09:00 Lois and I sit on the sofa and go over the pages of our Danish crime novel, because our U3A Danish group is holding its fortnightly meeting this afternoon.
When we've finished, Lois reads me bits out of her copy of "The Week" magazine, which gives a digest of last week's events from the UK and around the world. I tell her that Donald Trump isn't travelling for Thanksgiving - we speculate whether he's being uncharacteristically cautious over coronavirus or whether he's afraid they'll change the locks while he's away - but we're not sure. The jury's still out on that one.
the "keys" to the White HouseLois tells me about an interesting letter to the British newspaper The Financial Times (FT) from an American woman, pointing out some subtle biases in US media reporting of the recent election, and how these biases can infect UK press coverage as a direct result.
Another letter highlighted in "The Week" raises an interesting point about third-party candidates in the election: it's a letter from John Edwards in Sheffield, UK to the New Stateman weekly magazine. John points out that Joe Biden may have owed his success to Jo Jorgensen, the Libertarian Party candidate. Had Jorgensen not been running, and her votes been cast instead for Donald Trump, then Trump would have won, because in almost all the key swing states, the total of her votes were more than Biden's margin of victory. But would all these votes necessarily have gone to Trump? Lois and I are not sure, but we think we should be told. So the jury's still out on that one (again).
11:45 It's a drizzly morning, but we go for a walk anyway on the local football field - today is one of my "walk days", according to the schedule laid down by Connor, my physiotherapist.
we go for a walk in the late morning drizzle over the local football field
14:30 After lunch and a nap we settle down in front of the laptop for our U3A Danish group's fortnightly meeting on Skype.
Our meeting - I'm generally the first to arrive, which says something about me and my day: oh dear!
The meeting is a quite exhausting 90 minutes, because we have to strain our ears quite hard to hear what some of the group members are saying, mostly because of some discordant background noises that we haven't been able to eliminate - oh dear! Anyway somehow we manage, and we still have lots of fun: we're all enjoying the Danish crime story that's the group's current project. And it's great fun to discuss who we think the murderer is, and that kind of thing.
16:00 The meeting ends and Lois and I collapse in a heap. We're going to have a simple ready meal tonight, followed by profiteroles: we feel absolutely "knackered", no doubt about that.
18:00 We have dinner. I tell Lois I've heard that the reason top Republicans don't disown Donald Trump is not strictly that they're afraid of him, more that they're afraid of alienating his support base. They need that base to get themselves and their allies elected or re-elected, both in Congress and in state legislatures. Without Trump, that support base crumbles.
And Trump has begun to see himself as an alternative power in the land, a sort of anti-President, over the next 4 years, acting as a rallying point for his support base, and keeping them fired up, while frustrating as many as possible of the things Biden wants to do. Yikes!
It brings back Roisin Conaty's chilling words from the satirical quiz show "Have I Got News From You" edition of November 6th: "I think the thing is, none of us have got that nice feeling that even if Biden wins, Trump is going. It feels like if you are getting out of a really bad relationship, and everyone is like 'You're going to be free', I'm not though, am I? He's not going anywhere. He's going to be around. He's going to show up at your work...." Yikes (again) !!!!!
20:00 Lois disappears into the dining-room to take part in her sect's weekly Bible Class. I settle down on the sofa and watch the eighth and final part of the new Danish crime series, "DNA".
At the start of this final episode, police have now smashed the international kidnapping and trafficking ring that has been using Polish nuns to get hold of babies born to teenage mums in Poland and to sell the babies for adoption.
But Rolf, the Danish detective who's worked on the case, was himself a victim, when his toddler got kidnapped on a ferry 5 years ago. So we need Rolf to find his daughter, to give the series a happy ending.
To do this he has to beat some information out of a bent fellow detective in Copenhagen. He then travels to France, where he spies on the young woman who is bringing up his child, stalks her through the streets, and finally approaches her and the child outside the local school. Bad Rolf !!!!
Rolf trails the woman and child through the French streets
Rolf then approaches the woman and child at the local school
Rolf has come with a plan to somehow get hold of the child's DNA to prove that it's his. But when he sees how happy the child is, and finds out also that the young woman firmly believes it is her own child, then he hasn't got the heart to take the matter further.
Rolf is then arrested by French police for the manslaughter of the bent Danish detective who he forced the information out of. The man had died as the result of the fight between him and Rolf in Copenhagen.
Poor Rolf! He hasn't got his daughter back. His former partner, who he had the baby with, has taken up with a younger man, a glamorous Swedish pilot (or something similar). And now he's under arrest for manslaughter.
No happy ending here, then haha!!!!
Poor Rolf (again) !!!!!
21:30 Lois emerges from her Bible Class and we watch a bit more of comedian Paul Merton's new series all about his comedy heroes.
There's a discussion about how women comedians working in night-clubs have to outrival all the misogynist hecklers by being more rude, aggressive or outrageous than the hecklers, because this is the only thing that tends to shut them up. Oh dear!
But it's nice to see the late Marti Caine again after all these years. I saw her act live in a Sheffield night-club 50 years ago, when I was a student.
22:00 We go to bed - zzzzzzz!!!!!
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