A New A-Choir'd Taste

On Tuesday this week, Scooter and I went to a concert in the evening at the Purcell Room in the South Bank Centre. It had been years since I'd been to that venue, but used to be a semi-regular visitor many years ago. I've seen Oscar Peterson, Diana Krall, Dizzy Gillespie, Miles Davis, Manhattan Transfer, Keith Jarrett, Chick Corea and Philip Glass...to name more than a few!

This vist however was different. It was my first exposure to choral music! I love most forms of music, esecially jazz (see names above) and classical, but for some reason, never went to a concert given by a choir.

Well, that has now changed. A friend of mine (who also plays for the Steelers!) sings in a choir called 'Chantage'. Not just any choir either, but the current BBC Radio 3 Choir of the year.

I had no idea what to expect other than a wide range of music as my friend told me. He wasn't wrong. The show started with a tune by none other than Henry VIII and worked it's way through amazing arrangements of 'Under My Skin', 'Chile Con Carne', 'Let's Dance', 'Hit Me Baby One More Time', 'Tears in Heaven', 'Bridge Over Troubled Water', 'Clocks', and 'Cry Me A River' (the Justin Timberlake version.

Never mind the fact their director must have scanned my brain for some of my favourite tunes to perform but they were expertly arranged. I should add, this choir sang a cappella.

I was full of shivers and practically moved to tears on some of the songs and picking my jaw up off the floor on others.

It was also my first introduction to Beatboxing! The choir had the London beatboxing champion doing background vocals on Cry Me A River. He was amazing - I've never heard anything like that in my life. The next surprise was my friend doing the lead vocals on that song - I'd not heard him sing before and was very impressed indeed. Never mind the fact he looks great in a tux, he gave a fantastic performance. Mr. Timberlake would have been jealous.

So, all in all it was a wonderful evening, especially since I got to experience something new in the musical world, which for me, doesn't happen very often. I look forward to hearing more from Chantage and my mate's velvet tones in the future.

The quintessential English art?

A number of years ago I was watching 'Have I Got News For You' and one of the items was a story on how foreign students coming to the UK for the first time were being given lessons on 'queuing' (or waiting in a line for my friends across the Atlantic). I laughed at the time, but sure enough it was true - here's the BBC story.

Apparently queuing is a quintessential English art. Oh really? It must be a 'lost art', certainly 'round my manor. No one at any of the bus stops pays any mind to 'who was there first'. Of course, I notice this most when I'm the sole person waiting for a bus. Like a good citizen, I form an orderly queue of one. Then other arrive and fail to stand behind me. The bus pulls in halfway down the queue, and NOT at the actual bus stop post where I am standing. Clearly the bus driver has to take some blame here.

Sometimes I feel like yelling - 'excuse me, where any of you here first?', but then think better of it as I'd rather not be knifed or shot or looked at as if I was some sort of mental case. I can sort of forgive this behaviour on places like Oxford Street where the whole stretch of it is one giant bun fight, but where I live I just can't abide it.

What put me in mind to write this was two people, or 'queue jumping bitches' as I like to call them. One in Starbucks yesterday morning. I'd already had a nightmare journey in to work thanks to the Central line going tits up and this woman, headphones blaring away, waltzes past everyone, and then the person at the front of the queue says 'oh, after you'. I couldn't believe it!

Then today, at the post office, I'm at the head of the queue, corralled by those tensile ropes and posts, with about five people behind me. A middle aged woman ignores all that, and the automated 'Cashier number 4 voice', walks right up to an empty wicket and begins her business like none of us were there! The staff just served her as if she was next.

These two women were British and should 'ruddy well know better'. Maybe queuing lessons should be given to British people instead of foreigners.

For the time being though, whenever it happens, I'll just roll my eyes and mutter under my breath 'tsk, honestly'.

Now THAT is quintessentially English.

Doorway To Hell

Yikes - it's April and I've only had one entry so far. That's not very good is it? I must admit I've been stuck for ideas. I'm not really one to simply write about my daily life, although many bloggers do, like my friend RetroGoose, and I enjoy reading hers very much, but then she is a professional writer and I have no doubt she could write an enthralling blog about the simple act of making toast.

So, I must do better. I've been surfing around the net and found there's loads of sites for people with brain block like me that supply ideas for blogging. We'll see. Or I could stop using Facebook quite so much.

One thing I keep meaning to write about is the laziness of people. In particular how people act when approaching a set of doors a building. It seems they will automatically head to the one that is left open, even if there's a queue to get in or out of said open door. I see this ALL the time at the West One Centre at Bond Street Station.

At the main entrance there's three sets of double doors. The left set has a sensor that automatically opens them, the other two sets are manually operated, in other words the Herculean task of pushing or pulling it open is required. More often than not, one of the doors on the right side is wedged open and it just beggars belief how many people will walk towards that one to the point of having to wait to get through. Now I know this only takes a few seconds, but for gawd's sake, what is wrong with pushing open the adjacent door to get in or out?? Clearly a large majority of people are unclear on this concept.

I despair for humanity, I really do.

Liar!

I saw this book in the window of Waterstone's today.

I had a flip through and am considering reporting the author under the Trade Descriptions Act.

Nowhere does it tell me how to get Jake Gyllenhaal's body.

He's a celebrity, I want his body. I don't want to look like him, I want him.

It's just not on I tell you. ;-)

That's a Wrap!

All over for another year! It really bothers me just how quickly the years are flying by. I guess that's a sign of getting older. At least that's what people tell me who are older than me. Of course now I'm 40 (*sobs*) I'm getting close to being one of those older people. I certainly feel older when I mutter under my breath about unruly school children on the tubes and buses (as I did in a previous post). My mother-in-law assures me she had a great time in her 40's, so I will hold her accountable if I don't.

Yesterday and today on my way to work I saw a number of christmas trees sitting forlornly on the pavement (that's a sidewalk to the rest of you!). It's always a bit sad for me to take down all the decorations and realise all the build up to Christmas and New Year is all over for another eleven months. Or six if you're in the retail industry.

We really glitzed up our home this year and I thought it looked lovely. I would love to put lights outside and a big fancy wreath on the front door but I know they'd be nicked within five minutes of putting them out there. So all the 'tack' is inside, and now it's down and back up in the loft.

We had a lovely time over the holidays although I don't think I've ever spent so much time in our kitchen in such a short space of time. It all started with the scottish shortbread which I've been making for Christmas for a few years now. I always loved it as a child when my mom made it. Now she's a continent away and finds it difficult to make as you have to knead it all by hand. So I decided I'd learn how to do it. I've had a few goofs along the way - burned several batches and this year I doubled one batch, only to put in a single measure of sugar. It took me ages to figure out why that batch tasted a bit 'flour-ery'. Oops. Luckily Scooter was happy to eat them. Whatever is left would be good for a cheesecake base.

I also made fudge for the first time and that turned out really well. It was chocolate fudge of course, I mean, is there any other kind?

Scooter and I did Christmas dinner for four friends with all the trimmings including the stuffing which never made it to the table as we forgot! Oops. Damn that champagne! Still it was a wonderful night full of laughs and the occaissional fart. Damn those brussel sprouts!

We also hosted New Year's as well and had three other friends for dinner. More bubbly was the order of the day, one of the boys made his fantastic cheesecake with enough left over for the next day! Hurrah. They brought over their Wii games console as well. I've never been much for video games, but I'd buy one of these things - it's much more interactive and you feel like you're actually playing rather than simply pressing buttons.

Scooter and I were a bit sore in the shoulders from tennis, golf, target shooting and bowling. Oh and boxing too. So I think once we get a bit of extra cash we may treat ourselves.

So all in all it was a lovely time - we worked inbetween which I'd not done for about five years. It wasn't too bad, the buses and tubes were quiet and the office was practically dead.

I'm not making any official resolutions this year - I never seem to keep them, so should make a list of 'trys' instead...lose weight, get fit, save more money and try to blog more. I said that last year too, but maybe this year I'll do better.

Happy New Year!