And with 2 days to go, we’re rampaging down the home stretch! Today’s inbox saw another three recordings – from Rob, Shana (who’s recorded the pedal harp arrangement of Pieces of Eight I sent her while I was concussed) and Jenni. Rob’s very kindly offered to do some re-recording, which has given me the opportunity to tweak a couple of things in the trombone score, but what’s he’s sent is great so I’m considering that one done, and we’ll just see if he has the time to do the update.

But Shana’s (Pieces of Eight) and Jenni’s (Nest) recordings are up on SoundCloud now, bringing the total tracks on the online album to 6.

Alun has also sent me an updated version of his track, which came out extremely soft this end. I haven’t had a chance to listen to this update yet because the employment monster demanded my attention with a possible short mobile web-dev contract I need to quote for, but will definitely look at it tomorrow.

And, alas, contrary to plans, I haven’t started on Shana’s proper piece for this project – just shattered today after 4 very fun but exhausting days with a friend here from France so I just did what I could and am hoping to get to that tomorrow. Suspect there’s no chance of it being included in my official RPM Challenge album though.

The album also, finally, has a title. At first I was going to call it Miscellany 2012, but that seemed kind of obvious and dull and like I hadn’t made an effort. I made a set for it on SoundCloud, waved it about on Facebook… and then promptly realised that a much more appropriate name (although probably still not that imaginative) would be Lucky Dip, after which I found that while I could change the title of the set I couldn’t change the URL so the address of the album didn’t match it’s title. A small detail but one that bugs me, so I’ve deleted that set, made another one and redistributed the new link. Aargh. Messy. But probably better to deal with the mess immediately rather than potentially let old & broken links float about the internet too much.

So Lucky Dip it is. I figured it was kind of appropriate because it was a lucky dip for me, finding out what instruments I’d be writing for, and of course a lucky dip for the performers with what piece they’d get (if any), and finally the pieces have all turned out so varied that I think it’s also a bit of a lucky dip for the listener too. And then I found this photo on Flickr and that pretty much sealed the deal. I’ve had to write to the photographer to ask for permission to crop it, tweak it and whack my name over the top, but I’m hoping they’ll agree. If not, I may use it for inspiration – maybe do a drawing of their photograph or something??

2 days. 3 pieces to come. So close to the finish line!

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Yes, I know things have been a bit quiet round here, but it’s not like it’s been uneventful. There’s been the back-pain drama, there’s been the dental drama (round 2 of drilling and filling today so back on the painkillers again), there was a birthday, which resulted in lovely presents from lovely people, including: 1 proper real-live microphone, Nigel Slater’s fruit cookbook, a book on libretto-writing, one on poetry-writing, 2 seasons of Chuck. Plus of course the presents I bought myself: the iPad (which you know about and seems to become more useful and awesome with every passing day) and Logic Studio, which arrived on the birthday day but took us a couple of days to install due to my having dropped my laptop several months back, meaning that DVDs go into it but can’t really be relied on to come out again… Still working on how to get the software instruments that come with Logic up and running…

So there’s been a lot of playing about with toys. Mostly the ones I bought myself though as I need to get a cable for the mic, I’m finishing up other books before I start the libretto ones and my back has hurt too much to do much cooking (barring a culinary experiment which resulted in an apple-enhanced caramel cake which went down quite well).

So I’ll just slide over the missed days and focus on today. Obviously, I went to the dentist. He says that this should be the last of the deep drilling (thank heavens). Been pretty uncomfy though, but yay for painkillers! And also yay for spectacularly beautiful summer’s day even though it’s only spring! It was so lovely, I decided to walk home instead of catching the bus (which was taking too long and I was also getting bored), so I walked back through the sunshine and the intermittent smell of jasmine, listening to the birds going twit in the hedges and chatting with a friend in Australia via IM. Rather lovely, actually.

Once home I actually didn’t immediately have a nap, as I’d expected. Instead I did some work on my new piece. It’s been a little stuck lately but I managed to prod it forward a little and flesh out some of the earlier parts too.

Then there was tinkering about with Logic Studio. I’m really enjoying using this. Fascinating to discover that the interface basically hasn’t changed since I was using microLogic at uni – 15 years ago! so it’s mostly familiar, and the bits that are less familiar – the audio-editing side of things, isn’t that dissimilar from Pro Tools, so I seem to be picking things up pretty quickly. And I can’t begin to express how much easier and more comfortable it is to work in it, not needing to be tethered to a hardware box at all times. I don’t have to think twice about opening it up for a small sound-file-trimming job. And I’ve discovered some cool stuff – beat mapping to make a MIDI file sound more like it was played by a human than a robot to start with! I borrowed a book from the TVU library yesterday and started working my way through it this afternoon. Finding out some interesting snippets, but I’m hoping I can get away with just borrowing the book and not having to buy it. Would rather spend my birthday Amazon voucher on the Advanced volume

And then when the sun was setting, I got all inspired to grab the iPad and try a little bit of drawing. It’s not great, but it was fun to do and an interesting exercise, messing round with silhouettes and trying to get the sunset colours to blend a bit

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The big news of the day is that, having managed to reserve an iPad 2 online last night, I actually got into town in time to do so! So now I’m writing this on my very own iPad. Yaaaayyy!

So most of the afternoon has, of course been spent setting it up, loading apps, transferring settings, syncing, etc. And generally playing about, This was taken with the iPad’s camera using PhotoBooth:

Not sure that app will get a huge workout, but hey, it’s fun.

Also did a tiny photo walk today while waiting for Djelibeybi to arrive at Holborn for us to go and fetch the new member of our techno-family together. In the rain. Some nice shots, I think, but they’re on Flickr so I’ll add them in later.

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SO excited. Today I managed to buy new walking boots! Now, this may seem like a small thing to you, but after a full six months of being able to wear nothing but 1 pair of extremely ugly, ‘breathable’ running shoes (and let me tell you, ‘breathable’ not only lets the air in – it also lets rain, snow, slush and other things one doesn’t want on one’s feet in), I can’t wait to be able to put them on and go for a walk.

I did a little more work on the piece. It’s limping, but at least it’s moving forwards again. Hoping the meagre momentum continues. I also worked my way through a pile more of the Lisbon photos, some of which I’m rather pleased with.

Plus I made some more progress on my mother’s chunky chenille scarf – it’s looking pretty good!

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Sudden Ealing nostalgia meets delight in new camera.

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Found an interesting-looking graffittied gate on Brick Lane on my way to the station and just had to pull out my new camera and have a play.

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Well, it won’t be delivered until next week, most likely, but it’s chosen and ordered and considering it’s taken about two years to get to this point, I’m thinking this is a huge leap forward. Looking forward to some focused photos for a change!

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Only posted a couple, but I’m pleased with those (and especially the one here), and it’s good to be clearing them again after so many months of them sitting about.

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So I’m now done with the St Malo photos at last – and a couple in there that I’m very pleased with indeed.

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I’m very, very behind in getting all the photos from this year’s various events up online, so this is at least a bit of a step forward.

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