Subject: Re: Yum! Kipper!
From: "Marie Moffitt" <[email-masked]>
To: Nick Moffitt <[email-masked]>
Cc: [email-masked], [email-masked]
Date: Thu, 15 Oct 1998 06:20:18 -0700

Here it is, with a cc to its inimitable author, Theodore C. Johnson, PhD,
formerly my co-worker and now working for WallData.  Anything to add, Ted?

The Official History of the Yum Kipper Wars
(The Einar Bluetoes Saga)
by Theodore C. Johnson, PhD ([email-masked])

It was in the high dark ages, when the Western Swedes tired of the 
constant Viking raids of the people from the NorthWay. They begged 
the king for assistance and so it happened that the King and his armies 
marched from Stockholm to attack the Norgorers. Minor skirmish after 
skirmish pushed the Valiant and Reliant Norsk back into the mountain 
fortress of Halden. And it was here that they holed up and waited for 
Winter. Outside, the patient Swedes lived off the land as best they 
could, while crops failed and orchards died. At last, they had nothing 
left but the fish they could catch and stacks and stacks of dirty 
laundry. (Since the money had run out, the Chinese laundry wouldn't 
extend them any credit.) It was now late January, when the Swedish 
king froze to death while trying to sauna without a fire. Seven brave 
warriors jumped up and down in a circle around him, but they simply 
didn't put out enough heat; each time he broke out into a sweat, it 
would freeze -- and so he froze. With much ceremony and sorrow, the 
defeated Swedes carried their birdseyed chieftain back over the ice 
to Stockholm.

They abandoned everything on the spot, the rotting fish, the dirty 
laundry, and the pots of lye they had started to make their own soap. 
Leaving all, they left. In the night, in the distance, they could hear 
a great victory shout from the Northgoean camp inside Halden. Turning, 
they saw the figure of the Norsh chieftain, the hated Einar Bluetoes, 
thrown up in huge shadows as he danced around the bonfire made of 
their dirty clothes. And they cursed him.

It was not long, only two months later with the Spring sailing, that 
the Northway Vikings returned -- with vengeance. But something had 
changed. As they sacked, ravaged and burned, they seemed to be searching 
for something. Not finding it, they raged and threatened to become 
violent. Raid after raid progressed the same way, until the remaining 
Swedes held council with the invaders to reach some kind of understanding.

"We want the FISK! Yum, yum!" Einar Bluetoes shouted.

The Swedes looked at each other in dismay. What fish? They wondered.  
After long and bloody negotiations the scene became clear. In the rush 
to leave Halden, someone had dumped a basket of rotting fish into one 
of the lye vats. When they stormed the camp, the Nornits had built their 
victory bonfire from the abandoned laundry. The resulting heat slow-cooked 
the rotten fish in the lye vati -- producing a flavour that Einar Bluetoes 
later described as, "light, yet strong: like a bohemian dancer."

Thus, it was decided: In future, the Swedes would pay tribute to the 
Noroshkies in cauldrons of slow-cooked, lye-soaked whitefish. In return, 
the Viking raids would cease.

The Swedes were jubilant: "Nuts for the nuts!" they gleamed. So popular 
was this treaty that the Swedes later began making ceremonial batches 
of lye-fisk (or in the Western Swede dialect "[fis]k[d]ippers"). This 
progressed into dragging effigies of Einar Bluetoes through a trough 
of lye on the eve of the anniversary of the Battle of Halden (but this 
practice was later put down by the government). In others, the lye-fish 
were eaten by the young men as proof of manliness and excessive alcohol 
consumption. But by far the most common, modern version of the ceremony 
is observed when the dish (known now as "lutefisk") is served to 
unwelcome guests and relatives.