Ski France

From the balcony, Mottaret, February 2025

The annual ski trip this year involved nine people (two resident in France and the rest of us from various parts of the UK), of whom two are definitely non-skiers, one went out to ski just a couple of times on her own, one beginner who had booked lessons, one expert and the remaining four (including me) at about the same standard. All except the French residents travelled by train via a route we hadn't tried before but was far better than having to cross Paris on the Metro - St Pancras to Lille and then just across the platform from Lille to the 3 Valleys ski area, and a taxi at the end.

The journey was not without its problems, however. A large landslip had closed the main access road, and traffic was having to be re-routed so that both arriving and departing traffic went through a tunnel designed for traffic in one direction. Our French duo, who were aiming to get to the resort early and make us all supper, ended up having to sit stationary in their car for a number of hours, but decided against seeking refuge in the emergency accommodation that was being provided. Meanwhile, we were waiting for our taxi, which had also got caught up in the mayhem and arrived an hour late. Despite this we arrived before the car party and provided supper for them instead.

The conditions for skiing were perfect - plenty of snow, temperatures around -1 degrees, and glorious sunshine for the whole week except for one morning when there was light cloud. I started badly, perhaps due to overconfidence, and kept falling over on the the first couple of days. Then I was involved in a nasty accident, where an out-of-control skier bumped into me and knocked me over. I was absolutely fine but she had knocked herself out, and for a minute it wasn't clear how badly she was hurt. 

One of our party had seen the whole thing and reassured me that it absolutely wasn't my fault. The perpetrator/victim seemed to be skiing on her own because nobody else turned up to help her. Then a couple of random skiers who happened to be doctors stopped to help, she recovered consciousness but was clearly in need of medical attention, and there were enough people around by then to make us superfluous, so we left them to it. After that I skied much more cautiously and gradually built my confidence back up, so I didn't fall over again, and I didn't push myself to stay on the piste after about 3pm (which I might have done in previous years).

Apart from skiing there's entertainment (some of us watched LA Confidential on DVD - a bit more violent than I remember but a good film despite this), and food and drink. Hot chocolate with whipped cream is my drink of choice and there was a wide variety available, rating from about five out of ten to a magnificent ten out of ten in one particular café. We went out for a couple of dinners, cooked for ourselves a few times, ordered takeaway pizza, and for one evening I deliberately planned a vegan dinner because of my experience that cheese is the only protein available to a vegetarian, especially in the Savoie region which prides itself on fondue, raclette and many local cheeses like Beaufort and Tomme de Savoie. 

On the way back we stayed at a French hotel for one night, which allowed the trip to include seven full days of skiing. Expecting some sort of grubby Travelodge, we were actually accommodated in a lovely place where I managed to avoid cheese for one evening by selecting soup and chocolate mousse. 

What I've been reading

The Penguin History of the USA
by Hugh Brogan

"In a broad sweep of America's triumphant progress from early British colonisation to the Reagan years, Brogan explores the period from both the American and the British points of view, touching on permanent features of 'the American character' - both the good and the bad."

I wrote about this in a recent blog post - very comprehensive, but a textbook. What this means is that to get the most out of it I'd have to make notes. For example, there isn't a timeline with significant events, or even a list of presidents. The chapters aren't all sequential - he sometimes devotes a chapter to a topic (like slavery or industrialisation) within a time period that overlaps with other chapters describing other topics. But maybe it will be a useful reference text - I doubt I will read the whole thing again, but I'll hang on to it for now.

May Contain Lies: How Stories, Statistics and Studies Exploit Our Biases - And What We Can Do About It
by Alex Edmans

"Stories, statistics and studies lie to us on a daily basis, and our brains lie to us too. We need to acknowledge and understand the role that our own human biases play in interpreting and digesting the information that we consume."

A Christmas present, and a good and readable reminder that statements are not facts, facts are not data, data is not evidence and evidence is not proof. He tries to make it accessible by including anecdotes and stories and putting summaries at the end of each chapter, but despite this it's a little dry.

The Famished Road

by Ben Okri

narrated by Hugh Quarshie

"He is born into a world of poverty, ignorance and injustice, but Azaro awakens with a smile on his face. Despite belonging to a spirit world made of enchantment, where there is no suffering, Azaro chooses to stay in the land of the to feel it, endure it, know it and love it.  This is his story."

Evokes the atmosphere of the African setting with its magical thinking, herbalists, corrupt political parties of the rich and the poor with their thugs, and a family just trying to get by. The mother is a market trader and the father gets whatever jobs he can while training to be a world champion boxer, their young son 'works' by attracting custom to a local bar. That's pretty much all the 'story' there is; the main pleasure of reading is simply immersion in this world.

Nineteen Eighty-Four
by George Orwell

"In 1984 the world is divided into three parts, Oceania, Eastasia and Eurasia, all perpetually at war. In Oceania, the Party has created a totalitarian state that annihilates all opposition. In the forefront of the Party stands Big Brother, a figure of almost mythical power."

I got this off my shelves to re-read, more than 35 years since the date I'd written inside the front cover, because a friend recommended another 'spin-off' book written from the point of view of the main (and only) female protagonist. I thought I'd better remind myself of the story, and was slightly unprepared for the dense prose and immense cruelty within it. I remember reading and being impressed by George Orwell when I was young, so maybe I will revisit his other books.

Buddhism update

October 2024

Our little local Buddhist group is an offshoot of the nearest Buddhist Centre in Birmingham, but we are supported by a collection of individuals known as 'Groups & Pioneers' run by the Triratna Development Team. Groups & Pioneers comprises people in a similar position to us, i.e. supporting a small local group, or trying to start one. The Development Team arranges an annual retreat, which I have just attended, and as usual it was thought-provoking and inspiring. I came home with fewer ideas than normal because a) we are now doing pretty much all we can, and b) I have adjusted my ambition for the Warwick group down from 'Grow to a Centre' to 'Continue to Thrive'.

On the way there I collected a friend who was flying in from Dublin, and then discovered that his flight home wasn't until the day after the end of the retreat. He was happy to accept the invitation to stay with me for the extra day, and rewarded me with a meal out and home-made pizza for me and UJ (and enough for about four other people).

He and his wife rent out a room in their house, and less than a year ago the Red Cross in Ireland placed a Ukrainian refugee and her traumatised 5-year-old son with them. It has not been a success, and while he was away the relationship deteriorated to the extent that he has had to ask the Red Cross to remove and rehouse them. So I was pleased that he had the chance to chat to UJ and find some reassurance that they were just unlucky with their guest. And I have been very lucky.

While I was at the retreat centre I also found out that the main cook, who has been there nearly a year, is off sick and unlikely to be back for a while. This puts quite a strain on the team even though they now have a deputy chef, and I love working there in the kitchen, so I suggested I might find some time to volunteer. But looking at the state of my diary, and trying to avoid my habitual tendency to over-commit, I have pulled back from offering any dates until April. I am proud of myself for doing less!

In a very unusual week I had five different meetings with different Buddhists over the last weekend as well as four more during the week in person and via Zoom. In between these I continue to have a great time doing all sorts of varied and constructive activities as well as keeping on top of the (much less enjoyable) admin. So I have no complaints, and life is feeling particularly pleasant at the moment, as long as I spend no more than ten minutes listening to the news.

What I have not finished reading

Rivendell, East Sussex, July 2024

For the first time in the whole lifetime of this blog (more than 17 years) I haven't finished a book in the last month. The main reason is because the books I'm reading are long and dense - the Penguin History of the USA is really a textbook so I can't manage much more than half a chapter in one sitting. Spotify stopped me continuing with the immense Stephen King book because of its limitation on monthly audio book listening hours, and the Booker prize-winning Ben Okri audio book is 'literary', as most prize-winning books seem to be. 'Literary' here is a euphemism meaning 'very atmospheric but not much plot'.

I have never been a student of history - I gave up the subject as soon as I was allowed to at school - but have long wanted to learn about North American history, hence buying this textbook written by history professor Hugh Brogan. I have read about early settlement and immigration, farming, slavery, industry, the American Revolution, the Civil War and the founding of the Republic and its Constitution. I'm still a bit vague on the first half of the 20th Century (the Depression, Prohibition, First World War), but I've now reached the years after the Second World War and Senator Joseph R. McCarthy appears, launching his communist witch-hunt. This textbook was first published in 1985 with a second edition in 1999, but these extracts from paragraphs introducing McCarthy are chillingly familiar. 

"His genius lay in a certain hot, instinctive cunning which told him how to win power, headlines and a passionately loyal following by manipulating the worst impulses and most entire weaknesses of his fellow-countrymen. He was a liar on a truly amazing scale, telling so many lies, so often, and in such a tangled fashion ... new falsehoods sprouted faster than old ones could be rebutted ... [he] was able to see that the penalties for defying these shibboleths were small, the possible rewards enormous.

"He lied his way into his first public office ... he lied his way into the Senate ... he passed himself off as a wounded war hero (having injured his leg when falling downstairs, drunk, on a troopship) ... Once in the Senate he pursued his favourite interests, chiefly boozing and gambling, and financed them by taking bribes from corporations."

Here's one whole paragraph transcribed almost verbatim:

"McCarthy knew nothing about communism or the State Department, but he did know that mud sticks, especially if you throw a lot of it. It is doubtful that he ever thought he was doing much harm. He spent his days largely in the company of petty crooks and swindlers, and having no scruples, no respect for law and no concern for reputation (otherwise he would hardly have swaggered so conspicuously as a foul-mouthed, drunken, mendacious brute) probably could not believe that others might have different attitudes, or genuinely suffer if they were traduced. As for the point that his conduct undermined democratic processes at home and fanned hostility to the United States abroad (... Richard Rovere says, 'he was the first American ever to be actively hated and feared by foreigners in large numbers'), he ignored it completely. For him it was enough that he had secured his re-election, that money flowed in from anti-communist enthusiasts that he could spend as he pleased, and that he could keep the entire political establishment of the United States in perpetual uproar. He had fun."

The day after I read this, I heard in a podcast that Roy Kohn, whom I already knew of as the unscrupulous lawyer who was Donald Trump's mentor, was Senator Joseph McCarthy's chief counsel in 1954. Makes sense.

New Year in Amsterdam

Amsterdam, January 2025 (photo credit: Mr M)

Happy New Year! The world is looking increasingly unstable and I can hardly bear to think about prospects in various war-torn areas let alone the despotic, dictatorial, right-wing and populist governments that seem to be in the ascendant at the moment. Was it ever thus? Is it that the global nature of the news round means that we are just more aware of what is happening, rather than relaxing in blissful ignorance? Did the 60-year-olds in the midst of the Industrial Revolution look upon technology with the same horror as I regard the insidious poison of social media, especially on the young? I'm not sure how I would have survived if Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, TikTok and the rest had existed when I was growing up. We will surely look back and acknowledge that giving children access to the whole of the Internet cannot be a good idea, in the same way that we ensure they don't have a credit card until they are mature enough to use it properly.

Anyway, enough of the doom and gloom, I am sitting comfortably in Lola Towers after the excitement of the holidays in Nottingham and Amsterdam. I joined Lola II and Mr M on a Dutch adventure for New Year. We travelled comfortably by train, and took a tram from the central station to our Airbnb. This was two rooms at the top of a traditional tall thin Dutch house, occupied by our host who has completely filled it - shelves, walls, glass cabinets, floor space and furnishings - with comic books and Disney artefacts. 

Our host's main stipulations were a) that under no circumstances should we step into the apartment with outdoor shoes (due to dogshit on the carpet brought in by previous guests) and b) that we would not bring anyone else in with us (again, bad experiences with previous guests). When the host opened the door to welcome us and Lola II stepped inside wearing her shoes he actually yelled at her, which was quite an off-putting start to our relationship. Later in the visit he presented each of us with a picture created by his brother who is an artist. Mine was a laminated A4 picture of a toucan, which I deliberately left behind among the clutter in my bedroom.

Because of the time of year, quite a lot of shops and restaurants were closed but we still managed to find interesting places to eat. We had Thai, Indian and Japanese food for dinner as well as Dutch specialities at breakfast and teatime like pancakes, bitterballen (croquettes), cheesy pastries, olieballen (spherical doughnuts with raisins), apple pie and apple turnovers. There is a great reliance on cheese and ham and very few other savoury snack choices. On the final evening we ate in what might be described as a gastropub where there was no written menu and the waiter recited the options. This was the only place that disappointed on the vegetarian front - they had a couple of choices and they were fine, but not up to the standard of the meat and fish that Lola II and Mr M had.

The weather was cold and sometimes wet, but Lola II and I missed the worst of the rain by being inside the Rijksmuseum while Mr M went for a ferry trip and walk and got soaked. I really enjoyed seeing the originals of paintings that are quite familiar as well as unfamiliar art, and the audio guide gave just about the right amount of supplementary information. Lola II is quite familiar with art in the National Gallery while I'm more comfortable in museums of science, history and nature, but even I found the 17th century paintings fascinating.

All three of us enjoy our guided walks, and we went on two of them - the first a general historical introduction to the city and the second focussing on food. The first guide was hugely enthusiastic and had done his research into the drugs and sex work aspects of the city, which I imagine people ask about a lot. We also learned that this year is the 750th anniversary of the founding of the city, created by the dam on the river Amstel. On the food tour we were given sweet and savoury snacks as well as being taken to visit the Begijnhof - housing for single Catholic women when that was a proscribed religion - which was completely unrelated to food, but interesting nonetheless.

We did a lot of walking on New Year's Eve and the weather was pretty cold, so by about 10pm I'd had enough and went to bed. Lola II and Mr M are made of sterner stuff, but even Lola II was in bed before midnight. Our Airbnb had a roof terrace, and Mr M took up our host's invitation to watch the fireworks from up there as long as we made conversation with his friends who were visiting. Mr M enjoys fireworks, and there were certainly enough of them - apparently fireworks are illegal but a blind eye is turned on New Year's Eve, so the explosions started when it got dusk and it was like a war zone at midnight.

There were various other activities - we wandered about in a craft shop, made hot chocolate at home (twice), watched a film, Lola II visited a clandestine Catholic church and its museum and I met a Buddhist friend who showed me around the Amsterdam Buddhist Centre. 

Altogether it was a good holiday, although the centre of the city was very crowded and busy, and the weather could have been better. Getting around on foot and using public transport is so simple now that we have online maps, online translation, online routes and timetables, and Lola II and Mr M leading the way. Communication wasn't a problem because English is spoken more than Dutch - we frequently heard Dutch diners and waiters speak English to each other when ordering food and drink. And we realised how wonderful it is that there is no charge to visit our wonderful British museums and galleries compared to at least €15 each in Amsterdam.

December films

Birmingham, March 2024

I've discovered the drawback to audiobooks via Spotify - I'm only entitled to 15 hours listening a month, so my latest Spotify book will take three months unless I buy extra listening time, which I'm not going to do. On the other hand, this spurred me on to explore BorrowBox, which is a free audiobook lending service provided by the local library. The range of books isn't as wide as Audible or Spotify and if a book's on loan then you have to wait, but you can reserve them.

Aside from spending time reading print and audio books I've seen a LOT of great films in December. I had a fair amount of free time over Christmas, and signed up for a free trial of Apple TV for a week. It turned out that very few of the films I was expecting to find were available there for free, but I started watching Ted Lasso (a TV series rather than a film) and loved it! UJ subscribes to Netflix and Prime, I get Disney+ as a perk of a Lloyds bank account, iPlayer and YouTube are free, and my DVD-by-post fills in the gaps. And I really did watch all these films in December.

Beatles '64 (Documentary, 2024, Disney+)

It was a bit of a risk watching this given how I'd fallen apart slightly last time I watched a film about the Beatles in 1969. But this was five years earlier, and the film followed their first foray into America which included that famous Ed Sullivan show and all the screaming fans. I enjoyed it.

Despicable Me 4 (Children/Family, 2024, DVD)

Not the best in the series (that's probably DM2) but doesn't disappoint. Villains are suitably villainous, the good guys come through in the end, and there's enough minion slapstick to please anyone.

Beautiful Boy (Drama, 2018, DVD)

I'm not sure how this got into my list because I've seen it before. Steve Carell and Timothée Chalamet do a great job as concerned father and addict son.

Bird (Drama, 2024, Cinema)

This was a bit of a gamble because my film review podcaster gurus were a little ambivalent, but it turned out to be wonderful. A young girl is trying to deal with her chaotic father re-marrying and her mother's abusive boyfriend putting her siblings in danger when she meets an interesting stranger called Bird.

Women Talking (Drama, 2022, iPlayer)

Another fantastic film, about an isolated religious community where it has been discovered that the men have been drugging and abusing the women and children. A few of the women get together to decide what to do:- nothing, forgive, fight and stay, or leave. Made particularly special by some wonderful actors.

Conclave (Thriller, 2024, Cinema)

I collected my friend with the new hip and drove him to the cinema to see this - it didn't disappoint. The Pope has died and the Cardinals are assembling into the Conclave where a new Pope is elected. It's based on a book by Robert Harris so many twists and turns follow, some more obvious than others. The background music is particularly effective.

Snow Cake (Drama, 2006, DVD)

This was my eventual choice for Buddhist film night, a wonderful film starring Alan Rickman and Sigourney Weaver, whom we last saw together in Galaxy Quest. This is a very different matter compared with that sci-fi comedy - Alan is a buttoned-up Brit and Sigourney an autistic mother, and the scenery, humour and pace of the film make it so heart-warming.

Still: A Michael J Fox Movie (Documentary, 2023, Apple TV)

A biographical documentary made by Fox himself, starting with his hugely successful early career before his diagnosis with Parkinson's Disease in 1991 at the age of just 30. His sense of humour comes through alongside the difficulties of living with the disease. It was interesting, but nothing special.

CODA (Drama, 2021, Apple TV)

I've been wanting to see this ever since it came out, so it was one of the first things I picked from my trial of Apple TV. CODA stands for Child Of Deaf Adults, and the film shows how the hearing daughter of deaf parents with a deaf brother copes with being the family interpreter while having musical ambitions of her own which her parents can't understand, or even hear. It was a wonderful film, thoroughly recommended.

Swan Song (Sci-fi thriller, 2021, Apple TV)

Set in the near future, a guy who is dying can replace himself with a healthy version, but he's not allowed to tell anyone and he would then die in the facility that does the copying. It's a great premise and the film was mostly good but went much too slowly towards the end - I lost patience with his sentimental indecision.

Come From Away (Musical, 2017, Apple TV)

I went to see the stage show in London with Lola II and only discovered this movie version (filmed on Broadway) with my Apple subscription. It's got some great tunes and I love the story behind it: a remote town in Newfoundland, Canada takes in 7000 travellers who are diverted from their destinations when US airspace is closed in the immediate aftermath of 9/11.

Fly Me To The Moon (Romance, 2024, Apple TV)

A standard romantic comedy set within NASA in the lead up to the first moon landing. The premise is that a) someone was recruited to 'sell' the idea of going to the moon in order to attract funding, and b) the success of the enterprise was so important that a secret fake moon landing was to be filmed just in case the real one went wrong. Channing Tatum and Scarlett Johansson are both lovely to look at.

On The Rocks (Drama, 2020, Apple TV)

I was really casting about to see if there was anything left on Apple TV that I wanted, and rejected Killers of the Flower Moon because it was 3½ hours long. This looked interesting as it features Bill Murray, who usually makes a film worth seeing. Not so much this time, but good enough that I saw it through to the end.

Emilia Perez (Musical, 2024, Netflix)

This is the strangest musical that I have ever seen. It's a serious drama set within crime-ridden Mexico but featuring occasional songs like a musical, with the most unexpected plot twist I have ever encountered and ending with a huge gangster shootout. I absolutely loved it - highly recommended.

My Old Ass (Comedy, 2024, Prime)

Another cracking film, where a young woman meets an older version of herself (Aubrey Plaza, whom I love), and pesters her for a piece of advice which then proves impossible to follow. And then we find out why and it's heart-breaking. So not altogether a comedy, I suppose, but I thought it was great.

Wallace & Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl (Comedy, 2024, iPlayer)

Released on Christmas Day, I watched it (nearly) live and of course it's very entertaining. Perhaps I was saturated with films by then, but I didn't think it was anything extraordinary. The first plasticine animations were so original and different, but we're all used to them now.

Wit (Drama, 2001, YouTube)

I've been trying to find this film for many years and had concluded that it was no longer available until unexpectedly during a film-based conversation somebody mentioned they'd seen it, and suggested it might be found on YouTube. Which it was. Based on a play, over the course of 1½ hours it simply focusses on one woman's death from cancer after a life spent teaching 17th century poetry.

Human Traffic (Drama, 1999, iPlayer)

I brought this to Nottingham to watch as our Christmas film along with my friends, who hadn't seen it before. It portrays the club scene at the end of the 90's, which the four of us were all quite familiar with, and it definitely doesn't take itself too seriously.

So that was eighteen films watched in December, and on 1st January I watched another in Amsterdam with Lola II and Mr M - but that's a story for another blog post.

Christmas at Lola Towers

Worcestershire, October 2024

Aside from watching a huge number of films and reading those two stupid annoying Connie Willis books, I've done a few other, more sociable things during the festive break.

We had a badminton tournament, and I have come to terms with not being in the top two or three players any more. I continue to be exercised by Muscles, my Personal Trainer, and he has gradually increased the intensity of his demands, but never beyond my capability. Sister D says that this is the heart of her experience of a Personal Trainer - never being asked to do something you can't. I do feel, however, that I inhabit a body that is significantly less able than it used to be, and which constantly reminds me that I'm not as young as I was.

The U3A walking group has finished until next year, but three of us were going to assemble for the board games group until the host sent a sad message that the session was cancelled - his wife had a stroke. She is a lovely woman who is not in the least interested in board games but feeds us tea and biscuits and proudly showed us the picture she was painting as a Christmas present for her son.

And on Christmas Eve I donated blood, which seems a very Christmassy thing to do. I spent all of Christmas Day on my own and didn't even go out, but had a lovely time doing exactly what I liked. On Boxing Day I organised a walk with the Buddhists (seven of us turned up for that), and in the afternoon I went over for tea with the Man Who Remains Nameless. You seriously wouldn't be able to tell that less than four weeks ago he'd had a hip replacement. He says that there are certain movements that he needs to avoid, like twisting, or bending more than 90 degrees at the hip, but otherwise he just seems to be walking normally. It's astonishing.

I did have a belated Christmas dinner with my friends in Nottingham on the weekend after Christmas. Complete with presents, dog-walking and crackers (and therefore hats, jokes and novelties), we had a great time.

What I've been reading

A Calamity of Souls
by David Baldacci

narrated by Cary Hite, Kiiri Sandy, MacLeod Andrews, Sisi Aisha Johnson

"Set in the tumultuous year of 1968 in southern Virginia, a racially-charged murder case sets a duo of white and Black lawyers against a deeply unfair system as they work to defend their wrongfully-accused Black defendants in this courtroom drama."

I can't work out why I picked this book - it's very recent and not on any of my lists. Someone must have recommended it, and I'm glad they did because it's a fantastic read. I often have trouble with remembering characters and plot in the audio format, but not with this - and I made time just to sit and listen to find out what happens next. And it has a proper ending to the trial, even if the end of the book is a little contrived.

Blackout
by Connie Willis

"Oxford, England in 2060. A trio of time travelling scholars prepare to depart for various corners of the Second World War. Their mission: to observe, from a safe vantage point, the day-to-day nature of life during this critical historical moment."

Connie Willis has written two of my all-time favourite books (To Say Nothing of the Dog and Doomsday Book) but this one is a stinker. And the worst thing about it is that it's only Part 1 of the story and there's a whole other book I now have to read to finish it, and the second worst thing is that this one is 610 pages long (that's nearly an inch and a half thick) and the second half is 793 pages (an inch and three quarters), and it's all so annoying. She seems so proud of knowing the geography of London and which tube stations are on which lines and how to get from one to another that she spends whole chapters describing how to get from Bond Street to Piccadilly Circus by changing at Oxford Circus. Sometimes I have stress dreams about not being able to get to somewhere because of a road block or a train delay or because I can't run fast enough in my dream - well, this is a whole book just about that, with scenes of the Blitz and the Dunkirk evacuation thrown in for historical context.

All Clear
by Connie Willis

"When the three time-travelling Oxford historians become unexpectedly trapped in 1940, they struggle not only to find their way home but to survive as Hitler’s bombers attempt to pummel London into submission."

She could really have done with cutting out at least half of this book and the previous one - there are so many chapters where nothing happens except one of the characters waits for the other two to get back from where they've gone, or where someone tries to go from one place to another and is repeatedly diverted. There's a really good story in there that would make a great book if it were no more than 400 pages, and this stupid saga is 1400 pages. I'm not angry, I'm just disappointed, but both of these books are moving to the charity shop shelf.

Concert

Les Arcs, February 2024

Things are going to calm right down at last, with some days coming up having only one thing in them, and Friday to Sunday having nothing at all, which is probably a record. UJ will have gone back home to Kyiv so I'm looking forward to a bit of peace and quiet, in which I intend to do some walking if the weather is fine, and watching films. There may be nothing to blog about.

Meanwhile, our concert took place, for which my practice paid off and I experienced no significant embarrassments. It was different from our usual concert because we joined up with a small orchestra called Eclectica, which seemed similar to Lola II's music group. We (Coventry Arts' flutes, saxophones and clarinets) played the first half, there was an interval with tea and cakes, then Eclectica started the second half and we all came together for three Christmas pieces at the end. 

I loved the discipline of the orchestra, which reminded me of my school days. They tuned properly at the start, nobody chatted, they paid attention to the conductor... There are all sorts of tiny annoyances within our group - people parping when others are trying to tune (on the rare occasions when we do tune), people not having their music in order, everyone having to wait while someone finds a pencil, or drops a pencil, people chatting while another section is running through something, people just not listening then asking where we're playing from... There's one woman in particular who starts talking as soon as we stop playing and then invariably doesn't know where we're starting from. But despite these little issues I do enjoy the end result, most of the time.

Playing the baritone sax is quite tiring compared to the clarinet, and I had quite a lot to play so I wasn't sure I'd manage to make it to the end of the mass items. There was always going to be scope for miming among that number of people, but because of the break in the middle I carried on playing through to the very end. It was a very successful event in a much better venue than our usual cramped and freezing church - we were in a school hall with a stage - and the audience was much bigger than ours usually is. It was even accessible by train so UJ came along together with a man she's been seeing, who seemed very nice.

Smoke and mirrors

Tate Modern, November 2024

As well as the Assisted Dying event, I spent a lovely couple of days with Lola II and Mr M. We started with an Egyptian lunch in Knightsbridge - I was a bit early so popped into Harvey Nichols out of interest. I only went up to the food department, and concluded that it isn't a shop that I belong in at all. Then we went on to the Tate Modern, specifically for an art installation which beamed shapes of light in a dark room onto screens, and filled the room with haze so the passage of the light through the room could be seen. It was quite fun to play with the installation, although I really don't understand Art, especially Modern Art. It was also pretty expensive even though one of us got in for free thanks to an Art Pass.

Next day Lola II took me to an Art café where we each painted a small canvas. Looking at mine up close I didn't think it was all that good when I finished it, and I wasn't going to take it home. But when I was washing brushes across the room Lola II told me to look back at it, and it looked much better from a distance, so it is now in Lola II's house until such time that I can collect it - I wasn't about to take it with me to the demo and then onto the train.

Back home again, I went to visit my new friend (still nameless for the purposes of this blog) who fell off his bike and ended up in hospital with a broken hip. They gave him a hip replacement and sent him home after four days, when he was already able independently to make me a cup of tea - I brought cakes. We marvelled at our amazing National Health Service while also mourning its huge deficiencies.

Great progress for mum too, where we managed to replace her 2G phone with an almost identical 4G one, and she also achieved a price reduction of £7 by insisting on paying the price displayed on the shelf rather than what came up on the till. I am much less assertive that she is in shops, although I would say that she is a little too assertive on certain facts than she should be - the Blue Badge was not in the cupboard where she said it was, so there. Not until writing this did I realise that we could have parked in the disabled bays even without a badge - I think my assertiveness needs work.

I've had a few long, full days, but have been a bit more successful than previously at building in gaps between them, to the extent of not going on my Friday morning U3A walk because Thursday and Saturday had so much in them. This was the right decision. On Saturday I volunteered to staff the Leamington LETS stall at the local Repair Café on a day so filled with wind and rain so that hardly anyone came, then went straight on to my last music group rehearsal before the concert next week. The music this term has been so challenging that I've actually had to practise both saxophone and clarinet parts, which is probably a first for this group.

On Sunday, UJ announced that she'd joined a choir, something she's been thinking of doing for a while, and their carol service was taking place that afternoon, so I went along. She seems to have joined the Parish Church choir, which is somewhat surprising (she did say there was quite a lot of talking about God). The service was sparsely attended, which was a shame because I love belting out a Christmas carol among other enthusiasts. Unfortunately the bits between the carols reminded me why I really don't get on with Christianity.