5 hours at the Bayit later...

I feel happy and contented and that it has been a productive day today.  :D

The day didn't begin all too well with me being a little scared to even leave the confines of my bedroom until about 9.30 am due to ructions in the house, but after that things seemed to go rather swimmingly. 

I went down to shul and sorted out the noticeboard.  (Updating it to July birthdays three weeks late.  :S Sorry anyone who has a July birthday in Kenton.  Public apology.)  I also took down some other old stuff (although not all of it, as otherwise there would have been some rather large gaps... however, after Monday those gaps can be filled, so the remaining old stuff will be taken down too :)), and put up a 'gone for the summer' poster (A3 in order to take up more space.  I coloured it all bright and colourful too :)).  While I was there I sorted out other youth service business: requesting printed labels for our mailing on Monday, checking that we could actually use the shul building for envelope stuffing, etc. 

I then continued on my way, accompanying my mother to Preston Road to select tuck for camp (starts on Wednesday :D  Excitement all round) and then caught the tube (and then a bus) to the BA Bayit (it won't make sense to any of you really, will it?  BA is the youth movement I belong to (the one I am taking a camp and going to Israel with this summer) and the "bayit" (literally translating to house) is a house in Temple Fortune which has a gazillion photocopiers, lots of paper (all colours, including yellow) and is the headquarters of BAUK).  There was what could be described as chaos at the Bayit, where everything for all BA summer camps is being held at the moment (that's 5 different camps over the 4 - 18 August stretch and almost 500 participants, if not more), with there barely being a square metre of space to sit and do whatever you need to do.  Despite that, Hannah and I managed to find (having navigated the obstacle course *rather* well) a small space in which to work and placed ourselves down, for our 5 hour shiur booklet making stint.  (We didn't plan it to take 5 hours, nor did we realise it took that until we left and looked at our watches.)  A shiur is a source based discussion (I think that's the simplest way of describing it) and our shiur for camp is on Joseph's dreams.  We've made the cutest booklet instead of source sheets, with a great flowchart to interpret dreams with. 

So it feels like a productive day and I'm happy with it.  Still slightly scared by the small amount of time I have in which to do so much over the next few days, but hopefully it will pan out okay.  :)

End of term

I always feel rather ambivalent when it comes to the end of term (when you realise it is end of term, which it still hasn't properly clicked with me that it is, despite going for the traditional several hour long Starbucks session after school) and this year is no different. 

I suppose this year is not so bad, as often I feel like I don't want to break up from school and the routine and seeing all your friends every day (who you can see in the holidays, of course, but you never see them as much as you do during term-time if you go to school with them) and everything that I just love about school.  (I think I am rather strange in actually enjoying school... but then I love all of my subjects and really enjoy them, so there's no real reason for me to hate school.  I even rather like waking up at a reasonable hour each day (okay, 6.30 am isn't the best in the world, but at least I make good use of my day, and I seem able to function on little sleep).)  However, this summer I am abnormally ultra-busy, and I don't think I am even going to have time to realise that I am missing my school associated stuff.   I was trying to sort out this evening all the stuff I need to do before next Wednesday (when I go at 8 am to a week of pre-camp which is immediately followed by two weeks of camp... so don't expect any blogs in those three weeks, as they are highly unlikely... there'll be a super-long one afterwards to make up for it, no doubt), and I've just realised that I don't actually have time to go shopping for trousers and ugly-man-sandals, which I really do need for camp, methinks.  Definitely the trousers anyway.  I need the ugly-man-sandals for Israel after camp, and I only have about two days when I will actually be fully surfaced between camp and Israel, so it would be preferable to find some before camp.  Tomorrow is a really patchy day, and I have to go to school for 20 minutes (I can't believe I'm going to travel for near on three hours altogether, just to spend 20 measly minutes at school) and have a driving lesson at 4.30 (hopefully Peter will remember to show me where the test centre is this time, and how to navigate my way out of it), Friday I meet Hannah to sort out our shiur on dreams for camp, Shabbat is Shabbat, Sunday all the madrichim (leaders) for Aleph machane (the camp I'm a leader at) are meeting in the morning, and I'm sure I have stuff in the afternoon, Monday I have to do photocopying and sort out the mailing for our youth service £1 Friday Night Dinner on the 3rd September, Tuesday is Tisha b'Av (a 25 hour fast day- no food or drink from dusk Monday night until there are three stars in the sky on Tuesday night) and I also need to pack, and Wednesday pre-camp begins, as I've already mentioned. 

Anyway, back to the ambivalence... the above love of school (and so dislike of long holidays... a few days every so often would be much better- time to catch up on sleep, relax and return refreshed- six weeks (or is it only five this year?) just tend to seem too long.  The random few days together with a two or three week holiday once or twice so that people can go away.  Just not a six week one.  Too long, definitely,) then contrasts with the obvious joys of having a delightful rest and break (which is somewhat lacking this summer... but still, I'll manage) and what everybody loves about the summer holidays. 

I don't know.  I'm sure I won't like it when I only have twenty-something days annual leave in the working world (which is a while away, but still, I'm sure I'll complain), but at least then you can take the days when you like, and you don't have a six week block.  I'm also sure that I'll wish I did have six week holidays like at school once I start work, but hey, that's life. 

'Oliver!'

Strangely, having now done two performances of 'Oliver!' (I don't like that exclamation mark, but I do believe it is supposed to be there), the catchy tunes have somewhat disappeared from my mind. This could alternatively be due to my tiredness, which translates to my mind not being able to have a catchy tune playing at the same time as me blogging. Hm.

I think tonight's performance was better overall than last night's: the cast were much better, generally more in tune, and managed to overcome missing Bett, who was unfortunately ill. However, the band weren't quite so good this evening: we missed some cues (I started playing a cued part halfway through, as I realised that *very* few others had picked up that we were repeating, or even playing. Or something like that. My memory is beginning to fail me), someone managed to drop a tambourine during a quiet bit on stage and we were just generally clumsier tonight than yesternight. The audience were better tonight. Not sure if it was fuller, but they laughed more (and still at the right bits) and clapped lots and lots (in fact so much we repeated part of a number at the end).

Two things made me happy today:
(i) I found out that I most probably have Friday afternoons free next year (which are the most useful things in the world, since I would otherwise have to miss lessons to get home in time for Shabbat each week in the winter months) and
(ii) My very last lesson of the academic year is English next Wednesday, when we are having a poetry party (I still don't know which poem to take!). Originally I thought my last lesson would be chemistry in room 11, which is delightful and sentimental and really lovely, but the thought of English being my last lesson does make me happier. I guess that's good, seeing as I want to read English at university, and not chemistry.

Damned catchy musicals

Why did I agree to playing in 'Oliver'? Why? I should have remembered the torture of hours upon hours (and, in fact, days upon days) of catchy annoying tunes stuck in one's head. The numbers may well be fine when you see them as an audience, but when they have been stuck in your head for a week? Then it's bad. And I don't even have the vocal parts in my head. It's a random mish mash of the instrumental part that I play (i.e. clarinet and bass clarinet) with the vocals in during my rests. Gah. Argh. Erkk. (#Consider your ba-ba-ba-baa at do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-doo...#)

What's more, the kind people who wrote out the instrumental scores kindly write it out so that there are the most impossible page turns. And the bass clarinet part goes to the very top of its register straight after playing at the very bottom (that's about a 3 octave leap, which is fine on a normal clarinet, but on the bass!?!). Never mind the fact that it is the school bass clarinet. (Actually, it's probably just my shoddiness at playing the thing rather than the shoddiness of the instrument. Ms. B is constantly telling me that the school woodwind instruments are excellent quality, which they are. Or at least, the school A clarinet is definitely better than my normal Bb.) Hmm.

#Consider your ba-ba-ba-baa at do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-doo. -Sider your ba-ba-ba-baa one of the do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-doo.# Argh!

The Joys of Work Shadowing Part II

Hmm... I don't think I should have complained on Monday about fruitless searches, since today I have proof-read three articles, and that's about it. Seeing that I got in at 9.15 this morning and it is now 14:03, that isn't very productive, and has meant that I've had near on four hours of boredom and sitting doing nothing. (Well, I made use of time to check my webmail accounts, and find a map of where the theatre is for tonight and I'm writing this here now, so I have been doing something, but just filling the nothingness.) (Ooh. And I have nearly finished today's crossword.) I was considering reading some more of 'King Lear' which I have in my bag somewhere, but thought that would appear rather rude. Somewhat ruder than typing away at a computer, which nearly everybody else is doing too. It's just that my typing is nothing to do with their work, really.

Back to twiddling my thumbs... or maybe I'll read their new edition of Eurofruit which I have just noticed on the desk that I'm sitting at. Hm.