Here are some pictures taken at our technical rehearsal -

http://www.flickr.com/photos/11113367@N08/

They give a good idea of costume, a glimpse of the set and a hint of the chaos that is a tech when all you have is an hour. It's a shame we could not have got a full frontal shot in performance of the set in all its glory.

So that's the SCDA over for another year. The upside of not being a prizewinner is that we don't have to drag ourselves and the set to Grangemouth next month and I don't have the hassle of trying to find dates that suit everyone for a few rehearsals for the next round. But I do regret not having the opportunity to compete to take the show to Pitlochry Festival Theatre.

I thought the adjudicator's assessment of our production was absolutely fair but I can't say that I agreed with his decisions on the winners. I might have placed Livingston Players' "Womberang" amongst the first three for its energy and entertainment value but neither "Trifle" nor "One Day I Met Myself Coming Home" struck me as particularly good productions and how Trifle merited Best Stage Presentation is beyond me. There were at least two other shows, leaving my own out of contention, that were much more effectively presented than that recycled set last seen in an appalling piece about a paintball experience.

Claire has a nice set of pictures taken in the dressing room and at the after show party on Facebook and one of Umi's friends took some shots at the technical rehearsal which I hope to get hold of.

It's taken me four years to get this play on the stage and despite the lack of success in the competition I'm very pleased to have got there in the end and with a lovely team of players and backstage stars. Apart from the enduring memories of the production I've got this adorable set of cufflinks as a gift from the cast and crew. But I need to invest in a few more shirts with appropriately fashioned cuffs to fully enjoy them.

I'm trying not to stay up half the night watching the Olympics but it's tempting. Now that I've returned my DVD recorder I have to watch live although there is in fact very good highlights coverage during the following day.

I was glued to the ladies Snowboard Cross this afternoon even though I'd seen it all last night. The leaps and jumps they do are breathtaking and gloriously elegant in slow motion repeats. Having perfected what a friend described as my survival skiing technique which consisted in getting down the run in one piece with no trace of elegance and not necessarily always upright, I never had the motivation to try repeating the process on a board. But watching those girls and the men the day before I wish I had. Mind you I'd have been limited to jumps centimetres high compared to their metre high ones.

One of the things that makes it a better spectator sport compared to most downhill events is that, at least in the later stages, you are watching a race and not one individual competing against the clock.

Britain didn't have a single competitor in the men's event but in the women's Zoe Gilbert finished a very creditable 8th and would have done even better if she had not injured a knee in the later stages. British snowsport athletes have an uphill struggle when it comes to training and preparation and now the funding organization has gone bust.

Drambuie used to sponsor Scottish skiers, maybe one of the off-shore financial outfits that operate out of the Isle of Man where Zoe comes from could spare a few bob from their bonuses. Unless the fact that she was sporting a Poker Stars bunnet was not a personal fashion statement as it is when I wear mine on the golf course but an indication that she's already spoken for.

We're reaching the crunch point with the play. The set was moved into St Serfs yesterday and we are down there this evening for our technical rehearsal. One hour on the stage trying to make everything hang together for the first time is woefully inadequate but I suppose it's the same for everyone unless they have rehearsal facilities far superior to our own. Like NKAS for example but they are far away in time and distance and have nothing to do with this competition.

Performance is on Friday and fingers crossed I think it will be, if not excellent, then jolly good. I'm pleased with how it will look and sound and with the performances. The whole thing is about as close to the ideas I had in my head as it is reasonable to expect. But I'm not rushing to offer myself as a director again very soon if ever. Unfortunately I have some ideas and may not be able to resist for ever which is what I swear I would prefer to do.

Here's the latest manifestation of oddity on the stair. Is the lift and litter lunatic now revealing himself as a closet practitioner of witchcraft? When we get chicken entrails rather than a carnival mask perched on the wall light I shall start to get really scared.

Tonight may well be the first time that I have been inside the Carnegie Hall in Dunfermline. That seems a shocking admission for someone born and bred not much more than 10 miles away from it. But for we Langtonians Dunfermline was another country. Occasionally we had a family trip to Pittencrieff Park and visited the Abbey. I was bussed over for swimming lessons when I was at primary school and for a year I changed buses there when travelling between home and my Dollar Academy lodgings. But that's the extent of my intimacy with Scotland's ancient capital.

The hall doesn't look as though much has been done to it since it was built in the thirties. The interior reminded me strongly of the Adam Smith hall before it was transformed into the swish theatre that it is today though I think the Adam Smith was much more austerely decorated. I was struck by the orange tinted Gents clock above the auditorium right emergency exit. These were ubiquitous in the cinemas and theatres of my youth and one usually passed under one to get to the gents but I don't think the pun was intentional. I have a feeling that the Playhouse still sports one.

Of course I didn't go to the Carnegie Hall to look at the clock or the decor or to raise ancient memories but to a Fife Jazz Festival concert. I wasn't in the event wildly stirred by the Norrbotten Big Band nor by Ulf Wakenius and his quartet but I did very much enjoy the home-grown talents of Brian Kellock and Julian Arguelles to the extent that I succumbed to temptation and bought a CD. Who living in the shadow of the Pentlands could resist an album called The Nine Mile Burn Sessions?

PS You can catch the latter lads at the City Halls in Glasgow on Saturday 6th and at The Lot in Edinburgh on Sunday 7th.

I caught the tennis in dribs and drabs over the weekend. I saw the first set and a bit of the final before I went out in the morning and then managed to watch more after I came back from six hours set building. Tantalizingly I had to go out to a rehearsal at 11 points all in the third set tie-break. I had to quickly prevent someone there from revealing the result. But the result came quickly enough when I switched the recording back on - five minutes maybe.

A disappointing result but I'm sure that I can work hard at improving my groundling technique in time for the French Open. Scotland's next sporting disappointment will surely come on Sunday. I'll be set building again otherwise I might have been tempted to fly down to the Dryades for a "journée conviviale". A 9 hole scramble in the morning, lunch and Scotland versus France on the big screen in the afternoon.

The flashy DVD player/recorder that I bought primarily to see the tennis was nearly taken back to the shop on Monday because of a severe defect that caused it not to record as instructed and to scramble up the picture on a number of channels. Mysteriously it seems to have cured itself so I'm hanging on to it for a few more days to put its various functions through their paces and to record Scotland's defeat.

I suffered a little defeat of my own last night when I lost my rag with one of my cast. I had been determined to smile at all adversity throughout this production but alas a lass undid me.