{"id":2955,"date":"2009-08-10T18:52:35","date_gmt":"2009-08-10T22:52:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/?p=2955"},"modified":"2009-08-10T18:52:35","modified_gmt":"2009-08-10T22:52:35","slug":"weekend-report-panscandinavian-edition","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/?p=2955","title":{"rendered":"Weekend report, pan-Scandinavian edition"},"content":{"rendered":"

Sunday was the biennial<\/strong> (I just realized I\u2019ve finally figured out when to use \u201cbiennial\u201d and when to use \u201csemiannual.\u201d Unless, of course, I\u2019m mistaken) Walker Family Reunion.<\/p>\n

This year\u2019s big innovation was a family worship service, in the Old Stone Church which I\u2019ve written about before here<\/a>. In a way this wasn\u2019t entirely appropriate, since the Walkers moved to Kenyon after the new building in town had been built, so we never worshiped in the O.S.C. But I was happy to cooperate anyway, because I just love doing anything in that historic pioneer building.<\/p>\n

My brother and a cousin of my dad\u2019s, both pastors, did the sermons. My job was to lead the service. It was a bit of a \u201cdog\u2019s breakfast,\u201d as the English say, because I didn\u2019t have the opportunity to coordinate beforehand with the people doing the music (guitar, harp and violin. The violin would have scandalized the people who built the church. To them, the fiddle was \u201cthe devil\u2019s tool\u201d). But we got through it, and everyone seemed to have enjoyed it. <\/p>\n

My brother climbed up into the high pulpit to preach. Our cousin, an elderly man, just looked at it and shook his head.<\/p>\n

I based the service on the old service we grew up with at our church. I thought the old folks would appreciate the chance to do it again. I didn\u2019t anticipate that most of the old folks are gone now, and many of the people in the congregation were too young to remember that service.<\/p>\n

Ah well.<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s an odd thing that was first brought to my attention by Aitchmark. It\u2019s become something of a sensation in Sweden these days. The commercial (as you can see) features a rather gaunt model, singing a lovely, minor-key Swedish folk song, while different kinds of weather buffet her. They\u2019re advertising a skin cream. The idea is that Apoliva protects you in the four-season arrangement Swedes have to live with.
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What\u2019s made the commercial news is that (apparently, unless it\u2019s just a publicity stunt) a number of Swedes are complaining that seeing it terrifies them and is giving them bad dreams.<\/p>\n

I have to agree that the ad is a little weird. The model goes from looking lovely (in an anorexic way) to looking rather sinister. However, it hasn\u2019t given me any bad dreams.<\/p>\n

But then I\u2019m Norwegian and Dane, not some sissy Swede.
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Sunday was the biennial (I just realized I\u2019ve finally figured out when to use \u201cbiennial\u201d and when to use \u201csemiannual.\u201d Unless, of course, I\u2019m mistaken) Walker Family Reunion. This year\u2019s big innovation was a family worship service, in the Old Stone Church which I\u2019ve written about before here. In a way this wasn\u2019t entirely appropriate, … Continue reading Weekend report, pan-Scandinavian edition<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2955","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2955","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2955"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2955\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2955"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2955"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2955"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}