Prizes, Performance and Recompense

On Thursday I was invited to return to my workplace to attend the annual Learning and Development Awards celebratory event. It was wonderful to be back among the L&D team I worked with for so long and to celebrate with all those members of staff who were presented with certificates. I was enormously honoured and totally amazed to be recognised for my "Sustained Contribution to Learning and Development," and thank you so much to all those responsible for thinking of this and organising it. I was so impressed with the high quality of the event which so reflects the excellent and supportive work of the team, and reminded me of why I loved working with them.

On Friday night I accompanied my husband to a concert in London's Hackney Empire. I say accompanied him, as the band in question was definitely one of his favourites going way back, called The Residents, an avant garde band who certainly never hit the charts!

The journey there by train was pretty avant garde too, with delays due to "adverse weather conditions," and alterations to the information being provided on train times on a regular basis. A journey that should have taken an hour and fifteen minutes actually took over two hours but we got there with time to have dinner in an Italian restaurant at Highbury Corner and a drink at the Cock Tavern, a few doors down from the venue.

We were in for a genuine treat; the Hackney Empire is an amazing and authentic old music hall/theatre with beautiful stained glass, marble and gilded angels, and a ceiling dome which appears to reflect a sky of twinkling stars.

Hackney Empire 

Hackney Empire

I had been wondering what kind of audience to expect and I found a strange mixture of men of all ages, many wearing jaunty hats from trilbies and huge texan stetsons to tea-cosy style knitted hats to balaclavas with huge horns, which reflected the horned headgear of the band. There were also some of the most beautiful young and stylish women I have ever seen gathered together in one place, many with black geometrically cut hair and facial bone structures to die for. 

We arrived about thirty minutes before the band hit the stage to vivid blue lighting and a black and white geometric set.

My expectations had not been high but the concert was surprisingly engaging and entertaining. The band members' costumes were designed to conceal the identity of the artists, surely a forerunner of Daft Punk, with masks and dreadlocks, reminiscent of the Ood to those who follow Dr Who. Randy, the lead singer, was dressed in black and white checked underpants, reflecting the backdrop, a sparkly  white tailcoat and flippers - and not much else. The songs were short and punchy with sharp lyrics, interspersed with stories told by a skeleton head from the blue dome at the back of the set.

The band came back on stage in response to the warm applause for an encore and left the stage after 90 minutes, leaving a satisfied audience. I visited the Ladies before setting off for home and was told by the woman in front of me that she had cat-sitted for a neighbour and had been given the tickets as a thank you. The moral of the story for her was not to cat-sit again! I can't agree with her, as for me it was an interesting experience and great fun!

Getting home was not quite so much fun as, again, we were left waiting late at night at a major London station for 50 minutes before a train turned up, although the service is scheduled to be half-hourly. We were advised by the ticket inspector on the train to make a claim when we complained about the poor service and we will definitely do this. 

It was quite amusing that twice on the tube I was offered a seat by younger travellers, which indicates that I look older than I thought I did. However, despite the slight dint to my pride, I was happy to take up their kind offers and it was cheering to see that even in London, which is often given bad press, there are thoughtful and selfless travellers. This was slightly dinted by the arrival on the train of a family of Mum, Dad and a badly overweight son of about 12, whose constant whinging persuaded his Mum that she should push him into a seat as soon as one became free, regardless of the needs of anyone else in the carriage.