The snow is already appearing in Iceland, now on the mountains around Reykjavík. Winter is coming!

Snjóað í fjöll í höfuðborginni
Snow on the mountains in the capital

Höfuðborgarbúar vöknuðu upp við það í morgun að gránað hafði í fjöll umhverfis borgina.

Capital area residents woke up today to find the mountains around the city a bit grayer.

Esjan, Móskarðshnjúkar, Skálafell, Vífilsfell, Hengill og Bláfjöll höfðu fengið hvíta kolla. Það verður því ekki horft fram hjá því öllu lengur að nú styttist í vetrarkomu, þótt fyrsti dagur vetrar sé samkvæmt almanaki ekki fyrr en 25. október.

Esjan, Móskarðshnjúkar, Skálafell, Vífilsfell, Hengill and Bláfjöll have gotten white caps. It’s impossible to ignore any longer that winter is fast approaching, even though according to the almanac the first day of winter isn’t until October 25th.

kollur (m) – head, crown; cap
singular plural
nom kollur kollar
acc koll kolla
dat kolli kollum
gen kolls kolla
  
að stytta – to shorten, abbreviate
present past
ég stytti stytti
þú styttir styttir
það styttir stytti
við styttum styttum
þið styttið styttuð
þau stytta styttu

That last sentence was a little tricky, not sure if I captured it completely. I took horfa fram hjá to mean look past something, ignore it, turn a blind eye to it – hope it’s close 🙂

There are a couple of interesting things in this short article, like styttast í. This reflexive form of stytta with the preposition í has the meaning of something approaching, or drawing near (nálgast). In my dictionary there are actually two different uses, one with the accusative and one with the dative. The accusative form seems to mean that something is approaching, while the dative means something is ending or coming to a close. Since vetrarkomu is the accusative and dative form of vetrarkoma, you can’t tell for sure which case is being used here, but I think the accusative makes more sense.

Also note the use the subjunctive in the last phrase (), since referring to what the almanac says is a form of reported speech, which should make you think subjunctive.

vakna v                    awaken, wake up
grána v                    turn gray
umhverfis adv/prep         around
kollur m                   head, crown; cap
horfa v                    look
stytta v                   shorten, abbreviate
sam·kvæmt prep (dat)       according to