Wind Instruments

The ballet was excellent – BRB performing three shorts: a short Russian ballet, then several couples dancing to a selection of Frank Sinatra’s songs, then Daphnis and Chloe, an entire ballet that was vibrant and exciting. All the costumes were wonderful, the audience was very enthusiastic, and I brought a programme back for my 80 year old dogwalking friend Betty, who is a great ballet fan.

However, after a very long journey up there due to roadworks everywhere, I was in the mood for unwinding when we got to Plymouth. Hah! I’d forgotten how horrendous cities are – all those people jostling and shouting, cars tooting and screeching, shoppers dropping fish and chips, pasties, fag ends on the pavement. A team of Hari Krishna (sp) monks chanting and clapping. And me and Moll scurrying along, trying to dodge them all while Himself did his round of the music shops.

Himself is in his element because he’s bought himself another cornet, would you believe. This one is silver plated (he’s allergic to silver) and has a large dent in it.

‘But I got it for sixty quid, Pop. That’s a bargain,’ he said proudly.

‘SIXTY QUID!’ I cried.

‘But it’s a Besson, Pop,’ he insisted.

It was on the tip of my tongue to say’ ‘It’s a Con,’ but as I’d been reminded that I know nothing about musical instruments, I kept my mouth shut. Just.

So he is now the proud owner of two cornets and about ten mouthpieces. He has great plans for this new cornet, which will include de-silvering it and bashing the dent out with his brother’s help (they have all the equipment up at the workshop so this will be another challenge). In the meantime, he spent our time at my mum’s taking it out of its box and stroking it lovingly.

Also on the subject of wind, I met a lady in the toilets at the theatre who told me she had Crohns Disease. She was bent double and belching very loudly – as in VERY loudly.

‘I feel awful,’ she said, a plump lady in a loose white sweater. ‘My daughter wanted to take me out to lunch so we went to Dingles but if I don’t eat in time, my stomach plays up and the food took ages and it was too late for me, so I’m in agony.’ She paused for another very painful sounding expellation of air. ‘I shouldn’t be here, really, I should be in bed but I didn’t want to disappoint my daughter.’

Poor lady – what do you say? I gave her a hug and left to go back to my seat, very glad that I’m not stricken with that horrible disease.

And lastly on the subject of wind, Himself has a few problems in that direction due to his cancer treatment. He usually tries to get rid of it while walking the dog in the morning (which means timing it for when we’re not walking past other dog walkers). This morning, however, it sounded like a trapped mouse that had been sat on for a week.

For some reason, this reduced us both to hysterics. What is it with the English and farts?