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Yesterday  in Great Britain  it was all about weddings, street parties. There was  healing  of old hurt, meeting new neighbours and ridiculously Britishly eccentric hats (Princess Eugenie won by a length) –

it's a hat jim, but not as we know it!

though there were a couple of women in the Abbey who looked like someone had just attached a cereal bowl to their head and a ‘lorra lorra buntings’ – as Cilla Black would say. It was an unexpectedly moving day, and  this is my picture of the day. I took this photo at my Mum’s  little street party. The star of the party was the buntings.

Once they were up the street completely changed and I think I  have to start making my own buntings as they turn any place into a place of celebration. Thumbs up for buntings! oh and in case you were thinking it was all about birds there is also a  picture of a reed bunting.Buntings for the Royal Wedding

SONG OF THE DAY  White Flag -Dido

Well there is a tenuous link. Flags! Again an unexpected song choice, as I think Dido sounds like she is being strangled when

she sings anything above a whisper, but uses  a falsetto at the top other voice that is just a bit unique as her voice keeps flipping. This song is very haunting if you like a bit of maudling popppy pop. Stunned that the video has had 9 million hits on youtube. I am one person removed from Dido as she was a close friend of one of my friends. This song is a real haunter. “There will be no white flag upon my door..I’m in love..I always will”

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Today is the big day for many many couples all over the world (some pictured here) and their big day will be shadowed by an even bigger day in the streets of London. I have chosen to watch from a distance and give a chance for all those people who only come to London for the Theatres and the Big Events (as long as they don’t stray out of the ‘safe tourist zones’) to breathe my air and wave a flag for me for a day. I hear the rain is coming, but I wrote this early, so by now, whatever storms and disasterous or joyousness may already have taken place. I am watching a bit on the box and have already shed a tear at the idea of ordinary people camping out for 3 days to be involved in the day…ahhhh. Truth is, we are watching the wedding and all blubbing.

in the abbey
kate and dad

In case you missed it..ha ha ha  were asleep under a rock…top Grandson of the Queen is getting wed to ghasp! a commoner! No pictures necessary, well ok maybe a couple from the tv. I liked the merchandise they were selling in The Guardian this week, one included a t-shirt with the words ‘commoner’ and another was a cup that said ‘my other cup says ban the monarchy ‘ and the date of the wedding. They have been doing lots of funny non-wedding things, I particularly like the imaginary prenups below. non serious…I wish them the best of luck.

I, William Arthur Philip Louis Wales (hereafter known as The Man Born to be King), do undertake that in the event he gets bored with Catherine Elizabeth Middleton (hereafter known as The Commoner) or if The Commoner so much as looks at another man, turns out like his Mum and gets all moody and pukey, then all bets are off. In the event of any of the above, The Commoner shall get absolutely nothing except for a hideous pile near Sunningdale if his Granny is feeling generous.

Signed Will-i-am

I, Catherine Elizabeth Middleton (hereafter known as The Commoner), do undertake that if William Arthur Philip Louis Wales (hereafter known as The Man Born to be King) turns out to be a bit of a bastard and is shagging someone else, she will turn a blind eye. The Commoner does also undertake she will smile vacantly if the paparazzi photograph The Man Born to be King falling out of a bar with a couple of blondes and that if she in any way fails to shape up to the expectations of The Man Born to be King she will be returned to penury whence she came.

Signed Kate

good luck to them all!

SONG OF THE DAY –

It would have been tardy, and just plain dull to have the song of the day as ‘Going to the Chapel’, and will duly send an ‘unimaginative blogger’ sticker to anyone who does this( joKe)

NAT KING COLE -LET THERE BE LOVE

Nat King Cole -such an engaging man you cant help but lean into the screen to get more of his magnificence! But most of all baby….let there be love…for us all!


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I looked at me dashboard and there it was in black and white….four times more visitors on Monday than any other day for a while…strange, but true. I was making cyber tea and baking galactic cakes all day!…and then I pondered…….and  wondered for a while.

What and how this had occured?..was it my beautiful photo of one lonely cyclist, or the wonderful rendition of  Sister Rosetta Tharpe -Down By The Riverside? And then I sussed it!  It was a Monday and like me, many of the Bishopsgate Singers were perhaps itching for a sing ( mmm I am not sure if you can itch for a sing…it just does not sound quite right, )  and had a look at the blog to check they had not missed the first day of term. Well maybe, but the 25th was a Bank Holiday….ah time on our hands!  Thats what did it… maybe.

Bishopsgate Singers Singing for the Red Cross in Freezing Conditions!!

Anyway new term starts on Monday 9th of May, which is a  very late start, due to all these Monday bank holidays, but we are getting together on the 6th to raise some money for the Red Cross in the City of London somewhere…watch this space. Hope we can remember all the songs from last term…I may have to do a bit of homework myself!

SONG OF THE DAY

So my singers get practice cd’s usually halfway through the term. This is the one I was working on today today! yippee. An arrangment of ‘Aint no Sunshine’ just to balance out all those happy sunny songs we have been hearing lately,. So all the voices on the demo below are mine. freshly sung this afternoon and it is ‘take one’, by the time it is sung by a real group of singers it may change  dramatically…and I might wake up tomorrow and change it all! 

best to listen to at least 2 minutes as it does develop etc blah blah!

‘aint no sunshine

and then the original version

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So yesterday I lied, and once again flouting convention I am going to do my fourth study of the title of this week’s photo challenge ‘ONE’.

There is a song I used to sing when I spent more time dancing barefoot in marquees with lots of hippies ( me? Hippy…never…….much too earthly). The words were “and there’s only one sky to fly in”. This picture I took of the South East Coast of England reminded me  that we are all living under the same sun and the same sky. We all stare at the same moon and sleep under the same stars. Our moods are shared by the pull of  the same tides and planets. Wow …can you tell I have had a few days off?

Yes a few days of having some wind in my feathers and sun on my face has left me feeling more ‘at one’ with the world. I do my best to stay with  that ‘oneness’ in the hustle bustle of the world. It has been said how easy it is to be all enlightened and at one with the universe when sitting cross legged on the top of a mountain or on a beach in Thailand, but try it in the queue at an underground IKEA when the thing you wanted the most has no price tag on it, or someone pushes in the line at the bus stop, or the man next to you on the tube looks like he might kill you if you even look at him. The challenge is to take the feeling you might get sitting next to the shore line back to the world. ‘Be in the world but not of it’, is a phrase told to me that stuck. There is no real point in ‘dropping out’, because  surely our reason for being is what we can give to our community, whether it is washing other people’s socks, marking their english homework, mending their cars, making them laugh, teaching them songs,  or giving them something to read.

SONG OF THE DAY

Alison Krauss  -Down to the River to Pray

Lovely bit of choral singing in this, as well as Alison’s angelic tones…you will have heard it in “oh Brother Where Art THou” if you are into the Coen Brothers films.