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June |
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The
bits of stuff that fall in the cracks between Life, Music
and Outrageous Fortune. |
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Happy
Birthday to me...
1)
My beautiful Maria organised everything 2) Like
the two chocolate cakes 3) I even got my name on
the menu!
4)
The paparazzi were everywhere we looked 5) My Snickosphere
dessert came with this special message
The
birthday day..
17.6.15 - I have to say that
until this birthday I've never really taken the
marking of the passage of my time on this planet
too seriously - but this 70th one seemed serious
enough to justify a special effort. We'd been impressed
with the Oakridge Wines restaurant when Jeremy and
Susie were over some months back, so Maria booked
the restaurant well in advance for the Sunday before
my actual birthday. It all paid off because the
venue's service was attentive all day and the feedback
was that the food and wine were also very good.
The day was perfect weatherwise, which meant the
view from the windows overlooking the vineyard and
the valley were nothing less than spectacular and
as a consequence the vibe inside the restaurant
was equally sunny.
It'd been difficult sorting out who to invite and
who not to invite and I know some were disappointed
that we chose to exclude children from the party,
but the group in attendance represented both sides
of my Melbourne family plus, of course, the band
and partners with a few special guests thrown in
and was just the right size. Anyway the main thing
is that everyone seemed to get on well and have
a good time.
I made a speech before the cakes were cut and caused
a minor sensation when I blurted out that Maria
and I had intended to announce our engagement but
decided not to, but apart from that everything went
as planned.
At the end of the afternoon we said goodbye to everybody,
thanked the Oakridge staff and then made time to
stop off at the McClatchys' place on the way home
as they hadn't been able to get to the party. To
show there were no hard feelings the Robbos sent
me a pic of Keaton eating his piece of birthday
cake at home, so we felt at peace with the world.
Let's not wait another seventy years for the next
one.. |
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Rod
Quantock claims the penultimate speech and more |
A
stressful Friday
13.6.15 - My heart sank when
Ronnie asked me to sing at Enza's funeral because
I knew it would be one of the hardest things I'd
ever have to do. Peter Cupples had flown down from
Qld to sing as well, so I was in good company, but
it proved to be as harrowing as I thought.
To make things even more difficult I'd accepted
an invitation to appear that same evening at John
Pinder's memorial at the Circus Oz Spiegeltent in
Johnston St. I'd very little time to prepare but
in the end I pulled out my trusty G harp and everyone
seemed happy enough.
There was a host of fine speakers - Jane Clifton
compered the night and spoke along with Jon Hawkes,
Rod Quantock, (pic) Steve Kearney et
al. |
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1)
Bret de Thier and me - and bust! 2) Some of you
may not know who The Chants were.. sigh!
A pleasant reunion at Fed Square
6.6.15 - Bret de Thier
(pic 1) has been mentioned before on this page,
but as it was some time ago I'll remind you that
we went to Art School together in Christchurch in
the early '60s and that Bret subsequently went on
to become a successful designer (home architecture,
yacht interiors) while I went on to become a musician.
The good Doctor Warren Sellers was also a fellow
student at Ilam and so he and Dr Marg joined Bret,
Maria and me for lunch today at the Chocolate Buddha
in Fed Square and caught up a little on our various
doings - or, in my case, my various not-doing-much-at-alls.
Bret dragged a concrete bust over the ditch that
he'd done of me back in 1964 and presented it to
me in the Fed Square carpark and Maria took the
pic. I did a bust of him at the time (it was part
of our curriculum) but it's subsequently been consigned
to the tip. Probably a good thing too. |
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1)
Oooh! A parcel from Queensland! Could it be? 2)
Aaah! The hand-crafted personalised ear-plugs
- bewdy!
Musicians' designer ear-plugs arrive!
6.6.15 - Further to the discussion
in June's Pith & Wind, the ear-plugs
that I had plasticine casts made for a couple
of weeks back (from Pacific Ears) have arrived.
As well as being personalised, the silicone moulds
have relieving vents to reduce occlusion (where
the sound of your voice gets trapped in the ear
cavity) and removable (so you can clean them)
filters to reduce the overall sound by 15db. Of
course, I tried them out immediately ands was
struck by how different they are to standard ear-plugs.
I could still hear speech perfectly and my acoustic
guitar also sounded perfect but simply at a lower
level.
I'm going to have to set up the PA in the studio
and try them out under gig conditions. I'll keep
you posted..
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