In the highly improbable event that someone in the dim and distant future writes my life story, the aforementioned biographer can note that 9th July 2024 was the date and Røsdalsfjellet was the location that I officially felt properly old for the first time. Obviously there have been a few other clues, such as the very depressing bald patch, but there was no escaping the fact that age was catching up with me that day. The ‘joke’ goes that I do go a very good pace on our Tirsdagtur and that Solveig and Einar try and reduce my tempo by offering me “just one more” slice of lasagne/cake/ pancake before we go. Of course I could say no but….
On 9th July their son and some of his family joined us and goodness me the grand daughter was fast! Stein and her started off at a good pace and a wee while into the tur I decided that I’d like to catch up. Alas, ‘twas not to be - despite my best efforts I got nowhere near them. In fact, it was such hard work that just below the summit I stopped to catch my breath and wipe the two large trails of sweat off the sides of my face as I didn’t want to show how knackered I really was in front of the troops.
Didn’t bother even trying to keep up on the way down, and just had a nice chat (mainly in Norwegian) with Øystein instead. Amazingly, a few minutes after we had reached the bottom, Øystein‘s son turned up with his dad’s car keys which he had found on the trail. I did suggest that we go to Breivika to see if he could do the same with my Mariner’s cap….
One of the things that I love about the way of life in Norway, is the interconnectedness of things. When I was sorting out my mortgage, the inevitable question of insurance arose. Now Mr Stevenson, we can offer you a wonderful deal if you have your house/ contents/ travel/ car insurance with us. Memories of various phone calls back and forth as companies tried to match/better deals when trying to cancel things but it just seems to “happen” here. One car insurance stops and the other one takes over without any hassle. Of course I was worried that it ws my naïveté but no, all seemed to switch over swimmingly. And I was very impressed with the travel insurance, as I touched down in Aberdeen in June I got a message saying we see you’re in Scotland, here’s the numbers you hopefully won’t need….Same with the TV subscriptions, I already had Disney TV but it came free with my new subscription and my worries about how I was going to deal with that were dispelled instantly as within seconds of my new subscriptions I got a message saying that “we see what you’ve done and your payments are suspended”. Though obviously in much more professional language than that.
As I settle into my new pad in Bjørn, I’m gradually adding to the contents as and when I discover I need them eg eggcups/ water jug etc. As well as the wonderful fleamarket in Sandnessjøen, I have been using all the different little local Facebook groups to buy things. They are fantastic little sites where you can pick up useful things at very cheap prices that a new house owner requires eg a rather natty German World War II map of the local area. If there’s one thing I’m a sucker for it’s an old map. Obviously it’s not that old but I hope to get it framed and have that on one side of hallway downstairs and a “ye olde mappe” of Scotland for the other side. The other purchase I have made so far is a spin bike so that when it gets dark and my 10000 steps a day are harder to get…
Also, at this time of year, there are lots of posts from the local young people offering to do work to raise funds for their school trips the following years. Until I bought my own place I have never required the services but one of the posts I saw was the daughter of a friend who had helped with my move so I thought the least I could do was…. So bless her cotton socks she came across and cut the grass in front of the house. It was hard work as it hadn’t been cut in years and my lawnmower isn’t exactly top of the range but nonetheless she did a great job and it’s now much easier for me to keep on top of. Mind you, I was (irrationally I hope) embarrassed about the fact I had paid someone else to do the grass so when Sigrid came past, I rushed across to explain that it wasn’t laziness on my part but I was doing my bit for fundraising.
Very excitingly my house got its new roof this month - was very pleased with the work they did and the place was left immaculate when they finished. The old roof didn't look too bad but a/ there had been leaks and b/ Morten told me that there were nowhere near enough nails in the roofing and if there had been a particularly strong gust from the wrong direction I would find myself with a convertible house.
It probably doesn’t sound like it sometimes, but I still do actually work on the organ playing front. There have been a number of weddings with a wide variety of music - for one I played a medley of Bridal March from Lohengrin mixed with the music from Far Horizons - Skyrim. On other occasions I do feel the need to put my foot down and say “no”. One couple wanted an arrangement of a Coldplay song to go out to - I felt bad but I had to say it will sound terrible on the organ (and that’s not taking into account that the organ isn’t in the best shape) and it would still sound terrible but less so on the piano. But we’ve got a rather nifty sound system in Herøy so if the bridal couple have a particulary unusual music request, it’s usually quite a simple thing to play Spotify (other music services are available) through Bluetooth. Another advantage of doing it this way that if they want the something special on the way out, I can actually get out before they reach the back. I should make it clear that I do wait until the music has started just to make sure that all is well!
Non musical related, we even had a dog at one of the weddings. I thought it was bit unusual to have a dog to start with, then I noticed it was dressed in a bridal outfit… transpires it was the ring bearer. Bless it’s cotton socks, or more accurately its white tutu, it did do its job admirably even if it did take its time meandering up to the altar past all the pews. I suppose on the plus side it didn’t mistake any of the pews for a tree…
Once a year we go out to Gåsvær for a service. If you read my posts from my first year you make recall that it is the place with the terrible instruments. And unbelievably by the time we depated the island, they were even worse.
I learned much more about the island from Trine this time - it’s uninhabited most of the time and the houses are just used as holiday homes. If I picked it up correctly, the church was built with materials left over after the war by the Germans and transported up by some locals from Oslo. And it’s also one of the on-land places that one can take pictures with both Dønnaman and the Syv Søstre in it.
The church organise a small boat to take people from Sandnessjøen and Dønna/Herøy and between us and the holiday makers there must have been 30/40 people there? It was spectacularly hot, so much so that I forewent my usual shirt/tie combo and went for T-shirt/shorts. I’ve been working to try and bit of colour in my legs this year (it has been very sunny this year) and bought a few pairs of shorts in a sale. I’ve been told they look ok but I’m permanently paranoid that I look like “Frasier going into Bad Billy’s” (if you know the episode, you’ll know the look). Despite the sun I was still wearing a dark t-shirt which was not ideal and one of the ladies questioned my bold wardrobe choice. I explained that most of my T-shirts have some statement on them and I didn't feel that “partying Star Wars stormtroopers” or “American Cold War spy planes” were really the sort of thing one should be displaying while working in a church. Course the real reason is that I’m permanently concerned about my appalling lack of hand - cake - mouth coordination and figure any mishaps are hidden easier on a dark clothing.
As mentioned above this is the place with the 3 terrible harmoniums but this year I was prepared. Hours were not spent consulting the lectionary for appropriate chorale preludes or such like - rather, minutes were spent counting the bars in various pieces. I eventually settled on a prelude by Carl Nielsen that was a grand total of 8 bars. Even then I felt that it was a tad on the lengthy side for the instrument but hey ho. After surviving the prelude, I pressed on into the first hymn and that’s when things deteriorated from an already spectacularly low level. As I was pumping the pedals on the instrument with all my might there was an almighty crash as one of them gave way under my enthusiastic stomping. I was then left with one pedal with which to provide all the air. An already asthmatic sounding instrument sounded even worse. At the conclusion of the hymn I moved to the next harmonium. The problem with this one was that the high F# was stuck on permanently and if you so much glanced at the bass Eb, the Eb the octave below that would stick on for a few bars. Not so bad if the piece was actually in Eb but inevitably most of them weren’t.
And then there was the saga of hymn no. 299. As I was struggling with this terrible instrument, pedalling away with all my might, there was a dawning awareness that absolutely nobody singing. They obviously hadn’t a scooby what I was playing. Credit where credit is due, some of the congregation after a couple of verses, made a valiant attempt to try and sing this melody that was previously unknown to them. A post mortem after the service revealed that that while I was playing no. 299 the congregation were trying to sing no. 280. The first line of both hymns are the same and unfortunately Hilde had typed the wrong number. Of course if I’d looked beyond the first line I would have noticed. Pretty sure I’ll not let that happen again though!
As mentioned above, it was a spectacularly hot day and the heat was too much for one person who passed out during the service. She was well looked after by the people surrounding her and they eventually got her on the floor so that she could stretch out and the ambulance boat was called. Very wisely the service was brought to a premature conclusion (though I’m sure my boss was pleased that all this excitement happened after the collection was taken). Before we left Herøy, I was told that this service was possibly the best for kirkekafe as there is a certain amount of competition to outdo each other and who am I to complain? That being said, I have to admit to a certain uncomfortableness as we stepped round the poor lady on the floor to get to the coffee/ cake. And the guilt didn’t go away when I went back the second time.
She did recover though and by the time the boat arrived she was sitting up though they still did take her off just to make sure she was ok.
As well as the regular services throughout the summer I’ve also been doing a series of Wednesday concerts throughout July and will continue until the end of August. It does give me a chance to play pieces that are either inappropriate or a bit too long for a service.
Sabine also had the idea of doing a “balcony concert” - she lives by the water now so the plan was that people could bring their chairs and sit on the quay side or on the other side of the water and listen to us. A much lighter programme than our previous ones and it seemed to go down very well. At least 40 or so people. Who would have thought that a programme of “popular” music would be 10x more appealing that a programme of Bach music? Haha. The wind was a bit stronger than we had hoped but once Sabine had put a sock over the microphone for the clarinet it all seemed fine.
Still get nervous every time I see Take Five though.
This month’s blogpost title comes courtesy of Duolingo - another useful phrase I have learned this week.
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