It’s been a busy month, as you’ll see, but it produced fewer photographs than I thought. That’s mainly because I took many shots every time I took a picture, so my camera roll was really long but after picking just the best version of each pic I wasn’t left with very many.
We left off with the last weekend in May, and it’s June 30th as I begin this post (Nana and Pop’s anniversary, sniff), so all the pictures here are from June, with the possible exception of this one:
That’s a picture Molli sent us to reassure us she was having a grand time downtown at the annual Distortion music festival. I don’t remember if that was May or June and forwarded phone pics aren’t datestamped in a way I can read.
With the weather improving as June neared, it was time for some seasonal yardwork. The hedges had gotten completely out of control, so I was proud of how I managed to give them something like an actual shape again.
I needed a picture to have one of the AI services I’d been working on create a virtual me, and I wanted a full virtual Greg so it had to be a full photo. And even though it’s awful and I ended up not using it, there are so few photos of me on this blog I thought I should include it.
. . . So it’s kind of ironic the very next picture just happens to be of me.
We were having dinner down at Mormor’s as a prelude to seeing Bad Boys: Ride or Die at a theatre down in Frederiksberg. The pics aren’t great, but at least I got some.
As for the movie: highly recommended to anyone who likes the Bad Boys franchise. Maddie and her Lucas enjoyed it as much as we did.
In addition to the seasonal yard work, we also did some seasonal housecleaning, including the removal of a lot of old artwork we no longer needed lying around.
Most of it was just crap—broken frames, old framed prints that couldn’t be removed from their frames, stuff like that. But we also finally jettisoned the canvas on which we’d let guests draw at our wedding reception. It was cute, but we were never going to frame it or hang it prominently, so we took some digital archival pictures of it and out it went.
Buh-bye, wedding reception artwork:
June in Denmark means long, long days, and on one of them the evening sky took on such an unusual hue I had to have pictures. At first I didn’t think they did justice to just how weird the world looked—like a scene from Dune or Tatooine—but looking at them again now, with fresh eyes, I think some of the weirdness does play.
Okay, that was kind of boring, but check out the next two—and remember, as the kids say, no filter:
Maddie spent a big chunk of her own savings to buy tickets to Metallica. Yes, Metallica. (She went with Josephine, but her Lucas and his dad were seated in the same section.)
During the Friday night concert (it was a two-part event, with one show Friday and one Sunday), I sent Maddie a text to see how it was going.
The summer green of Hareskov
And finally time to reclaim our summer living room.
I ride through several pedestrian and bike tunnels on my commute. For reasons I’ve never understood, some of them are lit with big circular neon lights on either side. They’re orange. It’s been like that for as long as I’ve been biking, so at least four years.
This month they suddenly got all colorful.
It’s a cool look, but if those lights are all orange again in July I’m going to be pissed. Spending a little money to make bike path tunnels a little more aesthetically attractive is understandable. But if this was just a Pride Month thing—well, Jesus, how about spending that money erasing all that graffiti (or on any of about a million other things that might provide more taxpayer value than something this stupid and unnecessary)?
Oh: and get off my lawn!
On Friday the 21st, about half of the Asheville branch of the family landed in Copenhagen, the second stop of their whirlwind tour of northern Europe.
It was only a 48-hour visit, so we kept Friday evening low key: we stayed in and had flæskesteg sandwiches. On Saturday we invaded Copenhagen. (And so did some lousy weather.)
Given that we only had one day to work with and that we wanted to share a lot of Copenhagen with Helen, Pam, and Roxie, we’d been planning to skip Tivoli: it didn’t seem worth all the expense for just a two-hour visit in lousy weather. But Maddie’s Lucas was kind enough to gift us three passes for Tivoli (as an employee he gets ten per year), so we were fortunate enough to be able to make the visit without it costing a fortune.
First stop? Bubble tea.
We did the usual: wandered around, did a few rides, and coerced a stranger into getting a picture with all of us in it.
And we fed those infernal fish.
It really is one of the most beautiful places in the world, even in crappy weather.
I tried to get pictures of Pam and Roxie on the Tik Tak. I must have taken about thirty shots without getting a single really good one. In fact, they were only even remotely visible in three of them. So here they are.
We all did the Galley Ships:
I tried to get a pic of the under-50 crowd on the Daemon, but stupidly arranged myself to take the picture in a spot where I thought the coaster would be coming straight at me—but turned out to go thundering by me in the opposite direction.
We left around 17:00, giving us a full two hours to make our way across town to Nyhavnskroen, where we had reservations for dinner.
I know, I know, it’s a lousy shot, but it was only intended as a group wave to Aunt Deb (or, given the crowd, cousin Deb or niece Deb).
It was a great dinner: a fantastic location, great atmosphere, good entertainment, and great food.
I declare a momentary moratorium on my No More Food Pix rule to share some of the dishes we enjoyed.
Besides our little party of six, that first floor dining room (second floor, American style) had three other much larger parties: a 70th or 80th birthday party, a gathering of about a dozen Chinese businessmen being wined and dined by two Danes, and, arriving about midway through our meal, a rowdy bachelor party.
It was all very festive and fun and I think the Asheville clan got a nice taste of Danish food and culture.
After dinner we just made our meandering way to Nørreport for the train back home: that’s how quickly the day went!
Back at the house we camped out on the terrace. It was the first time we’d spent an evening out there in the rain, but with the awning and the space heaters it was even more hyggelig than normal.
And just like that, as Forrest Gump would say, the visit was over.
There was only just enough time Sunday morning for breakfast and then a quick visit down to Shelter 214, where the hardest working barista in Denmark made us all some delicious coffees.
And that was it: we went back to the house, loaded up the car, and set off to the airport.
A very short visit, but a very good one, and hopefully not the last!
That was June 23rd, and therefore also Skt. Hans Aften. We were all too wiped out to do anything that evening, but Mormor sent us some pictures from Frederiskberg Have:
(Naturally, the Asheville clan was no sooner off to Amsterdam than the weather turned summery again— we’re so sorry! we really tried to arrange better weather!)
Here’s a picture from my Monday morning commute, and it pretty well tells the story.
Thursday was Maddie’s dimission, her graduation from folkeskole. It was about 30 degrees out by then: by far the hottest day of the year so far. Exactly as Molli’s had been back in 2020. But at least there were no masks, social distancing, or hand sanitizing requirements.
We got a speech from the principal.
Then a speech from Kenneth, unquestionably the best teacher either girl has been fortunate enough to have.
(Yes, our seats were almost as bad as Maddie’s at Metallica.)
Here’s Maddie’s Lucas accepting his diploma from Kenneth.
And here’s Maddie:
Maddie Marie Kammer Nagan, proud graduate of Atheneskolen. . .
And now officially a student of Marie Kruses Gymnasium, starting this August.
Click on the class picture below (from their trip to Ireland, I think) to see the video Kenneth made for the class. It should open and play right away, just use your browser’s back button to return to this page. Maddie features prominently enough that it’s not a waste of time, but she’s not in the first 20-30 seconds because she didn’t transfer to the school until 5th grade.
The weather turned back to crap again the very next day.
(Too) early Saturday morning I dropped Molli off at the Birkerød train station, where she was meeting friends to head into Roskilde, where she’d be spending the week for the annual music festival.
She really is in that photo, I swear.
That’s it. That was our June.
For the permanent record, it’s probably worth noting that this election year in America hit a major inflection point on Thursday night (American time). . .
We’re stuck in the present, as always, but it seems clear that the consequences of that debate could be very far reaching in ways none of us can foresee right now, so I figured it was worth dropping it in for the permanent record.
And finally, my favorite internet silliness of the month.
Just two more weeks before I go on vacation, so the next post will be full of vacation goodness.
