Musical Sport

Swimming a leisurely breaststroke in our pool to the sound of the theme music for “Two pints of larger and a packet or crisps” took me back to an inchoate time when I still thought that popular music was something I could look down on with utter contempt because I could hum the more famous parts of The Coronation of Poppea based on the luscious strings version of an early Glyndebourne production on disc!  

Ah, the ease with which one could make value judgements based on the flimsiest of cultural scaffolding!

I’ve never stopped doing that of course, though I pride myself that I now know that my cultural background is more widely shallow than it was.

The bone conduction “ear” phones are working reasonably well and seem to be a vast improvement on the last set that I had years ago.  That at least proved that the technology worked, but it has taken some time for the hardware to get to the level where something more subtle than a base heavy pop track could make its vibrations through to the inner ear.  

I fear that my super-pretentious intention of learning the late Beethoven Quartets while doing my lengths never was really a serious possibility – though now, with the Neptune Finis in all its expensive glory, it might, just be possible.

But before then I will have to rationalize my tracks.  Admittedly I do put the thing on random play so that “Two pints of larger and a packet of crisps” was followed by a jolly little Bach gigue.  It’s those sorts of juxtapositions that keep me swimming lengths!

I have started listening to my DG set of H von K, after gloating over the collection.  I do recognize some of the covers as discs that I couldn’t possibly afford to buy except in sales and so have them all at bargain price is something of a musical delight. 

Not that I am a committed fan of His Germanic Majesty; I bought (at sale price) one of his conductings of Sibelius and I immediately placed a sticker on the front saying “DO NOT LISTEN!”  I did not throw it away as it was very useful as a sort of bookend to protect other more worthy recordings from the end-of-shelf pressure. 

It will be interesting to compare my present understanding of performances of the symphonies with what they were forty or so (!) years ago – indeed, as I intend to purchase another box set of his earlier recordings (at an even better bargain price) I will be able to compare different recordings from different decades of Beethoven symphonies and those of Brahms and Sibelius.

I can remember a televised performance of Karajan’s conducting of the Brahms symphonies where he was the only person shown full face.  The orchestra were in shadow and only their arms and fingers playing the instruments were shown.  Karajan conducted with his eyes closed and he was backlit so that his hair gave a halo effect.  The music was wonderful, but I did end up listening with m back to the television!

These discs are CDs not DVDs, so I should be fine!

My beach reading of The Tudors by Ackroyd continues to delight.  I have especially enjoyed reading about her late majesty Queen Mary I.  Questions about the likeability or otherwise of that monarch followed me like an infection from the age of 13 to first year in University with exactly (and I mean exactly) the same question: “Why was Mary Tudor unpopular?”  I must have answered that question at least six times in my academic career. 

Perhaps I should do a history course I the OU in the hope of doing it again and producing the final and authoritative response and put this recurring topic to rest at last!  I hope that there would be a little more depth and complexity in my answer now rather than the simplistic one-two-three of: was a Roman Catholic; married a foreigner and burned people. 

Or perhaps not, I could re-use all the trite points and try and present them in a post modern, ironic sort of way!

Tomorrow to the Sacred Mountain, admittedly more for the lunch and the art than the spiritual quality!

Lazy Days

What is the summer holiday for if not for indolence?  OK, the concept of summer holiday is perhaps a little inaccurate for me, but it serves its purpose to get me to September and the New Life (again) that retirement (again) brings.

That by way of exculpation for the lack of writing that should have been filling up the space on the Internet.  The fingers are willing but the neural impulses are weak!

Our last summer guest has left and we feel a little bereft!  It does, however, give me the impetus to get down to the reading and writing that is necessary for the last TMA in this particular OU course.  This is the longest of the pieces that we have had to write and the one which is nearest to a conventional academic essay.  As soon as that is out of the way then my mind must turn towards the demands of the examination which is now just under two months away.

Whatever the outcome of the exam and TMA I have to admit that I have enjoyed this course more than the previous one.  I may have been more out of my comfort zone, but that, I think has given me more challenges which are what the whole idea of doing another degree was supposed to have set me.

There is an overlap with my next course and it will be interesting to see whether “Creative Writing” will challenge me as much as the present course.  Obviously this is a higher-level course, but it is still the entrance level that most OU students will encounter before moving on to level 3. 

In keeping with the dictates of the way that we do things in the OU I have bought myself a little red book (as opposed to the Big Red Book for the course) in which I am writing fugitive thoughts; interesting conversations; apposite phrases and writing ideas so that I am at least partially prepared for the opening of the Course Forum on the 25^th of September. 

The course proper will have started in early October so I will be revising for the exam and doing in the introductory work at the same time.  I suppose it is a way of feeling sympathy for my ex-colleagues in Wales and Catalonia as they rush forward with cries of joy to meet the new term and the challenges that it will inevitably bring.  I too will be able to say with real feeling that I am “overworked” – though I suspect the sympathy from my erstwhile fellow toilers in the unyielding fields of education might be a little sparse!

On the material front my third (!) pair of bone conduction swimming headphones have arrived and, so far so good.  After a worrying moment when the tracks did not appear to load and the computer refused to recognize the Finis Swimp as a separate drive, things settled down and I have loaded a typically extravagant and eclectic selection of tracks and firmly placed the random switch on to ensure a bewildering succession of musical entertainment as I plough my lonely furrow intimidating small children out of my way.

I have very carefully kept receipt and packaging, as headphones like this tend to have a fairly limited life and I have paid too much for them to get only six of seven months of use out of them.

This time around I have made sure that “The Green Berets” is not one of the tracks – though I fear that the mere typing of that ominous title is enough to guarantee that the bombastic tune and nauseating lyrics will echo round my head for the rest of the day – and its only 10.45 in the morning!

I have also bought two more box sets of incredible value CDs, both of which are filled with reissues of records that I could not afford when they first came out and which I now cannot afford to let slip by at the cost of a couple of euros a piece.  The DG (with HVK as conductor) set also have reproductions of the original covers together with the information on the back of the cover in tiny poorly reproduced print which I can only read without my glasses on!  It is still an absolute feast of music and I must fly to Gava and MediaMarkt to get the next set of CD cases so that I can listen to the discs in the car.

At present I have been relying on the Catalan Classical Music Station which, while very good, is not really at its best when you are trying to listen to it without an aerial as some bastard has unscrewed and stolen it from my car.

Now the glorious sound of the Berlin Phil with DG clarity and the strict conducting of H von K will flatter me that I am now (at last) one with the Classical Music cognoscenti of forty years ago!  Better late than never!

Having just typed that, I relaxed for a moment and then caught myself tapping out the rhythm of “The Green Berets” on the arms of the chair in which I am sitting.  Never let it be said that I cannot undercut my own pretention!

After a rather muggy start to the day, the sun is making valiant attempts to assert its supremacy and justify the hordes trying to make the most of the link Bank Holiday by paying the inflated prices imposed for parking by our local den of PP politicians.

What used to be free parking along the sea front now comes with a hefty price and the effect has been startling.  There are spaces where there were none last year.  There has been a definite reduction in the number of cars in the area and, while this is good news for we residents, it can hardly be good news for the businesses and restaurants who rely on the summer season to make their profits.

Ah well, the people of Castelldefels have only themselves to blame as we are unique in this area as having voted for PP – and nothing that bunch of self-seeking, avaricious, selfish, unfeeling swine do should surprise.

On the national level the constant bombardment of the higher levels of the party and therefore government with accusations of corruption has become a badly scripted soap where the writers cannot stop themselves piling shocking revelation on top of another to try and engage with the jaded appetite of a viewing public already sated with excess!

On a more positive note I am sure that some aspects of the sad story of Spanish political life can be used as raw material for my next course.  Though, thinking about it, some of the material that we have been regaled with on the television might be consider a little too far-fetched for serious creative writing!

Resumed . . .

Alas!  What must my reader be thinking as day follows day and I write nothing.  It is not as if nothing has happened as our second British visitor of the summer arrived and left and we are preparing for the third.  But nothing.  Sad.

So – dinners and lunches; excursions and sunbathing; seaglass collecting and lamp building; TMA writing and grade getting; exhibition visiting and photograph taking; reading and studying; telephoning and talking; walking (!) and swimming; speculating and arguing; holidaying and working; laughing and cooking; spending and dissimulating . . . and I could go on, and usually would but there is the next part of a James Bond film to watch and, after all, I am only human!

Talking of frailty, I went to the Apple store.  I know that I was wrong, but I was with Suzanne and I begged her to watch over me and prevent me from signing over my life to that unfeeling money Hoovering organization.  To be fair I had a reason to be there.  A slight one, but a reason none the less.

From time to time I forget to plug my phone in and I find myself hoping that the sliver of power that is left is sufficient to work when I need it.  Obviously this was, and is, an unsatisfactory situation.  Never let it be said that I was not aware of the appropriate gadget to make life easier.  I knew that there was a device which would plug into an iPhone and give a power boost when you need it.  I also knew that with a touch of Protestant delayed gratification I could get such a device at a reasonable price from the Internet.

But I was in the Apple store in the centre of Barcelona and, rather than paying a reasonable price later I could pay an extortionate at once and not only get the device that I needed but also get a cord-pull closing, pseudo metallic plastic bag with an Apple symbol on it.  There was no real choice.

I now have an integrated case and battery booster and a woeful gap in my current account!

And another more shallow gap in my knee.  This is as a result of an attempt to get an ice cream at night and being thwarted by one of the depressions around the trees in our little Ramblas.  My fall was spectacular, but disappointingly unbloody.  I was resolutely macho about the whole thing and even managed to salvage my somewhat squashed ice cream and eat it with something approaching equanimity.

For the last week there has been an organically fascinating multi-coloured scabbing of the injury and now the consequent itching as the new skin forms.

And all the while thunder is growling and harrumphing in the background with an absurdly melodramatic light show of multiple lightning strikes and now, at last after an almost impossibly muggy day a welcome storm.  At least it will get some of the dust off the car!

And tomorrow, normal service in the writing area should be restored.

Back to the heat!

Back in Catalonia it is even hotter than in the UK.  This surely must be the only time that I can remember that I can say something like that and not be bitterly ironic!  The weather in Wales was wonderful and it continues this side of the Pyrenees as well.

As always there is an odd sense of dislocation as I re-enter the world of Castelldefels and realize that the round of friends that I ate, drank and chatted to is now a cramped flight away.  But not too far away and one of them will be arriving soon to stay for a week.  And next month Paul comes to stay.  So I will have plenty of opportunities to do what I did over the last few days!

Meanwhile the OU work (which waits for no sluggard using the excuse of journeying to a foreign country) continues and the pace has stepped up.  I have at last written the second piece that I was supposed to have and have edited right, left and centre.  There is still a lot to be done, but it does look doable!

The moneymaking scheme of charging for erstwhile free parking has swung into operation today.  No resident’s ticket of course, but new information pointing out to us that a new (and expensive) headquarters for the implementation of this PP inspired money grab was open and ready for business.

Equipped with various documents and Toni we drove off to the office acutely aware that we would be parking on fair game spaces.  The office looked thrown together and was staffed by one harassed, though outwardly calm Spanish speaking lady who was having to try and placate people who were fearful of being submerged by a flood of tickets because of the lack of the magic card proving that they actually lived there.

No duplicate or copy was available and we were sent away with the wildly unconvincing assurance that we would not be fined.  Not be fined by the squadrons of uniformed children who were gleefully setting out with their portable ticket printers ready and willing to attack anything without the badge that they had not issued.

After much huffing and puffing and muttering dark imprecations against our totalitarian local government we made our disconsolate way back to find nothing in our mailbox.

At least nothing for about ten minutes when scooter mounted post people started ostentatiously stuffing official looking letters through the box.

I now have my vision obscured by a shoddy little card lurking in its cheapo self adhesive holder on the right hand side of the windscreen.  Shoddy it may be, but protection it certainly is.

I am waiting for a call from The Family to get them from the cinema where they have been eagerly waiting to be scared by a late night screening of a horror film.

I chose the OU over the outré!