MY MOTHER-IN-LAW (2)

My mother-in-law turned 80 today, so congratulations to her.

Being 80, deciding how to celebrate the day became a complicated affair. There is a party in two weeks' time for her immediate family (20+), plus siblings (being one of 11, there are many of them); and close friends and neighbours were invited to brunch this morning. But what to do on the day itself if you are a member of the immediate family but not a friend or neighbour (i.e. like me)? The answer was one of those curious Danish social customs which I am learning to navigate after 25 years of experience. Although not officially invited to anything, we were supposed to turn up unannounced for afternoon coffee at the rather precise time of 15.00. Don't ask me how I was supposed to know this, I just was.

Such customs are in fact more widespread than you might imagine, particularly in rural areas. It reminded me a bit of the golden wedding I went to some years ago (of my wife's aunt and uncle). People turned up early in the morning to sing for them as a surprise. We were then invited to eat and drink something in a house which was miraculously decked out for 30+ guests at 8.00 am.

As a foreigner, this can be confusing. However, as I say, I have had 25 years of getting used to it. So I was at my mother-in-law's - quite by chance, of course - at 15.00 sharp, and thoroughly enjoyed the coffee, buns and cake that just happened to be there.

Walter Blotscher

MORTGAGE INTEREST RATES (3)

Back in April I was gobsmacked at how low mortgage interest rates could go. Today I am even more gobsmacked.

The rate on the so-called F1 loan (a variable rate mortgage in which the rate is set once a year) has fallen to 0.11% for 2014 at Nordea Kredit and 0.15% at NyKredit/Total Kredit. That means that with charges you can borrow kr.1 million and only have to pay around kr.500 a month after tax.

This is starting to get ridiculous.

Walter Blotscher

MINCE PIES

The school where I work has a Christmas market each year. The pupils make various things, and the proceeds go to charity. Being English I thought that I should contribute with something English. What represents an English Christmas better than mince pies?

Before we could make them, I had to overcome a cultural misunderstanding. I told the head of the kitchen that I would be using mincemeat (sent from the U.K., since it is not available here), which made her all nervous. Apparently there are lots of Danish health and safety rules in a school when you are dealing with meat, and she didn't realise that mincemeat has nothing to do with meat!

Sorting that out took a while, and then this evening we were ready to go. A team of seven put together 45 mince pies which will be sold on Sunday. Two were slightly broken, so we divided them up between us. Not as good as my mum's, but still pretty good for a first ever attempt.

Walter Blotscher

SORG OG GLÆDE

What do you do when your wife kills your 9-month old daughter with a kitchen knife in a fit of depression? That's the theme of Sorg og Glæde ("Grief and Happiness"), the new film by the well-known Danish director Nils Malmros. It's particularly relevant for Malmros, since that is exactly what his own wife did in 1984 to their baby. They are still together, though they have never had any other children.

Such a personal tragedy could have made the film sentimental, mawkish even. Reviews were mixed, the one in my paper rather damning. I saw it this evening and thought it was rather good. If you know the story and how it pans out, then the whole thing hangs on the quality of the acting, the cutting, the cinematography. And they were all excellent.

It also seems to appeal to the locals in my home town. A full house last night, around 50 tonight, a wet Wednesday at the end of November. Gravity from tomorrow, the Counselor next week, Hunger Games 2 before Christmas. They will all be rather different.

Walter Blotscher

IT'S ALL ABOUT BATHS

The current Danish Government is a three-party left-of-centre coalition, reliant for its Parliamentary majority on the support of the very left-wing Enhedslisten. However, that support has been less and less forthcoming in the course of the Government's two-year life, mainly because Enhedslisten thinks (rightly, in my view) that the Government has been ignoring it.

One area of politics where Danish minority Governments always face pressure is on the Budget. If a Budget is not passed, then it automatically leads to a vote of confidence; which, if lost, results in a fresh general election. So, for the past two months, the Social Democratic Finance Minister has been having endless discussions with Enhedslisten about what should be in the 2014 Budget. Those discussions have intensified in the past week because of the combination of a deadline for getting the bill ready and the results of last week's local elections. Enhedslisten had a good local election, and wanted to use that result as a springboard for putting their fingerprints all over the Budget.

In the end, it all came down (somewhat surrealistically) to a discussion about baths; should the elderly in an old people's home have the right to have a bath or a shower at least twice a week enshrined in law or not? The Government said no; matters to do with the elderly fall to local authorities, and although the Government was prepared to provide more money for the elderly in the form of block grants, it was not prepared to tell an individual local authority precisely how that money should be spent. Enhedslisten, on the other hand, wanted the right enshrined in law, not least because promises to give money to particular local authority areas have not always resulted in money being spent in these areas. It may seem bizarre that the Budget for a whole country should hang by such a thin thread; but hang it did, and there was no agreement when talks between the two sides broke up earlier today.

Enhedslisten does not have to present a Budget, but the Finance Minister does. So it was not so surprising that less than six hours later, he had stitched up a Budget deal with the right-wing opposition. The extra money for the elderly was still on the table, but he had to swallow some tax cuts and other goodies in order to get it through.

Why did the opposition agree to pass a Budget, why didn't they go for a vote of confidence instead? The judgement is almost certainly the one that if they had done that, then the Government and Enhedslisten would have made up and supported each other. Better to let the mistrust between the Government and its nominal support turn more and more bitter. The next general election is less than two years away, and the opposition can afford to wait.

Walter Blotscher

EXPENSIVE PROPERTY

Kensington and Chelsea is an inner London borough much favoured as a place to live by wealthy Brits, royalty, and foreign billionaires. The properties there are some of the most expensive in the U.K.

Just how expensive was brought home to me by a statistic I read the other day. The tax paid on home sales in that borough in the 2012-13 fiscal year exceeded the tax paid on all home sales in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland put together.

I can safely say that I will never live in Kensington and Chelsea.

Walter Blotscher

IT'S NOT OVER UNTIL IT'S OVER

One of the great things about sport is that until the final whistle blows, anything can happen. Two rugby matches this weekend proved that point yet again.

On Saturday, England played New Zealand at Wembley in the semi-final of the rugby league World Cup. New Zealand, the holders, had had a great tournament, scoring almost at will. But England have improved recently and really felt that they had a chance. It was a bruising contest, with England starting well, followed by New Zealand coming back and going ahead. Then, with 13 minutes to go, England scored a converted try to lead 18-14. The last period was frenetic, as New Zealand threw everything at the English defence, which held. Until a high tackle on a New Zealand forward led to a penalty and one last chance for the visitors. Shaun Johnson somehow eluded two England players to score a try to level the scores at 18-18; and then kicked the decisive conversion for a 20-18 result with the last kick of the game.

Today the New Zealand All Blacks were taking on Ireland at rugby union. The All Blacks are world champions and were aiming to become the first team in the professional era to win all their test matches in a calendar year. In 109 years of trying, Ireland have never beaten them, losing 26 of 27 matches, with only one draw back in 1973. However, New Zealand had nearly lost to England last weekend and were looking a bit end-of-season tired. Ireland came out roaring, scored three tries and led 19-0. New Zealand fought back gradually, but Ireland defended doggedly and it was still 22-17 as the clock ran down. With 30 seconds left, New Zealand were awarded a penalty, decided to run it, and finally scored a try almost two minutes after normal time (in rugby union the game continues after normal time until the first stoppage, and the try was the first stoppage). Aaron Cruden missed the conversion; but the Irish had run out too quickly, he was allowed to take it again, and he made it, giving New Zealand a 24-22 win.

If you were a New Zealand rugby fan, it must have been a great weekend. For everyone else, it was just great to watch.

Walter Blotscher

LOCAL ELECTIONS

There were a number of themes that came out of Tuesday's local elections for Denmark's 98 kommuner (local authorities) and 5 regions.

The first was a collective "fed-up'ness" with the current 3-party coalition minority national Government, reflected in the collapse of the Socialists' vote from 14.5% to 5.6%. Many of those votes went to the very left-wing Enhedslisten, up from 2.3% to 6.9%, which tends to support the Government and thereby give it a Parliamentary majority. It must be galling for the Socialists that locally, the Enhedslisten is now the bigger party.

The second trend was that although the national Government is unpopular, the main opposition party Venstre could not really take advantage. They increased their share of the vote from 24.8% to 26.6%; but after two years of opinion polls in the mid-30's, they were expecting more. The reason for that was party Chairman Lars Løkke Rasmussen's travel expenses.

The third trend was that the Social Democrats under Prime Minister Helle Thorning-Schmidt did better than expected (and many in the party had feared), falling only from 30.7% to 29.5%. Voters on its right-wing probably left and went to the opposition; but that was offset by voters on its left-wing who ditched the Socialists and could not stomach Enhedslisten. Furthermore, they retained the mayor's office in all four of the countries biggest cities, Copenhagen, Aarhus, Odense and Aalborg.

The fourth was the continuing rise of the Danish People's Party, a rise which has been almost continuous since its founding in 1995. The DPP is now the third largest party in local politics, and secured its first ever mayoral office, in Copenhagen (the capital has a super-mayor and a number of mayors).

The mayor's office is powerful in Denmark, since it is the only full-time job on the council and the mayor sets the political agenda. Who gets it is decided by a majority, and since it is very rare for one party to get an absolute majority, coalitions are the norm. Because of the intricacies of those coalitions, the Social Democrats and Venstre tend to end up with most of the mayors. In 2009, it was 49-31 (i.e. 80 out of 98); this time, it has turned around and is now 33-48. Most of the rest are held by the Conservatives, in local pockets of affluence. Despite their vote's falling from 11% to 8.6%, they held all of them, so they were another happy party.    

Pulling all that together, it looks as if the national election in 2 years' time will be closer than it might have been. Local councils have much more influence in Denmark than (say) the U.K., and the Social Democrats' showing in particular will have done the Government a power of good. It is still looking like there will be a change of Government, but not a landslide change.

Walter Blotscher

DANISH POLITICS (8)

The GGGI saga simply refuses to go away, and today claimed its first major political victim, when Development Minister Christian Friis Bach resigned.

Mr. Friis Bach is the minister charged with overseeing the kr.90m of taxpayers' money that has been poured into this organisation, and sits on its board. When details first emerged of GGGI Chairman Lars Løkke Rasmussen's extravagant travel costs, Mr. Friis Bach categorically denied, both to the general public and - even more important - to Parliament that he knew anything about Mr. Rasmussen's extraordinary travel rights and had not been present when the GGGI Board had approved the rules.

This turns out not to be true. He was there when the Budget was approved, and the travel rules were an appendix to that Budget. He had read the Budget, but had not read the appendices, and did not realise that in approving the Budget, he had also approved the rules. When the scandal broke, Mr. Friis Bach asked his officials on a number of occasions whether they were sure that he had not approved the rules, and they said no, thereby making the same mistake as he had.

Politicians on both sides of the political divide are saying that it is a shame that he has resigned (which was an entirely personal decision), and that it is all the fault of those officials. Mr. Friis Bach is well-liked, and is apparently a very good minister. I have less sympathy. Board positions carry responsibilities, foremost of which must be to read what is put in front of you as a basis for a decision. I used to be a civil servant and ministerial private secretary 25 years ago. The civil service could tolerate bad behaviour from a minister, intolerance, ingratitude and much else. The only thing it couldn't tolerate was a minister who did not read the brief. Mr. Bach Friis' experience shows why.

Walter Blotscher

NEW WORDS

One of the consequences of the internet is the spread of new words in the English language. Oxford Dictionaries, who know a thing or two about words, has just crowned "selfie" as 2013's word of the year. Apparently it means a photo taken of yourself and put onto social media. The new pope took one in August, which subsequently went viral.

Other shortlisted words included schmeat (a form of meat synthetically produced from biological tissue), twerk (the dance routine made famous by Miley Cyrus), binge-watch (watching lots of TV),  showrooming (looking at a product physically before buying it online) and bitcoin (the virtual currency which may or may not take off in the future).

I can safely say that although I use a fair number of words, not least in this blog, I have never used any of the above.

Walter Blotscher

MOVEMBER (2)

I promised pictures of how my November moustache would turn out. The students opted for a Pancho Villa Mexican-style moustache, plus sideburns.

I look dreadful, I know; as my wife succinctly put it, "you look a complete prat". But it is in a good cause, and only for 10 more days.

Walter Blotscher

A BIG FINE (2)

J.P.Morgan is busily settling all over the place.US$5.1 billion with the U.S. housing regulator, and US$4.5 billion to investors, who bought its mortgage securities. The proposed US$13 billion settlement with the Justice Department will be finalised soon.

US$22 billion and counting. And this is just in respect of one business in one country. Incredible.

Walter Blotscher

A REVOLUTION

A revolution is going on in Denmark. Not on the streets, but in the voting booths.

The cause is the Friday evening programme "Vild Med Dans" ("wild about dance"), the Danish equivalent of Strictly Come Dancing, and in particular the performance of Allan Simonsen. Simonsen, now 60, was a very good Danish football player in the 1970's and 1980's. In 1977, he was chosen as European footballer of the year, ahead of Kevin Keegan, even though Keegan's Liverpool had beaten Simonsen's Borussia Mönchengladbach in the final of that year's European Cup. Simonsen remains the only Scandinavian to have won the award.

Sportspeople are usually good at the dance format, being fit, naturally competitive, and in control of their bodies. The cricketers Mark Ramprakash and Darren Gough have won in the U.K.; and the shotputter Joachim B. Olesen and skier Sophie Fjellvang-Sølling have won here. But there's a problem with Simonsen, he can't dance for toffee. He makes me look positively elegant, something my daughter would think was nigh on impossible.  

Normally, the judges go easy on people who are really bad. But Simonsen was so bad that the exasperated experts ended up being rather rude. That in turn provoked a reaction, which has spread like wildfire on social media such as Facebook and Twitter; no matter how bad Simonsen is, vote for him. Since the rules of the programme mean that viewers' SMS's carry more weight than the views of the judges, it means that Simonsen has cruised through round after round, even though he can't dance at all. More talented, and more obviously talented, contestants have had to leave.

I haven't watched this year's series, since apart from Simonsen, I hadn't heard of any of the other contestants. But I note that the Danish revolution continues; after tonight's programme, he is through to the semi-final.

Danish commentators see in all this a desire by Mr. and Mrs. Average Dane to give the powers-that-be a good kicking, a desire that is not confined to dance programmes. The local elections on Tuesday look like producing similar results.

Walter Blotscher

ELECTION PRESSURE

The Danish papers today are full of the word Im, the name of a cute 7-year old girl, who was deported to Thailand on Sunday. Im and her mother are both Thai, and came to Denmark four years ago (i.e. when Im was three) because her mother married a Danish man. Unfortunately, that man died of cancer in May 2012. Thereafter, a series of authorities and courts have decided that the mother and daughter have a greater attachment to Thailand than to Denmark, and so should be sent back there. Which has now happened.

The sight on prime-time television of a cute little girl, who has spent nearly all of her life in Denmark and speaks fluent Danish, crying at the airport on the way to a country she barely knows, and all (and only) because her dad died unexpectedly, has provoked a strong reaction from the average Dane, particularly on social media. Normally politicians are hard-hearted about this sort of thing; but there are local elections next Tuesday, and no political party wants to be seen to be callous in the week leading up to them. In the space of 24 hours, the Justice Minister went from saying that nothing could be done, through the law could be changed but only for future cases, to the law could be changed with retrospective effect, but only if all political parties agreed. This last was a challenge to the right-wing and anti-immigrant Danish People's Party to put down a veto and take the consequences. But the DPP avoided the trap, and signed up.

Everybody said that they were merely closing a loophole in the law, namely hard cases caused by a premature death; Im is only one of 4 or 5 similar cases who will now be rescued and allowed to come back to Denmark. However, in the way of these things, people started to dig; and it turns out that there could be up to 1,000 cases over the past years, where foreigners have been quietly deported the death of the Dane. As I say, politicians are normally hard-hearted; but as I also say, there are elections next week.

Walter Blotscher  

EXPENSIVE TRINKETS

Two objects sold for eye-watering prices today.

Yesterday in New York, a tryptich painting by Francis Bacon of his friend and fellow artist Lucian Freud was sold for a whopping US$142 million. While in Geneva today a diamond called the Pink Star went for a slightly less huge US$83m.

Both were sold at auction, a structure which can drive up prices; but even so. The thing about these two trinkets is that you can't do anything with them, you can only look at them. And my problem is that I just can't imagine getting US$100 million worth of satisfaction from looking at anything.

Walter Blotscher

POPULATION GROWTH

Most European countries are predicted to have shrinking populations over the next 50 to 100 years. This will give problems, as there are fewer people of working age to take care of all of those pensioners.

One exception is the United Kingdom, whose population is growing and is predicted to continue to do so. Indeed, within a generation the U.K. will become the most populous country in the E.U., overtaking Germany, whose population is already shrinking. Whether that makes the Brits more amenable to Europe, is however, doubtful.

What is driving this growth is not the Brits themselves, but immigrants of one kind or another. The number of Brits has been stable since the beginning of the 1990's at around 52 million, but the number of non-native residents has gone up from 4.3 million in 1995 to 13.4 million in 2001. Many of these are from other European countries, Poland for instance.

Immigrants tend to do jobs that natives don't want to do; a London household without a Polish cleaner or plumber would be an oddity. However, they also increase pressure for housing on what is already a very crowded country. One of the reasons why the property market in the south east barely noticed the financial crisis in 2008.

That pressure is also contributing to a backlash against foreigners in all forms. With Bulgarians and Romanians eligible to come to the U.K. next year, British society is going to face challenges in the coming decades.

Walter Blotscher

CLEARING UP

I have been clearing up after the storm a couple of weeks ago. Chopping up the two trees that fell over in the garden, and sweeping up endless wheelbarrow-loads of leaves.

Not clearing up in the same way as (say) people in the Philippines have been doing. But it's still cold, wet, hard work, and I will be glad when it's finished.

Walter Blotscher

A.P.McCOY (3)

The jump jockey A.P.McCoy rode his 4,000th winner this week, a record which is unlikely to be beaten. The 18-time champion's nearest competitor Richard Johnson is way back on 2,567, so there is quite a margin.

I have to admit to feeling rather sorry for Johnson. In most sports, he would be a champion in his own right, but he has finished runner-up to McCoy in the jockeys' championship no less than 15 times. That must be hard to deal with.

Walter Blotscher

FREE DENTISTRY

My sister-in-law, after training as a kindergarten teacher and working in social affairs for the local council, has changed course at the age of 40 and decided to train as a dental technician. As part of her training, she needed a few guinea pigs on whom she could practice her teeth-cleaning skills. Since it was free and I am family, I volunteered.

I have very crooked teeth, a legacy of my youth, when braces were painful, injections were virtually unknown and gas was common. So cleaning my teeth to get rid of the build-up of gunk is not easy. My regular dentist obviously finds this sort of thing desperately tedious, so he does it in 10 minutes flat; which in turn means I tend to sweat a lot while he does it and end up with sore gums. My sister-in-law, being a beginner and wanting to do it properly, took a leisurely two hours, which was fine by me.

After the cleaning there was further practice with x-rays, including a panoramic view of my head. That was worth doing, since she found a tooth, which looked as if it had become infected. It was only after she pointed this out that I (and she) noticed that the tooth in question was in fact a bit loose. So that's going to have to come out next Thursday, unless of course it comes out of its own accord before then.

Unfortunately, because my sister-in-law isn't yet in the tooth-extracting business, that won't be free. I suppose you can't have everything.

Walter Blotscher

DANISH POLITICS (7)

It seems that the hole into which former Prime Minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen has dug himself gets bigger and bigger. The 20 October press conference, at which he presented details of all his first-class travel and hotel costs, was supposed to be the definitive end to the story. Unfortunately, as journalists pored over the bills and expense claims in the following days, the story refused to die. In particular, they came across one glaring inconsistency. Mr. Rasmussen swore at the press conference that he had never received cash per diems from GGGI, the organisation in question, which he had jetted around the world promoting. This turns out not to be true.

The amounts involved (under US$1,000) are trivial, particularly when set in the context of those first-class airfares. But they matter for three reasons. First, Mr. Rasmussen should have reported them to the authorities. Danish ex-Prime Ministers, who run the risk of being out of a job from one day to another, are given a generous state salary. However, that salary is reduced krone for krone by any other income that the person does in fact earn (in other words, if they get a well-paid business job, then they don't need the state salary). By not declaring those per diems, Mr. Rasmussen is in effect getting more from the state than he should.

Secondly, in certain circumstances, those per diems are taxable. So, again, by not declaring them, Mr. Rasmussen is not paying the requisite amount of tax.

Possibly cheating the state and possibly not paying taxes are bad things for any Danish politician to do. Which brings me to the third reason. Mr. Rasmussen is single-handedly undermining his own credibility as a once-and-future Prime Minister, and harming all of the right-wing opposition parties, for whom a great part of their electability is their supposedly strong economic and financial management. It's not a pretty sight.

Walter Blotscher  

SICK WORKERS

Denmark already has some of the most generous work and holiday arrangements in the world. The working week is 37 hours, and is rigidly enforced (in the sense that overtime is either very expensive for an employer, or people get time off in lieu). And most people get 30 days holiday a year in addition to public holidays.

However, holidays are not the only time when an employer doesn't see his or her employees, that also happens when they are sick. Which happens quite a lot. The average private sector employee had almost 7 full days off through sickness in 2011; in the public sector it was just over 12. In "caring" functions, such as hospitals and old people's homes, it is even higher, at more than 15 days. Put that all together, and an old people's home can expect its staff to be completely away for almost three months of the year on average, or a quarter of the time.

Such loss of time puts a huge premium on efficiency; which in turn relies a lot on education and training. In the past, that has been Denmark's great strength, and the challenge for the future will be in maintaining a highly qualified workforce. Unfortunately, looking at the next generation, I am not convinced that they have what it takes to continue a high wage, high welfare society. That rigid 37-hour week is going to come under pressure, in my view.

Walter Blotscher

LIBERACE

In an age when virtually everyone famous behaves outrageously, it is hard to remember just how outrageous Liberace once seemed. Back in the 1970's and 1980's he held court in Las Vegas, performing almost nightly in an odd mix of wondrous piano playing and high camp. Middle-aged women in particular loved him, and were more than prepared to suspend disbelief and take him at his word as an eternal bachelor instead of the promiscuous gay man that he really was. Public homosexuality was widely believed to be the kiss of death in the entertainment industry in those days, particularly in America, and Liberace always denied that he was gay, suing newspapers who suggested otherwise and constructing a complex network of female friends and associates to try and prove otherwise. It was only when he died of an Aids-related illness that the truth came out. Again, it is hard to remember that people felt they had to do that sort of thing only 30 years ago.

Between the 1950's and the 1970's he was the highest-paid entertainer in the world, and his Las Vegas shows towards the end brought him in around US$300,000 a week. Much of the money was spent on extravagantly kitsch homes and clothes, huge fur coats and a mansion with pianos in every room. The greater the kitsch, the more his public loved him.

This evening my wife and I saw the new Steven Soderbergh film Behind The Candelabra, which charts the long-term relationship between Liberace and his boyfriend Scott Thorson. It's a workmanlike film, rather than a great one. However, Michael Douglas is brilliant as Liberace; expect him to be nominated for the best actor award at next year's Oscars.  

Walter Blotscher

OVERSAVING?

Denmark has been on a diet for the past five years. Nowhere more so than in the local authorities, who have been given orders by central government not to spend too much, while at the same time they have had to take on more duties.

Against that background, you would expect the kommuner to be short of money. Far from it, it turns out. They are currently sitting on a collective cash pile of almost Dkr.35 billion, which is more than the Dkr.30.7 billion they had at the end of 2008.

All organisations need to keep a reserve for liquidity purposes, but this is ridiculous. The kommune where I live has a reserve of Dkr.450 million, which is Dkr.11.000 (more than £1,200) for every citizen living here. Even that is is only the fifth biggest cash pile; Copenhagen has almost Dkr.16.000 per person in reserve.

Many people, and not just those of a left-wing persuasion, are questioning whether all this cash squirrelling is a good thing. At a time of both high unemployment and a need to repair and renovate roads and buildings, couldn't at least some of that cash be put to good purposes? Saving is one thing, oversaving is another.

Walter Blotscher

MOVEMBER

In recent years, a social movement has sprung up. In much the same way as sportsmen wear pink armbands in order to register their support for the fight against breast cancer, so in November they grow a moustache in order to register their support for the fight against prostate and testicular cancer.

One of my fellow teachers has a big, bushy beard and is keen on this. Having a full beard already, he raises money from the pupils by threatening to shave bits of it off in order to leave the most ridiculous combination (a privilege for which they pay, of course). He has also suborned all of the other male staff into either doing the same or growing a moustache during November. I have agreed.

Since I look a prat with a moustache, I too will grow a full beard, and then auction bits of it off. I started on Monday, and should be able to present something cut-able by the end of next week. Pictures promised.

Walter Blotscher