Today I've mostly bin...

[Bunnylump]

OMG! Wish I had as much middle age spread as you, Scurra. Just sayin'!

I've bin dancing all evening. The band went down very well (funnily enough, especially with the die-hard young men who had been at the beer festival all day! ) It was seriously amusing, we had all the male twenty-somethings with their tattoos, muscly arms and singlets dancing with us ladies of a certain age. Not much inference would be needed to suggest their "preferences" but I must say they were very good fun!

However, I am, yet again, exhausted. Can't keep this up!

[giraffe]

.... watching Take That at the SSE Hydro in Glasgow.

We were guests of SSE, so we were in the directors' box, which was quite literally the best seats in the house. It was a really excellent evening's entertainment.

[Bunnylump]

Wow that looks like a good view, Giraffe. Why are Take That trying to look like Adam Ant (when he used to be sexy!) ?

[giraffe]

They had a variety of silly costumes throughout the evening.

[LAT]

Golly, that does look like it was very good seats. What fun!

[chazzie]

.....well yesterday I've bin........

......went to see 'Beautiful' the Carole King musical....... fantastic..... made even better by the woman who sat down next to me and said "you're far too young to know who Carole King is" - bless her!!

.......spent this morning at Heathrow - flight a little delayed back..... and overhearing a man who was also there last night.... saying what a brilliant show....

[Bunnylump]

Oooh, I love Carole King, that sounds good! And as you say, even better when you've had an unexpected compliment!

[eirian]

... appreciating why I sing in a choir. We're performing Carmina Burana next Saturday and rehearsed tonight with the soloists. It sounded amazing! Ok, so the tenors missed an entry, and the men didn't quite have the confidence at one point, but it's something else to sing in something that is that good

[LAT]

I love Carole King too and would very much like to see the show but it's not the sort of thing I would ever manage to get N to go to see.
I also love Carmina Burana. Hope it all goes well next Saturday.

[Wulfruna]

Me too, appreciating being in a choir. Our concert was last Saturday, when we did John Rutter's Requiem. In addition we did some unaccompanied motets by the French composer Duruflé, written in plainsong style, which was very difficult. We were really nervous about singing unaccompanied, and had been rehearsing it all the time with our pianist filling in our parts for us. It was not until the last rehearsal on the afternoon of the concert that we were totally unaccompanied - and suddenly the whole things fell into place and sounded gorgeous. All went perfectly on the night!

[Bunnylump]

To the seaside

[Laura]

Lovely!

I spent this morning in rehearsals with a camel puppet on my arm, camel-puppet-fluff up my nose and in my mouth, and being (wrongly) accused of inflicting this all on myself by going around kissing camels.

The things you do for your friends, hey?

[chazzie]

Finding out I'm having an extra day in Rome.....got delayed by 11 hours coming here on Thursday due to fire at Rome airport and now they have cancelled our flight back on Monday...thank goodness it's so much easier with internet to sort out issues like finding somewhere to stay!

[LAT]

Enjoy your extra day. Looks like you have good weather!

[Bunnylump]

Laura N all I can say to that is

Chazzie, hope you manage to get home OK!

I've only just got back - we have been away for the weekend with some friends to Lincolnshire. Never actually been to Lincolnshire before so thought it might be worth a go. Well, the bits we saw were very rural and quiet,* astonishingly flat and with more oilseed rape than you could shake a stick at. The asterisk is to exclude our visit to Skegness (which we did in the full knowledge of how awful it might be ) but we ensured we had the full "Skeggy" experience by eating cold fish and chips on the pier while it blew a gale. However, we did manage several pleasant country walks (including a long stretch of coastline) and meals out, and today came back via Lincoln and then Cambridge.

Lincoln was well worth a visit: the cathedral is pretty impressive, especially when approached by walking up "Steep Hill" (one of the few hills for miles!) as was the castle. When we walked round the castle walls we were treated to an unexpected display by the Red Arrows.

[SparkOut]

On top of the usual dreadfulness, been pretty disappointed that Pumpkin's university course (the only place in the country offering this particular course) has been cancelled due to insufficient applicants. She was offered a place at all the ones to which she applied, but really doesn't want to go to any of them, and alternative courses at UCB are not what she wants either. She has been dithering about whether even to go if we'd not even had this news anyway, so now as it stands, she's decided to go for a full time job instead.

[giraffe]

Getting a job sounds like a good idea. I think far too many young people feel they have to go to University. My niece didn't go when she left school as she failed to get the grades, and then during her resit year was offered a full time job. She is now at University, having decided after two years working that she wanted to do a different course to the one she originally applied for, and looks to be on course to do very well indeed. I think spending some time in the real world first has really been the making of her. Meanwhile two of my offspring are at University, neither with any idea what they want to do afterwards.

[Bunnylump]

...And I have a son who is 25 and still IN education, never having had a job! Another year yet to go on the PhD and no clear path for what next. His level of debt is horrific and there is absolutely no guarantee that he'll get a great job at the end of it all.

Don't be too disappointed, SparkOut, she can still apply in subsequent years if she wants to anyway. The last thing on Earth she needs right now is to see that she's disappointed her parents. Let her go with the flow and you never know where she will end up, there are always possibilities for bright young things like her.

[SparkOut]

The last thing on Earth she needs right now is to see that she's disappointed her parents.

You couldn't be further from the mark if you stood facing the other way and deliberately aimed in the opposite direction. She'll never disappoint me. I'm irked with UCB, that's all.

[Bunnylump]

Good!

Yes, that is REALLY annoying, isn't it? When K was looking into courses, I drove her and her friend all the way to Northampton to look at a degree course in Primary Education, which her friend had BOOKED INTO, only to find they had decided not to run the course.