The First Snow

Fir trees, on the whole, aren’t good for much.  They are thick, dark green and, unless you are a small beetle or a survivalist, are boring, boring, boring. Until the first snow falls. They then get transformed into a clump of magic and from every single one you expect to find a singing dwarf or growling troll.  Fortunately, life is full of disappointment.  On one of my walks there is a stand of firs, surrounded by birch trees.  It’s normally on the boring bit of the walk, but when the sun was glistening on the lattice of the birch branches and the white edged firs were sparkling against the pale blue sky yesterday, it was so beautiful that one had to sit down and appreciate it.  Obviously, that would be stand for a few minutes, cos sitting in the snow is not really to be recommended, being somewhat cold and wet.

The first snow cheers everyone up.  It’s what people have been waiting for, the reason for the winter tyres and the other equipment and, of course, the opportunity to have more outdoor fun.  By this the Swedes mean winter sports, which, in my experience mean sitting in the snow a lot.  We all know that the first snow will melt before long, but the beauty and hope is still there.  They will also say that everything is so gray until the snow comes, but this is only in their heads.  It is certainly more sparkly, in the sun, but in the clouds, the landscape has just shades of white going through to black.  Although, looking out of the window now, the chestnut brown of the wet pine trunks glows against the pearl grey sky, so I guess everything depends on how you look at it.

The kitten certainly enjoys the snow and is out-doors more now in minus temperatures than when it was 3 degrees and rainy. I think I’ll have to train her to get the wood and stuff as it requires to my horror, a different type of dressing.  Trouser legs have to be tucked in and it will will have to be fur-lined wellies at the back door from now on. The snow goes over the top of the clogs – ghastly. I also have to dive out of the front door before Graham goes to the car.  This isn’t some sort of marriage survival technique, but the snow has to be swept off the steps before it’s trodden in and becomes bobbly ice (technical term).

Well, it’s minus one, 4 cm of snow on the ground and some more in the air. Do I go for a walk or do I put another log on the fire, dig out the cocoa and put the Wii Sport on?  Excuse me, whilst I hitch the cat to the wood sled and decide what to do next.

The Charity Auction

On Saturday was the Handcraft (Handverk) Auction held by the Ryd Sewing Mafia (official title and yes, I belong, so be careful).  I was highly privileged, according to my grandmother, in being allowed to make two pies (paj) for this.  Ha, you may say, what’s the problem? Pies are different here, so I did an apple (no Bramleys!) and a black currant crumble. I have done Board papers, been on the end of official inspections, been a government advisor (bizarro) and I have never been so nerve-wracked.  I’m still awaiting the verdict, but people are still speaking to me, so it may be OK...

The Auction itself was great fun.  They are really, really old-fashioned now and this is one of the few still going. Yeah, we be in th’coun’ry.  It would be a shame if they did die out though.  The UK equivalent would be the Church Bazaar in that women run them, raise money for charity and have lots of handmade stuff.  There was a proper auctioneer, who told funny stories and was an ex-policemen, so I did wonder what was going on there then (groan...) and, of course, fika.  Fika is the totally and utterly amazing Swedish word for snack.  It tends to mean a roll and cake.   When I say cake, I mean multi-layered fruit, cream, jam and sponge confections that also can include meringue and crème de patisserie.  The joy...

Back to the Auction.  The stuff that was auctioned was handmade and I managed to secure a hand woven table runner.  I missed out on the bags that were made out of coffee bags.  Yes, the bags that are used to package ground coffee were sewn together to make a really cool shopping bag.  I am now saving coffee bags and have asked my grandmother to do the same, though she thinks I’m mad and may not take any notice of me.  There were also things like ‘choose and cut your own Christmas tree’ and homemade crisp breads as well as the usual knitted tomte (Google it!), jams, socks, embroidered table clothes, etc. The thing that really took me by surprise is that there was so much ‘lotto’, much more than the auction itself, in fact.  There was the normal raffle stuff (American lotto – why, no idea!), but they also sold, say, bread or hand-dipped candles with a number on the packet and you could win a prize.  I thought that was an excellent idea, you get something for your money, even if you do not win.

It is a shame that less people are doing handcrafts even though here, too, there is a bit of a revival.  I suppose that we cannot fit everything in any more.  Why only yesterday, I spent all my time playing Zelda and barely had time to eat properly let along knock up a cross-stitch rug.  I think that is why it’s fashionable to knit etc, because it means that you have time and it is that that is the luxury today.

Things we like about Swedish media

Once upon a time, a long time ago, lived a little girl who went on holiday to a country far to the north.  Sometimes it was very rainy and she couldn’t play in the forests and fields, so she asked her daddy if she could watch the television set in the corner of the room.  She saw that Bonanza was on one day, but Daddy said that she couldn’t watch it as it was on too late.  “Why is it on at 11pm?” she asked her Mummy. “that’s because it has manly fisticuffs in most episodes, if not gun fire, and such violence is not for children. You may take your grandfather’s shot gun and shoot all the villagers in an orgy of sickening terribleness”.  “Oh” said the little girl, “but I will be far more damaged by watching bearded and socked accordion players wink at me!” “then watch the home-spun slapstick comedy on the other channel” came the reply. The little girl sighed to herself, watched the news for the 4^th time that day and read some more Enid Blyton.

Nowadays how things have improved!

1)      Only 4 free channels – the restriction in choice is quite, quite restful and given that the other channels, apart from sport, merely run the same type of programmes, I don’t really feel deprived. Graham does, but he shouldn’t watch sport.

2)      The clothes of the presenters – The main news readers have become besuited clones of either doily bird seriousness or agéd gravitas, but the others are much more fun, especially the weather people.  My current favourite is one of the local news- readers, who is blonde, bearded and has the most comprehensive collection of loud, checked shirts that I have ever been privileged to see. No wonder the Vikings conquered Istanbul.

3)      There is 15 minutes of culture news every single day on the main channel, just before the local news and the main news, and a weekly book programme, which isn’t at 11.30pm, and a general cultural show. 

4)      The media assumes the audience has a brain each rather than one between the lot of them.  Example: Questions in quiz on trashy music radio programme, sort of like Capital, ‘who was the previous Finance Minister’ and a question on the rotation of the earth that involved serious maths.  There is an hour’s politics show at lunch-time on the equivalent of Radio 1 and a proper science programme on the telly for an hour each week at peak time.

5)      They don’t take themselves too seriously (apart from the critics of course).  There are coughs and splutters, wrong camera angles and delightfully timed “hummms”. My favourite quiz programme is DooBiDoo, which has a totally fab presenter who presides over singing anarchy quite, quite marvellously and makes the whole thing such a joy. 

6)      SG-1 is at lunchtime.

7)      They don’t censor lyrics.  I have learned such a lot about the hip-hop culture that I only knew in theory before.  The mad thing is that the sub titles can be a bit mealy mouthed in a rather random fashion.

8)       They import programmes from all over the world and sub-title them,  rather than dub, so on one day on one channel, there will be a David Attenborough documentary, an  Italian film, a Finnish short drama, an American comedy and some sort of Japanese programme (as yet to be determined as I don’t think the sub-titler knows either).

9)      The Swedish produced programmes have improved beyond all measure.  There are no longer wall-to- wall accordion players, though the comedy does tend to slap-stick.  All in all not bad at all.

10)   Everyone over the age of 35 complains that there is nothing on the telly.  Plus ça change!

Brush with Blighty

Brush with Blighty

Apparently, there are a number of rules that make a successful blog.  One of these is that there should be an new article  4 times a week minimum.  Whoops....

This time I do have an excuse.  The wilds of Cardiff do not have the internet.  Is that a puzzled look I see on your face? Do I hear cries of “but I thought you were in Sweden!” ?   It is all explained by the family emergency that saw my mother hot-footing it to one of my sisters in Amsterdam and me scrabbling to get to Cardiff to Dad-sit before she left. 

As I arrived at Heathrow, I wondered whether my heart would lift at the return to the UK and I would get too homesick to go back to Sweden.  Sorry chaps, but the place is dire.  Dreary, drab and dingy, the country looks as if it needs a good scrub. The people in the shops are gloomy and glum and the whole thing has lost politeness and manners.

I decided that I had gone completely native when the traffic in Cardiff seemed totally manic.  Previously it had been remarkable for its sparseness and general non-manicity when compared to London. Then I arrived at the flat and my father.  Argghhhhhh.

It is a dilemma writing some of this without appearing to dishonour my father, which I don’t really want to do.  However, it may, in some small way, help those who have difficult parents who get Alzheimer’s, so I will do my best. Theologically, I do not believe in Purgatory, however, I think that there may be a case for its presence on this plain of existence when the sheer tedium of the endless repetition of anxiety that is my father is experienced.  The holding pattern of questions (where’s mum, where’s she gone, why) took an average of 8 minutes to circle, apart from the night, when it was every 2 hours.  When there was some concentration required, like sleep, the questions would be even more anxious. The constant insistence on telephoning was difficult to head off without being bossy and prescriptive.  That was every 32 minutes, in case you think it would be ok to just let him phone. 

None of this was a problem to me really, though not being able to read or start anything much was slightly annoying,  because it is to be expected and there would be an end for me (poor, poor mother!).   The most difficult thing for me to deal with started at 2pm on Sunday – “but what about me? Why isn’t she looking after me?”  There was no comprehension that the world was not about him.  I do tend to find narcissistic egotism difficult to cope with at the best of times and when I was particularly weary, the only thing to do was to leave the room.  I had a headache for 5 days.

It really did make me ponder whether I managed my life to make everything about rather than care for others and about my insights into my behaviours.  I just hope that it isn’t too late.

 Ooooh, it was nice to come back.

Perils of the Countryside - Part I

In the absence of any nearby dairy animal, it was time to take a bolt to the village and replenish the milk.  The drive wends its way across one cattle grid into a field where it joins the ‘old road’, over another cattle grid and then up the slope to the top field  and the gate, with the road grade on one side and a sandy bank full of ancient pine trees on the left.  Then it’s only to get out of the car, open the gate get back in and the main road is ready.

On approaching the second cattle grid, it dawned on me that the fetching white and chestnut mottled pattern was not a new form of mushroom, but all 20 steers laying across the road and generally munching in a rather annoying relaxed manner.  I looked at them;  they looked at me.   I revved the engine; they looked at me.  I wound down the window and shouted “Oy!”  They looked at me reproachfully and lumbered to their feet, sighing.  Sighing! I moved the car forward 1metre.  They moved off as if they had a bad case of arthritis aggravated by a hangover for about 3 metres and then they all stopped, turned and looked at me reproachfully.  Did they move to the side before the slopes start?  No, of course not, but continued stopping, sighing and looking for the remaining 50metres to the road, where there was a long, lugubrious moo to send me on my way.  It was worse than trying to get to an exhibit at the Science Museum through the children and their mothers/nannies/weekend fathers.

An Agricultural experience

Relationships being particularly important in the country, I thought that I’d go and cheer on my grandmother’s cousin’s son’s second wife (may have forgotten a twist in the lineage there so don’t quote me) and her step son at the large show in our nearest big town.   They breed Herefords and had a steer entered in one of the classes.  Having never been to an agricultural show before, I dressed with particular care.  The show was in a big town and in the international exhibition centre, so involved no outdoors experience, what would you wear?  The horsey lot had make-up and lippy, (which is sort of weird – sorry horsey lot in my audience), there was a maximum of 3 skirts allowed at a time in the halls (yes, this was obviously a rule), although one was a pink neckband, so didn’t really count and only logoed baseball caps were worn if at all.  I had black clumpy boots, purple wool Monsoon skirt, skirted wool coat and a black beret with eyes and Diva lippy.  The poor chaps on the tractor stands were diving for cover.

Everything one could possibly have on a farm was there.   I morphed into a forest owning entrepreneur and got all sorts of free gifts, whilst having no idea what I was talking about or what was being said to me.  All sorts of words that I had no idea existed!  My vocabulary would have been impressively improved if I could have remembered the words long enough to look them up.  Still, I didn’t sign anything, so that’s OK.  I didn’t need to buy lunch either as there were lots of food stalls in one of the halls, selling stuff that was made on farms, so grazed on apples, sausage and cheese and then fell madly in love with a JCB mini tractor thing, which is the technical term. 

I think that I’m right in saying that in the UK it can be difficult to tell if someone has money.  I have used this to my advantage in Bond Street many a time.  That’s so not the case here.  The moneyed look really, really different from the hoi polloi (checked shirt and tee) and the trailer trash (checked shirt and Croydon facelift).  Their hairstyles are of a certain type, the skin glow is different and they all wear blazers and moccasins.   Given that social equality is like a religion here, I find it interesting that the visual difference between the classes is so marked, whilst in a class riddled society like the UK, it’s more difficult to tell the difference.  

Anyway after that particular musing in the coffee shop, I got back to the show ring in time to see the King’s entries, which were two Simmental bulls.  They were MASSIVE.  I’ve never seen anything like it.  They each weighed 1.5 tonnes and had balls the size of footballs.  They would not have been able to mount anything without squashing it flat, if indeed, they could have raised their front legs that high. Pure sperm factories.

GB’s steer was 3^rd in the class.  Marvellous day.

The Saga Begins

It was with bright heart and strong loins girt that we packed the trailer and the van at the end of the month of summer, otherwise known as August, on Tues of the day.  This being the month of summer it was, of course, pelting it down.  Song was on our hearts as my warrior (that's Graham, chaps) and I, his lady, (me!!!) faced the M25 bravely and strong arms.  It was strength absolutely everywhere, which served us well when one of the trailer tires burst a bare mile from the turn off to Harwich. We leapt from our steed, girt with reflective yellow stuff and took off the wheel.  Well, Graham did, I just made encouraging noises from the side, which he couldn't hear, cos it isn't half noisy!
Anyway, it was then that Loki (look it up, it is a saga - durrhh) caused the mayhem for which he is justly famed.  The spare tire was in metric, the old trailer was imperial. Alas, and alack, a signal to the AA was sent and the chariot appeared in only 15min. 
I have to say they were very impressive.  Apparently the M25 is the most dangerous place in the UK, with a broken down car being hit within 60 minutes of stopping.  I didn't really like to ask if that the median or mean time and whether it clustered at night or bad weather, so my "gosh, I'm so impressed" noises were enough.
Missed the ferry, but no problems in rebooking for the Thursday.  One of the theories of the cause of the bursting tire was that it was too heavy, so I put at least 20 of my books in the bins at Thurrock Services.  I spent the next 2 days in therapy, whilst repacking the van.

At least the rest of the trip was completely uneventful.  Although it could be argued that a completely flat North Sea was an event in itself.  Denmark had temperatures of 29 degrees and was beautiful as was the bridge between Denmark and Sweden. 

We arrive at our new life 10pm on the Friday with heavy hearts and fewer books than expected.