Well it's been a glorious week away in Denmark and Sweden and have I got news for you (not in a Paul Merton/Ian Hislop kind of a way).
In fact I have so much to tell you that I'm going to split this into (at least...) 2 parts as I don't want to lose you through boredom/exhaustion along the way.
So on with part one of this entry. A week or so before I set off on my Nordic travels I replanted my window box with 2 types of flowers and 2 herbs and before I left I was already seeing some life of growth. However, if you've been with me from the beginning you'll know that last time I attempted to grow some plants it ended in certain death for all the little seedlings. So will I fare any better this time? Would there be anything left by the time I returned? Would the birds have eaten everything? Would a frost strike again? Or would Manchester rain have drowned them?
Well obviously I'm not going to tell you yet! Don't you know how a story works? You'll just have to keep reading to find out what happened when I returned. (Such a tease!)
Now back to the main event... my Scandinavian adventure. It began in wonderful, wonderful Copenhagen. I was travelling by myself and needed to take a picture of me dancing (it being a capital city and all) so I carried my camera around trying to select not just the perfect location but also psyche myself up to approach a complete stranger and say something along these lines:
"Hello stranger, would you be so kind as to take my photo? I will be dancing in it so if you could catch the very heart and soul of my movement I'd greatly appreciate that."
Then of course I would need to dance in front of said stranger.
It might surprise you but I'm actually a lot more shy than I appear. Contrary to popular belief the idea of speaking to someone I don't know, let alone making a complete fool of myself in front of them isn't on my top 10 list of things I'd like to do (yes, ok it is on my top 40 things to do before I'm 40). But that's kind of the point whilst this list is fun, a lot of these challenges are actually about pushing myself out of my comfort zone and doing something a little bit braver than I would normally allow myself to do.
Oh, and then there's the tiny issue of having virtually no sense of natural co-ordination and balance needed in the art of dance.
Eventually I decided that there could only be one photo destination in Copenhagen. Despite it being a truly beautiful city with many fine buildings and remarkable statues and monuments, somehow it's best known for one of it's more unremarkable, insignificant sites: The Little Mermaid Statue. Some of you may be expecting it to be a towering effigy of Ariel from the Disney film. I'm afraid you're about to be very disappointed.
In fact she's barely a mermaid at all and only the size of a slightly malnourished teenager. If you think you're surprised see how shocked (and slighty amused) this Danish plug socket is:
I'd been considering asking a handsome Dane to help me waltz or maybe asking an entire school group if they'd conga with me but as I surveyed the setting something rather significant dawned on me... I would need to dance on rocks... next to water. Remember when I mentioned about balance and co-ordination? A last minute adjustment was needed to my dance style so bucking up my courage I approached a fellow tourist and asked him to take a photo of me hand-jiving!
Ok, so I know it's not the most impressive dance style and you won't see it on Strictly this winter but it's a perfectly legitimate dance style and it means I'm now 2/3 of the way through this particular challenge having already Salsa'd in Berlin.
Watch out Romans I'm coming to badly dance at you before I turn 40 next year. Rome may not have been built in a day but with my help it could crumble in one!
You may of course wonder what led me to holidaying in Denmark. Unless of course you've read other posts in which case you'll already know that the chief impetus for my travels was to attend Eurovision. Well, you'll just have to wait until the second installment to discover how I managed to cross off not one, not two but three of my challenges in the process.
Dancing Queen: Part 2 coming to a computer near you soon... stay tuned (this advert has been rated appropriate to all audiences)
You're still giggling at the socket aren't you? Go on go share it with someone else and feel free to share your surprised inanimate objects in return.
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