The alarm clock brrrrrrr-ed into full voice at 4.22 a.m.
today. The very hairline crack of dawn.
We had slid into bed at 9.20 p.m. last night after two and a
half hours of the best of opera sung by the very best of opera singers. It was
a recording of Puccini's most marvellous Tosca from Vienna. In the lead as Mario Cavaradossi was
Jonas Huffman with Angela Gheorghiu as Floria Tosca and as if that were not
enough top flight tonsils, there was also our very own (OK he is Welsh but
close enough), Bryn Terfel, brilliant as the evil Baron Scarpia.
Having trained our clogs off yesterday morning and then
enjoyed friends popping around to our front wall for a catch up, we did just a
few little jobs before Steve started to cook dinner and I did my usual
afternoon thing of writing up the day in this my diary page. The writing, serves the purpose of keeping me out of the
kitchen while Steve prepares and cooks dinner. He only very rarely asks me to assist
in some small way because he is a bit of a diva and he does not want me getting
in his way in our rather small kitchen.
After dinner when we hardly spoke to each other because we
are listening to If It Bleeds by Stephen King on audible over meals right now. My Stephen does not read Mr King; he
listens to audible books after I have read each one since he is more selective
than me and too much dripping flesh and other types of gore is not to his
taste, we watch SK movies together but he will close his eyes and ask when its
ok to open them again. I am the only SK ‘Constant Reader’ in the house. For me
I am well trained and my attitude to Kingy is; Bring it on!
So anyway, back to the plot, my diary plot that is. After I
had served dessert, which is often my department, since there is no skill
involved with plonking berries and ice cream on a dish. Then I am allowed to
wash up, clear away and wipe up any mess of the kitchen floor.
Then it is time for the bliss of relaxation proper. Steve
had set up when we would start to watch Tosca so that we could still get to bed
early because of the important early rising to avoid other people being out at
the same time as us.
Tosca was in three acts and so any movement was restricted
to the very brief break due to it being a recording and not a live event when
there would be a 15-20 minute interval. It was quite superb in every way with
only two moments that Puccinni had not written in. Both came late on in the
opera. The first came at the end of the aria sung by the hero who is about to
be executed, the worlds greatest tenor Jonas Kaufmann. The audience did not
just applaud they ‘Exploded’ into cheers, shouts, and stamping as well as the
applause, there could not have been was more noise were they a football crowd.
Steve and I also clapped noisily. The effect of all this so suddenly; it was a
burst of noise, was that our little black cat Birdy who had been fast asleep
between my lower legs as she usually does of an evening, shot up in a full mad
cat jump hair standing on end and leapt off my chair squealing and scampering
out of the room with an alarming amount of wheel spin, disappeared up the
stairs and would not come down again.
The audience riot went on for a crazy amount of time five
minutes or maybe more whilst the conductor waited, holding his baton to his
heart, waiting for calm. Jonas Kaufmann tried hard for a long time to stay in
character but in the end had to acknowledge the wave of worship and smiled and
then laughed before settling down again. As the conductor raised his baton
there was one last loud ‘Bravo’ that caused a second or two more delay. Then
the opera continued.
The second hold up occurred shortly after that when the
Angela Gheorghiu, who was due to make an entrance clutching the note that should
have saved the hero’s life: Gaff of the first order as she did not appear on cue
and had to be sought! Not so surprising though, after the rowdy appreciation of
the crowd had brought the performance to a halt a few moments earlier.
We thought it was the best Tosca we had ever seen or maybe
the need for some beauty in an ugly world had heightened our need for something
so emotionally fulfilling.
We both slept soundly and woke up ready for our run this
morning. Since we are planning a longer run on Thursday of next week (which
will be a celebration day for Steve and I) and we always do something special
on special days. So in the plan for the next five day Steve chose for us do our
most popular 10 km run this morning but in the reverse of the normal route. This
means that it started uphill more steeply than the other way around that is a very
gradual rise to the trig point at the top, best view all around and it was a
wonderfully sunny morning. Steve wears the Garmin always and he was pleased at
the end when he told me that it was the fastest we had run that loop; in either
direction, in over a year. So our training for our big race, Ironman Graz 70.3
that would have been on May 24th, has been going very well. What a
shame it has been put off until next year at the same time.
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