over the skyline, which we could see from a hill we walked up. We took some champagne and toasted the new year in.

On the geeky front, I'm impatiently anticipating the release of Burnout Paradise which is released at the end of January on the PS3 and -- more importantly for me -- the XBox 360. A demo version of the game came out in the middle of December, and what a demo it was! They opened up part of the city (a small chunk but there's a lot to see!) and they even enabled some of the online functionality, so I've been playing the demo with friends and having a great time. The full game promises to be fantastic, judging by the demo. I've been a fan of the Burnout franchise only since Burnout 3, when I saw it on a friend's XBox, and Burnout Revenge was a principle reason for buying an XBox 360.

More news as and when!