Berberis' World

There’s not much going on, singing-wise. I’ve been off for a week and haven’t been inclined to do any listening, practice, or even getting drunk and roaring along to Brahms Requiem, which is always a good standby activity. Instead, what I seem to have done most of is laundry, laundry and more laundry. At least the banana yogurt remnants are now gone from the sofa cushion cover.

I’ve also (almost) convinced our 15 year old son to spare whatever small part of his brain is unaffected by the endless and combined stimuli of video games and Red Dwarf re-runs for his GCSE set text, Silas Marner, as read by Andrew Sachs. You can lead a boy to books but, sadly, you cannot make him read.

Or is it Jonathan Sachs? If he ever decides to give up being Chief Rabbi, he should definitely go into audio books.

The most frustrating conversation I’ve had this week (apart from the constant one I have with myself) was with James at whatever call centre deals with our banking queries. Much of the 21 minutes that I was on the telephone was spent navigating their “press 1 for loans, press 2 for complaints, press 3 for limb amputation” system of call misdirecting screening. Once connected to the human being department, James twice tried to sell me insurance and a mortgage, told me that I should not be using my husband’s log-on details to access our joint account – the joint account we had spent all the previous day balancing (me trying to suppress my terror at our increasing overdraft) – and failed three times to answer my actual question. All this and they don’t pay interest on credit balances anymore! Basterds.

After all this I took the train to Charing X, got lost in Soho, had a meal in Eat Tokyo, a drink at The Market Porter (unbelievably busy outside, room to breathe inside) then came home, not really in a drinking mood.