Mikory's ABBA-blog

"Fire and Ice - you come on like a flame then you turn a *broken* shoulder..."

Well, so it was time for the artifical shoulder operation on Tuesday this week. The surgery went well, due to the delays the broken shoulder had begun to heal up so there was a lot cutting and sawing done. Thank God I wasn't aware what was happening. I woke up in the late afternoon and the pain was really, really bad. The staff told me that the first 24 hours are the worst, and they were right.
     I now have a stainless steel shoulder in my right arm so I guess I will be stopped at airports going through security in the future. Already the next day I was up and starting with very slow and careful excercises. You have to stand leaning forward and just let the arm dangle slowly with your shoulder relaxed. It will be a long period of physiotherapy, about 10 weeks. Unfortunately I will probably not regain all the movement I had in the shoulder before the operation, but as long as I can use both arms for typing, eating and doing most of the usual things I will be pleased. Typing is, as you probably can understand, a bit difficult, but I am very stubborn.
    I would like to thank the talented suregeons, nurses and physiotherapist at Karolinska Sjukhuset in Stockholm for what they have done for me. Now I need to let the wound heal and slowly go through the physio therapy.
     I wish you all a great weekend, the long summerlike autumn we had here until last week has now suddenly changed into almost winter. It actually snowed a couple of days ago. Today it's raining.
     Take care,
     Mikael :)

Happy Birthday to me!

 It's my birthday today. I'm 44 - and my blog is 4 years old. I celebrated it early, yesterday on Sunday, together with my family. A very nice dinner and a beautiful prinsesstårta (Princess Cake) (see picture) was served and friends and family were together.
     Thanks for the congratulations I have allready received and thanks for continuing to read my blog.

Glad midsommar!

Tomorrow (20 June) we will celebrate Midsummer's Eve here in Sweden. It's a big thing, everyone is waiting for the longest day of the year, drink too much schnapps and beer, eat herring and swim in icy cold water. Hmmm...
    But I found a clip of Björn, Benny, Agnetha & Frida from Midsummer Eve 1973 - 35 years ago. They did a concert in Bursiljum (must be a tiny folk park - I've never head of it). They were just a year away from breaking internationally and big. This was the "Ring Ring" summer tour, I guess.
     I wish all readers a Glad Midsommar!

Former ABBA stars reach settlement over script of "Kristina från Duvemåla"

     — Former ABBA stars Björn Ulvaeus and Benny Andersson said Monday they have reached a settlement with a Swedish playwright in a copyright dispute over one of their musicals.
     In a joint statement, the two musicians and Carl-Johan Seth said they had requested the case be recalled from an appeals court that was supposed to hear it this week.

Both sides had been feuding over who wrote the script for the musical "Kristina from Duvemåla", which has been seen by more than one million people in Sweden.

Seth appealed a lower court ruling last year in favour of Andersson and Ulvaeus, who rejected Seth's claims that he was the main writer of the script.

However, both sides agreed to drop the case after reaching a settlement that made it possible to "move on as friends," Monday's statement said. It did not give other details.

Seth's lawyer, Staffan Michelson, said his client's reputation as a playwright has been "completely restored" and that the scheduled court hearing this Wednesday had been cancelled.

The musical is based on novels by Swedish writer Wilhelm Moberg, which depict the journey by Swedish emigrants to the U.S. in 1850.

ABBA, which also included singers Agnetha Faltskog and Anni-Frid Lyngstad, gained worldwide fame in the 1970s and early 1980s.

Merry Christmas and a Happy 2008

Dear readers,
Thank you for all your mails, criticism, cheers friendship I have received this year. I'm proud to tell you that this blog now has reached 300.000 hits since the start in 2005. We certainly aren't a very little group of ABBA fans. The interest is higher than ever before. I'm sure Agnetha, Björn, Benny, and Frida are all really proud that people still care so much for their music.
     To get you into the Christmas mood here are four songs from Agnetha and Frida that have connections to the holiday.    

     Thank you for this year and let's all hope for an even better 2008!Love, Mikael
     SONG 1 SONG 2 SONG 3 SONG 4

Happy Easter!

My ABBA Blog is a winner!

What a great way to start 2006! A really big thanks to all of you who voted for this blog in ABBA Plaza's annual competition for the best ABBA site of the year. I was very happy to receive the e-mail telling me I have won this competition, today from Robert Verbeek, the owner of ABBA Plaza.
     And an extra thanks to all of you who have written to me, telling me how much you appreciate my site.
I have partly spent the holidays going through old ABBA stuff, and I have started translating articles and scanning pictures.
     I wish you all a happy new year and all the best for 2006! Here in Sweden the days are very short now, the darkness is horrible. But now we have gotten quite a lot of snow and that makes it a little brighter.

This blog has been nominated!

I'm very happy to announce that ABBA Plaza has nominated Mikory's ABBA-blog, together with nine other fantastic ABBA sites for the best ABBA site of the year 2005.

If you want to vote for this site I'd glad if you click on the picture below and cast your vote:

Thank you,

Mikael :)

God Jul/Merry Christmas!

I would like to wish all of you who visit my blog a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! Thanks for all the help and encouragment this year.

As you can see in my Christmas card I tried to take a picture of Santa, but he was in such a hurry, all I got was a picture of his hat... :)