You might very well think that, but I couldn't possibly comment

Last night we watched House of Cards, a BBC-produced mini-series from 1990, since it turned out that my mother-in-law hadn't seen it, and I got reminded what a wonderful, wonderful little series it is. It's about a (hopefully fictional!) British politician by the name of Francis Urqhart. At the start of the series he's the Chief Whip of the Tory party, which has just won a general election. He has been promised a cabinet post, and when he doesn't get it he gets pissed off and decides that he's had enough of waiting. He then proceeds to lie, manipulate, blackmail and generally act like a complete and utter bastard until he has what he wants. Urqhart is probably the most fantastically entertaining bad guy I've ever seen, and it certainly doesn't hurt that he's being masterfully acted by Ian Richardson.

It's unfortunately not out on DVD, but only on VHS. There are two follow-up mini-series, To Play the King and The Final Cut, in which we get to see more of his even nastier wife.

Family Matters

At the dinner at dad's yesterday I found out two things about my sister and brother.

The first that they, like me, aren't particularly fond of sweet cookies or sweet candy. All of us prefer potato crisps, popcorn, salt licorice or stupidly bitter chocolate to the sweet stuff. I thought I was the only person in the world who don't really like sweet candy, but apparently it's a family thing.

The second is that my brother has in his possession a bottle of what must be the most revolting alcoholic beverage ever. It's basically a flavoured vodka. So far, not so strange. Such liquors are very common up here in the frozen north. Usually, they're flavoured with various herbs, some of them psychoactive in large doses. Not so with the stuff my brother has. That one is flavoured with beaver. No, not that sort of beaver, you perv. The animal. Large aquatic rodent of the genus Castor. Well-known for building dams. Specifically, the liquor is flavoured with the musk glands that the beaver uses to mark its territory. It smells rather like an old, worn, sweaty and moldy leather coat. I didn't dare try to drink it.