Monthly Archives: November 2006

The General Novemberity Wearing Me Down

Matthew Cheney made me laugh today.

If you write about the weather, use as many adjectives as you can, or else your nouns will wilt and become adverbs.

Some coaches insist adverbs are stronger than nouns, but an independent panel of statisticians has proved otherwise. Despite appearances, though, statisticians don’t like nouns so much as they adore conjunctions.

The whole list of deliberately obtuse writing rules can be found here. And I found them via Justine.

Liam had a terrifying asthma attack late Wednesday night, triggered by a coughing fit in bed. The coughs compounded, and his bronchial tubes constricted, and then he started crying because he was upset and scared, and the whole thing just snowballed and got worse and worse. We finally got a shot of his inhaler contents into him after a struggle, which was surprising on its own because he usually loves his little mask, but he was having so much trouble breathing because he was coughing and crying that he wouldn’t let us put the mask up to his face. It took a while to get him to calm down enough to even give him a single breath of the medication, and then he still sounded awful all night. I lay awake all night listening to him over the monitor, and dealt with anxiety attacks the likes of which I haven’t had in about eight years, sourced only partially by the worry about the decision to not take him to the hospital. I hate this time of year. It’s wet, and damp, and there isn’t enough sunlight, and this year seems worse than others, somehow. I got quite ill the next morning, which didn’t help. HRH stayed home because neither Liam nor I were going to be able to handle the day otherwise, neither of us being very user-friendly or even available at times. I felt much better by the end of the afternoon. And I even made cookies, lovely excellent cookies from a newly tweaked recipe, which very closely resemble cookies from a long-gone bakery I used to visit now and again. (Basic shortbread ingredients and proprotions, being sure to use icing sugar instead of granulated, add one egg, plus loads of chocolate chips; chill for two hours; roll and bake. Once the fuses in the oven have been replaced, that is. You mightn’t need to do that last bit.)

But I had a wonderful, wonderful night of sleep last night, and a lovely outing this morning. I was dropped off at daycare with Liam and spent some time playing with him, his caregiver, and one of the other kids. I’ve missed this, since HRH has taken over the boy-chauffeuring job. I got to see Liam open the rabbit’s cage and lean in gently to kiss him, and Boo reach his fuzzy little nose up to kiss him gently back, several times. It was exquisitely cute, and did wonders to soothe the soul of Novemberity/sick/bad sleep ravages. Then I took the metro back and walked to the mall, picked up some sweaters for me and new PJs for the boy, and bussed home. The weather may be overcast but it’s so lovely and warm. It was a good day for an outing.

Since I’ve had the whole day to myself on Liam’s daycare days I’ve been trying to work as soon as he leaves, and this week has proven to me that I shouldn’t even sit down at the computer until after lunch. If I do, then the morning gets wasted anyhow, and I feel upset because I haven’t accomplished any work and half the day is gone. Well, at least I gave it a chance. From now on, the morning is for music and reading and walks. The afternoon is for work. If that’s how my brain has to separate things, then that’s how it’s going to happen. I get exactly the same amount of work done if I sit here for eight hours or three, so why force myself to be here for those first five if I can put them to other practical use?

Now I have web work to do.

Novella Update

Total word count, Il Maestro e le Figlie di Coro: 25,111
Total words Monday: 2,380

This part is taking a lot longer to explore than I expected it to, and it’s growing unwieldy and out of proportion with the rest of the novella as a result. I may just stop writing it and jump to the next event. This one is going to have to be broken down, focused, and interspersed with the others in order to give it the correct rhythm, and I can’t properly do that until there are others with which to give it context.

tearful the day

While I work I’m listening to the new Evanescence album The Open Door for the first time, and enjoying it more than I enjoyed the first album.

And then something in my brain that was paying attention to the music knocked on the other part of my brain that was writing, and said, “Excuse me, but we have a very well-done integration thing happening here, and it’s really very interesting. I think you should listen more closely.”

I know I’ve had music and masses on the brain for the past two weeks, but there’s really nothing like hearing Mozart woven into gothic rock, and woven in (thankfully) well.

fps Online Animation Auction

Every year fps: the magazine of animation holds an online auction of animation-related material in order to raise funds for charity. This auction’s proceeds will go to the Canadian Cancer Society for the second year in a row, as decided by the fps readership.

The auction goes live on Wednesday November 22 and runs for one week. You can see a preview list of some of the items available here, including original artwork, DVDs, books, CDs, and software. There’s also a direct donation button on that page that offers you the opportunity to donate to the Canadian Cancer Society via the fps parent company 5×5 Media, if you wish to contribute to funding support for those with cancer and their families without participating in the fps auction.

And a reminder: issue 9 of fps magazine is now available for download, which includes a review of the Pinky and the Brain Vol. 1 DVD set by yours truly.

Cautiously Optimistic

Well, today I don’t feel like passing out when I stand up. This is a definite improvement over yesterday.

For the purposes of appeasing posterity, a.k.a. my future need to check my records:

Total word count, Il Maestro e le Figlie di Coro: 22,731
Total words Monday: 1,275
Total words Tuesday: 2,340

Things have generally continued being less than stellar in the rest of my life. But at least there are new pages in the novella.

Musical PSA

Since so many other things got subsequently scheduled on the 18th (a.k.a. the night of my first concert this season) and no one can make it, I encourage everyone who wants to be at the upcoming Messiah concert to circle the date on their calendars this time. That date, once again, is December 16.

Maybe I’ll start including a footnote reminder of concert date, time, and location each time I journal about practicing or rehearsal, to keep it active in people’s minds. I don’t know how else to remind people of my concert dates. I announce them when I get them, which is usually six to eight weeks in advance, then again a week beforehand, and they’re always posted on the Currently Enjoying page. I don’t expect anyone not interested in the concerts to keep track of it or leave that evening free, but there have been a surprising amount of orchestra groupies this time who eagerly said they were going and then realised last week that they had double-booked themselves with various non-concert regulars in the meantime.

Edited to add: Okay, let me clarify because I can feel a couple of people getting defensive out there, which was not the point of this post.

a. I hate promoting myself. It feels like I’m pushing myself at other people and yelling “Look at me!” There has to be an easier way to do this.

b. Everyone has busy lives.

c. I don’t expect anyone to come to my concerts, ever. When someone does, I am dazed and grateful. When multiple individuals attend, I am downright jubilant and effusive in my thanks.

d. People tell me they want to attend, which I have to take at face value. I’m trying to find a method by which this can be made easier, and it’s just a fact that concert dates always slip people’s minds.

e. If no one can make it, I don’t take it personally. Not for the reasons you might think, anyway. You see, we hold concerts to make money in order to fund the orchestra. No audience, no ticket sales, no bank account to pay for rental of rehearsal space and operational costs, and so forth. Not to mention the very basic fact of no audience, what’s the point of holding concerts anyway, and if we’re not holding concerts what’s the point in preparing a programme? You see the problem.

So yes, people attending is a good thing, both for them and for the orchestra in general. And I like to have people attend; I like sharing what I do with others and offering them an evening of enjoyment. I specifically enjoy sharing what I do with people I know, because I can talk to them about it afterwards as they have a very different perception of the evening in general and the performance in particular. And my regulars all seem very upset that they overscheduled themselves, the sentiment of which I appreciate. It’s just unfortunate that everything seems to have fallen apart this time, and I like to think that it can be avoided in the future, for all the above reasons.