Peace

Last week I spent two days away in Leeds to see a couple of bands play at Leeds Metropolitan. The first of these was Rodrigo Y Gabriela, two fast fingered Dublin based Mexicans whose album has reached no.1 in the Irish charts and who appeared on Jools Holland in May. It was well worth going to see live with their unique sound on acoustic guitars with what they call metallic influences and I have never seen a guitar played as a percussion instrument in the same way as Gabriela played it. Two superb guitarist who are fast becoming known throughout the world. The other band was Hayseed Dixie. This music is classed as "a Hillbilly Tribute to AC/DC". It was pretty humorous by all accounts with four beer drinking hillbillies in dungaree shorts playing heavy music on mandolin, banjo, bass and guitar or violin. It was enjoyable but not enough for me to go and see them again or buy their music.
It was the first time I stayed in a proper hotel and it was nice to have breakfast without having to go and bring it all back up again like I've always had to in the past due to pregnancy. Yes it's been a long time since I've been in a bed and breakfast, too long! It was an enjoyable couple of days being back in the city where I spent many weekends in my late teenage years and it was nice to just enjoy the peace and quiet of being away from my noisy children. I hope to spend more peaceful times away in the future.

Apple Crumble

In our garden we have an old apple tree that I think is over a hundred years old. It is the last from an orchard that used to be on the site before these houses were built over 86 years ago. It is the biggest apple tree I have ever seen and although is partly falling down, as the roots have been pulled out of the ground over the years and it is leaning slightly, each year it still has an impressive amount of fruit and some very big ones too. It is obviously some kind of cooking apple due to the sheer size of the apples but they are actually quite a lot sweeter than Bramleys. Maybe they are from an apple that is no longer used. If anyone has any history of old types of apples please let me know. Anyway the last of them are now falling to the ground and the other day I made a crumble for my family and mainly for Marcus, my middle son. Since he helped his grandma make one a few weeks ago he has took a great liking to them and asks for one a lot. This one didn't fail to deliver and was thoroughly enjoyed by all. The remainder of the apples shall be left on the ground for the thrushes and the insects to happily devour and hopefully the tree shall live out plenty more years of crumbles.

East Park fright night

So about last night, well disappointing really. It was more like a mini hull fair but with dressing up. There was a fire stunt man there but there were that many people that we couldn't see, so all in all, well I won't bother to go next year. We will stay in with just our pumpkin face and a warm bowl of pumpkin soup in our belly, which we had when we came in from the cold last night and everyone enjoyed. Even Marcus had two bowls and said it was delicious, WOW.
On a better night out, three of us went to see the Billy Cobhan and Asere gig at the Hull Truck on Sunday night, it was great, well worth going. There is another cuban, brazillian band playing at the Lamp this Sunday called Quinteto Mambojambo(http://mambojambo.org) as part of their Sounds of the City gigs, (http://myspace.com/soundsofthecityhull) It should be good but with it being bonfire night I'm not sure whether I can go. I've already been to one where there was quite a well known folk singer, in some circles. She was sweet and had a good voice but country doesn't really have enough life and passion in it for my liking.