Home Alone

The charity rugby match went well, though the change from Rugby League to Rugby Union at half-time made things even more confusing than usual. Thirty players turned up and as many spectators. With a raffle in the clubhouse afterwards we raised several hundred pounds and the teams signed a Burley RFC shirt which will go to Becca's parents as a momento

In the evening Margot and I went to Selby to see Lau, a three-piece folk group taking a music in new directions. Very atmospheric. Fantastic evening and well worth looking out for. http://www.lau-music.co.uk

if that wasn't enough, on Monday night we went the National Centre for Early Music, a converted church in York with fantastic acoustics and a venue that performers really like. As well as early music they do folk, jazz and world music. We went to see Emily Smith, a Scottish folk singer we saw in the same venue a couple of years ago. She’s been nominated for Radio 2’s Folk singer of the year award and rightly so. She’ll be touring again in May 2012 so watch out for her. http://www.emilysmith.org/

On Tuesday we went over to Manchester for Matt’s birthday. We went with Sam and Jim to Sapporo, a Japanese Teppanyaki restaurant. In case you haven’t come across this it’s a sort of indoor sushi/noodle barbeque with your own chef, who doubles as a comedian. Sounds dubious, but was good fun and the food was terrific. http://www.sapporo.co.uk

Jim drove home but Margot and I stayed over and in the morning I took Margot to the airport. She was off to Romania for some workshop with teenagers up near the Urkraine border. She’s still there now in 2 feet of snow so let’s hope she get’s out in time for Christmas.

Had a game of squash with Matt before heading back to York (despite me going back to coaching on Monday, he won). He’s on a fitness regime and both he and Jim have signed up for the 3 Yorkshire 10k runs next year. Their main aim seems to be to beat me, which shouldn’t be too difficult unless they persist in playing rugby the day before.
Jim’s moved back in with us temporarily with his TV and his computer and is looking for a flat in York in the New Year. We watched “Animal Kingdom” on his big screen. A good film but - like”The Slap” which finishes this week on TV – not quite the side of Australia the Tourist Board would want us to see.