Kungsbacka

As expected, the early morning departure was brutal, but that did not really matter once I got to see William again, ten days after our grand day out in Gothenburg. Taking the train to Kungsbacka together, I got an update on his first week back at school, including a swimming proficiency test in Härlanda Tjärn, which he unsurprisingly passed with flying colours. And in no time at all, we were at the day’s unlikely chess tournament venue: a Peugeot dealership in Inlag.

Walking onto the site, I spotted a fully electric horse truck ingeniously branded “Plug and Ride”, reminding me again how politically effective it would be to brand electric vehicles as 100% nuclear powered – shifting the discourse around nuclear power from last resort to first choice.

As for the chess, William won three and drew one of his five rounds, ultimately finishing fourth and gaining another 20 Elo rating points, all while a heavy thunderstorm passed overhead. Luckily, the sky cleared once again, so by the time I got down to Halmstad, I had forgotten all about yesterday’s rest-day promise and headed out for five sunset kilometres along the coast.

Post-pancake

For this week’s long run, I decided to head up to the forests around Skedala and its three lakes. Located halfway between Halmstad and Simlångsdalen, the area was recommended to me by my colleague Ulf during my very first week at work in 2023, advice that I have happily heeded ever since. Without a car, though, it gets a bit trickier to explore unless you are prepared for a really long run, so in the future I might take bus 318 (in one direction, at least). For those driving, the whole area is very accessible – perhaps a little too accessible for me to dare a swim, tempting as the lakes looked.

Today’s run also brought my total above 2,000 kilometres so far in 2026 and left me right on pace for an average of 60 kilometres per week. I feel that this lower volume compared with previous years is doing me good. With my train leaving at 6:01 a.m. tomorrow for chess with William in Kungsbacka, I will get a natural rest day and, rather than panicking about it, I think taking more days off is making me come back stronger.

Sellpy, the sequel

Having had reasonable success selling things on Sellpy, I recently gave in to the temptation to buy something again, more specifically a corduroy jacket from Tiger for 335 SEK. Sadly, it turned out to be a little too boxy (not really visible in the picture above), so I have decided to return it, true to my new maxim of not keeping a single item in my wardrobe that I do not actively use. But the picture at least gave me a chance to show off the beautiful tinted windows here at Hallandsgatan, windows that have somehow helped soften some of the sadness I have felt since moving in last autumn.

Pouring myself a glass of Chilean Pinot Noir, I take some comfort in having completed a full airport loop earlier today and knowing that I will run another 25 kilometres tomorrow. More importantly, I am not condemned to Île du Diable like some latter-day Henri Charrière, but free to make the best of things – even if that may indeed include a bit of Îles du Salut.

Exotic redemptions

On its way from Copenhagen to Addis Ababa, Ethiopian Airlines flight ET725 makes a technical stop in Vienna, creating an exotic opportunity to travel for points between Denmark and Austria on a wide-body aircraft. Despite seeing two available seats, I think reason has prevailed for now, and instead I am exploring different Pågatåg options across Skåne before finally making it to Helsingborg.

Working on my article on the political economy of biogenic hydrocarbons, I am once again reminded of the enormous uncertainty surrounding all these long-term projections of the future, given how rapidly artificial intelligence is evolving and its potentially dramatic implications for the cost of machine labour. That is assuming, of course, that the future will be anything at all like the present. Just the other week, 1,367 researchers and engineers at OpenAI, Anthropic, and Google DeepMind signed another open letter warning about the risks associated with increasingly automated AI development. As before, the problem remains one of global coordination and broader catch-up as open-source AI models become ever more potent as well.

Reverse centaurs

Almost a year after our beer at Savoy, Gabriel and I got to meet up for lunch in Malmö today. Having grown up together in Kalmar, Gabriel has been a recurring character on the pages of Rawls & Me, with shared adventures stretching from Serbia to Sävar, but today we just got to hang out for a bit in Folkets Park.

Among the many things we covered, Gabriel brought up Cory Doctorow’s work on “reverse centaurs”: situations where machine intelligence does the directing while the human provides a cheap, disposable physical body to execute tasks, i.e. the exact opposite of what the AI revolution originally promised it would do. Like the suggestion that AI stands for “African Intelligence” (as its abilities depend on the underpaid work of millions in digital sweatshops across Africa), such concepts definitely have analytical purchase, even if their implications for the future remain ambiguous.

As much as I have spent the last 20+ years arguing for the democratic steering of technology, I am afraid that my personal response to AI embodies a certain degree of fatalism, a bit like Too-ticky in Moominland Midwinter: “All things are so very uncertain, and that’s exactly what makes me feel reassured”.

Outdoor office

While waiting to have lunch with Gabriel in Malmö, I walked down Friisgatan only to discover an “outdoor office” of sorts, a place where one can sit down without having to buy something. Small acts of resistance.

Low pressure

After a dry summer in Europe, the familiar Atlantic low-pressure systems have returned, bringing desperately needed rain to the British Isles and thoroughly soaking Eddie and me on the way to the station this morning. After sending him off to school in Gothenburg, I returned home and went for a rainbow run along Västra stranden.

And while I got caught in another shower, the views across Laholmsbukten definitely made up for it. Now on a train to Malmö, I am looking out over the stormy sea, pondering whether I should get off in Helsingborg for some more coastal air and a coffee. Having invested in a monthly ticket with Skånetrafiken (which, at 50% off, is one of the few really good things the current government has done), I suddenly have a lot of freedom when it comes to travelling around southern Sweden.

Otherwise, Eddie and I had a great evening yesterday, watching Erik Sandberg's Lönesänkarna to give him some historical background for his school assignment. Though short, I am still very happy that we get to have these moments together, even as a more permanent arrangement remains to be worked out.

Heidelbeeren

SD-Kuriren landed in my mailbox this morning. With no return envelope provided, I suppose I will have to fold it into a paper plane and send it back to the 1930s myself. As for more uplifting journeys through space and time, I found a small package of Darbo blueberry marmalade for my bakery roll, making it feel like I was back in Austria for a moment.

 

After pushing my luck to the limit with electric scooters over the summer, today marked my return to biking to work. Unfortunately, I forgot my helmet, but I will try to remember it next time.

Staff days

Today and tomorrow, we are having staff days. Unlike in 2023, when we got to stay overnight at Hotel Riviera in Båstad, this time we have remained in Halmstad and in our usual building. The day was nevertheless very rewarding, with plenty of food for thought and some important decisions made about the upcoming semester.

Starting the day with a run to Jansa Brygga and some fresh bread rolls from Bärlin, and ending it with a glass of wine at Mårtenssons, I am happy that Eddie is at least coming down to Halmstad tomorrow and bringing some responsibility back into my life. Already on Thursday, however, I am heading down to Malmö to see Gabriel for lunch, something that is well overdue.

Pixels

For the past few months, images on Rawls & Me have been rendering somewhat strangely, showing blurry, pixelated versions instead of the high-resolution photos originally intended. Luckily, with the help of OpenAI, I was able to fix the problem with a little JavaScript earlier today, so everything should look great again.

Otherwise, I have spent most of the day in Teams meetings, including an interview as part of an assessment of teaching expertise at Mid Sweden University. After running two half marathons this weekend, I decided to take a recovery day from running and just swing by the gym for a bit of strength training. Now back home, I have microwaved yesterday's leftovers and opened a small can of red wine from Catalonia to celebrate having submitted my fifth pedagogical portfolio assessment.

The Great Steppe

Of all the travels I dream of one day doing, Central Asia remains high on my list. From Samarkand to hikes in the mountains of Kyrgyzstan, adventures beckon. As such, I was thrilled to read – yes, in the same Vagabond – about two young Swedes travelling overland on trains from Sweden to Bangkok (well, almost: they had to take a short flight from Georgia to Uzbekistan). In discussing what they would like to have done differently, they say that perhaps they should have waited for international relations to calm down so that they could have travelled across Russia or Iran.

Reading this somehow made me both sad and hopeful at the same time. After all, this is a generation that has grown up with international relations deteriorating and conflicts intensifying everywhere from the Middle East to Ukraine, and for whom the formative events of my own generation, like 9/11, must appear just as distant as the Vietnam War did for me. Indeed, looking through the list of students starting their studies now in September, the majority were born in 2006 or 2007. And yet, there was something profoundly hopeful in the casual assumption that the world might calm down again, that closed borders might reopen, and that the Great Steppe could once more be crossed rather than flown over.

Two halves

In the end, Eddie decided to stay in Gothenburg with his girlfriend over the weekend, leaving me with a bit of time to catch up on work and running. With Malmö Marathon only seven weeks away, I thought that running two half marathons on consecutive days, while focusing on keeping my heart rate down (137 and 133 bpm on average, respectively), would be a good way to build some aerobic volume. By running half the distance on asphalt, I also hoped to get some practice on harder surfaces, much as I prefer running on trails.

Coming out to Tylösand, the weather was all wind and grey skies, with big waves rolling in and a sense of summer drawing to an end. On the way back, there was a bit of rain too and, passing the surfers at Sandhamn, the melancholy in the air was palpable. But a few hours into the afternoon, the sky has cleared again, so perhaps I should take a break from work and go for a walk into the city centre.

Members Truck

To presumably soften the blow of the recent 100 SEK per month price hike, American Express is currently touring the country with a silvery truck, giving out pastries and chances to win Michelin-starred dining experiences.

Seeing that the truck was in Helsingborg today, I got off my absolutely jam-packed Öresund train to pick up a bag. Sadly, I did not win anything Michelin-starred, but I did get a baked treat by Roy Fares (yes, the cousin of Josef Fares), which made for a perfect “calorie offset” after my half marathon around Tylösand.

Spanish Roadstead

For all my global travels, there are still all these white spots on the map: tracts that one has only ever passed through on the major roads, hinterlands one has somehow missed. Taking the train to Kristianstad yesterday, I got to experience both the deeply wooded lake country around Immeln and what Linnéa very fittingly described as Sweden's Louisiana: the watery landscape of the lower Helge å, where the river dissolves into wetlands, flooded meadows, and reed beds on its way towards Hanöbukten. Once there, the name “Spanska Redden” on the map immediately stuck with me as a promise of future adventures. Otherwise, the obvious six-letter clue for the Vagabond reading crowd would be “creole”.

Now on the train back to Halmstad, I hope to end this week with a few more long runs in Halland and plenty of coastal sunshine before a week that I will spend mostly indoors in different conference rooms.

Eclipse

Taking a high-speed train into the solar eclipse, I can look back on an incredible day with William in Gothenburg. Kicking things off with an hour at the gym, William challenged me to do as many chin-ups as possible. In the end, I managed 20 in one go while William did 17, but I have no doubt that he will surpass me within a few months, if not weeks.

From Järntorget, we headed over to Vapiano for lunch, followed by a swim at Pöl Harbor, which certainly reminded me how soft the heated waters of Brottet have made me. It is funny to think that many public swimming pools in Sweden originally had water temperatures of around 21 degrees when first constructed, something that many people would probably find unacceptable today. After a few refreshing laps and a visit to the sauna (all publicly available for free!), we hiked up to Keillers Park along a walkway constructed during the 1930s as part of a relief work programme.

Having had enough UV for one day, we then sought refuge at the library, where William pulled off a stunt by pretending to put his phone in my bag while in reality sneaking off to find a corner where he could play chess online. None the wiser, I was certain that he had found a good book, so I spent a couple of hours reading the latest issues of Monocle and browsing the poetry stacks before getting slightly nervous as the departure time of my train approached. Texting him, I discovered what he was up to but, obviously, I did not have the heart to be angry with him. Dropping him off at the summer chess tournament, where Anna will pick him up later, I was once again reminded that I have the best kiddos in the world.

Canvas print

Eighteen years ago in December, I was out exploring the North Island in a silvery Toyota Corolla. After landing in Auckland, I headed east to the Coromandel Peninsula, where I found peace by the Pacific. As a seasoned escapist, I could hardly think of a better motif to have on my wall here in Halmstad, now that the Northern Hemisphere is once again slowly turning dark.

For the moment, however, the sun is still very much here, so after spending all day in front of my laptop, I went for a coastal jog followed by another swim at my new favourite pool. Tomorrow, I am taking the train up to Gothenburg to be with William, and later this week, Eddie will be back here in Halmstad.

Matlådemåndag

As forecast, this Monday brought rain and grey skies – in other words, perfect weather for returning to work after the holidays. By lunchtime, I had already scheduled dozens of meetings, prepared one more lecture, and realized just how much of a crunch the coming autumn will be.

Meanwhile, Roger Pielke published a fascinating new dashboard that allows you to calculate the magnitude of the decarbonization challenge for different countries. Extrapolating into the future, it becomes clear just how important assumptions about future energy use are. On the one hand, there is spontaneous decarbonization and continued improvements in energy efficiency; on the other, there are new uses for electricity, like AI, and potentially a growing need for things like air conditioning in a climate-changed world. Running the numbers for Sweden and assuming that these opposing trends cancel each other out, replacing all fossil primary energy would require the construction of eighteen new 1 GW nuclear power plants (or a whopping 15,748 3 MW wind turbines). To achieve this by 2050, emissions would have to fall by almost 17% per year, more than twice the highest observed rate of reduction during the nuclear build-out of the 1980s.

To help with the carbon math, I at least brought my own vegetarian lunch to work today: a recipe from Tuvessonskan for mushroom ragù with white wine, thyme, and lemon zest that I will definitely make again soon.

Six issues

Despite frequently stopping my watch to drink, eat ice cream, or simply catch my breath under the pine trees, today’s half marathon out to Tylösand turned into a true nightmare. At least I got some lovely photos of the coast and plenty of sunshine to cherish tomorrow, when it is expected to rain all day.

A month ago, I subscribed to the travel magazine Vagabond, as they offered six issues and four Orrefors wine glasses for only 299 SEK. Just as I feared, however, travel magazines can quickly become expensive, and Linnéa and I now have an epic Francophone adventure ticketed for Christmas. More to follow in due time.

Calleth you

With four days together, Linnéa and I managed to swim a thousand metres at Brottet, make the complete version of my recreated SFO/Polaris salmon dish with a bottle of Dog Point from New Zealand, and drive down to Malmöfestivalen the following day for a midnight concert with The Ark.

Skolstartsluft and anticipation, with blank pages and new adventures awaiting. Right now, I am doing the laundry and planning an afternoon run out to Tylösand. Tomorrow at 8 a.m., I will be back at work, with one of the busiest Septembers on record coming up, so it feels good that Hallandsgatan now boasts a fox poster, a new bookshelf, and some ridiculously unnecessary Molton Brown hand wash in the bathroom – reinforcing that sense of home in these post-diluvian times.

Alto Molino

Transported back to SFO in 2019, I am experimenting with making pea purée with oven-roasted zucchini and salmon for dinner, accompanied by a new budget find from the Uco Valley in Argentina (available only as a 25 cl can at Systembolaget).

This afternoon, I finally cracked the code with the governance book and am now back to speed-making lecture slides for the autumn. I also managed to run out to Erikshjälpen and pick up a new lamp for the living room. Slowly but surely, Hallandsgatan is turning into a home after all the fires, floods, and separations.

Hovs hallar

 

Drinking coffee from my orange Santa Cruz mug, I am struck by the fact that I am much more familiar with the Central Coast in California than with our own stretch of coast here at home. To give just one example, I have never been to Hovs Hallar (where the blueberries are from), despite it being only fifty kilometres away and renowned for its natural beauty.

As I look towards the autumn, I hope to make up for my lack of local geographical knowledge. There are still so many places along the Halland and Skåne coast that I have never properly explored, and my run to Båstad alone gave me a couple of new favourites. For now, I am happy to put dreams of distant shores on hold. Still, it is unusual for me not to have a single trip to look forward to (Stockholm for work in September does not really count, lovely as it is), and with plenty of miles expiring later this year, something tells me that I will come up with something before long.

Reason prevailed

While still technically on vacation for another week, I have spent this Monday eating bagels and reading Elgar's Advanced Introduction to Governance for one of the courses I am teaching in September. In between, I have done the laundry, run ten kilometres in the sunshine, and ended the day with a swim at Simstadion Brottet. Open from 7 a.m. to 7:30 p.m. on weekdays, it is simply incredible to have free access to a 50-metre lap pool in the neighbourhood.

In a weak moment, I briefly considered registering for the 100-kilometre edition of Halland Ultra Beach on Sunday but, fortunately, reason (and a closed registration window) prevailed. After failing to complete the Essex Way Ultra just over a month ago, I feel a bit like I did in 2022, when I simply had to run Ultravasan 90 to set the record straight.

Sydney simulator

When visiting Jon in Sydney, one of the things I appreciated most was the city's public swimming pools, like the Andrew (Boy) Charlton Pool next to the Royal Botanic Garden and, of course, Icebergs out in Bondi. Here in Halmstad, we have “Simstadion Brottet”, which has been temporarily closed for repairs but reopened today, something that Eddie and I celebrated with a short swim in the afternoon sunshine.

Offering free admission, it is an incredible asset to the municipality, and I hope to return a few more times throughout August before it closes for the season.

Run to Båstad

Heading out into the midday heat, I began my birthday adventure by exploring the non-fording option of Halland Ultra-Beach (HUB) across Fylleån in southern Halmstad, a body of water that I have crossed many times further upstream in the woodlands of Halland but now got to share with all the cyclists following Kattegattleden.

Keeping a steady pace around 5:45 min/km, I then crossed the birdwatchers' paradise of Tönninge Meadows and the golden fields beyond. After cutting the HUB ultra race short twice, I was eager to finally see the coast between Halmstad and Båstad in earnest. Not racing, I allowed myself plenty of stops, including at the most lovely garden cafè in Påarp, overlooking the glittering sea and wind-sculpted pines. After a smørrebrød, I felt energized to continue into Gullbranna Nature Reserve on highly runnable trails.

Nineteen kilometres into my run, the trail headed out onto sand dunes that quickly proved difficult to navigate and slowed me down considerably. The preceding two nights with only a few hours of sleep made the whole thing feel like some kind of SEAL training exercise as my mind drifted to Coronado, sand filled my trail shoes, and the sun kept blazing. At Hökafältet, I finally plunged into the cool water before continuing on towards Mellbystrand.

Talking to Eddie on the phone, he said he wanted to come down to Halmstad tonight, so instead of running along the beach, I followed the bike path all the way to the railway station in Båstad. Finishing the full 38 kilometres in just under four hours of moving time, I was reasonably happy with my performance and already planning another run on the Bjäre Peninsula.