Thursday, March 14 2019

This afternoon Lois and I will be holding our U3A Danish group's regular meeting here, so we spend the morning clearing up and vacuuming all over the house. I move an extra chair out of the dining room into the living room. Then we sit together and read through the next 6 pages of "The Further You Fall", the first crime novel in Danish author Anna Grue’s "Dan Sommerdahl" series – this is the novel that is our group's current project.

"The Further You Fall", a crime novel by Anna Grue

Anna Grue

A horrible murder has been committed late in the evening in the kitchen of a large advertising agency in the small Danish provincial town of Christianssund. The murder weapon is a garrotte, which is a little unusual to put it mildly. The victim is one of the advertising agency's cleaning operatives, and she knows her killer well, it seems. The motive is completely unclear. My goodness, scary!

We are currently on the second chapter, where we get acquainted with Dan Sommerdahl, the novel's hero, who according to the blurb on the back is the man who finally solves the murder and identifies the killer. He works as a creative director in the advertising agency, but he is currently on sick leave due to a recent mental breakdown - he is very depressed and he is currently spending a lot of his days at home under the duvet, which doesn't sound particularly promising, to put it mildly.

Dan is married to Marianne, a local doctor, and the couple have 2 grown up children, who are not living at home any more.

In the past, Dan used to practise "systematic adultery", both under, and on top of, his Ad Agency desk, with some of the agency's cool young women who "flowed through the industry like a gentle stream" [I translate the Danish here word for word, but I’m not totally sure I understand that phrase].

Now, however, it seems that his previously crazy sex life has settled down, or at least we hope it has.

Christianssund is just a quiet Danish provincial backwater.  But unfortunately, it’s becoming more and more frequent nowadays for the shadow of adultery to hit the staidest of small towns. I read a shocking archive news item the other day on my go-to news site, Onion News.

Mr and Mrs Saunders

Nestled in the southeast corner of New York State, Manhattan is an old-fashioned kind of community, the kind of place where people still live close in close proximity to one other and go to the corner store to pick up the daily newspaper.

So when the people in this close-knit town on the Hudson River found out that two of their own, Abe and Myra Saunders, were divorcing after 23 years of marriage, disbelief was the prevailing response.

"I was stunned when I heard that someone in our town was getting divorced," said David Cutler, 37, who said he didn't know Mr and Mrs. Saunders, but lives just six blocks from their apartment on 77th Street. "This just isn’t the kind of thing that normally goes on here."

"My first reaction was total denial - I simply didn't think it was possible," said Andrea Zimmer, 34, a lifelong resident of the town’s sleepy little Upper West Side neighbourhood. "Maybe things like this are considered commonplace in other towns, but not here in Manhattan."

Even more shocking from the point of view of local residents was the circumstances surrounding the couple's break-up. For the past 18 months, Abe, 48, a tax lawyer at the local savings bank Chase Manhattan, has been having an affair with Lisette Solomon, a 26-year-old co-worker.

Abe's wife, Myra Saunders, 47, a buyer for Bloomingdales, a local clothing store, did not find out about her husband's adultery until January 21, when he confessed the affair and asked for a divorce, so he could move in with his mistress.

"Abe's scandalous affair with a younger woman is the talk of the town," said Elliott Sharperson, a writer for the local paper, the New York Times. "From the post office to the library to the butcher’s shop, pretty much anywhere you go around here, that's all we're talking about."

"Can you imagine? A tax lawyer secretly sleeping with a woman 22 years his junior?" said Manhattan resident Edna Rudolph. "I don't know how Abe can ever expect to walk down the street in this town again without feeling that everyone is staring at him. The shame he must feel.”

Good grief, how shocking. Let us hope that we never hear about such stories coming from our own small town, I have to say! But more than 20 years have passed since the Saunders story broke in the world's press, and I have not heard any similar news from the couple's town, so things may have returned to normal in that charming little beauty spot, or I hope so at least!

12:00 We have lunch and afterwards I go to bed and take a short afternoon nap. I get up at 1:45 pm and start preparing for our group meeting.

14:30 Group members ring the doorbell, and we study Danish for an hour and a half. Patti is the newest member of our group: her parents were Danes who fled to the UK at the beginning of World War II, but they only spoke English to her when she was growing up. She has a lot of Danish relatives, but she knows a lot less Danish than the rest of us.

She has enrolled in an online Danish course at the Copenhagen Language Centre, and has now had 2 online lessons, so I expect that she will soon be moving from the bottom to the top of the class. She shows me how to enrol: I am considering joining one of the centre's courses - and it is encouraging to have someone in the group keen on speaking the language rather than just reading it, and it makes me want to do it same, as long as I feel I have the time for it – oh dear!

Copenhagen Language Centre

16:00 The meeting ends without being followed by the usual chit-chat session.  Members feel they have to leave before the horse racing fans come out of the racecourse at the end of today's programme and the traffic jams begin in earnest - yikes!

18:00 Lois and I are both very tired, as always after a "Danish" day, when we spent the morning cleaning up the house, and the afternoon leading our Danish group's regular meeting.

We have dinner and spend the rest of the evening watching some television, but we have difficulty concentrating and drift off to sleep occasionally. We are growing old, no doubt about that. I pinch Lois's arm when her eyes start to close, and vice versa, like the two old crows we are.

The 13th episode of the current (and final) season of the Big Bang Theory sitcom is on.

A fun episode where the legalistic Sheldon gets angry with his friends Howard and Bernadette because they built a patio outside their house without applying for the council’s permission.

Sheldon starts complaining  about this  "animal" behaviour to his wife Amy afterwards, while they’re out driving in their car.

It shows how tired we are that we do not immediately get Sheldon's "yellow line" reference. In the UK (and Ireland?)  we have a white double line in the middle of the road to ban drivers from crossing it, whereas a double yellow line along the side of the road indicates that parking is prohibited around the clock. It's the opposite in the US.

I discuss the question with Lois, but we have both forgotten what the colours are in Europe and Australia. My goodness, we are completely washed up this evening, that’s for sure.

22:00 We collapse into bed - zzzzzzzzzzz !!!!!

Danish translation

I eftermiddag skal Lois og jeg holde vores U3A danske gruppes regelmæssige møde, så bruger vi formiddagen på at rydde op og støvsuge overalt i huset. Jeg rykker en ekstra stole ud af spisestuen ind i dagligstuen. Vi sidder og læser igennem de næste 6 sider af ”Dybt at falde”, den første krimiroman i den danske forfatter Anna Grues ”Dan Sommerdahl”-serie, den roman, der er  gruppens nuværende projekt.

”Dybt at falde”, en krimiroman af Anna Grue

Anna Grue

Et forfærdelig mord er blevet begået sent på aftenen i køkkenet af et stort reklamebureau i den danske provinsby Christianssund. Mordvåbnet er en garrotte, hvilket er lidt usædvanligt for at sige mildt. Ofret er en af reklamebureauets rengøringsassistenter, én,  der kender morderen godt. Motivet er helt uklart. Du godeste, uhyggeligt!

Vi læser for tiden romanens 2. kapitel, hvor vi stifter bekendtskab med Dan Sommerdahl, romanens helt, der efter bagsiden er den, der til sidst løse mordet og identificerer morderen. Han arbejder som kreativdirektør i et reklamebureau, men han er sygemeldt på grund af et nyligt sammenbrud – han er meget deprimeret og tilbringe mange af sine dage hjemme under dynen, hvilket ikke lyder særligt lovende for at sige mildt!

Dan er giftet med Marianne, en lokal læge, og parret har 2 voksne barn, der ikke bor hjemme mere. I fortiden dyrkede Dan ”systematisk utroskab”, under og ovenpå sit skrivebord, med nogle af bureauets cool unge kvinder, der ”i en lind strøm flød gennem branchen”.  Nu imidlertid virker det som om hans forrige vilde sexliv er faldet til ro, eller det håber jeg i hvert fald!!

Desværre bliver det mere og mere hyppigt, at skygge af utroskab kan ramme de mest stilfærdige af småbyer. Jeg læste en chokerende nyhed forleden på mit go-to nyhedswebsted, Onion News.

Manhattan, der ligger i det sydøstlige hjørne af New York State, er berømt for at være et gammeldags slags samfund, det slags sted, hvor folk stadig bor tæt på hinanden og går til hjørnebutikken for at hente avisen.

Så da folkene i denne tætte havneby på floden Hudson fandt ud af, at to af deres egne, Abe og Myra Saunders, skiltes efter 23 års ægteskab, var vantro det fremherskende svar.

"Jeg var bedøvet, da jeg hørte, at nogen i vores by blev skilt," sagde David Cutler, 37, der sagde, at han ikke kender hr og fr. Saunders, men lever kun seks blokke fra deres lejlighed på 77th Street. "Dette er bare ikke den slags ting der normalt foregår her."

"Min første reaktion var total fornægtelse - jeg syntes simpelthen ikke, det var muligt," sagde Andrea Zimmer, 34, en livslang beboer i byens søvnige lille Upper West Side-kvarter. "Måske tingene som dette betragtes som almindelige i andre byer, men ikke her på Manhattan."

Endnu mere chokerende fra synspunktet af lokale beboere var omstændighederne omkring parrets brud. I det sidste halvandet år har Abe, 48, en skatteadvokat hos den lokale opsparingskredit Chase Manhattan Bank, haft en affære med Lisette Solomon, en 26-årig kolleger.

Myra, 47, en køber til Bloomingdale, en lokal tøjbutik, fandt ikke ud af hendes mands utroskab til 21. januar, da han tilstod og bad om skilsmisse for at flytte ind hos sin elskerinde.

"Abe's skandaløse affære med en yngre kvinde er byens tale," sagde Elliott Sharperson, en forfatter til lokavisen, New York Times. "Fra posthuset til biblioteket til slagterbutikken, stort set hvor som helst du går rundt her, det er alt, hvad vi taler om."

"Kan du forestille dig? En skat advokat sover hemmeligt med en kvinde 22 år yngre end ham?" sagde Manhattan indbyggeren Edna Rudolph. "Jeg ved ikke, hvordan Abe nogensinde kan forvente at gå ned ad gaden i denne by igen uden at føle, at alles stirrer på ham. Hvor må han skamme sig."

Du godeste, hvor chokerende. Låd os håbe på, at vi aldrig hører sådanne historier stammende fra vores egen by, det må jeg nok sige! Men der er gået mere end 20 år, siden Saunders-historie brød i verdens presse, og jeg har ikke hørt nogle lignende nyheder fra parrets landsby, så kan det være, at tingene er vendt tilbage til det normale i det der charmerende lille smørhul, eller det håber jeg i hvert fald!

12:00 Vi spiser frokost og bagefter går jeg i seng for at tage en kort eftermiddagslur. Jeg står op og begynder at forberede mig på vores gruppemøde.

14:30 Medlemmerne ringer på døren, og vi studerer dansk i en og en halv time. Patti er vores nyeste gruppemedlem: hendes forældre var danskere, der flygtede til Storbritannien i begyndelsen af den 2. verdenskrig, men de talte kun engelsk med hende, da hun voksede op. Hun har en masse danske slægtninge, men hun kan mindre dansk, end resten af os.

Hun har indskrivet sig på en online danskkursus hos Københavns Sprogcenter, og har nu haft 2 onlline timer, så forventer jeg, at hun snart vil flytte fra bunden til toppen af klassen. Hun fortæller mig, hvordan man kan indskrive sig: jeg overvejer at deltage i et af centrets kurser – det er opfordrende at have nogen i gruppen der er frisk på at tale sproget i stedet for bare at læse det, og det overtaler mig at gøre det samme, hvis jeg føler jeg har tid til det.

Københavns Sprogcenter

16:00 Mødet slutter, og medlemmer skal af sted, før hestevæddeløb-entusiasterne  kommer ud af væddeløbsbanen i slutningen af dagens program, og trafikpropperne begynder for alvor – yikes!

18:00 Lois og jeg er begge meget trætte, som altid efter en ”dansk” dag, hvor vi brugte formiddagen på at rydde op i huset, og eftermiddagen på at styre vores danske gruppes regelmæssige møde.

Vi spiser aftensmad og bruger resten af aftenen på at se lidt fjernsyn, men vi har svært ved at koncentrere os og glider over i søvnen af og til.  Vi bliver gamle, ingen tvivl om det. Jeg kniber Lois’ arm, når hendes øjne begynder at lukke sig, og omvendt.

De viser det 13. afsnit i den nuværende (og sidste) sæson af sitcommen Big Bang Theory.

Et morsomt afsnit, hvor Sheldon bliver vred på sine venner  Howard og Bernadette over, at de byggede en terrasse udenfor deres hus uden at ansøge om kommunens tilladelse. Sheldon brokker sig over deres ”dyriske” opførsel til sin kone Amy, mens de bagefter kører et eller andet sted i deres bil.

Det viser hvor trætte vi er, at vi ikke umiddelbart forstår Sheldons ”gule linje”- reference. I England har vi en hvid dobbbelt linje midt i vejen for at forbyde bilister at krydse den, mens en dobbelt gul linje på vejens kant tyder på, at det døgnet rundt er forbudt at parkere. Det er det modsatte i USA – jeg diskuterer spørgsmålet lidt med Lois, men vi har begge to glemt, hvad farvene er i Europa og Australien. Du godeste, vi er helt slået op, det ved vi med sikkerhed!!!

22:00 Vi kollapser i sengen – zzzzzzzzzzz!!!!!