Saturday, May 5

Garden, 11:40
We might have had a glass of wine too many last night. Certainly we got up late this morning, after agreeing a rather full set of activities for today.
I start by getting the hose down from the attic where it has spent the winter. Before I attach it my eye catches the empty holder I will soon wrap it around and, having my phone in my pocket for some reason, I photograph it. I then climb up, get the hose, put it on the patio floor, and get distracted by Irma calling me to help do something else.
Last autumn we had a wooden canopy put up over the shed door to stop the snow blocking our way to the shed. In practice the weight of snow almost tore the canopy off the wall, and then almost tore the wall off with the canopy. Now it stands there repaired and I have to paint it white.
I will paint a first coat on the door thing, as I have taken to calling it (Irma refers to it as a lippa in Finnish), while Irma drives off to do something else. I will then wash all the outside windows while the first coat dries.
When I have finished the windows I will return to the door thing and give it a second coat. The paint tin will declare itself completely empty at the very moment I have finished. Irma will arrive back to find just enough paint at the bottom to touch up a couple of poles where the white has disappeared in a wheelbarrow / pole collision.
At 17:30 we will have washed, dressed and tidied ourselves up in readiness for Kepa’s record-launch party. The record, called Kepa Lehtinen plays theramin, goes on sale today, although I failed to find out exactly where.
We will walk across the road and join a genial gang of his and Selja’s friends. We will talk, drink a little, and have endless barbeque ribs and salads. I will also get to play with Kepa’s theramin: the first one I have seen in real life. I had expected it to look bigger and like something from the BBC Radiophonics Workshop. In fact, it consists of a wooden box and two antenna.
After an hour alone with it I will manage to make a rudimentary scale, or an approximation of one.
Eventually, at about 22:00, after we have had coffee and cheesecake, we will decide that we should politely leave.
We will get to bed by about 22:22.
We will learn tomorrow that, had we stayed, we could have joined in the communal singing of Stairway to Heaven at 3:00.