Busy day today. As soon as I got up, I made a start on our homemade spreadsheet to work out how much we're spending at the moment and to estimate how much we've therefore got to stop spending before our money supply runs out. It's best to do this depressing sort of calculation early in the morning when you're feeling strong, rather than just before bedtime. I then made a quick bowl of porridge (porridge being great value for money) before ringing the Glebe Community Centre Theatre Company to see if they still have $5 seats available for their Saturday matinée performance of Twelfth Night next weekend (they do), and then catching a couple of buses to a 10 o'clock meeting where we were planning the diplomatic Christmas party at the end of next week, at which something like 140 people are expected.
Home again at lunchtime via the shops, to work on some digital photo projects for various Christmassy purposes; it took most of the afternoon, especially as I had to make a call to iPhoto in the midst of this (haven't a clue what our iPhoto ID is for the login screen), but I did also speak to my daughter who can now be seen and heard in the on-line NPL Christmas greeting! Click on that link to hear her and four of her colleagues singing Ding Dong Merrily on High in NPL's sound measurement laboratories. My grandson Alexander was half inclined to sing to me as well today, but thought better of it when he realised he could be watching Thomas The Tank Engine on the screen instead, so said "Bye-bye Grandma!" in no uncertain terms. Then I had to make a quick supper for Chris, home in good time because he had to teach at the flying club this evening. I invented a thick Mediterranean-flavoured soup including lima beans, chickpeas and chunks of ham. There's a word for that sort of meal; I can't think of it. Anyhow after a bit more juggling with our budget spreadsheet we ate fast and so had time to play the Borodin piece on our clarinet and piano before Chris went out again.
Yiwen and Pete came round to bring us some Jamaican rum cake they've been making all this year, now baked & being divided amongst their friends. I decorated a cardboard box for the diplomatic party and finally sat down to write an essay in Spanish on what I would have been if I hadn't been what I am now. I have to read it out at the Spanish conversation tomorrow before going by bus again to a completely different meeting, this one about editing the flying club's magazine.
3 comments:
... so what would you have been if you hadn't been what you are now? I'm sure I'm not the only one who's curious to know!
Tal vez hubiera querido haber sido una cantante de ópera. Quizá hubiera
sido famosa (¡como Kiri te Kanawa o Renée Fleming!) y hubiera podido cantar en los teatros de la ópera de fama mundial. Pueda ser que
hubiera cantado las óperas de Mozart, por ejemplo.
Cuando era joven, tuve una buena voz para cantar y tomé lecciones de canto. A veces canté solos en conciertos. A menudo fuí solista y
me gustó mucho esa experiencia, aunque estuve casi siempre nerviosa el día anterior. Fuí a una escuela donde mi padre era profesor de música (y de canto también), pero no quise hacer lo que mi padre quiso que yo haga. ¡Era un poquito rebelde!
De todos modos, si yo hubiera sido una cantante, hubiera tenido una carrera glamorosa, pero hubiera encontrado que era una vida difícil, ya que no hubiera podido ver mucho de mi familia o de mis amigos, pues hubiera estado
viajando constantemente. Es también una vida muy competitiva y yo no soy una persona con mucho espíritu de competición. ¡Creo que estoy contenta como soy! Ahora no me importa que no soy famosa.
(My essay was checked by Marisa from Peru and her corrections are incorporated here.)
(Added on Feb 5th, 2009) I've remembered the name of the bean stew: it's cassoulet!
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