The Paternal Optimist

Bluebells For The Boy Wonder

In approximately ninety minutes, the BW will arrive at Geneva airport, and he and the PO will drive off together to Zermatt. The sun is shining, there's a bit of a breeze, the temperature has dropped a touch... the PO can't wait.

Meanwhile, over at A Flickering Light the PO has a bit of a musical nostalgia trip going on - or at least he will have by the time anyone reads this, assuming that no-one reads this before nine-thirty this evening.

Not wanting readers here to miss out, here's a question for you both : can you guess what was Number One in the UK charts on the day the Boy Wonder came kicking and screaming into the world ?

If you're struggling, here are three hints :

1. The title perfectly describes the PO
2. Frank Sinatra also had a hit with a song of the same name (though not actually the same song)
3. There's a clue in the title of this post

The PO will be back in just over a week to give you the answer - if you haven't already guessed by then.

A Chip Off The Old Block

Those of you who are easily shocked - particularly those of you in full-time employment with normal working hours and standard vacation entitlements - please look away now...

Yes, that's right : since midday yesterday, precisely three weeks before Good Friday, the Boy Wonder has officially been on his school holidays, and is now enjoying a few days at home (while, much to their chagrin, Button and Schmoo continue to toil over their textbooks) before he comes to join the PO in Switzerland next Wednesday.

The BW professes to being tired and says he needs the break, and it is true that even as term was drawing to a close there was no let-up in his busy schedule. On Tuesday, for example, he and the entire Hogwarts population made the trip to Birmingham, where the school symphony orchestra, featuring the BW on viola, performed a concert at the Symphony Hall as part of the Hogwarts 450th birthday celebrations. On the programme were numerous favourites from the Last Night of the Proms, including Elgar's Pomp and Circumstance, and the BW thoroughly enjoyed the experience of playing in a full-size concert hall.

The end of term also means school reports, of course, and though the PO has not yet received his copy, the BW has already given him a sneak preview of a few of his grades : a 1A in English and another in Music; 1B in Maths; and a 2C in Physics. He was naturally a little disappointed by this last grade. But he was positively incensed by the comments that went with it, which he says were "a word-for-word copy-paste of what was written on my last report." He even thought about sending a sarcastic e-mail to the DP in question, but thankfully thought better of it.

Still, overall he sounded happy enough with the latest judgment from the Hogwarts DPs.

"Your English teacher seems to be pleased with you," the PO said.

"Yes," replied the BW with his usual effusiveness.

"I heard you wrote a really good piece about the aerial photograph taken of the whole school making the Hogwarts logo. I'd love to read it."

"Yes, the teacher thought it was really funny," said the BW. He paused for a moment before adding, "I thought it was rubbish."

"Rubbish ?"

"Yes. Compared with some of the other things I've written, anyway. Sometimes it's really difficult because other people think things I've written are really good, when I think they're rubbish. And things I think are good, they don't like as much."

Welcome to the world of the writer, BW. Welcome to my world.

Hiding Headlights Under Bushels

Scientists are at a loss to explain the phenomenon - the PO suspects that El Niño, or perhaps his lesser known sister, La Niña, are involved in it somehow - but, every once in a while, a piece of news floats across the Atlantic and finds its way to Geneva.

Such occurrences being rare, it is important that they be recorded for posterity.  Naturally, not only is the PO happy to oblige - he considers it his duty to do so. A duty all the more pleasant it must be said, when the news is good and when it concerns his favourite Guitar Hero - for it seems that the GH's band, Headlights are starting to get some serious exposure.

First, one of my favourite tracks by them, Everyone Needs A Fence To Lean On, was chosen to feature during Episode 18 of Season 2 of the hit ABC show Grey's Anatomy (the first season of which started showing here in Switzerland only three weeks ago), which aired on February 19th. Part of the proof is here, along with some very complimentary words from the show's Music Supervisor, Alexandra Patsavas :

Champaign, Illinois' Headlights are also appearing at SXSW and are at the forefront of the resurgent scene happening in the twin cities of Champaign-Urbana. By merging electronics with the barest of pop elements, Headlights carve a unique niche for themselves that falls nicely between My Bloody Valentine and The Postal Service and are signed to one of my favorite labels, Polyvinyl Record Co. We licensed "Everyone Needs A Fence To Lean On" for the show.

But the real proof is here :

Second - and I'm sure you'll agree, even more impressively - the band's The Enemies EP is going to be distributed - sorry, distroed - right here in Switzerland. As the buzz on the Headlights website explains :

German Label Mi Amante Records has picked up The Enemies EP for distro in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland. It will be printed on white vinyl and will include the bonus track "Pity City". Official street date is April 7, but will be available for sale online two weeks before. Check out  www.miamanterecords.de for details.

The PO sends big hugs and congratulations to the GH (and his Songstress, naturally).

Today, Switzerland. Tomorrow, The World !!

The DPs Speak

This blog's regular readers will doubtless both be relieved to hear that the Paternal Optimist was unable to attend this year's parents' meeting at Hogwarts, which took place last weekend, and that they will consequently be spared the sort of gratuitous mockery that has blighted previous reports of his encounters with the Dedicated Professionals whose sole objective in life is, like latter-day Mr Gradgrinds, to plant Facts, nothing but Facts, in the minds of the Boy Wonder and his fellow pupils - and to root out everything else.

For, as any fule kno, Facts alone are wanted in life.

Fortunately, while the PO was in plain dereliction of his duties as a father, preferring to spend his Sunday recovering from the effects of skiing the day before in powder snow the like of which has not been seen in the French Alps in ten years, the Mother Superior was not about to shirk hers.

Indeed, not only did she assume upon her slender shoulders the full responsibility of meeting with each and every one of the BW's DPs - that is to say, every one except the ICT DP; and the DT DP; oh, and the PE DP; in fact, one might be tempted to think that the Mother Superior has something against acronyms - but afterwards she also got stuck with sitting through several hours of "cheesy wind music" (her words, not the PO's), waiting for the BW's appearance in a choir performing that well-known Bach Oratorio, the not-in-any-way-cheesy The King With Cold Feet, including the unforgettable number Searching For Hot Stuff . How it escaped the attention of the writers of The Full Monty, the PO will never understand.

Still, the PO's absence did have at least one positive consequence : without him there to bombard the DPs with inane questions and to blather on endlessly about how things were different in his day, the MS was able to restrict each interview to a maximum of ninety seconds and limit the discussion to the bare essentials - a task made considerably easier by the fact that, as she put it to the PO, "no-one had a negative word to say about your boy."

Here then, without further ado, is a resumé of each of those interviews :

French : Ee eez purfect. Ah cannot folt eem.

Maths.  : Very bright, isn't he ?

English : Sophisticated of thought and of expression. An inspired piece on the Hogwarts 450. I would like to see the book he is writing. [So would the PO]

Greek : Excellent.

Physics : I didn't notice he was in my class until he did really well in his test.

History : Very good.

Latin : Very very good.

Art : Very focused. Get's on with it himself.

Drama : Natural and focused. [Obviously, this is the latest buzzword.]

Music : Very good.

Geography : Obviously not a priority, especially with all the music he does. He should be congratulated on managing his time so well.

[Note to future biographers of the BW : the comments attributed to the various DPs listed above are in fact versions paraphrased by the PO of the words reported to him by the MS. Any resemblance to any words actually uttered by the DPs in question is entirely coincidental.]

Gotta Make Way For The Mother Superior

Many congratulations to the Mother Superior and the Laughing Buddha who got married today in the romantic city of Corby, on what was apparently the most auspicious day of the year for the LB.

The PO wishes them many more years of happiness together.

Today, The Hogwarts Region - Tomorrow...

...Manchester, London or Oxford.

While his peers were freezing their socks off on Saturday afternoon in some corner of a Hogwarts field, the Boy Wonder, performing in the Intermediate 2 category, played his Khatchaturian Toccata - "I've only just re-heated it, so it was OK, but it could have been better, though I was told it was more percussive, which apparently is a good thing" - along with an unspecified piece by Pál Kadosa, which went "really well", and duly qualified for the next round of the 2006 EPTA competition, which takes place in May.

The BW may choose in which of England's two great metropoleis (look it up) he wishes to perform. 

Or, alternatively, he may choose to play in Manchester.

Other than that, he has nothing of any import to report.

It Takes One To Know One

[Created here.]