Danskcolin: Friday November 8 2019

09:00 I sit down at the dining table and browse through approx. 250 lines of Geoffrey Chaucer's Middle English poem, "The House of Fame," written in the 14th century. Lynda’s U3A Middle English group is holding its regular monthly meeting today at 2:30 pm in the bar of the town’s Everyman Theatre, and this poem is the group’s current project.

Chaucer's poem, "The House of Fame," is a little strange, to put it mildly. The poet dreams of a giant eagle's claws lifting him high into the sky, to a place called the "House of Fame" where a goddess lives, with her feet on the ground and her head high in the clouds.

My goodness, what a crazy world they used to live in in those days, no doubt about that !!!!!!

But I can see that the eagle feels sorry for the poet, because, he says, Geoffrey is always writing about love and sex, but isn’t personally getting any, either the one or the other.

Geoffrey spends his day working on his accounts, and afterwards, instead of going into town and having fun, he goes straight home and sits down with some book or other, with a dazed look in his eyes - in short, he is living like a hermit.

My god, poor Geoffrey !!!!!

But today is Geoffrey's lucky day, because the eagle wants to show him another place, where people actually have fun and the parties never end - hurrah!

I can relate to Geoffrey's problem to a certain extent: I spend a lot of time reading and using the computer until I have sore eyes and I start to feel dizzy in the head - and I sometimes wonder if I ought to go to more parties, but on the other hand, it probably wouldn't suit me particularly well on second thoughts. But I'm still not sure either way - the jury is still out on that one.

12:00 Lois and I have lunch and afterwards I go to bed and take a short afternoon nap. I get up at 1:30 pm and stand at the bus stop waiting to take the bus into town.

Meanwhile, Lois goes around the corner to the local library to help library staff organize and lead their weekly "Baby Bounce & Rhyme" session for local babies, young children and their mothers (and grandparents).

a typical "Baby Bounce & Rhyme" session

at our local library

14:00 Meanwhile, I wait for the bus to arrive. As I sit and wait, I snatch a quick photo of our friends Stephen and Frances's house, a few doors away from us. They have been forced to get a new roof - it has become impossible to continue repairing the old one (now 90 years old), says Stephen.

Stephen and Frances's house, as it looks this afternoon

Poor them !!!! Lois and I have a similar house, but we were lucky in that the people we bought the house from in 1986 had already had a new roof installed, which was a bit of a relief to put it mildly.

The bus arrives. I get off in front of the M&S department store and walk around the corner to the Everyman Theatre. I walk up the stairs to the bar, have a drink, and wait for the other group members to arrive.

14:30 The meeting starts and we take turns reading out approx. 40 lines of Chaucer's poem in a hopefully authentic Middle English accent, and afterwards translate them into modern English - we laugh a lot and I sometimes wonder what the other customers in the bar think of us, but I’m going to let that one slide: I'd rather not go there ha ha!

Here in Cheltenham recently, the town’s largest workplace, GCHQ, celebrated its 100th anniversary, but this afternoon during Lynda's group meeting we realize that a similar intelligence service actually already existed in the Middle Ages: it was housed in a palace and run by a goddess – good grief, what madness !!!!

And we can see that the goddess must have had some kind of decipher-capability because even enciphered conversations (using primitive vocoders maybe?) were no problem from her point of view – yikes!

And we speculate a little in the group whether the goddess is actually perhaps still at work out there, analysing all the world's conversations and things like that, or maybe she has retired by now. After all, almost 750 years have passed since Geoffrey wrote his poem!

My god, what a crazy world we live in !!!!

16:15 The group meeting ends and I take the bus home again – and Lois and I relax with a cup of tea on the couch. We are both completely exhausted and have nothing left for anything extra at all. It's been a very busy week, no doubt about that.

18:00 We have dinner and spend the rest of the evening watching a bit of television, the latest episode of "Gogglebox", a fun programme where the participants comment on some of the week's TV programmes from their couches and armchairs.

In tonight’s episode, the programme's participants respond with their typical cynicism to the announcement of a new House of Commons Speaker, Sir Lindsay Hoyle.

I think the Goggleboxers are right – it does look as if Sir Lindsay is watching his tv in a care home - it's a bit like the room my father had, although somewhat larger. And my father often used to go around in socks, and no shoes.

I remember Lois’s cousin Iris took a room in a local care-home when she was only in her 50’s, just because they happened to have a vacancy and she didn’t want to miss out on it. And Sir Lindsay, although still an MP is obviously much older than Iris was, and he would probably fit in much more readily with the other residents than Iris ever did!!

22:00 We go to bed. I read about 30 pages of my bedtime book before drifting off to sleep - zzzzzzz !!!!

Danish translation: fredag den 8. november 2019

09:00 Jeg sætter mig ved spisebordet og blader igennem ca. 250 linjer af Geoffrey Chaucers middelengelske digt, ”Berømmelsens hus”, skrevet i det 14. århundrede. Lyndas U3A middelengelske gruppe holder sit regelmæssige månedlige møde i dag kl 14:30 på baren af byens Everyman-teater, og dette digt er gruppens nuværende projekt.

Chaucers digt, ” Berømmelsens hus”, er lidt mærkeligt, for at sige mildt. Digteren drømmer om, at en kæmpe ørns kløer løfter ham højt op i himlen, til et sted kaldet ”House of Fame”, hvor en gudinde bor, med hendes fødder på jorden og hendes hoved højt oppe i skyerne.

Du godeste, sikke en skør verden de dengang levede i, ingen tvivl om det!!!!!!

Jeg kan se, at ørnen har ondt af Geoffrey, fordi digteren altid er i gang med at skrive om kærlighed og sex, men personligt får han sig selv ikke noget, enten den ene eller den anden.

Geoffrey bruger dagen på at arbejde på sine regnskaber, og bagefter, i stedet for at gå i byen og hygge sig, går han lige hjem, sætter han sig med én eller anden bog, med et fortumlet blik i øjnene – kort sagt lever han ligesom en eremit.

Du godeste, stakkels Geoffrey !!!!!

Men i dag er Geoffreys heldig dag, fordi ørnen har lyst til at vise ham et andet sted, hvor folk hygger sig og festerne slutter aldrig – hurra!

Jeg kan selv relatere i en vis grad til Geoffreys problem: jeg bruger en masse tid på at læse og bruge computeren, indtil jeg har ondt i øjenene og bliver helt ør i hovedet – og jeg undre mig nogle gange, om jeg bør gå til flere fester, men på den anden side ville det sandsynligvis ikke passe mig særlig godt, ved nærmere eftertanke. Men det er jeg ikke helt sikker på – juryen er stadig ude om det.

12:00 Lois og jeg spiser frokost og bagefter går jeg i seng for at tage en kort eftermiddagslur. Jeg står op kl 13:30 og stiller mig ved busstoppestedet for at tage bussen ind i byen. I mellemtiden går Lois rundt om hjørnet til det lokale bibliotek for at hjælpe bibliotekets personale med at at organisere og lede deres ugentlige ”Baby Bounce & Rhyme”-session for lokale babyer, små børn og deres mødre (og bedsteforældre).

et typisk ”Baby Bounce & Rhyme”-session

på vores lokale bibliotek

14:00 I mellemtiden venter jeg på bussen. Mens jeg sidder og venter, snupper jeg et hurtigt foto af vores venner Stephen og Frances’ hus, nogle døre væk fra os. De er blevet tvunget til at få et nyt tag bygget – det er blevet umuligt at fortsætte med at få repareret det gamle (nu 90 årige), siger Stephen.

Stephen og Frances’ hus

Stakkels dem!!!! Lois og jeg har et lignende hus, men vi var heldige i, at de mennesker, som vi i 1986 købte huset af, allerede havde få et nyt tag installeret, hvilket var lidt af en lettelse for at sige mildt.

Bussen ankommer. Jeg står af foran M&S-stormagasinet og går rundt om hjørnet til Everyman-teatret. Jeg går op ad trappen til baren, får noget at drikke, og venter på, at Lyndas andre gruppemedlemmer ankommer.

14:30 Mødet starter og vi skiftes til at læse op ca. 40 linjer af Chaucers digt i en forhåbentlig autentisk middelengelsk accent, og bagefter oversætte dem til moderne engelsk – vi ler meget, og jeg undrer mig nogle gange, hvad barens andre gæster tænker på os, men det springer jeg over: det ville jeg hellere ikke tænke på ha ha!

Her i Cheltenham for nylig fejrede byens største arbejdsplads, GCHQ, sit 100-års jubilæum, men i eftermiddag indser vi i løbet af Lyndas gruppemøde, at denne efterretningstjeneste faktisk allerede eksisterede i middelalderen: det havde til huse i et slot og drevet af en gudinde – du godeste, sikke et vanvid!!!!

Og vi kan se, at gudinden må have haft en eller anden slags kryptografisk kapabilitet, fordi samtaler omsatte til kode (ved hjælp af primitive vocoders måske?), ikke var noget problem fra hendes synspunkt!

Og vi spekulerer lidt på i gruppen, om gudinden stadig er på arbejde, analyserende alle verdens samtaler og den slags, eller om måske er hun gået på pension. Når alt kommer til alt er næsten 750 år gået, siden Geoffrey skrev sit digt!

Du godeste, sikke en skør verden vi lever i !!!!

16:15 Gruppemødet slutter, og jeg tager bussen hjem igen – Lois og jeg slapper af med en kop te i sofaen. Vi er begge to helt udkørte og har ikke overskud til noget som helst. Det har været en meget travlt uge, ingen tvivl om det.

18:00 Vi spiser aftensmad og bruger resten af aftenen på at se lidt fjernsyn, det seneste afsnit af ”Gogglebox”, et morsomt program, hvor deltagernes kommenterer nogle af ugens tv-programmer fra deres sofaer og lænestole.

I dette afsnit reagerer programmets deltagere med deres typiske kynisme til meddelelsen af en ny formand i Underhuset, Sir Lindsay Hoyle.