Blogpost February 1st
Dear reader I trust my little Blogpost finds you well. It’s been an interesting few weeks, not least because so many wonderful, creative humans have checked out and left the planet! There’s a lot more creative space to fill with such cultural icons as (to name just a few): David Bowie; Lemmie; Alan Rickman; Colin Vearncombe and even Terry Wogan now gone onto the big gig in the sky. Bless them all. There’ll be one helluva knees up going on “up there”!
I hardly ever make New Year’s Resolutions but found myself recently fired up and wanting to be “healthier and fitter than I’ve ever been” – no idea which inner voice made the passionate request – but it’s stuck to me and I’m remembering to check-in with the ideal I’ve set for myself, almost daily – almost.
With that in mind, Bob and I have tried a new approach to our eating habits with something called the Sirt Food diet. There was an interesting article in the Saturday Times at the beginning of the month which piqued our interest. Armed with my new-found zest for all things healthy and with Christmas wedged firmly beneath our tight-fitting belts, we thought we’d give it a go. The main premise of the diet is to use a group of foods (not exclusively), which activate the Sirtuin process whereby the body burns fat and increases muscle – what’s not to like? A short list of these foods includes: Bird’s-eye chilli; Buck Wheat; Capers; Celery, including it’s leaves; Cacao; Coffee; Extra Virgin Olive Oil; Green Tea (especially matcha); Kale; Rocket. get the picture? There is of course a race among the big Pharma groups to develop a pill to pop in order to cash in on this natural phenomena … but we can (with only a little effort) do it ourselves using fresh, delicious, nutritious food!
Sure enough after the seven day booster-start, we were looking and feeling a great deal lighter and leaner. Trying to incorporate these new ideas into our everyday life is – as ever with these things – an interesting challenge but so far so good. Even with a few detours involving restaurant meals and social events, we’re doing OK. We’re eating a lot more Kale and Rocket and a lot less wheat and dairy which seem to work well – for us at least. Ask me in a couple of months time if we’re still sticking to the Sirtuin advice and I may have a different answer but for now … it’s all good!
Just after our week of dietary change, we spent some time in the UK catching up with family and friends we’d not seen in far too long. We started our whirlwind tour in Rochdale in the delightful company of my dear friend of thirty plus years, Lynda Turner. Then followed two fabulous nights with Bob’s brother and sister-in-law in York and the fun continued with two more nights with our great friends Diane and Bryan Ansell who live near Newark. And to top it all we thoroughly enjoyed the most wonderful party in Penistone to celebrate Chris While’s sixtieth birthday, which turned into a brilliant concert of amazing performers – including: Martin Simpson; Charlie Dore; Ken Nicol; David Hughes; Helen Watson; While and Matthews (of course!!); Kellie While; Jo&Ben Broughton … you get the picture?! It was awesome! The room was filled to the rafters with totally wonderful human beings … having a fab-u-lous time. Thank you so much Chris While for the invite!! You ROCK!
We’ve been back on the tiny Isle for a week and in that time I’ve had a startling hair make-over … which even I love! And sporting said hairdo I’ve made several appearances on Manx Radio! Who knew? Question: can one “appear” on radio? Well it helps if one of your best friends now works there full time 🙂 Christy DeHaven recently joined Beth Espey and Jo Pack on Women Today (weekdays 2pm-3pm) and also now hosts the mega 3 hour Sunday Soundtrack show. Given that I’m leaving these northern shores for the southern hemisphere on Wednesday (Feb 3rd!) and won’t be back till the middle of June, she thought she’d better grab me while she can 🙂 xxx
It was great fun being part of the lively debate on all things Barbie&Ken on Friday’s Women Today and I loved playing the show out with Love Me Like A man which Jo captured on her iPhone: HERE (all but the final wail!) … and Christy and I had a fab time chatting and playing songs we love on Sunday afternoon. It was also really good fun sharing (for the first time!) newly co-written songs in their demo form (Sweet Rain – written with Rob Laufer and snippets of Calling My Name and Nurtured By Nature written with Steve Lima). We didn’t have time to play the music I wrote for Angela Hyriniuk’s new Meditation CD “Ascension Mastery” (due for release in the next few months) nor the recent mystical chants I’ve recorded or … talk about the novel I’m (still!) re-writing. I forget just how creative I’ve been over the past few years. And there’s more to come …
Part of our Australian trip this time round includes performing with Michael Fix in a new Duo musical adventure … shows as yet to be confirmed though we’ll both be performing at Glen Innes over the weekend of April 28th-May1st. Exciting times ahead that I will most assuredly keep you up to speed about.
For now I’ll leave you with this week’s video/song offering, as ever a weird mix of visuals from the past few weeks on the Island and a musical foray into A Dutch Musical written by our fabulously talented friends Tom Harriman and Pamela Phillips-Oland: The Soldier of Orange – based on a true story – is the most successful Dutch Musical ever! There are exciting plans afoot to bring an English version to the UK and Tom asked me to sing Queen Wilhelmina’s songs as demos for possible new producers. In this song – a duet with the leading man’s love interest – I sing a duet with Tom’s brilliant daughter Julia Harriman: Come Back To me … both women in different locations desperate for The Soldier of Orange to return safely to them. Enjoy!
My next Blogpost will mostly be from the Southern Hemisphere … hello Perth here we come!
As always … thanks for stopping by … I really do appreciate it.
Take care.
With love and light.
Christine xx
Christine Collister 