Strawberry Swiss Roll and Some Venting

Today I was ill prepared to cook so I had to go with something I could make with what was in my pantry. I decided on a swiss roll - I have never tried one and always was too nervous that it would be hard - so today was the day. The cake itself is really interesting- you beat 3 eggs and some sugar for what feels like forever - until they form a "mousse" and then add just fold in a little sifted flour- nothing else! Funny enough when it bakes it smells like eggs. It is very thin cake- you flip it out onto a sugar coated piece of wax paper do some edge trimming, add your jam/filling and roll it up. Much easier then I made it out to be in my head and it tasted good too! Here is a similar recipe but mine was slightly different but mostly the same.

Now on to the venting- so as you learned from the relocation drama post we are staying longer in Norway. We were excited by this for only one reason- we could travel a little more. But now we have a visa conflict that is super annoying! Our visas expire May 5 - my last renewal took 5 months to process and they say the wait now is 6 months. So we went last week to the immigration office (we arrived at 6:30am after being turned away the week before at 7:55am) to submit our paperwork to renew - we were told we are too early and they won't process it until 4 weeks prior to our expiration date. But here is the reason for the vent - you can't leave the country on an expired visa - so we are trapped in Norway for up to FIVE months! We are trying to get the company to assist us with this since Jason may need to travel for work in this time period. Our company contact in Oslo tells us that if we lived there we could go to a special "international worker" office and get the renewal processed in one week and travel while it is being processed. Glad we live in the backwards section of the country.

I was trying to make myself feel better by rationalizing that all immigration offices suck everywhere. I thought I would compare it to the US- bad idea! Even though the US has a horrible reputation for immigration it is way better then here. You can apply online- check the status online - check wait times for every type of permit/visa etc. And you can travel on an expired visa as long as you can show that the INS has received your renewal. Needless to say these are for "foreign workers" like Jason and not someone trying to become a resident etc. But even the fact the US recognizes there is a big difference between an expat and someone seeking residence/immigration is a big step up from Norway. Grr! We have booked travel to Egypt but we also know we may need to cancel it if it comes down to it. Nothing like feeling trapped to annoy you.