It's a very wet day here, the first for weeks. It will probably rain for all of June now, to maintain the average West of Scotland level of damp.

All of my free time's been taken up recently with a big research proposal, but today I'd better also do some preparation for next Wednesday's concert at Hatchlands with Kathy Fuge, when I get to play the John Player virginals that once belonged to Charles II.

If you're in Scotland, make sure you watch this on Friday: what's not obvious from the trails on BBC2 here is that the film is by Thomas Riedelsheimer and the music by Evelyn Glennie and Fred Frith, the team behind this. Thanks to Fred for the heads-up on that one.

A useful tip from a different Evelyn in my Alexander lesson this week: even if you're right-handed, put your mouse on the left hand side of your computer keyboard. It will then be much closer to the QWERTY part of the keyboard (there's no number pad on the left to get in the way) and your mouse-using arm will be less extended when doing all the fiddly repetitive movements that it has to do. The side-effect is that it also makes you use the mouse less, and keyboard shortcuts more, which in the long run speeds you up.  Assuming that your software is well enough written not to be too mouse-driven of course ...