Cheer up. It could be raining...

Looking west along Nørregade

These pictures were taken last night, being the early morning of 2nd Dec. 2010. As you can see, Denmark is in the grip of winter again, and as in previous years, we seem to be getting one of those white Christmas's which we were led to believe would never again happen. Global warming or just global clueless? You can't see it in the photographs because they were taken with a long exposure time (about 2 seconds) but the air was full of big fat snow flakes.

Looking south along Gammel Munkegade

I had assumed that the snow would stop traffic again as it did a few days ago, but it didn't. We resolved to drive out to Freja's kindergarten (which is situated in Moesgaard forest) but alas, the car wouldn't start so we decided to take a taxi out there and drive back on the Kindergarten's own bus...

But first we had to pick up Magne at his day care centre which is situated in the middle of Aarhus, about three blocks from home. Mette called in good time to arrange a rendezvous with a taxi with a seat for a small child (timed for 14:50) and off we plodded through the snow.

I was well packed in, but the wind chill between the buildings was wicked and it seemed like the bad luck which had crippled the car was still stalking us. We reached the day care centre and picked up Magne who was a bit whiny, then positioned ourselves to await the arrival of the taxi, and waited... after fifteen minutes, with the cold biting at his face, Magne crapped out and started screaming. I can't really blame him, his nose had started running and once he started crying as well, his face was covered in slimy liquid which with the wind chill must have felt very painful. We wiped his face, and tried to cheer him up, but to no avail. Standing in the middle of the city with a howling child was not fun, and as we'd decided to take a taxi, we hadn't brought a pram or stroller. It became obvious that Magne wasn't going to make it and we decided to split up. I carried Magne home in my arms (he screamed all the way, much to other people's merriment) and Mette stayed to wait for the taxi...

Magne and I made it home and relaxed with bread rolls, milk and You Tube. Magne cheering up once we starting watching funny animal antics and Pocoyo. Mette however was left standing in the cold waiting for a taxi which finally arrived at 15:20. It took a further 15 minutes to reach the xmas party, by which time, all the coffee, gløg (a sort of Danish xmas wine) and food was gone, and poor little Freja was in a pitiful state, believing herself to have been forgotten. Since she has spent the last few weeks practicing a song she was to sing for the occasion, it was particularly hard for her to think she'd been abandoned. Mette told me, Freja was beside herself with happiness when she saw her freezing mother finally trudge up the hill to reach the kindergarten. (Poor pregant Mette). I wasn't too happy about it either as I'd looked forward to seeing Freja sing the traditional 'Sankte Lucier' song. Not sure how its spelled, but its a song which kids sing at xmas whilst holding candles.

We all ended up safe and warm at the end of the day, though we found Freja's feet were soaking wet and freezing cold when she took her boots off. I fixed this by wrapping us both up in a duvet on the sofa with her feet pressed against my legs so she could heat up. We watched 'Emil from Lønneberg' whilst Magne walked about with a pirate pistol and made funny shooting noises.

If you don't know 'Emil from Lønneberg', it is a Swedish children's story by Astrid Lindgren (the grand old lady of Swedish children's literature), and was televised back in the early 1970's. As hero children go, you can't get much better than Emil!

Every one's gone to bed now, and I've just finished the write up from yesterdays Takshendal game. We've switched gaming evenings to Wednesdays as Thursday has become untenable for the foreseeable future. Tomorrow is another day, and now its time for a last track from the Balkans and then off to bed...