I went back to the UK! (Temporarily.) Since I sang with the chapel choir for two-thirds of last academic year, I got in on one more tour to France, though in the end it was extremely light on singing music. We began in Ste Anne d'Auray, where we have ongoing friendly relations with the Academy of Sacred Music. Having practiced with their teenage choristers, we took a long bus ride to Paris, where we did our best to survive an epic heat wave. There we performed our one and only concert: singing Fauré's Requiem in the church where Fauré was the organist, La Madeleine. Back in Ste Anne, we sang mass at the cathedral and took a trip to the seaside. The weather was gray and drizzly, but I think we were happy to finally be cool again. And my carpool car stopped to check out one of the many sets of standing stones outside the town of Carnac.
When the choir trip was done, I had another week to spend in Cambridge. I tinkered with emails and such in the mornings, then headed to the University Library for lunch and the afternoon hours. It was nice to make focused progress on my latest research project, and of course to see old friends.
Since coming back, I have been overwhelmed with all of the tasks I have going at once. The spinning plates are beginning to wobble, honestly. It's a combination of paid work (from several sources), a conference paper to research and write, a book chapter that's way overdue for revising (I hate revising), the long-gestating book proposal, and job applications. Whew! If I make it through the first week of November, things should calm down a bit. Then I can look back and be a little proud of how many things I managed to accomplish, albeit while missing every single deadline.
