So tonight is Midsummer’s Eve here in Sweden. Nationwide, it’s probably the biggest party day/night of the year, but as usual, we’re not partaking in the festivities. Olof says he’s never been a big Midsummer person, so I haven’t been able to get the hang of how the celebrating is properly done. I don’t guess it’s too big a loss, all in all, since we’re neither of us big drinkers, but the holiday is culturally important and I would like to have a better feel for the tradtions. Over the years I’ve had to accept the fact that Olof isn’t very culturally aware and I usually have to look elsewhere if I want to learn more about the Swedish way of life. It has actually happened on more than one occasion that *I’ve* been the one to fill *him* in on the way things are done here in his homeland.

Anyway, our big activity of the day was loading the kids up in the car about 7:30 and driving to town for a fast-food dinner. I’ve gotten so lazy lately about cooking. I’ve been blaming it on the heat but that’s really only a small part of it. I’m just completely uninspired about food these days and can hardly bring myself to do more than pop an English muffin in the toaster. But I digress … so, we had our burgers and fries in a restaurant that was very uncrowded despite it’s being the only thing open in town. Midsummer is second only to Christmas here, and the downtown area was all but empty, with most people well engaged in pagan festivities by this time (with not a little booze on hand, judging from the lines we saw yesterday in the liquor store).

We did happen onto a bit of excitement out in the parking lot after we’d finished eating. As we were getting in our car, a group of young toughs pulled up next to us. I think (hope) that the driver wasn’t drinking, but each of the other three or four climbed from the car holding an open container or two. They took a seat at one of the picnic tables outside while the driver went inside the restaurant and came back out trailed by another group of guys. By the looks of things it was four against four. They were all ready to rumble and words were exchanged (the one thing we heard was “Give me my money!”). As we drove away there was more yelling and shoving, and a bit of kicking and hitting, too, and then a bunch of girls got in the middle (of course), and the physical stuff stopped, at least for the moment. It actually looked like it might turn into something bad, and I had told Olof to call the police, but he didn’t want to. One of the girls was talking on the phone and he said she was probably calling the cops, but I sort of doubt it. In any case, we left and that was that as far as we were concerned. Oh, except for Tage parroting “Call the police! Call the police!” from the backseat the entire way home. Edifying.