Three positive things...
Monday, January 31, 2005Let's see...
While waiting for something, I stepped into a pet store to look at the fish. (They also had bunnies!) I love fish...I find them restful, but...I hear they die rather quickly, and am too softhearted to deal with that. Oh, go ahead, laugh at me. ;) Anyway, there was a quartet of these chubby smaller than a fist but larger than usual Goldfish, with their mouths set in a perpetual, gentle, golden colored smile. And I walked to one side of the tank, and they followed me, then swam there, looking at me, smiling little smiles. Then I went to the other side of the tank...and they followed me, then sat and stared. I repeated this a couple of times...God, I was so tempted to buy all four...such loyal attention could get to a girl's head.
There was a sign outside...gosh, I so need a camera phone...I guess they didn't have a Q or an O, so the sign read "Duality Hay" And, having just read a book where there was a concept of duality as applied to quantum physics, I was like, woah. What kind of impact would Duality Hay have on a horse or cow?
The Anvil Chorus came on the radio, so my family and I went down the road, radio turned up, windows down, playing that! Eeeee! Such fun!
Now, for a question!
Ok, classical music lovers...please tell me, how do you remember the names of pieces? I mean, I can recognize a few...Bolero, The Moldau, Hall of the Mountain King, etc...but, so many I just can't. Opera arias I can, even though I don't understand the words, I can latch onto them...any secrets you can pass on so I don't sound completely ignorant? :D
Permalink Cindy scribed this at 4:52 PM
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Red on snow
Thursday, January 20, 2005Yesterday I ventured into the snow to check and see how the oil tanks are doing...the outside tank doesn't have a meter on it, I have to use a very long wooden fold up ruler to dip it once in a while. I noticed, very bright on the fresh snow, scores of feathers. Rust red and grey tail feathers, the dark grey of down, spread an impossible distance, the lightest coating of snow holding them in place and filling in fresh cat tracks. A small smear of blood was the only other evidence...I picked up some of the feathers, saddened, realizing it was probably Mrs. Cardinal, who I bore an especial affection for, having watched her and her husband cuddling together in trees, and him fetch her and feed her seeds and bread. Watching them I thought, that's the right kind of marriage.
Deer tracks are very thick in the snow...but none have sought shelter against the house this year. (Yet. Also, so far, they've not chewed much on the things they shouldn't.) Also, I saw a huge gang of turkeys...thirty at least...(If there are murders of crows, parliaments of rooks, terrors of sharks, is there a name for a group of turkeys?) pass my house. They supped on the hillside above, then went across for a leisurely drink. I love when they settle for the night, especially if it's snowed, because you can see these huge black blobs in the trees, hear the chucking of their gobbles as they get ready to try and keep warm and sleep.
Also am a very bad plant mother. My ivy died, and one of my Christmas Cactuses isn't looking very happy. The other one is thriving, though, blooming, even. I love watering plants. They smell green. And happy.
Two things I learned today:
Pre-mixed plaster in a bucket can get moldy and rot, rendering itself useless. And it sticks a real horror. Like rancid sewage.
Standing over a heating grate while dying your hair is not wise. (I wear glasses, and have to take them off to dye my hair, right? And there are only two mirrors in the bathroom...the one over the sink, which puts me too far away to see, and the one over the heating vent. So, I was standing on the heating vent, the blower came on, and blew a thickly coated piece of hair right in my eye. I screamed like a little girl for mommy, all the while flushing out my eye and saying intelligent things like, "Ow! *&^! Oooowww!" By the time she got there my eye was cleaned out, but I think she was happy that I still call for her when I'm really panicky. Urm.)
Permalink Cindy scribed this at 11:27 PM
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Okay, I shouldn't've laughed about the hair bit, but if I'm honest I must admit that I did. Erm, sorry. I hope your eye is okay, Cindy.
I believe it may be a 'rafter' of turkeys.
Time, Time, Time...
Wednesday, January 12, 2005I forgot to buy a dayrunner on my once a season trip to Wal Mart, and was feeling truly lost. I was coming up with all sorts of stand ins for it, even seriously considered marking up my Terry Pratchett calendar, until my mother, who should be canonized, went to the doctor and found that he'd put out a basket of them With His Compliments. Woot! Now I have a clear blue day runner...since those plastically jelly (is that what they are called?) purses may still even be in style, I feel so chic. I no longer have to rely on my rapidly deteriorating brain to remember Things that Need Doing. It does occur to me that I should take up drinking, at least I'd have an excuse for my actions...er, memory loss, but really, I think the problem with me is my grip of time seems to have disappeared. It slips away so very fast...and I always was absentminded.
Last night I finished Terry Pratchett's The Truth, which is about printing and newspapers coming to Discworld, basically. His humor is so gentle, he's hilarious, and yes, satiric, but it's not mean. And any book with Vimes in it is a favorite...and Death. I'm oddly partial to Death. I so need to find a copy of Hogfather...basically, it sounds like Death becomes Santa Clause. I'm not sure what's getting read next...next week I officially begin book reviewing again, but I was wondering if I should get a start now. Probably. The pile's already growing. I received 6 books today.
I edited today...and got to read the press release advertising my new position as managing editor at Fiction Addiction. :) So today's pretty good.
Permalink Cindy scribed this at 4:01 PM
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I never could get used to day-timers. Or dayrunners, if you prefer. They always run away from me. A pile of index cards works just fine for me. Strange? I dunno. Maybe, maybe not. Just different.
Good stuff on the press release regarding your new position! Yay!
*sighs, shakes head*
Tuesday, January 11, 2005Liz Burton posted this funny little article to the Zumaya group:
http://chronicle.com/free/v51/i19/19b00501.htm
She has a talent for finding the neatest stuff. While it has a lot of humor, it makes some interesting points abour selling books...
Today I'm going to attempt writing a world building class...I wrote a fairly well recieved article several years ago on world building, and decided to make a class out of it. But since I've said pretty much everything I had at the time, it's been a miserable experience writing something new and exciting that would be worthy of people's hard earned 15 bucks. So, I've decided to discard what I wrote and try again new. *eek* Sigh. I should have done the website tutorials instead...
Is anyone besides myself a little...saddened by the fact that INXS is part of a new reality show, created by the Survivor guy, where they're searching all over the world for their next lead singer? *sigh*
Permalink Cindy scribed this at 10:15 AM
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It's going to be awfully hard to find someone to replace Hutchins. But, yeah, a reality show? For that?! Bleah.
My mistake. Correction: Hutchence. O.O
Happy Birthday, Mr. Holmes!
Thursday, January 06, 2005Today is Sherlock Holmes Birthday! Had he existed, and lived to tell about it, he would have been...(2005-1854....) 151!
http://www.sherlockian.net/world/ includes lots of facts, including the fact that Sherlock never says "Elementary my dear Watson." That can be traced back to P.G. Wodehouse's novel PSmith, Journalist. You might be familiar with Wodehouse from the very funny Jeeves stories.
(Also, the birthday for Holmes was apparently decided by someone else, not Doyle. But it works in a pinch.)
Permalink Cindy scribed this at 11:28 AM
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Did I ever tell you that when I was in Jr. High, what they now call Middle School, and living in Thailand, I absolutely loved Sherlock Holmes? If I wasn't reading Holmes, I was reading about Frank and Joe, the Hardy Boys (I don't even remember how many of those books I owned, it was so many). And if it wasn't the Hardy Boys, it was an Agatha Christie book. I was very much into mystery novels at that age. I still like a good mystery, even today. I think Lawrence Block has to be one of my favourite authors in that genre.
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My house is set on a hill...one of my bedroom windows looks down a steep hill, over a thin strip of road, down more steep hill and trees, and down to the bottom of the valley, were a tiny ribbon of creek wends its lazy way down, a mile or so, under a highway, and continuing until it reaches the river.
Today, because it's been raining for several days, the ribbon is a rapids, over flowing it's banks, several times it's usual size. Part of my heart, the wilder part, glories is the too much cream coffee color of the waters, the little lace foam of the rapids.
It is the part of my heart that tells this story:
Once, the pixies made a nest in the crumbling concrete of a highway overpass...though the term was too grand, really, for the seven by twenty foot corridor that crossed over the tiny creek that the pixies once called home. It was a good nest, the babies seemed to enjoy the rumbling vibration of the vehicles passing over head. But recently, the waters rose, the splashing roar threatening the rare clutch of youngsters who would spread their wings, finally, after a gestation of ten years, and bring magic to the world.
Amberfgris knew she had to get someone big enough to wade in and carry the babies to safety, but who?
The other part of my heart wends it's way down with the water, too. But it does stop at the wash, it goes on, to the river, to the places it's flooding, to the people who lose so much. Furnaces destroyed, water sources damaged.
It tells a story more like this:
Mary watched as the waters rose mercilessly. She'd lost her job last year, but had been grateful that she owned the house free, knowing she'd never have to worry about being homeless. But now...everything was in doubt. The house could be saved, certainly, but would she be able to live in it?
As a writer, you're part fortune teller, part psychologist. Even if the future you're telling about couldn't possibly exist, you need to be able to see everything, all three sides of the coin. Its all about different possibilities and logical outcomes. But sometimes it really does kill the joy of things.
Permalink Cindy scribed this at 10:55 AM
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'allo, Cindy.
Nice to see you are still well, and I hope the coming years are just as pleasant.
Still looking forward to your books, and the link from your main page to this journal is broken. A simple problem, ostensibly-- I'm sure you'll figure it out.
Time passages...
Monday, January 03, 2005Saturday, I found out about the fabulous new direction Fiction Addiction, the website I've managed or moderated the forum of for...oh, three years(ish)? and that direction includes closing down said forum. I'm sad about this, because I met alot of wonderful people, but feel that my new postiton...as managing editor, is brillant, and will allow me to help would be writers in a whole new way.
But I still miss all the people at the forum. I'm sorry I didn't get to say goodbye, and I hope the ones who want to will keep in touch.
Permalink Cindy scribed this at 10:11 PM
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The ones who want to? Who wouldn't want to? Count me in as one who wants to.
Hey, this may be the old template, but I still like it. That cross is just grand.
At least you found out about it. I was a moderator too and I knew nothing until I tried to go there (having recovered from the Christmas holidays and got back online) to find it gone!
*nods* I tried to contact everyone, but couldn't get through. Sorry about that.
Do we know why Apryl did this? Having been around since the days of "Bella" (or was it delphi - which ever was first) I was very surprised that this happened - seems unlike her.
WillowFae
Not really. I think she just needed a change? I really don't know, dear...I do know it happened fairly fast. :(
g d townshende, at
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10:04 AM