Bakewell tart, Bristol, and BRASS BANDS!

I have been a very busy person! (...and a little lazy, when the opportunity arose...) You will remember that I my last post was about Wednesday. It's been a week.

I never know what day it is anymore, or what time it is either.
Oops.

I suppose I'll begin with Thursday then...

THURSDAY:

Thursday was a pretty chill day. I got to sleep in, and then my UK mum Jo gave me a ring and said that she wanted to take me out to lunch (or rather, what I call lunch and what the British call either lunch OR dinner). Anyway, she picked me up and we went to a small little cafe in a building from the 11th century. Jo knows the owner Rose very well; she gives cornet lessons to her son. Rose gets up very early in the morning to prepare for the day, cooking up whatever is on the menu for that day and baking a selection of cakes. She only stops to take her son to school.

After my bowl of hot tomato-basil soup and a chunk of delicious homemade bread, we had to have afters. Jo (and everyone else, for that matter) spoiled me entirely this week with such things; they kept saying to me, "You won't get this soon, you'll be a poor student!". This was a good point, and I never seemed to have the heart to say no.

So I had some Bakewell tart. It was fantastic. If you don't know what it is, just google it. I don't feel like typing up a description. (My laziness is getting worse!)

That night, Jane made trifle. More dessert/pudding/afters! I had to try it - because I had only heard of it ever in Harry Potter books...so I assumed it was magical...hardy har har. It was really good. I wouldn't say magical necessarily, but really very good. If you don't know what is is, just google it. Re-use the tab you opened when you googled bakewell tart. (Reduce, reuse, and recycle!)

FRIDAY:

oooooo I liked Friday! I was scheduled with Jo and Steve, and they were to take me to Bristol for the first time ever! I was pretty stoked.

We took the scenic route, as they wanted to take me over the Clifton Suspension Bridge. I've decided that I'm going to treat it like a mini version of the Golden Gate...because let's face it, nothing will ever compare to the Golden Gate. Well, for me at least.

Here is a really crap photo of us driving across the bridge.
The views were fantastic, but did I get any photos of the view?
Of course not.. Why would I think of that!?

We drove past Bristol City Football Club's playing field. I guess they're my new team? I keep asking people who I should root for in the English Premier league. Obviously Manchester United is out, because they are the Yankees of football, and they buy all their players, which is lame. Ian and Nicky say to root for Chelsea FC. Steve and Jo say to root for Arsenal. Bob, Heather's husband, roots for Norwich City. I am inclined to root for Liverpool, for obvious reasons (*cough*THE BEATLES*cough*) Or Everton. They are close.
I don't know. Maybe I should just watch ManU and root for whoever is playing against them, yeah?

Or perhaps I should start actually liking football first...

While contemplating life and talking to my adoptive parents, we had suddenly arrived at Victoria rooms, my new music building. And I could not. stop. smiling.

LOOK!!! LOOK AT IT!!!!! 

This is where I get to go to school. I walk ten minutes north and this is what will greet me.
What universe am I living in? I don't get it. Maybe it will seem more real once I actually start doing some work...

Jo insisted on taking a picture of me in front of it...for my blog...but I am not going to post it...because dangit, it's my blog! ((She's been my mum for a week and a half and I'm already rebelling!))

Anyway, we got some lunch at a super huge restaurant and went to Millennium Square by the harbor.

There's a screen on that building where they showed the Olympics. Pretty sweet dude.

some fountains n shizz

le harbour

We headed back to Somerset. We stopped in Wells, which is supposed to be the smallest city in England; Steve said that to be an official city, you had to have a cathedral. And let me tell you, Wells has a badass cathedral.

Wells is also where the movie Hot Fuzz was filmed. 

(Dolan these pictures are mostly for you, because I know you love that film and guess what? I lurve you!)

           

There was also a moat. A REAL LIVE MOAT! 

And REAL LIVE ENGLISH PEOPLE PLAYING CROQUET.

Of course they were LIVE English people. It's really hard to do anything when you're dead.
But then again I wouldn't know that for sure.

SATURDAY & SUNDAY

I guess I'd never really thought about it before, but I've never actually seen another brass band. I didn't go on the trip to Washington with HBBB (biiiiiiiig regret of mine) and I've only ever played in HBBB and MS&NRS.

Well, I suppose if I'm going to see brass bands, listening to roughly 70 of the best from each section (sans Championship) isn't a bad way to start, right?

The crew when we arrived at the racecourse.

The 2nd section played in the morning. I did not get to see any 2nd section bands, as we were a) driving to Cheltenham and b) rehearsing! Around noon there was a draw for placement. Out of 23 total bands, we drew the 6th slot. We put our stuff in a room, got dressed, warmed up, registered, and then we played. The band played to the best of it's ability, and I think we were all pretty happy with our performance. Steve said that we were certainly better then some of the groups before us, so we had hopes of placing somewhere in the middle of the pack.

After exploring the stalls of brass instrument and sheet music retailers, and getting something to eat, we listened to the last couple of bands.

Those curtained boxes are for the adjudicators.

When the last band had played, the hall was suddenly filled with all of the other groups. I'll admit, I was a tad anxious...it'd be cool to place in the top 10, and you never know!
After impatiently waiting through some speeches that no one wanted to hear, the results were given for the top six groups. They announced 6th place, which was group number 4. Steve has said that they were terrible not very good earlier that day...so wow...maybe we actually placed?! They announced the next 5 groups...and we were not announced.

Interesting. So where did we place?

Jo, who was our onstage representative in case we did get anything, came back to us after the ceremony to tell us where we had placed.

22nd.

22nd out of 23 total.

Uhm, what? No way Jose. Apparently the judges were looking for something completely different from what we had given them. The remarks on the judges sheets were not helpful in this regard - they said 'inconsistent' a lot, but they did not offer anything constructive so none of us were actually sure what they wanted from us. But at this point it was out of our control. Ah well, so it goes. I still had an awesome time and I would do it again in a heartbeat.

A group of us had decided to stay the night in Cheltenham. We all went to the hotel, to the bar, and had a great time moaning about the results and moaning that the bar was closing early. (I don't drink but I moaned on behalf of the people who do.)

Sunday was spent on an extended breakfast in the morning, and stuffing my bag with muffins for later on so I didn't have to pay for racecourse food. (Hey, I'm a cheap college student!) Tom was looking for a bass trombone mouthpiece, and he and Stephen (Steve and Jo's oldest son, my adopted bother I suppose!) went around to try out different horns. We watched a few 3rd section bands, and then a few 1st section bands. After viewing them, I think I'd put HBBB as a 2nd section band.

We drove back to Somerset in the drizzly rain. I must be really loud or something, because apparently the only time I am quiet is in the car...which I knew already. I go hours without talking while in the car. I don't know why. It just seems like a good place to watch the world go by, contemplate life, and think about witty anecdotes to write on your blog.