Singing in Llantwit again

A rather quick everyday breakfast this morning, as we had to collect Mother Frances at nine fifteen and drive to Llantwit Major for a choir rehearsal. It was meant to be a recording session for the music we sang in Advent, but the sound technician was unwell. Instead much time was spent organising rehearsals for the next concert on Palm Sunday. Neither Clare nor I will be able to sing in it as we're in Spain, but we went along for the pleasure of a singing with others and learning some new Early Music, from the Holy Week repertoire. 

The skies were overcast and it threatened to rain, but didn't fortunately. Frances needed to get back for an afternoon of work, so we didn't stay for a pub lunch of fish and chips, as we did previously. We resolved to but some when we reached Canton, but found both our local chippies were closed. Instead, we bought cod and oven chips to cook at home, with peas from the freezer. The fish was actually much nicer pan fried without the heaviness of batter.

Afterwards, I went out for a walk in the park and down the the River, which was up again by half a metre and was probably higher and just overflowing earlier in the day, judging by the presence of riverside pools of water. It rained in the night, and I suspect may have rained much more, nearer the Taff source in the Brecon Beacons. Even more rain is promised tonight, although it held off during the day, giving way to a strong cold wind. I was in the last quarter of a mile on the way home when there was a sudden short burst of heavy rain, though not enough the soak me through fortunately.

By chance, when I was going my daily DuoLingo Spanish exercises I came across a link to the DuoLingo podcast series, which I first discovered a couple of years ago but lost track of or didn't have time to pursue after listening to a dozen or so episodes. This prompted me to download the Google podcast app so that I could subscribe to the series of over 120 episodes and have them listed conveniently to take up on while I am travelling or waiting for something to happen. They are very interesting, varied in content and also in tSpanish stories from different countries, told in the accent of the place. I should have done this ages ago.  

Tomorrow is the Sunday in the month with an 8.00am Communion at St Catherine's, and it's a busy day for Mother Frances, with a Ministry Area conference in the afternoon, so I offered to take the service instead of her. Just as well there's nothing compelling to watch on telly tonight, so I can get to bed early. 

Singing again

The temperature leapt up by ten degrees overnight, and it rained heavily. Oddly it felt colder than when it was minute three as the humidity increased. Walking to St Catherine's for the Eucharist the drains were overwhelmed and a detour was needed to avoid being soaked by passing cars despite the rain we were three dozen adults and kids in church.

After lunch, I finished Thursday's Morning Prayer video and uploaded it to YouTube, then we returned to church to prepare for the second of our Fountain Choir concerts at six. I took my little digital voice recorder with me and planted it on the front seat, unsure of how well it would work. I was quite pleased with the result.  We sang well and the music was well received by the audience of two dozen.

After supper and an initial edit of the concert audio, I searched for something to watch on More Four and came across several episodes of the inspector Rocco Schiavone detective series. They were on the Walter Presents site, but haven't been aired live. I watched one and will certainly enjoy the rest. 

Unexpected indoor slip

The alarm got me out of bed at seven fifteen and walking to St Catherine's by half past seven. I expected the ground to be icy, but not wet and slushy. It seems there was a heavy downpour in the night flooding the drains, with a spell of drizzle as it tailed off, turning to sleet and then a light flurry of snow, coating gardens and parked cars. Quite a surprise. There were only five of us for the service, half the usual early Communion congregation. 

Back home for breakfast, then a drive across town to St German's for the eleven o'clock Solemn Mass. Twenty of us instead of the usual thirty. I will miss being here for Christmas. Bless them, they gave me a lovely bottle of Chateauneuf du Pape for a Christmas present.

The road home across town skirting the city centre was far less congested than last Sunday so I was home by one. My lunch was waiting for me, but Clare had gone for a siesta, bearing in mind the demands of the afternoon. We left at two for the drive to Llantwit Major, collecting Mother Frances from the Rectory on the way. I was grateful the air temperature was 3C and the roads ice free. They stayed that way when we drove home in the dark later.

By ten to three all the Fountain Choir singers were in place, attending to lighting and taking a quick run through of some of the pieces, in a warm up session. Then at half past three an audience began to gather. Around a hundred people altogether. Filling the nave. Anna talked them through each of the pieces before we sang, and then we gave it our best effort. It was a spirited performance, flawed by minor errors which Anna and singers may have spotted, but hopefully few of the audience.

Welcoming us at the end of the concert was Philip Morris, retired Archdeacon of Margam, attending with his wife Sheila, a couple we've known for more than fifty years, since I was in St Mike's, when we got to know his parents. Clare taught him English in Whitchurch High, during her first teaching job. They live now in Llantwit and he helps out as I do, most Sundays. He was standing in for Edwin Counsell, Rector, but as a choral music fan would have come anyway. He said it was the first concert of fourteenth century in Llanilltud Fawr anyone could recall. Music from the same century in which the church in its present form was re-built. Our audience was most appreciative which pleased us all. Next Sunday we're singing in St Catherine's, but will there be quite such a good audience I wonder?

We got home at twenty to seven. Before we ate, I had a belated bereavement phone call to make, which I did upstairs. Clare called me down and as I neared the bottom, slipped on the last but one step and my back leg caught on the third step twisting my leg and ankle up behind me. Agony overnight but pain slow to recede. Luckily nothing is broken or torn,  dislocation avoided, and it can bear weight but free movement hurts, so I'm laid up with an aching ankle. I think I'll be limping for a while once I get moving.

While laid up after supper with a foot bandage, an ice pack and a glass of wine, I watch a full length performance of Schubert's 24 song 'Winterreise' cycle on BBC Four. Two youngish musicians Baritone Benjamin Appl and pianist James Baillieu  perform in a pop-up theatre on top of the 2,250 m Julier Pass in the Swiss Engadine, built as a temporary structure for a series of summer festivals. It cannot be used in winter for public performances due to snow, but the recital was filmed in and around the place, with the singer role playing Schubert walking in the snowy wastes in between indoor shots. An unusual arty music video lasting 90 mins, with a few clips of musicians talking with shining eyes. A lovely distraction from the unpleasant discomfort of my twisted ankle. 

Hard rehearsal

This morning after breakfast, I took Clare to her eye appointment at the Heath Hospital, and then worked on completing this week's Morning Prayer video. When she returned, we drove to Lidl's  in Llandaff North where she'd seen a DAB kitchen radio designed to fit under a shelf or a wall cabinet. We had one in place next to the cooker for many years. It was quality and hard to tune if it lost power, but served its purpose. There were several in stock and it was just the right shape, so we bought one, and did most of this week's grocery shopping as well. Fitting the radio is the next task, one which Clare is keen to do herself, so she's satisfied it's done right. 

Ruth's weekly email arrived with next week's texts to work on, so I prepared them, recorded and edited the Office. Later I wrote an accompanying biblical reflection, as well, then cooked butter beans in a sauce with pasta for lunch.  

I walked several laps around Thompsons' park listening to a recording on my phone of the 14th century plainsong version of 'O Virgo Splendens' repeatedly. I find it very tricky to memorise correctly, which is vital in a vocal ensemble of eight people. It doesn't seem to stick as well as the other pieces we're doing, but I must persist so I don't make a mess of it on the day. Our first performance is next Sunday evening in St Illtud's Llantwit Major.

Then, an early supper, as we had a choir rehearsal in Saint Catherine's at half past six. It was demanding on concentration and stamina, but Anna our choir director seemed fairly satisfied with the result. Mother Frances is singing with us, and afterwards she signed the verification paperwork for the documents needed to confirm who I am to the Euro diocese safeguarding people. These now have to be scanned and sent, to expedite matters with the paperwork mailed later, I suppose. In a couple of months I'll have to go through this process all over again for the Church in Wales' safeguarding process. Frances is a naturally diligent person, but I think she shares my distaste for this 'prove who you are' business in a community where the pastoral watchwords are 'know and be known'.

I've volunteered to take the eight o'clock Communion again on Sunday. Rota arrangements haven't yet taken into account the resumption of this once monthly traditional Sunday act of worship, attended by about ten people, so Frances doesn't have the support of Rhys next Sunday and would otherwise have to take three services and rush around far too much. I'm so happy to be fit and well enough to be in a position to offer to do this nowadays.

I recorded and edited the biblical Reflection when we got back from church, and went out for a breath of fresh cold night air, to stretch my legs at half past ten. Finally a DuoLingo Spanish session. The app is congratulating me for the length of my continued span of learned over the past six nearly seven years. IT says I'm among the top one percent of learners, and invited me to boast about this achievement on social media. I don't believe their stats and certainly wouldn't boast about it on social media. Such a silly idea, inviting all sorts of trolling and spam.

Jazz night out

After breakfast this morning, Clare had a jazz piano lesson with Eddy. He mentioned that he was playing a gig this evening at a cocktail bar in St Mary Street. Naturally she decided she wanted to attend. A Friday night in town isn't a time I'd choose to go out, when the city centre is packed with carousing young people but reluctantly, I agreed.

Yesterday I had an email from Emma the Euro-diocesan Locum administrator about renewing my PTO, and requirement to fill in a form for the Safeguarding Office as the basis of their checks. When I tried to do this, this morning, although the document sent was a standard .docx file it resisted my attempts to fill it in, being marked 'read-only'. When I checked out the OneDrive embedded online MS Word app, it too refused to do anything other than display read-only. I tried saving a copy to edit, but still it wouldn't work in Libre Office, my default Word Processing app. I don't use desktop MS Office. When I re-saved the file in Open Document .ODT format, it became editable, though editing was slow to respond. At least I got it done and sent it off eventually, but it took far longer than expected.

I finished and printed out my Sunday sermon while Clare had her lesson, then cooked lunch. Afterwards, a brief snooze in the chair followed by a walk in Llandaff Fields and along the Taff, I saw a goosander in the water a good half a mile above a spot downstream where I see them roosting. When walked past the rock,  a little later, a mallard couple was perched on it. I wondered if they'd dispossessed the goosander forcing it to move to the stretch of river where I saw it. For more of last year I rarely saw any goosander on the river as I had done in previous years. I guess these changes in habitual behaviour are symptomatic of changes in environmental and weather conditions. Animals are more affected than humans by subtle changes I think.

During supper, we listened to 'Amser Jazz' broadcast from the RWCMD over YouTube, then walked to St John's to pin a poster on the church notice board about the Fountain Choir concert a week Sunday at St Catherine's. The church was brightly lit and there was a carol service going on within when we arrived. The first Christmas lunch of the year had been served up in church this lunchtime for about twenty people.

We caught a bus into town from nearby the church, and made our way to the castle end of St Mary Street to the cocktail bar where Eddy's gig was taking place. It was packed with young people on their first stop  of the night, drinking cocktails. People came and went fairly quickly so we were soon able to move from a high seat opposite the bar to a table right next to the band. Eddy was clearly pleased that Clare had come, and she introduced us in the break between sets. A piano, bass, guitar trio, playing post war Jazz standards, perfect live cocktail lounge music, played with vigour by three young musicians a third our age. Wonderful!

I recognised the bass player from the 'Amser Jazz' gig we watched earlier.. He caught my attention, as I thought he was playing a proper string bass from what we heard. I looked, but couldn't find a string bass, just a bass guitar sounding like a proper string bass. Tonight he was playing one. Nice technique I thought, and told him so when we congratulated the band before leaving for a ten o'clock bass. The young guitarist was rooted in the classic jazz guitar tradition of  Wes Montgomery and Barney Kessel, despite all being born well after they'd died. It was a musical treat.

We were lucky not to wait long for an 18 bus to Canton Cross, as the temperature was 5C. Not a night to be standing around for long. I watched the latest episode of Astrid and Rafaelle on catch-up when we returned, as it was on telly while we were out tonight. Bed rather late.

Rehearsing in Llanilltud Fawr

Rain all day of varying intensity right into the evening. After breakfast we drove to Llantwit Major for a full rehearsal of the Fountain Choir concert we're going a week next Sunday, ten pieces of varying levels of difficulty, plus discussion of stage layout and acoustics and hospitality arrangements. Anna recruited a church member to look after ticketing and welcome arrangements. The programme should last about an hour. I'm still not utterly confident of myself, with so much Latin text and phrasing which challenges the habitual sense of rhythm, as it's early medieval music and some of the tunes are definitely dance measures. A lot more work to do then, in the next two weeks.

It was lovely to meet up with Father Edwin the Ministry Area Leader, for the first time since he preached at a funeral I attended in St German's a few years back. Having had a good long stint as a country Vicar, doubling up as Diocesan Director of Education, he's now pastor in chief of St Illtud's Parish Church, one of Wales' foundational sites, dating from the sixth century when Illtud established a monastery there which trained pastors for evangelising wherever they went within the travel reach of Celtic Christianity, in effect most of the western Atlantic seaboard Galicia, Britanny, Galway the Western Isles, if not beyond. He loved his involvement in schooling, and his eyes shine brightly with enthusiasm for the emerging potential of his remarkable everyday workplace. He's much loved.

Inevitably, with the retirement of Bishop June this week, the subject of electing her successor came up. He's one of the two electors I have known for many years. I made my pitch for choosing a candidate who is of the Church in Wales with a deep knowledge of our tradition and culture, both sacred and secular, not another import from the Established Church the other side of Offa's Dyke. The difference is an asset to be celebrated, and we're not short of people for the role in this time and place, women and men. In fact Edwin would himself be a suitable candidate, well known with a credible track record. But could he bear to part company with Llantwit, any more than Llantwit could bear to part company with him?

After the rehearsal five of us chatted over lunch together at the Two Swans pub, to far from the church. One Italian, two German and two Welsh, discussing the terms in respective languages for different coffee brews, after a remark about the appearance of lengthy coffee menus in some coffee shops in recent years. Well, the variety has always been there, but its systematisation in coffee bar menus is a phenomenon of the age we live in.

When we reached home there was nowhere to park the car in our street or in the wider neighbourhood. I ended up parking the other side of Thompson's Park with a ten minute walk in the rain back to the house. Any Saturday in the rugby international season the city is invaded by thousands of extra cars carrying fans and shoppers who would rather than than use the city's park and ride facilities use any space they can find in outlying residential areas. If you go out by car for a few hours shopping, you can expect to lose your space for the rest of the day, if not the weekend.

It continued to rain unrelentingly until late evening again, but I was determined to get some exercise, rain notwithstanding. I walked to Tesco's to get wine for the weekend, and then walked in Llandaff Fields for an hour. This required a change of rain gear, one lot sodden by the short walk to Tesco's, so on my second outing I used the free brolly received when I bought my latest pair of Ecco shoes. I've yet to find time to wear them indoors to find out if they fit as well as I thought they did in the shop.

After supper, I extracted the SIM and SD cards from my Blackberry and installed them in the new Moto phone. Both worked without issue. All that needed to be done was find my habitual ringtone and deploy it in the new phone to avoid any confusion at the moment of receiving a new call. I took me a while to work out how. Now Moto has replaced Blackberry and given me a fresh Android user interface which works well for me.

One surprise, on re-installing Duo Lingo on my new phone was a complete overhaul of the user interface, demanding that a rather lazy routine user like me face the challenge of learning new stuff and paying more attention rather than just going over new stuff. Now I know the big learning algorithm has been tracking me and found me out. It's rather fun, this kind of digital prod, especially as I ready myself for a spell of work in Fuengirola where I'll be able to get involved with the ecumenical social outreach work of Lux Mundi, some that that would be been unimaginable when I was last there eight years ago. Amazingly all things work together for good.

Usefully busy

I emerged from a good night's sleep to the return of sunny weather this morning. After breakfast I phoned the neighbour who is acting as executor for a man with no next of kin, whose funeral I am doing next Monday, and arranged to visit him tomorrow afternoon, following my post op optometrist visit.

Then set about making this week's prayer video, only to discover that the Photos app I'd been using had been removed by Windows 11 and replaced by Clipchamp, much more complex, and maybe find if you are stitching videos together, but not if you're just doing a slide show  with audio. A Clipchamp pop-up note said I could download the old Photos app, now rebranded as Photos Legacy. A ridiculous and annoying waste of time aiming to impose on you something you don't need and wate time seeking out the thing you do need. Ah well, I finished the job, and then moved on to digital task number two.

The Church of England Pensions Board, as mentioned previously, is going paperless next year, unless you make a special appeal against this. Well, I decided to try out their sign up system first, and followed the instructions in the letter, which included a registration code. The one given me looked odd and initially I couldn't figure out why. I entered all my details plus the code, and I got an error message in response. The code was in square brackets, I tried with and without the brackets. Nothing. 

It occurred to me this was not my personal code, but a tiny piece of mail merge programming language. I called the helpline and found I was one of many whose batch mailing had failed to deliver a personal number. A week of apologies to every caller for the help desk clerk. What a nightmare! Another properly error checked letter would soon arrive, but the registration code was also printed on a document notifying me of a pension increase which was mailed out last February. I retrieved it from my almost orderly pension file folder, and successfully used it to register my new on-line CofE pension account. I must get around to doing the CinW equivalent. I think we have one, but I haven't bothered yet, as we still get paper documents - running behind the CofE.

Quite a good experience in the end really. There was almost no helpline queue, and I spoke to a kind lady, rather than a robot pretending to be human and failing the voice test.

After a busy morning, I lost track of time and had not long started to cook lunch when Clare returned from her study group. Fortunately the meal didn't take long to make so we were eating by half past one. Then Ruth's weekly email with the Morning Prayer texts arrived. When I checked the scripture passage for my Thursday offering, from Revelation 21, I noticed something I'd not registered before, and it gave me an idea for writing a reflection on it. In just under an hour it was written and recorded, which was satisfying. Then I went out and did the weekly grocery shopping at the Co-op, and walked until it was dark.

We had a Fountain Choir rehearsal in St Catherine's at six thirty, so we set out early to arrange chairs of the seven of us who were able to attend. It got very cold in church as we had no heating so it was rather a struggle to get through, especially as the ancient Latin music we're singing is both unusual and hard to remember. I'm out of my depth really. It was great to return home to a warm house, even though the heating at home had been switched off three hours earlier.

A little more preparatory work on a Lent Course for St Andrew's Fuengirola before turning in early. My ankle has been giving me extra trouble today, perhaps because the ambient temperature has dropped to the level that's normal for this time of year, even if it's happening much later than usual.

By accident or design?

I slept for nine and a half hours last night and woke up refreshed. All thanks to Kay's osteo work on my legs yesterday. There was an email from Pidgeon's confirming a funeral booking for two week's time, and a message from Frances asking me if I'd take tomorrow morning's Eucharist at St Peter's Fairwater. Clare and I then worked through the music we're singing for next month's Early Music concert and she cooked lunch while I uploaded and edited some photos from the past few days. 

For the first time I also made use of Microsoft's Clipchamp Video Editor for a clip taken yesterday of a golden leaved tree by Blackweir Bridge, to find out how easy it would be to learn. I've made slideshows using a few different apps, but relied on old school Movie Maker for years on odd occasions when I needed to edit video, as this could be used without internet. The revised version had too many features to make it worth re-learning how to use it, so I didn't bother with it, found and installed the Windows 7 version on previous devices instead. I've not needed to tinker with video footage in the past few years, so I'm pleased to find something simple and handy for my limited needs.

It rained most of the morning, but had stopped when I went out for a walk after lunch, and looked as if the sky was clearing. Appearances were deceptive however, as more rain clouds swept in from the west. Ten minutes into my walk, the rain started again and didn't stop for more than a hour. It wasn't very heavy so I kept going and just got wet slowly. 

We had an early supper before a choir rehearsal. I thought it was going to be in St Catherine's and I had to open up the church and put the chairs out. But we got the week wrong, it was in the Rectory instead. The choir WhatsApp message board has a great many messages to read in a busy spell, so it's easy to become overwhelmed with excess detail and

I got to church at six, opened up and put some chairs out in a semi-circle for the choir to use. Clare came a little later, then when nobody turned up at six thirty, she rang a choir member and discovered our joint diary error. Then I had to put away the chairs, lock up and then we walked to the Rectory at Victoria Park, and were half an hour late joining the others.

Kim offered us a lift home in her car, as she lives nearby. We were amazed to discover that she runs a classic Morris Minor, in excellent working condition fifty three years old. Brother in Law Eddy ran the estate car version of this when we were all a lot younger, inherited from their father Francis. As David and Anneke grew up and needed more space, he traded it in for an Astra. It's probably forty years since we last rode in any Morris Minor. It's the sight and sound of a bygone era.

We returned home to news of missiles hitting a rural area 8km inside Poland's border with Ukraine. Russia denies it was theirs although the nearby Ukrainian city of Lviv was among the places hit with a hundred missile strikes on energy infrastructure targets today, as has happened daily this week. 

Missile guidance systems rely on satellite navigation, but any missile can malfunction mechanically. It's also possible this was an Ukrainian anti-aircraft missile colliding with a Russian missile. It seems that both sides use the same basic weapon, adapted for different purposes. Only thorough forensic investigation of airspace surveillance records will reveal the truth of the matter.

If it was a Russian missile, this strike could be a random failure, or be aimed at provoking a reaction, since Poland is a NATO member country. Putin could well be testing NATO's willingness to take action  collectively given that 'an attack on one is an attack on all' is a founding principal of the charter. I don't imagine NATO member government defence ministry staff will get much sleep tonight, with a meeting to review the situation tomorrow.

New shoes, new brolly

I had a disturbed night's sleep due to aching injured thigh muscles. It didn't occur to me that I might take an analgesic, but after breakfast I took a 400mg ibuprofen and it calmed down. Clare went to her study group, and I started work on next week's reflection before cooking fresh sardines and veggies for lunch when she returned. Annoyingly the pair of cheap reading specs I bought yesterday have broken already.

I needed an hour's siesta in the chair afterwards, and then went into town to bank a cheque, and look for a new pair of shoes, always a daunting task to my mind. I ended up buying a pair in the Ecco shop, and was given a promotional Ecco pocket umbrella for free!

By the time I reached home it was approaching six o'clock and an early supper was waiting on the table for me as we had a Fountain Choir practice in St Catherine's at six thirty. Two hours hard work! Having attempted a repair on the specs I took them with me to the rehearsal unintentionally in place of a much better pair of prescription reading specs. Somehow they held together throughout the rehearsal.

As we left the church grounds afterwards, Mother Frances who now sings with us, was heading out on her bike. I offered to lock the gate for her, as I also had church keys with me. Unfortunately, they were my keys to St John's, and she'd disappeared into the dark by the time I realised this. I had to walk home and get the right keys, then return to lock the gate properly. What an idiot!

I walked further today than I did in the week before yesterday's injury, but my leg didn't hurt nearly as much as I feared it would. It still feels bruised, like a sprain, but is much less painful than expected. I'm thankful for small mercies.

I got back in time to watch the ten o'clock news, with worrying news of the US mid term elections threatening a shift in the balance of power away from the Democrats to the Republicans, and further threat of Trump running for a second term as President. God forbid, at this critical time in global politics with financial and ecological crisis plus the Ukraine-Russia conflict already promising to destabilise further international relations. Unhappy times.

Hidden gem

Another damp day, overcast with occasional showers. Rhiannon had an early train this morning, so Clare went with her on the bus to see her off at the station while I was still asleep. After breakfast I read a couple of chapters of 'Invierno en Madrid'. I'm nearly at the end of this 600 page novel now. It's taken me several years in fits and starts. Meanwhile, Clare cooked a curry for lunch.

Straight after, we drove to Rumney for a hairdressing session with Chris. While he was working on Clare's hair I went for a walk down to Parc Tredelerch (the Welsh name for the Parish of Rumney). It's ten minutes walk away from his salon, the other side of the main railway line. It's an area of partially drained marsh land on the eastern bank of the river Rhymney, which flows down the valley of the same name past a town on the edge of the Brecon Beacons out into the Severn Estuary. 

The park contains Lamby lake which takes twenty minutes to walk around. It's the remnant of an ox-bow lake, cut off from the course of the river a long time ago, and now separated from it by  three metre dyke. It's teeming with fish, home to thousands of birds and surrounded by marsh grass, shrubs and trees. Until twenty years ago the area was a site where waste material could be officially dumped, then it was cleared and landscaped to make a park. I was sorry I didn't take a camera with me. Next time I will. It's amazing I knew nothing of this secluded nature reserve on the fringe of a large suburban housing estate until Chris suggested I walk there.

When we got back I went out for another bereavement visit as things are still unsettled about the funeral I'm doing this Thursday. Unfortunately nobody was at home, so I had to send a text message urging the next of kin to contact me. I rang John, one of the funeral arrangers at Pidgeons, and we discussed what needed to be done, and later exchanged emails, so that at least we know what's going to happen.

An early supper, then a walk to St Catherine's for a Fountain Choir rehearsal. The music is challenging, but even more so is reading and absorbing the Latin text. All good fun, and back in time for the final episode of the darkly comic nasty crime thriller 'Inside Man'. As it was about a well meaning Vicar who loses the plot and ends up responsible for a couple of deaths, even though he doesn't kill the victims, I found it uncomfortable watching.

Bye bye booster

A mild and cloudy start to the day. Clare went off to her study group after breakfast. I archived my latest photos from Spain and prepared lunch for Clare's return, The news media are obsessed with the state ritual of handing over the role of Prime Minister from Boris Johnson to Liz Truss, and endless speculation about her cabinet appointments, policy plans, and whether or not her first speech will be broadcast from outside Number Ten or indoors if it rains. An awful waste of time in my opinion.

I went for a walk along the Taff after lunch, saw and took photos of a solitary egret on the eastern shone, a place where I've seen just one hunting for food on several occasions in summers past. Apparently there are more of these birds upstream around Forest Farm area, but I've only ever seen a single one this far down.

We had an early supper as we had a six o'clock rendezvous with Fountain Community Choir members at a house twenty minutes walk away from home at the city end of Canton. Ten of us gathered to rehearse for a concert before Christmas of mediaeval liturgical and devotional music, some interesting and challenging things to learn. I felt completely out of my depth, and my vocal cords were stiff and unfit. The music was all new to me, and will be fun to learn. The rehearsal and concert schedule shaping up cuts me out of any more locum duties this side of Christmas, and that's just as well, given the gaps to be filled in maintaining the ministry of the church to its faithful remnant in coming months. I expect to be busy most Sundays and on weekdays.

Mother Frances has joined the singing group. I really hope she finds it's a fun adventure. As we arrived she sent me a message about a funeral a week Wednesday. Tomorrow I stand in for Emma at Fairwater's midweek Eucharist.

Our EE signal booster has stopped working, after seven and a half years of pretty decent service. I got in touch with EE by Direct Message and was told that the device was being phased out, replaced by 4G voice over internet mobile calls. Well and good if it works, but we can't get enough 4G signal on the ground floor of the house to be able use this facility - IF we have a phone designed to do this. Clare's phone does, my Blackberry is too old. There we are, built in redundancy at work. And no compensation. The signal booster and my phone are destined to become electronic waste for no good reason, and there's been no improvement in mobile phone service in the house since we moved in.

 

One more step on recovery road

Sunshine and showers today, and it's a bit warmer, more like May is expected to be. I uploaded today's reflection, audio and text to WhatsApp shortly after eight. After breakfast, Clare went off to Cowbridge with a friend for a study session in a group member's garden. A pleasant outing for her. I went to the GP surgery with my prescription request and collected Clare's eye medication from the Treganna Pharmacy before cooking lunch. 

I drove to Llandough Hospital for an ultrasound scan this afternoon. On my way back I went to PC World at Culverhouse Cross to buy a new cartridge for my lazer printer but found the store no longer stocks lazer ink cartridges, so I'll have to order one on-line instead. The Currys PC World in the city centre closed for good during the pandemic. Now they only have superstores on the eastern and western sides of Cardiff. So much of their business has moved on-line in the past couple of years. The superstores are in effect giant showrooms for all kinds of consumer goods, and are not well frequented by clients. I wonder how long they will last? Interestingly enough there are dozens of ink-jet cartridges available in store. These truly are money spinners, as they don't last long. In contrast, a lazer ink cartridge can deliver ten thousand copies and last several years. Anyway, there was an Aldi next door, so I bought a couple of bottles of wine to take home instead.

For the first time since last summer the Fountain Community Choir in which Clare sings met to practice at St Catherine's, following all the covid secure requirements which the Parish sticks to religiously. Also the Parish Brownie pack met again, in the church grounds rather than in the hall, but these small steps are welcome hopeful signs of return to normality. Once my last operation is done, I'll consider a return to singing again. I've not felt able to sing with others this past few years. It calls for a certain energy that I have lacked, whether its physical or emotional I don't know, but when the time is right and the Spirit moves, it'll be possible.

While Clare was out I watched the last episode of the second series of New Amsterdam, which finally showed up on the More Four home page, and then a long episode of 'Inspector Falke', dealing with a case that involved asylum seekers, covert gay relationships in a homophobic setting, drug dealing and police corruption, not to mention the murder of a woman during a police hunt - very complex and a last minute twist in the revelation of which copper was corrupt. 

A Bosnian Welsh connection and Leonardo celebrated

Two services to take this morning St Dyfrig & St Samson's at nine and St Catherine's at ten thirty. Thankfully the journey between the two on a Sunday morning is six minutes. I'd have had longer in between them if I'd succeeded in writing a shorter sermon, and I did take a couple of hours to concentrate it by ten percent, but twenty percent would have been better. Editing for conciseness is a skill I have learned over the years, but with some subjects it's difficult, although there was another reason for not leaving St Dyfrig & St Samson's on time.

A young man called Daniel who normally serves at St Mary's comes and stands in as MC when Julian the regular MC is away on business. He was there last week as well. As we were getting ready for the service, one of the others in the sanctuary party asked Daniel when he was next due to go out to Bosnia again. Interesting, I thought, and asked what took him there. His answer was surprising. He leads a script writing team with a film making project, which is working on a story from the time of the Balkan war in the 1990s. 

The town of Gorazde was besieged by the Bosnian Serb army in 1995 after becoming a Bosnian Muslim refugee safe haven, as happened in Srebrenica. In the latter, the UN peacekeeping force surrendered the town to the Serbs and over 8,000 people were massacred. Weeks earlier the Serb forces had taken UN peacekeepers hostage in Gorazde, but couldn't take the town as a contingent of the Royal Welch Fusiliers, part of the UN force wasn't captured and fought back, saving the town from the same fate as Srebrenca. The story isn't so well known, but is certainly worth telling. After the service, I told Daniel about my visit to Sarajevo in November 1997, and expressed interest in his project, so we're going to meet for coffee and a chat later this week. And that nearly made me late.

At St Catherine's there were fifty communicants and a couple of dozen children in Sunday School to bless at Communion. Having spent time with them in the hall Mthr Frances came in with them and interviewed the children about what they'd been learning. It was such a delight to have Emma, Nick and little Ned there with newborn Eleanor, Emma's first outing apart from the doctor's, since giving birth last week. I felt truly blessed being able to bless Eleanor and say a prayer for her and Emma at the altar during Communion. There's good positive energy in the church community these days, with people responding to fresh leadership after nine month wait for a new Rector. Most cheering.

In the afternoon, Clare was singing at Insole Court with the Fountain Choir and left to rehearse right after lunch. I followed on later. It was a joint concert with the Roath Recorder Ensemble celebrating the life of Leonardo da Vinci in this 500th year anniversary of his death. It featured poetry as well as music of the period. I used my Sony HX300 to video the choir from the back of a large drawing room, filled with performers and audience. The acoustics were very good and the sound quality of the recording was far better than I expected, so it was worth doing, to provide choir director Anna with performance evaluation material.

Time for some catch-up writing after supper and then an early bed. 

Housewarming

This afternoon we drove to Mountain Ash for the housewarming party of an ex-colleague of Clare's. The house which Gareth and Sophie bought a year ago at a good price and are now renovating is in a side street terraced row up the eastern hillside above the town with lovely mountain views. Theirs is perhaps a century older than the other houses, perhaps where an official or landowner had lived, or even a Manse maybe. They have enough land around for a garden and also to extend the house one day. Gareth has made a garden tree house for his young daughter, and he loves it.

There was hardly anyone there I knew. People were in family groups with young children and pets to manage, so that limited the amount of conversation possible. I ended up talking with a convinced and well informed euro-skeptic, which was probably good for me. Some of his analysis didn't ring true as fact to me, but who am I to fact-check the rhetoric of others when it borders on conspiracy theory? I don't do any political homework after all.

Thankfully we needed to return after a couple of hours, as Clare was being taken to St Edward's in Roath to  a rehearsal before an evening concert by the Fountain choir and Roath recorder ensemble. I  stayed home to finish tomorrow's sermon, and watch this week's double episode of the outstandingly good French flic series 'Spiral'. The concert will be repeated soon at Insole Court, half an hour's walk from home. That suits me better.

A summer concert and a couple of weighty matters

I last used Windows Movie Maker a year ago, so I had to re-acquire from the depths of my memory the ability to use it. There may be better, cleverer and more up to date programs out there. This one dates back to Windows 7, but still works and is available to download, so I have it installed on my desktop Windows 10 workstation. As my use is so occasional, it's not worth getting acquainted with anything else, given my limited needs. It's a waste of time. Once I got back into gear with it, a batch of ten short videos to process took the morning to complete and upload. Alan had asked if I could use Dropbox. I opened an account last year, but had little need to use it. Google Drive serves most of my limited needs. In fact, the free 2GB upload limit wasn't enough to complete the job, so I had to open a second account with a different email address, for the remainder. Once these have all been accessed and downloaded by Alan, I can remove the files. They'll be kept on a USB drive for future reference.

In the evening Clare had a lift to Insole Court, the performance venue to prepare the concert with the other choir members. It was a pleasant summer evening, so walked there. This time, there was room to mount the Song HX300 on a tripod, so filming was easier and better quality. I think the sound was OK, but no doubt the critical ears of choir director Anna will have something to say about that! The concert presented an international mix of little known madrigals English, Welsh, Italian, German, Macedonian and Hungarian, challenging to sing, as I well know from listening to Clare learn words and music over the past few months.

I was press-ganged into taking ticket money at the door. There was an audience of twenty in a room which held double that amount, in the beautifully restored out-buildings of the main Insole Court mansion. How the place has changed since Rachel's wedding reception was held here 13 years ago. It was quite run down in those days, but a group of local community activists campaigned to bring it back from the brink, and everybody now benefits. 

Uploading this batch of video clips to YouTube for Anna will have to wait until tomorrow. We got back after Inspector Montalbano had started, and thanks to BBC iPlayer we were able to watch it from the start. It was late when we went to bed, but it was worth staying up for. It was a complex tale with unusual twists and surprises, full of beauty and sadness - the second time I've used that phrase this week. The episode included a delightful portrayal of Vigata's Festa di San Giorgio procession through the streets with a Spanish style trona, for the saint's image, carried by a crew of white shirted guys, who bore it on high at arms length, rather than shouldering it. That's how light it was. Or else a dramatic fictional conceit. In Spain tronas are so heavy that if they are lifted up on high it's possible only for a matter of minutes.

To add insult to injury,  the episode included the funeral of Pasquano, the irascible overweight cake eating crime scene pathologist. Four bearers handled his coffin, as if it was empty. For a corpse of his size and weight six bearers are needed, and have to shoulder and carry with care, as I have often seen, to avoid a dropping disaster or injury. It was bad acting, in the absence of borrowing a few redundant cemetery kerbstones, to give weight and authenticity to the fictional proceedings. 

   

Hard decision times

Our artist friend Fran came to lunch yesterday. In recent months she has been working on the initial stages of PhD studies into the iconography of Sofia - Holy Wisdom. For her it's meant lots of reading and the occasional difficult seminar meeting, but no time for painting, so she's decided this path is not for her. She needs a way to enquire which is more praxis oriented, and steeped in dialogue with other practitioners engaged the same theme. The standard scholarly route seems too narrow and head centred to stimulate a creative response. Thankfully she has discovered this before expending a great deal of energy on it. I still look forward to the eventual outcome. She's a wise and thoughtful person.

This morning, Clare went to her study group at Russell's house. I had another dressing change visit to Riverside Clinic after lunch and then I drove to Dinas Powys to drink coffee and chat with Russell about the spiritual impact of modern technology on our lives today. It's something we're both interested in.

Clare went off to choir practice not long after I got back. I don't have enough spare energy to be able to acquit myself usefully in group singing. It's a disappointment, but I cannot tell from one day to another what impact the behaviour of my wounds will have on me, as it's so variable. After several quietish days with minimal pain and discomfort, today wasn't a good one.

More brexit votes in Parliament this evening. I'd be amazed if these result in a breakthrough, given the insistences already given by the EU that further changes to the negotiated withdrawal agreement are out of the question. No only that, but also deep seated division of opinion and political power plays being made by MPs make consensus seem unreachable. Meanwhile the day of withdrawal gets ever closer, and with it, heaven knows what kind of chaos.

  

Movie night with friends

A routine visit to check in with my GP this morning, and tell the tale of the past few days. He had a couple of very young looking medical students on placement with him. I said how, despite all that's happened, the nursing care I've been receiving has led to a improvement in my overall condition. Also with the medication change, my blood pressure average readings resemble much more what he is happy with, after a long spell of being elevated worryingly. Nursing care or pills? Both, I reckon. Then back to the Riverside Health Surgery in the afternoon for a dressing change - every other day, now things seem to be a bit steadier.

We went to Chapter Arts Centre to see a movie this evening 'The Favourite'. Described as a black comedy in the ethos of the Restoration period, relating the story of eccentric Queen Anne and her women lovers. It was superbly filmed period costume drama with brilliant acting and direction, no doubt destined for high filmic honours. The script was coarse, witty, sometimes funny, but I found it lacked any content to uplift or inspire me. There's nothing new to learn about being from the details of decadent lives notable for unabated vicious intrigue that I feel I need to know. Royal voyeurism as entertainment? We stoop so low. Are we so bored with ordinary decent lives? It's not for me. A wasted evening, as far as I'm concerned.

We met choir friends Claus and Anna on our way into the movie theatre. We sat together, then after the show, invited them back home for 'Abendbrot' - bread cheese pickle and salad washed down with a bottle of Pflazer Spätburgunder from Lidl's - a favourite light red for all four of us. Anna told us of her programming plans for the next concert series. Unusual music, promising to be challenging and fun to sing. I hope I shall be able to rejoin rehearsals this time around. It would be a real tonic.

   

Early Music videoing

We attended the Parish Eucharist at St Catherine's this morning, and then after lunch returned to church after lunch for the Fountain Choir concert in which Clare was singing. If it hadn't been for my current condition making rehearsals problematic, I would have been singing too. I made myself useful however, by taking photos with my HX50 and videoing almost all of the performance with my HX300. 

I'd intended to set the camera on a tripod and leave it to run but there were two snags, the first being lack of a blank SD card. Fortunately the card in the HX300 had enough space, despite being half full of pictures. The spare card in my wallet was full. I had forgotten to buy a replacement. Secondly the tripod adjustable platform mounting to which the camera is attached is unstable and won't rest in a horizontal position. I can't work out what's gone wrong with it but a repair or replacement is needed, so I ended up shooting each song hand held, and moving around, which actually gives more variety.

The choir sang a variety of Early Music pieces, and was joined for several of them by the Roath Recorder Consort, a quintet featuring the full range of recorders, as befits the music. I was pleased with the result of my efforts, and delighted that the concert went as well as it did. Hopefully some of my videos will find their way on to YouTube, and be used to publicise this musical collaboration on the next occasion when a joint performance is planned. 

Needless to say, I spent the evening learning yet again how to edit with Windows Movie Maker. It's July since I last needed to, making videos of Rachels' gig at the Apothecary. The laptop running it was Windows 8 and almost five years old. This program belongs to the period, and not to the era of web apps now forced upon us. As it happened, while editing there was a spell when we were without internet, but as it's a stand alone program, I could keep working, which is more than one can say about many current app offerings.

An awkward evening

I didn't feel sociable enough to attend the Steiner School Christmas Fayre today, even though Clare was singing there with the Fountain choir. I went into town instead, and bought all the annual supply of Christmas cards I need to accompany our end of year newsletter. I believe this will be the fiftieth year in which I have written our annual round-robin. Such a pity I never kept hard copies, and can only account for those stored digitally, since 2002. I'll make a start on writing this tomorrow.

In the evening, we treated ourselves to supper at Stefano's, which promised musical entertainment after the meal. The food was excellent, but the singer, ostensibly with several albums to his credit was more of a working men's club entertainer, interspersing songs with attempts to tell outrageous jokes like an old school working men's club stand up comic. Everything was delivered at such a pace that much of what he said verged on the unintelligible. It spoiled an otherwise pleasant evening, as far as we were concerned. 

Daring even to hint at racist and sexist jokes or jibes contemptuous of 'political correctness' is unacceptable. To judge from the proprietor's reaction it was an embarrassment to him. I felt sorry for him, but at least it won't tarnish their reputation for good food. Entertainers are here today, gone tomorrow. It wasn't easy to gauge the reaction of other diners, to know whether others may have been as uncomfortable as we were during this performance or trying to be convivially tolerant. We left earlier than we might have done, though not as early as we both felt we should, but as we were seated rather far back from the exit, we were reluctant to expose ourselves to more embarrassment. It wasn't exactly what we were looking for to start our countdown to Christmas.

  

Evening Taffside walk home

I walked to St Luke's to celebrate Mass with four people this morning. Fr Jesse Smith attended, on his way to meet the Archdeacon. It's ages since we last met. It's great to see him looking fit and well after a challenging bout of serious illness several years ago. At that time I did some locum duties in his Parish, though we got to know each other when he was Team Vicar in Central Cardiff Parish 16 years ago. He left us for a Tyneside parish. I remember going up there for his induction, a six hour journey. I was delighted that after a spell over the border he returned to the Parish where he's been incumbent now for ten years.

I had an email request to take a funeral a week Thursday. I won't be able to meet with the family members until next Monday to discuss the service, but that gives me plenty of time to prepare. 

This evening we went to choir practice, and numbers attending were thin enough to conclude that it's now time to stop rehearsals for the summer. Instead of learning new pieces we did some voice exercise work, which to my mind is a good thing. Mine gets well worked in the course of leading services but doesn't really get stretched by new demands. I have a little idea now of what I need to be doing to remedy this. I've lost a few bottom notes, but it seems that it's never too late to recover them, if I make the effort.

We went to choir by bus, but there were no buses timetabled for eight thirty when we were ready to set off for home, and nobody going in our direction to give us a lift, so we walked back 5.3km along the Taff trail, after buying a picnic supper in the swish new Llandaff North Lidl store. It was a very pleasant summer evening walk, marred only by discarded cans and bottles. I couple of items I could not pass by, I carried 400m to the nearest bin. Sometimes the distance between bins is greater. More are needed to cope with the problem caused by the couldn't care less members of our throwaway society. More bins require more maintenance staff, and city budgets have experienced terrible cut backs. 

Last week I completed a local council on-line survey to give feedback on its public cleansing services, as I expressed an interest in the issue many moons ago. In this era of enforced austerity in public spending, I believe it's necessary to make it easier for volunteers to work on keeping litter under control, by making collection resources available to them - temporary bins, bags, gloves, tongs etc. Is this too hard to consider, I wonder?