You have the Bosendorfer. I'll go for the Bechstein. That walnut casing is just beautiful.

I'd be more cautious and try them both first.

I'd rather have a clarinet

I'll be greedy and go for a clarinet as well.

You would

Why go for a clarinet when you could have an alto flute...

I played 2nd clari at York band on my own last night, really enjoyed it

Nah, just a REALLY good violin...... well and a decent flute wouldn't go amiss right now

Well apart from the flute bit.

Got my Kindle! I wasn't expecting it until next week. haven't a clue whether I will like it or not but it can't be worse than forever running out of books to read.

Ooo, will you let us know what you think of it Aquarelle? It's something I've been thinking about getting, I don't like running out of books either!

Got a date for starting my course in Sheffield - 6th Feb

I'm sure it'll be fab!

I can go home at 2pm Looking forward to teaching tonight.

Barry - I hope so

I seem to have the opposite problem - too many unread books sitting on my shelves and never the time/inclination (you need both at the same time) to read them...

Going to be my friend's wedding pianist Honoured to be asked obviously but additionally, really happy that I actually feel capable of doing it, where "capable" equals "not going to freak out" rather than "able to play the notes".

Yes, I will Louise but as I am an idiot about anything digital (even some parts of my piano) it will be a while before I manage to get it working. I have set aside next Sunday afternoon for setting it up and registering and all that jazz. Then I shall see how you get the free books and how you order the paying ones. If anyone has any helpful comments ...???

If you are not sure I can help as I set up a Kindle for my mum after I bought it as a present for her last Christmas.

You must have an Amazon account to use it and if you want books that are not free, most are dirt cheap, then you must have a valid debit/credit card linked to your Amazon account in order to pay.

With your Kindle, there are a lot more places to get free books than just Amazon. A bit like IMSLP, if the author has been dead a certain length of time, works are public domain. Some you may have to manually transfer to your Kindle, but that is easy (plug it in to computer, drag and drop downloaded file in to Kindle drive - done!)

Here is a guide to some places to get free books

I'm gradually working my way through 45+ H G Wells works I got from Project Gutenberg - great stuff

My physical unread bookshelf with actual physical books I have yet to read on it isn't getting any smaller, I still keep buying real books too! But I have got a lot on the Kindle and then don't need physical copies, and it is great on a day like today where I would have to bring two (or more) books with me for my journey but I can just bring my Kindle and have a huge choice of things to read.

Hi Aquarelle,
I use http://www.manybooks.net/ for getting free books. They seem to have a wide selection and the site is easy to navigate. I have a Sony book reader so I simply download them as pdf documents and use the software that came with the reader to drag them across. There is an option also to download in Kindle format.
I love my book reader although I don't consider it in any way a substitute for real books - I still buy those. But I found it particularly good to have a selection of short stories for travelling - things that can be read when whiling away the odd hour in airports or hotels.
Hope you have plenty of fun with yours!

Yay! The glaziers have just been and fixed my window! Only trouble is the lovely new clean shiny window shows up how dirty the others are...

I like mine and have used it for other purposes than just reading books.

Time to get the window polish out.

I will get round to it - eventually

Nice relaxed band practice (no bandmaster) so an hour of individual practice and then a blast through the Christmas music - with me taking the flute solos Brilliant fun!!

So pleased that you feel up to doing this. We had a friend to play the organ for our wedding, and it does add to the occasion. I didn't know much about organs at that point, and remember being slightly surprised at the time that he asked for access to the church on the morning of the wedding to practise on the instrument. Of course, I understand much more about that now!

When is the wedding?

December - I'll have about a month, but it won't be hard to put stuff together. I don't know why she decided she'd rather have a pianist than organist, possibly because she and I often play piano together. I've got to help her find a nice recessional.

Just had an e-mail to say that I"ve won a parcel of yarn (Manos!) as a result of giving feedback on a small online shop's website. Nice surprise!

A song book I've been wanting for months and months finally arriving

I've been waiting three and a half weeks for some music, finally turned up last Saturday.

Seeing proper sunshine for the first time in a while has made me happy today

Talking to Wolfram Alpha

Resists temptation to say, "Who???" and quietly avails herself of Google.

Whatever turns you on!

I bought a 1/4 sized violin last month to take to the schools for pupils to try, and tried it out for size on my 7 year old son.....well he's just had his first lesson after asking very nicely, and enjoyed every minute

A physics/math student's best friend, that's who! (And it does talk - try asking it about the meaning of life )

Another thing that has made me happy this morning is that I managed to resist the compulsion to set alarms at odd hours and slept a full 6 hours

Really pleased to hear this! I hope you are coming out of whatever phase that was, because it's very hard to do well in Maths when you are overtired.

An unexpectedly good practice session. Started out with streaming eyes and nose and constant sneezing (some kind of allergy, I think), finished feeling much better AND the piece is starting to come together.

always nice when that happens

and glad you're feeling better too

I've just had a lovely practice session too... but without the sneezing thank goodness! (poor you)

Really challenging my sight-reading

Had a lovely birthday and got my sax

*jealous*

I've been drooling over pictures of the Manos Lace, Silk Blend and Maxima for ages.

Do you know what you're getting in the parcel?

Jolly good - what did you opt for in the end?

Having all 3 of my kids at home for the entire weekend (well at the moment)!

Perfect timing!!


Me too, very jealous!

Manos silk blend, 100 grams. I hope it's a nice shade - it seemed a bit too cheeky to ask if there was a choice of colour! Hoping it might arrive in today's post.

: ( looks like no post delivery today then ?

ooh, hang about though ----- no, he's gone straight past.

Maybe Monday will be a good day for you then?

I have just won one of the prizes in the AB Violin Star competition - a complete set of the Violin Star books, with matching books of accompaniments.

Very nice!

As confirmed in an ABRSM email to me Well done, Misterioso!

four weeks until my next Saturday shift

I live in hope!

Congratulations - great news for you Misterioso!