Similar jokes were made when the outlook for a Swedish NATO ascension was bad. The much more cool-headed and diplomatically grounded Finns were set to join NATO without trouble. So the solution was obvious: Sweden should join Finland instead of NATO.

Relevant context is that Norway was the junior partner of a personal union with Sweden for most of the nineteenth century and until 1905. Also Sweden and Finland was one and the same realm for six centuries or so until 1809.