When Julie Peterson decided to have a baby on her own two years ago, she picked a tall, blond, blue-eyed Danish engineer as a sperm donor to match her own Scandinavian heritage. But when she went back to the sperm bank to use the same donor to have another child, she was stunned to discover that the federal government had made it impossible.

“I just cried,” said Peterson, 43, who lives in North Carolina. “I was in complete shock. I hadn’t thought about anything but having another baby with this donor. It was just so surprising and bewildering. ... Now I have a beautiful Viking baby, which is what I wanted. I was hoping to give her a full sibling.”

The Peterson household, 2025.  Young Jean-Baptiste comes running into his mother’s room, his eyes red and streaming.

Jean-Baptiste: Maman!  Maman!
Julie, icily: What.
Jean-Baptiste: Maman, it is Brunhilde... Maman, she has maked in my room again un feu.
Julie: Perhaps it is because you have invited it, with your weakness.
Julie: Perhaps it is because you lack Viking blood.
The fire alarm goes off.
Jean-Baptiste, timorously: I do not want to be a Viking, I am a chrétien... I want to make a life of service to Jesus, in a monastère... a chateau de Dieu…
Julie stands, trembling, apoplectic with rage.
Julie: Your God is false and weak.  The single eye of Odin sees all.
Brunhilde, entering suddenly, clad in furs and wielding an elk carcass: Cringing scoundrels!  Where is the treasonous fire alarm?  I crave to smash it.
Julie: Wretch, help your sister destroy the fire alarm.
Jean-Baptiste: I… I am faint with hunger… I seek fromage...
Brunhilde: YOU SHALL BE SUSTAINED BY MEAD AND ELKFLESH, OR YOU SHALL DIE.
Brandishing the elk carcass, Brunhilde chases Jean-Baptiste from the room.  Julie Peterson gazes bitterly after them.
Julie, aloud, to herself: Why, oh why, did I settle for the freely available French sperm.

Tags: international relations, science, france, vikings, denmark, sperm, elkflesh