Yes, Friends, say what you like about our friends and neighbours over there across the North Sea in Scandinavia, but some days they just seem to dominate our headlines, don't they - the scamps!!!!
Take this morning's Onion News for example, if you want "chapter and verse" (!!!!!)
me and my wife Lois - a recent picture
Certainly, any of our neighbours who have the misfortune to ring our doorbell this morning, if they glance through our window, will see us on the couch "getting busy" with our Danish homework, in preparation for this afternoon's meeting - not a pretty sight at the best of times!!!!!
BBC Radio 4 is calling this their 'Norman Day' and is certainly 'pushing the boat out' [no pun intended!!!] in programmes about the Normans' invasion from across the Channel, and the subsequent impact they made on all aspects of our lives here, to put it mildly!!!!
(left) Lois and me looking over our Danish homework this morning, and (right)
us conducting a typical online meeting of our "Intermediate Danish for Old Codgers" group
Needless to say, Lois and I have been personally (and solely!!!) responsible for raising the profile of the Danish language in Liphook, where it was at a pretty low level when we first moved to the town in January 2025. Our own interest in the language started during the seven years when our daughter Alison and family were based in Copenhagen 2012-2018, and Lois and I visited them several times, would you believe!!!!
flashback to 2013: Lois and me, dressing up at the Viking Museum, Trelleborg,
during one of our early visits to Denmark to see our daughter Alison and family
Excitement is certainly brewing in the Danish murder mystery our little group is reading - "Judaskysset" (The Judas Kiss) by Danish crime-writer Anna Grue. The book is all about a young Danish "romance-scammer", Jay, who particularly targets 60-something menopausal women lottery winners, getting into their beds and then into their bank-accounts (!), a theme which resonates with our little group's mainly older, female members, so that's all good!!!!!
(left) Danish crime-writer Anna Grue, with (right) her murder-mystery
"Judaskysset" (The Judas Kiss) which our little group is reading
Young romance-scammer Jay, when he's in bed making love to these older women, has an unfortunate tendency of then falling asleep and taking the bedclothes with him, leaving the women to rely on their menopausal 'hot flushes' to keep themselves warm, which is a pity!
So far, there's been little in the way of hard evidence to convict Jay, but now maverick Danish ex-cop Dan Sommerdahl is on the case. And Dan has persuaded his own big sister Bente to pose as a menopausal lottery-winner to try and trick Jay, and lure him into a trap. But will Jay recognise Dan, who's got a high public profile in the Danish press as a maverick ex-cop repeatedly "running rings" around the "real police"?
I wonder.....!!!!!
(left) Jay with one of his victims, a 60-something menopausal lottery-winner,
and (right) maverick ex-cop Dan, who's using his big sister Bente to lure Jay
into a trap - but will Jay 'smell a rat' and recognise Dan from his pictures in the papers?
So will Jay recognise Dan, who's Denmark's leading "maverick ex-cop", or will Jay fall for Dan's "sting", and go to bed with Dan's big sister Bente, as Dan hopes?
We'll just have to wait and see! So watch this space!!!!
[I don't think I'll bother! - Ed]
20:00 Tired out as always, after one of our "Danish" days, Lois and I get ready for an early bed with one of the many radio programmes on BBC Radio 4 today celebrating France lending us back the 1000-year-old, 230ft long Bayeux Tapestry, which depicts William the Conqueror's victory over the Anglo-Saxons at the Battle of Hastings in 1066, which is nice!
flashback to yesterday: King Charles and Queen Camilla viewing
the 1000-year-old Bayeux Tapestry in the British Museum,
with new UK premier Andy Burnham and French President
Emmanuel Macron and their wives
BBC Radio 4's "Norman Day"
And listening to all these programmes on "catch-up" over the next few days will certainly keep Lois and me out of mischief, no question about that!!!!
Tonight, however, we content ourselves with the special edition of "The Food Programme", in which food historian Dr Annie Gray travels to Normandy to investigate the impact of the Normans on our British food and drink, both then and now.
Poor Anglo-Saxon waiter!!!!!
Lois and I didn't know that one of the first things William the Conqueror and his army did, after landing in England, was to find something to eat, and their first meal is depicted graphically in the Bayeux Tapestry, so was obviously seen as a 'must do' on their arrival, which makes sense!
They don't seem to have brought any food with them, very much a "rookie error" - and a possible result of "crossed wires" in the planning department, perhaps? And the tapestry shows them immediately charging through the Sussex countryside "seizing" food, and generally pillaging, perhaps a bit angry over their planning 'snafu' and taking their embarrassment out on the locals, perhaps (?), which seems a pity!
the Normans on arrival in England, realising that they had
forgotten to bring any food, and taking their embarrassment
out on the locals by pillaging, ransacking etc - what madness!!!!
We also see how the Normans prepared their first meal "on the hoof", and also how they ate it: a cooking pot over a simple fire, skewers with birds on, some using their shields as makeshift 'plates', even managing to find something to drink along the way etc etc. What madness (again) !!!!
And later, after the invasion has been officially launched, there's a "Last Supper"-inspired dinner presided over by the terrifying Norman bishop, Bishop Odo, with proper bowls, cutlery etc and with soup and fish on the menu, and an Anglo-Saxon 'server' to take orders and bring in the food, looking a bit 'servile', probably hoping for a tip or other gratuity, although the Normans were famously tight-fisted, so good luck with that one, fella haha!!!
the invading Normans at their first proper feast in England,
presided over by the terrifying Bishop Odo, and with a poor
Anglo-Saxon waiter struggling to bring in the food - although
whether the famously tight-fisted Normans gave him a tip seems unlikely
And we hear that, in the longer term, the Normans totally revolutionised food in England, popularising pork, bacon and chicken, also cheese and cider, plus venison and also rabbit, with altogether spicier food aided by mustard and black pepper etc - what madness, wasn't it !!!
New monasteries became a key element in the preparation and marketing much of the country's food, which would certainly have kept all those monks and nuns out of mischief, to put it mildly! And our whole landscape was transformed by the Normans, with deer parks set up for the venison, and vast networks of rabbit warrens, plus dovecots for keeping pigeons, all controlled by the Norman noblemen and their staff.
What a crazy world they lived in, back in those far-off times!!!!
Will this do?
[Oh just go to bed! - Ed]
22:00 We go to bed - zzzzzzz!!!!!
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