Tomorrow, unless the weather forecast is absolutely dire (general Welsh weather is entirely acceptable), we’ll be off to LT’s pad in Pembrokeshire.  As I’m unlikely to have much opportunity for a wifi connection, you will probably have to manage without me for the weekend, darlings.  I know.  It’ll be hard for me too – more than for you, in fact.  You all have a life outside blogging, after all.

Today has been lovely, involving shopping for food and wine, various domestic blissings and a lot of laughter, but one fly has crawled into the ointment, in that my poor dear clarinet is a bit bust.  One of the keys (F natural) has broken off, for no apparent reason except, I suppose, that it’s over 60 years old and, if my hips of the same age are failing, I suppose an F can.  So I’m playing tunes which have sharps so I don’t need the F, and it’ll have to go for repair when I get home.

When I first started playing the clarinet, I took it to be tuned by a retired chap, whose name I’ve forgotten, I’m sorry to say, who lived in Framlingham.  He was pleased to see it.  “A Boosey and Hawkes Regent! I would have tuned it when it was made, I worked for Boosey and Hawkes and tuned all their Regent clarinets in the ’50s”.  We talked about it and reckoned that the clarinet, which was my grandfather’s, was made about the time I was born.  So it became increasingly dear to me.  He said that it’s got a very good barrel and when the keys wear out, it’s worth having them replaced because it’ll still be a better instrument than comparable modern ones.  I hope this breakdown isn’t a precursor to something major, though.