Dept. of Really, Really Scattershot
Saturday, 2 March 2013 12:28 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kaffy_rThe Sun is Shining and I Must Too
As in, I must really, really do something other than play endless games of solitaire today. Posting is the first thing I can do to make myself feel as if the brain is actually working. So, in short order I can tell you things.
I finally finished Chapter 19 of Hearts & Moons and am working on Chapter 20. I have been working on this story for more than five years; I don't know whether that's a testament to my persistence, my lack of writing discipline and ability to plot properly, or all three. I can testify that the story has become something more than I expected it to be, back when I was first started writing it off a prompt from the gifted![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
cathica. I will finish it, but I suspect it will need massive early-chapter revisions once I do. Ah, well.
Speaking ofcathica, who does what I can not, she was featured in February as part of Women in Horror month on Colleen Anderson's blog. Anderson asks interesting questions, but I don't think it's possible to capture cathica's essence in such a short piece. If you haven't read her fiction over on Teaspoon, you should; she does have a dab hand at horror, but she's also damned striking at everything else, too.
Hmmm, what else? I attended a day-long workshop on union mobilization, which was extremely helpful. Our union has found a new office, so we are safe from the predations of the previous and very unstable landlord. I am reading a non-genre book, Beautiful Ruins by Jess Walter, as a work-connected exercise. I am reminded again of how difficult it is for me to read books that aren't science fiction, speculative, fantasy or poetry. It undoubtedly says a great deal about my inability to concentrate.
I also read Stormdancer, by Jay Kristoff. It's Japanese steampunk, but it's also a very good portrait of the way a 16-year-old girl might deal with a tough family situation, and a vivid painting of a polluted but vibrant world. Sadly, it's the first book of some sort of series, and it was just written last year, so I'm afraid I'll have to wait for the next one. I understand that the reviews on this are wildly divergent, with negatives dealing with issues of cultural appropriation, etc. Since fantasy is, to my mind, a morass - or a celebration - of cultural appropriations of all kinds, I'm going to stick to the story and say I liked it a lot.
For the second time ever, I went with BB and our good friendapostle_of_eris to Hausermann's Orchid's, in the Chicago suburb of Villa Park. Hausermann's is a family owned business that grows, distributes and sells orchids. Once a year, for two weekends, Hausermann's opens to the public, and apostle_of_eris, an orchid lover, introduced us to the place a few years back (I was last there in 2010).
As I said, Hausermann's grows and sells orchids (and the occasional bromeliad.) Nothing but orchids. Acres of orchids, of all genuses growing in tiny bottles before they are brought out to grow in rows and rows in the moist warmth of greenhouses ... big florid blooms, and tiny sprays that look like snowflakes or strings of pearls, lady-slippers of all types, from simple bedroom ivory to ballroom carnelian and gold, huge scarlet-orange explosions and ... PURPLE! Every possible shape of orchid in every possible shade of purple! I adore purple ...
It was wonderful - not least because, for me, the various aromas and fragrances are as much a draw as the beauty of the blooms. Sure, not all orchids have fragrance and some that do have fragrances you might not expect, but they smell!
There are so many words for smell, each with its own connotation: smell, odor, aroma, fragrance (I suppose it's a bit like the old saying that horses sweat, men perspire and women glow.) And normally, I would say that Hausermann's was filled with fragrance, because "smell" would seem so pedestrian.
But the word smell is also so direct. And the smells of those flowers - so fragrant sometimes, so surprising other times, sometimes so odd - spoke for themselves; they needed no compliments. They went straight to whatever part of my brain responds to smell, and they touched it. Caressed it, tickled it, punched it sometimes, then got right back to caressing it. So ... smell. I left Hausermann's giddy. Almost drunk with the smells. I'll go back next year for the smells. And the pretty. Here are a few pictures. (They're thumbnails, because they're rather huge, and the one thing LJ still has over Dreamwidth for me is ease of uploading pictures. Gah.)
Finally, there are birthdays I forgot and some birthdays coming up. But they deserve their own post.
P.S. Is it March 30 yet?
As in, I must really, really do something other than play endless games of solitaire today. Posting is the first thing I can do to make myself feel as if the brain is actually working. So, in short order I can tell you things.
I finally finished Chapter 19 of Hearts & Moons and am working on Chapter 20. I have been working on this story for more than five years; I don't know whether that's a testament to my persistence, my lack of writing discipline and ability to plot properly, or all three. I can testify that the story has become something more than I expected it to be, back when I was first started writing it off a prompt from the gifted
cathica. I will finish it, but I suspect it will need massive early-chapter revisions once I do. Ah, well. Speaking of
cathica, who does what I can not, she was featured in February as part of Women in Horror month on Colleen Anderson's blog. Anderson asks interesting questions, but I don't think it's possible to capture cathica's essence in such a short piece. If you haven't read her fiction over on Teaspoon, you should; she does have a dab hand at horror, but she's also damned striking at everything else, too.Hmmm, what else? I attended a day-long workshop on union mobilization, which was extremely helpful. Our union has found a new office, so we are safe from the predations of the previous and very unstable landlord. I am reading a non-genre book, Beautiful Ruins by Jess Walter, as a work-connected exercise. I am reminded again of how difficult it is for me to read books that aren't science fiction, speculative, fantasy or poetry. It undoubtedly says a great deal about my inability to concentrate.
I also read Stormdancer, by Jay Kristoff. It's Japanese steampunk, but it's also a very good portrait of the way a 16-year-old girl might deal with a tough family situation, and a vivid painting of a polluted but vibrant world. Sadly, it's the first book of some sort of series, and it was just written last year, so I'm afraid I'll have to wait for the next one. I understand that the reviews on this are wildly divergent, with negatives dealing with issues of cultural appropriation, etc. Since fantasy is, to my mind, a morass - or a celebration - of cultural appropriations of all kinds, I'm going to stick to the story and say I liked it a lot.
For the second time ever, I went with BB and our good friend
apostle_of_eris to Hausermann's Orchid's, in the Chicago suburb of Villa Park. Hausermann's is a family owned business that grows, distributes and sells orchids. Once a year, for two weekends, Hausermann's opens to the public, and apostle_of_eris, an orchid lover, introduced us to the place a few years back (I was last there in 2010).As I said, Hausermann's grows and sells orchids (and the occasional bromeliad.) Nothing but orchids. Acres of orchids, of all genuses growing in tiny bottles before they are brought out to grow in rows and rows in the moist warmth of greenhouses ... big florid blooms, and tiny sprays that look like snowflakes or strings of pearls, lady-slippers of all types, from simple bedroom ivory to ballroom carnelian and gold, huge scarlet-orange explosions and ... PURPLE! Every possible shape of orchid in every possible shade of purple! I adore purple ...
It was wonderful - not least because, for me, the various aromas and fragrances are as much a draw as the beauty of the blooms. Sure, not all orchids have fragrance and some that do have fragrances you might not expect, but they smell!
There are so many words for smell, each with its own connotation: smell, odor, aroma, fragrance (I suppose it's a bit like the old saying that horses sweat, men perspire and women glow.) And normally, I would say that Hausermann's was filled with fragrance, because "smell" would seem so pedestrian.
But the word smell is also so direct. And the smells of those flowers - so fragrant sometimes, so surprising other times, sometimes so odd - spoke for themselves; they needed no compliments. They went straight to whatever part of my brain responds to smell, and they touched it. Caressed it, tickled it, punched it sometimes, then got right back to caressing it. So ... smell. I left Hausermann's giddy. Almost drunk with the smells. I'll go back next year for the smells. And the pretty. Here are a few pictures. (They're thumbnails, because they're rather huge, and the one thing LJ still has over Dreamwidth for me is ease of uploading pictures. Gah.)
Finally, there are birthdays I forgot and some birthdays coming up. But they deserve their own post.
P.S. Is it March 30 yet?
no subject
Date: Sunday, 3 March 2013 01:36 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: Sunday, 3 March 2013 05:36 pm (UTC)Heh. It's a sort of low-key, stubborn, intermittent persistence, but it persists in persisting, and therein lies my eventual salvation. At least I hope so.
The orchids were ... I loved them this year even more than the last year I was out there. I don't remember ever being made quite so giddy by all the fragrances. (As for the pictures, BB was saying that some of the shots were really good, and I said, "Taking pictures of flowers is really cheating, because flowers don't take bad pictures. It's all the beauty of the flowers, and none of the photographer's skill." Still, it's wonderful to have the images as a way of conjuring the day up again.)
no subject
Date: Sunday, 3 March 2013 06:59 pm (UTC)Oh, I'm sure. You know, I only came back to fanfic writing and online fandom because I'd left a fic unfinished the first time round and I couldn't bear it - so, 8 years later, I finished it. I hope yours doesn't take you as long, but persistence is the thing, in the end, isn't it?
Well, the photographer can take some credit. It's still possible to end up with blurred things, stuff out of shot or in shot that shouldn't be! :-)
no subject
Date: Sunday, 3 March 2013 10:55 pm (UTC)Oh, you have no idea how much hope this gives me! (Also it makes me wonder whether you're my Internet Twin. *g*
It's still possible to end up with blurred things, stuff out of shot or in shot that shouldn't be!
Ah yes, the "thumb on the lens" school of photography. I am a master at that. Heh.