Thursday 30 July 2009
chewing on a cherry Starburst (we don’t get those in the UK; in Canada they don’t have the lime green ones), on the road between Halifax, NS and Caraquet, NB. Kris and Nick are singing rounds
For a few years I’ve had a ‘no Heathrow’ policy, and on this trip it would have been so expensive to enforce it that eventually I thought ‘Sod it’ and booked myself onto flights through London. And to my great surprise the transfer from Terminal 1 to Terminal 3 was extremely smooth and stress-free, I wasn’t too grumpy after getting up at 4am, and I got to Halifax on time. Then it took me two whole hours to clear immigration, I finally made it to the baggage hall, and …my bag had stayed in Heathrow. This also happened almost five years ago to the day, probably the last time I flew Air Canada to Halifax.
Having been up since midnight Halifax time, yesterday I was far too tired to make decisions, so our rehearsal with Suzie and Mark consisted of playing stuff through, messing around a bit and deciding ‘let’s leave that to percolate for a while’. In a programme that includes early 17th century Italian songs, early 18th century Scottish instrumental music, some Acadian traditional songs, klezmer tunes, and a Tango-habanera by Kurt Weill, Suzie is playing lots of melodica, and I’m doing a bit of singing. Some mistake surely?
Happily installed at Nick and Liz’s place, I had a mid-evening nap before a very welcome meal and a late evening outing to go double dutch skipping in a parking lot. As a complete first-timer, I did manage to get into the ropes but never managed more than three jumps before my confidence collapsed in a tangle.
Awake this morning at 6.30am (not bad at all for the first night in a new time zone) today’s rehearsal actually included some useful decision-making from us all. And now my big red suitcase has turned up and is safely in the car, I have clean clothes on again, and there’s about 5 hours’ driving still to do. I wonder how long Kris and Nick will keep singing. I may have to join in.
