The Lyorn's Den

Stage fright, as usual, stopped when the audience was in and the lights went on. ( Read more... )

It's amazing how long a busy weekend filled with nice things can feel.

Role playing games

Last weekend, we were playing one of our SF RPGs. ( Read more... )

Music

This Friday, our choir had the most relaxed performance of the year at a village party. ( Read more... )

Other stuff

Saturday morning, it was raining (very good thing). I had some friends over for breakfast (one of them was visiting from the Hamburg area), we talked (mostly about role playing games, as usual), and after breakfast, I met with K__ and mad_freddy in the boulder hall. I feel as if I'm not progressing much (it's always harder than it seems, and my strength does not last as long as I feel it should), but I actually see that I am progressing, as the difficulties are colour-coded, and I have now made first attempts on green (medium easy) and can to most orange (easy).

Of course, in the night, everything hurt and I couldn't sleep. *sigh*

So I went to the pool later today than I should. The rain had stopped and it wasn't quite as empty as it could have been, but OK.

Other than that, I also read a few Silmarillion fanfics, which I might link to in some future posting, and made a chocolate-cherry cake and should write down the recipe... but not right now. I read a lot of kid's comics from the 70s, mostly French ones, and enjoyed it more than I would have expected, and now I'll be off to write a small scene inspired by the comics, about a hellish boat ride which fits just fine into a story that I really should pick up again.

To bad that even a longish weekend ends!

Also: There is a lunar eclipse next Friday early in the night. I need to find a good space to watch it.

Though I cannot blame "not writing" on "travelling"... but just a few notes here, for me to keep track of my life.

Currently I'm on holiday, but at home. Trying to do something about my to-do list, because I barely managed to keep up with the necessities so far.

May 6th to 9th we had a choir weekend in the Bayerische Musikakademie in Alteglofsheim. I did not get lost in the building this time!

May 10th to May 15th I was home because of a family emergency. I did not really plan that. Fortunately, I got time off work on very short (4 workdays) notice.

May 26th to May 29th we were at the choir festival in Stuttgart. It was OK. Hot. Some thunderstorms. A bunch of good and a few very good choirs, but nothing that knocked off my socks. (Maybe the Swingles. But they were kind of in a class of their own.)

Jun 7th to Jun 14 I took the Hurtigruten Boat trip from Kirkenes to Bergen, ( Read more... )

I read Naomi Novik's "Uprooted" (nice, liked it), Perceval Everett's "God's Country" (good, hated it), Catherine Asaro's "Carnelians" (OTT, but fun), and half of Daniel Kahneman's "Thinking, Fast and Slow" (very interesting, but I argued a lot with it in the margins).

Other than travelling, we played our on-going SF campaign on May 22nd, ( Read more... )

We had a few performances with the choir( Read more... )

Sunday Jun 5th I held a Kaffeeklatsch ( Read more... )

I'm feeling kind of OK now. As long as I do not think about having to go back to work in a week's time. Maybe I'll write something more about the Norway vacation. But, knowing myself, most likely not.

Yesterday was my choir's end-of-year party, with school holidays starting and our practice room being unavailable until mid-September and everything. It's a potluck, and this year I found that I had two hours between leaving work and arriving at the party, which, considering that about 1 hour of those two will be spent driving, is not a lot of time. (Yes, I know, and I regularly read that other women need 20 minutes to cook dinner, and 3 minutes to get ready in the morning -- let's say, I don't. I need 10 minutes just to cook an egg.)

So, I took liberties with the idea of a tiramisu: ( Strawberry curd cheese cream on cookies )

Party was nice. The recordings from our singing on Sunday had the wind roaring like a freight train, but as far as we could discern, were did not sing out of tune, even though we did have a lot of fuzzy entries. I could not hear myself singing, which surprised me: My pronunciation is so bad that I usually recognize it on the first line.

Yesterday evening I said to Ceridwen, "The usual. I did nothing this week". She remarked that that could not be true. She was right. So, before another week ends up in my mind as "nothing happened" and another year disappears in the "nothing has happened" fog, I'll try to keep at least a short list. Cut for boring.

( Rain )

( Car troubles )

( Choir party )

Sunday Ceridwen came back from a music festival and we had some tea and cake.
And today it looks like there will be another thunderstorm, and I am again driving Ceridwen's car.

The neighbors are having a party, and now it's close to midnight, one guy is playing the guitar (not very well), and singing (not too bad). I can make out most of the songs. Currently it's "Skyfall".

I would enjoy being there, but listening isn't too bad, either. There's a magic in this.

I feel that I'm getting tired, or lazy, or focused on the basics. Some tasks start to get moved from one day to another, never completed. I do too much of nothing, and not even the things I want to do when I have nothing else to do.

In part I blame the weather, but mostly the need to meet some carpenter or plumber or electrician every darned morning, so I never can start a day rested and energetic.

( Wednesday: Looking at furniture, and music fail )

( Thursday: The drag continues, panic sets in )

( So. Tomorrow )

Send good thoughts.

Thursday to Sunday of last week (June 7th to 10th), the choir I sing in was at the 2012 Choir Festival in Frankfurt. That was fun.

( Getting there )

( Arriving )

( Music )

( Evening )

More to come...

The commute is doing me no good. The situation at work is doing me no good. I'm cold and tired all the time. I feel that I eat enough, yet I am always desperately hungry for sugar. Several times this week my hands were shaking so hard I could not use a cell phone unless I braced it on my knees. I am moody and I have the mental resilience of a soap bubble. I behave like a drama queen and I just cannot stop myself. ( Read more... )