14/12/20, 0913hrs
Saturday was one of those days, disappointingly wet and featureless, after an extremely pleasant and sunny Friday, the day before. I did watch the final two episodes of The Stranger, and have to disagree with some of the reviews of that final episode. I suppose with “not everything concluding “nicely”, this might have been frustrating, but I am left looking forward to a future series when we shall see “what happens next”. By the time Series 2 comes out, I will have forgotten about it anyway. I continued with various jobs around the house, prepared food as required, and cleared up afterwards. Being in the mood for some heavy-ish classical music, I trawled YouTube for some weary inspiration. I had already located an excellent performance of Mahler’s 5th Symphony which I managed to “lose’ part way through the Adagio, fiddling with the “remote”! However, I came across an almost best ever Pictures at an Exhibition, the Ravel orchestration, live, complete with encores. Wonderful! especially a “best-ever” Great Gate of Kiev which was raised to new heights as this final movement journeyed towards its triumphant finale. A couple of renditions of A Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra, another favourite, continued my ill-thought out programme of music for Saturday night; I concluded, watching archive footage of the Halle Orchestra under the baton of Sir John Barbirolli. Seeing a small part of the inside of the now demolished Free Trade Hall in Manchester revived wonderful memories of parents who would take me to these concerts as a “special treat”. No Christmas cards were written on Saturday.
Yesterday, Sunday, was even more wet and miserable than the day before. I had overslept but just managed to make it to St. Mary’s before the start of the morning Eucharist at 10.30. However, like the previous Sunday, the day didn’t start well. This time, I had forgotten my mandatory face mask, as well as, I would discover once inside the church, my glasses! Thankfully, St. Mary’s had spare new face masks, so I didn’t have to be turned away. Being Father Keith’s farewell service in the Parish of Buxton, the church had its maximum congregation social distancing would allow, and although I had booked in advance, I was shown to the last available seat, at the side of the pulpit from where I could see absolutely nothing! It’s ironic. When Fr.Keith arrived in Buxton, I was very late for his induction at St. John’s in 2013, having come straight from work. There was some food left over, however!
Roger came over for Sunday lunch, this time prepared by the Tradesman’s Entrance on the Market Place. This proved to be magnificent. Unfortunately, my idea of keeping the desserts (fruit crumble) warm in the oven was not quite so intelligent…they were just edible after losing their caucasian colouring somewhat!
I finished writing the main batch of Christmas cards last night.
Today, following a reasonable but intermittent sleep, I was awake just before 9am. I had cleared up the previous evening. I shall venture into town, post the cards I have written, and hopefully, the roofer will come to fix the carport and hopefully prevent further damp undermining part of the interior decoration of the kitchen-diner.
One question remains; will we come out of Tier 3 on Wednesday? It would be nice!
Once again, SEASONAL GREETINGS, David, 10.21hrs, 14/12/20.
David's Cruise 