Gears

We currently have visiting grandparents who came bearing gifts - new bikes for both girls. The bigger bike for the bigger girl has gears and they're taking a bit of getting used to as I shout gear changes across the park - "Twist it to no.2, it'll be easier to pedal", "You're going downhill now, try changing to 3 or 4!", that kind of thing. So far though, pretty good. Had a little trip out along the canal until we hit a path-wide slab of ice and made do with a few circuits of the park instead. All before 9.30, and it's not even a school day. Barely had time for a coffee before we were up and out.

Now, my local swimming baths opened again for the first time today after the break. I duly went along late afternoon and found the pool was closed because of lessons. Damn.Went back an hour later when it was open properly and had a decent workout. I know I get cranky when I don't go for a few days, good to be back, really good.

Followed up the exercise with a cinema trip, preview of the new Russell Crowe film. Remake of a French thriller. They shouldn't have bothered. Crap. Boneheaded, clunky and just plain cannot-really-be-arsed-with-this from start to finish.

So, thank goodness for Ricard Villalobos in amongst all this (knew I'd swing this round to a bit of music somehow). Not overly familiar with his own stuff, but I just love some of the remixes he's done for other folk. Current favourite is his remix of (what they call at least) a recomposition of Ravel and Mussorgsky by Moritz Von Oswald and Carl Craig (couple of clips of this here and here). So you've got techno bods taking apart some classical stuff in the first place and then getting a Chilean house producer in for the remix. It works just great for me.