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Yeah, I did, on Friday, because the "trick" to the whole deal is grabbing a hold of someone with a distinctive voice or accent, after which one can "jigsaw puzzle" the conversation halfway together.

I was transferred to a man at the embassy; nope, couldn't understand him (because men usually speak monotonally and without rhytem), and then to a woman who shouted and roared, but without distinctive patterns to her voice, and then finally to "Inge," whose voice ebbed and flowed, high points and low points, shrill and calm, musical and atonal, giving me "clues" as to what she was saying.

I must say the people at the Royal Norwegian Embassy in Washington, D.C., are among the most patient people I have ever encountered (they are not so patient here in Nebraska, most of the time); I had them running around like a bunch of chickens with their heads cut off, but they were always very kind and polite.

"Inge"--that might be a telephone name and not her real name--took the details, and promised to send me some "hard news" about Norway (via regular mail), and then Saturday morning when I checked my e-mail, there was a message from her, giving me "links" to some other Norwegian stuff.

"Inge" is 27 years old.

I tried to recruit her for Free Republic, and more specifically, for the "Norway ping list," but she insisted she is not "into" computers or the internet; she does it as part of her job, but in her personal life, she would just as soon deal with people face-to-face.

She did express an interest in meeting an authentic American cowboy, sometime.

"Inge" gets a AAA+++ rating for "customer service."