Yes, I know: I’m late yet again with my entry. I planned on doing it yesterday evening but totally forgot we had dinner plans. In fact, it’s been a very eventful week all told, so I’d best get started on the story-telling.
First off, we had a lovely meal with Lew and Pari, neither of whom we’d seen in ages. They’re both very well, but very busy too. They’ve each taken on teaching jobs and will be doing an awful lot of travelling between here, Poitiers and Paris. We do not envy them! Matt’s meal was a big hit and it was a lovely evening so we kicked it off with Champagne and nibbles out in the garden. They left us around midnight and we had our customary nightcap before turning in.
The next day we both suffered a disproportionate hangover and weren’t in great form. For me, I had the added trauma of having to get myself to Thiviers that morning and have my x-ray taken for my jaw. That all went fine and I’ve now got to go back and see my dentist next week to see what he thinks. In the evening, we had our usual band practise with Musique en Herbe. It being August, a few people were away, so we did a few songs but mostly took it easy. We also learned that we’ve 2 more gigs coming up. The first is just Music’Friends, our smaller group, and is in Périgueux in about 2 weeks. We’re due to play for an hour so need to at least double out setlist, which is going to be a challenge as its becoming hard to find times when we’re all free to rehearse now that school’s restarting. The second gig, with the entire group, is in mid-October – and unfortunately, Matt is going to be in the States so I don’t quite know how we’re going to work that one out.
We had dinner plans on Saturday: we’d been invited to Nadine and Jean-Claude’s, but unfortunately they had to postpone, so we ended up with a quiet and plan-less weekend, in contrast to the week that followed it.
Some time back, we ordered some paint from Lee and Richard so we could redecorate our bedrooms. We spoke to Rich at the weekend and they arranged to come over on Monday afternoon to give us a hand with it all. We did all the prep work the day before and had an early and, by our usual standards, very tame evening. The next morning we got right to work on painting our bedroom and the toilet. Under Richards’ direction and supervision, we repainted our cupboards and all of us took turns doing the ceiling. This was a pain to do as it’s made of tongue and groove slats, so had to be done with a brush. It also ended up needing 4 coats due to the stain showing through. After a full day we still weren’t done, so the boys left us and Rich arranged to come back the next day to finish up.
That evening we had a Musique en Herbe practise with Music’Friends. We were a number of men down, so used the time to kick ideas around for new songs. We left with a list of 16 (rather eclectic) songs to learn and not much time in which to do so. All par for the course!
Rich was due back at ours at around 1 the next day as he was picking their friend Glenda up from Limoges airport and was going to call in on the way back. Unfortunately her flight was delayed, so we had a bit of a wait and a later lunch than planned. Afterwards, he put the final coat of paint on the ceiling and walls. We’ve got a couple v small bits to finish off in our room and in the toilet, but once they’re done I will post some photos. We’re really pleased with the result: having a white ceiling has made a phenomenal difference in our room – it feels so much airier and less claustrophobic! The walls are a lovely shade of very pale green. In the toilet, we opted for a bright yellow – and bright it most certainly is! I think once the shelves are back up it will calm it down some. We now face the dubious task of having to do the guest bedroom by ourselves and the pressure’s on to do as neat a job as Rich did in our room…
The next day I moved all our stuff back into our room, in a bid to calm the Smoo down. He took all the disruption very badly and has been in a bit of state all week. Hopefully he’ll readjust soon. In the evening, we were invited out to dinner by William and Clare, our pewter jewellery customers. I find him a little hard-going at times, but they were both on good form and we had a lovely time. We’d been a little worried for them as it seemed they were struggling work-wise, but it sounds like things have really picked up again. In fact, they’re hoping to get someone (ideally one of us) to commit to a few hours a week uploading products to their site and to Amazon. We’re in theory open to the idea but need to discuss it some more with them.
Right, I think that’s about all for the round-up. Next week’s entry is likely to be quite action-packed: we’re off to the Mad Italian’s for dinner on Saturday, to Lee and Richard’s for Villebois’ annual fete on Sunday, and on Tuesday we’re going over to Rigit’s for dinner. Oh, and we’re off to Amsterdam on Thursday! Matt’s best friend Gerald from the US is almost as big a fan of the place as we are and dropped us a message to say he’s booked a week there, in case we were free. Well, how could we resist?!
Ok, lastly – here’s a few more vids from our recent concert. The last ones were all Musique en Herbe tracks, so here’s a few we did with Music’Friends (as well as Money for Nothing with Musique en Herbe which I missed off my last entry). The first one, “Your Smile” is an original composition.