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Friday, September 28th, 2007
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9:27 am - In a list, 'cuz I'm lazy
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1. On the first minute of the 27th while we were on the way back from Christine's, Rich presented me with a box of Djarum Blacks he'd gone out of his way to find.
2. Hours later on the lazy sleeping-in morning of the 27th Rich presented me with a stunning necklace that I'd seen and fallen in love with at the Green Man Festival in August (and later had been gutted to find missing when I went to purchase it).
3. An Amazon delivery from my as-yet-anonymous Switch Witch arrived, containing copies of Lolita and Real Energy and a Capercaillie EP.
4. Beth sent me a message on the bpal.org forums telling me that my words of praise re: Libra '07 had actually made her get teary with happiness.
5. Money turned up in my checking account (thanks mom!)
6. Rich and I went to the cathedral in Cologne and climbed to the very top in cold rainy and blustery autumn weather.
7. We were admiring the church bells midway up the tower at 3:00 when they began to toll and it was a terrifying, lovely, body-shaking brain-numbing soul-ringing experience.
8. We had curry for dinner (what? it counts. it was awesome.)
9. Birthday messages turned up on the Internets from Sarah and Jessica and Jackie and the bpal.org crew.
10. We finished up by going to the Thursday night club where the regular DJ was absent and replaced by someone who was *much* better, got a free bottle of champagne and danced until 2am.
Why can't I turn 24 every day? Thanks to everyone who made yesterday special, whether you're reading this or not.
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| Friday, September 14th, 2007
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11:36 am - career meme
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1. Go to http://www.careercruising.com/.
2. Put in Username: nycareers, Password: landmark.
3. Take their "Career Matchmaker" questions.
4. Post the top umpty results:
1.Zookeeper
2.Nursery / Greenhouse Grower
3.Anthropologist
4.Fruit and Vegetable Grower
5.Activist
6.Print Journalist
7.Writer
8.Translator
9.Ecologist
10.Professional Athlete
11.Psychologist
12.Sport Psychology Consultant
13.Historian
14.Communications Specialist
15.Political Aide
16.Veterinarian
17.Public Policy Analyst
18.Critic
19.Market Research Analyst
20.Outdoor Guide
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| Thursday, September 13th, 2007
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4:52 pm - HEY SARAH!!!
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| Wednesday, September 12th, 2007
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12:49 pm
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I've been working hard on forgetting the undergrad that I had a hopeless crush on for the first half of this year and I think I've just - about - managed, to my great relief.
Exams are finished as of last Thursday, which means I'm now just dicking around in Germany until 15th October when I fly home. While in London I was staying with a friend and had a conversation with a couple of her housemates one night, one of whom had just returned from Australia. She, like me, has travelled a hell of a lot, but is currently planning to stay in London (or at least the UK) for as long as she can manage. Apparently this is because of a conversation she had with another friend who said that the hardest thing you can do, sometimes, is stay exactly where you are. It's too easy to just say 'sod this' and then pick up and go when things start to get on your nerves (like the weather, or the people, or the traffic, or the job, or a million other things). And then you never put down roots anywhere.
The words struck a chord with me, and I'm thinking of staying in Florida for a while and seeing how things go.
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| Sunday, September 9th, 2007
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2:34 pm - yeah, I'm a wuss
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Rich and I took the bikes out this afternoon for a brief ride through the woods. It was hugely distressing to realise how unfit I am - after less than five minutes of very very gentle uphill slope, my legs were shaking so badly I had to walk the damn thing the rest of the way. At 9st4 I'm far from overweight, just miserably out of shape - my muscles are so weak. And I know it's going to be a real pain in the ass to go about getting into shape. *grumble*
By the way, if anyone reading this is from the BPAL forums, this is Baitu's livejournal. Just to help you all keep track. :)
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| Wednesday, August 8th, 2007
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7:43 am - Happy birthday Sarah!
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To the sweetest pessimist I've ever known: I hope the coming year brings you joy, my dear.
Rich and I have elected to skip the whole France thing on account of it being too damn expensive and complicated, so instead we're flying to Glasgow today and spending a long weekend at his family's in Edinburgh. The Edinburgh Festival's on so we will be seeing at least one play. As usual I'm shit-scared of flying but very happy at the prospect of seeing Edinburgh again before leaving the UK for I don't know how long...
Monday we'll be on the 9 1/2 hour bus (grim) to London to see his brother, and thence to Green Man festival. As usual we'll get no contact from Oxfam about how/when to get to the festival grounds until the 11th hour. My inner compulsive hates this deeply but I find it's best to shut out the inner compulsive, especially for purposes of travel.
Love to all.
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| Tuesday, July 24th, 2007
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5:36 pm - GLADE Electronic Music Festival
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from an email to my mother
Yo!
I lives!
Barely!
Haha, no, seriously, it was absolutely mental. Something might have made the news in the US about the floods in southern England...well...that's where the festival was. We stewards got there on Wednesday evening, which was beautiful, hung around on Thursday, also beautiful, and midday on Friday the public started to arrive. Still beautiful. I worked my first shift on Friday 4 to midnight...it started raining around 10pm. It DID NOT STOP for about 14 hours, absolutely pissing it down. I've hardly ever seen it rain that hard in England before. Thunder and lightning as well, which was just wonderful with all of us camping in the middle of a field full of masses of electrical equipment! There were a lot of tents that were flooded and a couple of proper wash-outs; I was lucky and my tent (borrowed from Larry Knibb) was only a bit damp on the bottom. Still too wet to sleep, so I basically didn't sleep much. Also absolutely bloody freezing cold; when I finished the shift on Friday night one of my shift partners brought over a sleeping bag to my tent so that we could be warm enough to sleep. (Worked a charm.) 1 water-soaked field + 27,000 people tramping across it = mud about 10 inches deep, and me with no wellingtons. Naturally there was some business on site selling them for the extortionate price of 15 pounds, but after I stood in queue for the cash machines for an hour with all the other poor broke bastards the damn things wouldn't read my Visa card and I had to withdraw from my HSBC account instead, which only had about 20 quid in it. So it came down to a choice between wellies or food for the weekend, and I opted for food. The trainers, impressively, are not totally destroyed and I think they'll be looking good again after a wash, but I will definitely be getting some proper footgear before going to Green Man festival in August, as the main problem with trainers was not wet feet so much as that they had ZERO traction in the mud. Like walking on soap. Major suck.
The festival was definitely not without its plusses, however; I got very lucky and ended up with three shifts near one of the stages, a very cool place called ID Spiral. There's a brief video clip of it here: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-69791256052530474 [poor quality and it's from 2006, but if the computer will play it then you can at least get some idea of the music.] I did have one of the dreaded midnight-8am shifts, but since my stage was the only one that had music 24 hours it wasn't tedious, and I actually dressed warmly enough for it this time (unlike at Glastonbury, when we all froze.) I worked with some cool people and spent a bit of time Saturday afternoon in the Roots tent, which played dub and reggae and funky global stuff -- it wasn't too crowded inside so the ground wasn't a total morass and I could dance until I was too exhausted to continue. Also I didn't have to deal with any incidents while on shift, which was a stroke of luck; Glade is pretty infamous for having a lot of drug and alcohol casualties. I did see plenty of people tripping, but they all seemed to be handling things well enough ;) On the whole, it was probably slightly more trouble than it was worth, but at least I can say I was there volunteering for Oxfam and therefore get points for the Good Deed -- if I'd paid for a ticket and ended up in Mud Hell for three days I'd probably be less happy!
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| Friday, July 13th, 2007
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3:27 pm
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Dreadfully unsettling experience this morning: the phone rang right after I got out of the shower and there was a woman's voice on the other end of the line, high-pitched with uncertain English. For about 5 really confused seconds I thought it was our friend Aggie from Taiwan and couldn't figure out why in the hell she was calling Rich's flat in Germany, then I realised it was Natalie. For those of you just now joining us, Natalie is the woman Rich has been seeing while I was in London; we met each other completely by chance at a concert a couple of weeks ago and since then we've all hung out a few times (resulting in last weekend's hangover.) She wanted to come round to return our sheesha which we'd brought over last weekend. 'OK.' 'And then we can have tea?' 'OK.' 'And then I can go?' 'OK.'
It's not that I dislike her company because she's slept with my Richard, far from it. It's that she's cute in many of the right ways (short hair! comfortable jeans! artsy glasses! really really good skin!) and although she's never kissed a girl I understand she's 'considered it'. This knowledge combined with my general antsiness around people I don't know very well led to a fairly frantic quarter of an hour before she arrived. Picture Val trying to blowdry her hair, clean the living room, put earrings on, figure out which scent to wear (out of the 120 or so perfumes I currently own) and take deep calming inhalations of lavender essential oil all at the same time. Oh yes, and drink coffee. Probably counteracting the effects of the lavender.
But in the end all was well; we had tea and talked for an hour or so without stumbling into any really uncomfortable double entendres or lengthy silences. It was nice. Maybe someday I'll be able to go into uncertain social situations without panicking beforehand. Little victories like this help.
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| Thursday, July 12th, 2007
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3:46 pm
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One day Alice came to a fork in the road and saw a Cheshire cat in a tree.
'Which road do I take?' she asked.
His response was a question: 'Where do you want to go?'
'I don't know,' Alice answered
'Then,' said the cat, 'it doesn't matter.'
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12:47 pm
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11:13 am
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Book 14/50
The No-Nonsense Guide to Islam, Ziauddin Sardar and Merryl Wyn Davies
Book 15/50
The Book of Chinese Beliefs, Frena Bloomfield
Book 16/50
The Monstrous Regiment, Terry Pratchett
Book 17/50
The Queen of the Damned, your mom
So I've been, er, reading a lot....
In just a few days I'm getting on a plane (eek) and heading to merry olde englande once again in order to steward at the Glade festival. It's gonna be amazing, cats. Not only that, but I get to see Rachael on Monday night and Miriam & maybe Bekki on Tuesday, maybe maybe... and then there's the special joy of spending the morning and afternoon of Tuesday in the uni library, poring through sagas to fill my dissertation with references to primary sources. Aw, it'll be fun. This is what I signed up for, after all :D And when I've typed all those references up in Old Norse (typing Old Norse goes like this: insert symbol, insert symbol, insert symbol until your head explodes) the beast will be just about finished but for the polishing.
Life is good, eh?
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| Sunday, July 8th, 2007
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11:45 am
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| Wednesday, June 27th, 2007
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1:35 pm - for the pollock fans
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| Monday, June 25th, 2007
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5:53 pm
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Book 12/50
Going Postal, Terry Pratchett
Book 13/50
The Language of the Genes, Steve Jones
Book 13/50 was very educational. But I need MOAR Terry Pratchett, dammit. Why do I always think it's a good idea to bring self-improving books with me when I travel?
So anyway, I haven't posted in ages. I'm in Germany now, living with Rich, and have been here for about three weeks. It's grey and chilly most of the time, and it rains a lot, which is cool, although the sunset at 11pm is starting to drive me batshit (canNOT sleep!!!). Monday to Friday he works and I do uni stuff -- currently reading the first volume of the Kristin Lavransdatter trilogy by Sigrid Undset. It's utterly charming and available in a very good English translation which I read years ago; nice if you're looking for something to read.
Saturday night we went to see Das Ich perform at a free music festival (promo for some goth compilation CD coming out); they played for ages and were gratifyingly bouncy and bizarre. In a strange coincidence, I ended up meeting Natalie, the girl Rich has been seeing while I was in London. There had been absolutely no plans to do so. Just before Das Ich started and we were in the middle of the (huge) crowd, he asked out of the blue if I wanted to meet Natalie, and when I, completely nonplussed, said sure, why not, he reached forward and tapped someone standing right in front of us on the shoulder. She's even shorter than me, with teeny-tiny round glasses and soft features and a very nice smile, and awesome brown curls. She greeted me with a hug and a kiss on the cheek, and strikes me as Safe and Very Likeable. I'm glad I met her, especially since I would have avoided doing so except for that totally random crossing of paths...
The German goth scene rocks. There's just so much of it -- five or six club nights to choose from on just about any night of the week. That being said there is a certain amount of doss music and there are a certain number of obnoxious people on the scene, so it's a bit of a chore weeding through them all to find the good ones. There is an awesome night called Lurie which we'll be going to this Saturday, all EBM and industrial and no weepy bollocks. (I have a much higher tolerance for weepy bollocks than Rich does, which is occasionally a source of friction when I want to dance to, I dunno, This Mortal Coil or something and he wants me to keep him company or go home.)
So far, *not* actually missing England. I'm heading back in about three weeks to do Glade festival though -- and btw, do any of the English people (Mim, Wolfie, I'm looking at you) know anyone who's going? I'm slightly amazed at the fact that I don't know a single person who is...
hugs to all.
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| Friday, May 25th, 2007
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8:03 pm
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Book 11/50
The Countryside Explained, John Seymour
There are things to love about my dissertation topic. For example, a bit of the index in one my sources reads as follows:
sexual intercourse, 130, 148 (see also intercourse)
anal, 175
oral, 175
with animals, 94, 124, 126
with demons, 149
with Devil, 148-149, 153
sexuality,
female, 126, 127, 129-133, 138-141, 144-145, 148
homosexuality, 158
orgies, 135-137, 148, 155, 169
sodomy, 158, 175, 176
Now that's a to-do list if I ever saw one.
Last night around midnight I was preparing to go to bed and started running a bath; had about an inch of water in the tub when I heard running footsteps and giggles in the corridor. Eyyad Jihad went rushing by holding an enormous sheesha and saying 'Sheesha! Kitchen!' with that manic excitement and irrepressible giggling that we love him for even if he is a homophobe. Ended up having the smallest party with the most unlikely group of people I could imagine in the kitchen: Your Humble Narrator, Eyyad, Edyta (who was already drunk and had to leave for the airport in four hours), Qing (sitting with her feet on the kitchen table and smoking menthols like a pro), and Maria (who kept excitedly suggesting really weird crap to put in the sheesha, like oregano and basil). We turned out the lights and I brought my blacklight and we had bellydance music and bizarre Greek folk music from the '20s, and strawberry tobacco and a bowl of fresh strawberries as well. I was smoking pretty steadily for about an hour and a half and I'd forgot just how *high* you can get from a plain ol' sheesha; there are photos of me sitting on the (disgusting) kitchen floor giggling insanely and cutting a grapefruit, which I decided I really needed to eat, spur-of-the-moment. Shortly before I gave up and went to bed Maria's mad-scientist approach to the sheesha won out and
over Eyyad's strenuous objections the other girls topped off the nasty bong-water with about a third of a bottle of tequila. Apparently this is nice (to smoke, not to drink). I politely declined and fled.
Sorting through old papers today (downsizing; packing soon) I found notes I'd made on a rune divination from last July, and was amazed at how much sense it makes in retrospect. But being able to make a good guess at what it was pointing at way back in July -- that, I suppose, is what separates the true seers from the rest of us who poke around with these sorts of things now and again, in a small way.
current music: Wumpscut
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| Thursday, May 24th, 2007
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9:34 am
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| Monday, May 14th, 2007
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10:10 pm
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| Sunday, May 13th, 2007
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7:03 pm
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Book 6/50
The No-Nonsense Guide to Women's Rights
Book 7/50
The Amber Spyglass, Philip Pullman
Haven't cried this many times in the course of a single book since Lolita. Call me emotional, I guess -- but damn, what a good read!
Book 8/50
A Clockwork Orange, Anthony Burgess
Spent a thoroughly enjoyable afternoon (and evening, and much of the night) yesterday with some fellow members of Ar nDraiocht Fein (http://www.adf.org/core/) and Kirk Thompson, no less a figure than the vice-Archdruid (or is that the Archdruid of vice?) of aforementioned organisation, who's over doing a quick tour of the UK. Cosy gathering with the members of Hollow Hills protogrove, potluck supper; Kirk gave a talk on Indo-European cosmology and SACRIFICE (offerings, if you like; sounds less intimidating, doesn't it? ;) and there was much good cheer and cracking of dirty jokes by all. And the puns flew thick and fast.
Very pleased as I've been a member of ADF for two years now and this was the first occasion on which I'd met any other members in the flesh, and the overwhelming sense of cheerfulness and *sanity* and good sense warmed the very cockles of my heart, yes it did.
Pagan potlucks aside, I've generally been In and Working of late -- up to my ears in books and notes on shamanism (specifically of the Saami variety, probably better known to most of y'all as Lapps) and seiðr rites, for a consideration and comparison of the two is my chosen dissertation topic, Oh my brothers. The note-taking naturally is quite tedious but at least the reading is interesting...
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| Friday, April 27th, 2007
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12:09 pm
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Book 4/50
Northern Lights, Philip Pullman
Book 5/50
The Subtle Knife, Philip Pullman
They actually live up to the hype. When can I get the third one?
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| Wednesday, April 25th, 2007
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6:17 pm - warning! this post is rated R
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Book 3/50
Seven Viking Romances, Penguin Classics
Medieval stories translated by top scholars in the Old Norse field. This is very serious stuff, folks; ancient stories committed to manuscript by monks many centuries ago. I'm putting the best bits from the saga of Bosi and Herraud up here to save y'all reading the whole thing:
...The old man showed them to the living-room, where not many people were to be seen. The woman of the house was getting on in years, but there was an attractive young daughter. The girl pulled off their wet clothes and gave them dry things instead, then brought a basin so they could wash their hands. The table was laid, and the young woman served them with excellent ale. Bosi kept eyeing her suggestively and touching her foot with his toe, and she did the same to him.
In the evening they were shown to a comfortable bed. The farmer slept in a bed-closet, his daughter in the middle of the room and the foster-brothers in a bed under the gable beside the door. When the people were asleep, Bosi got up, went over to the young woman's bed and lifted the bedclothes off her. She asked who was there, and Bosi told her.
'What have you come for?' she asked.
'I wasn't comfortable enough in my bed as things were,' he said, and added that he'd like to get under the bedclothes with her.
'What do you want to do here?' she said.
'I want to temper my warrior,' said Bosi.
'What sort of warrior's that?' she asked.
'He's still very young and he's never been steeled,' he said, 'but a warrior ought to be hardened early on in life.'
He gave her a gold ring and got into bed beside her. She asked him where the warrior was, and he told her to feel between his legs, but she pulled her hand back and said he could keep his warrior and asked why he was carrying a monster like that on him, as hard as a tree. He told her the warrior would soften in the dark hole, and then she said he could do anything he wanted. So now he set the warrior between her legs. The path before him was rather narrow, and yet he managed to complete his mission.
***
In the evening they were shown to their beds, but as soon as the light had been put out, Bosi went over to the girl and lifted the bedclothes off her. She asked who was there, and Bosi told her.
'What do you want?' she asked.
'I'd like to water my colt at your wine-spring,' he said.
'Do you think you can manage it, my lad?' she asked. 'He's hardly used to a well like mine.'
'I'll lead him right to the edge, then push him in if there's no other way to make him drink,' said Bosi.
'Where is your colt, sweetheart?' she asked.
'Between my legs, love,' he said. 'You can touch him, but do it gently, he's terribly shy.'
She took hold of his prick, and stroked it and said, 'It's a lively colt, though his neck is far too straight.'
'His head isn't all that well set,' agreed Bosy, 'but his neck curves much better once he's had a drink.'
'Well, it's all up to you now,' she said.
'Lie as open as you can,' said Bosi, 'and keep calm.'
Then he watered his colt generously, completely immersing him. This pleased the girl so much she was hardly able to speak. 'Are you sure you're not drowning the colt?' she asked.
'He has to be given all he can possibly take,' said Bosi, 'he often gives me a lot of trouble when he isn't allowed to drink his fill.'
Bosi kept at it for as long as he wanted, then took a rest. The girl was wondering where all the fluid between her legs had come from, for the whole bed was lathering under her.
'Could it be your colt's drunk more than was good for him,' she asked, 'and then vomited up more than he's drunk?'
'Something's the matter with him,' said Bosi, 'he's as soft as a lung.'
'He's probably ale-sick,' she said, 'like any drunkard.'
'Could be,' he said.
So they entertained themselves to their satisfaction, the girl being now under him and now on top. She said she'd never ridden a more even-paced colt than this.
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