The organist librarian

Took Henry to Crystal Palace park - the new cafe is very good and he enjoyed the dinosaurs and farm especially the meerkats and tortoises. To quiet time in hall as Adrian and Daniel were tuning organ. Superb Figaro from the Royal Opera House. What wonderful music and singing!

Back to work after the holiday and 40 lengths. Dan was there and Marvin. Arrived to find 4 boxes of books dumped outside the front door so moved them next to orange bags and they were taken away! Cleared up book sale and not best pleased to find staff had not done what I said. Recycled a lot of books and stored the rest. Wet day. Angela came for more training. Watched Rick Stein on Italian cooking and opera but I fell asleep. On Friday I watched again on BBC4 the Covent Garden production of Marriage of Figaro while packing up ornaments and pictures in the lounge. Must be one of my favourite operas and it is 30 years since I sang Basilio!

Thursday did some more weeding of the shelves in preparation for the West Hill stock which should arrive soon. Liz got fish and chips from McDermotts and we ate it at Grandma's. She had had her hair done and was looking forward to Gordon's visit today. I watched most of "Carmen" from Covent Garden on HDD. The tenor Jonas Kaufman was outstanding both singing and dramatically. Liz spotted a boy she knows from St Helen's school in the cast. The production was excellent. Also saw start of programme on Pavarotti in 7 arias. Jay Cormier's meditation today in "Daily reflections for Advent & Christmas 2007-8" is about moments of revelation like the moment the disciples first met Jesus. Such a moment for me was when singing Don Basilio in Figaro and the audience laughed in the first act trio when I sang "Ah how delightful". After months of preparation and rehearsal this was a wonderful moment and life was never the same again! Yesterday I was ba...