Not Turning Scandinavian

I don't think I am turning Scandinavian. After all, there is no evidence for this. Heikki Kovalainen, for example, has a tiny face in a big head, and I have a big face in a tiny head. My home is a bit Scandinavian, but it is not all white furniture and floorboards.

I like Iittala products, so all the glassware and cutlery comes from them and some other pottery. I have a few things from IKEA and to be honest, I sort of enjoy walking around the store because it is exactly the same all over the world, and I can forget I am on in a retail park on the outskirts of Edinburgh. I met a Dane called Dita Bang. It's the kind of name you cannot make up. She is incredibly, not a stripper. I love the music of the Scandinavian and Baltic countries, and could easily do without all the other classical stuff I have. I became a fan of ABBA later on in life. The first time around I was fashionably and, mistakenly scathing. Little did I realise that Benny Bjorn Agnetha and Frida were producing modern Scandinavian-influenced folk music that will still be around 100 years from now, long after Oasis and the Arctic Monkeys have been forgotten and buried.

The Finns are of course traditionally mournful. You probably think it is the suicide capital of the world. Think again! In the years between 1992 and 1997 the suicide rate dropped by a whopping 40%. Men are four times as likely to top themselves as women. However, the Finns are still twice as suicidal as the Norwegians, who are a lot more suicidal than us Brits. I have been feeling suicidal for about 35 years, so I am not entirely sure my heart is in it, and therefore, that is further proof that I am not turning Scandinavian.

Please do not get the impression I am concerned about this. My liking for Norwegian jumpers and Fjallraven anoraks is not something one needs to get on an NHS waiting list for. Even my addiction to pickled herrings can be managed most of the time.

No, so I am probably not turning Scandinavian, but I yearn so very deeply, for a sauna and a good beating with some birch twigs.

Meanwhile, here is a track that sums up the last weeks and the next few; inundated with visitors (I must stress, people I like and love) but visitors all the same, which handily sums up all I like about the Fab Swedish Four: