First off, here are some photos of our last gig. It was a quiet week, so this should be a brief entry. I went to choir on Tuesday where we discussed our performance at the soirée. In general, people felt positive about it, and we were certainly better than our concert in June. We had to stop during one of the numbers to get back in sync, but it was our most challenging song, so not a huge surprise. Of course, we rattled it off easily on Tuesday, so it was probably just concert jitters. Well, that and the fact that most of the Alto section stare at their sheet music instead of watching the choir director. Nearly all of the feedback has been positive, both about our gig, and the evening in general.
We had a meeting for the anti-wind farm group on Friday afternoon. As Will put it, it was a meeting where we decided to have a meeting. It will be for all of Milhac, sometime in January, to share our position with the public. We appear to be making some progress in that things are slowing down, although probably not through anything we’ve done. The measurement mast was meant to go up this month, but we’ve heard it’s been delayed. There are also some people higher-up in government who have come out against having them in our area.
The main event last week was Thanksgiving. We originally planned to do it on Friday night, but we have a Musique en Herbe concert this Sunday, so we moved our celebration to Saturday so we could rehearse on Friday. It was even more chaotic there than normal, which was disappointing since we have a concert so close. They only decided the set list that night, a week before the gig. In addition, our neighbour Gilles, the piano player, decided to come along, so he played on many of our songs. There is already one pianist, which is sometimes too many, so having a second made it far worse. Gilles either doesn’t understand, or doesn’t care what the song is meant to sound like, so he just plays all over the melody, often competing with the vocals. Finally, one of our bandmates asked him to stop. We are fearful that he’s been invited to play at the upcoming concert, which is already shaping up to be a disaster.
We had only French guests for the first time this Thanksgiving. It was Manu & Mathilde, Gael & Corrine, and their friend Jura who is staying with them. It was my usual menu, with a few changes: turkey pieces with gravy, stuffing, mashed potatoes instead of roasted, brussels sprouts for the green veg, roasted carrots and parsnips, roasted squash and red pepper with cheese, cranberry sauce, and sweet potato pie for dessert. Oh yeah, and bread, because no meal in France is complete without it. Like last year, I made a spreadsheet with a list of everything that needed doing and when. Dinner was planned for 9, and we started eating within 10 minutes of that. I had quite a bit of sous-chef help from Will this year, and I wouldn’t have been nearly as close to schedule without him.
It was a first Thanksgiving for all of them, so we did a bit of explaining, especially that everyone needed to have seconds. To my surprise, we polished off a number of the dishes, including the cranberry sauce, which we usually have loads leftover. We hung out drinking and smoking until midnight when Gael and Corrine left; M & M left around 1:30. We had originally invited Philippe, but he was DJ’ing an event in the village, so declined. However, he and our neighbour Alain saw that our lights were still on at 1:45, so they stopped in for a vodka. Will and I stayed up watching telly until 4 when we went to bed. Overall, it was a very successful meal, and we’re not saddled with too many leftovers. I may not even bother to make soup this year. Speaking of leftovers, we took advantage of having mashed and sprouts and made Bubble and Squeak yesterday. It was a first attempt for me and it turned out pretty well.
I have started contributing to an online magazine for English-speakers in France. My first article was published a few weeks ago. It’s not a paying job, but I plan to use it as a way to advertise our business. I’m also trying to interest the owner/editor to use us for hosting/maintenance. On the work front, Will put a site live today, and it was a fairly large one, so will be nice to get paid for it. I’ve written off the bad debt from my second transport company since his web site is no longer up. I will try calling him anyway. Ok, time for leftovers, part six.