long weekend and a short week
This is exactly how it should be, in my opinion. You see, not only have I taken tomorrow to go play with beelady, but we get Friday off for Easter as well. Yay!!! I was not as productive last week as I could have been, so I will really need to bump it up a notch and be super C this week. Also in store: my first Russian lesson on the company dime and dinner with the ever fabulous jorgitoelcubano. Yes, I think this week will be a good week.
Now about the other things we've done lately. . .
Murder in the Cathedral was interesting. It was performed in the "Actor's Church" off Covent Garden piazza, so the ambiance was really great - and only added by the fact the organist was playing as everyone came in and got settled. I do so love organ music. The performance itself was a bit off. First and foremost, I got the impression that many of the actors had absolutely no clue what their characters were saying - individual words, fine, but a lot of the monologues (and it really is more a series of monologues) came out as complete nonsense. The emotions and actions didn't match the words at all and the meter was all over the place and mostly non-existant. Very surreal and made the already tight prose even more difficult to follow. The 4th temptor, however, was fantastic. Reminded me a lot of an actor we saw at Fringe last year, actually - he played one half of Mephistopheles in Faust. Anyway, his performance almost made the whole thing worth it. Still, we both walked away with quite a lot to think about and resolved to find the text to read for ourselves. Great choice for some lenten meditations though.
Then Saturday was Tango as usual, only I got critiqued in front of the entire class. Things started off well as he picked me to demonstrate correct posture (yay!) and then went downhill. . .you're pushing down and much too stiff in the upper body. . .you're dancing too much on your toes - be more flat footed. . .your ochos are way too spicy. . .turn more slowly. . .even more slowly. . .relax your arms. . .focus your eyes. . .and on and on for what felt like ages, but what was probably only 10 minutes. When he finally dismissed me I was almost in tears. It was all valid corrections mind you, but to have everyone in the class watching when it was supposed to be a demonstration was really too much. Towards the end of class, I opted to let raayat dance with someone else and I stood to the side, the instructor came back over and we went through some things more constructively, which helped (both in terms of me being flustered and in terms of dancing better), but an apology for tearing me apart in class would have been nice. Alas, I don't think it's something dance instructors are capable of it; that and it punched all the spots I thought were well healed over from my previous dancing days. I'm still mixed if it was a good class or not - I learned a lot certainly, but my confidence took quite the hit. Well, at least we have a whole week to practice before going back.
That night we found what sounded like a great jazz club that's actually within walking distance from the flat advertising a Brazilian fusion group. Fantastic! Just what we needed to have some fun. We get there and turns out the band had reserved the entire bar area for their friends and all the tables were booked for dinner. Um ok. Not sure why they bothered to put something in Time Out when they weren't planning on letting anyone else come. Struck me as being very rude. Then we ended up at possibly the most un-British pub in the city - we asked for chips and got a blank look. Yes, that's right. The bar staff didn't know what chips were or if they did, certainly did a good job of pretending they didn't. Very bizarre evening. So we took this as a sign that it just wasn't our night and went back home. Oh well.
Today was the usual relaxing and doing chores, so nothing much to report there aside from the fact we're completely caught up with laundry. Yay!! I did manage, however, to forget to put baking soda in the muffins. . .not a terribly good sign is it?
I'm almost done with The Floating Book by Michelle Lovric, which has been a really lovely read. Some really wonderful characters and great exploration of a particular time and place. Loving it very much. Next book will be The Eyre Affair at long last. And after that - well who knows really? I'm certainly not getting through as many books as I used to. Not really sure why. . .
So I'm actually in quite a good mood despite what looking back seems like a rather lack-lustre weekend. It happens sometimes I suppose.
Now about the other things we've done lately. . .
Murder in the Cathedral was interesting. It was performed in the "Actor's Church" off Covent Garden piazza, so the ambiance was really great - and only added by the fact the organist was playing as everyone came in and got settled. I do so love organ music. The performance itself was a bit off. First and foremost, I got the impression that many of the actors had absolutely no clue what their characters were saying - individual words, fine, but a lot of the monologues (and it really is more a series of monologues) came out as complete nonsense. The emotions and actions didn't match the words at all and the meter was all over the place and mostly non-existant. Very surreal and made the already tight prose even more difficult to follow. The 4th temptor, however, was fantastic. Reminded me a lot of an actor we saw at Fringe last year, actually - he played one half of Mephistopheles in Faust. Anyway, his performance almost made the whole thing worth it. Still, we both walked away with quite a lot to think about and resolved to find the text to read for ourselves. Great choice for some lenten meditations though.
Then Saturday was Tango as usual, only I got critiqued in front of the entire class. Things started off well as he picked me to demonstrate correct posture (yay!) and then went downhill. . .you're pushing down and much too stiff in the upper body. . .you're dancing too much on your toes - be more flat footed. . .your ochos are way too spicy. . .turn more slowly. . .even more slowly. . .relax your arms. . .focus your eyes. . .and on and on for what felt like ages, but what was probably only 10 minutes. When he finally dismissed me I was almost in tears. It was all valid corrections mind you, but to have everyone in the class watching when it was supposed to be a demonstration was really too much. Towards the end of class, I opted to let raayat dance with someone else and I stood to the side, the instructor came back over and we went through some things more constructively, which helped (both in terms of me being flustered and in terms of dancing better), but an apology for tearing me apart in class would have been nice. Alas, I don't think it's something dance instructors are capable of it; that and it punched all the spots I thought were well healed over from my previous dancing days. I'm still mixed if it was a good class or not - I learned a lot certainly, but my confidence took quite the hit. Well, at least we have a whole week to practice before going back.
That night we found what sounded like a great jazz club that's actually within walking distance from the flat advertising a Brazilian fusion group. Fantastic! Just what we needed to have some fun. We get there and turns out the band had reserved the entire bar area for their friends and all the tables were booked for dinner. Um ok. Not sure why they bothered to put something in Time Out when they weren't planning on letting anyone else come. Struck me as being very rude. Then we ended up at possibly the most un-British pub in the city - we asked for chips and got a blank look. Yes, that's right. The bar staff didn't know what chips were or if they did, certainly did a good job of pretending they didn't. Very bizarre evening. So we took this as a sign that it just wasn't our night and went back home. Oh well.
Today was the usual relaxing and doing chores, so nothing much to report there aside from the fact we're completely caught up with laundry. Yay!! I did manage, however, to forget to put baking soda in the muffins. . .not a terribly good sign is it?
I'm almost done with The Floating Book by Michelle Lovric, which has been a really lovely read. Some really wonderful characters and great exploration of a particular time and place. Loving it very much. Next book will be The Eyre Affair at long last. And after that - well who knows really? I'm certainly not getting through as many books as I used to. Not really sure why. . .
So I'm actually in quite a good mood despite what looking back seems like a rather lack-lustre weekend. It happens sometimes I suppose.