I was the first person to enter the departure lounge at Innsbruck Airport this morning after sailing through security etc. Mind you the check_in desk was so unprepared for their first customer of the day that they had no boarding cards or luggage labels in their machines..

Now the long wait for the Edinburgh flight after a lovely week in lovely Cortina.

I was accosted in the street yesterday afternoon by a Mormon missionary lady who asked what had made me happy that day.  I replied shamelessly yet truthfully - "drink".  Taken at lunch with some former workmates in a sufficent but not excessive quantity.

Many other things have made me happy in the last couple of weeks.  Scotland's amazing recovery in the Calcutta Cup match for example. Technically a draw but it felt a lot better than that.  Contrast our footballers in Khazakstan.  They need to bring in Davie Robertson from Real Kashmir to sort them out.

Ewan was here for a few days en route to ski in Austria.  While he was here we went to see the new stage musical version of Local Hero.  It was fun, if a trifle long but this was its very first performance so it will probably be trimmed.  According to Ewan the scene set in Houston needed a few stetsons and cowboy boots to give it a more authentic air.  He had various social engagements but the one pleasure he unaccountably missed was hearing my daily saxophone practice. Surely not intentionally.

As a measure of how long it had been since my last cinema visit, when I went to see Capernaum all the adverts except one were new to me.  It's a wonderful film.  Read the review I've linked to and go see it.

Another lovely film was Born Bone Born or Senkotsu in its Japanese title which is the custom that lingers on in some small islands of a family gathering together to wash the bones of a dead relative a few years after the death once most of the flesh has fallen away.

That sounds pretty grim but it was a delightful and frequently humorous family drama, and it made the bone washing ritual a respectful and dignified ceremony that one might like to experience.

In comparison to those films The Aftermath was a more familiar story of a couple whose marriage is on the slide.  There's a bit of extra-marital rumpy pumpy naturally but it ends happily.  The particular circumstances, their different feelings about the death of their child and the setting, the British administration in Hamburg at the end of the war are what gives it its flavour.  Not an unentertaining film but accurately valued by the critics at two stars.

I think two stars is what Claire has awarded Beauty and the Beast in her mind given her reaction or lack thereof to the performance at the Festival Theatre last week.  I thought it was better than that though I can't raise the delirious applause of the Telegraph's Ballet critic.

The SCO gave an interesting concert last night and as a woodwind player I could only marvel at how clarinettist Max Martin softly pulled long, low, dark notes from silence. Astonishing playing.  And he was only one (if perhaps the best) of a talented body of players.

A splendid musical weekend at The Burn was rounded off by this lovely snow scene yesterday morning.  Concerns were raised over possible travel problems but by mid afternon the snow had vanished not only off  the dykes but from the entire landscape.

I took a couple of pictures from indoors as well, of which here is one.

One of the talks I enjoyed most at last year's Book Festival was by the author of a book called Monsieur X.  I decided against buying the book at the time in favour of waiting for the paperback edition to come out.

Well now it's out and I've read it.

It's the tale of an upper class Frenchman who took on the might of the French state run betting organisation, the PMU, and made a killing, several killings in fact despite the PMU wriggling around to change its rules and the financial police sticking their noses in in an attempt to find proofs of his other little sideline as an illegal bookie to the toffs.

Now I've no interest in horse-racing or gambling but I loved the book.  It's a great story.  The author, no doubt with sales in mind, didn't reveal how Monsieur X's adventures finished and nor shall I.  It would spoil your pleasure if you read the book.

I've also just enjoyed one of last year's hit shows on the Fringe.  The good ones often come back in a reversal of the bad penny trope.  It was in Traverse 2 for the Fringe but was selling out in the much larger Traverse 1 last week.  Ulster American is a brilliant comedy in which an Catholic Irish American egotistical, over-acting, recovering alcoholic, Oscar winning filmstar has been persuaded by what he declares to be the best script he has read in a decade to come to London to appear in a new Irish play.

His meeting with the director and author is the setting.  He overwhelms the director with his intensity and physical presence driving him to declare that if Jesus held a gun to his head he would rape Margaret Thatcher with the caveat that horrible woman though she was she didn't deserve it.

When he discovers that not only does the author maintain that she and her play are British not Irish but that the hero he is to play is a Protestant bent on exterminating the Fenians, who he now discovers are Catholics he wants to abandon the whole project.

The director is equally upset by the author's insistence that the play is British and doubly upset when she admits to being a Conservative.  And he's desperate to placate the pair of them and keep the show alive.

It was brilliant and the denouement gasp provoking with an exceptionaly funny curtain line.

Manchester had the pleasure of my company for a weekend for the first time in years at what was styled a jazz workshop.  Organised by an outfit called Jazzsmart and led by Andy Scott, a well known player, composer and educator in the saxophone world there were about 20 of us.

On the Saturday we worked our way energetically through various pieces and all had a go or two at soloing.  The session was followed by a few drinks and a meal in Chinatown.

On the Sunday it all happened again (minus drinks and meal) with the very welcome addition of a rhythm section.  A couple of industry reps were in attendance with shiny new saxes for us to lust after and try. No sales were made as far as I could see but a number of appetites were obviously whetted.

We finished in time for me to catch an earlier return train than I had booked so I made my way briskly to Piccadilly only to find that the earlier train had been cancelled.  Indeed most trains to and from Manchester airport (where my booked train would originate) were being cancelled so I decided to get further up the line to hopefully connect with a London train.

I ended up in Preston with a London train connection some hours away, sipping a Leffe beer after casting aside the barman's warning that it was very expensive until my originally booked train arrived with my reserved seat intact.

Back home I had one of my periodic trips to Glasgow where I had a good lunch with Ian and Andrew at the Italian Kitchen followed by a tour of Tennent's Brewery.  The strange thing about the brewery was that no-one seemed to work there despite claims that millions of cans and bottles leave the place every week.  None of those millions were whizzing round the bottling lines which we were told were under maintenance.  Naturally we ended up in their bar supping the pint included in the tour price.

A couple of days later I had another pleasant lunch this time at the French Institute with Esther and Andy here for an astronomical conference.

James MacMillan is often described as Scotland's greatest living composer and to celebrate his 60th birthday the SCO programmed a concert featuring two of his compositions conducted by the composer himself.  The percussion concerto, Veni, Veni, Emmanuel is a great piece for anyone who enjoyed growing up banging toy drums and that must be everyone surely.  The choral piece, Seven Last Words from the Cross, which I hadn't heard before was lovely.

The Grads featured in the SCDA One Act Competition with a very amusing play called The Actor's Nightmare.  They did well enough to win a place in the next round. It's also at the Churchhill and if I go again I shall avoid the tempranillo which was dreadful.  Stick to G&T there is my advice.

Following on from the recent jazz weekend featuring Belgian jazzers we've had a Blues weekend.  I got to only one gig.  It was at St Brides, which incidentally was looking good.  I haven't been there for ages.  Anyway the gig was excellent though it was a bit of a slow burn for me.  I wasn't too excited by the first half but after the break there was a great band led by singer Nicole Smit.  She came on accompanied by drums and guitar and was joined as the gig progressed by the two musicians who had played in the first half.  I liked them much more as band members than as solo artists.