Somehow, we've got away with it

These final few weeks of the year have been the most exhausting of my life, but it's all been fun stuff. Got my third car of the year as my 'stopgap' Honda was struggling to the extent it wouldn't have been worth putting it through it's MOT. I've picked up a Japanese import, an unusual, quirky box of a car...certainly an alternative choice, but I love it so far despite the odd look. I've spent so much on cars this year, not just buying them, but repairing them. Please let that be it for a long while. 

My private students have been revving themselves up for our big Christmas concert, whilst my school students also had their own gigs across various assemblies. Everything went so well, in particular my private student gig which was a collaboration with Vicky's singers, alongside a brilliant house band who had never met each other but did their homework. 

That was on Friday and we'd made just over £500 for charity. On Thursday it was a glorious FH Christmas gig, the only frustrating thing about it is that we just don't see each other enough...wonderful from start to finish in front of an adoring audience. On Saturday I performed 'The Many Cars...' for the fifth time, this time around my mate Tim's house. By now my voice was shot to pieces and I could barely speak; I nearly pulled the show but then he told me he had a big crowd coming down who were excited to see me again (I'd performed there about 5 years ago) so I battled through it. I wasn't great, to be honest, garbled, a few jokes lost along the way, all a bit rushed, but the audience seemed to really enjoy it. 

And then yesterday it was our year finale: the 12 Gigs of Christmas. 12 gigs, 12 venues, 1 band, 1 day. We used to do this every year but haven't done post-Covid, but when I jokingly suggested it to Claudia, Marcel and Edd at a gig in October this year they agreed to it so I put the feelers out for venues. A lot more effort than normal this time, a lot of venues have closed since we last did it and those who were up for it seemed quite specific about when we could play to due to other festive events but we made it work, despite a schedule which involved a lot of zigzagging around town. I guess yesterday was all about proving that we could still do it - we're much older these days and these events take a lot out of everyone. And did it, we did. All 12 gigs. No disasters...some venues that were quieter than others, some venues that were certainly more welcoming than others, but some cracking moments in there, we somehow managed to keep it to time and played pretty well throughout the whole day. We raised £860 for charity, and I loved using QR codes that go direct to a JustGiving page, it made life so much easier not having to deal in cash. A wonderful end to the year, despite my hands really hurting after it...

Today is my first day off for Christmas. I'm just tying in a few loose ends, finishing Christmas shopping, panic buying my wife an anniversary present (our anniversary is on Christmas Eve), organising Josie's surprise 40th (on the 27th, she won't read this) but now slowing down. Probably my last blog post of a busy old year...thanks for reading and Merry Christmas! x

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