In the last 6 months or so you may know that Sir has refined the art of the Banana Lounge Lizard... interspersed with the last remnants of Sir's mum's estate, getting married, mowing the lawn, a daily walk and general hours of house and Proto-Doctor maintenance. Its been a real breeze of a time.

Well, yesterday Sir had the privilege of sending off the thesis emendations and henceforth have a wife whom is a real one, and Sir is no longer in the position of phD widow. Hurrah!!

The other big hurrah type is probably known to you. It comes slowly, from a place of great depth and usually some form of grief. It creeps up on us in our dreams at first.... , mine were fairly literal and strangely soul burning dreams of Jacqueline DuPre, playing in a cheesy sound stage set, playing with the MSO etc etc, you get it. In Sir's case it manifested its self as "Christ! I can't spend the next 3 weeks of my summer holidays playing Tomb Raider every day!!" Sir realised that even though her mastery of Lara Croft's triple back flip and remarkable skill in reaching relics in a time trial rivaled any 12 year old titty raider fiend... sigh, the sad truth is that Sir cannot share this with her grown up friends and stay a respected member of her chosen family.

Yesterday, Sir went to visit a dear friend who is struggling to finish her phD. We listed to music, ate and played with the pug puppy who was also visiting. Then she suggested that Sir borrow her Bodhran. As Sir was attempting to play this crazy Celtic beast she realised what She needed to do. Her soul needed feeding, desperately.

Now Sir has a beautiful new creature who will need a few months of playing in until Sir can get the new, better set of strings. Maybe later this year Sir can trade her up to a more professiona model. Far from 30 year ago when Sir first picked up the Violin, and many years of wanting to wring it's scrawny neck, she is delighting in the body memories of playing the Suzuki Method, but for 'Cello. Happiness. My soul as woken up and wants to be fed.

Moments like this make Sir remember that there is more to life on the inside as well as the outside. Not too long now until the teaching begins again. Sir got in just in time....