fredag den 30. september 2022

Z - A :: Zip through Autumn ~ 2

Second installment of Zip through Autumn is: Xenodochy in blogging, Why blog

Xenodochy ... ? I think I have a fairly large English vocabulary, but this was a new one. Xeno- means something with strangers, but the rest ... ? The dictionary tells me: "reception of strangers; hospitality" Aha, yes this is what blogging is all about. Greeting strangers, inviting them inside your life, making them feel at home and even visiting them. This is one of the reasons my blog is bilingual. Most strangers are not good at Danish 🙂

And as to why I blog, that's an easy one. I love writing, sharing my ideas, teach something, share tips and stories, and a blog is excellently suited to this.

-- α --

Andet afsnit i Z - A-udfordringen hedder Xenodochi og blogs - hvorfor blogge?
     Xenodochi, øhh, jeg kan græsk nok til at se xeno- altså noget med fremmede, men hvad? Jeg slog op og fandt ud af at det betød gæstfrihed, det at tage imod fremmede.
     Jamen, gæstfrihed er jo det, der er formålet med en blog. Tage imod fremmede, byde dem indenfor, forsøge at få dem til at føle sig hjemme - det er blandt andet derfor min blog er tosproget, der er jo ikke så mange fremmede der er gode til dansk 🙂

Hvorfor jeg blogger? Det er meget enkelt, jeg elsker at skrive, fortælle, lære fra mig ...  og her har jeg fundet nogen, der gider høre på mig.

-- β --

The most stranger-friendly language sure must be pictograms. And IKEA of Sweden is famous, maybe even of Herostratic fame (to stay with the old Greeks) for the pictograms in their assembly instruction leaflets.

This is a long detour for me to share the photo of an idea that came to me upon seeing an IKEA tea bag among a gift of tea bag wrappers for folding.

-- ɣ --

Det mest fremmed-venlige sprog må være piktogrammer. IKEA er kendt  - ja måske endda herostratisk berømt (for nu at blive hos de gamle grækere) - for deres instruktionsfoldere og deres piktogrammer.
     OK, det var lidt af en omvej for at dele et billede jeg tog, da jeg fandt en IKEAthepose i nogle theposer, jeg fik foræret til min theposefoldning.

-- δ --

What is inside an IKEA tea bag?  -- ε --  Hvad er der inden i en IKEAthepose?
 
Here's a link and the list of dates and prompts. So if you care to join, get on board.

Sept 21- 27 ~  Zero excuses, Yearn to
Sept 28- Oct 4 ~ Xenodochy in blogging, Why blog
Oct 5- Oct 11 ~  Variety, Unique to my blog
Oct 12- Oct 18 ~ Ten-year plan, SMART goals
Oct 19- Oct 25 ~ Recommend, Questions for visitors
Oct 26- Nov 1 ~ Priorities, Open
Nov 2- Nov 7 ~ Never blog this, Motivating
Nov 9- Nov 15 ~ Lesson, Know where I've been
Nov 16- Nov 22 ~ Joy and Job in blogging, Ideas
Nov 23- Nov 29 ~ Happy Habits, Goal of your blog for remaining 2022
Nov 30- Dec 6 ~ Fortitude, Easy tips
Dec 7- Dec  13~ Dare, Chance
Dec 14- Dec 20 ~ Balance, Achievements in 2022

torsdag den 29. september 2022

Words for Wednesday :: Aunt Jemima's Garden 6

his meme was started by Delores a long time ago.  Troubles led her to bow out, but the meme was too much fun to let go, and now Words for Wednesday is provided by a number of people and has become a movable feast with Elephant's Child as our coordinator.

  Essentially the aim of this meme is to encourage us to write.  Each week we are given some prompts. These prompts can be words, phrases, music or images.
  What we do with those prompts is up to us:  a short story, prose, a song, a poem, or treating them with ignore...
  We can use some or all of the prompts, and mixing and matching is encouraged.

  Some of us put our creation in comments on the post, and others post on their own blog. This fun meme includes cheering on the other participants.
  And the more the merrier goes here as well, so if you are posting on your own blog then please tell us in the comments, so that all other participants, can come along and applaud.

The words appear on Elephant's  Child's blog every Wednesday in September. The words come to us from the head of David M. Gascoigne.

I'm a day late, sorry, and continuing the story of Aunt Jemima's Garden.
This Wednesday's words are:


Afternoon
Furrowed
Enchanted
Knowing
Organized
Singing

      And/or
Clutched
Beyond
Metaphysical
Symbiosis
Vital
Father


It was a beautiful afternoon, the house was situated at the road, with fields stretching from the unkempt hedges into the far distance, the furrowed fields emitted a nice, pungent earthy smell, which both girls enjoyed.

Finally in small careful increments, Susan set the stone to her eye and looked into Aunt Jemima's enchanted garden. Not knowing what she would see, she was totally awestruck. The garden was crammed with fairies. They sat in the flowers, hey hung from clotheslines, windowsills, roofs and just everywhere. It was overwhelming. Susan stood still, the fairies seemed to be organized after size and colour, and they were singing.
She listened, no, not singing, maybe crying. She clutched the stone while holding it to her eye. No mean feat, and listened. The faeries sung, or cried, Susan was still not sure, about the big world beyond the enchanted hedges, beyond the wall.
Susan took the stone from her eye, still she could hear the crying song from all the fairies. "Heidi," she said, "something is wrong here, totally wrong. The garden is crammed with fairies, they could not hide even of they tried." She put the stone back with a swift, hard movement, and even thought the fairies cowered, they could not all hide. She handed the stone to Heidi, who in her turn looked trough it.
"I have never seen anything like it," she said. "What do we do?"
"My first thought was simply letting them out, breaking the magic circle that binds them or something," Susan said. "But I'm in doubt. There are so many. Do they as that book has it live in some ... what was it now ... Yes metaphysical symbiosis with wizards, and would they perish without this vital something from magic?"
"I don't know," Heidi said. "My father would. He always liked fairies and studied old books to know more. He would be totally crazy to be here."
"Can we summon him somehow?" Susan asked.
"Nope, but ... I have an idea. A magic letter! That would sure make him come, he can teleport, he knows the garden."
"Brilliant!" Susan said and dug up her notebook and pencils from the basket. "Here, you write!"

onsdag den 28. september 2022

Flax - an Itty-bitty Update

     Den 27. - altså efter 6 dage i tønden - hev jeg bundterne op af vandet igen. Det lugtede slemt! Og jeg synes, de bare knækkede for et godt ord, og jeg frugter, de har fåert for meget, og dermed er totalt ubrugelige. Dagen inden, den 26. havde de været helt uændrede.
     Først hang de på vores tørresnor for at blive skyllet igennem af regnen. I dag hældte jeg dem over med frisk vand og hængte dem op i tørvejr.
-- 💠 --

September 27, after 6 days in the barrel, I took up the flax PHEW! what a stench. And the straws were brittle, I hope they are not over-retted, but fear that this is indeed so. The day before I tested the straws, and they were unchanged. For a day they hung on our clothesline being washed by the rain, today I poured fresh water over them and hung them on a wall beneath the eaves to dry.

Jeg forsøgte at rense et enkelt strå, der kom dette her ud af det, så nu får vi se.

-- 💠 --

I tried cleaning a single straw. This is the result, so I hope it ends well.
Skal det mon se sådan ud? -- Is this right?

Og noget smukt at kigge på mens jeg bekymrer mig.
And something pretty to look at while worrying.


tirsdag den 27. september 2022

Z - A :: Zip through Autumn~ 1

These last weeks months I have been blogging way less than I would have liked to. I have an idea in my head, but when I return home, too many things stand in line clamouring for my attention. When I finally get to sit down at the computer, I usually find that all my nice ideas have turned to broken words lying in heaps around me, not to be salvaged, much like the notes in this old drawing. 

It was like this yesterday. It was Poetry Monday, topic: Field trip. I was at a meeting and going there and back, I had three things on my mind: The meeting (hello, Capt'n Obvious), an upcoming exhibition in the crafters' guild I'm a part of, and a poem for Poetry Monday about me as a homeschooling mother and a terrible field trip to the woods with my children where everything just goes awry. Sons falling into a lake, getting bitten by ants, hit one another with sticks, gathering poisonous mushrooms, getting caught in the brambles, ... and the ending; the very best thing about a field trip is the hot cocoa on your return. But it never got written.

Now the people behind the A-Z Challenge offers a Challenge in reverse: Z-A during Autumn. A light version of the A-Z Challenge. Let me cite them:
No Masterlist, no forms to fill out, and no special place for links. You might want to share links to your posts using the #AtoZchallenge hashtag, or in the comments of these posts. That's up to you.
Do as much or as little as you like during this reverse alphabet challenge.
Here are some SUGGESTED prompts.
We propose doing two posts a week for this event.
And agonizing here, I already - almost - wrote the first blog post. Almost, because I can't stop offering excuses.

Here's a link and the aforementioned list. So if you care to join, get on board.

Sept 21- 27 ~  Zero excuses, Yearn to
Sept 28- Oct 4 ~ Xenodochy in blogging, Why blog
Oct 5- Oct 11 ~  Variety, Unique to my blog
Oct 12- Oct 18 ~ Ten-year plan, SMART goals
Oct 19- Oct 25 ~ Recommend, Questions for visitors
Oct 26- Nov 1 ~ Priorities, Open
Nov 2- Nov 7 ~ Never blog this, Motivating
Nov 9- Nov 15 ~ Lesson, Know where I've been
Nov 16- Nov 22 ~ Joy and Job in blogging, Ideas
Nov 23- Nov 29 ~ Happy Habits, Goal of your blog for remaining 2022
Nov 30- Dec 6 ~ Fortitude, Easy tips
Dec 7- Dec  13~ Dare, Chance
Dec 14- Dec 20 ~ Balance, Achievements in 2022

lørdag den 24. september 2022

Words for Wednesday - Aunt Jemima's Garden 5

The second set of words was:

Myriad
Quilt
Product
Lip-service
Assemble
Bask

Which takes me a little closer to Aunt Jemima's garden.

In silence they walked down the road. After a myriad of false starts they finally found number 123. It was old, decrepit. Surely nobody lived there or had lived there since Aunt Jemima and her husband moved out those many years ago. They looked at the letter box. The writing had faded, but they were still able to read Carlsen, and a long name, which could be Jemima, or almost anything else.
Carefully they opened the creaking gate and went into the garden. It looked just like they imagined the garden of the sleeping Beauty. Everything growing wild, but beautiful. The house was almost hidden in tall, flowering hollyhocks. On the clothesline laundry still hung. Most of it worn to rags by sun, rain and animals. An old quilt, bleached, but otherwise sound hung on the line.
"Do you think the rugmaking husband made that quilt?" Susan asked.
"Maybe. I saw hard, uncomfortable floor rugs in my mind, but maybe he was really making quilts," Heidi answered. Susan clasped the stone in her pocket. "Was that only a product of my imagination, or did that quilt just move?"

She froze and slowly, oh so slowly pulled the stone from her pocket and put it to her eye. Heidi saw and understood and she too froze. After a few minutes she did what Susan had done out on the road and dispelled all the bugs and critters pestering her. This was too important to spoil by being bitten by some obnoxious mosquito in a wrong moment. From now on, Heidi decided, she would pay lip-service only to her mom's rule of no magic, and do what she wanted to, just like Susan. All those small things in everyday life, cantrips and so on. But never ever big stuff. She felt stiff, felt like moving to ease a cramp in her leg, but she knew, Jon and Thora had told them often enough, that it was easier to suppress the impulse first time around, and that giving in did not lead to anything but more itches and cramps.
Susan's hand with the stone was now level with her shoulders. A new itch began in Heidi's left leg. To distract herself she began to mentally assemble a list of all the cantrips she knew which could be safely used outside of school. at the same time basking in the happy, free feeling inside her head. It was right to use your magic!

Hør -- 5 -- Flax

Sorry, reposting for visibility.
Monday evening I listened to the second of two yearly webinars from the Nordic 1 sqm flax project. It wass partly a where are we report, partly a how to proceed from here. The Swedish Eva Anderson was a veteran flax grower and user. And during her talk, I fould that my alignment of roots, was an old trick. She also encouraged us to use what we already had for the treatment of flax, she recommended a rolling pin for the threshing. Thus encouraged, I found my rolling pin.

Indlæg taget ned og op igen for synlighed, undskyld forvirring.
Mandag aften lyttede jeg til et nordisk webinar for 1 kvm. hør-projektet. Det var dels en status på hvor vi var nu, dels en hvad gør vi nu-vejledning. Den svenske, meget vidende Eva Anderson fortalte blandt andet at det jeg gjorde med at støde rødderne så de var lige lange, var et gammelt trick. Hun fortalte også at i så lille skala som 1 kvm. hør var, kunne man bare bruge, hvad man nu havde for hnden af redskaber, blandt andet kageruller.
      Det gav mig mod på at fortsætte, så jeg fandt kagerullen frem.
Her er alt andet end selve stråene: ukrudt og frøkapsler, små, knækkede stykker strå og blade ... og forhåbentrlig også nogle frø.
Everything but the reeds. Weeds, leaves, seedpods, small pieces of broken reeds ... and some seeds I hope.

Efter at være blevet grundigt behandlet med kagerullen kom det hele ned i en stor skotøjsæske og udenfor sammen med en vaskebalje. Og så hældte jeg det hele fra fra æske til balje og tilbage igen udenfor i blæsten.

After a thorough treatment with the rolling pin all the stuff was poured into an old shoebox. I found a square plastic bowl and went outside pouring from one container to another and back again.


Her er resultatet så i en gammel grovsigte. Der gik mange frø tabt undervejs, for det var en forholdsvis ny proces for mig, og hørfrø er meget lettere end dem jeg tidligere har forsøgt mig med.

The resulting harvest in an old flour sieve. I lost many seeds in thois process. I have tried it before, but only rarely and with bigger, heavyier seeds.

Alligevel endte jeg med ca. 40 gram frø. Og da jeg ønskede mig tre gange så meget, som de 10 gram jeg begyndte med, er jeg helt tilfreds.

Anyway, I ended up with 40 gr. flax seeds, which is satisfactory, as I aimed for three times the 10 gr. I began with.

Rødning -- Retting
Jeg besluttede mig for at ville rødne i vand, ikke markrødne, dels skulle det gå hurtigere, dels bliver vores have flittigt besøgt af hunde, katte, ræve, duer, skader, solsosrte, mus ... og jeg kunne levende forestille mig at de lavede uorden i mine fine hørbundter.
     Jeg havde masser af mere eller mindre fantasifulde Storm P-løsninger på hvordan hørbundterne skulle holdes under vand.
     Men Skribenten støttede heldigvis den meget simple idé at stikke dem ned i vores regnvandstønder. Den blå var ikke høj nok, så bundterne endte nede i den venstre, grå tønde. De fik en tagsten ovenpå for at forhindre dem i at poppe op hele tiden, hvilket de meget gerne ville.
I decided for retting the flax submerged in water as opposed to dew retting. It should be a faster process, and our garden is overrun by cats, dogs, foxes, crows, mice, blackbirds ... and I imagine they very well could make a mess of my nice bundles placed on our lawn.
  I had a lot of more or less flighty ideas, but in the end the Writer supported me in simply placing them in our rain water barrel. Keep it simple!
  The blue one was not tall enough, so into the leftmost grey one they went, with an old tile to keep them submerged, as they kept popping up.

fredag den 23. september 2022

Words for Wednesday Aunt Jemima's Garden 4

This meme was started by Delores a long time ago.  Troubles led her to bow out, but the meme was too much fun to let go, and now Words for Wednesday is provided by a number of people and has become a movable feast with Elephant's Child as our coordinator.

  Essentially the aim of this meme is to encourage us to write.  Each week we are given some prompts. These prompts can be words, phrases, music or images.
  What we do with those prompts is up to us:  a short story, prose, a song, a poem, or treating them with ignore...
  We can use some or all of the prompts, and mixing and matching is encouraged.

  Some of us put our creation in comments on the post, and others post on their own blog. This fun meme includes cheering on the other participants.
  And the more the merrier goes here as well, so if you are posting on your own blog then please tell us in the comments, so that all other participants, can come along and applaud.

The words appear on Elephant's  Child's blog every Wednesday in September. The words come to us from the head of David M. Gascoigne.
This Wednesday's words are:

Illustrator
Judgement
Insignificant
Friend
Creative
Married
    and/or
Myriad
Quilt
Product
Lip-service
Assemble
Bask
 
I had a hard time trying to bend those words to my will, continuing the story of Susan, Thora and the crickets. In the end I had to give up and follow the words back to Aunt Jemima's garden instead.
  I only used the first set, but maybe more to come. And as usual I took up the additional challenge of using them in the order they were given.


When everything was back in the basket, they walked on, holding the basket between them.
"Do you think their names are still on the mailbox?" Susan asked, "Or how will we know we found the right house?"
"I hope so. Aunt Jemima is the sister of my paternal grandmother, so her last name is not Bach like us, but err, something so plain that the contrast to Jemima always tickle my funny bone. Let me look at that old envelope again," Heidi said, and let go of the picnic basket. Susan had been pulling up a bit to compensate for Heidi's lower grip and was toppled when she suddenly let go. She sat down, hard, on the gravelly road.
"Oh, sorry," Heidi said, "did you hurt yourself?"
"Susan gingerly placed the big basket next to her and got up. She dusted off and felt her behind and legs. "No," she answered, "nothing bad at least."
Then she dived into the basket and pulled out a bottle, "Bur your bottle lost its flip-top." Some of the contents had spilled into the basket, and the two girls quickly pulled out sandwiches, blankets, and napkins. Nothing much had happened. When everything was tucked back in, and the bottles safely re-sealed and propped up by the blanket, Heidi finally pulled the letter from her pocket.
"Jemima Carlsen,  Smedevej 123 pr. Ejby" she read.
"Carlsen," Susan said. "Is that her last name or her husbands? I know you told me that she was married. But I cannot imagine a husband for her," Susan said earnestly. "You told me he was a rugmaker, and a politician. He must have been quite the man to do that and be married to Aunt Jemima."
"Yes and Mom told me recently that he also worked as an illustrator, he drew illustrations for the journals," Heidi said. "I have a hard time imagining Aunt Jemima and a husband too. She's so bossy, I imagine him as small grey and mousey. But that's hard to figure with him being a politician, and a rugmaker, and an illustrator.""
"Let's get going," Heidi said. They picked up the basket and walked on. Heidi continued: "Aunt Jemima and her interesting husband were also young once, maybe she were not this intimidating then."
"Let's not pass judgement where we lack compassion ... that's what my Mum said as I asked about my aunt Clio and her husband. She reminds me of Jemima," Susan said thoughtfully. "My aunt .. she's not my aunt by the way, but my dad's great aunt or something. She's married, to a small grey, insignificant man. Once I asked Mum how these two ever met and fell in love and ... you know. Then she told me off for prying, and cited that one about judgement and compassion."
"I know how Aunt Jemima and her husband ... what IS his name ... I can't remember ..."
"Don't think too hard, then you will remember," Susan interrupted.
Heidi nodded slowly and continued. "At least this is what dad tells. Aunt Jemima had a friend. This friend was interested in aunt Jemima, as she was tall, witty, creative and even pretty - hard to imagine her as young and witty. Anyway, this friend dared Mr. Carlsen to ask her for a dance. It was some kind of bet, even. And then Mr. Carlsen and aunt Jemima ended up getting married, and the friend was so angry."
"What happened too him?" Susan asked
"Dad never told," Heidi answered.

Now I have no less than three recent serial chapters unfinished: The story of Susan, Thora and the crickets. the tale of Aunt Jemima's garden , and the overlong strange testing in Transformation ending in a visit from Australia.  I hope to finish one or more of these in the coming weeks, it's confusing as it is now. Even more as I'm editing the chapters about Birch Manor in my spare time.

torsdag den 22. september 2022

Hobbit Day

Today is Hobbit day.

A day to celebrate J.R.R. Tolkien's works. Always on the 22nd of September, the birthday of Bilbo and Frodo.

For the tenth time Rachel at The Edge of the Precipice is hosting an Annual Tolkien Blog Party. Thanks to Lissa for refreshing my memory of this party.

To celebrate today, Rachel invites us to a game of tag, and I'd like to play. Here are her questions and my answers.

-- 0 --


1. Who first introduced you to Middle Earth?

     I do not remember, I think I just stumbled over The lord of the Rings in a deserted corner of the local library.

2. Has your love of Middle-earth affected your life?

     Yes. We often do things that are Middle-earth related, shooting bows and arrows, mushroom gathering, playing, talking, cooking ... even bathing ;)
     And for many years I have been playing first Dungeons and Dragons (a pen and paper game) and later World of Warcraft (online game). None of these would ever had existed without Tolkien's works.
     We often talk of persons and creatures from Tolkien's works, and as his works also are morally deep, but veiled in literature, they are good starting and ending points for theological, moral, and ethical discussions.
     I have taught myself a lot of Quenya and Sindarin and the writing of Tengwar (Fëanor's runes).
    
3. Have you ever dressed up like a Tolkien character?

   No, I never dressed up myself as a Tolkien character. But I have on many occasions dressed up my children - or helped them dress up as - Elven warriors, Hobbits, Dwarwes, and even a Goblin. All thanks to Tolkien.

4. What people in your real life would you want in your company if you had to take the ring to Mordor?

     My husband, my children, and a man I know who is a 'survive in nature' and martial arts specialist. That makes nine ;)

5. What Middle-earth location would you most like to visit?

     The Shire, Mirkwood, Fangorn, Rivendell, Lothlorien, Edoras, Beorn's house, ... all of Rohan, Helm's Deep  ... everywhere, only not Mordor actually.

6. Are there any secondary characters you think deserve more attention?

     I have always wanted to hear more of the other Istari, Gandalf's co-wizards - I would like to hear the true story, not the strangely distorted version from the movies ;) I wonder if Tom Bombadil is one of them ... lor at least related. And what about Beorn? ... So many questions.

7. Would you rather attend Faramir's wedding or Samwise's wedding?
     Rosie and Sam's wedding. I am much more drawn to the cosy and abundant hobbit parties than to grandiose state happenings - these are what I like to watch on TV, but to attend, a Hobbit wedding wins!

8. How many books by J.R.R. Tolkien have you read?

     I think I've read every fiction book he ever wrote, and I even read bits of his scholarly works.

9. Are there any books about Middle-earth or Professor Tolkien (but not written by him) that you recommend?
     J.R.R. Tolkien - A Biography by Humphrey Carpenter.

10. List up to ten of your favourite lines/quotations from the Middle-earth books and/or movies.
     It is the songs that really stays with me, and I am hard put to find a favourite here. It depends on time, mood and place.
     But the best performed song is according to me Far over the misty Mountains from the first Hobbit movie. It was just perfect - as were all the music in that part. we were sorely disappointed this was not continued in the two sequels.




tirsdag den 20. september 2022

Blogger is Mending -- Blogger i Bedring

Blogger is still s...l...o...w, but I can once again access my Layout options, and have hurriedly added my Flax page - in Danish only - to the tabs on top, and changed the picture in the sidebar from a Good-bye to the Queen to a link to this new page.
  The blog rolls in the sidebar are also almost back to normal. Thanks to whomever has been pushing the right buttons.

-- 🇧 --

     Blogger er stadigvæk l-a-n-g-s-o-m, men det går bedre. Jeg kan nu komme ind på min lay-outside igen og har skyndsomt tilføjet min nye hørside til fanebladene øverst, og i sidepanelet til højre har jeg skiftet farvel til Dronningen ud med et link til denne nye side.
    Også listerne med links til andre bloggere er næsten tilbage til normalen. Tak til den Blogger-medarbejder, der har trykket på de rigtige knapper.



mandag den 19. september 2022

Poetry Monday :: Yaarrrh!

It is Poetry Monday!
 Diane - who has taken over the hosting of  this challenge - and Mimi of Messymimi's Meanderings - who supplies us with many of the topics - are also writing wonderful, funny, thought-provoking, ingenious and honestly well written verse. Go and read them!
  Karen of Baking in a Tornado has joined us in this crazy pursuit, and promises us at least a poem a month!
  SpikesBestMate often publishes a nice verse in the comments.
  Jenny at Procrastinating Donkey who has been a faithful participant, is slowly returning to blogging after her husband's passing from this world. Let's continue to send warm thoughts, good energy, and lots of prayers her way, now that her mum's health is in need of a prayer too. But still we dare hope that she will join Poetry Monday again.


Today we celebrate Talk like a Pirate Day! Which happens to be a day celebrated in the online game World of Warcraft too.


In that other world where oft I go
For rest and relaxation
It's Pirates day today. YAHOO!
We have some recreation



A mug of rum, or maybe two
To end our deprivation,
Forget the fights with friend and foe
Now I'm a pirate too!




Ol' Chumbucket then spoke to me
A word of truth and wisdom.
Dress like a pirate halfways be
To talk like one - perfection!





So 'hoy there, matey! it'll be
Instead of "Hello darling".
And should I like a cup of tea
Yarrr! Tea! you'll hear me snarling!



 - - - - -

Next Monday again we'll meet and write poetry: Field Trips are our theme.

søndag den 18. september 2022

Blogger-problemer -- Blogger Troubles

All of a sudden I cannot acess my Layout options. The blogroll is broken, showing only blog names, not latest post. And a click on the blog name takes me to a page with feeds, not to the main page of the blog.
Dear Blogger, what is happening?

--  ???  --

Pludselig kan jeg ikke komme ind i mit layout og ændre på Bloggens udseende. Og listen over de blogs jeg følger, ser sær ud. Det nyeste indlæg mangler, og hvis jeg klikker på bloggens navn, kommer jeg til en underlig side med feeds, ikke til selve bloggen.
Kære Blogger, hvad sker der her?

Sunday Selection - Hør / Flax

Some days ago I found a page in English describing the different steps from From Flax to Linen
I have - according to this site - told of Steps 1 & 2: Ploughing - Sowing, and Steps 3 & 4 Pulling - Stooking.

Next up is Step 5: Rippling. This is the process used to deseed the flax. The top ends of the dry bundles of flax are pulled through nails hammered into a board, like a comb. The seeds are collected below on a sheet (From Flax to Linen).

-- 💠 -- 💠 --

     Jeg fandt et netsted på engelsk, der superkort beskriver hørrens vej fra frø til klæde.
Ifølge den oversigt har jeg omtalt de første 4 trin: Pløjning & såning og ruskning & vejring.
     Ergo er vi nu nået til Trin 5: Knebling - at fjerne frøkapslerne fra stråene. Det gøres ved at trække negene igennem en hørkneble, som er et stykke træ med søm eller lignende i tætte rækker.

  The stooked (dried-in-sheaves) flax. The lowermost sheaf was pulled September 2, the two top ones are two out of four pulled September 7.
  The first-pulled sheaf was kind of unruly. The straws were buckly, not straight and nice like the four sheaves pulled five days later. It was harder rippling them, and i wonder if this difference will remain through the coming processing of the flax. 

-- 💠 --

     Den vejrede (tørrede) hør. Nederst det 1. bundt, der blev rusket den 2. september, øverst to af de fire fra den 7. september.
     Det var ligesom at hørren var blevet mere lige på de fem ekstra dage. Det første bundt var sværere at have med at gøre, stråene var ligesom krøllede og bugtede sig i alle mulige retninger, hvorimod de fire neg fra den 7. var pæne og glatte. Det bliver spændende at se, om den forskel forbliver gennem hele processen.

This is what I used for rippling. The lid of my old wool picker. It did OK, but if I had had more than 5 small sheaves I would have made another contraption with the spikes placed much closer to one another.

-- 💠 --

Denne her er hvad jeg brugte til at kneble med. Låget til min gamle grovkarte. Hvis jeg havde haft meget mere end de fem små neg, havde jeg nok lavet en anden indretning, for der er for langt mellem sømmene i denne her.


This is the rippled sheaves, notice how the ends are all together, as opposed to the un-rippled ones. I found out that rippling was easier if all the roots were aligned, so I stood up the sheaves one by one, held them loosely with both hands and banged them gently against a table - not unlike what you do to a deck of cards. This removed the last, dry earth and aligned the ends.

-- 💠 --

     Her er så to kneblede neg. Se hvor pænt enderne ligger i modsætning til de ikke-kneblede. Jeg fandt ud af at kneblingen gik lettere, hvis rødderne lå sammen, og ikke forskudt for hinanden.
     Så jeg begyndte med at stille hvert neg op og banke det mod underlaget mens jeg holdt løst om det med begge hænder. Noget i stil med hvad man gør med et spil kort efter at have blandet det. Det slog den sidste tørrede jord af rødderne, og samlede dem.

This is the seed pods - and leaves, and weds, and too short flax straws - nicest portion shown here. Darkness fell before I made it to the threshing of the seeds. I wonder how much seed will come off this. I sowed 10 gr. and would like at least triple this amount next year.

-- 💠 --

Her er så frøkapslerne - og bladene og ukrudtet og de knækkede hørstrå. Det her er det pæneste udsnit. Det blev mørkt inden jeg nåede at tærske og rense frøene. Jeg er spændt på, hvor mange frø, der kommer ud af det for jeg såede 10 gram, og ville gerne have mindst 30 g. til næste år.



Next up: Step 6: Retting (and threshing - which is not a step in  From Flax to Linen).

Næste gang: Trin 6: Rødning (og tærskning - der ikke er med i den engelske oversigt)


-- 💠 --


For at huske alle de gode råd, små tips og genveje, har jeg samlet alt om hør på dansk på en side for sig selv. På grund af Bloggers idioti, er det midlertidigt ikke muligt at sætte siden ind i fanerne foroven, men her er et link: Hørside

onsdag den 14. september 2022

Words for Wednesday -- September 14, 2022

This meme was started by Delores a long time ago.  Troubles led her to bow out, but the meme was too much fun to let go, and now Words for Wednesday is provided by a number of people and has become a movable feast with Elephant's Child as our coordinator.

  Essentially the aim of this meme is to encourage us to write.  Each week we are given some prompts. These prompts can be words, phrases, music or images.
  What we do with those prompts is up to us:  a short story, prose, a song, a poem, or treating them with ignore...
  We can use some or all of the prompts, and mixing and matching is encouraged.

  Some of us put our creation in comments on the post, and others post on their own blog. This fun meme includes cheering on the other participants.
  And the more the merrier goes here as well, so if you are posting on your own blog then please tell us in the comments, so that all other participants, can come along and applaud.

The words appear on Elephant's  Child's blog every Wednesday in September. The words come to us from the head of David M. Gascoigne

This week the Words are:

Laboratory
Devoted
Ridiculous
Happy
Tenderly
Sick
      And/or
 Encouragement
Diseases
Formidable
Unruly
Vaccine
Cricket
I have given up on my continuing stories for the time being, but I have not left Susan or the Unicorn Farm. As usual I took up the additional  challenge of using the words in the order they were given.

The smaller laboratory on the second floor was devoted to the transformation of small animals and inanimate objects. On the shelves running all around the walls over the doors and windows stood a ridiculous amount of stuffed animals. Some were old and decrepit, with hairless snouts and torn ears, some looked new and almost alive. Susan was happy to find at least three different owls on the broader shelves in the back of the room.
  Tenderly she took them from the shelf and handed them down to Thora who placed them on a table. Susan climbed down the ladder, and concentrated on the three owls at the table.
  "This one," she said to Thora, "this one looks like the owls on my Grandma's clothesline."
  The stuffed owl looked sick, and Susan needed little encouragement to pump Thora for her knowledge about owls and their diseases. Thora's knowledge in such matters was formidable, and they spent the next couple of hours happily ensconced in discussions about less savoury symptoms of diverse diseases among owls and other flying familiars.

  Jon stood in the door, his unruly hair even more disorderly than usual. For how long he had been standing there neither Thora nor Susan could have told you.  He cleared his throat. Susan and Thora looked up, and Thora asked him what he wanted.
  "If you're quite done discussing Avian pox, I'd like to have a word with you concerning the vaccine for yellow fever," Jon answered.
  "Just a sec," Thora answered, "We've have to put all these stuffed animals back. Taavi wants this room for some experiments of his on crickets and grasshoppers"
Jon left and Susan asked: "Is Taavi really going to experiment on grasshoppers?"
 "That's what he told me," Thora said earnestly, "and I think he meant to involve you in the catching, 'summoning' he called it, of crickets and grasshoppers."
"Thanks for the warning," Susan said warmly. "I better go and study the names for those in Icelandic." Susan ran off and Thora sent a fond smile in her direction.

mandag den 12. september 2022

Poetry Monday :: Chocolate Milk Shake

It is Poetry Monday!
 Diane - who has taken over the hosting of  this challenge - and Mimi of Messymimi's Meanderings - who supplies us with many of the topics - are also writing wonderful, funny, thought-provoking, ingenious and honestly well written verse. Go and read them!
  Karen of Baking in a Tornado has joined us in this crazy pursuit, and promises us at least a poem a month!
  SpikesBestMate often publishes a nice verse in the comments.
  Jenny at Procrastinating Donkey who has been a faithful participant, is slowly returning to blogging after her husband's passing from this world. Let's continue to send warm thoughts, good energy, and lots of prayers her way, now that her mum's health is in need of a prayer too. But still we dare hope that she will join Poetry Monday again.


Today we do Chokolate Milk Shakes!  Which I understand comes from a machine in cafeterias and such. The garden is keeping me busy, but I cannot
not write a poem for toady.

Chocolate milk shake?
A couple of haiku
to talk about that.

I never had them,
But steaming hot chocolate
came from our machine.

And in my hurry
I often scalded my tongue
on the concoction.

But in the winter
It was thawing my fingers,
and warming my bones.

Therefore I give thanks
to this plain drink. Forsaking
Chocolate Milk Shake.

 - - - - -

Next Monday again
We'll meet and write poetry:
Pirate Talk's the theme.

fredag den 9. september 2022

Hændelser i haven

Happenings in my Garden

Hør -- Flax

Min kvadratmeter hør den 3. juli  --  My square meter flax July 3rd

Min kvadratmeter hør den 29. august  --  My square meter flax August 29

Nærbillede af blomster og frøstrande samme dag  --  Close-up with flowers and seed pods same day

-- 💠 -- 💠 --

     Endelig har jeg taget mig sammen til at høste - ruske som fagudtrykket er - min hør. I onsdags, da solen skinnede, blev den rusket og bundtet i mindre pæne bundter, der her står til tørre på vores havebænk. På grund af regnen er de nu kommet indendørs.
     Bundtet til højre, blev høstet sidste fredag og har ligget til tørre i skyggen på et gammelt havebord.
     Skiltet dukkede også pludselig op for et par uger siden - jeg tror det måske har været en tur inde hos naboen, for væk var det, da jeg ledte efter det.

-- 💠 --

  Finally I pulled my flax; this happened Wednesday in the sunshine. Here the bundles are displayed at our garden bench together with the now no longer missing sign; it suddenly re-appeared some time ago. I suspect it of having been visiting with the neighbours.
   The bundle to the right was harvested earlier, last Friday and has been drying on an old table in the shadows. Now all the flax is indoor because of the rain.


Minikiwi

For to år siden fortalte jeg at vores minikiwi havde afsløret sig som en han. I dag, da jeg var ude at hente æg, fandt jeg en overraskelse i græsset under minikiwien.

-- 🥝 --

Two years ago I told about out mini-kiwi, I told that it was a male plant, and how I bought him a m´new wife. Today, as I was in the garden to get the eggs, I found a surprise on  the lawn.

Da jeg så kiggede op så jeg ... mange frugter  --  Looking up I saw ... lots of fruits.

En efterforskning på nettet gav som resultat at denne minikiwi hverken er mini eller en han. Det er en helt almindelig kiwi, Actinida deliciosa , af sorten 'Jenny', der er berømt for at være den eneste kiwi med både han- og hunblomster, for at være ualmindelig hårdfør, for sin smukke røde behåring og gode smag.
     Jeg købte denne plante i 2007, som en af tre minikiwier, men der må åbenbart være sket en fejl. Jeg klager ikke, men håber nu på en sen frost, så frugterne kan nå at modne.

-- 🥝 --

Some research in the interwebs told me that the mini-kiwi was neither mini, nor male. It is an ordinary kiwi Actinida deliciosa of the sort Jenny, known for being the only sort with male and female flowers and for its hardy properties, its beautiful red 'fur' and tasty fruits. 
I bought this one as a mini-kiwi 15 years ago, but obviously a mistake has happened. I won't complain. But now I hope for a very late first frost, so that my kiwis will ripen.

Smuk, rød behåring -- Beautiful red 'fur'.

onsdag den 7. september 2022

Words for Wednesday & IWSG - September Question

This meme was started by Delores a long time ago.  Troubles led her to bow out, but the meme was too much fun to let go, and now Words for Wednesday is provided by a number of people and has become a movable feast with Elephant's Child as our coordinator.

  Essentially the aim of this meme is to encourage us to write.  Each week we are given some prompts. These prompts can be words, phrases, music or images.
  What we do with those prompts is up to us:  a short story, prose, a song, a poem, or treating them with ignore...
  We can use some or all of the prompts, and mixing and matching is encouraged.

  Some of us put our creation in comments on the post, and others post on their own blog. This fun meme includes cheering on the other participants.
  And the more the merrier goes here as well, so if you are posting on your own blog then please tell us in the comments, so that all other participants, can come along and applaud.

The words appear on Elephant's  Child's blog every Wednesday in September. The words come to us from the head of David M. Gascoigne

The Words are:

Happen
Truck
Hollow
Daffy
Tired
Joke


  These words allow me to tell a story that has been running around my brain the last week, blocking all writing.
A short preamble. In July 2011 I sat in a train homewards bound after a long day of meetings in  Copenhagen. At that time the news screens in the tube was mercifully silenced, but the flickering pictures caught my weary eyes, and I
looked at the screen without really seeing. But suddenly a photo made me sit up. I knew that place! ... impossible, I chided myself; it is somewhere in Africa, you have not been there! Then a man was interviewed in front of a building, the camera showed off the large square once again, and then a text ran over the bottom of the screen announcing some delay, hiding where this took place. Luckily the newsreel repeated itself, and the journey was long. Next time around I read: Juba, the capitol of the new republic of Southern Sudan. Yes I had been there, I had been to Juba. And I felt happy for the people there.

  This all happened on my travels. Earlier I told about my brush with a bear. Later on that same journey, we went to Egypt. We sailed down the Nile, and some of us wanted to go to the southern part of Sudan.


    We were adventurous, we were curious, we wanted to see a jungle, and we wanted to help. We knew there was an experimental farm outside Juba. We didn't bring much stuff, a small bag with a change of clothes and a sleeping bag. In my bag I had a few pencils, a pen, a diary, a Russian Pepsi-cola bottle with a flip top cap and a "treasure chest" a blue tobacco tin with pretty coins from the whole trip, a scarab from the pyramids in Cairo and pretty stones (it was unfortunately stolen from me on the way home), and of course our passports and papers in a pouch around our necks.
  We arrived on a Friday morning by jeep - having flown from Khartoum to Juba, the rainy season that had just ended had washed away the main road.

Four of us didn't like the "discrimination in reverse" on the farm. We were treated like royalty, not allowed to go barefoot, not allowed to carry anything, we worked maybe an hour on Friday and two hours all day Saturday, the rest of the time we were shown around and had to admire the farm and everything on it. Among the sights were test crops, papaya trees where the fruits grew directly from the trunk of the tree, and pineapples where the pineapple fruits grew in the middle of something looking like giant green pineapple tops. We were sure it was the nice gardener making a practical joke, but both crops do grow just like this. But most of the time we were allowed to feed the chicken or just walk around and look pretty. Sunday was Epiphany and we went to mass at the local church (in Loa) where Father Bill resided - and where we stayed overnight. At the party afterwards we told him we wanted to get off the farm, go to work, and see the country. He told us that this was a great idea. The country had a lack of people understanding the way people thought and worked there. He told us of a development initiative that could have been really smart, but turned out stupid - he used the word 'daffy', which made us laugh and think of Daffy Duck. The initiative was a grain mill built by linking a stationary bike and a small mill together, so that instead of turning the millstones by hand - a very hot, tedious and tiring process we had already tried in Egypt - the millstones were turned by biking. Only in that tribe, women were forbidden to ride a bike, and men not allowed to grind flour. The bike-mills stood in a corner and rusted. We talked long into the night.
    The next morning he pointed out a trail and handed us a letter, telling us to follow the trail to the river. It was a long walk and hot (probably 35-40 degrees), but eventually we reached a small village of round huts in an enclosure where an old, smiling man with bad legs sat by a hut. He welcomed us warmly, and sent his grandson, who had stayed in the village to help him, down to the river for some water for us. We could barely see through the glass, but after walking about 5 km in the heat, we drank it without hesitation.
     The first day we were guests, everyone came and touched us, pulled at our hair, and rubbed or pinched our arms and legs to make sure our strange fair complexion stuck and was not some sort of make-up. We ended the day by being given a bath under the supervision of all the village women and girls. We were stood in a round metal tray and doused with water and washed with soap from head to toe by a very old lady. The boys were treated in the same way at the other end of the village. But after the head of the village read Fr Bill's letter, and saw that our blood was just as red when we cut ourselves, we were allocated a hut and put on a work shift - along with the half-grown children ;)
    We got up at sunrise 6 am as we were very close to the Equator, and ate bean-filled bread triangles, washed down with big glasses of bittersweet tea it was sweetened with sugar-cane juice squeezed from the hollow reeds by a contraption looking for all the world like an old mangle. The boys were put to making bricks, going round and round in the clay and straw, later stamping it together into square moulds, which then dried in the sun. We girls walked - far away - and picked beans, tomatoes and some weird grains (durra?) until it got too hot. At noon we sat under a big mango tree and played with a string (apparently something known among children all over the world) or drew - I brought my two worn pencils - or we swam in a tributary to the Nile with a strong current to keep away some parasite. One day we heard a strange clapping noise, and the other girls pulled us quickly away from the shore - crocodiles. Lunch was another bread triangle with bean filling and water, lots of water.
    The afternoon was spent hoeing another field, or picking more of the tall grains. Then we walked back carrying the filled baskets and the young girls laughed heartily at our attempts to carry the baskets on our heads. They ended up in our arms! For dinner we ate sim-sim, shelled sesame seeds, crushed with a stone grinder, and mixed with some other toasted seeds. With it a thin chicken or fish soup, with beans and green leaves, fried giant bananas, and the ruptured tomatoes from the day's harvest - they were unsellable. We had black coffee with sugar cane juice to drink in the evening. We were dizzy and tired the next day in the heat, despite all the water we drank. Then I got wise and asked for salt. One of the girls took me by the hand and we wandered to a small market under the biggest mango tree I have ever seen. There I bought a palm leaf cone of salt, which we sprinkled liberally on our next meals -  we were sweating so much we were desalinated, not dehydrated. It helped. 
    At 6 pm the sun set and it got dark in less than ten minutes. Then we gathered in a big hut and took corn off the cobs while people sang, talked and laughed. There was a lot of laughter, and we were annoyed at not being able to understand anything.

    The women in the village amused themselves by putting us to all sorts of jobs we couldn't manage, like washing clothes. Then when we were messing around with a tub and a washboard, the women, laughing and teasing, pushed us away and, gesticulating and talking loudly, showed how to do it. The boys experienced the same thing, being set to weave cages from palm leaf stems. It looked easy when one of the men did it. With a knife, he split the stem into four, drilled a few holes here and there, split another stem, folded and bent, and poof, he had made a small box with a lid that could be opened able hold 3-4 kg of tomatoes. The boys' first attempt was not good, to put it mildly, and there was much laughter.
    One evening, while we were decobbing corn, the police arrived. They said that white people were not allowed in the villages after sunset, and drove us to a "town" nearby. There weren't many more houses than in the village, but they were square and two-storey, They dropped us off at a cheap hotel. We were told to report to the police the next morning. It seemed very deserted. There we had to sleep and stay for a few days before the transport Fr Bill had arranged for us went back to Juba again. We probably should have just given them some money, but we weren't that clever.
    After two dreary days at the "hotel" where we had to turn up every day, morning and evening and get a paper stamped by the police, the transport arrived. It was a UN relief truck, bound for the refugee camps on the Ugandan border near Nimule, before returning to Juba. We rode along and sat on the edge of the rear end. The load consisted of hoes, paper-sacks of lentils, beans and grain. Every time the truck stopped at a new refugee camp, everyone got off, unloaded all the sacks, axes, hoes, etc. from the truck, dropped off the number that needed to be dropped off, and threw the rest back on board. The result - of course - was that several of the sacks were ruptured and the bottom of the truck's hold was flooded by spilled grains.
    The refugees in the camps were from Uganda. Some had fled from the regime of Idi Amin and had been in the camps for years, others had arrived after his fall and had just recently arrived. Most of them were educated people. Many of them spoke perfect English, French and/or German. They told us that they had stuffed their cars with family and valuables like jewellery and just driven northwards until they went out of gas, then they walked on, carrying what they could. Now they sat here, doctors, professors, for and against Idi Amin, weaving palm leaf mats to survive. Many had fine suitcases, now empty and used only to sit on, for they had sold the contents for food. A cloud of hopelessness hung over the camps.
    We ate biscuits and tinned food from the load morning, noon and night. The biscuits were full of small beetles, and we cracked the biscuits open and banged them against something hard before eating them.
    At night we slept on the load while two men took turns driving - we were not allowed to, though we volunteered. One late night we drove through a forest fire. A small antelope jumped out into the road and was run over. The man driving the truck jumped out with a big knife and slaughtered the animal, a pregnant female. Then we helped hoist it up a tree and tie its hind legs, and while the rest of us slept, he roasted the deer over a fire. Then in the middle of the night we were awakened to venison and more beetle-ridden biscuits.
    There were beetles in all the flour and bread. Normally they were baked - and therefore dead - but in those biscuits they were alive. At the bakery in Juba we were allowed to see the bakery, there were beetles and worms everywhere, and the apprentice baker walked around in a big through to knead the dough with his feet ... The bread was baked over an open fire in a big oven at the back of the bakery. They were cheap and tasted good!
    Juba was a city of contrasts. Square houses in the centre, and round huts in the outskirts. Arabs sat on their chairs at small tables, playing cards and drinking tea all day long, just as the Turkish men had done in their villages. They wore jellabiya, a foot-long robe of light fabric, with long sleeves and embroidery - they were rich. They owned the cars, the sewing machines ... anything of value or that could create value, and came from the north. Then there were the ordinary Sudanese, the Nuur and Loa, they were, well, ordinary. Generally they were very dark, very smiling and laughing. We couldn't go shopping without being laughed at several times a trip. Probably mostly because of our atrocious language skills - we spoke very primitive Cairo Arabic. They were the bakers, postmen, bus drivers, teachers, tailors, tea sellers ... in short, all the tradesmen and other people we came into contact with.
    And then there were the Dinka. Tall, handsome men and women who were cattle nomads. We had met 3 Dinka men on the train in southern Egypt, where they got off at a halt in the middle of the desert and just wandered off across the sand, westwards. Now we met some Dinka warriors. The biggest problem we had was frankly not to stare. For they were, as I said, tall, handsome, self-confident men. And they arrived there at the market, in the middle of a town, wearing shields, spears, armrings and neckrings, money bags around their necks ... and nothing else! The contrast to the shrouded, furtive Arabs was striking.
     Next morning we met with the other students at the post office and flew back to Khartoum.

- - - - -

September 7 question - What genre would be the worst one for you to tackle and why?

My answer: Romance! I never read much of this, two of my sister's magazines to ascertain that the blonde man and the dark haired girl found one another in the end - the determining factor being their hair colour.
     I never really liked this genre, and I felt - and still feel - that anything more than a chaste kiss and "they lived happily ever after" have no place in a book I want to read.

mandag den 5. september 2022

Poetry Monday :: Labour Day

It is Poetry Monday!
 Diane - who has taken over the hosting of  this challenge - and Mimi of Messymimi's Meanderings - who supplies us with many of the topics - are also writing wonderful, funny, thought-provoking, ingenious and honestly well written verse. Go and read them!
  Karen of Baking in a Tornado has joined us in this crazy pursuit, and promises us at least a poem a month!
  SpikesBestMate often publishes a nice verse in the comments.
  Jenny at Procrastinating Donkey who has been a faithful participant, is slowly returning to blogging after her husband's passing from this world. Let's continue to send warm thoughts, good energy, and lots of prayers her way, now that her mum's health is in need of a prayer too. But still we dare hope that she will join Poetry Monday again.


Today we do Labour Day!  Which to me only means first Monday of September - Autumn on its way, Sigh.

Sun is shining
Skies are blue
Winds are blowing,
feeling cold.

Birds are singing
Grass is green.
Dandelions 
Silver-white.

Tractors ploughing
Earth turns brown
Seasons turning
Into grey.

 - - - - -

Next Mondays topic is: Chocolate Milk Shakes.

Owlets on the Wings

Today no poem (yet) but a YouTube video. The three owlets were let out this Saturday.