Ursa Major's Blog

When I went to bed last night at 8:30, I turned on music to go to sleep to. I don't remember hearing any of it, as I must have been asleep instantly. I woke up at 6:00 AM to go to the bathroom. But just to pee pretty much. I think giving my bowels a rest yesterday by not eating until evening was the best thing to do. I ate some chicken last night, and a few rice crackers with hazelnut butter. I know, I shouldn't really eat rice crackers, but I needed something, and was too tired to cook for myself. And my husband had bought a whole roasted chicken and potato salad (which I can't eat, either), and McDonalds for our daughter.

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I do have a headache, and I'm still tired. I am definitely going to have a nap this afternoon before going to see my counselor. It's a 1 1/2 hour drive to get to him each way, and I don't have to leave until 6:00 PM, as my appointment is from 7:30 to 9:10 (that's a two hour appointment, as his counseling hours are only 50 minutes long, to allow him to write down his notes between appointments).

Last night I practiced my violin. I got sick of playing 'Twinkle twinkle little star' only, and moved on to playing the songs on the next pages, teaching myself a few more notes in the process. I know that it sounded pretty dreadful. My daughter, who was chatting with her friends on MSN messenger, unbeknown to me, recorded me and sent the recordings to her friends, who were all laughing at me! Little brat!

I am having my second violin lesson tomorrow, maybe it will help in learning to sound a little nicer. It is very hard to hold the violin and the bow properly, to put my fingers in the right position and to move the bow just right to get a good sound. It takes a lot of coordination and is really multi-tasking (which I am almost incapable of).

But hey, I've only had one lesson so far, and with practice and perseverance I expect to get reasonably good at it. It takes time and patience. You need to keep going while it still sounds terrible, before you can sound good (I have to keep telling myself that, too).

The one teacher, who I've known for two years, as he is the one fixing my recorders, was the teacher playing the duet with the girl playing the clarinet. I didn't know he plays and teaches the clarinet, too. When it was the teacher's turn to perform, he played a Celtic song on the recorder. It was beautiful. I don't think he has any recorder students, as most people don't look upon the recorders as a serious instrument, and as a result would be unwilling to pay $25.00 for a half an hour recorder lesson.

But I think I will go and take recorder lessons with him. I really miss playing my recorder, and learning to play it better. My younger brother and I would be playing all the time when I was still in Germany, and he was teaching me to play amazingly well. But here I don't have anybody to play with, since my two oldest daughters are married and gone (I taught them to play).

I still play nicely, but not brilliantly. Most of the time my recorders are put away. I have a whole collection of them, I think I have fifteen to twenty recorders. Four wooden soprano recorders (my favourite is my rosewood one, but I have a very old one that was handmade in Germany a hundred years ago that I treasure as well, and the one my father sent me two years before he died, which was a real surprise, as it was very expensive, about $200.00, plus my youngest brother's recorder, which he stopped playing) and a bunch of good plastic ones, two wooden alto recorders, plus several plastic ones, a wooden sopranino recorder, a plastic tenor recorder (I really want a wooden one, but those cost a lot of money)and a very small recorder (don't remember what it's called now, I don't play it, it's something neat to have). This collection is worth several thousand dollars. It's too bad to waste it by not playing.

I will take two recorder lessons and two violin lessons each month. That way I am learning something new (the violin), but I will also play at an advanced level learning to play the recorders better, which will be somewhat more enjoyable, as it will actually sound beautiful.

Well, I better get ready to see my doctor. I hope that we can figure things out, to get my adrenals and thyroid working again without any herbal remedies.