The Aardvark Blog

Scarecrow Sunday, Applications for Café position, Idle Thoughts of a musical & vinous bent
5/08/2018

Today, as I never tire of telling people, is Scarecrow Sunday, Brampton Bryan's annual fete, when the village is teeming with Scarecrowws (this year on a musical theme), stalls and lots of activities and it is also the only time of the year when access can be made by the general public to the ruins of Brampton Bryan Castle, on guided tours led by Edward Harley. Plus the flower displays in the church are terrific. Aardvark is entering into the spirit of the proceedings and there will be guitar music from 11am-2pm courtesy of a  young man called Oran.

To continue the musical theme, we also have our recently opened 'Summer Sextet' exhibition, of ceramics by Rob Fountain and Bas Titford, paintings by Kathy Heinzelmann, Kevin Street and Brian Lammas, and sculpture and drawing by David Howorth.

Many thanks to the many people who have contacted us with regard to the part-time café position that has opened up with the departure of Katie Sims who is off to walk the Camino amongst other adventures. It has been wonderful working alongside Katie for the last year and we will very much miss her. For those who wish to say goodbye, her last day is this coming Wednesday. Applications for the position must be with us by Friday 10th of August.

Finally, this morning when I was walking our beloved bookshop dog Coco, my mind turned to my two other favourite subjects - music and wine. I started to try to pair up composers with particular grape varieties. Beethoven obviously has to be Cabernet Sauvignon, and I myself think there can be no dispute as to Mozart and Chardonnay. Ethel then pointed out to me that before moving to pairing grapes and composers first one must decide whether a composer is red or white. Haydn seems to me to be obviously white (Gewurztraminer), and Verdi red (Barolo). But others are somewhat trickier. What about Schubert. Or Messiaen (personally I would opt for Viognier and put him in the white category). Much dispute over Bach who Ethel thinks must be Pinot Noir (partially due to the organ music), but I leant first towards Riesling. If one cannot play idle games on a summer morning, when can one. Any thoughts?