Today is Gustav Adolfsdagen – the anniversary of the death of Gustav II Adolf on November 6th, 1632 in a battle at Lützen.

So how does one commemorate the death of a monarch? Well, strangely enough, by eating a special type of cake decorated with a chocolate or marzipan image of the king on top. This tradition began in the late 1800s, probably in Göteborg, which was a city founded by Gustav II Adolf in 1621 and where he is still revered. I haven’t been able to discover the somewhat bizarre connection between the eating of cake and the death of the king in battle and nowadays it seems to be a dying tradition, overtaken by other events at this time of the year. However, here in Nynäshamn it was possible to buy these special Gustav Adolf cakes at the local bakeries.



The grey, misty and damp weather continues. This is one of the reasons that November is not one of my favourite months. The darkness and rain seem to arrive so suddenly – before I have a chance to brace myself for them and it is always disappointing to see the golden blaze of October leaves reduced to a brown, muddy, wet mess on the footpaths.



I read a description once of these months, where a birch tree was compared to a human hand. The image was of the hand gradually becoming a skeleton as the leaves fell, with the fingers unfolding and reaching skywards. The clouds become lower and lower as November advances, with the skeleton fingers reaching higher and higher now that the weight of the leaves had gone, until finally in December, they poke a hole in the clouds and the soft snowflakes stream down. It is very much like that and one of the things that sustains me through November is the thought of all the snow to come in December.

I saw some swans swimming in the freezing water earlier in the week. No wonder they get bird flu! The water temperature is down to 8C. Silly birds. Though I did see one of them swimming along with one tootsie out of the water, so perhaps there is hope yet.



The bathroom renovations continue and are now at their most depressing stage, where the entire apartment is coated in a layer of builder’s dust, despite extensive plastic sheeting taped everywhere and all you can see are bare bricks and holes in the walls.

Just before they started, it looked like a typical 1950's style Swedish bathroom:



After this week's efforts, it looks like this:



And our klädkammaren (box room) that used to house all of our clothing and linen (which is now piled up on our bed and covered with sheets of plastic) has several interesting holes in the wall, nowhere near ceiling height. This is slightly worrying as I wonder wtf they are doing!



I know it will slowly get better, but on this wet, cold grey day, December 9th is looking a long, long way away...