Wherever you go, there you are.
Feb. 3rd, 2014 04:59 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
f4f3I'd intended heading straight to the cottage on Friday after work, but instead I accepted an invitation to a concert of Burns songs and some other music at the Mackintosh Church a few hundred yards from the flat.
It was well done - trad arrangements of Burns' songs from two singers and a piano, interspersed with some lovely violin (and occasionally fiddle) playing. That sort of performance of the songs isn't really my thing - I prefer Eddie Reader's faithful but more accessible readings. Burns was a farmer (not a very good farmer, but he got his hands dirty) and a hard drinking womaniser. Hearing his songs done with reverence is a little like the Swingle Singers doing Hank Williams. It sounds pretty, but the soul has been removed somewhere along the way.
My previous visits to the Church have been when the Yarn Cake have been holding their Glasgow School of Yarn events there. I should have guessed that the proprietor would be there, but it was still a surprise when I bumped into her at the end of the gig. Part of me wants to think that she cut me dead because she was surprised too, and that I'm reading too much into one look.
Still, if looks could kill they could have carried me off in a basket.
I did head off to the cottage on Saturday morning, and picked up some nice food at the Loch Fyne deli. The weather was pretty wild. I missed the worst of the snow, but there were a few cars off the road at the Rest And Be Thankful, and the tide was as high as I've ever seen it from Inverary through to Ardrishaig. The village green at Lochgilphead was mostly under water, and the waves were breaking over the road and sea wall at Ardrishaig. I had a walk down along the front, and took some pictures of the lighthouse. I have some memories of that lighthouse, and the sea wall, and they weren't comfortable freight on Saturday night.
Sunday morningwas mostly spent tidying the cottage up (and listening to Tom Waits), and then I decided to watch Inverness Cally Thistle play Hearts in the League Cup semi-final. I didn't really have a dog in the fight, and started up favouring Hearts as an underdog, even if I don't normally support them. I thought it was a good decision when they came back from a goal down to level and then go ahead in the second half, and Thistle had two players sent off. And then nine-man Thistle scored in stoppage time to take it into extra time, and then won on penalties after that finished goal-less. Great spirit from both sides, heart-break for one.
I left the cottage to drive home just as extra time started, and caugh the end of the game and the first half of the Scotland v. Ireland rugby match on the car radio. I won't go into the rugby score - too painful.
Back home I watched the first episode of the first season of the US version of House of Cards, and liked it enough that I watched the next two straight after that. Then, to finish my sportsday, I watched Andy Murray lead the UK to their first victory over the US in the Davis Cup since the 1930s.
Then off for an early night, and a richly detailed dream in which I was still married, stil living in Newcastle, and still trying to to make a go of the marriage. It reminded me of all the good things there had been in that relationship, and the house where we lived. I dreamt of snow, and Susan, and Mikey, and the guinea pigs, and I dreamt that I had to get up in the morning and drive to Inverness.
And then I woke up with no Susan, no Mikey, no snow, no guinea pigs. But I still had to drive to Inverness.
It was well done - trad arrangements of Burns' songs from two singers and a piano, interspersed with some lovely violin (and occasionally fiddle) playing. That sort of performance of the songs isn't really my thing - I prefer Eddie Reader's faithful but more accessible readings. Burns was a farmer (not a very good farmer, but he got his hands dirty) and a hard drinking womaniser. Hearing his songs done with reverence is a little like the Swingle Singers doing Hank Williams. It sounds pretty, but the soul has been removed somewhere along the way.
My previous visits to the Church have been when the Yarn Cake have been holding their Glasgow School of Yarn events there. I should have guessed that the proprietor would be there, but it was still a surprise when I bumped into her at the end of the gig. Part of me wants to think that she cut me dead because she was surprised too, and that I'm reading too much into one look.
Still, if looks could kill they could have carried me off in a basket.
I did head off to the cottage on Saturday morning, and picked up some nice food at the Loch Fyne deli. The weather was pretty wild. I missed the worst of the snow, but there were a few cars off the road at the Rest And Be Thankful, and the tide was as high as I've ever seen it from Inverary through to Ardrishaig. The village green at Lochgilphead was mostly under water, and the waves were breaking over the road and sea wall at Ardrishaig. I had a walk down along the front, and took some pictures of the lighthouse. I have some memories of that lighthouse, and the sea wall, and they weren't comfortable freight on Saturday night.
Sunday morningwas mostly spent tidying the cottage up (and listening to Tom Waits), and then I decided to watch Inverness Cally Thistle play Hearts in the League Cup semi-final. I didn't really have a dog in the fight, and started up favouring Hearts as an underdog, even if I don't normally support them. I thought it was a good decision when they came back from a goal down to level and then go ahead in the second half, and Thistle had two players sent off. And then nine-man Thistle scored in stoppage time to take it into extra time, and then won on penalties after that finished goal-less. Great spirit from both sides, heart-break for one.
I left the cottage to drive home just as extra time started, and caugh the end of the game and the first half of the Scotland v. Ireland rugby match on the car radio. I won't go into the rugby score - too painful.
Back home I watched the first episode of the first season of the US version of House of Cards, and liked it enough that I watched the next two straight after that. Then, to finish my sportsday, I watched Andy Murray lead the UK to their first victory over the US in the Davis Cup since the 1930s.
Then off for an early night, and a richly detailed dream in which I was still married, stil living in Newcastle, and still trying to to make a go of the marriage. It reminded me of all the good things there had been in that relationship, and the house where we lived. I dreamt of snow, and Susan, and Mikey, and the guinea pigs, and I dreamt that I had to get up in the morning and drive to Inverness.
And then I woke up with no Susan, no Mikey, no snow, no guinea pigs. But I still had to drive to Inverness.
