Wednesday 17 January 2018

08:30 Lois and I go in the shower and get up. Lois walks around the corner to the local clinic. She has decided to get an appointment with our doctor to discuss the digestive problems that have been hitting her recently now and then.

10:00 I start to browse through "The Greenland Prophetess", in Eric the Red's Old Norse saga. Scilla's U3A Old Norse Group is holding its next meeting this afternoon at 2pm in the town library, and this saga is the group's current project.

The story is all about Torbjørg, a Greenland prophetess or witch, who made a living from giving out prophecies to the local farmers on request. When she was on the job she put on a special uniform to show everyone that she was a genuine prophetess. The uniforms included calf-skin shoes and so-called (white) cat-skin gloves.

two excerpts from the saga of the Greenland Prophetess all about

her attire: a hood with a cat-skin lining, calf-skin shoes and "cat-skin gloves"

(my translations in red)

The connection between witches and cats is interesting. In England, all witches kept (black) cats - perhaps Icelandic and Greenland witches kept white cats, but that's something I'm not entirely sure about.

I remember that Freyja, the goddess of love and fertility, and the goddess of everyone's favorite day (Friday) used to travel in a chariot pulled by two cats, which suggests that cats in the old days were stronger and easier to train than modern cats.

Freyja, goddess of love, with her cats - poor cats !!!!

Minx, the cat our daughter Alison left with us when her family moved to Denmark 5 years ago, is not the kind of cat you could train easily, no doubt about that. And she has an instinct about being in the wrong place at the wrong time. If Lois and I had a chariot like Freyja's, Minx would always be missing when we wanted to drive here or there in the chariot, there's not much doubt about that!

11:00 I take a little look online and I find Morten Ingemann's latest comic strip. My goodness! I get a bit of a shock.

Ingemann, the Danish cartoonist, is my favorite cartoonist. He is especially interested in ugly, overweight, middle aged or older people, the kind of people rarely given attention  by most cartoonists.

The Dane, Morten Ingemann, is my favorite cartoonist

Today's heartwarming comic strip reminds us that we all have the ability to make others happier and more satisfied with their own lives, simply by means of ordinary human contact.

We see a middle-aged married couple on their way home in the evening after visiting their neighbors. The man says to his wife, "I think our visit to Lisbeth and Palle did them some good." The woman asks him, "Why do you think that?" The man replies, "Didn't you see how sad they looked when we arrived, and how happy they looked when we had to leave? "

It's easy to shut ourselves away, and maybe we sometimes do it a little too much. We should never overlook our opportunities for making others happy by mixing with them occasionally, that's something I know for sure!

12:00 Lunch and afterwards a short afternoon nap.

13:30 I drive into town and park the car in the parking lot behind the library. I want to pay via smartphone, so I can feel like a modern person, but the system is down for some reason. The machines do not accept coins so I have to use my credit card and I actually end up feeling like an old crow again - damn it!

14:00 Scilla's U3A Old Norse Group holds its meeting. There are 4 of us altogether, including Scilla, our teacher. Of us three students, it turn out that it is only me who has read the full extract of the Greenland prophetess, which is a little disappointing, but I'm going to let that one slide. I am just too diligent and conscientious, that's where the problem lies. Damn (again)!

16:00 The meeting ends. I feel quite jaded. I drive home and find Lois on her way out of the house. She has her doctor's appointment at 4:30pm.

17:00 Lois comes back again. The doctor has prescribed tablets, but she wants to see her again in two weeks' time, to make sure that the tablets have addressed the problem.

Lois has decided that tomorrow (Thursday) will be her annual "homemade marmalade day", a big day in our calendar. She hurries into the kitchen to complete the preliminary preparations.

18:30 We have dinner - we are exhausted.

We listen a bit to the radio, the exciting and atmospheric second part of a new crime series set in Norway (or maybe Sweden: Lois and I are not quite sure).

The program opens with an incredibly powerful, dark and moody monologue from the narrator.

“No one would have believed in the last years of the 19th century that human affairs were being watched from the timeless worlds of space. 120 years later little has changed. But here, at the fringe of Sweden, there are no aliens, only the trees, which stand like wooden witnesses to man’s inner rubbishness. Here it is cold as a tomb, and there is never enough herring in the sandwiches.”

Lois and I are both agreed that this is certainly a brilliant start to the second episode. In fact, it has made the rest of the episode in many ways a little redundant, we think.

20:00 We continue to listen to the radio, an interesting interview with Victoria Coren Mitchell, presenter of Lois' and my favorite tv quiz, "Only Connect", one of the few TV shows that are not suitable for very stupid people ha ha ha.

Victoria is such an interesting and unusual personality, we think. She got a bachelor's degree at Oxford University (first class, with distinction). She is a writer, journalist and professional poker player. Whilst working as a journalist on the "Erotic Review" magazine, she and a work colleague decided to create the world's best porn movie ever.

As the television host on our favorite tv-quiz, Only Connect, she is known for her humorous introductory and closing monologues. Humor is in her DNA. Her father was Alan Coren, a humorist and editor of Britain's famous humor magazine, Punch.

She says tonight she was brought up to believe that it is a little offensive to say something serious if you could make a joke instead. Her father thought it was very rude to expect people to sit quietly while you told them in a serious way what your opinion was. Who cares what your opinion is? Think of a joke, or keep your mouth shut. He thought that if humanity had to do without either PG Wodehouse or Goethe, it would be in far better off without Goethe.

Food for thought in abundance there. Lois and I would like to be more like her, apart from the porn movies and the poker - it's too late in our case to make a start on all that: it would demand years of training, no doubt about that.

20:30 We turn off the radio and watch a bit of television. An interesting documentary is on, "Trust Me, I'm a Doctor". The host of the program is the charming television doctor, Michael Mosley, along with some of his television doctor friends.

The program's trailer has focused on the question, "Is it healthier to eat one's carbohydrates for breakfast or for dinner?", a question that Lois and I have recently discussed with each other, but we find the program's experiments and conclusions do not really help us. 'Breakfast or dinner' does not really matter when it comes to carbohydrates: the most important thing is not to get too many of them, but we already knew that - damn it!

21:30 We continue to watch television. Another interesting documentary about Trump's followers, one year after the presidential election.

The program interviews 4 voters who voted for Trump last year. It turns out that 3 of these 4 voters would vote for him again today. It is not new but nevertheless noteworthy that Trump supporters are not worried about Trump's lack of conventional diplomacy and standards, or the evidence of secret understandings between the Trump campaign and the Russians. And all Trump's failures can be blamed on the Democratic Party and the media.

Most voters in all countries are of course not very intelligent, but they have genuine deep feelings and dissatisfactions, which sadly are easy for demagogues to exploit. What the world is missing today is those kinds of sensible but inspiring politicians that can shoot down the arguments of people like Trump or Farage. What has become of the great politicians we had in the past ???

22:00 We go to bed - zzzzzzzzz !!!!

Danish translation

08:30 Lois og jeg går I bad og står op. Lois går rundt om hjørnet til den lokale lægeklinik. Hun har besluttet at få en tid hos vores læge for at diskutere sine fordøjelsesproblemer, der af og til har ramt hende for nylig.

10:00 Jeg går i gang med at blade igennem ”Den grønlandske profetinde”, der findes i Erik den Rødes oldnorske saga. Scillas U3A oldnorske gruppe holder sit næste møde i eftermiddag kl 14 i byens bibliotek, og denne saga er gruppens nuværende projekt.

Historien handler om Torbjørg, en grønlandske profetinde eller heks, der levede af at give spådomme til de lokale bøndemænd på deres anmodning. Når hun var på arbejde, tog hun en speciel uniform på, for at vise alle, at hun var en ægte profetinde. Uniformen inkluderede kalveskindsko og såkaldte (hvide) katteskindhandsker.

to uddrag fra den grønlandske profetindes saga, der handler om

profetindes påklædning: en hætte med en katteskindfoer,

kalveskindsko og ”katteskindhandsker” (mine oversættelser i rød)

Forbindelsen mellem hekse og katte er interessant. I England holdte alle hekse (sorte) katte – måske islandske og grønlandske hekse holdt hvide katte, men det er jeg ikke helt sikker på.

Jeg mindes, at Freja, gudinden af kærlighed og frugtbarshed, og gudinden af alles yndlingsdag (fredag), plejede at rejse i en vogn trukket af to katte, hvilket forslår, at katte i de gode gamle dage var stærkere, og nemmere at dressere, end de moderne katte.

Freja og hendes katte:  stakkels katte !!!!!!

Minx, katten vores datter Alison forlod hos os, da hendes familie for 5 år siden flyttede til Danmark, er ikke den slags kat, man kunne dressere nemt, ingen tvivl om det. Og hun har en instinkt for at være i det forkerte sted på det forkerte tidspunkt. Hvis Lois og jeg havde en vogn som Frejas, ville Minx altid nå at være fraværende, når vi havde lyst til at køre her eller der i vognen, ingen tvivl om det!

11:00 Jeg kigger lidt på nettet, og jeg finder Morten Ingemanns seneste tegneseriestribe. Du godeste! Jeg får lidt af et chok.

Danske Ingemann er min yndlingstegner  – ingen tvivl om det! Han interesserer sig især for grimme, overvægtige, midaldrende eller ældre folk, de slags mennesker, som de fleste tegnere sjældent giver opmærksomhed til.

Danske Morten Ingemann, min yndlingstegner

Dagens hjertevarmende tegnestribe minder os om, at vi alle har evnen til at gøre andre lykkeligere og mere tilfreds med deres egne liv, simpelthen ved hjælp af almindelig menneskelig kontakt.

Vi ser et midaldrende ægtepar på vej hjem om aftenen efter et besøg hos deres naboer. Manden siger til sin kone, ”Jeg tror, at vores besøg hos Lisbeth og Palle gjorde dem godt.” Konen spørger ham, ”Hvorfor tror du det?” Manden svarer, ”Så du ikke hvor triste de så ud, da vi kom, og hvor glade de så ud, da vi skulle gå?”.

Det er nemt at lukke os inde i os selv, og måske gør vi det nogle gange lidt for meget. Vi bør aldrig overse vores muligheder for at gøre andre glade ved at omgås dem af og til, ved jeg med sikkerhed!

12:00 Frokost og bagefter en kort eftermiddagslur.

13:30 Jeg kører ind i byen og parkerer bilen i parkeringsplads bag biblioteket. Jeg har lyst til at betale via smartphone, så jeg kan føle mig som en moderne person, men systemet er nede af en eller anden grund. Maskinerne accepterer ikke mønter, så jeg skal bruge mit kreditkort, og jeg faktisk ender med at føle mig som en gamle krage igen - pokkers!

14:00 Scillas U3A oldnorske gruppe holder sit møde. Vi er 4 i alt, herunder Scilla, vores lærer. Af os tre studerende, viser det sig, at det er kun mig, der har læst hele uddraget om den grønlandske profetinde, hvilket er lidt skuffende, men det springer jeg over. Jeg er for flittig og samvittighedsfuld, og der har vi problemet. Pokkers (igen)!

16:00 Mødet slutter. Jeg føler mig helt udkørt. Jeg kører hjem og finder, at Lois er på vej ud af huset. Kl 16:30 har hun sin lægeaftale.

17:00 Lois kommer tilbage igen. Lægen har ordineret tabletter, men hun ønsker at se hende igen om to uger, for at være helt sikker på, at tabletterne har læget problemet.

Lois har besluttet at i morgen (torsdag) er sin årlige ”hjemmelavede appelsinmarmelade dag”, en stor dag i vores kalender. Hun skynder ind i køkkenet for at klare de indledende forberedelser.

18:30 Vi spiser aftensmad – vi er udmattede.

Vi lytter lidt til radio, det spændende og stemningsskabende andet afsnit af en ny krimiserie, der udspiller sig i Norge (eller måske Sverige: det er Lois og jeg ikke helt sikre på).

Programmet åbner med en utrolig kraftig og stemningsskabende monolog fra beretteren.

"Ingen ville have troet i det 19. århundredes sidste år, at menneskelige anliggender blev iagttaget fra rummets tidløse verdener. 120 år senere er lidt blevet ændret. Men her på kanten af Sverige er der ingen aliens, kun træerne, der står som stive vidner til menneskets indre pissedårlighed. Her er koldt som en grav, og der er aldrig nok sild i sandwicherne. " 

Lois og jeg er enige om, at dette er uden tvivl en brilliant start på det andet afsnit. Resten af afsnittet er faktisk på mange måder blevet lidt overflødig, synes vi.

20:00 Vi fortsætter med at lytte til radio, et interessant interview med Victoria Coren Mitchell, der er værtinde af Lois’ og min yndlings-tvquiz, ”Only Connect”, et af de få tv-programmer, der ikke er egnede til meget dumme mennesker ha ha ha.

Victoria er sikke en interessant og usædvanlig personlighed, synes vi: hun erhvervede en bachelorgrad på Oxford University (første karakter, med udmærkelse). Hun er forfatter, journalist og professionel pokerspiller. Mens hun arbejdede som journalist  på magasinet ”Erotic Review”, besluttede hun og en arbejdskollega, at skabe verdens bedste pornofilm nogensinde.

Som tv-vært til vores yndlings-tvquiz, Only Connect, er hun kendt for sine humoristske indledende og afsluttende monologer. Humor er i hendes dna. Hendes far var Alan Coren, der var humorist og redaktør af Storbritanniens berømte humormagasin, Punch.

Hun siger i aften, at hun blev opdraget til at tro, at det er lidt krænkende at sige noget alvorligt, hvis man kunne lave en vittighed i stedet for. Hendes far syntes, det var meget uhøfligt af dig, at forvente at folk sidder musstille, mens du sagde på et alvorligt måde, hvad du mente. Hvem er interesseret i, hvad du mener? Find på en vittighed, ellers hold kæft. Han syntes, at hvis menneskehed måtte undvære enten PG Wodehouse eller Goethe, ville det være i langt bedre tilstand uden Goethe.

Stof til eftertanke i overflod der. Lois og jeg vil begge to gerne ligne hende mere, bortset fra pornofilmene og pokeren – det er for sent i vores tilfælde at starte på alt det der: det ville kræve årsvis af uddannelse, uden tvivl om det.

20:30 Vi slukker for radioen og ser lidt fjernsyn. De viser en interessant dokumentarfilm, “Stol på mig, jeg er læge”. Programmets vært er den charmerende tv-læge, Michael Mosley, sammen med nogle af hans tv-lægevenner.

Programmets trailer har fokuseret på spørgsmålet, ”Er det sundere at spise ens kulhydrater til morgenmad eller til aftensmad?”, et spørgsmål, som Lois og jeg for nylig har diskuteret med hinanden, men vi finder programmets eksperimenter og konklusioner ikke rigtigt hjælper os. ’Morgenmad eller aftensmad’ gør faktisk ikke så stor forskel, når det kommer til kulhydrater: det vigtigste er ikke at få for mange, men det vidste vi allerede – pokkers!

21:30 Vi fortsætter med at se lidt fjernsyn. De viser en anden interessant dokumentarfilm, der handler om Trumps tilhængere, ét år efter præsidentvalget.

Programmet interviewer 4 vælgere, der sidste år stemte på Trump. Det viser sig, at 3 af disse 4 vælgere ville stemme på ham igen i dag. Det er ikke nyt men ikke desto mindre bemærksomt, at Trump-tilhængere ikke er bekymrede over Trumps mangel af konventionelle diplomati og standarder, eller over beviserne for hemmelige forståelser mellem Trump-kampagnen og russerne. Og alle Trumps fiaskoer kan skyldes det demokratiske parti og medierne.  

De fleste vælgere i alle lande er selvfølgelig ikke særlig intelligente, men de har ægte, dybe følelser og utilfredstillelser, som desværre er nemt for demagoger at udnytte. Hvad verden mangler for tiden, er den slags fornuftige men inspirende, store politikere, den kan skyde argmenterne af mennesker som Trump eller Farage ned. Hvad er der blevet af de store politikere, vi havde i fortiden???

22:00 Vi går i seng – zzzzzzzzz!!!!