spring clean

greetings and salutations...

well it's far too late in the night to be starting a posting but wanted to check in as i have a busy easter weekend ahead.

my landlord and lady depart in a little over 4 hours for a week in devon and in their place for a few days comes Tim -the-lawyer from across the water to hang with some of the ikon crew and get a well earned break from all things litigious. so tomorrow morning will see me go into that last minute clean up where 'he can take us as he finds us' becomes 'scrub every surface and then behave like things are always this sparkling', which can only be my mother's genes running through me. the result will in actuality be somewhere in between. but house guests are good that way - they are a kick up the ass to get ship shape and after a fair bit of shifting stuff around today i am feeling pretty confident that my wrist is up to hitting the studio and getting it organised. [does happy dance]

looking forward to the conversation that will ensue, and with a list of things to get done between the chat, by 11pm on sunday, the journey of ikon ::xocolatl:: will be over. the women that have made this gathering are an amazing bunch. at our final meeting tonight, despite us all feeling tired, we still found space for much laughter. it's lovely what a bottle of red and some chocolate will do for the spirits. i'll miss having them at the table come next wednesday. but still, there is the monday night team to return to and in a couple of weeks an enlarged creative team is heading to the north coast for some extended time together to start planning for greenbelt 07.

::

was delighted and filled with pride of the soul sisterhood to finally be able to go buy the latest collection from alison krauss.
two previously unreleased tracks, 'jacob's dream' and 'away down the river', were written by our own lovely julie lee. if one doesn't move you to shed a tear, the other will. haunting and moving respectively. consumate song writing, beautifully performed. but i have to say, i can't wait to be sitting beside julie hearing her perform them. some of my happiest times have been spent with that gal, usually with her guitar close at hand. let's hope it's not too long... as i write it occurs to me that it is 6 years ago this weekend i moved to northern ireland. julie was living here in belfast at the time. tucked in amongst the cinema tickets on my mantelpiece is a little card she made me for my arrival...

sleep beckons and i'll end with the inscription...

let tomorrow come...
tomorrow...
not by your will is the house carried through the night.
- wendell berry.

welcome to the neighbourhood.

LB,x