I Am A Swede

Mmm, what a lovely idea.... Ok, if all the rest of them die I can possibly live with Tina surviving. At least she's had the decency to leave Emmerdale and never return....

It's been a warm and sunny day here and if you didn't know it you'd never have guessed that something like Coronavirus/Covid-19 exists. With the possible exception that it's not as crowded as usual everything looks perfectly normal. The cafés have reduced the number of tables and chairs, but they're open for business, just like hair-dressers, bookstores, shops and restaurants. And despite this we're not seeing any major increase in deaths or infected. At 11:30 a.m today (Swedish time) we had 7206 confirmed infected and 477 deaths, and 418 of them were 70 years or older. Only 5 deaths were people under 50 years of age.

I think he was even married to another man, and that was the deal-breaker for Kathy. Has it only been twenty years?! Feels like Charity and Cain have been polluting the air-waves much longer than that. I have no problem with Emma Atkins, but I cannot stand Charity (or any Dingle) and I have to admit that it's hard to read an article that is nothing but complimentary about her/them. Asked whether she's keen to stick with Emmerdale for the foreseeable future, Emma replied: "More than happy, yes!" Interesting that Suranne Jones auditioned for Charity. I wonder how the character would have turned out with her in the role.

Dancing Queen - ABBA

Happy 70th birthday Agnetha!

I can believe that some of those small island nations could be corona-free, but some of the others... not so much. For instance I think it was Turkmenistan who banned every mention of it, so it's no wonder they have no reported cases.

Ah yes, the plane crash..... the beginning of the decline. I know most people won't agree with me, but to me the show was much better before the plane crash. It was a show with a distinct identity that made it special. Of course that didn't evaporate over night, but slowly over the years it got more and more toned down, and now Emmerdale has virtually lost everything that made it unique and is virtually undistinguishable from Coronation Street or EastEnders.

^^

In my opinion, if any year from the 1990s should be counted among the very best, it should be 1993. It was a year full of great movies, in all different genres: comedies (Dave, Sleepless in Seattle, Much Ado About Nothing), action (Jurassic Park, The Fugitive), thrillers (The Firm, In the Line of Fire), movies for a younger audience (The Secret Garden, The Nightmare Before Christmas), foreign-language (Germinal, Farewell My Concubine, The Scent of Green Papaya) and especially drama films (Schindler's List, The Remains of the Day, The Piano, Philadelphia, In the Name of the Father, Shadowlands, The Crying Game etc)

It's much too early to say anything definite, but for the moment it looks like we might have been able to stem the tide a little. The number of new cases has remained more or less the same the last few days, and we're beginning to see a slight increase in people being able to leave intensive care. Of course we now face the Easter holiday season when a lot of people, especially from Stockholm, usually travel north to the ski resorts. And since the vast majority of cases (so far) come from the Stockholm region there is a fear that the disease will find new momentum. Some ski resorts have closed down for the season, but most are still open. There have been pleas for people to refrain from going north over Easter, and we'll just have to see how those pleas will be received.

I read that other countries are expressing disbelief about the way we here in Sweden have handled this pandemic so far. Here is a report from the BBC correspondent in Stockholm about just that, if anyone's interested. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-52076293