Talking Tolkien

The picture above is of my friend Luisa, at Andy's and Christine's bbq on the weekend.


As I mentioned yesterday, Helen and Alec are visiting from the UK (they are moving to Amsterdam soon). Here is Helen's Guest Blathering:

---

Guest Blatherer: Helen Waters

Tuesday, June 26th is an important day for a couple of very important people: it's my brother's 34th birthday and my friend Helen Vincent is getting married. Next to my parents, these are the two people I have known the longest.


Helen Vincent and I went to the same play group (kindergarten), along with my brother Michael: he is only a year and day older than me, and we were often mistaken for twins, much to our disgust.


All I remember about Play Group is that we went there every Friday morning for several years (or at least, it seemed like it), and one day a policeman and his anthropomorphic bolisha beacon came to teach us about road safety. My mother has a photo of that day. All the little pre-schoolers are sitting in a big circle paying rapt attention to a policeman and his ventriloquist road sign... except for me. I'm clinging in terror to my mother, who was a volunteer there. Maybe that bolisha beacon didn't really move it's great yellow orb of a head, and likely it didn't speak anywhere but my nightmares, but certainly, it was the scariest thing I'd seen since Raggety the scary stick-creature from Rupert Bear.





Thirty years later, my brother lives in Stoke-on-Trent with his wife and 4 year old daughter, Helen Vincent will become Helen Manning on a Caribbean island, and I still have trouble crossing the road.


I'm very happy to be in Canada, especially since we're off to the cottage today, but sorry I can't be with Helen and Anthony to wish them a long and happy life together, or with my brother on the one day of the year I can say to him: HA-HA YOU'RE TWO YEARS OLDER THAN ME!!

- Helen

---

Back to regular Blatherings...


After I posted the bbq pics online, I got quite the shocking e-mail from my system administrator, Bryan Fullerton, letting me know that electricpenguin.com files were taking up 175 MB. Holy toledo. Fortunately Reid was kind enough to take over hosting of the bbq pics, which he added to his own. You can see them here. Bryan says that most of the 175 MB consists of our active logfiles.


Reid, by the way, is trying to read Lord of the Rings. Influenced by Luisa's enthusiastic "sprinkling of little Tolkien books all over the house", my LOTR journal and the upcoming LOTR movie, he is even making his progress public in his own discussion group. Feel free to post some encouragement or heckling, whichever you find more appropriate.


Speaking of Tolkien, I've created a new section in the message boards called Talking Tolkien (Reid's forum is in this section). And as I mentioned yesterday, Allison is starting up a reading group for The Silmarillion. Wow, lots of interest...nearly 60 new members in the past 24 hours.


For those of you wondering whatever happened to The Bryan Project, never fear. I'll be posting one or two more things on the site soon, including an *interview with Bryan's mom*.









Watched "Almost Famous" on DVD last night with Helen and Alec. Alec hadn't seen it before, and the rest of us didn't mind seeing it again. I had to crash before it ended, I was too tired. And this after taking a hefty THREE HOUR NAP in the afternoon. I've been doing a lot of napping lately, if you haven't noticed already. Jeff's theory is that I'm finally starting to actually Relax and am catching up on Relaxing after the months/years of Not Relaxing.


We're going to the cottage today for a few days; I'll have more of a chance to practise napping there as well. :-) I'm hoping to get Helen and/or Alec to post a Guest Blathering, perhaps even later today.


Updates/news:


(CNN) A Supreme Court ruling favours freelance writers.


Scott has finally updated his Scribbles!


Today's Blatherpic:


- Luisa, at Andy's and Christine's bbq last weekend.


- a bunch of pictures Helen found for her Guest Blathering.


- Helen and Alec.

Feel free to suggest a daily poll question.


Today's Poll:

Do you sleep on planes?

racism

I was the only Asian person in my class throughout grade school and high school. Non-Caucasians were a rarity out in the suburbs back then, so much so that during a murder investigation, a policeman came to talk to me because it wsa rumoured that the murder suspect had been briefly seen in the company of an "attractive female of Asian descent". When this finally dawned on me, I was flattered and horrified and amused all at the same time.


Despite the universal WASPishness of my hometown, I encountered very little racism. Or perhaps I didn't recognize it for what it was. Ironically, I see much more evidence of that sort of thing nowadays than I ever did back then, not sure exactly why.


No one likes to admit they have racist tendencies.


I cringe at sweeping generalizations about a particular ethnic group. Even when statistics may comprise a grain of supporting evidence, ridiculous conclusions are often drawn, usually as an excuse to say something negative about a particular individual or group. Sometimes these generalizations are made by individuals I had thought rational and well-educated.


But enough ranting on that topic.


Updates: Helen and Alec are visiting with us from the UK, and we'll be going to the cottage tomorrow. I've updated My Life In A Nutshell. I've finished Lord of the Rings! Allison's starting up a Silmarillion reading group on message boards, for those interested.


Today's Blatherpic:


- From a land deed belonging to a friend of mine (who inherited it from his grandfather). I was shocked to see that the document was dated in the 1960s.

Feel free to suggest a daily poll question.


Today's Poll:

Are you (even slightly) a racist?

bbq

Good food/friends day yesterday. Brunch in the morning at Grapefruit Moon with Parki, Bryan, Lindsay, Wendy and Jeff. Bbq at Andy's and Christine's in the afternoon. Evening drinks and snacks at the Liberty with Helen, Alec, Amanda, Sandra, Scott and Ron.


I had to miss Andy's and Christine's bbq last year because of the Inkspot deal negotiations. Had a wonderful time this year, seeing old friends, feasting on barbecued salmon and swordfish steaks, playing with the kids out in the backyard (see photo at top of page). I'll be posting some photos over the next while. You can also check out this photo gallery, which Reid was kind enough to host.


I recently began experimenting with a program called iView, which will make it much easier for me to keep track of all my digital photos. It also enables me to easily create online photo galleries like the one linked above; I plan to make use of this for future con pics. :-)


Dead tired today. I'd like to see the Gay Pride Parade on Yonge Street, but suspect I'll end up napping this afternoon instead.







Today's Blatherpic:


- Elspeth, Justine, and Jennifer at the bbq.


- Andy, cheerful bbq host.

Feel free to suggest a daily poll question.


Today's Poll:

Have you been COMPLETELY honest in every single Blatherings poll question you've answered so far?

fashion crimes

I remember how intimidated I was when I first met Jeff's side of the family, especially the Ridpath women. Tall and slim, each of them could have stepped out of the pages of a fashionable women's magazine. Carrying themselves with natural grace and poise, their clothes (whether casual jeans or floor-length evening gown) exuded good taste and elegance...I always felt like a bit of a country bumpkin when I was in the same room.


Jeff's mom took us to Niagara-on-the-Lake this week for dinner and a play ("Picnic", which was excellent). It was somewhat chilly, so I had brought my leather jacket. When we left the restaurant, my mom-in-law retrieved my jacket from the coat check for me. She handed it to me with a laugh, saying, "I knew this coat had to be yours...only you would wear leather in June."


She said this with affection, of course, but I admit feeling a brief twinge of embarrassment, as if I had just belched loudly in a high-class restaurant. And then I wondered why it was so wrong to wear leather in June. I've never been able to master all the complicated rules of the fashion world (and to be honest, just haven't had the motivation to try); I'm sure I've committed more fashion crimes than most people. I wear black in spring, white in winter, socks with sandals, and carry a backpack with a skirt. My standard dress in university was track pants and a sweatshirt, with running shoes. I have little patience with hair-fussing, so generally let my hair air-dry after a shower, combing it with my fingers if I don't have a brush handy (which is frequently). I'd much rather spend the extra time checking e-mail one more time, finishing a few more pages in the book I'm reading, noodling on my harp.


I'm such a geek girl.


The clothes I do like the most tend to be the most comfortable and fraying around the edges (because I wear them all the time), or too over-the-top to wear except on rare occasions (my fave "formal" piece of clothing is a tight-waisted flared black velvet jacket with gold embroidery and tiny sparkly bits embedded into the cloth...I bought it for $12 at a vintage clothing shop on Queen Street).


When we were growing up, my Mom made most of our clothes. I still have clear memories of her bent over the sewing machine, cutting and hemming, holding pieces up against us to see if the size was right. She'd comb through sewing shops, looking for fabric sales. Our clothes may not always have been the height of fashion, but I suspect my parents were more concerned with getting clothes on our backs rather than making sure we were in style. I do still cringe when I see childhood photos of my lopsided grin staring out from a younger self clad in mismatched plaid and crooked horn-rimmed glasses, but the grin is genuine, supported by a happy childhood and much love.


Although I didn't appreciate it properly back then (what child does??), I am grateful now, thinking of all affection and time my mother put into each piece of clothing she made for Ruth, Jim and me. I still have a few pieces left, but can't bring myself to ever throw them out, no matter how worn or out-of-style they may be. Maybe someday I'll learn how to quilt squares of the pieces of fabric together into a comfort blanket. Even grown-ups need comfort from time to time. :-)


Going out to brunch with some friends this morning. Hm. Looks a bit chilly out; better get out that leather jacket...

Feel free to suggest a daily poll question.


Today's Poll:

Do you consider yourself fairly well-dressed compared to most people?

writing again

To you filkers out there: If you haven't already, be sure to check out Andrea's Housefilk Info page. Many thanks to Andrea for researching and maintaining this resource!


Worked on my song collaboration with Andrea yesterday. This project is a fun challenge for me, since I don't do songwriting collaborations that often. I've never been that great at the "Rand and Adam" type of songwriting process, where you work on a song with the other person in the same room. (Speaking of Ookla The Mok, Adam recently posted an amusing Marcon report online, for those interested). However, I think it would be fun to do more collaborations by e-mail and smailmail, with exchanges of music files and cassette tapes.


Created some more Filemaker databases to help with my novel prep. I've designed them so I can use them for any other fiction novels I'm working on. I'm not a Filemaker expert, but part of the enjoyment of the process for me is learning more about the program through practical application, working on projects that I'm actually going to use. Since my deadline isn't really until September (end of our sabbatical), it leaves more room for experimenting with bells and whistles.


I have four databases so far: character description, society and culture, background info, and a basic plot outline. Each has its own subtopics. Each character record, for example, has fields for a name, brief summary of who they are, appearance details, motivation in the story, basic relationship with the other characters, conflict, and miscellaneous notes.


This may seem like overly elaborate prep for a YA novel (YA = young adult), but I figure it's worth experimenting. I don't tend to remember certain types of details well, and as a result often have to go flipping back through previous chapters to look up nitpicky info again, so I don't have one of the characters' hair change colour halfway through the book, or forget to tie up a loose end in the plot.


As I create and fiddle with these databases, I'm also working on my actual novel prep. Each project helps with the other...I'll be fleshing out a particular character, for example, and realize that there should be a section where I can describe the fact that she's crazy about 60s kitsch, or named her dog after the star of an obscure movie she saw in fourth grade, and so on.


Yes, I know I'm supposed to still be on my sabbatical. :-) But I'm finding that I can't NOT write. My Blatherings were enough to satisfy that hungry bit of my writer's soul before, but now that's not quite enough. I feel somewhat like a chocolaholic who has been forced to go on a diet for a long while and, suddenly finding herself free to eat anything she likes, craves a total immersion in all things chocolate.


I suppose that's the reason I'm going a bit nuts with the comic strips, Flash experimentation, new 'zines and resource Web sites, songwriting. I've also been reading anything I can get my hands on (right now I'm plowing through "Son of the Shadows" by Juliet Marillier, which is WONDERFUL).


I'm also starting to (*gasp) spend less time online, and more time in the Outside World. Reading, playing and writing music, interacting with people face to face. Part of this is simply because I need the break. But I also suspect that it's because of my own fiction writing. I can't write in a vacuum. Or I suppose I could, but my writing would be flat, the characters mere caricatures.


So if I skip a Blathering now and again, or don't seem as glued to my e-mail as I used to be, that's why...I'm out in the world looking for source material. :-)







Today's Blatherpic:


- Morning at the cottage.


- Sign outside an antique/secondhand shop. Parki, Kate, Jeff and I browsed briefly (and they did, indeed, have Contents).

Feel free to suggest a daily poll question.


Today's Poll: (Courtesy Chris Conway)

Do you think you're happier now than you will be 10 years into the future?