Category Archives: The Boy

Hello World…

… I am not dead, just busy. (And in a curious amount of pain, for some reason. It’s fine as long as I don’t move.)

The concert was lovely. As I expected I enjoyed myself immensely for the first half and played very well, with the overture standing out as particularly good. As I’d feared, though, I began wilting in the symphony. I aced and loved the first movement but the second movement was faster than usual, which was fine up till the fugue-type bit started by the cellos. As we came up to it I realized that there was no way I could do it at that speed so I just hung on and did what I could. Which wasn’t much, really, and it depressed me despite knowing that it was the speed and not my ability. The mood clung to me and I just couldn’t enjoy the scherzo and trio much, but I was bound and determined to enjoy the fourth movement, and I did, but only because I insisted on it.

Thank you to HRH, Ceri, Scott, Marc M, Marc L, Mel, Amanda, and Val for sharing the evening with us. I think the audience was at about sixty percent capacity, although it really seemed like more when everyone congregated in the hall for cider and cookies at intermission. I can’t even estimate actual numbers.

Now we have two weeks off. This may not be a bad thing, as I suspect the pain at the base of my spine is from sitting in the new chairs three times in four days.

I took my manuscript printout with me when I dropped the boy off at the caregiver’s yesterday, and betook myself to the cafe in which I used to write before we moved. I got myself a decaf latte and a brownie, then sat and worked on editing the manuscript for two hours. It was good to be out, in a silver of sun that slowly moved from my papers to myself, away from the distractions of the internet, my bookshelves, and the chores in the kitchen. I slashed and rewrote Chapter Three and some of Four, then came home and began transferring last week’s edits to the file. Chapter One and Two are mostly done now, with just one or two places I’ve marked to polish or check a fact. I think I’ll be doing the cafe thing again on Wednesday, except I may try a different location because the music was loud and not very conducive to my mood. Trying to listen to my MP3 player above the cafe’s music was worse, though. When I used to go there the staff was friendlier, and they played jazz.

It was so beautiful yesterday that I had the back door open while I was making dinner. Sparky and I were watching blackbirds from the back deck when we had a visit from a rather large plump squirrel. It climbed up the stairs and inched its way on to the deck looking at us expectantly, and I had visions of the thing turning ugly when I informed it that we were not serving. I also hoped that none of the cats were sitting in the middle of the kitchen floor, or they’d be outside like a shot. Sparky spent a lot of time between the car and the front door bending over to see the quarter-inch tall first signs of all the bulbs we planted last fall, poking at them and saying with great excitement that he could see the flowers growing. And we saw a robin, which was lovely too.

Spring is good. And it’s not going to take as long for all the snow to melt as we’d expected, because the temperature has radically readjusted and we’re looking at sun all week (Thirteen degrees today and Thursday! Sixteen degrees tomorrow!) with periodic clouds and scattered showers before light rain all weekend. The middle of the back yard is already mud and dead grass. The sun is doing wonders for my outlook.

Sparky and I are home together today and having a lovely time so far.

Friday Photos

Hurrah! This has been an extraordinarily good mail day. Not only did I get a CD I’d ordered for Liam and the ceramic poetry pendant I’d bought from a handcrafter, but the Fed Ex man just came and gave me the box of the newly redesigned Way of the Green Witch!

Every time I get a box of author’s copies I post a hero shot, and today is no different:

I’m sure Fed Ex guys have seen it all, but this one either truly didn’t notice or tactfully said nothing about the smear of hair dye on my jawline. Sigh. Figures he’d ring just as I was halfway through.

And as I’ve brought up the topic of my hair, I just have to say that I’ve been loving this cut. I especially love feeling the curls brush the back of my neck when I shake my head. I adore long hair, especially long curly hair, but I’d finally decided it was time to cut it after years and years of long hair. Last year I had four inches cut off in June (which translated to six inches shorter when the curls sproinged post-cut), then two in November, and now another three gone which translates to four and a halfish post-sproing. That’s almost ten inches hacked off in nine months, and no, my hair doesn’t grow very fast at all. I haven’t had hair above the shoulders in years and years. It’s certainly much cheerier and easier to care for. I’ve been asked for photos of my haircut, so here you are:

And a gratuitous Liam/Autumn picture too, taken when we were having so much fun a couple of days ago in the sun:

And, heck, why not, a hero shot of the boy to show off how big he is:

There are your Friday photos. I have no idea of this will become a regular thing; it’s just the second Friday in a row that I’ve posted pictures.

Eee!

Here is some film news that I know will be welcome to the other Hypatia fans among my readers (I seem to recall Fearsclave calling himself a drooling Hypatia fanboy, and I know there are others):

Filming is currently underway on “Agora”, a work directed by Alejandro Amenabar (“The Others”, “The Sea Inside”), that centers on the efforts of female philosopher and mathematician Hypatia to save the collected wisdom of Alexandria. Starring in the role of Hypatia will be Academy Award-winning English actress Rachel Weisz.

Hypatia! Rachel Weisz! Pardon me while I squee in an undignified fashion.

Jason writes more about it here at the Wild Hunt blog. There’s nothing much over at IMDB yet except a curiously off-centre plot outline that mentions nothing about the focal event of the story, the destruction of the Library of Alexandria. Please, universe, don’t turn this into a flat love story; there is so much richness that they can draw on in the form of politics, religion, and philosophy.

It’s shooting in Malta, which I know will interest my parents. There’s no formal release date, but I suspect it will make a late 2009 appearance.

Gratuitous Kitten Photos And News

Because what you all need is a dose of Vitamin Ktn on a spring Friday, I am sure.

I am forever shoving him out of the way so I can see the monitor and my work, or picking him up and dropping him onto the floor. When it gets excessively repetitive I throw him out of the office and close the door. If he’s in here and feels Kitten Narcolepsy coming on, he stumbles to my writing desk and passes out for an hour and a half.

Gryffindor exists in full-fledged Happy Battle Kitten mode pretty much all of the time. Got feet? I will chase them! Got a long sweater on? I will stalk it! Is that a bit of fluff? I will attack it! Are you breathing under that quilt? The movement must be caused by a Mystery Rodent! Is that a carpet? I will subdue it! Is that a rogue Cheerio or Rice Krispie? Nom nom nom.

He is fine with all the other cats, but Cricket still has issues with him and they scrap at least once a day. Gryff hides behind my cello in the corner if Cricket walks into the office. This is somewhat cute but mostly nerve-wracking, as a sudden move by either of them could topple the instrument. Two weeks ago I caught him happily leaping and scaling the soft case it was in. He hasn’t done that again. Ahem.

He is enthusiastically curious about everything, and insanely interested in water. He jumps into both the kitchen and the bathroom sinks when we’re using them. Gryff also perches on the edge of the full bathtub and inches his paws down the side to touch the surface. Splashing him with water doesn’t scare him off, either. He looks up with delight as if to say, “More! More! Splash me again!” I was brushing my teeth Tuesday morning when suddenly there was a kitten standing in the sink on his hind legs with one paw on my chest, the other darting into my mouth to catch the toothbrush.

Liam has appointed himself the Gryff Police. If the kitten jumps up onto a counter or the dinner table, or starts playing with a plant, the boy says, “I will stop him!” and runs at the cat, shaking a finger and saying, “No, Gryff, down from there!” A week or so ago he very seriously said to the kitten as it was being deposited onto the floor after an ill-timed leap onto the table during a meal, “No, Gryff, not when food is on the table.” Gryff has taken to Liam to such an extent that he tries to hide under the boy’s covers or bed when it’s bedtime. And when Liam has gone to sleep, the kitten sleeps outside his door.

And that is your Kitten Update. Would you like some coffee with all that sugar?

Sparky: Now With Wheels!

There were lots of fun things that happened this weekend, like trips to the farm, maple sugar, the boy’s very first Easter egg hunt, playing with his cousin, dinner out in a grown-up restaurant featuring a decadent plate of ice cream with real whipped cream and gourmet chocolate sauce… but I think one of the most exciting things that happened this weekend (certainly for HRH and I) was the triumphant acquisition of Sparky’s very first tricycle.

He wasn’t as enthusiastic about riding it as he was about petting it and taking it for walks and showing it off to people.

There’s a second-hand shop in the next town that I always hit for new coats, pants, shirts, and whatever else may be lacking in the boy’s ever-being-outgrown wardrobe. This time we got a new light spring jacket (not that he needed one; he has a raincoat and a perfectly good light spring coat, but this one had Dash and Mr. Incredible on it. Come on! How could I pass that up?), lined splash pants, and the tricycle. The trike was fifteen dollars. We were very impressed with ourselves. (Do you have any idea how expensive new tricycles are? It’s ridiculous.) Now we don’t have to introduce emotional stress into our godsdaughter’s life by asking her if she would be willing to pass along her old tricycle.

When we went downstairs to the garage to do laundry yesterday, he found the trike and wrestled it from the storage side to the laundry side. He wanted to bring it upstairs with us, and was very upset when I informed him that tricycles are not played with indoors. If things keep melting the way they’re doing out there, and the weather warms up just a bit more, then we can try the riding to the corner thing. Although I’m willing to bet that he’ll ride for a few feet then walk it along the rest of the way there and back.