A day late, but...
Dydd Gwyl Dewi Hapus, pawb! Happy St David's Day, everyone!
I didn't get to say anything yesterday because I wasn't home until midnight, and quite frankly I was too tired to make a coherent post. We had a gig at the Lyric Theatre in Carmarthen, West Wales, yesterday evening and we spent the last two hours of the day travelling.
My day mostly progressed normally; dropped Rowan off at school, went to work. Rowan and I both had Welsh rugby shirts on, and he was taking part in the school's Eisteddfod festival. Me, I didn't have anything going on at work - the only thing our 'Ministry of Fun' organised was a poetry competition about 'how great it is to be Welsh/live in Wales' *yawn*
However, at two o'clock I high-tailed it away from my desk and down the lift to join my fellow choristers on the coach that was waiting outside. I chatted to Jan in the seat behind me as we drove over to Swansea to collect the choir from our office there, then Jan moved and Zoe came to sit next to me in order to make space on the coach and we chatted for the rest of the journey. We did try and rehearse, but the CD player on the coach kept jumping. It took an hour and three quarters to get there, and we made it on time for our scheduled sound check at four o'clock - though typically they weren't ready for us. We used the time for warm ups and last minute rehearsals, though, so all's good. Though we were quite exhausted when we got done an hour later, as our routine is quite wearying, us not being professionals or anything.
We all then retreated to the Wetherspoons pub down the street for our dinner, as we had two hours to kill before we needed to get ready. And it was Steak Club night! \O/ I had a yummy rump steak with a jacket potato. Zoe and I were debating whether we wanted to get dessert too, but eventually we reasoned it would sit too heavy while we performed. The last thing you need when you're trying to sing, particularly when there's some degree of movement involved. We chose to pop into the Co-Op store next door on our way back to the theatre for some treats for the journey home.
I managed to sneak myself into the second row for this gig, much to my relief and Melissa and Zoe's slight annoyance. Mel probably because she's used to having me in the front row with her, and Zoe because she ended up in the front in my place, where she's usually near the back. Zoe thankfully didn't hold it against me, but Mel? Who knows. She attempted to 'tell' on me, likely assuming Andrea would coax me back out of my hiding place again, but she ignored it. Did make it a little harder to see her directions, but it did make it slightly easier to hear the rest of my section. If I could just have been someplace in the middle rather than right next to the sopranos, it would have been near perfect.
The gig itself seemed to go really well; Andrea was certainly very positive in her feedback, regardless of the fact her job involves motivation. I think she'd been somewhat nervous, particularly with our version of Oasis' 'Wonderwall'. And there were a couple of songs in our programme that either the Cardiff contingent or the Swansea one hadn't had enough time to polish - as is always the case, somehow. But we pulled it off. We came away thinking we were probably the high point of the show, bracketting both sides of the interval; the other acts on the bill were the Pontadulais Brass Band, and the brother of the Tenor from the GoCompare commercials (If you don't know what I mean, feel free to YouTube - it's a Marmite thing, and personally I think it's hysterical) and Andrea said we were the only one the relatively small audience cheered for. For some reason I never notice that sort of detail.
We then had to hang around till the concert was done, so we could take a bow at the end. This meant hanging around in the changing room and chatting. It got a bit warm in there with so many people milling about (Can't imagine how it would have been if we still had the numbers we did two years ago when we did the Albert Hall!) so Zoe and I followed the example of several others and hung out in the entrance way for a bit to get some fresh air. We entertained ourselves by looking at the posters for upcoming shows and thumbing through the theatre's schedule booklet.
Took us a little while to locate where the coach was parked waiting for us; while the driver was able to drop us off outside, the street arrangements in Carmarthen didn't allow for him to wait for us outside at the end of the night, so we had to try and find him. Unfortunately Andrea didn't quite manage to follow his directions properly, so we got a little bit turned around *grins*
The journey back to Swansea was a bit uncomfortable; the seats on the coach are somewhat narrow and my companion somewhat on the larger side (as, alas, am I) so I ended up sitting slightly off the seat, with the lowered arm rest digging into me. Plus the pregnant soprano I'd been stood next to for the performance was somewhat nauseous, and needed the driver to pull over at one point. Once it was just us Cardiff-iffians we were able to spread out and be more comfortable. It was quite entertaining as Tony and Richard were so exhausted they were a little punch-drunk, and the banter that flowed was on the same level as a night at the pub. There was joking, there was random breaking into song - I had a great time. It was past eleven thirty when we got back to the office, and Zoe kindly offered to drop me off on her way back home. I was so grateful, as the last bus on a Tuesday night is eleven o'clock and the taxi fare from town to mine is about twelve pounds. Thanks to Zoe I was home by midnight, eating the microwaved soup I'd picked up for my supper. Wasn't very nice though, and I wished I'd just stuck to cereal, but I hadn't banked on being able to get a proper steak dinner.
While all this was going on, Rowan was enjoying a sleepover at his friend Lewis's house. My parents are enjoying another holiday in Gibraltar this week (and rubbing everyone's noses in it over Facebook *wink*) so even my usual rather limited childcare options weren't available. Thankfully my high-school friend Gawain is working locally this week, so his wife - who I've also gotten to be good friends with now that our sons are in school together - was able to cope with a fifth child in the house and agreed to babysit for me. She took him to school this morning too - which is a good thing because I slept right through my alarm this morning! I think my brain subconciously knew I'd taken the rest of the week off work to work on my assignment that's due on Friday, and subsequently allowed me to sleep in. Didn't get as much done today as I would have liked, but I'm back on the school run tomorrow morning and that makes it easier to get into the library and get stuck in.
I didn't get to say anything yesterday because I wasn't home until midnight, and quite frankly I was too tired to make a coherent post. We had a gig at the Lyric Theatre in Carmarthen, West Wales, yesterday evening and we spent the last two hours of the day travelling.
My day mostly progressed normally; dropped Rowan off at school, went to work. Rowan and I both had Welsh rugby shirts on, and he was taking part in the school's Eisteddfod festival. Me, I didn't have anything going on at work - the only thing our 'Ministry of Fun' organised was a poetry competition about 'how great it is to be Welsh/live in Wales' *yawn*
However, at two o'clock I high-tailed it away from my desk and down the lift to join my fellow choristers on the coach that was waiting outside. I chatted to Jan in the seat behind me as we drove over to Swansea to collect the choir from our office there, then Jan moved and Zoe came to sit next to me in order to make space on the coach and we chatted for the rest of the journey. We did try and rehearse, but the CD player on the coach kept jumping. It took an hour and three quarters to get there, and we made it on time for our scheduled sound check at four o'clock - though typically they weren't ready for us. We used the time for warm ups and last minute rehearsals, though, so all's good. Though we were quite exhausted when we got done an hour later, as our routine is quite wearying, us not being professionals or anything.
We all then retreated to the Wetherspoons pub down the street for our dinner, as we had two hours to kill before we needed to get ready. And it was Steak Club night! \O/ I had a yummy rump steak with a jacket potato. Zoe and I were debating whether we wanted to get dessert too, but eventually we reasoned it would sit too heavy while we performed. The last thing you need when you're trying to sing, particularly when there's some degree of movement involved. We chose to pop into the Co-Op store next door on our way back to the theatre for some treats for the journey home.
I managed to sneak myself into the second row for this gig, much to my relief and Melissa and Zoe's slight annoyance. Mel probably because she's used to having me in the front row with her, and Zoe because she ended up in the front in my place, where she's usually near the back. Zoe thankfully didn't hold it against me, but Mel? Who knows. She attempted to 'tell' on me, likely assuming Andrea would coax me back out of my hiding place again, but she ignored it. Did make it a little harder to see her directions, but it did make it slightly easier to hear the rest of my section. If I could just have been someplace in the middle rather than right next to the sopranos, it would have been near perfect.
The gig itself seemed to go really well; Andrea was certainly very positive in her feedback, regardless of the fact her job involves motivation. I think she'd been somewhat nervous, particularly with our version of Oasis' 'Wonderwall'. And there were a couple of songs in our programme that either the Cardiff contingent or the Swansea one hadn't had enough time to polish - as is always the case, somehow. But we pulled it off. We came away thinking we were probably the high point of the show, bracketting both sides of the interval; the other acts on the bill were the Pontadulais Brass Band, and the brother of the Tenor from the GoCompare commercials (If you don't know what I mean, feel free to YouTube - it's a Marmite thing, and personally I think it's hysterical) and Andrea said we were the only one the relatively small audience cheered for. For some reason I never notice that sort of detail.
We then had to hang around till the concert was done, so we could take a bow at the end. This meant hanging around in the changing room and chatting. It got a bit warm in there with so many people milling about (Can't imagine how it would have been if we still had the numbers we did two years ago when we did the Albert Hall!) so Zoe and I followed the example of several others and hung out in the entrance way for a bit to get some fresh air. We entertained ourselves by looking at the posters for upcoming shows and thumbing through the theatre's schedule booklet.
Took us a little while to locate where the coach was parked waiting for us; while the driver was able to drop us off outside, the street arrangements in Carmarthen didn't allow for him to wait for us outside at the end of the night, so we had to try and find him. Unfortunately Andrea didn't quite manage to follow his directions properly, so we got a little bit turned around *grins*
The journey back to Swansea was a bit uncomfortable; the seats on the coach are somewhat narrow and my companion somewhat on the larger side (as, alas, am I) so I ended up sitting slightly off the seat, with the lowered arm rest digging into me. Plus the pregnant soprano I'd been stood next to for the performance was somewhat nauseous, and needed the driver to pull over at one point. Once it was just us Cardiff-iffians we were able to spread out and be more comfortable. It was quite entertaining as Tony and Richard were so exhausted they were a little punch-drunk, and the banter that flowed was on the same level as a night at the pub. There was joking, there was random breaking into song - I had a great time. It was past eleven thirty when we got back to the office, and Zoe kindly offered to drop me off on her way back home. I was so grateful, as the last bus on a Tuesday night is eleven o'clock and the taxi fare from town to mine is about twelve pounds. Thanks to Zoe I was home by midnight, eating the microwaved soup I'd picked up for my supper. Wasn't very nice though, and I wished I'd just stuck to cereal, but I hadn't banked on being able to get a proper steak dinner.
While all this was going on, Rowan was enjoying a sleepover at his friend Lewis's house. My parents are enjoying another holiday in Gibraltar this week (and rubbing everyone's noses in it over Facebook *wink*) so even my usual rather limited childcare options weren't available. Thankfully my high-school friend Gawain is working locally this week, so his wife - who I've also gotten to be good friends with now that our sons are in school together - was able to cope with a fifth child in the house and agreed to babysit for me. She took him to school this morning too - which is a good thing because I slept right through my alarm this morning! I think my brain subconciously knew I'd taken the rest of the week off work to work on my assignment that's due on Friday, and subsequently allowed me to sleep in. Didn't get as much done today as I would have liked, but I'm back on the school run tomorrow morning and that makes it easier to get into the library and get stuck in.