Saturday 9 June 2018

08:00 Lois and I get up and eat breakfast. I have decided to switch to porridge as my new routine, instead of my usual bowl of branflakes because of the added sugar and salt yikes! Life is hard sometimes, no doubt about that! Soon we will not be allowed to eat anything, I have no doubts there !!!! We will all starve to death - mark my words !!!!!

10:00 We go out into the garden to do a little weeding among the long grasses and ferns, both in the front yard and in the backyard around the fruit trees. Lois also gets started with planting out a bunch of seedlings.

12:30 We have lunch and afterwards I go to bed and have a gigantic afternoon nap while Lois does more gardening in the flower beds in the front yard. I get up at 3pm, and jump on my exercise bike. I cycle my usual 6 miles.

18:00 We have dinner and sit ourselves down in the living room. We see a special program showing highlights of Queen Elizabeth's birthday parade that took place this morning in London.

We both like this parade. We are very pleased that we have various traditional ceremonies like this - its origins are more than 200 years old, and it’s a bit of a comfort in unsettled times. There are some who think it's now outdated and should be scrapped, but we look forward every year to seeing the wonderful sight of the red lines of soldiers, hearing the amazing music and getting a glimpse of the royal family, this year with the added attraction of seeing Meghan take part for the first time.

We have clearly grown a little soft in our old age, no doubt about that! But my late mother would have been proud of us.

Lois and I settle down in the living room

to see the Queen's birthday parade

It's nice to see the whole family on the palace balcony,

including Meghan and her amazing off the shoulder dress

21:00 Lois steps out into the dining room to call Iris, her cousin. I carry on watching television, an interesting documentary about Melbourne's own Germaine Greer, the famous author of "The Female Eunuch": not good bedtime reading, I have to say. It is impossible to characterize her as a feminist or anything similar - she refuses to be characterized or to admit to being a part of any movement.

She is obviously a nightmare to interview - the interviewer's attitude is wrong, the question is wrong. No matter what the interviewer's opinion is, she takes the opposite one.

She is an old lady now and we see her pottering around in her house in the countryside, in the county of Essex, and here and there around her little farm, inspecting her trees, her shrubs, and her flock of geese. The house has now become too big and she is preparing to downsize, like a lot of old people Lois and I know - yikes, it comes to all of us sooner or later! Germaine is trying to downsize her book collection, just like us ha ha. She started donating them to Oxfam until Oxfam became involved in scandals.

I do not think she has ever been in a steady relationship for long and it's easy to see why. But I was surprised to hear that she embarked on a serious relationship when she was 60 - it did not last long: no surprise there. But it must have been promising for a while - she admitted tonight that at the time she went in for HRT treatment, "so that the vagina could be penetrated". Good grief, too much information, Germaine !!!

Her massive contribution was, as an individual writer and individualist, to tell individual female readers of her ground-breaking book, that they did not have to be what men wanted them to be. They could be exactly what they themselves wanted to be.

22:00 Lois' phone call to Iris ends. She pops into the kitchen and sees a mouse scuttling round - yikes! But it disappears quickly. We invite Minx, Alison's cat, to step into the kitchen, but we suspect that Minx's mouse-catcher days are sadly over. She is now 18 years old. But we decide to let her wander around in the kitchen tonight, as well as in the utility room, which is her normal domain at night.

We go to bed – zzzzzzz!!!!!

Danish translation

08:00 Lois og jeg står op og spiser morgenmad. Jeg har besluttet at skifte til grød, som min nye rutine, i stedet for min sædvanlige skål klidflager på grund af klidflagernes tilsat sukker og salt – yikes! Livet er svært nogle gange, uden tvivl om det! Snart vil vi ikke blive tilladt at spise noget som helst, det har jeg ikke nogen tvivl om !!!! Vi vil alle sulte til døden – bemærk mine ord!!!!!

10:00 Vi går ud i haven for at luge lidt blandt de lange græsser og bregnerne, både i forhaven og i baghaven omkring frugttræerne. Lois går i gang også med at udplante en række potteplanter.

12:30 Vi spiser frokost og bagefter går jeg i seng for at tage et gigantisk eftermiddagslur, mens Lois laver mere havearbejde i blomsterbedene i forhaven. Jeg står op kl 15, og hopper op på min kondicykel. Jeg cykler mine sædvanlige 6 miles.

18:00 Vi spiser aftensmad og sætter os i stuen. Vi ser et specielt program, der viser højdepunkter af dronning Elizabeths fødselsdagsparade, der fandt sted i morges i London.

Vi kan begge to godt lide denne parade. Vi er meget glade for, at vi har forskellige traditionelle ceremonier som den her – dens oprindelser er mere, end 200 år gamle, og den er lidt af en trøst i disse usikre tider. Der er nogle, der mener, den nu er uddateret og skal skrottes, men vi glæder os hvert år til at se det vidunderlige syn af de røde linjer soldater, høre den fantastiske musik, og få et glimt af det kongelige familie, dette år med den tilsatte attraktion af at se Meghan deltage for første gang.

Vi er tydeligt vokset lidt bløde i vores alderdom, ingen tvivl om det! Men min afdøde mor ville have været stolte af os!

Lois og jeg sætter os til rette i stuen

for at se dronningens fødselsdagsparade

det er rart at se hele familien på palædsets balkon,

inklusive Meghan og sin fantastiske off shoulder kjole

21:00 Lois træder ud i spisestuen for at ringe til Iris, sin kusine. Jeg fortsætter med at se lidt fjernsyn, en interessant dokumentarfilm, der handler om australske, Melbourne fødte, Germaine Greer, den berømte forfatter af ”Den kvindelige eunuch”:  ikke en godnatlæsning, ingen tvivl om det. Det er umuligt at karakterisere hende som feminist eller noget lignende – hun afviser at blive karakteriseret eller at indrømme at deltage i nogen bevægelse.

Hun er åbenbart et mareridt at interviewe – interviewerens attitude er aldtid forkert, spørgsmålet er forkert. Lige meget hvad interviewerens opfattelse er, indtager hun den modsatte.

Nu er hun en gammel dame, og vi ser hende pusle i sit hus ude på landet  i grevskabet Essex, og her og der i sin lille gård, efterseende sine trær, buske, og sin flok gæs. Huset er nu blevet for stor, og hun forbereder sig på at downsize, ligesom en masse gamle mennesker Lois og jeg kender – yikes, det kommer til os alle før eller senere! Germaine er i gang med at forsøge at downsize sin bogsamling, ligesom os ha ha. Hun begyndte at give dem til Oxfam, indtil Oxfam blev involveret i skandaler.

Jeg tror ikke, hun nogensinde har været i et fast forhold i lang tid, og det er nemt at se hvorfor. Men jeg var overrasket over at høre, at hun begyndte på et alvorligt parforhold, da hun var 60 – det varede ikke ret længe: ingen overraskelse der. Men det må har været lovende for en stund - hun indrømmede i aften, at hun på det tidspunkt tog HRT behandling, ”så vagina kunne penetreres”. Du godeste, for meget information, Germaine!!!

Hendes massive bidrag var, som individuel forfatter og individualist,  at fortælle individuelle kvindelige læsere af sin banebrydende bog, at de ikke måtte være, hvad mænd ville have dem til at være. De kunne være præcis, hvad de selv ville være. 

22:00 Lois’ opkald til Iris slutter. Hun smutter ind i køkkenet og ser en mus pile rundt – yikes! Men den forsvinder hurtigt. Vi inviterer Minx, Alisons kat, til at træde ind i køkkenet, men vi mistænker, Minx’ musfangende dage er desværre forbi. Hun er nu 18 år gamle. Men vi beslutter at lade hende vandre rundt i køkkenet i nat, udover bryggerset, der er sin normale domæne om natten.

Vi går i seng – zzzzzzz!!!!!