Morning has broken (as have my eardrums....)

There are a variety of sounds that can gently lull you into awareness after a night's sleep. A couple of generations ago it would have been the clinking of the milkman doing his rounds, the rattle of a newspaper or letters through the letterbox or the hissing of the Teasmade (if you don't know what one is don't ask as it will accentuate my age compared to yours and I may have to hit you....). These days there are still pleasant sounds to awaken to... birds singing, people walking by on their way to work, the beep of a mobile phone message from a friend.

But let me assure you of one thing....one sound that I can say with all certainty that you DON'T want to wake up to is what I was dragged kicking and screaming from my slumber from this morning. An octagenarian recorder ensemble. Or to be more precise, an octagenarian and tone-deaf recorder ensemble accompanied by an octagenarian percussionist with a rhythm bypass.

Now I sleep well believe you me. In fact I doubt that there is much I couldn't sleep through. May be that's why by the time I became aware of a very discordant sound reaching the recesses of my brain, Brad had decided there was some urgent work needing doing in the garden and the dog was hiding behind the sofa with her paws over her ears.

Now I'm not being discriminatory here but there are very few people who should be playing the recorder. Its not well-known as the most attractive sounding of all instruments but at least when its played badly by a five year old during their first school concert, there can be something endearing about the sound of someone puffing down a piece of warbling plastic. When its played by a contingent of 80-year OAP's whose hearing aids need new batteries, it really starts to lose any "Aaaah" factor.

And I really ought to know, living as I do in a terraced house that shares a joining wall with one such 80-year old recorder-playing athsmatic (we'll call her Doris). I've even grown accustomed to the steady stream of local elderly folk hobbling past the window on a daily basis and to partake of Doris' very special own brand of rudimentary recorder tuition. And I'm even starting to get used to the fact that she has taken it upon herself to set herself up as the local version of Jules Holland by recruiting a whole band of these geriatric disciples twice a week with whom to engage in regular jamming sessions next door. They make quite a sight congregating at Doris' house. There's Marge with the dicky heart, Ena whose just recovering from a stroke, Agnes with her steel hips, the list goes on. All presided proudly over by athsmatic Doris whose whistle-blowing is noticeable by the fact that she runs out of puff every few notes and takes a breather to recover before coming in again at the wrong place.

But this morning there was something different. Not only did we have the full recorder contingent doing a discordant rendition of something that sounded distinctly like "London's Burning" (at least it went round and round and round in a similar fashion) but we also now appeared to have the added bonus of a percussionist. Not just any old (pardon the pun)percusionsist but one who seemed to possess only one type of drum and proceeded to bang it repeatedly in a way that was so methodically out of synch with the music that I must say it must actually have indicated a certain level of talent. In fact it was so totally detatched from any hint of being part of the same piece of music that I actually thought it was someone doing building work nearby and banging something to start with.

I had to laugh the other day when Doris announced they were off to do a gig. Well actually she termed it a "recital". I have to admit (*blushes*) that I actually wished I knew where it was happening so I could go along and watch the audience's reactions. Apparently one piece they were doing was going to last 7 minutes. Mind you may be it would normally last 1 minute but they had to allow for incontinence breaks and a quick hip replacement during the pauses?

Oh dear I probably seem really ageist now...I'm not really, honest! In fact as you will see from my next blog entry (YES! I've got the next one in mind already!) I actually spent last night rescuing my lovely elderly neighbour (Max this time not Doris) after he had a nasty fall. I love old people. Just not when they play recorderd VERY badly with terrible drum accompaniments and wake me up. I tried to drift back to sleep after but it was so bad it kept infiltrating my brain and I ended up dreaming I was round at Doris' house and she was teaching me to play the electric drums via a tiny keypad whilst her elderly possy were mashing it up in the lounge around me. At least I think that was a dream......