Weekend enjoyable and my husband still impresses me after nine years of marriage. On Saturday we went down to Somerset to see his parents - his mum's birthday. We had a lovely lunch in a remote pub on the Levels, 15th Century, with a beautiful log fire, twinkling fairy lights, lots of real ale and delicious food. Strolled round the lovely village church afterwards, full of interesting history.

Sunday up early to face a day of cold, howling wind and driving rain. Reluctantly drove down to Margam Park for the RNLI Reindeer Run - Andrew more and more dispirited with every mile we travelled. Each competitor was offered a free pair of reindeer - mysteriously, he declined (sweet old fogey that he is). By the start, I was battling with the umbrella, and the rain was driving horizontally from the sea up past the steel works. Anyway, he lined up and he ran. I stayed in my spot, having squelched through deer poo and mud, progressively fighting the brolly and leaning into the howling drizzle, when every so often a pack of muddy reindeer wearing apparitions would appear in the gloom, thunder past and then disappear in a cloud of Deep Heat, including Andrew, who was smiling broadly as he ran. Eventually the handful of spectators stumbled back to the cars and he appeared with his goody bag, having run a spectacular time of 55 minutes, which was excellent given the slippery going, gale force winds, cold and steep hills (not to mention the deer poo). He was delighted and elated and muddy and I was delighted and elated and soggy. So we sat in the car and steamed our way home where he leapt in the shower and then spent the afternoon deservedly reclining on the sofa. What a star. I attach a photo.

Now I can write about the Ring. When I had cancer, I promised myself that if I survived, there were two experiences I particularly wanted - one was to visit Dollywood, the other was a Ring Cycle and over the past four nights we've done it in Cardiff at the Millennium Centre. The auditorium is lovely with good accoustics, giving a very crisp sound. Prince Charles was in the audience on the final night,but without his new wife, perhaps it's not her thing. There are several reviews floating around in the press - I would summarise the experience as wonderful orchestra, singing good in parts but the staging was a complete nightmare with the set being so totally incomprehensible that I simply don't know where to start in trying to describe it. The production was done by the Mariinsky Theatre, St Petersburg and it was interesting to see the stylistic differences. In particular, the singers all adopted that declamatory style that has fallen out of fashion in the UK. If you've ever seen Blackadder Third, the episode with the actors, then you'll be able to perfectly picture the manly stance, legs apart, chest expanded, head high and arms in that peculiar theatrical hold that nobody in real life ever actually uses.

What can I say about the music though? If you closed your eyes it was sublime, quite literally giving me goosepimples at times, making me nearly cry at others, exciting and intense. My head is full of it, ringing with the sound of it still. There was an elderly gentleman sitting next to us, who explained at one point that he had even seen the Ring at Bayreuth, and his mother had also, but in the process she had become a "Wagner nut" as he affectionately put it. The trouble is this music and the characters are so powerful how do you go back to anything ordinary after that? It is addictive and I am already wondering how I can get my next fix. I sympathise entirely with his mother - becoming obsessive is a very real danger. If I did, my daily life might be difficult though - thinking about routines would be difficult with a head full of dwarves and dragons and love and betrayal and warriors and swords and armour and horses and all the other wonderful things that happen.

On a more prosaic note, the surtitles were gloriously fouled up with frequent error messages, little link to the story (they kept jumping ahead) and the most inappropriate slangy,casual language used - very much textspeak. Textspeak has its place - I use it myself enthusiastically when texting, but it isn't right for characters in complex moral dilemmas, or life and death choices. And although my knowledge of German is nearly as extensive as my knowledge of football, I know Wagner didn't write sentences as flat and prosaic as - Wotan, pay ur debts now - Rheingold or It's all over and I don't care - Gotterdamerung.

I will do a separate post about the Ring Cycle as it deserves it. A weekend, continuing as I write, of howling winds and torrential rain. Much colder too. Last Thursday husband had the day off and to our enormous excitement a delivery of two trees arrived. Firstly, our multi stemmed silver birch Jacquemontii which has the most beautiful white bark and an elegant fountain shape. Secondly, a slender rowan which will have red berries. Both were planted and the garden lights then cabled up so are now working. Wow. Not sure if I can take photos in darkness to illustrate the effect but will experiment. When it stops raining I will take a photo of the trees in daylight. When dh went to buy the cable, not surprisingly he succumbed to the lure of more plants. He got another couple of beautifully coloured cornus and two climbing roses, one of which he remembers being very much loved by his Nan, which is a lovely happy association. We have also been experimenting with top dressings on the raised bed. We had considered glass but that seems to be too disco even for us - so we currently have little circles of a green chipped stone around some of the plants. It doesn't look too much like a municipal cemetery thankfully so we may get some more. He also bought a winter jasmine - they aren't rare but they are lovely and I like them for their cheerfulness in a dark time of the year.

Because the purchase of the green chips needed a visit to a diy shed, we also looked at Christmas lights. Those who know me will know that I would be delighted to have a house looking like the strip in Las Vegas, hopefully visible from space. My dear one has unaccountably more restrained tastes and even threatened me at one point with a Martha Stewart christmas when I was getting tiresomely over-excited. This is one of the those marital testing points that you have to negotiate. At the time of writing, a flashing snowflake is hanging on the front of the house with a static tree shaped light to be erected also. After that, who knows what will follow? Watch this space.