"He's fallen in the water!"

Problem-solving by the scientific method, as evidenced by Barry-the-cat:

A shred of gushyfudz has somehow got itself into the water-dish, submergingly. How to retrieve it? Baz has been working on this ever since breakfast, and will not be defeated. He was half-thinking about just closing his eyes, opening his mouth and plunging his face in, but he chickened out of that. (Okay, that's interpretation, and anthropomorphism too; but he did spend a long time with his face a millimetre from the surface, looking just like a boy trying to work up the courage.) He did try dipping his paw in, but the wicked sliver slithered away and his paw got all wet and he didn't like that.

Last time I looked, he was having a drink. A long drink. Maybe the water tastes nicer with a bit of a meaty edge to it - but my deep suspicion is that he's trying to drink the whole bowlful, and so get drily at the gushyfudz. He's taken a lesson from Lew Grade, and is lowering the Atlantic.

Draft!

This morning I have finished the first draft of this year's Summer Phantoms story, so yay for that. It's been a slow one: a page or two a day, every morning, down at the Lit and Phil. First story I've written entirely on the Laptop of Heavenly Perfection, I think. It's a little different from my usual: more mysterious, less analytical. We'll see how that goes down.

This is the story that I conceived in Henley, on a walk along the river: it was triggered by goose-shit on the path and the weir at the end of the walk. When I left the library this morning, the darling-du-story was still the line that had occurred to me on that walk, that I actually wrote down at the time to be sure of it:

"His grin was as green as goose-shit, and as foul."

But on the walk home, this has been modified:

"His grin was as darkly green as goose-shit, and as foul."

That 'darkly' slows the whole sentence down, in a way that I like; turns it from a slash into a drag, as of a blade across the skin. [But what part of speech is that 'darkly' - can it still be called an adverb, when it qualifies an adjective? I have no technical vocabulary...]

Also, I have a new vacuum flask. This one is half the size and twice the weight, and does not become warm when it holds a warm liquid. I think this is a good thing. Also, it's pink: and pinkliness is next to blackliness in the ranks of the good.

Also, this week's rule seems to be that I shall encounter one old friend per day, whom I haven't seen for ages. New rule next week.

Forgot to mention...

My other favourite line from the new story (which is called "Between the Woods and the Water", by the way) is actually something I came up with for a postcard joke on my first canal-boat holiday, more or less twenty years ago. Can't tell you what it is, as it's currently the last line of the story, but I love that I finally found a way to use it seriously, for it is just the best line ever.

Also forgot to mention that - utterly to my surprise, as it is kind of radical in its treatment - my abbreviated form of Dracula has been approved by editorial, so the rest of today is devoted to picking at it & tidying it up, maybe cutting it a little before it goes back to them in final form. And the rest of this week I shall be writing the associated material, and then have that off my desk, hurrah.

Meanwhile, I have been downstairs watching the total madness that is "Waking the Dead" (cold-cases police team TV series, for those who don't know it; great fun, and getting madder with every series) - and for the last twenty minutes I had two, count 'em two, yes both of the boys on my lap! In more or less perfect amity! Back to back and pretty much turned away from each other, but touching, and not at all fighting! I did have to let Mac chew at me for a minute before he settled, but that's standard, and he didn't even threaten to bite or pounce on Barry. It may be a one-time wonder, but it's a wonder none the less.

And I also forgot...

Today (as every day, yes yes) is full of forgetting.

The thing I forgot to say about my new vacuum flask is that it is rated at "half a quart". Which is like talking about half a pair of hounds: one understands entirely, but you might as well say "two quarters". It's a descriptive inefficiency, and not useful.

It's a damn pint, okay?

Review

thisplacehere likes the set-up for Dispossession, and is not so taken with the resolution. Ain't that so often the way? It is even possible that he has justice on his side; at this distance - it was the first book I wrote in this house, which makes it twelve years ago - I only remember the fun stuff. Which is the set-up, and my beloved Luke the fallen angel. For yes, I was writing urban fantasy before anyone invented the term; and Luke still sits in my head, all bright and smeared and sharp. Kinda like an ice-pick. I wrote a short story about him too, subtly entitled "Luke, Homeward Angel"...