Ballet Time

First of we've gained two new followers which suppose shows what a bit self publicity can do.
Seeing we're on the build up to Christmas needless to say the other events that take place during this season have already started and amongst them is the grand tradition of the Christmas ballet show. I  love the dances, costumes and music to many of these ballets.
Coppéllia
Coppélia is a sentimental comic ballet with original choreography by Arthur Saint-Léon to a ballet libretto by Saint-Léon and Charles Nuitter and music by Léo Delibes. The ballet is based on two macabre stories by E. T. A. Hoffmann, Der Sandmann (The Sandman), and Die Puppe (The Doll) premiering on May 25 1870 at the Théâtre Impérial de l´Opéra.
The story of Coppélia concerns a mysterious and faintly diabolical inventor, Doctor Coppéliuswho has made a life-size dancing doll. It is so lifelike that Franz, a village swain, is infatuated with it, and sets aside his true heart's desire, Swanhilde, who in Act II shows him his folly by dressing as the doll and pretending to come to life. It's a favourite of mine having bought many years ago the Mari recording of the music on an imported HMV UK record.

Change

Where shall I start this week?
I suppose I could start by saying I managed to straighten out some differences at work with people that were beginning to really bug me because while I like what I do and it has it's 'little' opportunities  that many sadly don't have, this 'big' stuff was taking the shine off it.
Also I feel a bit more at ease with past events, events that really shook me, being able to go about everyday business without having that must be  'watching over your shoulder' feeling all the time.
I'm also winding down yet another part of my internet existence as this particular place has lost much of its functionality and as so few really visit it, I've come to the conclusion the time I spend on it is better spent on my 'little time' . It's that much more rewarding.


Anyway to fashion and this was a Pansy flared dress while aimed at and in groan up sizes sizes isn't a million miles removed from a teen dress available from top shop:

I thought it was cute working well with a few accessories without being too fussy (I don't like fussy designs).

Malory Towers and more

Well I guess the good news is I'm feeling better than I was around this time last week as was really down in dumps with some work related stuff best not gotten into on a publicly accessible blog and wanting more 'little' time something I understand most of us struggle with.
Thanks to everyone in chat this week including our guests from US camp.
I've already gotten two self presents sorted so it's just a question of putting some money aside for a few things for my family as like a good many others facing big bills we've decided to par down what we get each other.

As I think I've mentioned  the odd time in Chat I've been re-reading Malory Towers, the classic story of a all girls high school on the coast of Cornwall, South-west England directly overlooking the sea as written by Enid Blyton.
I bought a set of the original six volumes recently with the front cover of the slip case using this illustration the girls arriving at school. My school skirts are very similar to that of the girls on the far right which is more junior/middle school one. The current editions use some ghastly cheap computer generated images of girls while this 2004 set is more classy.
So far in I've just finished the Fifth volume.
Her books were a big part of my childhood that I loved mainly for their sense of innocent adventure, well observed characters and moral tales interwoven into the narrative.
With Malory Towers we see the world of this  boarding school which is a Castle like building with four wings, mainly through the eyes of Darrell, a first year boarder aged 12 getting to grips with induction procedures, new school rules, making new friends who as the series progresses we learn all about, their strong points and well their failings and learning to take on more responsibilities for themselves.
Each wing has inter-house competitions and for some sports their are coveted matches with other schools, the values of giving your all for your team and team mates, honour and being a gracious winner are write right through.
We also have escapades, ill thought out actions like going awl to perform and becoming so ill we can't sing, playing tricks on teachers and even some serious stuff like poison-pen letters not to mention theft.
For some such stories were (possible are even) a fantasy -a school life in childhood never experienced but preferable to the one they had - but to me much of this was very much like the reality apart from the poison-pen letter bits.
Newsflash: I did play tricks on people back then!
You could say it was really a guide cluing me in to what I was to experience making the transition from day school easier. 
I hope to re-read a few more of her series in the upcoming year.

Teenbeat III

Coming the month before Christmas is white might be the last Teenbeat  edition of this year tm with part of a trend thought the last few years in Europe at least of offering older albums in special low price packs.

To me Steve Lukather, Jeff Poraco and Bobby Kimball were not just in demand LA based session players gracing many albums in the 70's an the 80's - just check the notes on your albums from that era for the extras!  - but the core of a talent group going under the name of Toto who released many albums but to which with the exception of 1982's IV with it's clutch of hit singles like Africa and Rosanna don't register on the general public's index of sings they know.
Tot's music is perhaps best characterized by strong arrangements involving horns, keyboards and other instruments as well as fairly thoughtful lyrics in a sound which does also rock 
Their first album shows promise with Child's Anthem and Hold The Line which as I recall was a 45 but the first side is lacking a bit of something, the second - you can tell I was brought up in the lp era - is a strong set.
The next album in the pack is 1979's Hydra which has more of uniform concept showing the potential of rock to be musically challenging in the title track especially and is the home to '99' a Favourite of mine..
1981's Turn Back I feel got lost in a clutch of splendid releases that year although it contained Goodbye Eleanor a fast paced rocker and is a very strong album.
The pack does include IV which was huge seller and a good album but one I felt was a bit too mellow and almost too polished while it's follow up Isolation from 1984 has more of a rock feel with songs like Carmen, Holyanna and Stranger In Town the video of which is etched in my memory.
If you've ever been curious about Toto or just wish to explore some classy music this set is a cheap way to do it.

Presents of the past

Somebody mentioned in Chat last week - might of been Sam R - about the new range coming to ToysRUS in time for the upcoming Christmas (and other) festivities.
This got me thinking about some of the things I had and maybe you did too from your chronological childhood and I feel like talking a little about them this week.
At the time there were at least in my country quite a number of shows on the television featuring Magicians who invited members of the public to take part in their acts and these shows really held my attention.
It was just so super exciting to see something disappear and then by magic reappear at the waving of a wand or a chant so my folks bought me a magic set with a wand, hat and a few other things to try these tricks out.

 It was something a bit like this one but in white background box going by memory.


I also had something quite useful as I have dyspraxia  which makes trying to write neatly something of a pain and that was a basic Child's Typewriter with a small frame, limited to A5 or maybe going as far as A4 paper.
Iused that to write short stories, thank you letters, lists and labels for school projects on.
This dear reader was well before the personal computer was widely available with word processing programs like Word Star came about never mind MS Word so you really didn't have too many choices!
We didn't have the spell checker - hurrah for the Can-E spellchecker on here! - so you had to use a little erasure and overtype this  being before even correction fluid became widely available for budding typists.
Mine was a Petite a bit like the one below which I kept until high school when I got a grown up manual typewriter.

Fun and Games edition

Seeing it's the annual Greenland's Bonfire and ghoulish weekend to which a number of my friends are attending although I'm going through a pawley spell so aren't, I thought I'd add something from a far as a contribution in kind to that magical spirit.

Pumpkins will be carved making them into lanterns, food will no doubt be consumed and finally that there bonfire will be lit which I think is a British tradition.
Meanwhile all the stores are gearing up to Christmas time getting new stock  in and starting the promotions for toys and games which kinda reminded me of one we used to play both at school and at home.

The great thing about Junior Scrabble the word based games is there are two tways of playing.Younger players can begin with the exciting, ‘Words and Pictures’, a game expressly created to help with the recognition and formation of complex words. Once someone has mastered that there's ‘Rainbow Scrabble’, which is the more challenging version intended for younger players of age seven and upwards. The scoring system is identical to the ‘grown-up’ version, yet far easier to use and keep track of. In a clever move both games are also conveniently located on each side of the board, making it easy to swap from ‘Words and Pictures’ to ‘Rainbow Scrabble’.

Tean Beat II

Golly gosh another entry with a difference about music.
Well I don't know about you but one of the highlights during the year at our high school was the School Disco which we were lucky in that we had a proper dj set up and mc spinning the discs  some of which we supplied from our own modest collections.
One the most in demand request for discs was from the group Chic which I had a decent set of 45's at the time to which we danced to loving funk and Soul music at the time.
This takes me to a recent 2cd set issued by Music Club a budget UK label called Chic Magnifique which I purchased.

This disc has 37 recordings by them including  all the hits we loved such as Le Freak, My Forbidden Lover, Good Times, Hangin' as as well as a few tracks from the 1992 Chic-ism comeback album .
It comes with excellent notes that reveal just how many of these tracks have been sampled by today's R&B/Rap acts and reminds me so much of those 'Good Times'.

Also up on the deck but for different reasons is a disc by the noted singer-songer writer Linda Ronstadt except that for me at least this was amongst the stuff we heard on FM radio back especially at weekends and evenings in the dorm then so frequent that although many of her hits from that period are burnt into my brain I never bought any albums by her then or afterward.

Born in 1946 in Tuscon, AZ, Linda's career started in 1967 with the Stone Ponys which is represented on this disc by Different Drum but then sh went solo recording for Capitol having a huge hit with You're No Good and Asylum/Warner with a swathe of hits throughout the 70's such as Blue Bayou, It's so Easy and Hurt So Good. Later on she explored jazz-pop with Nelson Riddle and Mexican folk which is also covered on this set with such tracks as What's New but inevitable it's the 70's material you come back to and has the lion's share of generously packed discs.
An artist who plows a musical furrow for a while and moves on is hard to compile and at times it's almost as if you've put Linda's songs on shuffle but outside of shorter less value themed collections it's hard to see what else the compilers of this set could do. It's certainly better value from both volumes of her Greatest Hits sets.