Good Friday, so I took the day off from the office, apart from a trip to Bristol Airport and back. Lunch was a truly excellent pâté de foie gras, followed by a crab. Tomato salad with David Quayle's excellent tomatoes. The thoroughly appropriate wine was an Alsatian Gewürztraminer (Edmond Rentz). In the evening, a purée of aubergines followed by a superb gilt-head sea bream. Evening music supplied by G F Handel: opera arias and duets sung by Sandrine Piau and Sara Mingardo. Who could ask for more?

As a complete and utter contrast, I finished the evening with Tchaikovsky's sixth symphony. To borrow and adapt Stravinsky's quip (applied originally to the person of Rachmaninov): 45 minutes of Russian misery. I love it it, and it stays after all this time as one of my very favourite symphonies. For a start, it is one of the few works where I welcome and enjoy all four movements. I cannot say that of too many symphonies, apart from Schubert's Unfinished and Bruckner's Ninth.