Hi 5!

Examinations are formidable even to the best prepared, for the greatest fool may ask more than the wisest man can answer. Charles Caleb Colton.

I must say AMEB is fast. Ditz's flute teacher rang tonight with
her results. No surprises.

Yes she passed ~ by the skin of her teeth. C+. A pass is a pass & we're not proud. I had to laugh though at the breakdown. Her scales need more work. Hello? Tell us something we don't know. Her playing itself got huge accolades though again, her counting needs work. Don't we know it! Ditz does not like to count. When she first began band the hardest thing for her was to play at time because she thought everybody else was too slow so took off just as fast as she could play & would be bars & bars ahead while the conductor rolled his eyes & I cringed. Ditz likes her music fast & all year the Largo has been driving her to distraction. Week after week I listened to Jan painstakingly take Ditz through it bar by excruciating bar while Ditz chafed at its slowness but the work paid off. When it counted she played it really, really well. Naturally the Largo is the piece I liked best & Ditz liked least & therefore practised least.

I think Ditz has shocked herself. I don't think she thought she was good enough & unfortunately if she doesn't find challenges bracing she looks for ways to avoid them. Those she takes on she tackles with perseverance. Grade 3 was a stretch for her too. Jan said it would be at the beginning of the year & how easy it is to forget that she really hasn't been playing for all that long & she started in a school band. If she had done grade 2 she would have aced it. She really had to work hard to do the grade 3 work. Just reading the stuff is a challenge!

So I'm pretty stoked for the kid, ya know.

Ditz has also won herself some tickets to the premier of Bolt ~ which is in town. At night. On Monday. Yes I will have to drive her in. It will cost me more in petrol & parking than the tickets are worth but she is so excited & I do think she needs to do some silly things just for fun. Especially because I was right. The next round of Abba Mania is about to begin with the attendant logistics problems but I will be limiting what Ditz can do. At this time of the year my budget just can't carry the cost of too many extras.

Tomorrow Ditz has flute & it's great she can face Jan with a pass. She's been trying to wriggle out of this lesson all week but funnily enough she stopped protesting once she knew she'd passed her exam.

Flute, violin, choir concert at one of the schools , which I have to find in peak hour. *sigh* I'm travelling more for music than I ever did for soccer. The Wave is finished. We have a bit of Mara still to go but we may do that as bedtime reading. Knowing perfectly well that the schools have wound down for the year & are no longer doing any learning I'm not pushing Ditz too hard, just enough to tie up our loose ends before we break. I need to stop. My life is not fun when it gets this out of control. I want to garden & harass the cat & contemplate my navel on the deck, count the raindrops, read something that actually requires my brain to work, wander along the waterfront & through the mangroves & if I don't leave the island or drive a car for 6 weeks I won't be the one weeping. No I can't see that happening either but I'm the eternal optimist.