The Ghouling years

Just a matter of few days before I'm off for a ghoulish time so I'm working presently on packing my case, double checking as you do that everything you need is in there plus other things like money.
It's interesting to reflect on how it has been in the last three and a bit decades the way we mark this time of the year has changed because over here in the UK Halloween as such wasn't marked but people did hold All Hallows Day parties with guising and toffee apples.
The more recent custom of Trick and Treat isn't native to the UK but an import from the States a good number hold the children's tv program  Blue Peter responsible for doing a feature on in the early eighties that then spread like topsy.
Into that the participates created outfits to which people rewarded with candy and it wasn't long before as in the States commercial outfits became widely available even if face paint and the like obviously was hand applied.
In this country it cuts into the Guy Fawkes season where we mark the foiled attempt to blow up the Houses of Parliament with effigies, bonfires and fireworks in 1605.
For that ear muffs may help as some fireworks are really loud!

Fall Sightings 2018 Part 2

In what seems more like a last hurrah of spring  rather than The Fall, I've been out quite a bit this last week noticing things.

 We're getting in classic golden fall territory in our local wood withe the leaves going a coppery colour and a good number down to ground level making a colourful carpet.

Strange things having been going on as while as you can see the leaves are starting to decay actually on Saturday Afternoon they were smothered with at least three Ladybirds per leaf and indeed I had to carefully scoop one that had attached itself to me and put it on a leaf.

There were two spotted ones and the Harlequin ladybird.

The trees at the end of the  lane are starting to go go coppery as those just opposite already have

 Down at ground level you can see the leaf carpet around each trunk and to where Zee-Zee's mates were spotted running up and down the branches in a carefree way.

It's been a great week out.

A spot of colouring

The weekend was not particularly conducive to going out with strong winds on Friday so with even bigger and strong people than myself struggling I needed to stay indoors which as you probably aware isn't something I like at all, being an outdoor girl.
One thing you can do when it is like this is colour and so I had my colouring book out on Friday.

 Normally when I colour I use Staedtler colour pencils available in the Noris Club 36 colour pack as they respond well to different pressures for shading and don't easily break in the way some cheaper ones found in convenience stores do
They also sharpen well.
That illustration is from the Jacqueline Wilson Colouring Book published by Penguin UK and illustrated by Nick Sharratt who does the drawings in her stories.

Fall sightings 2018

This week in the crazy world of me we actually go outside at the start of the Fall where within a built up area you actually get to see things you'd normally have to go a bit beyond down the country lanes for.

 I wouldn't go mentioning requiring a new jumper in the presence of these two as they may well Baa you out within seconds. They're within a hundred yards of a community centre but it doesn't feel like it.

 If anyone ever accused these two of horsing about they'd have quite answer to that as I careful supported the camera with the lens set at 105mm in uneven light and later on adjusted the exposure a little.
It was around here I once almost lost a camera bag to curious horses!

 There's nothing like crisp leaves and sunlight although I used to cheat in the old days armed with the Olympus OM4 and use the TTL flash with a warm up filter sometimes to get the kind of golden colour cast I like.

Teenbeat XVIIII - Driving to Billy Paul

More from the the time it was less clunk click fasten your seat belt so much as as it was a rat-a-tat CLUNK  coming from Pops Q8 player as we sped the highway between hospital appointments which both avoided being out of FM range on the radio and gave us four speakers.

 Life was simple then! Speakers in all four doors, push tape in to play, pull out to stop or spin the radio dial for a station and that was it.

Anyway that trip on takes us to these three albums and yes I can count -just!-  cos we had them .
Billy Paul was one the big names of the then big Philadelphia International  records label that specialized in jazz influenced soul, going beyond Motown and PhillyGroove and I loved that music and it has to be said, still do.
Philadelphia International was formed by producers Kenneth Gamble and Leon Huff after their earlier Neptune and Gamble labels with the backing of Columbia Records who wanted to tap into soul and "Black Music" sales.

In 1972 Philadelphia International issued 360 Degrees of Billy Paul which wasn't his first album but it was the home of the smash hit Me and Mrs Jones, the more decisive Am I Black Enough  U.S. follow up and Brown Baby which I think was issued in the U.K.
The record was issued in SQ quad (four channel surround sound) that played on regular stereo players and tape but released on Q8 quadraphonic tape in early 1973.
War of the Gods was issued in 1973 and is a more psychedelic soul album that personally I find more musically interesting if less overly commercial. 
From it Thanks For Saving My Life was lifted reaching #37 on the U.S. singles chart and #33 in the U.K. It two was issued on SQ record and Q8 Quadraphonic tape.

In December of 1973 Philadelphia International brought over a number of artists to the UK and Europe and two albums, one by the O'Jay's and this short set by Billy Paul were issued the next year.
Billy's is a short set recorded in London and Chatham, Kent where he expands upon the studio versions and acts today as a reminder of his ability to hold an audiences attention.
The Quad mix unlike many of live albums doesn't just place the audience in the rear but does put a few effects in the rear channels.
The SQ records were phased out  by the end of the 70's and the Q8 tapes were discontinued  by around 1977 although we hung onto our player for several years. 
In that time until last week, these albums in those mixes remained locked in the tape vaults when Vocalian-Dutton in Great Britain re-issued them as extra content on the Super Audio cd versions they issued complete with original stereo mixes on sacd and regular cd layers.
They sound superb on my player and accompanying hifi equipment.

Classical sacd round up part ten - two from the Atlantic

As I am road testing the second update to Pale Moon to see if they've been able to make it stable enough to use I am listening to some discs that I intend to talk about today,

 Leonard Bernstein was many things, composer, music teacher, advocate of the Arts and a great American of the last century.
I have a good number of his compositions originally recorded for Columbia (UK/Canada: CBS) records conducted by himself in a 7 cd Sony Music cd box set and a few choice extras such as the 1993 recording of On The Town.
Recently over here, the London symphony Orchestra's own cd label issued a recording in Super Audio cd (also playable in regular cd) taken from a live performance at the Barbican Arts Centre, London of his Wonderful Town musical.
Set in the 1940's but written in 1953, it tells the story of Ruth and Eilleen quest to make it big pursuing careers in writing and acting moving from Ohio in the Midwest to New York's Greenwich City  from the cramped basement apartment they moved to.
Along the way they meet colourful characters they'd never lived cheek by jowl by before in this city that never sleeps and the score reflects this being a a bright and cheery love letter to it.
The infectious jazz influenced score includes such classics as 'Ohio', 'One Hundred Easy Ways' and  A 'Little Bit in Love'
This performance is exhilarating, never letting up and technically superb.

Seeing this years Proms season ended September 10th thoughts went back to composers of the WW1 era.

 I have a good number of cds by by the mystic Gustav Holst and spotted this 2008 recording by the late Richard Hickox in a series of his Orchestral works he started and whose baton has been picked up by Sir Andrew Davis
This Chandos Super Audio cd has the popular Ballet from "The Perfect Fool" conceived as a an opera but written to ballet form in 1922 plus the much less popular but worthy The Lure ballet and Golden Goose choral ballet together with The Morning of the Year ballet the last two being composed in 1926.
I found this recording most enjoyable.

Read and in uniform

The weather is a bit better than it had been from the start of this week so I start with saying the last few entries that have been a little different from the the norm on this blog have been fairly well received.
I have been continuing with refreshing some items of my uniform although in certain  others areas I'm well stocked adding a  few replacement blouses and a green jumper to it.

 As most people know I usually look very much like her never happier to be wearing our school dresses although I dare say if I were to accidentally cause the netball to land though Miss Green's window I may well know it for a while!
Seeing it is early September I have been working my though some past stuff connected with roles and courses I've had that were very much paperwork heavy  tidying things up as there comes a point where most of that is no longer needed it just takes up unnecessary space with notes, bulky folders and so on.

As well, I also got around to reading Little Women although I'd had it for a while which is a timeless coming of age story of the four March sisters set in the post Civil War period in the States as though through childhood to adulthood, helped by their mother learning to navigate what it means to be a young woman from sibling rivalry to love, loss and marriage.