party
After the disputation (the public thesis defense), there was the party.
Doctoral dinner: Jan Richard, Svennik, Tanja, Tore, Sigured, and the back of Ragnhild's head.
Øyvind, Synne, Faltin, and Susanne
My parents live in a big old house -- a farm, actually. It is cold and impractical during the week, but it's a great place for a formal party! As a present to me, they hired a caterer that made a long row of great tasting tapas dishes. People seemed to enjoy themselves, and I had a truly wonderful time.
Philip, our youngest, is taken care of by Susanne and Bjørn-Helge....
..as I get to chat a little with my wife Mona.
Doctoral dinner means lots of speeches. My great colleague Arnte performed as master of ceremony, leading us through the speeches of the Faculty, the Department, the Committee, the Supervisor, the parents, and the Doctorand (hey, that's me!).
Arnte did a great job as toastmaster
Trine Syvertsen cracked everyone up with the speech on behalf of the faculty. She's the sub dean of research, but also a professor in our department, and I know her well. She's so great. Most deans almost fall asleep during disputations, but Trine had been taking notes. In her speech she gave an assessment of my rhetorical strategy in my defense. According to her, I had been enthusiastic: "I like doing research," "I like editing video," "I like multimedia," "I like this theory," "My opponent poses an interesting question," "I like messy hypertext."
Then she read me a poem: all the synonyms for finished that were in a thesaurus. Because, as she said: "There are good dissertations and not so good dissertations. There are long dissertations and... well, long dissertations. Then there are finished dissertations and not yet finished dissertations. The faculty likes finished dissertations!"
Trine's speech
I've resolved never again to delete an e-mail. My supervisor Gunnar never does, and in his speech, he produced an e-mail I sent him in 1997, with the subject title "I think I want to be a Ph.D...." In the message, I actually sketched some of the thoughts that were developed at the very end of the thesis writing.
Gunnar's speech
My mother held a beautiful speech, quoting Håvamål, the Viking code of morals: "It is best for man to be middle-wise/Not over cunning and clever"
Mum
My sister Mari, standing, with her husband Olve, Marianne and Espen.
Trine is discussing with my 92 years-old maternal grandmother.
Receiving present from Ragnhild (far left) and Tanja.
I got lots of nice presents: wine, books, music. My colleagues gave me an amazing huge basket, stuffed with wine, champagne, a cigar, an iSight camera, a box of DVDs, chocoloate treats, and a gift card to Amazon! I was overwhelmed. Christmas came early this year...
Opening present.
Bjørn-Helge, Lin, Bjarne, Hans Magnus, and Arnte showing off mobile phones.
Arnte started an SMS relay, where a message was sent around from phone to phone. Everyone added a line, and it resulted in a strange little poem they sent to my phone.
Talking. Bjarne, Hans Magnus (behind lamp), Mona, Synne, Sigurd and Tanja (standing up), Ragnhild, and Arnte
Then we danced to Abba and talked until it was really late and I collapsed in bed.
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