Classical because of the complexity of the music, punk because it was the sound of my youth.
I love Sibellius, Rachmanninof, Tchaikovsky, Mendelson, Stravinsky, Holst, and many more. I can’t name all the symphonies, concertos or other pieces of music they wrote. My memory for music is in the tune, not the detail.
For that reason I can also enjoy punk rock and music of that era, people like Blondie, Ultravox, The Police, Bowie, Elvis Costello.
But apart from a few, stand out songs I cannot remember the names of their songs, singles or albums. It’s like I have a blind spot in my memory. If I do a quiz I never get music questions right. It’s just weird!
I treated myself to an acting workshop for my birthday. It was a bit of a random choice, but I’ve found myself stuttering more since I got Parkinsons disease and I thought it might help my concentration and confidence.
Luckily some of my friends were also there which made me feel less anxious. We started out being given various exercises. First we had to look at someone in a large circle of people and then point at them. The person had to say ‘yes’ which gave the person pointing permission to walk over to them. In the meantime that person had to point to someone new, be acknowledged with a yes and then move on.
It wasn’t complicated, but it was hard to get your head round. It’s hard to just explain it. A few people said yes and started moving themselves instead of waiting for the other person to move. We eventually went on to counting, so it was like a moving conversation with numbers instead of words. Confusing for some, and hard not to make mistakes.
At the half way point we were given short pieces of dialogue. We were then split into groups of two and asked to read through the scripts and pick out concrete facts, not opinions. So you could say those facts could ground the performance, whilst opinions in the scripts could change how you felt about your partners character.
The whole workshop showed how important listening and reacting to another actor is. I don’t know if it helped my confidence but I have to say I enjoyed it. It was run by Claybody Theatre, based at the Dipping House, at Spode Works, Stoke, Stoke-on-Trent.
What a day! I went up to the Harpers Titchy Theatre event today. We held a small theatre in the round, with short two page scripts. Funny and poignant, thought provoking and hopefully memorable.
In addition a local author had a stall selling her books, we had various stalls selling knitware, tee shirts, some glassware, turned wood pieces, penkhull mystery plays memorabilia. Plus the obligatory raffle and tombola. I am currently drinking the raffle prize I won.
We were not only entertained by the actors, but also Ukelele players and Clay Chorus choir.
There were lovely cakes, scones, sandwiches and ice creams for sale. Plus tea, coffee and juice.
All in all it went really well. Hopefully enough funds were raised towards staging a full Mystery play event in Penkhull next year, which would be the twentieth anniversary of the community event.
14 years after the Conservative Party took over government in the UK, the Labour Party has now won our General Election.
Yes the election votes were counted last night, and this morning, after the votes had been collected in only two results are outstanding. I guess that’s because we have about a fifth of the population of the USA and I think I’ve read that the UK would fit into Texas?
But it is remarkably speedy. Sir Kier Starmer is now Prime minister. He is already selecting his cabinet and has taken over the reins of government today. Rishi Sunak the Prime minister yesterday has left number 10 Downing Street already.
It’s so different from what we saw on January 6th 2021 in the States. No fight over the winner, maybe a few recounts, all done manually with people counting bundles of votes which were collected in from Polling stations within hours of them being cast. And how do we indicate who we want to vote for? With a pencil cross in a box next to the candidates name.
The only change recently? Having to have photo ID. Not universally appreciated as not everyone has it and you have to apply for a certificate of authenticity if you don’t have a photo driving licence or a passport. The amount of electoral fraud was only in the hundreds if I remember rightly. This was one expensive policy by the previous government that might have disenfranchised some voters yesterday.
So congratulations and hoping for a much better, less frantic, government for at least the next five years!
Take a photo mainly of sky. Have one or two corners with a building or plant on it. Use a collage tool to create four images and rotate them so that the silhouettes merge in the middle… Voila!
I went on holiday on a wine tasting tour with my relative. Unfortunately I started coming down with a cold on the coach. Soon my nose was red with sneezing and my throat was sore.
Over the channel and into Europe. I slept most of the way. I had thought that I would be able to order some aspirin in a shop, but I made the mistake of asking for it in a familiar way rather than the proper (formal) way with strangers. I got an disapproving look!
Two days of cold with runny nose. I don’t remember much, I couldn’t taste the wine, I didn’t know how to order food. Half of the trip was during a local holiday so the shops shut at midday.
Eventually it was time to come home. I enjoyed the scenery, the friendly vineyards and wine tasting cellars. But I was glad to be back on the coach.
The highlight? Watching ‘ The hunt for Red October’ video on the TV above my seat. It cheered me up and took my mind off the journey.
Had a ‘retinal migraine’ last night, an unnerving experience. I was reading subtitles on TV when they started to go blurry, then the edge of my vision started to sparkle and look jagged, hard to explain, so I’ve tried to draw it. Apparently according to my optician it’s not unusual, I should have covered one eye then the other. If it happens in both it’s an effect in my brain. It cleared up after 20 mins. (if just in one eye, then it may be a problem in one of my eyes).
I just read a post on Facebook about a rainbow and it bought back memories from the 1980s.
I was outside on a sunny day when dark clouds piled up as a shower passed by. I noticed a rainbow forming and unbelievably the end came down just up the street from where I was, about fifty yards away. I walked forward and it moved away. I tried jogging, but it kept the same distance away, then gradually faded as the sunlight was blocked by clouds behind me. I really think this is a real memory, not imagined…
I’m sad to say that I didn’t get my painting of Molly Leigh the Burslem witch into the three counties open exhibition this year. (Staffordshire, Cheshire and Shropshire).
I know they had over 200 entries and it depends who is selecting the works of art. I also know that the exhibition has to be cohesive and not too eclectic. So will I enter again? Yes, but I will probably choose to do something less specific. But I’m glad I painted this.
The reason why? I painted something similar to this as a mural in the Leopard Hotel in Burslem, Stoke-on-Trent, several years ago. The building burned down a couple of years ago and I wanted to try and recreate the memory of it. The painting means a lot more to me than getting it in this competition. X
