Well this is a quick look at some of the places and faces of 2011 in roughly chronological order – starting with my birthday in Paris in January, and ending on Christmas day.  I notice that Dimi is there at the beginning and the end!

I’m struggling to remember what day it is.  They are all melting into a blur of studio time and late nights.  We have been surviving on pasta, pizza and red wine and right about now I’m ready to get home to my own food, bed and routines.  I am really tired, and I think all of us are coming down with colds.  Today is the last day in the studio, but we are behind schedule.  Unfortunately we haven’t had time to get any of the vocals done, which means more work at home.

Tonight we are going to play a concert, but without drums as the venue has no drum kit.  We tried to cancel it, but it wasn’t possible.  Tomorrow we make the 1,000 km trip back to Milan, and Dimi flies back to Paris the day after that.  That makes Friday the 30th, and thereafter New Years Eve.

Here are some photos from around the studio this afternoon.  We’ve had some nice sunny days, and it’s just cold enough.  This is a movie projector from the 1950’s that Stefano rescued from the scrap-heap when the local cinema closed down.  I was surprised to see it standing there on the grass, but it’s a pretty cool garden ornament.

We are having a very lazy relaxing Christmas day at Masseria Lobello.

The fire is blazing.

The Christmas tree lights are on.

Everything is quiet and dark.

We are stuffed and sleepy.  I can’t stop eating the leftover panna cotta in the refrigerator.

Pete and Dimi are waiting for the final verse of lyrics that need to be written.  In the meantime we have come up with a couple of ideas for the children’s album we want to record next year.  We are back into the studio tomorrow.

It’s Christmas Eve in Puglia.

It has been a beautiful sunny day and we are happy that we have got the base of most of the songs in the bag.  Two more days next week to do extras and overdubs.  This was in the studio at 10pm last night, getting the last song done.

For now, we are going to try and find somewhere open this late to stock up on wine and head to masseria lobello for a big xmas eve dinner and party with Tobia, Cecila and co.  Our brains are hardly in Christmas mode, but I think we’ve earned a little break.

In the last three days we’ve made it through 8 hours of studio rehearsal in Milan and a 12 hour drive yesterday down to Lecce, which is right in the south of Italy.  Are we ready to go?  Mmm, I hope so.  We are in an incredible studio and feeling very inspired, if not well rehearsed.  Last night we arrived at about 9pm and went out for a pizza.  Stefano’s car ran out of petrol, but luckily in the south here there are never any problems that can’t be solved: people are very friendly.  Here are some pictures of Campi, which is about 15km from Lecce.

There is so much history here, with the city of Lecce dating back over 2,000 years, and the region is full of Baroque architecture.

My brain is in a bit of a Salento red wine fog from last night so please excuse my lack of ability this morning.  We’re sleeping in a super little wooden cabin outside by the pool.

It’s a very nice place to wake up in the morning.  No sun today but not soooo cold.

It is very flat in this area.  This is my third visit; last time I was here was on the way back from Sicily in August 2009.  It was 42 degrees and hot hot hot.  I could have done with the pool then, on this visit it’s not going to get a jump in.

This is a photo of the studio taken from their website: http://www.sudestudio.com/

It’s very impressive.  The recording room is enormous.  Today we are setting up; it takes a long time to get everything ready to record so I have plenty of time on my hands.  In fact, in the hanging around studio time and driving time we have just had I made a new pair of black fingerless gloves for Pete.  However, when both he and Dimi tried them on in the car it was clear that they were Dimi’s rather than Pete’s because they fit him perfectly.  So Dimi has warm hands, and I am pleased, and Pete less so.  I have a big bag full of wool to keep me occupied while I’m waiting, but perhaps I ought to go and help, or finish the lyrics.

I started crocheting before the summer with the plan to make a crochet bikini.  I found a pattern on the internet from 1971, bought some yarn from the Friday market on our street, and set to work.  I found that it is much harder than you’d (well, I’d) imagine to make a crochet bikini.  A couple of attempts worked out either massive or ridiculously tiny, and one attempt I just couldn’t fathom how to get it finished up right.  The pattern from 1971 was somewhat hard to translate into my language.  I tried some other patterns on the internet, and realised half way through that there is a difference between American crochet directions and British.  So in the end I accepted defeat.  Perhaps it was a sign, because this summer I didn’t manage to get one single swim.  Maybe next year I’ll try again.

I started with the squares as a practice and planned to make a cushion cover.  One day as I was sitting here merrily crocheting away someone jokingly suggested that I should make a cover for my bass amp head.  Well once an idea as cool as that takes hold it can’t be removed, and today, after hours and hours of crocheting and planning, I finally stitched the whole thing together.  I am incredibly happy with my little project; it’s far better than a boring cushion cover (perhaps I’ll still make some though).

I still have a little bit of yarn left over and I want to make some little chickens.  I already made one, and then I spitefully killed it in a moment of insanity, but that’s a whole other story.