Tuesday, September 4 2018

08:00 Lois and I get up and go in the shower early, because Ian, our local window cleaner, is coming at 9am and we do not want to be spied on - yikes! But, in fact, he calls us when we get out of the bath - it's starting to rain and so he is going to postpone until Thursday. The rain also means that I cannot do gardening again today - damn! The weather girl has got it wrong again.

The gardening is becoming more and more urgent day by day - we think that Sylvia, Lois' Australian cousin from Melbourne, and Rod, her new partner, are flying today to England. They have planned to spend approx. 2 months over here visiting Sylvia's many relatives - and they are staying with us between 17 and 24 September.

We think Sylvia and Rod are travelling on a Quantum Emirates plane departing at 5am from Melbourne and arriving at Birmingham around 5pm, with a 2 hour stop in Dubai. Lois and I chose the same airline and route in April 2016 when we flew in the opposite direction.

10:00 Lois has administrative work this morning - her sect's autumn semester of Bible seminars will begin next Tuesday in Brockworth County Library and she has to contact all those who participated in previous semesters to tell them about the start date and the topics to be covered, etc.

12:30 We have lunch and afterwards I go to bed and take a huge afternoon nap. Lois hurries into the kitchen and gets started on cleaning the oven - not a pleasant task, that's for sure.

15:30 I get up and we drive into the village. We swing by the local post office to send two packages to our grandchildren: two children's magazines for our 5 year old twin grandchildren in Perth, Australia, and a few chocolate bars as an extra birthday present for Josie, our grandchild in Haslemere, Surrey, who turns12 on Friday.

Josie and her siblings, Rosalind (10) and Isaac (8) are starting in their new English schools tomorrow. The family recently moved back to England after almost 6 years' residence in Copenhagen. I am quite sure that they are currently feeling quite nervous, even though Alison, their mother and our eldest daughter, has tried to prepare them as much as possible by arranging get-togethers, playdates, etc. with local children of the same age.

Our grandchildren's new English school uniforms -

In most Danish schools there is no requirement to wear uniforms as far as I know.

Ed, Alison's husband and son-in-law has not yet found a new job - he was made redundant 5 months ago by his former company, but he has adopted the policy of waiting for "the right job" rather than taking second best. Lois and I suspect he got a very generous amount of compensation when he was made redundant because the family do not seem to be too hard up for pennies, to say the least! He is in Copenhagen again this week, "networking" with ex-colleagues and others in the same profession - we assume he is continuing to make his face known and sniff out possible job opportunities, but that's something Lois and I are not completely sure about.

16:30 We come home from the post office and listen a little to the radio, an interesting program about Gene Kelly, the famous movie star, known for his talents as dancer, singer, choreographer and film director.

An interesting program - Kelly was a perfectionist, and always worked harder than everyone else involved on set, just like Fred Astaire did. Kelly had a wide range of talents, and invented his own very masculine dance style, which made it respectable for young men to embark on the career without being suspected automatically of effeminacy or homosexuality. He did not object to homosexuality, but he thought "men should dance like men" and "women should dance like women", it seems.

Unlike Fred Astaire, Kelly lacked the least trace of a sense of humour - he had to always ask his colleagues whether something was funny or not. And after "Singing in the Rain", his subsequent career was a bit disappointing, I have to say.

During the program, we hear a few seconds of Kelly's version of "Halfway Down The Stairs" (from AA Milne's poem) a song I've always associated with Kermit from the Muppet Show - I did not have the faintest idea that Kermit was not the original interpreter of the song.

The song always reminds me of my late mother because she loved the original poem. As a quiet and timid child, a little overweight, who grew up in South Wales in a house with 8 lively and bossy siblings, she had the habit of sitting and daydreaming halfway down the stairs, just to get some peace and quiet. Poor mom!!!!

Kermit's emotional version of "Halfway Down The Stairs"

18:00 We have dinner: roast lamb, roast potatoes and homegrown green beans with homegrown plum tart and custard for dessert (made from home-grown plums into the bargain) - yum yum! We spend the rest of the evening listening to the radio watching a little television.

We hear an interesting radio program all about the so-called Spanish Flu, the pandemic which raged worldwide in 1918, with over 50 million dead.

Lois is particularly interested in this program because her grandfather, George Cox, died of the disease. He served in the British Army's Medical Corps and was infected while working at military hospitals in the Oxford area. He contracted the disease on 18 October 1918 and died 6 days later, 18 days before the end of the war.

Lois' grandfather who died of influenza and pneumonia in 1918

Luckily, Lois' mother, Ruth Cox, had been born 2 years earlier, in August 1916, otherwise Lois would not be here today and I would have had to have married someone else - yikes!

The disease, which was not in the least respect Spanish, actually played a massive role in military campaigns during the last few months of the war, but it was mostly unreported due to censorship and fears that news of the pandemic would be bad for morale.

In all, a rather confusing program, with a lot of voxpops and a lot of contradictory theories and explanations. And I suspect the jury is still out on the real story of where the disease originally stemmed from, probably bird flu of some kind, but nobody knows where it first arose.

It is interesting that the disease primarily affected young people in the 20-40 age group. Lois' grandfather was 45 years old, just a little older than the average patient.

Old people generally seemed to be mostly immune, perhaps because of the varieties of influenza they had been exposed to in previous decades of their lives, but nobody is entirely certain about this.

It is thought that the involvement of the world's English-speaking countries in the war was a major factor: first Australians and Canadians, Indians, etc., and later Americans, because this all required the transportation of large numbers of young men forced to live in crowded conditions either inside in massive military camps or aboard military ships.

21:00 We turn off the radio and watch some television. The 6th part of a new documentary series is on, all about the Vikings.

An interesting program in some ways, but like all the previous episodes, this documentary film is a classic example of an hour long program with approx. 15 minutes of information. Also the title of the series - "The Viking Dead", which sounds so creepy and exciting - is not really appropriate as far as this episode is concerned, because it is all about the Vikings' many treaure hoards, of jewelery, silver coins, etc. that have been dug up all over Britain and Scandinavia.

When the Vikings first attacked churches and monasteries on the east coast of England, they concentrated on grabbing as many items of jewelry as possible - often jewelry torn off the covers of beautiful copies of the gospels and that kind of thing.

It is interesting that the majority of these jewelry items ended up in the tombs of women in the Vikings' Scandinavian homelands. It is thought that the Vikings snatched the jewelery primarily to impress the girls and women they wanted to seduce or generally hook up with - good grief! What a crazy world we live in !!!!

In later centuries, the silver and gold etc. came as the result of trade rather than piracy and the like. Much of this silver, including silver coins, was buried in thousands of hoards throughout Scandinavia: in particular on the Swedish island of Gotland in the Baltic, but also in many other areas.

Archaeologists have for a long time been somewhat puzzled and confused about why so many silver coins ended up buried in hoards and caches, and why the hoards were rarely, if ever, robbed. Now researchers believe that it was part of the old Nordic religion that everything that got buried in the earth during a person's lifetime became instantly available to them in the future after their death.

I sympathize with these people who decided to bury a portion of their cash so that they could buy great things after death. It's a bit like planning a summer holiday and putting money aside so you have enough to be able to afford to eat at the best restaurants and buy a lot of great souvenirs, etc.

Instead of the "hole in the wall" it was a "hole in the earth" - but broadly the same sort of thing, I guess

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

Danish translation

08:00 Lois og jeg står op og går tidligt i bad, fordi Ian, vores lokale vinduespudser, kommer kl 9, og vi har ikke lyst til at blive udspioneret – yikes!  Men faktisk ringer han til os, da vi kommer ud af badet – det er begyndt at regne, og derfor vil han udskyde til torsdag. Regnen betyder også, at jeg igen i dag ikke kan lave havearbejde – pokkers! Vejrpigen har taget fejl igen.

Havearbejdet bliver dag ud dag ind mere og mere presserende – vi tror, at Sylvia, Lois’ australske kusine i Melbourne, og Rod, hendes nye partner, flyver i dag til England. De har planlagt at bruge ca. 2 måneder herovre på at besøge Sylvias mange slægtninge – de bor hos os mellem 17. og 24. september.

Vi tror, at Sylvia og Rod rejser med et Quantas-Emirates fly, der afgår kl 5 fra Melbourne og ankommer til Birmingham ved 17-tiden, med en 2 timers stop i Dubai. Lois og jeg valgte de samme flyselskab og rute i april 2016, da vi fløj i den modsatte retning.

10:00 Lois har administrativt arbejde for – sin sekts efterårssemester af bibelseminarer begynder næste tirsdag i byen Brockworths bibliotek, og hun skal kontakte alle dem, der deltog i foregående semestrer, for at fortælle dem om startdatoen og emnerne, der skal dækkes osv.

12:30 Vi spiser frokost og bagefter går jeg i seng og tager en gigantisk eftermiddagslur. Lois skynder sig i mellemtiden ind i køkkenet og går i gang med at gøre ovnen rent – ikke en behagelig opgave uden tvivl.

15:30 Jeg står op og vi kører ind i landsbyen. Vi smutter ind i det lokale postkontor for at afsende to pakker til vores børnebørn: to børnemagasiner til vores 5-årige tvillingebørnebørn i Perth, Australien, og et par chokoladebarer som ekstra fødselsdagsgave til Josie, vores barnebarn i Haslemere, Surrey, der fylder 12 på fredag.

Josie og hendes søskende, Rosalind (10) og Isaac (8) starter i morgen i deres nye engelske skoler. Familien flyttede for nylig tilbage til England efter næsten 6 års ophold i København. Jeg er helt sikker på, at de for tiden føler sig lidt nervøse, selvom Alison, deres mor og vores ældste datter, har forsøgt at forberede dem så meget som muligt, ved at arrangere sammenkomster, playdates osv med lokale børn i samme alder.

vores børnebørns nye engelske skoleuniformer –

i de fleste danske skoler er der ikke nogle uniformer, så vidt jeg ved.

Ed, Alisons mand og vores svigersøn, har ikke fået et nyt job endnu – han blev afskediget for 5 måneder siden af sit tidligere selskab, men han har adopteret planen om at vente på det ”rigtige job”, snarere end, at indtage noget næstbedst. Lois og jeg mistænker, han fik et meget generøst erstatningsbeløb, da han blev afskediget, fordi familien ikke synes at være i bekneb for skillinger, for at sige mildt! Han er i København igen denne uge, i gang med at ”netværke” med eks-kollegaer og andre i samme profession – vi formoder, han fortsætter med at gøre sit ansigt kendt og snuse efter mulige jobmuligheder, men det er Lois og jeg ikke helt sikre på.

16:30 Vi kommer hjem fra postkontoret og lytter lidt til radio, et interessant program der handler om Gene Kelly, den berømte filmstjerne, kendt for sine talenter som danser, sanger, koreograf og filminstruktør.

Et interessant program – Kelly var perfektionist, og arbejdede altid mere, end alle andre involveret i filmoptagelsen, ligesom Fred Astaire. Kelly havde en bred vifte talenter og han opfandt  sin egen meget maskulin dansstil, hvilket gjorde det respektabelt for unge mænd at indtage karrieren uden af blive mistænkt automatisk for kvindagtighed eller homoseksualitet. Han havde ikke noget imod homoseksualitet, men han mente, at ”mænd bør danse som mænd” og ”kvinder bør danse som kvinder”, ser det ud til.

Ulig Fred Astaire, manglede Kelly det mindste spor af en humoristisk sans – han måtte altid spørge sine kollegaer, om noget var morsomt eller ej. Efter ”Singing in the Rain”, hans efterfølgende karriere var lidt skuffende, det må jeg nok sige.

Under programmet hører vi et par sekunder Kellys version af ”Halfway Down The Stairs” (fra AA Milnes digtet) en sang jeg bare har associeret med Kermit fra Muppet Show – jeg havde ikke den fjerneste idé at Kermit ikke var den oprindelige fortolker af sangen.

Sangen minder mig altid om min afdøde mor, fordi hun elskede det oprindelige digt. Som et stille og forskræmt barn, lidt overvægtigt, der voksede op i Syd-Wales i et hus med 8 livlige og dominerende søskende, havde hun for vane at sidde og dagdrømme midt på trappen for at få lidt fred og ro. Stakkels mor!!!!

Kermits følelsesmæsige version af ”Halfway Down The Stairs”

18:00 Vi spiser aftensmad: stegte lam, stegte kartofer og hjemmedyrkede grønne bønner med hjemmelavet blommetærte og custard til dessert (oven i købet med hjemmedyrkede blommer) – yum yum!  Vi bruger resten af aftenen på at lytte til radio og se lidt fjernsyn.

Vi hører et interessant radioprogram, der handler om den såkaldte Spanske Syge, den pandemi, der rasede i 1918 verden over, med over 50 millioner døde.

Lois interesser sig i særdeleshed for dette program, fordi hendes morfar, George Cox, døde af sygdommen. Han tjente i den britiske hærs medicinskorps og blev smittet, mens han arbejdede på militære hospitaler i Oxford-området. Han pådrog sig sygdommen den 18. oktober 1918 og døde 6 dage senere, 18 dage før krigens slutning.

Lois’ morfar, der døde af influenza og lungebetændelse i 1918

Det var heldigt, at Lois’ mor Ruth Cox, blev født 2 år tidligere, i august 1916, ellers ville Lois ikke være her i dag, og jeg ville have måttet at have giftet mig med nogen anden – yikes!

Sygdommen, der slet ikke var spansk, spillede faktisk en massiv rolle i militære felttog i krigens sidste få måneder, men det blev for det meste urapporteret på grund af censurering og frygter for, at nyhederne af pandemien ville være dårlige for moral.

I det hele taget et ganske forvirrende program, med en masse voxpops  og en masse modsigende teorier og forklaringer. Og jeg mistænker, juryen er stadig ude om det rigtige historie om, hvor sygdommen oprindeligt stammede fra, sandsynligvis fugleinfluenza af en eller anden art, men ingen ved, hvor det hele oprindeligt opstod.

Det er interessant, at sygdommen primært smittede de unge – mennesker i 20-40 aldersgruppe. Lois’ morfar var 45 år gammel, så lidt ældre end den gennemsnitlige patient.

Gamle mennesker syntes generelt at være for det meste immune, måske på grund af varieteter af influenza, de havde været udsatte for i foregående årtier, men det er ingen helt sikker på.

Man tror, at involveringen af verdens engelsktalende lande i krigen var en stor faktor: første australier og kanadier, indere osv og senere amerikanere,  fordi det hele krævede transporten af store mængder af unge mænd, der blev tvunget til at bo i overfyldte vilkårer enten inde i massive militære lejrer eller om bord på militære skibe.

21:00 Vi slukker for radioen og ser lidt fjernsyn.  De viser den 6. del af en ny dokumentarfilmserie, der handler om vikingerne.

Et interessant progam på nogle måder, men ligesom alle de forrige afsnit, er denne dokumentarfilm imidlertid et klassisk eksempel på en time lang program med ca. 15 minutters information. Også seriens titel – ”The Viking Dead”, som lyder så uhyggelig og spændende – er ikke rigtigt passende, hvad angår dette afsnit, der handler om vikingernes mange depotfund, bestående af smykke, sølvmønter osv, der er blevet udgravet, hele Storbritannien og Skandinavien over.

Da vikingerne først angreb kirker og klostre på Englands østlige kyst, koncentrerede de sig mest om at snuppe så mange smykker som muligt – ofte smykker revede fra omslag af smukke eksempler af evangelier og den slags.

Det er interessant, at flertallet af disse smykker endte ud i gravene af kvinder i vikingers skandinaviske hjemlande.  Man tror, at vikingerne snuppede smykkerne primært for at imponere piger og kvinder, de havde lyst til at forføre eller generelt  finde sammen med – du godeste! Sikke en skør verden vi lever i !!!!

I senere århundrede ankom sølv, guld osv som resultatet af handel snarere end af sørøveri og dens slags. Men meget af dette sølv, herunder sølvmunter blev begravet i tusindvis af depotfund hele Skandinavien over, men i sær på den svenske ø Gotland i Østersøen men også i mange andre områder.

Arkæologer har i årevis været lidt betuttede over, hvorfor så mange sølvmønter endte ud i depotfunder, og hvorfor depotfunderne blev sjældent eller aldrig plyndret. Nu tror forskere, at det var en del af den gamle nordiske religion, at alt, man begravede i jorden under sit liv blev umiddlebart til rådighed i fremtiden efter sin død

Jeg sympatiserer men disse folk, der besluttede at begrave en andel af deres kontanter, så de kunne købe flotte ting efter deres død. Det er lidt som om, man planlægger en sommerferie og lægge penge til side, så man har nok til at spise på de bedste restauranter, og købe en masse flotte souvenirs osv.

22:00 Vi går i seng – zzzzzzz!!!!