Notes on a weekend
I spent most of my weekend playing on my new beyooootiful piano (pictures tomorrow; the camera was left in the car). It's great; I finally worked out the proper chords for a song I wrote (probably one of my best), noodled through all my sheet music (at least the stuff we brought down), and played Trois Gymnopidies properly for the first time in 10 years (my keyboard doesn't go low enough for the bass notes). Some of the things I haven't played at all in over 10 years, others just sounded so much better on a real piano, you have no idea.
However, my piano is possessed, and the ghost possessing it doesn't like Chris de Burgh. At all. Every time I tried to play one of his songs, the middle D stopped playing. After a short rest of about an hour, it started playing again. The first time, this was a shock - pianos are not supposed to do that, especially new ones. After the second time, it was a little bit funny. The third time, it was very funny.
We will still be having the piano tuner look at it when he comes for the six-week tune-up, but seriously - only when I play Chris de Burgh. I'm not a big fan of "Lady in Red" (overly sentimental, and it's the only song of his they ever play over here), but a couple of the others are quite good - "Don't Pay the Ferryman" is a fun little number, and "In a Country Churchyard" was made for playing at weddings. But still, the piano has spoken, and the CdeB song book goes to the bottom of the pile.
In completely unrelated news, I am definitely going to be at Kingdom A&S Festival (I booked a hotel room this morning), so I will be available for judging all day, and anyone who wants a personal consultation, come and find me - if I possibly can, I will make time for you.
In news unrelated to that, I have just ordered the silk for the cutest little period embroidery project ever, which I charted out this weekend. I'm pretty sure of how the whole thing goes together, and it shouldn't take me 'til next year to get it finished (it's a couple of months of work, tops). I'll post pics when I'm done. It's really cute, trust me.
Finally, just for grins, I found pictures of me at my fattest (roughly 195-200#):
And me now (135# or so):
I keep these pictures as a reminder.
However, my piano is possessed, and the ghost possessing it doesn't like Chris de Burgh. At all. Every time I tried to play one of his songs, the middle D stopped playing. After a short rest of about an hour, it started playing again. The first time, this was a shock - pianos are not supposed to do that, especially new ones. After the second time, it was a little bit funny. The third time, it was very funny.
We will still be having the piano tuner look at it when he comes for the six-week tune-up, but seriously - only when I play Chris de Burgh. I'm not a big fan of "Lady in Red" (overly sentimental, and it's the only song of his they ever play over here), but a couple of the others are quite good - "Don't Pay the Ferryman" is a fun little number, and "In a Country Churchyard" was made for playing at weddings. But still, the piano has spoken, and the CdeB song book goes to the bottom of the pile.
In completely unrelated news, I am definitely going to be at Kingdom A&S Festival (I booked a hotel room this morning), so I will be available for judging all day, and anyone who wants a personal consultation, come and find me - if I possibly can, I will make time for you.
In news unrelated to that, I have just ordered the silk for the cutest little period embroidery project ever, which I charted out this weekend. I'm pretty sure of how the whole thing goes together, and it shouldn't take me 'til next year to get it finished (it's a couple of months of work, tops). I'll post pics when I'm done. It's really cute, trust me.
Finally, just for grins, I found pictures of me at my fattest (roughly 195-200#):
And me now (135# or so):
I keep these pictures as a reminder.