Friday 9 February 2018

09:15 Lois has to go out. She and Mari-Ann, her friend, have been invited to coffee and cake by their friend Debbie, who lives in Brockworth. Lois drives over to Mari-Anne's house and Mari-Ann drives them both over to Brockworth. They also hope to see the Winter Olympics opening ceremony from South Korea on television. One of Mari-Anne's two sons lives and works in South Korea and he has tickets for one day next week, I think.

10:00 I have a little bit of alone time and start reading the last 17 pages of "Accursed" by Gittemie Eriksen, the Danish crime novella which is our U3A Danish group's current project. I add a list of the difficult words in a little vocabulary at the bottom of each page, to save the members of the group having to look them up in the dictionaries. I'm so warmhearted ha ha ha!

At this point in time I am now the only one in our Danish group who knows the mass murderer's identity!

But I have to be careful now. It may be that some group member will try to torture me to find out who the murderer is and then kill me before I can reveal the secret to the others. I decide to take some "reasonable" precautions - nothing elaborate. I do not want to draw attention to myself.

But, to some extent, I'm more interested in the "journey" taken by the novel's hero, Constable Per Janson. He starts the story as a typical hen-pecked husband, married to Vivi, a stuck-up, snobbish woman who is always yelling at him and is often quite distant and stand-offish in her relations with him. But two thirds of the way through the novel, Per and Vivi have a night of hot sex, first of all late in the evening and then again the next morning when Per is supposed to be at work. But after that excitement, Vivi more or less disappears from the story line, and Per has megacrush after megacrush on various beautiful young women he meets during his investigation.

In the last scene of the novel, after 4 policemen have taken the murderess away in handcuffs, Per is alone with Mia Ohm-Pedersen, the beautiful local lawyer. Per tells Mia that he will always be in debt to her. "You must say if there is anything I can do for you", he pleads.

Mia answers, "There is something you can do" - at this point, the expectant Per's level of arousal is quite obvious. "Get me home," she answers, and she buries her face in Per's shoulder. He puts his arms around her.

But what happens next? We will never know unfortunately! Damn!

My personal opinion is that Vivi, Per's snobbish wife, was trying to use sex with him as a weapon to get what she wanted, in this case, access to the village's glittering upper classes. She insisted that Per stay in bed and give her "another go", even though Per's boss had told him to turn out to investigate a new killing.

I remember that the use of sex as a weapon was for some months outlawed in the United States during the singer Pat Benatar's short term as judge in the country's Supreme Court (report on July 9, source Onion News in Photos).

12:30 Lois has not yet appeared so I cook and eat lunch. She finally comes home at 1 o'clock and we chat a little about her morning. I go to bed and take a giant afternoon nap.

15:00 I get up and listen to the radio, an interesting program called "The Last Word". Lois and I have a habit of hearing this program every week because we want to find out if anyone has died or not in the last 1-2 weeks (I noticed that in most weeks exactly 5 deaths occur). The host of the program is the charming Julian Worricker.

Hannah Hauxwell has died unfortunately, at the age of 91. She was a farmer living an isolated life on a small farm on the top of a hill in north Yorkshire when she was "discovered" by a television documentary-maker in the 1970s. Her only company was her little herd of cows. The farm had no electricity or running water. Her father and her grandfather had owned the farm before her.

Hannah Hauxwell, who unfortunately died recently

I've always been interested in accents, but I'm surprised to hear Hannah's voice in the ITV recordings: an accent I've never heard before. And I thought I had heard them all. My goodness! It was only a little bit like the usual Yorkshire accent, and it also had traces of Scottish or Irish.

I believe that people in remote and isolated villages can often preserve accents that have died out elsewhere. When Lois and I lived in Maryland, USA between 1982 and 1988, we were members of the local archeology society and we investigated a small hamlet consisting of only two houses. We met one of the two residents, and I thought he was an Englishman, an English farmer, judging from his accent, but he told us his family had lived in the village for generations.

Kenneth Seddon has also died, a chemist who always went everywhere in a suit - in the deserts, in the Everglades, everywhere. He was famous for developing super solvents.

Kenneth Seddon, with his chemicals

It is interesting that Ken also worked on an antique scroll from the 9th century, called the Chinese diamond sutra. The scroll had been preserved in the British Museum in London. Early in the 20th century the museum staff glued the rolls onto some cardboard - my god, what madness !!!

Ken worked on preserving the ink on the manuscript, but also on trying to dissolve the glue that had been used to attach it to the pieces of cardboard. Good grief - what a crazy world we live in !!!!

Unfortunately, it's too late to sack the "scientists" who were so generous with their glue sticks - pass the sickbag, Alice !!!

18:00 We have dinner and spend the evening watching television. An old episode of "Top of the Pops" is on, from April 1985.

The music in this episode is not that fantastic, I have to admit, 

but it's nice to see the 1980's hairstyles again.

The show's best moments come, as always, when we see the dancers in the studio with their fresh young faces: these girls are now coming up to 60 years of age - yikes!

Lois and I did not see this episode when it was first broadcast by the BBC because we were living in the United States between 1982 and 1985, together with our 2 young daughters, Alison and Sarah. But in April 1985 we had already begun thinking about the coming August when we would have to move back to Britain.

We spent some days in April in Philadelphia with our daughters, and saw the most important sights, including the Liberty Bell, and we looked around a battlefield from the civil war. In addition, we spent a day in the city of Washington DC. My sister Kathy and her partner, Steve, showed us their apartment and we ended up all six of us going up on to the roof of the building. We also visited the CNN studies where Steve then worked.

Happy days!

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

Danish translation

09:15 Lois skal ud. Hun og Mari-Ann, hendes veninde, er blevet inviteret til kaffe-og-kage hos Debbie, der bor i Brockworth. Hun kører over til Mari-Anns hus og Mari-Ann skal køre hende over til Brockworth. De håber også på at kunne se vinter-OLs åbningsceremoni fra Syd-Korea på fjernsyn. En af Mari-Anns to sønner bor og arbejder i Syd-Korea og han har billetter for en dag næste uge, tror jeg.

10:00 Jeg har lidt alenetid og går i gang med at læse de sidste 17 sider af ”Forbandet” af Gittemie Eriksen, den danske kriminovelle, der er vores U3A danske gruppes nuværende projekt, og jeg tilføjer en liste over svære ord i en ordforrådliste i bunden af hver side, for at spare gruppens medlemmer for at slå dem op i ordbøgerne. Jeg er så varmhjertet ha ha ha!

På dette tidspunkt er jeg den eneste i vores danske gruppe, der ved identiten af massemorderen ha ha!

Men jeg må være forsigtig nu. Det kan være, at et eller andet gruppemedlem prøver at torturere mig for at finde ud af, hvem morderen er, og derefter dræber mig, før jeg kan afsløre hemmeligheden til de andre. Jeg beslutter mig for at tage nogle ”fornuftige” forholdsregler – intet omstændeligt. Jeg vil ikke henlede opmærksomhed på mig selv.

Men jeg er i en vis grad mere interesseret i ”rejsen” af novellens helt, landbetjent Per Janson. Han starter historien som en typisk tøffelhelt, gift med Vivi, en fisefornem og snobbet kvinde, der altid skælder ham ud, og er åndsfraværende over for ham. Men to tredjedel af vejen gennem novellen har Per og Vivi en nat af hed sex, for de første sidst på aftenen, og igen næste morgen, da Per bør være på arbejde. Men derefter forsvinder Vivi for det meste fra historielinjen, og Per har megacrush efter megacrush på forskellige smukke unge kvinder, han møder i løbet af sin undersøgelse.

I novellens sidste scene, efter 4 politimænd er gået af sted med morderen i håndjern, er Per alene med Mia Ohm-Pedersen, den smukke lokale advokat. Per fortæller Mia, at han altid vil være i gæld til hende. ”Du må endelige sige til, hvis der er noget, jeg kan gøre for dig”. Mia svarer, ”Der er noget, du kan gøre” – på dette tidspunkt er den forventningsfulde Pers ophidselse helt åbenbar. ”Kør mig hjem”, svarer hun, og lægger sit ansigt ind mod Pers skulder. Han lægger armene omkring hende.

Men hvad sker der så? Vi skal aldrig vide desværre! Pokkers!

Min personlige mening er, at Vivi, Pers snobbede kone, prøvede at bruge sex med ham som et våben, for at få hvad hun ville have, i dette tilfælde adgang til landsbyens overklasse. Hun insisterede på, at Per blev liggende i sengen og ”give hende en omgang til”, selvom Pers chef havde bedt ham om at rykke ud for at undersøge et nyt drab.

Jeg mindes, at dét, at bruge sex som et våben, var i nogle måneder forbudt i USA, under sangerinden Pat Benatars kort periode som dommer i landets højsteret (rapport den 9. juli, kilde Onion News in Photos).

12:30 Lois er ikke dukket op endnu, så jeg laver og spiser frokost. Hun kommer endelig hjem kl 13 og vi snakker lidt om hendes formiddag. Jeg går så i seng for at tage mig en gigantisk eftermiddagslur.

15:00 Jeg står op og vi lytter lidt til radio, en interessant program med titlen ”Det Sidste Ord”.  Lois og jeg har for vane at høre dette program hver uge, fordi vi ønsker at finde ud af, om nogen i de seneste 1-2 uger døde eller ej (jeg har bemærket, at der i de fleste uger sker nøjagtig 5 dødsfald). Programmets vært er den charmerende Julian Worricker.

Hannah Hauxwell døde desværre på 91 år. Hun var bondemand, der levede en isoleret liv på en lille gård på toppen af en bakke i det nordlige Yorkshire, da hun blev ”opdaget” af en tv dokumentarfilm-mager i 1970’erne. Hendes eneste selskab var hendes lille besætning af køer. Gården havde intet elektricitet eller løbende vand. Hendes far og hendes farfar havde ejet gården før hende.

Hannah Hauxwell, der desværre døde for nylig

Jeg har altid interesseret mig i akkenter, men jeg er forbavset at høre Hannahs stemme i ITV-optagelserne: en akkent, jeg aldrig har hørt før. Og jeg troede, jeg havde hørt dem alle. Du godeste! Den lignede kun en lille smule den sædvanlige Yorkshire-accent, og det havde også spor af skotsk eller irsk.

Jeg mener, at folk i fjerne og isolerede landsbyer kan ofte opbevare akkenter, der er uddød andetsteds. Da Lois og jeg boede i Maryland, USA mellem 1982 og 1988, var vi medlemmer af den lokale arkæologisamfund og vi undersøgte en lille flække bestående af kun to huse. Vi mødte en af de to beboere, og jeg troede, at han var englænder, en engelsk landmand, ud at domme fra hans accent, men han fortalte os, hans familie havde boet i landsbyen i generationer.

Kenneth Seddon døde også desværre, en kemiker, der gik altid i jakkesæt – i ørkenen, i Everglades naturpark. Han var berømt for at udvikle super-opløsningsmidler.

Kenneth Seddon, med sine kemikalier

Det er interessant at Ken også arbejdede på en antik rulle fra det 9. århundrede, der var kaldet den kinesiske diamantsutra. Rullet var blevet bevaret i British Museum i London. Først i 20. århundrede limede museets personale rullerne på nogle stykker karton – du godeste, sikke et vanvid!!!

Ken arbejdede på at bevare blækket på manuskriptet, men også at opløse limet, der var blevet brugt for at sætte det fast til de stykker karton. Du godeste – sikke en skør verden vi lever i !!!!

Det er desværre for sent til at afskedige ”forskerne”, der var så gavmilde med deres limstifter – ræk mig lige opkastningspose, Alice!!!

18:00 Vi spiser aftensmad og bruger aftenen på at se lidt fjernsyn. De viser et gamle afsnit af ”Top of the Pops” fra april 1985.

Musikken i afsnittet er ikke særlig fantastisk, det må jeg indrømme, 

men det er rart at se 1980’ernes frisurer igen.

Showets bedste tidspunkter kommer, som altid, når vi ser de dansere i studien med deres friske, unge ansigter: disse piger nærmig sig nu 60 år – yikes!

Lois og jeg så ikke dette afsnit, da det først blev sendt af BBC-kanalen, fordi vi boede i USA mellem 1982 og 1985, sammen med vores 2 unge døtre, Alison og Sarah. Men i april 1985 var vi allerede begyndt at tænke på den kommende august måneden, når vi ville være nødt til at flytte tilbage til Storbritannien.

Vi tilbragte nogle dage i byen Philadelphia med vores døtre, og så de vigtigste sevurdigheder, herunder frihedsklokken, og vi kiggede rundt i en slagmark fra den borgelige krig. Derudover tilbragte vi en dag i byen Washington DC. Min søster Kathy og hendes partner, Steve, viste os deres lejlighed, og vi endte alle 6 med at gå op på ejendommens tag. Vi besøgte også CNN-studierne, hvor Steve dengang arbejdede.

Lykkelige dage!

22:00 Vi går i seng – zzzzzzzz!!!!!