Here, in our Northern Bavarian cultural residence, we are no longer allowed to rehearse on Sundays. That in itself is not a bad thing, but overlooks the fact that if you work six days out of seven it might actually be useful to have a free day when you can get boring, everyday stuff done, like shopping, washing and the like. OK, you can wash on Sundays, but pretty much everything else is a no-no: museums and swimming pools are closed, shops barricaded up (well, they're not, as there's no vandalism here in Bayreuth, but you get the point). It was even more extreme when I moved to Koblenz in 1987: the weekend curfew began at 12 noon on Saturday (except for the so-called 'Long Saturday', once a month, when the shops stayed open until - wait for it - 2pm!) and encouraged hibernation until 9am, Monday morning. The idea is to encourage family life, and that is incontestably a good thing. The strange thing is that Germans have the smallest families in Europe, if they indeed have families at all; their birth rate is, along with Austria and Spain, the lowest in the European Union. Just had a nice Skype session with Mrs. Fingers. The Fingernails are both at friends' places this weekend, so my dear spouse is feeling particularly lonely at the moment.
This post is coming to you courtesy of a TMT Hotspot in the theatre. I'm completely alone in these hallowed Wagnerian halls; in fact, I don't even know whether or not I'm allowed to be in this particular part of the theatre campus, having reverse-opened a fire door to get here. I just hope no-one from security has seen it open and locked it again, then I really will have a solitary Sunday.
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