Parkdale Halo

On Wednesday morning it was cool for summer but I kept the windows open anyway. I just wore sweat pants and socks all day instead of shorts and bare feet.

I worked out the chords for all but the final line of “Ah! Si j'avais un franc cinquante” (Oh If I Had A Dollar Fifty) by Boris Vian. I also worked out the chords for the instrumental intro to “La petite rose" by Serge Gainsbourg. The music for each verse seems to be the same as the intro.

Around midday I brought the stepladder down from the landing between the second and third floors. I cut a length of the super strong black thread that I’d found a several months ago and wound and tied one end to the bolt at one side of my twisted bicycle rim. Then I climbed with it up on the ladder under the light fixture in my kitchen. I loosened the finial and wrapped and knotted the other end of the thread around the screw before retightening the fixture more securely than it was in the first place. It was easier than I thought it would be and it seems to be holding, although I avoid stepping directly under it in case it comes crashing down. I think it might look pretty good if I painted it red but that’s a distant future project. Also now that I’m looking up it becomes more obvious that I’ll have to scrape, sand and paint the ceiling eventually.

For lunch I split a had a focaccia bun, toasted it and had a cheddar and lettuce sandwich with mayonnaise.

In the afternoon I did my exercises while listening to Amos and Andy. This was another rehashed story. A wealthy elderly woman tells Kingfish she wants to adopt an adult male so he pimps out Andy to be her son. They think they are going to be on easy street but she puts Andy to work. When Andy learns that she’s actually broke he tries to get the adoption annulled but the judge rules that since he’s now legally her adult son he must provide her with $40 a week.

I synchronized the camera audio with the computer recording of  my July 3 rehearsal and then saved it as "Person" so I can separate that song and upload it to YouTube. There are a few soft pops when I sound half of the “p”s but there's not much that I can do about that now.

For dinner I had a fried egg, two sausages and a toasted focaccia bun with a beer while watching two episodes of William Tell.

In the first story Tell, Hedda and the Bear are stealing the tax money from the tax collector’s safe. Tell is wounded by a soldier's crossbow and the arrow head has broken off inside his body. Hedda and the Bear get Tell to a hiding place in the city but Gessler and his men are closing in. Tell gets the Bear to get the patriots in the neighbourhood to pretend that the plague has stricken their quarter. The letter X is painted on every door and people are calling “Bring out your dead”. A woman touches Gessler and he thinks he has been infected. The immediate physicians have wild treatments that they want to try like a paste made of frogs eyes or an amulet in the shape of a lizard. Gessler wants Dr Von Eckenburg, his own army surgeon but on his way to Gessler the doctor is abducted by the Bear. The doctor pretends to be willing to treat Tell but he does not follow a Hippocratic oath and he betrays them, escaping to tell Gessler that he doesn’t have the plague and to inform him of Tell’s location. But when Gessler gets there Tell is gone. And when the doctor arrives in his own home he finds that Hedda and the Bear have broken in with Tell. This time they swear that they will kill him if Tell dies. Eckenburg removes the arrow head but says he can’t stop the bleeding without a certain potion from the apothecary. He writes what he says is a prescription in Latin and Hedda takes it to the apothecary. The druggist gives Hedda something but after she leaves he goes to see Gessler because the prescription had also contained a message in Latin for the governor to come to his home. Gessler understands immediately that Tell must be at the doctor’s house and goes there with his men. Meanwhile Tell has recovered to a surprising degree and so Hedda and the Bear tie up Eckenburg. The Bear goes out the window to the roof and over the wall, he helps Tell down just as the soldiers break in. They get one shot at Hedda but miss just as she goes over.

            In the second story a young Austrian officer named Fritz, who has just been stationed in Altdorf is disturbed by Gessler’s treatment of the peasants. When the peasant Hoffman says he can't pay the twenty five kulen because his family only has thirty for the winter, Gessler makes him pay not only the twenty five but an extra five for resisting. When Hoffman says he only has one cow the soldiers also find a calf and so Gessler says he will make an example of Hoffman and have him beheaded. When Hoffman’s eleven year old son attacks the arresting soldier the boy is also arrested and condemned to death. This is too much for Fritz and so he goes to ask for advice from a Swiss priest who tells him that his conscience comes from a higher authority than his military superiors. Fritz seeks out William Tell, but assures him that he is no traitor and would fight him to the death on the battlefield but he can’t stand by and let innocent people be executed. He says he has a plan to rescue the prisoners but he needs Tell’s help. Tell sneaks into the castle in an empty wine barrel. While Fritz is giving his soldiers instructions in the dungeon he has them facing him with their backs to the cells. Tell comes in behind them and lets the father and son out. They sneak up the stairs while the soldiers still save their backs turned. But by coincidence Gessler brings the Grand Duke of Austria downstairs to inspect the dungeons and discovers the prisoners missing. He has the gates closed and searches the wine wagon that is about to leave with its empty barrels. He not only recaptures Hoffman and the boy but also William Tell. Fritz has another plan to rescue Tell and the others but when he tells the Bear that he needs six men to carry it off he is captured. The Bear believes Fritz has betrayed Tell and that the new plan is just another trick to capture more partisans. He goes to Gessler and offers Fritz in exchange for Tell but the officer is not important to Gessler. The Bear goes back to prepare to hang Fritz. Meanwhile Tell has to escape on his own. He gets the guard to come close to the bars with a promise of buried gold and then knocks him out to take his keys. They fight their way out of the dungeon and Tell manages to reach the Grand Duke to hold him hostage until they are free of the castle. Back at the rebel camp the Bear is about to hang Fritz when Tell intervenes and says Fritz would have saved them if the Bear hadn’t stopped him. The Bear begins, “But I thought …” but Tell interrupts and advises him not to think because it always gets them into trouble. Fritz decides not to stay because with Gessler in charge the same situation would arrive again. Tell arranges for Fritz to go to Italy.