Racing Along
9 November

Life continues to move apace and so this posting is just full of the bits and pieces that I have been doing recently.

For example, Ross and I went to the Turner Prize exhibition at Tate Liverpool. I'd taken the day off work because my Quaker group were supposed to be going to Noddfa again. In the event, the conference was called off. I kept the day's leave and we used the time to have lunch and the viewing at the Tate. It wasn't very good. I suspect there is something off kilter about the whole Turner prize thing. The nominations are supposed to be for a particularly good exhibition during the previous year. From that exhibition, a few works are shown out of context. However, I suspect that the judges/critics award the prize based on their knowledge of the totality of a career.

Ross and I both liked Zarina Bhimji's photographs. But they have such old fashioned craft in their making that they are unlikely to win. Nathan Coley's maze was uninspiring. Mark Wallinger's dressing up as a bear inside a Berlin art gallery may have been fun but was too lightweight to bear the pressure of meaning placed upon it. Nathan Coley's There Will Be No Miracles Here is going to win because it is so starkly out of place in the gallery.

And, on the previous evening, I went to another Philharmonic concert. I wasn't that enamoured of the concert I attended back in October but this was superb. Our conductor was the Phil's chief from back in the 80s, Libor Pesek. I liked the performance of Dvorak's tone poem The Watersprite but it was the second piece of the first half, Janacek's Sinfonietta that really set the place alight. I love this music since I discovered it on black vinyl LP as a student. With the big brass contingent, performances don't come round very often. The only other time I've heard it was a Prom performance in the mid 1970s. It was fabbity and I bounced around in my seat a lot.

You'd have thought that, after that, the second half might have been an anti-climax. But no. Out came the piano and Barry Douglas gave us a thrilling rendition of Brahms Piano Concerto No 1. Stunning is the only word. I left the hall in a state of shock only too pleased to get a lift home from Roland.

There's been interaction with other friends too. Out of the blue, I had an email from my German friend Chris. It came to pass that he was likely to be in the North West on business and wondered if we could meet up. Well, it never happened. Suddenly, the line went dead again so I must assume that the trip never happened. I must do a catch up email sometime and get further news from him.

Ross and I also hosted a meal for one of my Quaker friends, Elizabeth. We needed to talk about the training course which we are planning on giving. It seems an age now since we went to Swarthmoor Hall together and we really must press on and get this thing together before the New Year.

On Thursday/Friday of this week, there was a huge tidal surge in North Sea which affected the East coast and East Anglia in particular. Even Holland raised its flood barriers for the first time in an age. I was concerned for Colin but he was OK.

We were remarkable unaffected by the Great Storm of 2007. Oulton Broad got a bit damp but the sea defences just over from our office held well. If the sea had been a foot higher, it would have been a lot different.

So, we had lots of ribald comments about surges and swells instead.

However, all of this pales into insignificance when you look at the news from Mexico where, in the state of Tabasco, floods have left over half a million people displaced and/or homeless. It's a coastal area and something like 70% of it is under water with 100% of agricultural production affected. I simply cannot comprehend such calamity. It makes the floods in this country seem puny by comparison and yet they have left their own misery in terms of lost homes and lost livelihoods.

There's also been family things. Ross and I had lunch at Café Jacques with his parents, his grandad and his brother Sam at the beginning of the half term week. The older people were on their way to Liverpool Airport and an Easyjet flight to Seville for a brief Euro break. The younger members of the team were freeloading a pleasant lunch and some good conversation.

The following weekend, Linda and Mary were visiting my parents. Once again, there was a meal, this time on the Wirral and, once more, the oldsters paid. Again much pleasant conversation was had.

Ross and I have watched a couple of good DVDs from the local library. We liked Miss Potter with its blend of autobiographical narrative and occasional fantasy animation to show Beatrice Potter's fertile imagination. Renée Zellweger didn't really convince but she was acceptable. Ewan McGregor was fine as the love interest. It was a nice movie which would get 2.5 stars if I did half stars.

Equally as good and in a similar vein of imagined biography was Becoming Jane - a story of Jane Austen's early life. How much of the lost love and near elopement were anything like near a truth, goodness only knows. But it made a good film. The cast was one of those usual British character repertory companies with Ian Richardson, Maggie Smith and Julie Walters. Anne Hathaway was more than acceptable as Jane. James McAvoy was more than fine as the love interest. It was a good movie.

Ross and I have become firm fans of James McAvoy. We saw him first as the faun, Mr Tumnus, in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe back in 2006. And, of course, he was in Atonement earlier this year. We think that he is rather cute.

We liked the fact that this film included a skinny-dipping scene which gave us a first view of a lovely little tush.

Though apparently his arse featured quite a lot on the TV programme Shameless - I must see if the series is available on downloads.

Back in June, I read and mightily enjoyed Sovereign by C J Sansom. My only disappointment was that I had jumped into the middle of an ongoing series and would have to do a little catching up with plots which had already been referenced. Well, I've started the process by reading Dissolution - the first of Matthew Shardlake novels. As expected, it was very good. But some plot elements were spoilt by knowledge of the later book. Still, it was easily worth three stars.

We've not been following much television. The best of English television currently is Spooks. We're not happy that Zaff seems to have been dispatched though he does still appear in the opening credits so maybe he'll make a dramatic re-appearance later on. The format this year seems to have changed as well. Although all of the episodes are stand alone, there's an over-arching storyline about Iraq becoming a nuclear power. Still, it's good escapist stuff.

The only other TV that I'm intent on watching currently is Heroes which is heading towards its first series conclusion. I have enjoyed it certainly but I know that I am looking at content that other people around me have seen already. And I know from stills that I have seen that there have already been developments in series 2. So, it's frustrating.

Very frustrating also was the Web broadcast of the new English National Opera production of Carmen. I'd read all of the pre-season publicity and, had I been based in London, I should probably have booked on the spot. Well, I would have been very disappointed. Even the presence of artists of the calibre of Julian Gavin and Alice Coote could not redeem matters. I thought that Edward Gardner's conducting lack Gallic charm and elegance. The decision to cut the recitatives made nonsense of all of the motivation of the characters. Katie van Kooten sounded to me as though she were yodelling her way the rôle of Micaëla. It really was very ordinary.

I've now had notice that my V1 certificate is on its way. It will be good to have that done and dusted. I can continue being an exceptionally good Internal Verifier and Quality Assurance Co-ordinator but I can now do it safe in the knowledge that I have a piece of paper which says that I am competent.

And, heavens be praised, the saga of my car insurance claim is finally coming to an end. An offer has been made which I shall accept. In total, I will have received enough money to pay for the replacement car which is all I've ever really wanted. By that light, this could all have been settled back in May.

I cried off reiki tonight. Janet suggested it as it was beginning to get stormy. As I sat typing this and the winds blew, I was very glad that I was not driving down the East Lancs Road.

And, on that note, I approached my last period of annual leave from work for this year.