Aston woods

 I thoroughly recommend a walk in Aston woods at this time of year.  They are absolutely beautiful with the bluebells and rhodadendrons.

Photos don't do it justice really.

Glastonbury Astonbury. The Friday night review.

2 names for 2 festivals.  The same apart from 2 letters, and the fact they both had music but the similarity ends there.  One is famed for mud, camping, outside stages, stone circles and various hippy type stuff.  The other took place in a church or a village hall and served tea.  Ordinary tea which you get from a supermarket, not tea made with herbs or mushrooms or whatever.  Well I don't know about the Saturday, but the Friday concert which took place in the church was definately not like Glastonbury.  Not that it mattered.  It had it's own character and charm.

Apparently this has been one of the most well attended Astonburys ever. The church was almost full to capacity.  This could be due to there being a lot of childrens acts performing.  The panto kids and teenagers sang some songs from the panto.  Aston school choir sang too.  Kathy Razzell did a showcase of her music students, my personal favourite being the one who did the Monty Python theme tune. Dan Jefferies played his guitar and sang some songs.  He is a confident, natural performer who was completely comfortable in front of the crowd. If he keeps going the way he is I can see him joining the next big boy band when he's a bit older.

Of the adults to name a few, we had Joe Nutman on his keyboard, Alison Hurt and Luke Fitchett (They did both nights), and Tony Luke, our vicar.  He has a really great singing voice.  He got as far as boot camp once on the x-factor you know.  Oh and some hand bell ringers.  They were surprisingly good.

Most of the acts were people from the village or nearby and did short slots. They were all quality acts and it showed that Aston definately does have talent.

The church was toasty warm, much warmer than on a Sunday I hate to say.  (Not that I want to put anyone off going to church on a Sunday.  In winter wear a good coat and sit somewhere in the middle and its usually not too bad.  In the summer it's pleasantly cool ).  They put the side heaters on as well as the middle ones.

Yard Sale 2013

Today we did the yard sale again.  We did ok, but not brilliantly, certainly not as well as last year.  This could be for a number of reasons.  Firstly there seemed like there were less people, just a few less.  Then I suppose these are not good times for people economically, although that could make people buy more stuff second hand rather than new.  The weather was a bit patchy as well, there was sunny patches and rainy patches.  At about 12.45 there was quite a more persistent shower and quite a few people packed up then, even though it was supposed to finish at 2pm.  In the end I think the main reason I didn't do so well was that I didn't have as much stuff to get rid of as I thought I did.  I looked at it all once I'd got it out and thought "Is this it?"

Later on in the day the sun came out and we went to take the sign back to the organisers.  We spent some of our profits on a swiss roll at Colin's and all was right with the world.

Spring into Jazz (part 2)

After enjoying it so much last year, I was very pleased to get tickets for this years Spring into Jazz.  This time they did a set called Tin Pan Alley in which they played songs and told the stories behind the music.  Tin Pan Alley is a street where all the jazz publishers were in the olden days (I don't rightly remember the exact era its from.  Probably somewhere around the 1920s.  Good job I'm not being tested). After the amount of stories about musicians, publishers and songwriters they told last year, I was surprised that they had any more to tell this time but there was hardly any repetition of stories and not much repetition of tunes either.  The fact I actually remember what they repeated from the previous year says a lot about how good it was as my memory is rubbish.

The band consisted of a singer who also played banjo, a trumpet/ cornet player, a saxophone/ clarinet player, a pianist and a euphonium player who had the most huge instrument ever.  Just lifting it up was a feat in itself, let alone playing it.  Apparently he used to have a metal one which was even heavier, but now he's moved onto a plastic one.  They were all very accomplished musicians.

This time they didn't have a bar, it was bring your own drinks and a fish and chip supper was ordered in from Georges.

Return of the Phantom Blogger

Yesterday someone said to me "you're the phantom blogger aren't you".  Once I'd got over the embarrassment of people knowing it was me who wrote this blog, I quite liked the idea that people were reading my blog and trying to work out who wrote it.  I like a good whodunnit myself.  I suppose if I wanted to write an anonymous blog it's probably not a good idea to write one about the village where I live.  At the end of the day, it just nice to know that people are actually reading it.

After the events at the end of last year, I haven't felt like writing much, but maybe it's time to get back to it.

Big gig

In Weston village hall last Saturday was the big gig and big gig for kids.  The kids were on in the afternoon.  As with any good village event there were tea and cakes on sale, some of which were homemade.  Only 2 acts turned up in the end, a group of girls who dance and one girl who sang a solo.  Brian Dawson did a couple of Beatles songs on the piano then everyone went home.  Apparently there were 4 more acts who didn't turn up, and if they had that would have made a good show.  I don't know why there wasn't a better turnout.  I would have thought a talent show for kids would have been more popular  but maybe it got overshadowed by the adults big gig later on.  Hopefully it won't put the organisers off putting on events like this in the future. Some people say that it wasn't well advertised but I disagree.  There must be people going round the village with their eyes shut.  I just hope they weren't driving.

The big gig itself in the evening was a success.  There was a good turnout for the audience, mainly adults and older children.  They had a group of older guys who played blues type music and they were very accomplished musicians.  Then they had 3 duos of a bloke playing a guitar and a woman singing.  That was the only similarity between the 3 duos, musically they were very different. In the evening the tea and cakes were gone and replaced with a bar and there were little pots of peanuts on the table.  A good time was had by all.

The Pod

Well the pod has finally arrived in Aston.  It seems very popular with the youth in the village and I've seen hardly any of them hanging around at the Lych gate, which was the reason it was built in the first place.  So far, it's achieved it's purpose.

This shelter has speakers and you can blue tooth music from your i-pod to it, and it plays the music.  It is powered by a handle which you wind.  It has lights that work when it gets dark and has lots of entrance/ exits to prevent bullying.  One lad, when his friends told him that there was this shelter which plays music from your i-pod, thought it sounded so good that he didn't believe it was real until he saw it.  Apparently it got covered in graffiti within a week of it being put up, but someone from the parish council went and cleaned it up, and when I went there today there wasn't any.

I have heard a lot less noise from the race track recently.  Maybe they've finally listened to the protests from the residents of Aston and the nearby villages.  Instead I seem to hear a lot of cows mooing, which gives the village a more rural feel.  I wonder if anyone will start up a protest against cow noises?