Home reunion

Another bright frosty winter's day after a fair night's sleep. I woke up clear headed for a change and stayed like that until lunchtime low blood sugar assailed me. Clare cooked pancakes for breakfast, and afterwards I went grocery shopping. On returning I started to feel light headed as my blood sugar dropped, so I made haste to cook some pasta and make a chick pea and mushroom sugo to go with it. Fast food but tasty, and it quickly boosted flagging energy level. While waiting for Kath and Rachel to arrive, I walked in Llandaff Fields for an hour, and spotted a pair of pied wagtails foraging on the footpath but they moved too quickly to photograph. The girls had just arrived when I got home.

After cups of tea and biscuits, Rachel took out her grandpa's 'cello and started playing, I accompanied her on the guitar and Clare or Kath joined in on flute. I rarely feel inclined to pick up the guitar to play on my own, less so since the stroke, but when Rachel started playing, I automatically joined in with her, despite a few errors due to lack of practice for many months. My guitar playing relies on harmonising from memory and I found that my musical memory and ability to recognise things without latency isn't as affected as it is with visual memory, which still works, but is slower. For this, I am most grateful.

We went out for supper to Stefano's and had an excellent early evening meal. The rising 'Wolf' full moon was with us on the way to the restaurant and the way back. We stopped and howled at it, the way we did when the girls were young. When we got home we made more music until it was time for bed, preceded by a foot rub from Rachel. So lovely to be together again.

 was less impaired

Family feast

We woke up late again, to sunshine and clouds, but no rain. It's Clare's birthday today, so I made porridge and then cooked pancakes for a long leisurely breakfast. Clare and Ann went to the Co-op, and I went to Tesco's to buy a bunch of flowers, wine, plus extra mushrooms and garlic to cook for a light lunch, given we're dining at Stefano's this evening, en famille. When I got back I composed a birthday haiku to write in a card I bought for her.

Then, a walk in the park for an hour. There was a RSPB promotional stand, and I stopped to chat to the guy who was looking after the stall and chatting up passers by. He told me that he works at the Newport wetland nature reserve, somewhere we've yet to visit. He'd been in the Algarve on a birding trip earlier this year, and we talked about birds we've seen in the Iberian Peninsula. I talked about my time in Nerja. Over by the stables I caught sight of a pair of ladybirds with big black spots on a yellow background. 14-spot ladybirds they're called. There are 22 spot ladybirds as well. These are not uncommon, but I guess we're more used to seeing red ones with black spots.

At a quarter past six, Kath and Anto arrived together with Owain, having picked him up from the station. We had a table booked at seven, so there was just enough time for a glass of Prosecco before arriving there for an excellent meal. Being a Saturday night, the place was packed but we had a corner table. The music wasn't too loud,  nor was the buzz of conversation with fifty odd people eating together and talking, so we were able to converse too. We were back home by nine, drinking another bottle of wine and chatting, until it was time to turn in for the night, earlier than usual for us. A symptom of advancing age and weariness, sad to say.

Unforgettable initiation

I woke up early to a bright sunny day, though still chilly. We had a leisurely breakfast with added festive croissants and Easter eggs, delivered if not consumed. added. Then we walked into town accompanying  Owain who had to return home early to prepare for a deejaying gig this evening. He wanted to visit M&S to buy some socks, as Bristol no longer has a convenient city centre store, so we went with him and had a  coffee there once Owain left for the station. In the menswear section, he bumped into an old friend of his from the Cardiff techno scene, with whom he had corresponded only yesterday. Sheer coincidence, which gave pleasure to both of them. Anto hadn't been to the city centre for several years and was curious to see how different it looks as a result of the redevelopment, so I gave him a guided tour of all the new builds, then we walked home along the Taff.

We went to Stefanos for an early evening meal at five, so I could leave in good time to drive to St German's for the Easter Vigil at St German's by seven. When Basma arrived we went through the detail of the baptismal rite together with Peter and Hilary, her sponsors and James who looked after the practical details. Basma's daughter Maya and an English friend came with her. There's no better time in the year than Easter Eve for a baptism even if the services is rather long. 

My contribution was to simply to conduct the baptism rite. after the Liturgy of the Word, which included a thoughtful and appropriate sermon by Fr Jarel. Basma was understandably moved by the experience, having waited for so many years to be safe and free to proceed. I was nervous about forgetting the words of baptism in Arabic or pronouncing it incorrectly, but it came out right in the moment. Peter and Hilary her sponsors played their part and were also visibly moved, and several others said the same after the service. For Basma it's the end of one long journey and the beginning of another. Accompanying her to the font this past six months has been an experience I won't forget.

I stood in the sanctuary in silent prayer during the Eucharistic prayer and Communion, something I've done rarely, and this too was a beautiful way to be on the receiving end of the service at the climax of a  Triduum in which I had no other duties to perform.

I was home just after ten. My Fitbit sent me several notifications congratulating me in a patronising and childish way for walking 20,000 steps during the day, possibly the first time it has recorded my doing this. I found everyone had gone to bed already, anticipating the advancement of the clock by an hour. In fact all the house clocks but one had been put forward, so after a glass of wine, I also took advantage of an early night to rejoice in my bed, tired but happy.

Matinée Première

A mild and sunny day, with waffles for breakfast. Afterwards I printed off tomorrow's sermon, then started on next week's edition of Sway, Sunday readings to go with it and a couple of new parish publicity pieces, as I was feeling fresh and had enough concentration to work accurately. Some days I'm too distracted for it to be worthwhile making the effort. Other days, no problem. Bad days might be due to lack of good sleep. It seems to vary in a way I can't make sense of. 

After lunch we drove to the Bay for the matinée première of the WNO's 'La Traviata' at the Millennium Center featuring Australian-Mauritian Stacey Alleaume as Violetta and Korean David Junghoon Kim as Rudolfo two well matched singers in leading tragic roles, delivering an emotionally powerful performance with ease. It was an impressive first outing for a WNO standard opera. I think the stage production is much the same as it was when I've seen it before twice at least, but with some effective changes in the presentation of later scenes.

It was pleasant to leave the theatre in daylight and good mild weather, a couple of hours before sunset. After the drive home, I walked around the block for twenty minutes to stretch my legs. Then we went to Stefano's for supper - a festive meal for Clare and Ann whose birthdays are within a week of each other. After a glass of wine and opera chat, an early night.

Unexpected chaos

This morning after breakfast I walked up to St Michael's College with a bag of books on Orthodoxy to leave there for Ross, who forgot to take them with him from St German's on Sunday last. I intended to go by bus from Llandaff straight into town to buy Clare's birthday present, but left without a face mask, so I had to return home to collect one, and then catch the 61 into town. The Tudor Street road works impose a one way system, and the buses have adopted this, entering the city centre from Fitzhamon embankment over the Wood Street Bridge, then continuing to a bus stop on one side of Westgate Street, where inbound and outbound passengers get on and off. It must get pretty crowded at peak times, and in these covid times that's not such a good thing.

Ann was due to arrive from Felixstowe at three thirty five this afternoon, but her train was delayed by just over an hour.  I left the house to collect her by car in what I thought was good time, but traffic in Canton was very heavy. I thought I would have to queue for ages at the Tudor Street junction, but this wasn't the case. I was only five minutes later than Ann's first ETA, then she texted me about an extension to the delay. The train arrived five minutes later than the delayed time advertised on the information panel and went to a different platform. The barrier operator let me through to look for Ann, but with no success. I phoned her and discovered she took a wrong turning from an unfamiliar platform and got lost. One of the station staff kindly escorted her to the other end of the station, and all was well.

Apparently the conductor on her train got off at Swindon, so it had to wait for a replacement conductor to arrive by car from Bristol, forty five minutes away on the M4. The added fifteen minutes was him needing to find a petrol station en route. Due to a shortage of trained fuel delivery drivers some petrol stations have none to sell, and others have queues as a result of motorists panic buying. How soon chaos spreads. 

The first thing Ann did on arrive was make an on-line compensation claim to the train operators. She may get some of her outbound fare refunded. The procedure was understandable enough once you understood what was required, but the web page layout was tricky to negotiate, and took two of us to figure out. It requires a photo of your ticket, and either a ticket number or a booking reference. Nothing on the ticket  indicates which is which of the three groups of numbers it contains. The long ticket number (presumably) seemed to be accepted, but the web application form crashed and had to be re-started. What seems to be the booking reference, a much smaller code of letters and numbers worked. Next time we won't need to guess. Anyway, within minutes of completion Ann had an acknowledgment of her refund application, so the system is functional, and will deliver compensation to her bank account, in a matter of weeks.

Owain arrived at seven, his train from Bristol was delayed twenty minutes, so I collected him from the station, so that we could assemble ourselves in good time to walk to Stefano's for supper at eight. It was an enjoyable way to spend the rest of the day, excellent food nicely served, no mishaps, a return to order after journey chaos.

Dining out with Owain

Fishy story and a movie masterpiece

It's bright sunny weather and not pouring with rain for today's elections for the Welsh Senedd and Crime Commissioner. That might encourage a higher voter turn-out, with added reassurance that polling stations will be run according to covid secure protocols. Just bring your own pencil. Clare and I submitted our postal votes two weeks ago, as we've done for the past twenty years. We probably won't know the result until Saturday. I do hope Mark Drakeford is re-elected, as he's served the nation well during the pandemic, with his clear, sober, measured manner of communication. 

News, as I woke up this morning, of sixty French fishing boats gathering in the waters around the port of St Helier Jersey to protest about the issues relating to the requirement for them hold a license to fish in UK waters around the Channel Islands, as part of the post-Brexit trade deal. Yesterday the French government made threatening noises about cutting of the island's electricity supply if this wasn't resolved - you have to wonder what sort of fools in government are appointed to make inflammatory comments of this kind. The British government is equally capable of such stupidity however. It seems to be a common affliction among people who think they have power and authority to speak out publicly with little thought for the impact - or do reporters fan the flames by confusing off the record gossip with public statement? 

By lunchtime, there were two UK fishery protection vessels monitoring the situation and two French patrol boats, and conversation about the issue was already taking place. The new EU-UK trade deal which was recently announced grants that historic Channel Island fishing rights in UK waters are retained by the neighbouring French fishermen, but they need a license to support this. More paper-work, easy on-line if you have time and back office support to apply, but many of the fishermen are small business operations that may not have that support. Some have applied for licenses but not yet received them. Is the system not working? Not yet fit for purpose? There is another issue, a bit more embarrassing to be faced.

Those applying for licenses have to state the size and type of catch landed annually. This is important for the conservation of fish stocks, something the UK government is trying to be more zealous about. There is a suggestion that more fish is being taken than the conservation quota allows - probably true for both the French and British fleets - the French complain they've not had to give this precise information before, when all was regulated by Brussels. 

Over-fishing has quietly gone on for generations. It's hard enough for small fishermen to make a living at the best of times. The real enemies of marine conservation are large scale trawling enterprises, that scour the seabeds and destroy vital habitat. Their 'productivity' drives down the price of fish. They profit, small businesses suffer from reduced income. It's not fair. If only our proudly 'independent' government would really put some effort into clamping down on those who are doing the damage to our environment, even if it meant the price of fish were to increase significantly 

After breakfast and morning prayer, I walked to St John's and celebrated the Eucharist. Again there were fourteen of us present. Then, back home to cook lunch ready for Clare's arrival from kindergarten. As promised earlier in the week, I booked us a table for Sunday lunch this weekend at Stefano's. It'll be our first restaurant meal this year. I hope it's warm enough on their little patio. It's still unseasonable cold as well as wet, despite promises of hot weather to come.

On my walk down to the Taff after lunch, I spotted the first brood of four Mallard ducklings on the river with their mother. What surprised me was how big they seemed. In previous years, the first ducklings seen have been smaller, and there have been as many as eight of them in a brood. I'm sure I would have noticed them earlier if they'd been out there, as I walk by the river most days. I wonder if the cold wind of the past couple of weeks has had any influence on their late appearance?

This evening we watched the masterpiece movie 'Citizen Kane' by Orson Wells. I think it's the first time I watched it with some understanding. The last time I saw it was about fifty years ago, and then maybe I didn't see the entire movie, and wasn't as visually aware as I have become since I started taking photos forty years ago. I was intrigued at the scene on the night when Kane stands for election as Governor of NYC, his newspaper readies two possible next day front page headlines announcing news of the result: 'Kane Elected Governor' and 'Electoral Fraud!' The movie was made in 1943. Did Trump model himself on Citizen Kane, I wonder?

The movie was followed by a documentary about Orson Wells as an artist as well as film auteur, visiting the many places where he lived and worked, revealing the influences they had on his creations - a lifetime's sketchbooks and paintings as well as movies. It was fascinating, and the narrator didn't talk about Wells, but rather addressed him throughout, as in a eulogy for someone still living. A powerful device which put it on a different level to the average documentary. An inspiring evening of telly - for a change.

'Spiral' returns

Nick and Sue stayed overnight in a dog-friendly AirBnB on Romilly Road, and breakfasted at the Brod Danish cafe nearby. This allowed us to have a lie-in before we met up to take Digby for another walk down to the weir and back before lunch and their return trip to Edinburgh. 

Llandaff Fields was hosting 'Cardiff Cross Challenge', a huge junior outdoor athletics meeting with races around a 3km long circuit around the park for children of different age groups from schools and athletic clubs. There were hundreds of children and parents milling around, watching, consuming refreshments or queuing in an orderly for one the dozen portaloos on site. There was an assortment of stalls, selling kit, promoting membership, selling food and drink, all of which had arrived and been set up, along with an enclosure for running events in the past twenty four hours. It's a pity the ground was still sodden by this week's rain. It'll look terrible for weeks to come. Still, it's for a good cause.

After a brisk walk, down to the river and around Pontcanna Fields, we returned, consigned Digby to his bed in the back of the car. The Nick and Sue took us to Heaney's restaurant in Romilly Crescent for lunch. The decor is distinctly minimalist, and the gourmet nouvelle cuisine menu is equally so. Even with an explanation from our waiter, we found it hard to understand the various menu options. 

The dishes I chose were tasty enough but the portions were small. I an additional plate of veg and some french fries would have satisfied my appetite, as we normally eat in the middle of the day. It's a pity we didn't go to Stefano's, a few doors up the street instead, but Sue was intrigued with the style and setting of Heaney's, and  was keen to try it, a good enough reason reason for going there.

We returned home for coffee and a slice of Clare's bara brith, then Nick and Sue too their leave of us and headed back to Scotland. In the evening BBC Four screened the first double episode of French crimmie 'Spiral', with a same lead actors playing Parisian detectives, judge d'instruction, and a bunch of dodgy lawyers. The series has been running for fourteen years, two years less than the original US top rated NCIS. I think 'Spiral' has killed off fewer key characters over the years too. Season seven opens up with the murder of a senior cop who has overseen the careers of Laure and Gilou down the years. The investigation trail uncovers a huge protection and money laundering racket. Promising!

With a much grander budget and global demand NCIS has screened seventeen series with 381 episodes, only a handful of them double episodes. There have been fewer story-line threads linking certain episodes. The eighth series of 'Spiral' is currently screening on French networks only, and there have been seventy six episodes altogether, but each series is bound together by a narrative thread which is much tighter and more complex. Subtitling for non Francophone audiences leads to a much longer cycle between releases, but it's always worth the wait. Beautifully filmed with superb acting and strong plots, relevant, never fanciful. Saturday evening excitement and interest as autumn turns to winter is guaranteed!
  

Early birthday family weekend

Another good night, glad to be waking up to sunshine again, albeit a little later today as we edge toward the autumn equinox on Monday. We had a Saturday lie-in before breakfast, then Clare filled holes in the shed door with putty. I'll add another coat of weatherproofing paint later.

Kath, Anto and Rhiannon arrived with Owain mid-afternoon. The traffic was so bad that it doubled their usual journey time, so they arrived in time to pick him up from the station. Rhiannon presented a beautiful chocolate birthday cake she'd baked and decorated for her grandma. We're celebrating six days early, as next weekend was going to be less convenient for a family gathering. We took the cake with us to Stefanos' Restaurant in the evening for a family meal, and fed it into the restaurant's cheery birthday ritual, burning a Roman candle on top of the cake or ice cream pudding, and singing 'Happy Birthday to you', with some diners within earshot joining in.

After the meal, Owain took his leave of us, hastily taking a taxi to the station rather late, hoping to catch the last train back to Bristol. We were relieved to receive a WhatsApp message ten minutes later to say that he'd been successful. He needed time to himself, as he was in Berlin until Tuesday, then in London for a work conference on Wednesday, so he's still playing catch-up.

Today is the fiftieth anniversary of my ordination to the Diaconate. I've been working on tomorrow's sermon all week, and having printed it out, made more minor changes and printed it out again. I've decided for a change not to preach on the scriptures of the day, but on the meaning of the Diaconate as an ordained ministry. I think it's the first time I've ever done this.

Coast walk

Yesterday, I delivered my accumulation of electronic waste products to the SFX Tech office over in Newport Road. I had difficulty finding it, despite the accuracy of Google Maps, as the 'Dominions House' building had no name plate. The building seemed to host only a Thai Massage Parlour. I rang the office to check I had the address correct, and found that I did. The office was on the first floor above the Massage Parlour! A strange location for an electronic recycling depot. The guy who came down to relieve me of my stuff was evidently in a hurry, so there was no time to chat and find out a bit more about the organisation. Most importantly, it's there and offering a valuable service to people with a bad conscience about electronic waste. When the CBS office finally closes there's somewhere we'll be able to take kit that can't be re-purposed.

We made the most of the beautiful weather today and drove to Penarth with a picnic, and took a walk along the coast path along the clifftop as far as Lavernock. The last time we did this was in April, just after my birthday. The hedges along the clifftop are overwhelmed with blackberry bushes. Unlike in Bute Park, there's a smaller proportion of fruit here ripe for picking at the moment. It's more exposed and peak fruit will probably come in a couple of weeks time. The berries here are smaller than ones inland. Even so, Clare with little assistance from me gathered just over half a kilo, which produced a beautifully sweet fruit syrup, perfect for Sunday's apple crumble.

The tide was right in when we arrived and slowly went out as we walked, revealing a red sandstone bed of rock at the base of the 100 foot cliff, decorated tastefully by the sea with a scattering of grey limestone pebbles. The fields behind the cliff path are awash with nearly ripe pale golden barley, and I spotted three different species of butterfly, thought I'd be unable to identify them. I watched a flock of several dozen finches burst from a garden hedge into the air, flying in a cloud formation with tail-enders zig-zagging to distract predator's attention from the majority of birds. This behaviour I've only observed at close quarters once before, at the Rio Aguas in Mojacar. Sadly, too quick for photos.

A Chinese family was out exploring the path. One of them quizzed Clare about the blackberries she was gathering. They hadn't seen them before, back home in Hong Kong, wild or otherwise.

We stopped for a drink in Cioni's, at the town end of the managed parkland area of clifftop, before a visit to Asda while heading for home. Clare needed some medical grade olive oil to soften earwax, but was unable to find any, but I came away with a couple of bottles of wine anyway.

We treated ourselves to supper at Stefano's Restaurant, before settling down for the evening. The last two episodes of Danish thriller 'Below the Surface' were aired on BBC Four. There was a sinister twist to an apparent islamist kidnap plot with  Russian spies succeeding in duping some extremist would be jihadis into a botched attack which then becomes a hostage crisis, whilst at the same time duping a top Danish military intelligence official in collusion. As ever the savvy hero saved the day and there was a happy family ending with another series to follow most probably. (Yawn)

   

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.

  

Michaelmass birthday girl

Yesterday being her birthday, I rose early before Clare, to arrange the traditional family birthday table, with one of the last of the roses from the garden, a lit candle and all her cards on display, plus my modest gift of a National Trust cafe recipe book. After breakfast, she went off to the gym, and returned with fresh croissants and an an escargot to have with mid morning coffee.

Sister in law Ann arrived for the weekend just after midday and Kath drove down for an overnight visit, arriving at seven, just before we were due to visit Stefano's restaurant for a birthday supper. There's an all new menu there now, and we were delighted with what we ate, plus two excellent bottles of Nero d'Avolo.

Our waiter picked up that it was Clare's birthday. We'd not made any special cak arrangemetns but he came to the table at the end of the meal with a glass of flaming Zambuca to blow out, while we all joined in singing Happy Birthday. A delightful gesture.

Today being Michaelmass, I was glad of an opportunity to stand in for Fr Mark and celebrate Mass for three people at St Luke's in the morning.

This afternoon Kath drove us to Dyffryn for a pleasant sunny afternoon stroll around the grounds starting with a light lunch, followed later by tea and scones. Some of the trees have turned colour but not many. The greens just seem paler. The acer and maple trees are putting on a good show and the seasonal dahlias are flooding the beds with bright colour. A lovely outing - photos here.

In the evening, we sat and watched 'Mystery Road' together on BBC Four. It's slow moving and gives some remarkable views of the Australian Outback landscape and a plot which addresses the issue of the crystal meth plague afflicting even the remotest areas of the world. In our nightly must listen radio soap opera, the Archers, Freddy Pargiter has just been given a twelvemonth sentence in a Youth Offenders Institution for dealing in party pills. The exploration of the impact of this on his family and the community, and how people respond to it, is as just educational as any documentary. The Beeb are to be congratulated for this slice of long drawn out contemporary drama.

St Sylvester's Day

What a pleasant surprise to learn this morning that Jan Gould, Vicar of 'The Res' Glan Ely is awarded the British Empire Medal in the New Year Honours list recognising her amazing musical work with children and young people in the locality and city in the Making Music Changing Lives project. It is modelled on 'La Sistema', the Venezuelan music education project among poor people, which has been going for a quarter of a century and touched half a million lives. Jan and her co-workers have shown this way of working translates well from third world to first world. At a time when state funding for the arts and music education falls prey to economic austerity, it shows what voluntary community enterprise can achieve.

Clare returned from shopping with a bag of Seville bitter oranges, which have just arrived in our local greengrocer's shop. By tea time, the first batch was done. I went out to get my regular prescription medication, only to discover the local pharmacy re-located during the week to a former delicatessen store opposite our GP surgery in King's Road. After Clare had done her recipe calculations, another expedition was needed for some lemons and a few more oranges to make up the right weight for the number of empty jars to hand. 

While we were out, I bought a new cover for my Samsung J3, having given the one I bought last week in the shop on the corner of Severn Road to Owain. When Clare gets her J3, I'll be in the same shop again to get one for her. The shop is, I believe, run by a local Pakistani family, always helpful, cheery and polite. Posted at the side of the doorway is a notice apologizing for regular Friday lunchtime closure. The shop is generally open long hours, why bother? It's a simple statement reflecting the fact that attendance at Friday Prayers is built into their trading norms. The local mosque is a couple of hundred yards up the side street from the shop. I have the highest regard for that. Nobody should have to apologise for living their faith in work or out of it.

Today is New Year's Eve, or St Sylvester, as it's known in much of Europe, after the early church Pope commemorated on this day in the Latin rite Calendar (John Wycliff, translator, in Anglicanism). People tend to dine out on St Sylvester, as they also tend to dine our ot feast at home on Christmas Eve across the Channel, rather than Christmas Day. Anyway, Clare fancied dining out this evening, so we went to Stefano's for an Italian meal fairly early, in order to be back in good time, just in case the children started calling us early before going out to see the New Year in. Which they did. Connectivity is not so good tonight, whether talking to Andalusia or to Arizona. All the world is wanting to call up and greet someone, around the clock from sunset to sunrise, whatever time zone that may be in.

The noise of Fireworks has been punctuating the air all evening. We've both tired enough to go to bed and not bother to see the New Year in, rather sleep off the horrible old one. But how to get to sleep with all that random noise in the background? It's hard to imagine what 2017 might bring, but vital to be ready for anything, in a spirit of good-will, compassion and helpfulness, resisting the indulgent greedy, selfish spirit of the age. I wonder how I might be able to make some difference for the better, and not be part of the problem, for as long as I'm fit and able? Having finally moved on from CBS after nearly seven years, I start 2017, looking for a fresh challenge to awaken my energy and imagination, before I become totally addicted to a soporific lifestyle.

  

Night out

For our Monday morning drive back to Cardiff, we chose a longer, potentially less congested route, following the A14 north to the M6, turning west on the A45 towards Warwick, for just about half distance, and from there a familiar route across country to the M5 and M50 back into Wales, along the route we use to get to Kath and Anto's. There were certainly fewer traffic queues, but it still took us six hours, as it rained for the first two third of the journey, and we needed several stops. Clare drove the middle section of the journey, the first time she's done a long stretch since her shoulder operation, with no ill effect, which was pleasing.

We returned to find a note from the postman that his attempt to deliver our new high speed TalkTalk broadband router had failed, as we were away, so I'll have to collect it tomorrow. The new service is due to begin on Thursday of this week. Hopefully it will resolve the problems we've been having due to an overloaded slower connection, and justify the extra expense.

This morning, on my way to celebrate the midweek Eucharist at St Saviour's Splott again, I called at the Post Office main sorting office to pick up the router parcel, not to be opened until the new service goes live, apparently. I had intended to go into the office late afternoon, after taking Clare to the Heath hospital for an eye check-up, but I dozed off in the chair, still recovering from yesterday's long drive unfortunately - old age taking its toll. Then Ashley and I conversed at length over the phone and I completed some work tasks on-line. Another good reason for having better connectivity.

Instead of cooking, we went out to Stefano's Restaurant for supper, as they were having one of their live music evenings, with a variety of singers performing operatic and music theatre songs for an enthusiastic audience of diners. Well, why not it's still holiday season, isn't it? said Clare.
 

Opera matinée weekend

Yesterday the temperature was mild and the sun shone, so we took Andrea out to see Duffryn Gardens. Few of the trees have yet begun to change colour and several flower beds are vivid with the bright colour of autumn blooms. The warm brought out a variety of bees, a few butterflies and lots of dragonflies, which were busy mating over the ornamental ponds.

The leaves on the vine decorated pergola at the far end of the main lawn are still an untainted green, and bunches of small black grapes nestle beneath them. It's a lovely sight.

We navigated our way across country from Duffryn along narrow lanes to find Llancarvan church with its mediaeval wall paintings, but sadly it was locked, so we headed for home.

We went out early to Stefano's for supper - fresh picked porcini mushrooms and arancini were among the treats on the menu - a perfect prelude to the evening viewing of 'Young Montalbano'. Andrea is also a fan.

Today is my first Sunday in a while without locum duty so we breakfasted late, went to St. Catherine's for their Harvest Festival Eucharist and showed Andrea the Riverside market before returning for lunch. We set out early for the opera, to enjoy half an hour's afternoon sun down the Bay before the performance of Donizetti's 'Roberto Devereaux' started. It's the third in the series of operas set in the court of the royal Tudors, with a magnificent performance by Alexandra Deshorties as Queen Elizabeth the First. The set design was similar to that of the other two operas in the series - 'Anna Bolena' and 'Maria Stuarda', dark and minimalist with hardly any reference to the historic period.

In the second half the Queen ascended to sing from a throne which resembled a giant mechanical spider, prowling around the stage. When it was revealed during the scene, it raised a ripple of amusement among the audience. It was incongruous and un-necessary, a gross metaphor of predatory power where a subtle one would have sufficed. The music was marvellous and so were the singers and orchestra, so disaster was averted, and a good time was had by all. It was good to emerge from the Millennium Centre before it got dark, for a change, and return home for a quiet evening of conversation about Geneva days.

  

Alexandra Deshorties

Alexandra Deshorties

Alexandra Deshorties

Sunny pleasures

Yesterday I started thinking at last about my trip to Spain. I renewed my EHIC+ travel insurance policy for the year and printed off my EasyJet boarding pass I was I little annoyed some fifteen hours later to receive a nagging email from EasyJet urging me to check in on-line. Confusing to say the least, but as EasyJet in the drive for better efficiency move exclusively to on-line check-in, so that all you need to do is drop off your bags when you arrive at the airport, there are bound to be teething troubles. This time I've opted to take only hand luggage with me, as last summer in Spain I found that I didn't need nearly as much as I took with me, as it was so easy to wash and dry clothes. So, I've had a practice run at packing what I need already. Now that the weather is more consistently warm and sunny, the trip to far hotter Spain looks more like the work it is and not just an excuse to escape from the British climate.

Before dining out at Stefanos with Clare and Owain, I spent the afternoon in the CBS office, making sure that communication from afar will be hassle free. Since Ashley's hard disk crisis last year, Skype hadn't been  re-installed on his computer, so that needed to be fixed. We'd used it when I was working in Costa Azahar, but not when I was in Sicily and it had just been forgotten. It's silly really not to use it when we're calling each other from offices, not least because of the ease with which exchange of documents can be effected while a conversation is going on, and then discussed. Must try harder to use more common sense. There was also the list of chronic debtors to be revised prior to taking recovery action - thankfully dad debt is small now compared toa couple of years ago, but we'd be better off with little or none.

This morning we enjoyed our sunny garden, uploaded Clare's Arizona photos to the web, and after lunch outdoors, went to Dyffryn Gardens to have tea, walk around the arboretum and sample the virtues of the Leica's wide angle lens in my new Lumix DMC-LX5 in shooting close-ups of leaves and flowers in the bright afternoon light. Here's three examples:

I love the way the sunlight shines through the leaves in the one above, and how it makes the flowers glow in the one below.

And the one below makes me think of something extra-terrestrial, from the world of sci-fi.

I was struck by the volume and birdsong out there in the Vale, in comparison with our neighbourhood, which is definitely down on numbers of garden birds this year. And while other parts of the country are complaining at the dearth of buttercups, there are vast fields of grass, gold and green.

   

Santes Dwynwen

The first meeting of the new CBS RadioNet steering group was this morning, convened by the city manager, not unreasonably impatient to get on with set-up business even though we still await the appointment of representatives from retail users. There were half a dozen of us, and after a wobbly beginning - we'd not been informed until the last minute that the start time had been deferred an hour - and it was a little difficult to get clarity about lines of responsibility on some issues.

Ashley and I have the longest continuous memory of how CBS was designed to run. Unfortunately the original intentions have been poorly pursued because the stakeholders who should have taken careful interest from the outset didn't, and the exercise of keeping CBS firmly tied to its mission and ensuring its viability was simply left to CBS volunteers to get on with.

After five years of poor support, all sorts of people are starting to take an interest who don't have sufficient background or understanding of our highly regulated framework. Assumptions are made which aren't always accurate, so getting clarity of communication at the outset is essential to avoid grief later on.

Anyway, after a few awkward moments, the meeting outcome was positive. We will be meeting on a monthly basis for the rest of the year. That'll keep us nicely on our toes.

If I'd known about the morning meeting delay in advance I could have organised myself better. I missed an opportunity to attend Mass for the Conversion of St Paul, and that was a disappointment, as he remains one of my top ten Saints.

After working in the office through lunchtime, I went home to work on a document to circulate to students on the whys and wherefores of creating their personal portfolio, then went up to College at the end of the afternoon on an errand before Clare and I went out for supper at Stefano's restaurant around the corner. It was a special fund-raising evening to raise money for a  de-fibrillator, featuring a quartet of Welsh National Opera singers performing popular romantic arias. It was, in the old Celtic calendar Dydd Santes Dwynwen, the Welsh counterpart of St Valentine, both belonging more in folklore than in history, unlike St Paul. 

The food was good and the singing delightful. It was most enjoyable conclusion to a dark chilly wet, yet nevertheless busy winter day.