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I have a long singing day today, which is going to be a bit hard, as I have the voice of a dog who has spent a week in a horrible holiday kennel. The whole day will be cushioned by the fact that the lovely JM is cooking us a roast chicken dinner tonight, and she is the best roast chicken dinner maker I know!

I think if I was to have  a last meal before I leave this mortal coil, the roast chicken dinner with GRAVY and MASHED POTATOES and all the trimmings would be up there in my one hand choice. Another choice would be really really good sausages with mash and onion gravy.

So about 7pm tonight you can think of me in my roast chicken heaven -though there is a fine chance I may fall asleep in my dinner, as I find working and socialising on the same day quite tricky.

SONG OF THE DAY –Forget me Not

This song was brought to us by a group of African singers called the Diamond Choir, who I think worked in  South African Diamond mines, please correct me if I have got this wrong, I think a bit like the old  pit men colliery bands and choirs, they visited this country several times to  sing and raise awareness of the struggle with HIV. I believe they don’t visit anymore in case they try and stay…This is a video of the Bishopsgate Singers and the Trinity Laban World Choir ( catchy name, someone said to me yesterday!) opening our end of term sharing at the beginning of the week… so loverly.

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And if you are not out by now, you will be by about 1pm, so like I said yesterday, this is a day round our way to avoid the pubs as the secondary school teachers are out and the sturdy  young ones and the drinkers ( as an ex -secondary music  teacher, who taught 500 inner London teenagers a week, I have to say alcohol helps) will start drinking at 2 and continue until they fall over…raaaaaa!

Yesterday, my song of the day was School’s Out by Alice Cooper and today I am just musing over that feeling that you get or can reminisce about.  The first day of the summer holidays! A head teacher in the first school I was a full time music teacher, told me to bottle the feeling of the key going into your front door on the first day of the summer holidays…..I am now aiming to have that feeling every single day of the year…The feeling of being free everyday.

One thing about teaching, people think you are so lucky to have big holidays, but the holidays are set in stone,  timetables are relentless, and by the time you get to the beginning of the summer holidays it is usually about 4 weeks too late. You are so tired, you spend 2 weeks  licking your inner wounds ( mmm interesting turn of phrase …I don’t think I will use that again). You might spend 2 weeks feeling like a real person and then you spend 2 weeks counting down back to the madness that is teaching life. Anyone who thinks teacher have an easy life should spend a week in a class room. It is really really hard and teachers need more respect…big respect.

It has all got a bit quiet round here. I hear that at this time of the year over a  million Londoners leave for healthier climates – I am convinced they are replaced with about the same amount of tourists and visiting school trippers in  crazy t-shirts, sensible plastic macs, bum bags  and backpacks.

The tourists stay in the hot spots, so round our way there is a kind of erie hush in the air which might be like this until the end of the August Bank Holiday…deep joy!

So I have a slight lifting of my spirits about the fact soon much of my life will be my own again, but still have another 8 days of work before I can dissolve into a mush for a few weeks and see if I can get rid of the underlying chesticoff  (not in Russia).

SONG OF THE DAY – Queen  – I want to break free

Sort of never really liked the more popular Queen era and I believe they all got rather hedonistic in their big glory days, but this song, a bit like some of the Abba songs is a grower and the sentiment is great for today. I find the video a bit distracting from the song…ha ha dresses and moustaches….only funny for so long. And Bless Mr Freddie…Surely he had enough money to wear a shirt…unless the lack of shirt was part of his freedom thang. I personally find it better to listen to the song with my eyes closed.

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All the Rowan ( Mountain Ash) berries are out and the birds are in heaven. I think they are a bit early this year. Everywhere in London the Rowan trees are winking with crimson, juicy berries, which I knew where delicious for the birds so should have put two and two together  as they are edible and good for making jam and things. The link here tells me that they are also good for singers, and you can gargle with the juice.

The birds never eat them all, so I reckon I might harvest a few, though last year big flocks of redstarts came over from some where like Finland and ate the rest in about february…wow…a bird anorak too!

My favourite plant in our back garden is unknown. Mr P. reckons it is a thornless blackthorn. He bought it from a garden centre, it was one straggly thing in a corner with no label. It is trained to grow against a wall and has the most beautiful leaves that go through all shades of amber to red in the autumn. At this time of year it is full of very plump looking black berries which last about two weeks, because the blackbirds gorge themseves on them until the shrub is berry less. The wood pigeons try to eat the berries and manage it every so often, but are a bit big for the thin branches and end up just sitting around not getting much action at all.

I went to a school to day for their summer concert and the weather is so dull and drizzly and what with the berries being out it feels like tone of those grey september days not the last day of school……

SONG OF THE DAY -SCHOOLS OUT -Alice Cooper

The summer of 1972 saw the release of this single. It went Top 10 in the US, was a number 1 single in the UK.  Mary Whitehouse, a well known campaigner for values of morality and decency, succeeded in having the BBC ban the video for “School’s Out” and  a Member of Parliament petitioned  the then Home Secretary to have the group banned altogether from performing in the country. ha ha ha ha ha 
The end of term is is either today or tomorrow, unless you go to a posh school in which case you have been off for weeks. So look out for the flocks of  single and/or young drunk teachers everywhere during the next two nights…best avoid pubs tomorrow night altogether, cos it aint pretty…. . So cliches apart…who cares. I love the fact that when this track came out …there they were, the rebels in the audience, wearing floral smocks, check out the girl Alice grabs to dance with at the end…I remember having something very similar in my wardrobe, that I probably made myself though I was  almost not even a teenager then. I suppose floral smocks were a nice alternative to the outfits 10 year old girls are wearing now, which look much more like what Alice and his band are wearing. Bring back the floral smock! BRING BACK THE FLORAL SMOCK! Oh bums they did….it’s everywhere…and it was not a good look the second time either…I can’t believe Alice Cooper was 24 when this video was made…he looks 63…oh that is how old he is now……good ploy..look ancient when you are young ….the best bit is the electric guitar at the beginning.

later  x

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This is post 201 of my postaday2011 , which means there are still 164 days of the year to go…as my blogger mate Dark Vador so aptly put it ‘flippin’ek’ that still a lot of posts to go…will we make it? How many people have dropped by the hyperspace wayside screaming for mercy,”no more posts… no more!”. Or perhaps they just forgot, ran out of steam, lost interest…got something much more exciting to do.

The thing is I still find this an exciting thing to do. I love the challenge, the routine, and I am so not into routine, and the fact that this time is just about me me me me. I have a fantastic job, but it is a ‘people’ job,  so it is a good balance for me to spend some time gazing at my own naval, being a complete anorak, being in my own space.

So what’s with all the numbers?..well it is 42 years TO THE DAY when Neil Armstrong walked the walk and talked the talk on the surface of the moon….

I have completed 201 one 2011 postadays and there are 164 left..I have already forgotten what the 20 is there for…oh well..it will come back to me.

Today is more planning for a 7 day extravaganza of teaching/directing/ singing at the Guildhall Pop and Rock Summer School, need to get it all done today so must stop slacking!

SONG OF THE DAY 1 Giant Leap-My Culture

Walking on the Moon would have been way to easy as a link. But 1 Giant Leap is what Neil said when he stood on the moon, so I think this link is much more subtle. This is an amazing track and a wonderfull video well worth watching all the way through.