Friday 18 August 2017

Holidays - Things To Do

It's me again. The Doll. The Old Man and me have decided to get away from it all. Or some of it at least. Not very far. To Dorset it looks like.

We do not travel much. We do not holiday much. When you are a gold-plated pensioner, every day is a holiday. N'est-ce pas? So I am making lists of things not to forget. Because when you are a pensioner one of the things you do best - is to forget.
And we have been shopping. For the things you need on holidays. Sandals for a start. There are bound to be beaches of loveliness in Dorset. I do know there are.
I have already bought one pair of sandals which, after a few hours of pain are to be returned to the shop. Today I bought another pair. This time ... so far so good. The Old Man is inspired to do likewise and buys a very complicated pair of Northwest Territory beach things covered in Velcro straps ... every which way. In fact these are so intricate that the shop assistant is also not too sure which webbed opening to use for foot insertion. But a solution was found and we have returned from shopping and are wiggling our respective toes.

But now I do wonder if I shall be spending silent, wet, holiday afternoons watching the rain dribble down the panes of glass. Silent that is except for the monotonous ripping sounds of The Old Man adjusting and re-adjusting the Velcro webbing on his sandals.


Thursday 10 August 2017

Mrs D Scratches Away With a Pen

Now that Mrs D is trying to draw her animations ... she has realised her drawing skills are somewhat rusty.

Also, she has been infected by an obsession with getting a fountain pen to draw with. See her blog post about just such an obsession.

She hunted high and low in local shops but nothing suitable to be found. So she climbs into the internet and finds a pen site, would you believe, and cheerfully orders a Lamy pen with a fine nib and a converter to fill from bottle ink... and a bottle of ink of course (Diamine ... go and look at all them colours...)

When it all arrives, quickly and accurately with a free packet of Haribos (!!), she scribbles away .... and then ... when she remembers ... she scribbles still.

From a portrait by August Sander

Sunday 6 August 2017

Streaming Komische Oper Berlin's "The Fair at Sorochintsi" by Moussorgsky

Muggy late summer weather. Out in the garden, hanging me washing, besieged by swallows swoopin' and chatterin'. Why flying so low? Flying ants, that's why, and the birds was swooping in for a meal of fat queen ants on the wing.

But sometimes this weather gives me a right old headache, or the feeling of the start of one. This happened the other weekend and I took to me workroom, feeling sorry for myself, unable to read and nothing on the radio... until I do have a brain wave and try the internet and the Opera Platform.  And I found a piece from the Komische Oper Berlin (same director, Barry Kosky, that brought "The Nose" to Royal Opera House).

Dear friends I spent a pleasant couple of hours, forgetting my headache and lounging around to the streamed pleasure of  Moussorgsky's "The Fair at Sorochintsi" Berlin style: farce, love story, devils and curses, drama, pigs heads and stilt-walkers. And great chorus singing. My kind of opera production.
You can stream it from Opera Platform until 21st October 2017 and I suggest you do.