updatey thing

I'm quite looking forward to a choral concert in Elora this evening ("Cantus" on this program) and another choral concert on Sunday ("Paradise Found"). In between, who knows. Likely hiking tomorrow, and possibly some hanging-out and stuff. Yeah. The week seems to have zipped by quickly. I've gotten a fair bit at work done; and some great social stuff too. Life, indeed, is good.

Last night, we watched the second half of Becket, which might be up your alley if you've seen and enjoyed The Lion in Winter. Both feature Peter O'Toole as King Henry II; the guy makes the job of King sound like a real pain. First his best friend (Thomas Becket) turns out to not be a toady when he's made Archbishop of Canterbury; then his kids and wife turn out to not like him very much at all. Sucks for you, Ed...

Becket is apparently the much less historically accurate of the two films; but it's got a really wonderful story and (apart from some awful Italian accents) great acting. It's long: 150 minutes.

Time to go home. See y'all later!

Things we've learned this evening...

1) If you're gonna have a vanity license-plate, Mr. HAS INC, don't drive like a total asshole. 'Cause if you almost cause three accidents in a two-block distance, and it's clear where you're parking, somebody just might call the cops on you.

2) The Indian restaurant up on Northfield has an excellent dinner-buffet for $15 on Friday nights. Yum.

3) If a festival is gonna hold a music concert in a city-owned barn, there should be plans to deal with rain. These plans should not be to let all the rain come under the doors and pool in the middle of the floor. Especially if the barn is designed to hold water/salt-brine in the wintertime rather than letting it drain anywhere. 'Cause a torrential downpour will do spectacular things to one's concert space.

I'll have photos (and possibly a movie) up soon, it was an awe-inspiring flood. After they spent a lot of energy trying to sweep away the (many hundreds of litres of) water, they ultimately moved the concert to Knox Presbyterian Church in downtown Elora, where the show did indeed go on, only an hour after it was supposed to.

Cantus sung quite well- they opened with an Eric Whitacre piece (Lux Aurumque) which was probably the best piece of the evening (d. and I agreed, at least). I liked the first half more than the second- there were two Walt Whitmanesque pieces I liked- A Sound Like This, by Edie Hill, based on poetry by Kibir, translated by Robert Bly. The second was actually based on two poems by Whitman; titled We Two, by Steven Sametz, based on "Not Heat Flames up and Consumes" and "We Two, how long we were fool'd."

The second half seemed a bit percussion-heavy and with a few meh pieces.

But their encore was Franz Biebl's Ave Maria, a piece d. and I both adore, which was a wonderful ending to a somewhat long evening.

Much thanks to melted_snowball for driving us home through fog and wet, when we'd both rather be home sipping a drink.

Speaking of which, I never got my drink. *goes off to fix*