At home with the Yesbergs

We're feeling much more at home now that all our stuff is here. We've bought loads of little things that weren't in our boxes (broom, sponge, baby change matress, vase, radio aerial), and a I've invested a little more in my wine education too. Haven't opened them yet, so no notes yet, but they're all French, so it is a legitimate self-education expense! Perhaps I should mention that I've had a couple of wines recently, but without the occasion to record the details. Most of them haven't been worth recording, and I can't forget one quickly enough. But I should mention the Chilean one: Casillero del Diablo. We tried several bottles on Monday night in Farnborough. I'm sure the company, atmosphere, and food had something to do with it, but the Cabernet was quite good. Not a very long finish, but quite a full and balanced flavour, and easy to drink. It seems to be available just about everywhere.

It was "Remembrance Sunday" this Sunday. It seems that the British celebrate the armistice on the closest Sunday to 11 November, whereas we would be more likely to celebrate on the day itself. For the school's service (yes, that means 13 days of school in a row for Stephanie!) the chamber choir and community choir sang a piece (Elgar's Ave Verum Corpus, in English, arranged for SSA, with TB doubling the A part), and led some hymns (St Clement, Judith, Cwm Rhondda). Afterwards, we were very pleased to be able to join the music teacher and her family for lunch at the local chinese restaurant. Their girls are in years 1 and 3, so we had a full house. Or should I call it a strait? We enjoyed the buffet, and then reconvened at the pet shop for some further entertainment.

Despite there being some rain in the afternoon and early evening, we managed to poke some tubes into handy empty flowerpots, and set off the fireworks. It was certainly a short show, even without segues from one to the next. But they were fun, and we'll have some more another time. Later last evening, I found myself at Gloucester Cathedral again for a performance of Victoria's Requiem of 1605. I have very fond memories of singing that on Good Friday in about 1988 with QUMS Chorale at St Johns. Last night's performance was with a group more than twice the size (17 ladies, 14 men), and they had a sackbut doubling the bass part. This accompaniment, along with the spanish pronunciation of latin (including latin scripture readings) made it more authentic. Perhaps the size did too. It may have been the acoustics of the Lady Chapel, but I found the whole thing rather loud. In contrast to our unaccompanied performance, departures from the original were rather apparent, and in one section seemed to confuse the group. But the overall performance was enjoyable - I'd go again. It's interesting to be able to look at so many different conducting styles in close proximity. I'd like to look into some academic literature on the matter one day - not a textbook on how to conduct, but perhaps scientific comparisons on the effects of different styles.

No progress on the computing front today. It seems to bother me less at the moment, though, now that many other things are sorting themselves out. The new laptop has a SATA hard drive, so it should be relatively easy to plug it into another machine, and copy the vital bits off it. It's just a question of finding someone with a suitable machine. Perhaps buying another hard drive for the laptop would be the best option for now. Will have to sleep on that concept.

We had quite a clear night, and so it was a little chilly this morning. There were some frosty patches on the common outside our house, and on the western side of the hills, the car was showing an air temperature of -0.5C at 8:15 when we dropped the girls at school. Some locals were walking around in t-shirts, but we couldn't manage that. It's a sign of how well the central heating is working, that we weren't aware just how cold it was until we stepped outside. There were some comments about the girls' room, but some minor readjustments should have that sorted out now.

Helen was pleased to report 10/10 and a star for her spelling test today, and I think Stephanie has had her first proper violin lesson- at least the first one with her own violin. But I haven't heard how that went, yet. Our French for Beginners pack has arrived, so we can all start to parlez the francais. We're hoping to go away again this weekend, but I have to admit the destination is more likely to be Cymru than across the channel.