Category Archives: Words Words Words

Hat Wiktory!

I have finally — finally! — finished Bodhifox‘s hat. It sat alone and feeling unloved for two weeks. I finished the second earflap at Ceri’s house on Saturday (to where I gratefully escaped from my House of Sick Persons, feeling temporarily better myself: I did my hair! I put makeup on! I left the house! When you’re sick you feel like this will never happen again, so it was a big deal.) I’d have done the i-cord and tassel there too and been finished two days earlier, but I discovered that I hadn’t brought along the tiny remaining ball of bronze yarn. (Argh!)

So this morning, the first thing I did after checking e-mail was to look up the instructions how to knit an i-cord (how beautifully simple, I may knit nothing but i-cords when I need to relax), then make the tassel, and attach the betasselled i-cord to the hat. Et viola (as Fox himself would say)! One Jayne Cobb style hat, done in Ravenclaw colours!

Here it is, perched on my metronome and stuffed with a tote bag, looking slightly wonky:

I’d wanted to line it for warmth, but it’s late enough in winter that I’m just going to send it as-is and let him decide if it needs lining. So now I will pack it up and get it out to the post office in the next couple of days.

Happy Imbolc, Fox!

Imbolc Poetry Web 2009!

Every year on February 2 a web of poetry winds its way through the Internet in honour of Brighid, the Celtic goddess associated with inspiration and poets. This year’s invitation is here, reproduced on blogs and journals across the world; the original blogger who began the annual tradition says of it, “Why? Some poetry is warming. It cracks the ice in the heart of the Earth to remind her that spring is just around the corner. Or … if you live south of the equator, choose poetry to cool the heart of the Earth so as to remind her fall is coming.” The blog that first introduced me to the poetry web and reminds me of it annually is Pandora’s Ephemera Ephemerae.

Brid is the goddess to whom I am sworn, and that’s probably not a surprise for those who know how much music, writing, and art mean to me. I figured she would be much too obvious and so I looked everywhere else when starting on my spiritual path, until I realised that Brid was bashing me on the head with the proverbial Divine clue by four. I love participating in this poetry web every year. The idea of poems, pictures in words that capture something emotional that prose handles very differently, twining throughout the Internet enchants me.

This is my poetry offering this year.

    It was a hard thing to undo this knot.
    The rainbow shines but only in the thought
    Of him that looks. Yet not in that alone,
    For who makes rainbows by invention?
    And many standing round a waterfall
    See one bow each, yet not the same to all,
    But each a hand’s breadth further than the next.
    The sun on falling waters writes the text
    Which yet is in the eye or in the thought.
    It was a hard thing to undo this knot.

    ~1862, Gerard Manley Hopkins
    “It was a hard thing to undo this knot”

Do you have a poem you’d like to share? A favourite? Something that speaks to your soul right now for some reason? Or perhaps something you’ve written yourself? Take the invitation and spread it far and wide, with joy. For the web of poetry to be connected in cyberspace as well as the world and our hearts, all I ask is that you link back to this post and to the original invitation to help others find it. If you post a poem, leave a comment here with a link to it (if you can, yes, I know there are issues with the comment box not being available off and on), and leave a comment with a link to it at the other poetry posts you read today, too, in order to help weave the web. Enjoy exploring the poetry by following the links you find.

Have a blessed and healing Imbolc, Gentle Readers. The flame in our hearts burns steadily against the coldness of the world. Every poem, every new word set down lights another candle against the darkness.

What I Read This January

Ruled Britannia by Harry Turtledove
The Art of WALL*E by Tim Hauser
The Art of Ratatouille by Karen Paik
Coraline by Neil Gaiman (reread)
Tales of Beedle The Bard by J.K. Rowling
On Writing by Stephen King
All the Windwracked Stars by Elizabeth Bear
The Sister by Paola Kaufmann
How To Knit by Debbie Bliss
The Knitting Workbook by Debbie Bliss
Mr. Darcy’s Decision by Juliette Shapiro
Wishful Drinking by Carrie Fisher

I could have sworn I read more than this, but that may be because I’ve got two short story collections and a novel on the go that aren’t finished yet as well.

In Which She Flails Incoherently

The Exciting Thing from this past Wednesday has been embargoed till next Tuesday, which means I have to sit on it until then, damn it.

I did, however, just do a follow-up call to someone I don’t know (oh, how I hate cold calling) and not only did I get put right through to the guy, but he was at his desk so I didn’t have to leave a likely-to-be-ignored message, and I wasn’t put on hold at any point. (In this business, that’s miraculous. Especially last thing on a Friday afternoon.) I was therefore able to obtain confirmation of next Tuesday’s Cool Thing and finally firm up the details. And it turns out that it’s even better than before, because (a) it’s twice as long as we’d initially thought (!!!), and (b) as a result of the scheduling I get to do this with a very cool partner who wouldn’t have been otherwise available.

Now I have to sit here and engage in cooled-out flailing all by my lonesome. At least it’s cooled-out flailing, and not panicky flailing. I am past the panic, and am thoroughly cooled out.

ETA: You know, it’s ironic: half my readers will be equally cooled out, and the other half will be, “Huh? What? Why is that exciting?” and dreadfully disappointed when the embargo is lifted. I reserve the right to squee in my own journal about stuff I find exciting!

Apropos Of Nothing

Someone bring me a margarita. A proper one, with the ice all crushed in it.

No, nothing to celebrate. I just think a nice, cool, lime margarita would go down really nicely about now. Good for the throat, you know. Oh, hey, if we need a reason, how about we celebrate the fact that I m upright and functional?

I just did a bunch of author maintenance stuff. Now, back to the anthology ms.

Friday!

Not that it makes much of a difference in my world, but it is.

I am feeling much, much better than yesterday. Eleven hours of good sleep count for a lot. The pain in the throat/sinus area has diminished to a much less distracting level without me having to throw ASA at it, although it is still somewhat swollen, and although I am achy (as usual) I don’t have to fight the yawning void of lassitude that was sucking at me yesterday. Or at least I don’t have to fight it as hard. So, back into the editorial fray! There is work to be done! Also, I get to invoice for some work today, which is always fun.

I have not knitted in a week. How odd. It occurs to me now that knitting is something I could have done yesterday afternoon when I dragged myself off to bed.

Oh look; it’s snowing again.

I Am Mighty

To my astonishment, the publisher has agreed to give me to give me pretty damn near what I’d asked for fee-wise for this anthology project. Not only that, the deadline has been extended so I’m not requiring my contributors to cram this into the next two weeks, and I don’t have to try to collate and edit the entire book by an equally insane deadline. Huzzah!

I also finished my first draft of yesterday’s assignment and it’s off waiting for the editor (a different editor, that is; ooh, the glamour of freelancing) to look at it. I also practised the cello. (Treble clef; good gods. Lots of it. And lots of little notes to a single bow in the Hebrides overture. Eep. The 7/8 handles well in that range, I have discovered.) I even tried changing the two lower strings on the 7/8 to the ones my teacher lent to me to see if that improved the projection and balance on the lower end, but they sounded scary and vaguely piano-like and the tension was completely out of whack with the upper two, so I changed them back. The luthier has given me an appointment for next Friday night, so that’s good. (In more ways than one: I’d originally asked for tomorrow night, but if this is indeed the Martian Death Plague, as the unfortunately experienced Mousme suspects, tomorrow night wouldn’t have happened.)

And now, because I have edited a new submission and one of the existing ones, I have accomplished more than what I set out to accomplish today, and I am going to go lie down. Because wow, do I feel woozy.