ALL TOGETHER NOW - AAAWW!
One of the troubles with living in a damp and draughty 18th century Cumbrian farmhouse is that it's - well - damp and draughty, and in order not to freeze when sitting motionless at one's computer, one has to wrap oneself in a nice warm fleecy blanket. (It's cheaper than leaving the central heating on, and much better for the planet.) My current computer blanket is red. (Steve's has Spider-Man on it.)

Came back to my chair yesterday to find my blanket already inhabited by Aineko, who had made a very nice nest for herself in the middle of it. I know what you're asking now. And yes, I was mean and cruel and made her move, although she was quite happy to jump back up on my lap once I was properly wrapped.

Too late

. . . to be writing much. I want to go to bed. But I promised myself I'd write a bit every day so here is today's news.

FLICKR EXPLORE


Why does it seem such an honour to have some of your photos appearing in Flickr's Explore? It's a computer algorythm for heavens' sake. Why should it matter? But I've just discovered I've had 2 photos put there, having a high degree of interestingness (now there's a neologism that just slips smoothly off the tongue, isn't it?) Both are photos of the Cumbrian sky, and one of them wasn't even taken with a camera, but with my O2 Cocoon phone. I dunno. Really, I dun. But for some reason I now want more pics in Explore.

TRYING OUT NEW BOOTS
Took dogs down very muddy lane, wearing my new walking boots, purchased in Keswick at the weekend. Came back with dry feet and dirty boots. They seem to work, then.

PIPING HOT
Supposed to be 8 of us, but only 6 stayed to play. Helen turned up long enough to convey her apologies, but they've sold their house and will be moving away on February 1st, so she will, sadly, no longer be available to play with us. The rest of us played a Petite Symphony by Gounod, and a few other things, and laughed a lot. This is what it's all about, really.

Books

Reading Chris' blog today reminds me that if there's nothing much else to write about, there's always the book you're currently reading. Just finished Northern Lights which I've read after seeing the film. It's a strange experience, that. I usually read the book first, if there is one. In this case I approached the book thinking I knew what was going to happen, and that it would just be fleshed out a bit more, but of course things happen in the book that are avoided in the film for one reason or another. It's well written. Pullman has a much better command of the English language than Rowling, for example. The story flows along nicely and I never once stopped to groan about style, which tends to happen a lot with HP books. (Thank goodness I'll never have to read another one of those.)

So, I'd finished Lyra's story, and not having books 2 or 3 yet, I needed something else to read last night. Had a poke about in the pile of books I've never got around to reading, and found one I'd picked up for 10p at Eaglesfield Village Hall, where hall users bring in books which are bought by other hall users: 10p for each book is left in a jam jar. I gather the vast proceeds from these transactions go towards the hall fund or something. The last one from there that I read was called, intriguingly (if you're an arctophile anyway) The Bear Went over the Mountain by William Kotzwinkle, the chap who wrote the original story behind E.T. Very strange story, that was, about a bear who stole an author's manuscript, took it to New York and, posing as said author, became a celebrity, while the real author gradually started turning into a bear and spent the winter hibernating in a cave. So, anyway, this is how I come to be reading, for a change, a classic of English literature - Brideshead Revisted. And since I'm probably in a very small minority here - the group of people who never saw the TV adaptation - I shall be approaching it fresh and eager and with very little idea of what happens. I shall let you know how I get on.

What I really want is Iain Banks' latest opi. (That looks silly. What's the plural of opus, for heaven's sake? Can this be right?) I've had The Steep Approach to Garbadale on my wish list for ages, but I'm going to buy it for myself shortly, as soon as his newest SF book, Matter hits the shelves. Probably buy them both at once. Embarras de richesse!

And now, finding myself almost out of teabags, I think a quick trip to Tesco might be in order. Adieu.

An average Monday

Even when you work from home, Mondays can be a bit miserable, especially if the sky's constantly grey and it rains from time to time. There's no need to go outside so you just stay where you are and get on with some work.

You dash off later to a Belfagan practice, via Sainsbury's and Steve's dad's house to deliver his projector which Steve had been fixing - again. (It keeps falling over.) Bit of dancing, bit of playing, bit of bitching. Heigh ho. Same old.

Checking in on uklc I find that Edith has sold her flat in Horten, which seems like a wise move. She seems to have made a decent profit on it too. I wonder if she'll invest in a small Lake District property now?

Above: (left) Edith's famous front verandah; (right) the view from the verandah.

The sax doctor and other stuff

Today Steve wore his Sax Doctor hat, so we had to get up early (on a Sunday!) in order to get to the venue in Carlisle by the back of 10. Roz holds these Sax Days from time to time, mainly to give her own students (of whom there are many) a chance to play together in ensemble, and stretch themselves a bit, but it's also open to other sax players, and a good crowd usually turns up. There are various playing sessions throughout the day, and at lunchtime and tea break times The Sax Doctor is available for free consultations.

The majority of those who arrive at his surgery are, of course, people who are already customers of ours - most woodwind & brass players in this area gravitate to Marshall McGurk sooner or later (there's nowhere else to go if your instrument breaks down, and after all, we are very good). Big overhauls can't be done, but odd little leaks and bits of missing cork can be dealt with, advice can be asked for and given, and a nice chatty atmosphere fills the room.

I, of course, benefit from all this by being allowed to sit in on the playing sessions, simply by virtue of being The Sax Doctor's trusty chauffeuse, and let's face it, I could really do with some help in the sort of sax playing Roz specializes in. I've been sight-reading music almost as long as I've been reading words, and I'm also good at memorizing a tune, but the one thing I still haven't learned is the gentle art of improvisation.

Even after a lot of well-explained theory (Roz is an excellent teacher!) it's still very stressful having to do a solo, however simple, in front of a group of other, equally stressed, people. I don't think I was the worst in the room, so at least I didn't go home feeling embarrassed, but some of the others were very good indeed. I feel keen to keep working at this now, so watch this space.

We were also treated to one of Peter Gardner's fascinating talks on great sax players of the past: on this occasion his subject was Johnny Hodges (1907-1970), an alto saxophonist of whom I was only vaguely aware. He played with Duke Ellington's band for 38 years and had a beautifully clear tone. As someone who is a folkie first and a classicist second, I love listening to Peter's enthusiastic descriptions of people like this, superb musicians who played in a field quite different from my own. I come away full of new knowledge and understanding and a desire to find out more.

BLOODY FLICKR, though . . .
is still not working, despite messages on the Flickr blog to the contrary. At sometime after 7.30 PST (which stands for what? Er. . . Pacific Standard Time or something? How many hours behind us are they in San Francisco anyway?) they claimed to have fixed everything, but all I get is stupid messages about Flickr having a massage.

Phew!
At last . . . nearly 2230 GMT (no idea what that would be in PST terms) and Flickr's working again. I don't quite understand how one can become addicted to a photo-sharing website, but of course, as we Flickrites know, there's a lot more to it than that.

Flickr withdrawr

Argh . . . Flickr's offline. Here's what they say:
" We started on a database upgrade and a few alters to the database structure last night. Given our scale, tasks like this takes a long time, and makes a definite impact on site performance.

You may have noticed today that the site is having lots of hiccups and that behaviour is generally pretty erratic. So, we’ve decided to take the site offline until things settle down. We’re anticipating a couple of hours is all we need at this point.

Sorry about this! It will be one of those massages that ‘hurts so good’. We’ll post updates here as we have them."

How will I survive? I need my Flickr fix.

I do love my phone's camera!

You just don't get artistic-looking photos like this with a proper camera. I was on my way back from Maryport, noticed the sun was setting, and took a slight detour along the coast road. Stopped briefly in the beach car park, tried to remove the fluff from the phone's lens, and took a few quick pics. Extraordinary results, really. Mind you, the sky really was something special - you need good subject matter to get any decent results at all from the phone.

By the time I got back to the house the sky had turned red and orange and was quite spectacular, so I went out in the garden with my real camera and tried to capture it, but none of these were nearly as good as the quick ones I'd snatched on the beach.

See what I mean? I mean, it's OK, but it's just another bloody sunset, isn't it?