Good party

I think vyvyan's and razornet's new flat has been sufficiently warmed. My pork steaks were a big success again so the effort of driving to Tesco for soy sauce and onions late last night was worth it. :o)
There was a game of You don't know Jack! and geeking about cameras and photos with wintrmute (*waves*) and general chitchat and fun.

Off to bed after I've watched Dr Who. Tai Chi Intensive at 10am. That's going to be interesting.

Ow...

The Tai Chi Intensive was, well, intense.
Paul, the instructor, was superb. I always thought our instructor is at a level I'll never never reach but this guy was just amazing. OK, he's been doing Tai Chi for 15 years but still...
As usual, we did a set to start with and then we only did foundation exercises, first tor-yus and then don-yus. Paul both demonstrated and described the correct movements and postures and pointed out the frequent mistakes. He also walked along the rows, individually pointing out things.
This was very good because I now know those exercises well enough to practice them at home and as they are on the spot you don't need much room so I can do them while watching TV or whatever.

To finish we did a special set concentrating on the aspects we'd been practising before. Very very good.

Regular class on Wednesday and my first General Workshop all next weekend in Colchester. Getting up before 7 will be hard but at least I won't need to drive.

Shake, Rattle and Roll

After I got home, I had proper breakfast while watching "Sould Deep", the first part of a program about the history of Soul I had taped from BBC2 last night.

It started from the beginnings when Blues and Jazz were combined to what was later called Rhythm&Blues (which IMHO has nothing to do with what they call R&B these days) which was later combined with influences from church and Gospel music (Ray Charles was one of the first to do this) and eventually became Soul.
Lots of old clips, interviews with surviving stars of the time and also mention of the problems and difficulties black artists had in that time (40s and 50s) before the Civil Rights movement.

It's fantastic to see a program like this in the prime time slot. Well done, BBC!

Dr Who was good as well although not quite as good as some of the previous episodes. Still looking forward to the rest.

Right, on with the work. Gah.

Side note: Ray is finally out on DVD over here on the 6th of June. I almost picked it up in Boston but I had luggage space issues.

(no subject)

Why do they release the video game that's based on EpIII before the film comes out? That's just silly.