Weekend

[coloneldespard]

Actually - and against all odds - had a good and rather too busy weekend. Friday night I hadn't intended to go out, but got dragged out with the gang for Japanese. Stopped off at a pub, where we won a meat tray, leading to drunk dialling from the resturant to BFF to let her know "We-won-a-meat-tray-wanna-do-BBQ!!!-and-I-have-a-PUMPKIN-to-carve-and-

Comments

[mmebahorel]

That is excellent news!

(also, your pumpkin is awesome. It's got to be hard to find pumpkins in the spring, I should think. Do a few get imported from the Northern hemisphere for big bucks around Halloween?)

[coloneldespard]

Hmmmm...interesting question! We do go through a lot of pumpkins, but they tend to be local varieties like Queensland Blues. The big orange pumpkin is only seen in small numbers at Halloween...so either it's grown somehow for the market (not sure how, but we tend to get pumpkin all year round rather than seasonally) or they're flown in. I paid about $20 for mine, so not cheap (but worth it for 20 mins of boozy fun!)

[opheliathemad]

wow, i'm so happy for you! that's just awesome about your dad. sometimes modern technology just floors me. when i hear about something like that my entire being shuts down to the basic funcions of breathing and saying 'wow.'

everyone's been mentioning Cole Porter lately to me! I might actually like Porter more than Sondheim, but the jury's still out :D. Which are your favorite Porter songs?

[coloneldespard]

Yes! It makes me want to donate more regularly to the Fred Hollows society, which works to restore sight to people in third-world countries. Sometimes all it takes is a small op. This could have gone disastrously wrong, of course, but thanks to the docs it just all went smoothly...almost anti-climactically after all the worry my parents have been through about putting him under the knife.

I love the playfulness of Porter's lyrics..."Just One of those Things" always resonates with me (partly for personal reasons), and when I was a kiddie my favourite was "Have You Heard?" (It was one of the songs they did on Friday). More and more I'm liking "So In Love With You", which they also peformed. "You're the Top" is always fun (seems so 1920s to me!), but virtually anything will please me. It was such a sharp contrast to compare the sheer cleverness of Porter with the trite glibness of "Love Never Dies", which should never have been in a line up with the others.

[opheliathemad]

By 'Have you heard' do you mean ' Well Did You Evah?' The one that goes 'have you heard the coast of maine/just got hit by a hurricane/well, did you evah?/what a swell party this is?' because in that case that's one of my favorites too! I also love You're the Top, Brush Up Your Shakespeare, Let's Do It (which i preformed once!)...most of his list songs really, because he's just so CLEVER with the rhymes and lyrics. What REALLY gets me about Porter is how he can write a ridiculously clever list song and leave you in stiches and then pull out something like ' In the Still of the Night' and leave you in tears. He's probably my favorite composer.

Love Never Dies...died, basically. Some of the music wasn't bad, but the plot, charecters and lyrics were so ridiculous, it killed whatever good music there was.

[coloneldespard]

Yes! I *adore* it - first saw it in "High Society" when I was a kiddie, and just thought it was magic. Have you seen that wonderful Youtube video of "Your the Top" wet with pictures of Louise Brooks?

And "Let's do it" is a favourite...I love the extended version that Billie Holliday sings, where it just goes on and on and on with the word plays.

You're absolutely right about the humour and the pathos...when "So in love with you" is performed well, it's one of the few songs that can almost bring me to tears. And, as I said, I adore "Just one of those things"...so understated. My BFF and female flatmate have been known to cry during "Begin the Beguine".

[sophiedegrouchy]

Thanks for this story. Adorable seniors are one of my sure-fire d'awwwwwww buttons, and it makes me even happier knowing it's your parents. :)

[coloneldespard]

They are ridiculously adorable at times, and this was one of those times! Dad was happier than I've seen him in I don't know how long, and therefore so was Mum, and everyone around them couldn't have been happier for either.

[toi_marguerite]

Yay! I'm so glad that you had a good weekend, and that's such excellent news about your father! :)

[coloneldespard]

It was good! A bit exhausting, but good!

[skepticalboffin]

Good to hear about your father, and how well his surgery's turned out!

And re: concert - was Ashkenazy conducting??? You have no idea how envious I am: he's the biggest of my living musical heroes, and you folks have him conducting the Sydney Symphony Orchestra!

Oh, and w00t Cole Porter! Would you be interested in all-band arrangements of some of his songs? ;)

[coloneldespard]

Alas, not Ashkenazy...it was Guy Noble (who, I think, had a lot of fun with it - it was a very lighthearted performance, and there was some playful interacting between him and the singers). Every time I see something like this, I think I need to get to the Opera House more often! Interesting line up of performers - they had Todd McKenny, who was the original "Boy from Oz" before Jackman took it to the US. The standout was operatic tenor David Hobson...although I admit I spent much of the performance ogling the shoes Trisha Crowe was wearing (ooooooo - sparkly!)

I would love an all-band arrangement of some of his songs! I have whole playlists of Cole Porter on my MP3 player.

[skepticalboffin]

Sending you a couple of my favourites then. ;) Let's see if I haven't managed to get all the links scrambled

[coloneldespard]

You are a legend! Am downloading as we speak (and playing "Night and Day". And after Saturday I am vowing *yet again* to actually get to the Opera House more often!