a weekend at home

We'd sort of agreed that this would be a quiet, stay at home kind of weekend rather than gadding about. It's probably at least 6-7 weeks since we spent the whole time at home and it means a few things can get done around the place.

I realise this means the highlight is more likely to be the delivery of the Ocado groceries than, say, a trip in a cable car, but you should see that organic broccoli.

So it's become an opportunity to watch some of the uplifting Paralympics on telly and be quietly pleased that the coverage has maintained a good quality, albeit with fewer channels now it has moved to Channel 4. Kudos to whoever came up with that canal-boat C4 ident that flows to a view of the stadium.

Like many, I'm not familiar with all the special classifications used and there's some more noticeable differences in the speeds among athletes, but it's still exciting to watch.

The challenge now will be to find a way to bottle the positivity created from both the Olympics and Paralympics and to keep the sentiments flowing forward as we hit September and more normal news returns.

in which my woolly thinking makes me listless

It's supposed to be a long weekend, but I had a rather late Saturday start. I suspect the efforts of the week had somehow piled up and forced me to take it easy.

That's good in some ways, but also means my 'down time' isn't being spent doing 'my' stuff.

In addition, there's an increasing pile of domestic paperwork to ripple through and sort out. Sometimes it's like there is a conspiracy around Bank Holiday weekends which become extended rainy domestic administration times instead of fun style decompression.

Well, I suppose I this afternoon managed to cycle over a few hills to look lambs frolicking in the fields in keeping with today's new report that says even five minutes of exercise in green spaces is beneficial. Part way along a mad rain soaked my underprepared clothing and I had to shelter under a tree until a big brown dog told me to move on.

It was the second tree that had a good view of the sheep, followed by the reappearance of the sun.

This could all have been a tick in the right box if I'd planned it; what's the old saying, "No lists make me listless"...?

punctuation from a working weekend

In truth, I've had to do a fair amount of work this weekend, interspersed with modest unsatisfactory television grazing and a spot of (well received) cooking on Saturday evening.

Apart from that it's been a rather quiet weekend, although not one where I feel particularly recharged because the working part has blurred it into a 'working from home' weekday sensation.

Right now I've decided to put everything work related away, checked the weather outside (now sunny again) and to find myself heading out to make a late appearance at a music event. It's somewhere in Surrey and will involve varied transport.

At least there will be some punctuation from the working week and I'll head into the proper office tomorrow.

strozzi palace

Another interesting apartment for Thursday and Friday, as we travelled to Cheltenham prior to Jo and Andrew's wedding at the weekend.

Stupendous weather to help us enjoy the cafe society of central Cheltenham. Some last minute shopping before the weekend and a move to yet another hotel which was the base for the occasion.

In the meantime I was able to drift off towards Montpelier although the run of events has successfully prevented me from any other blog posts.

how does tuesday feel like it should already be the end of the week?

Brushing my teeth this morning, I wondered to myself how could it possibly only be Tuesday morning. It already felt like another whole week had passed. I guess its a function of a short weekend and playing with trains and cars and taxis and planes and some action-packed long working days.

So I headed for an early breakfast at the Nearby Fashionable Cafe, and ran into Okke. He independently commented that it already felt like a long week, although in his case he'd just arrived here at around midnight after miscellaneous plane hiccups. And Paul has just left town for Toronto, via Frankfurt and Mel was texting me from LHR on the way to Melbourne via Singapore.

So here I was at 6.55am getting ready to grab a cab across town when this old lounge track comes onto the cafe's speakers. 'One Night in Rio', by Louis Austen, which is only a slightly more exaggerated part of what we were feeling.

The rashbre central copy is here, and here's a few of the lyrics, sung in European:

"So we met at the Hilton Hotel at the lobby
We said we have to leave immediately to Germany
So we hired a cab,
When I saw the cab I thought I’ll faint! because this little cab
Was just a Mitsubishi, a shifted car,
I’m used to ridin’ limousines, luxury cars, with all my stuff,
a minimum one suitcase, two pairs of shoes and three backup singers
I’m used to this, I need this!

Anyway, this driver had no idea how to get to the airport,
‘cause at the 14th street he took a left turn, instead of a right turn,
and I was really mad at him which was:
Hey man we have to.. to be at the airport in a few moments!
So how hard can you do that!
‘cause the flight, leaves, to Berlin!
...
So finally we arrived in Berlin
It was raining, of course
So nobody’s picking us up
‘cause where the hell are these guys?
But anyway, so let’s go get the luggage
And we went down and, there was no luggage, there was no luggage!
So I waited half an hour for my luggage
So I went down to the counter and said: excuse me, where is my luggage?
We flew from New York to Berlin
So he looked into his computer, and he said:
Sir, it’s on the way to LA (LA, LA, LA…)

You get the picture.

listening to radio 1 - big weekend is actually rather happy

Driving back from the supermarket, my car was still retuned to the radio station from when the garage repaired the springs a couple of weeks ago. I've hardly driven the car since, let alone flipped the receiver command system.

It was on Radio 1.
The Big Weekend.
Live music from Swindon.

It caught me unexpectedly, and is actually quite good. I may have to dig out one of those handwritten cool lists for revision.

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