Mellow

Walked to work in Rose Street today to the sound of church bells and birdsong. It's a mild (12°C or so) sunny and windstill day, I'm sitting at my desk with the windows and doors open. Behind me, one of the office computers is copying some music CDs (my own, I hasten to add) for use here: Glenn Gould playing Bach's "Goldberg Variations" (the 1985 version), Barenboim playing Chopin's "Nocturnes," and an oddity: the Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir singing "Orthodox Chants of the 17th and 18th Centuries."

Sheer boredom has prevented me from stating that it has rained for at least some part of very day for nearly three weeks. Today's forecast is for 17°C and mostly sunny, but the long-range forecast is for 8°C and rain again. Blah. Getting dull. This time last year, I was eating lunch on my balcony aka the summer office.

I walked home on Friday at sunset, and because the evening was so nice I made a detour around the Feuersee, and there saw the first bat of 2008 swooping above the pond. Spring advances. The chestnuts have leafed out and are putting up their little pyramids of blossom; the lindens in Rose Street are in full leaf, though the eponymous roses aren't yet doing much.

[Updated at 1:30 pm] walked home via the Feuersee again, and had my first ice cream cone of 2008. Bloody marvellous.