Morning Tea on Christmas Day is always a sugar filled event; rum balls, apricot balls, vanilla rings, lebkuchen, loftkökurs. Then a touch of savoury with pineapple dip and salmon dip.
It is also a time for all of Grandmum’s good china to come out. I think Grandmum would roll over in her proverbial grave if we used anything but the good china (proverbial because she was cremated). The glasses are one of the most treasured pieces in the good cupboard, my aunt brought them back from Venice many years ago, it does feel quite refined drinking lemonade out of those glasses 😀
I was given this star by my host family in Germany where I spend Christmas 2002. It well actually Germany in general gave me the Christmas ornament bug. I could quite easily decorate our entire tree with my ornaments. I received a very cute little star this year from the Oxfam shop and I plan on getting the 2007 Swarovski star in the next few days.
I took this photo the other week in the garden as the 50mm 1.4 was begging to go out and play in the daylight instead of spending its time confined to dark concert venues. 😀
This post is coming at you from my new computer, that I built the other night. It is a dream, so fast and we haven’t even overclocked it yet. Lightroom is just buzzing along and I love it! Delay loading images, what is that?
The other great thing is the sound! I went from a motherboard with el cheapo onboard sound to a not motherboard with not so el cheapo sound and the very first thing I noticed when I hooked up my speakers was the sound, it was so clear and crisp!
We are in the middle of Christmas preparations at the moment. We are going to get the tree tomorrow.
Sunday night saw me jump on the Concord v2 for a special night at the Hotel Chelsea. Well not quite but close. Instead it went something like the following. My not so gallant steed for the night (The Pulsar) and I picked up Thor from her house before we headed into The Valley for some pre-show drinks/chatter/random events with Tom. After a name change issued to me on my behalf, it was into The Troubadoure for a night with a theme of the Hotel Chelsea. (side note, The Troubie stamp is pretty cool, if I got tattooed on my wrist, do you think they would give me free entry for life?) Tom Woodward was in town *for one night only!* and along with Ange Takats and Cameron Elliot they were putting on a show at The Troubie. Titled “a night at the Chelsea”, promising me a night of music by three artists inspired by the music scene at the Hotel Chelsea in the late 60’s. The promise was certainly delivered.
Ange Takats
I have been meaning to see Ange live for a couple of months now, the classic myspace syndrome, all these cool local acts and only so many days in a week. She was well worth the wait, as I was in for a treat. She opened the night by singing a song, just singing, no guitar, no backup, just her. Rather impressive. Throughout the night she by far spent the most time up on stage as at some point during the boys sets she provided some backup vocals. She has a tale/song about the curse of knitting for boyfriends who then leave with the knitted goods (the word on the street is that to stop this happening that you need to marry said boyfriend and then give knitted goods). That got a gold star in my book.
Tom Woodward
Well there was that rather very interesting guitar tuning interlude. There were a handful of new songs. There was “my song” (publicly known as Reminding me of Your) played in the December 07 style rather than the August 07 style, which is a bpm increase of oh about 60% and a much edgier sound, very different and I don’t know which version I prefer. It was top shelf stuff, could it have been any less? (that answer is most definitely no). I can’t yet offer any soundbites/textbites for the new songs though. Other than that that there is a video clip for one of the new songs at the end of this post. Press that play button!
Cameron Elliot
I didn’t get to *really* hear much of Cam’s set as I was chatting up the back. Which means that I can’t really offer any profound or non profound as the case often is about Cam’s music other to say that I did quite enjoy what I heard though and will be keeping track of him. Cam was the Tom Waits or perhaps the Leonard Cohen of the night, he was one of those two as Tom was the Bob Dylan and Ange was the Joan Baez/Joni Mitchell.
After the “solo” sets were over they got together for some good old fashioned supergroup fun. One of which was of course I shall be released and there was another really great tune they did which I can’t recall at the moment.
Then some time later the music ended. some time after that the night ended with this. Tom and Thor on the footpath. In the light of a streetlight.
Last night I went to a concert. Correction it is now Friday so on Tuesday night I went to a concert.
It was called Lock up your Sons. It was a presentation of 4 guitar toting ladies, Georgia Potter, Deb Suckling, Jackie Marshall and Emma Louise. Each of the ladies were introduced by a man/boy who has had something to do with each of the ladies, that was a really nice touch. Each of these ladies had their stories to tell and each played with a special feeling about them. I have seen Georgia a few times so I knew that she would be good. I saw Jackie Marshall supporting Missy Higgins back in May and looking back now I don’t know why I have not been to see her again since then as she blew me to the wall, damm. I had no idea who Deb Suckling was till she was introduced and then I was blown away again, over the years of listening to the zed’s and reading the street press I have often heard about a local band called Brindle, turns out she is the singer from said band. The final member of this group of ladies was the youngest at just 15/16, her name is of course Emma Louise, she hails from Cairns, she won the 2007 Q Song Peoples Choice Award which tells you all you need to know and that is that this girl/lady is good.
To give you an idea of the night, here is the promo poster that was up round the place. Does it not sound like the most interesting night?
I picked up a 16-35mm f/2.8L II USM on the weekend 2nd hand, essentially brand new for a very nice price. I have been dreaming of this lens for long while and now it is mine 😀
When I went for a walk on Sunday morning, it came along for the ride 😀
I have to wonder why this person picked this world over the world. Do they believe that this is not the only world?
This one is from the front garden of the man I bought the lens off. (Hi Trev)
