First private lessons at St. John's International School

It's been a pretty nondescript start to January.  I've been keeping up with the running, and that is therapeutic; I've logged about 35 km in the last seven days.  The weather has been cooperating, with temperatures usually in the mid single digits, with enough clear periods that I have kept fairly dry.  Yoshi certainly appreciates running in the forest on alternate days with me and with Maggie.

We haven't signed up for any races yet but plan to do the Bouillonnante with Lawrence and the Hammers this year.  I have wanted to do it for a long time but have always had a concert that has conflicted with the date, so have had to miss out.  This year it takes place on the 25th of April, so I should be able to get it in before I go to Canada to sing the Vaughan Williams concert with Jurgen.  I'm not sure if I'll just do the 15km run or if I will train up for the 29km; I will try some longer runs this month and see how I feel before the registration opens in mid-February.  It is quite a tough trail with lots of climbing, much more than any other race I've done, so it's a good challenge.

I gave my first private singing lesson to E. last Thursday, and it seemed to go pretty well.  It will be a regular Thursday thing, and I hope that there will be some other students who step forward so that it can be a more efficient use of my travel time.

Malcolm was home on the weekend.  He picked up two more guitar repair jobs this week: it would seem that that is turning into a good side-line for him, entirely through word-of-mouth.  His various building projects are proceeding well.  He has also signed up for an two-week internship with a luthier in Spain sometime this spring.  It's not a paying position , but it will be a good learning and networking opportunity for him.

Yesterday I sharpened the chainsaw and set up my sawbuck in the driveway, cut up the last half of the firewood that we collected last weekend, and then split it all up to a suitable diameter for our stove.  When Duncan got home we stacked it all inside.  I'm not so excited about this wood but it will do for now; it doesn't burn super hot, so I am suspecting that it didn't really dry all that well during aging.  My favourite book on firewood, Lars Mytting's Norwegian Wood, warns against the problems of improper wood stacking: if it isn't dried properly in the initial stages, it never really dries completely, and you can get issues with mold and fungus that can affect its heating properties.  I think that now that I've got most of the kinks ironed out of my Ryobi chainsaw, that I will go back to the cheaper method of ordering 2-3m long logs so that I can cut and split and stack them myself, like I did a couple of summers ago.

Now it's off to the grocery to see what looks interesting there.  Maggie just got a new Lagostina pressure cooker as part of the Delhaize promotions, and so she's been having fun playing with that, but I think that it's my turn to make dinner...