"Don't Die" (Tuesday 12 June 2007 )

What's new chez nous? This week's stream of consciousness:

We got two mirrors from Sarah's voice tutor, Sonia. James The God helpfully provided transport - these monster panes were 6' by 4' and 7' by 2'6" - but unfortunately Gil The Mong bounced one of them off the ground while we were carrying them down to the van, with the result that an enormous crescent snapped out of the long side. Fortunately - this is just like a game off I'm Sorry, I Haven't A Clue - James is an artist in glass, and he took us and the injured mirrors to his workshop at UBC, where he performed several dangerous cutting-and-snapping operations. Now I'm not often impressed by people in their professions. I don't expect you to be impressed by what I do in my job, because it's my job; it's what I spend, and have spent, the bulk of my life doing, and if I were no good at it, I'd be doing something else. And likewise this is your job, and I expect you to do it well even if I know nothing about it. But James? His work is something else. His motto when working with enormous chunks of glass is "Don't die", and ten minutes of helping him carry and operate on these mirrors convinced me of the ghastly ease with which you could kill yourself at a moment's notice in this line of work. This is no namby-pamby artistry with a palette and easel; this is hardcore stuff worthy of an Irving Stone novel, with someone hauling his own granite from the quarry and generally getting extremely physical with his materials, with the consequent risks of them getting physical right back at him. So my respect for him is now at an all-time high for any man I know; all this and he sings too! And, although they no longer possess the measurements given above, we now have two mirrors leaning against walls in our apartment, and they look good.

Even better, because they're leaning against rather than being fixed to the walls, they make us look good. Or better, anyway, as our weight loss continues to spread.

The High Spirits concert happened on Sunday 10th, with a dress rehearsal on the Saturday. Venue: the Unity Church on Oak and 40th. Nice place, nearly 400 seats, and not a bad stab at filling it, although bear in mind this is a choir with 50 members and a reasonably active community of former members, so I expect there's a certain amount of familial arm-twisting in the LMCS style. Sing Sing Sing went with a bang and my scatting was pretty good. Grumble Too Much, the song dissing women in general and whoever we pick on from the soprano and alto sections in particular, was a hoot - James and I launched into an impromptu dance. We are very silly in that song; it's the only way to play it. The full programme ran to eighteen songs, which is a Posse-ish number, and was acceptably diverse. I don't have the list to hand but I'll run it next time. I do appreciate the way Ieva puts together a real potpourri of stuff, with nothing too long or dull. (Although Barter comes close, but fortunately James and I can leave the skirts to sing that.)

The one thing that's always bugged me about amateur shows, and I accept we indulged ourselves in this when we did our farewell-to-Burge rendition of With A Little Help From My Friends in East Preston (1), is when the show ends - except there's a presentation of flowers - and a speech or two - and much love is shown in all directions - and all in front of the audience. As a professional concert-goer this stuff bores me. I'm not exactly enthralled by it while I'm on stage. But I accept that an amateur concert with an indigenous audience has an excuse for it. I just prefer to see something which starts strongly and ends without petering out, and that's what 'showing the love' feels like to me. But I also know from Posse experience that talking to the audience afterwards is, if self-indulgent, very rewarding, and they like it too. As usual I'm two people on this topic and at least one of them is a hypocrite.

What else, I ask myself, seeing as how it's midnight-thirty and we're trying for an early night for the umpteenth time? Panda Swimming continues apace - I still haven't managed a second breath, but I'm working on it. Still immensely proud of that. We wrote a song for Ieva's 60th birthday party, coming up this Saturday. James' ensemble is working on Sarah's The Blackbird Of Derrycairn and loving it. We might get our relocation expenses back from Radical sometime soon. It's been too hot here, and then it rained lots at the weekend. Podge the polar bear has taken to hanging out of the bedroom window - at an altitude of about 180 feet. Tenpence is trying casually to push him all the way out.

And Sarah had her first voiceover audition, although it's for unpaid work and she won't know the outcome until July. But the feedback was very positive and the work is professionally recognised and would be good experience anyway.

Visuals later in the week - now, beddybyes. Much love to all.


1. And after all our efforts, Burge kept coming back! I imagine myself singing Empty Chairs At Empty Tables at his funeral and he'd come busting up out of the coffin to add a harmony line. Never dead!