My New Year's resolution for 2010 was the following ambitious endeavour: "This year I'm gonna go out and do all those things - I'm gonna right the wrongs and answer the 'what ifs'." Below I shall dutifully share some of the things I have done so far (and some I meant to do but didn't).
I wanted to reduce my work hours to free up some more time for all the FAR more interesting things I could think of spending my time on. My colleagues seemed to concur that this option was reserved for people who had kids and that my request would probably not be granted. But if you don't ask, you don't get. So I asked and I got! How many hours I wanted to work was left for me to decide, and I was astonished both by how easy it was and how no one else seemed to even consider it. Come on - who doesn't want Mondays off?
Okay, this was one I didn't have the guts for, but I immediately regretted not doing it. I was at a Brett Anderson concert in a small venue, and inbetween songs there was a bit of random banter between Brett and the audience. At a quiet moment I wanted to shout "Congrats on getting married!" but my courage left me, being in a small space with hundreds of people, including my husband and the man I have spent my entire adult life referring to as my inspiration. I did want to congratulate him. Having heard him sing about the women who have been a part of his life for a couple of decades, I am happy he has found someone to marry. I'm sure he felt my best wishes and support beaming toward him the whole evening, though.
Since I was about 6 years old and found out Mensa existed, I always reckoned that membership of this esteemed institution was the pinnacle of achievement. Yet I never got around to (or dared, perhaps?) to sit their official test. This year I decided to grab the bull by the horns. British Mensa uses two tests, one aimed towards verbal reasoning and one with diagrammatical challenges. Different IQ tests use different scoring systems, so you are given a score which shows what percentile you fit into compared to the rest of the population. A score in the top 2% for either test qualifies you for Mensa membership. After analysing and evaluating my own performance thoroughly the result arrived, along with an invitation to join Mensa. I'm glad I finally took the test!
I'll be damned before I'm "age-appropriate". I'll dress like a 20-year-old, skip like a child and complain about noise like an OAP whenever I please. The title of this section is from a James single from 1992, but that's not to say I'm stuck in the past. I explore new things, just because I *can*. I went to a concert with a band called One Night Only despite knowing that the rest of the audience would probably be at least 10 years younger than me - and they were. I knew there would be nobody there who knew me, and I proudly declared to my colleagues, "I'm gonna dance, and it's gonna look bad!" And I did, and it did, and I had fun! It was a great gig.
All in all, I can recommend not holding back (or trying not to, anyway). It's giving yourself a great gift, answering those questions and trying the things you're not sure you dare to do, and it can do wonders for your confidence. People say the things you end up regretting are the things you didn't do, which is certainly true for my experiences this year.
Life is subject to cancellation without notice. Get the most out of it.
P.S. Next year I really should get around to climbing the Inca trail in Peru and seeing Machu Picchu!
Being a great lover of the performing arts, I thought I'd offer an opinion of the shows of the year so far (ordered chronologically).
To be honest, Messiah is somewhat long-drawn. I'm not a huge fan of Händel (there's only so many times you need to tell me poor Jesus was "despiséd" before I start to share in his pain!) so I can't really say whether this was a great rendition or not, but we decided to give this annually recurring event a miss for New Year 2011.
Lovely wee intimate concert. Great venue. I had presumed the music would be low-key and mainly acoustic as on the albums. However, this was full-on electric rockpop, which didn't suit all the songs, but Brett was in fantastic form.
With lyrics so gorgeous it makes you almost misty-eyed (some ladies were unable to hold back a wee tear), powerful music and amazing voices, this was a beautiful experience musically. However, the change of the setting to modern-day New York didn't work out that well. The poor artists can't afford medicine, but they have laptops?! Better to stick to the original setting of Paris circa 1830.
As is the case with professional musicals, this was a full-on evening of entertainment. There were a bunch of funny references to pop culture, for instance suggesting Simon Cowell had been "sent from Hell to destroy music" and that X Factor had played a large part in killing music (the story takes place in the future where all instruments are banned and music is computer-generated). Although the story is somewhat ludicrous, you play along simply because of how funny it is. The music was fantastic - of course, it's Queen after all - and for the grand finale of Bohemian Rhapsody, Brian May himself took the stage to play the guitar solo. I'll be seeing it again, this time with Kevin, when it comes to Glasgow in February.
Again a thoroughly professional night of entertainment. With dramatic set pieces (including the chandelier which gets released from under the theatre ceiling and swishes down past the front rows to "fall" on the stage) and mind-blowing singing, this was another experience I would definitely repeat. Love the story, love the songs, and it was done with all the skill required. The Phantom without his mask reminded me slightly of a sewer creature from an early episode of the X Files, which I suppose fulfils the purpose of making you agree he's hideous. However, as with so many love stories, no compelling case is made for the other leading man (he's just the only alternative), which means I couldn't really see why the leading lady was attracted to this self-satisfied piece of fluff. Anyway, that's about the story. The production was excellent.
In all good musicals, one or two of the songs remain in your head for days, sometimes weeks afterwards (or in Kev's case, a year - for the sake of humanity, let him never see Cats again!). And after hearing "I Dreamed A Dream" dozens of times over the last year thanks to a certain Miss Susan Boyle, the mind quite easily gets stuck in a distinctly Les Mis groove... Especially Rosalind James as Éponine made an impression - a gorgeous voice for "On My Own". Musicals are such elaborate sensory experiences that you can only surrender and be carried away, and Les Mis was no exception.
This is a great concept. For the last few seasons, Scottish Opera has staged a handful of brand new mini-operas of approximately 15 minutes each. I had attended a study day previously to find out what to expect in terms of the music, which was useful. They were all very different: Zen Story had a distinct Eastern influence; Sublimation made use of sound diffusion to underline a horrible memory; The Money Man kept playfully changing pace (keeping the musicians and the conductor on their toes); 74° North had a beautiful and haunting libretto about the past; and The Letter (the most accessible piece musically), which takes place in a Jewish settlement at the beginning of World War 2, used a certain scale which is frequently used in traditional Jewish music. The stories were gripping and very well told, and although the music wasn't "catchy", it perfectly underpinned the mood in each piece and almost told the stories by itself.
An enjoyable way to spend a Sunday afternoon with a broad programme of music, beginning with Bartók's Hungarian Sketches, then some Mozart and Rossini (a symphony and two operatic arias), and ending with Mendelssohn’s Overture and incidental music from A Midsummer Night's Dream - concluding with the famous Wedding March. Very uplifting and lovely music, and perfectly set in the bright, ornate space of the wee church.
There is now a break in the concerts for a little while. Fortunately, the upcoming Scottish Opera and RSNO seasons promise some fabulous experiences from September onwards. For now, I have our first wedding anniversary, a gruelling written test and a trip to Denmark to keep me busy.
As this is a music-related post, I should probably mention that over the last few months I have uploaded some more mp3s to the page My Music. And whilst on the topic of new additions, there is a new poetry page called "Status Report" in the Writings section.
Okay, so it's a bit far-fetched, but I was attempting a reference to "Tuesdays With Morrie". I have reduced my work week by 20% as I will no longer be working Mondays. Have spent a disproportionate amount of time in an office and not enough time having fun with my guitar and manipulating my CSS, so I'm slowing down a bit to smell the roses (and maybe take pictures of them).
My first projects revolve around recording music - I still have quite a handful of songs on the "to do" list. Of course, it would also be great having time to write NEW songs. Then there's the question of redesigning the colours and artwork on this website and my JavaScript studies, which I have had very little time and energy for previously. I also have this fab new camera coupled with ambitions to sneak up on the local wildlife and capture their startled expressions as I merrily click away (OK, on a realistic level, I will need a telephoto lens for this). In the long term I was considering taking music lessons on Mondays or maybe a refresher course in French. So many ideas... Here is what I have promised myself:
My Mondays will be for...
- health: yoga, maybe pilates, horseback riding and generally going outside, not being stuck in an office
- music: recording, practicing piano/guitar/singing, writing songs, events with the opera and symphony clubs
- web design: improving the site (creative changes and maintenance), learning new skills like JavaScript and PHP
- family: having spa days for myself, taking care of the cats (playing, grooming, ensuring they get their supplements etc.) and of course spoiling Kev
- photography: capturing the local biodiversity, weather permitting
- reading: fiction, poetry, lifestyle books, language studies... I never feel I have enough time to read
- running errands and doing household tasks - not that this should be allowed to take up too much time!
My Mondays will not be for...
- staying in bed till noon
- wasting time on Facebook and googling random crap
On a different topic, Thursday the 6th is the day of the general election in Britain. As anyone on my Facebook contact list knows without a shadow of a doubt, Nick Clegg, leader of the Liberal Democrats, is my champion. If the Tories win it's gonna take a lot of Häagen-Dazs to numb my pain. There's even an underdog style Facebook campaign for the Lib Dems.
Lastly, a follow-up to an earlier post about a certain pair of boots: I had to can my plans to acquire a pair of Oakley's as they only come in size 7 and larger (discriminating people with smaller feet). I bought two new pairs of Doctor Martens in London instead - the standard black 1490s I've had before, and a pair of 14 eyelet faded lavender ones (a slightly more girly option). They'll only last about a decade, but I guess my size 6 feet aren't worthy of nuclear-blast-proofness. *sniff*
I'm heading down to the Big Smoke for a week on work related matters. Knowing how to intersperse business with pleasure I have quite a busy evening programme as well. I'm going to We Will Rock You and Phantom of the Opera, and as I can't go to Les Mis (it's on its 25th anniversary tour - I've got tickets for Edinburgh in May) I can dine at Le Gavroche in its stead.
Going to check out the zebra finches with electric guitars at the Barbican Centre. On Saturday, I'm planning a visit to Marlborough art gallery to salivate over their Chihuly collection, followed by lunch at Tate Modern. Then a trip to Covent Garden to visit a few select shops before catching a train back to Glasgow in the late afternoon.
Spring and early summer are always a busy time, and by now my calendar is pretty full until mid-July. After that there is a break until the opera and symphony seasons begin in autumn. However, I'm sure I'll soon be making plans for August - there are so many things I want to do!
My birthday this year brought one of those unexpected perfect moments which cannot be planned - a moment of complete and utter happiness.
It's not that the rest of the day was half bad either. Both Kev and I were off work and had morning tea in bed. Despite having told him not to get me a present, Kev had bought two things I very much coveted. The first he presented to me was the one album I didn't have by the Canadian singer and pianist Chantal Kreviazuk, which I had been meaning to order online at some point. The other was a Canon EOS 500D SLR camera - something I had wanted for some time but reckoned was too expensive. Kev bought a bundle with camera body, a standard lens, a UV filter, extra battery, memory card and carry bag. I was very surprised and very pleased.
The day was spent being cosy around the house, one of our favourite activities, and in the evening we went to try a new restaurant, Brian Maule at Chardon d'Or (food being another shared interest). We loved every bite of this exquisitely prepared French cuisine - it was the best meal of our lives. I don't know whether it was just the sheer perfection of dinner - my smile grew bigger with every dish - or whether it was the glass of Rutherglen muscat I had with dessert, but when we stepped out in the pleasant spring evening to walk back to the car, I felt absolute bliss. It was one of those moments of pure poetry that you just don't want to end. Walking along with your favourite person on a quiet evening, having just enjoyed a flawless feast - heaven.
Kev intimated that he wanted to make my birthday next year even better. I have trouble seeing how he could eclipse this perfection.
Playing around with ideas for new navigation/menu and a different colour scheme, like this one with faded purples and blues. I'd love to hear some ideas and opinions. You know where to reach me.
I've started a spring diet as many months of overindulgence means I have gained a distinctly rounder shape, which is unacceptable and must of course be addressed as a matter of priority.
The Atkins diet has been suggested to me by several people as a means to lose weight. The basic idea is that eating meat and vegetables will make you feel fuller for longer and kick off your metabolism, unlike starch-filled carbs which will just make you eat more and keep you from burning the excess body fat. Being a keen nutritionist, I agree with the late Dr Atkins in that Westerners eat far too many refined carbohydrates like sugar and white flour (and white rice, potatoes and pasta for that matter), but I cannot get behind a dietary plan that aims to cut out carbs completely to lose weight. I believe that complex carbs like brown rice and whole grains are an essential part of a healthy food regimen. And studies show that a low-fat diet has the same long term weight-loss effect as a low-carb diet. As dull on the palate as macrobiotic food may be, I did lose 19 pounds while eating large measures of couscous and white quinoa!
I believe moderation is the healthiest approach to anything. I believe in unprocessed foods like brown rice and apples. I also believe - like Dr Atkins - that a cooked chicken breast will keep me full for longer than a chunky piece of bread, and that most types of bread are essentially bad for you. I believe that the two main principles in my own weight loss plan should be to only eat the amount I require, instead of emptying the plate no matter how much is on it, and to cut out the afternoon chocolate intake at work and the evenings spent on the sofa, merrily sharing a tub of Häagen-Dazs almost mechanically while being engrossed in a movie. I believe in identifying your own bad food habits in order to lose weight, and snacking is mine. (I'm also culturally conditioned to comfort eat, which doesn't help - a lot of people in the Western world grow up with an unfortunate oral fixation which makes quitting the sweets/booze/cigarettes even harder.)
In short, when it comes to dieting I follow the same beliefs that I apply universally: That everyone is different and has different requirements, and that a knowledge of the individual coupled with an extensive knowledge of nutrition means I can tailor a diet that fits me perfectly. It's called a holistic approach.
I'm a jeans-and-T-shirt kinda gal. I'll dress up when there is occasion to do so, but as anyone who sees me on a daily basis will know, I really don't care for fancy clothing. I like my plain but warm cardigans. I find clothes shopping frustrating and prefer to buy things online.
I've been saying I wanted a new pair of Doctor Martens for a while - I just hadn't got 'round to actually buying them, mostly because the regular black 1490 ten eyelet boot doesn't seem to have won the favour of the current-time fashionistas and thus I haven't actually seen them in any Glasgow shops I happen to pass.
I like DMs because they're good value. My father shook his head when I bought my first pair as a teenager; he reckoned they were just a ridiculously expensive fashion item. Ten years later they were finally worn out after continued use day in, day out, summer through winter, and I lamented them with a comparison to the countless pairs of lesser quality footwear I had owned and which never seemed to last as long as my affection for them.
It wasn't the name that attracted me, it was the high standard of manufacture. Therefore, I am by no means bound by any loyalty to the Doctor Martens brand. In this week's Time magazine there was a page about Oakley (the eyewear makers) and their constant innovation. It was basically an ad, like the iPad tablet "review" 3 weeks prior. Unlike the Apple article, this one had the desired effect - it brought their boots to my attention. The Elite Assault Boot was designed for the U.S. Elite Special Forces to use in assault missions (says the spiel on the Oakley site). With soles like tractor tyres, it is not stylish footwear for a lady. But the point is, these boots look like they could actually outlast ME.
I told Kev that these ultra-durable boots were only sold in a handful of shops worldwide, one of them being a London Oakley store. I mentioned that seeing as I'm going to London in April I should probably give them a ring in March to check stock levels and sizes. I told him these boots were fire-proof and puncture-proof and would keep your feet safe through a nuclear armageddon. I may have embellished a little, but he got the idea.
And he asked what they cost, so I showed him the article in Time, which sets the price at $500. A quick conversion of today's exchange rate makes that £323. And Kev's response - as if I was buying a pair of high-fashion heels from Milan which could only be worn on that one day of the year where Scotland is dry - was, "That much - for a pair of SHOES?!"
*sigh* Men! Never happy...
Doctor Martens (left) - Oakley Elite Assault Boot (right)
The most active part of the site remains the My Music page. I have just uploaded fresh and slightly better versions of Please Don't Play the Piano and The One I Loved. I'm working on Someday, Xenia, Wolf's Moon and a couple of other songs at the moment, and now that I have bongo drums I'm plotting ways to work them into the songs as well! Still quite chuffed with my recording of Moon Woman - if you've not heard it yet, please indulge me and do so.
I have removed the guestbook. To be honest, guestbooks are a relic from the 90s where people visited each other's "homepage" and left a polite message. Not on trend in 2010. It's had a good run - the guestbook has existed since I first created christinereid.com back in 2004. I'll add a feedback form to the site eventually when I get my arse in gear and learn some PHP. Until then, anyone whose opinion matters has my email address...
By now the site has had its current design for over a year (since The Big HTML Revamp), and it was always intended to be temporary - something that would suffice until I had the time to put some fancy CSS together with clever images and all. I suppose this year I should aspire to either paint something a little bit more interesting or get some photography to make the damn place more stylish (you wouldn't believe the comments I get about the green background... and pretty much all of them are from my own husband). Suggestions would be appreciated.
Older entries purged.
