It’s beginning to look a lot like the rainy season, plus the return of cross-stitch and a character interview excerpt
It’s raining again this week, and I’m sure I soon won’t consider that worth mentioning other than to complain.
For now, though, it’s refreshing.
And I’m sure the garden appreciates it, since I’ve been neglectful.
I dunno if it started last June when I fell down the stairs and conked my head, or what, but then last year I did a lot more watering. This year at some point I thought, fuck it. If things die, they die. And what doesn’t die has proven itself strong and healthy.
I guess it’s also that I know I’m leaving. I’m planning a move to the United States, and if all goes well and on time, this time next year I will have sold this house and moved on. (And into a more arid region with radically different growing conditions so I have to learn from scratch.) And I guess that’s impacted my dedication levels, plus being frustrated with battling the invasive weeds here and everything else.
Let’s just say I’ve enjoyed the wildness of the garden this year, but I’m also looking forward to living in a condo and only having to worry about a couple plants in pots on the balcony. (I’m thinking a compact bush variety cuke, a hanging basket with cherry tomatos, one or two shrub roses and a pot with jasmine in it.)
In the meantime, I guess I’d better get my ass in gear this fall and do some massive clean-ups.
Anyway, what else… I did get rid of the bass clarinet as mentioned last week; in fact I drove down to return it as soon as I finished the blog.
I was debating buying a sax instead, but I think that shall wait until next year. Otherwise I have to haul it with me.
I’ve mentioned before about the knitting instinct kicking in with the change in the weather, and I’ve been working away a couple rows at a time on the Wassailing Stole:
I’m about an eighth of the way through the main body of the piece, then there was a fringe edging described in the pattern that gets added on later. I may do that one or I may figure out a different edging for the top and bottom.
Especially because I kinda ignored the initial instruction to cast-on the first row with a provisional crochet chain method with the stitches on waste yarn… mostly because I couldn’t remember how to do it, lol… so I used my usual cast-on method and I don’t have any live stitches on waste yarn. I can easily flip it upside down and pick up the whole bottom row to fake it, I guess.
I swear I have a copy of Nicki Epstein’s Knitting On The Edge somewhere around here. And if not, I can order a new copy to get ideas from.
Funny… a few months back I thought maybe when I move I won’t knit at all anymore, but realistically I’d still knit in the cooler months. I just might be knitting with more bamboo, cotton, and linen than wool and cashmere.
Besides, there’s always lace shawls and socks and dishcloths, even in hot climates.
On a similar note, the change in the weather reminded me of my poor “Halloween Quaker” cross-stitch piece which has been languishing. So I did a little bit of work on that as well this week, whilst watching YouTube:
It ain’t gonna be finished by this Halloween, that’s for damn sure. But I got another crow finished and the little bat beneath the crows and started the last crow and that took a couple hours… not that I’m as fast as I used to be with it. Also I was Facebooking with friends as much as I was stitching, probably.
What else… I’ve been getting back into reading up on Babylon and Egypt, as well as Tibetan tantra.
And I’ve been back on Duolingo and Drops in a more dedicated manner. I’ve been on Duolingo again for the last couple weeks trying to brush up on my Spanish as I expect it might come in handy next year, plus my brother’s moving to Mexico so if I want to go visit, I’ll need it.
This week I’ve started reviewing my Irish on there and Hebrew, and I’ve added in Greek. Haven’t gotten all that far with any of them, but it adds up over time.
In terms of work, I’ve been writing some scripts for short character interview videos for the web series, including cranking out a 20 page one yesterday for Sally, the studio receptionist.
I kinda like not knowing where it’s gonna go when I start these, and I ended up with a sequence wherein she reveals that she and her sister met with Bono, who her boss (with occasional benefits) despises but she insists nothing happened… in a very defensive sort of way, lest the boss get the wrong impression.
INTERVIEWER: I meant did you sleep with Bono?
SALLY: No!
INTERVIEWER: Really? But Nick thought he could smell Bono on you!
SALLY: Look, Bono was sitting between me and Alba in the restaurant. That’s all.
INTERVIEWER: You weren’t tempted?
SALLY: Nothing happened!
INTERVIEWER: OK.
SALLY: Can you just cut the whole thing about Bono out? I don’t want Mr. White to get the wrong idea.
INTERVIEWER: Sure, sure. Why would he get the wrong idea?
SALLY: I told you nothing happened.
INTERVIEWER: Right.
SALLY: I have a boyfriend.
INTERVIEWER: Right.
SALLY: I just wouldn’t want Mr. White to think something did happen, because it didn’t. I’m not that kind of girl.
INTERVIEWER: Exactly.
SALLY: And I don’t want Mr. White to get the wrong impression.
INTERVIEWER: Of course not. I mean, you and Nick have worked together for years now, you know him, he knows you…
SALLY: What’s that supposed to mean?
INTERVIEWER: Nothing. I just mean, surely he can trust you, and he knows your character.
SALLY: Yes he does! And I don’t like your implication!
INTERVIEWER: What implication? I just mean that–
SALLY: I am not a homewrecking tramp!
INTERVIEWER: I never said you were!
SALLY: I don’t sleep with married men!
INTERVIEWER: I never said you did!
SALLY: I don’t appreciate your snide implication that I know Nick White in any manner aside from a purely professional one!
INTERVIEWER: I didn’t–
SALLY: I think we’re done here!
(“Sure, sure” = the interviewer ain’t cutting a damn thing. LOL)
So far this exchange is the only one where the perpetually saccharine Sally raises her voice and yells over anything in the whole series.
Speaking of the series, I got yet another cast member in, this one being a Wonder Woman doll (redressed, of course):
Something about her face just screams “real estate agent” to me, lol… so, this is Nick’s Greek or Israeli realtor… I can’t do either of those accents so I guess she’s second-generation here with no accent.
And I just looked up some Greek names for her. I think I like Zosime for a first name and Xenakis for a last name. Neither of which Nick can pronounce so he will annoy her by trying to just call her Suzy.
I also imagine he will think her name has something to do with that whole Zoso thing Jimmy Page is all about, coupled with a joke about how Zosime is a little too old for Jimmy Page, being that she has a driver’s license and all.
Zosime means “likely to survive” but note it doesn’t say anything about “likely to not throttle Nick for getting her name wrong.”
It’s pronounced “Zoh-SEE-mee” or in its fuller form “Zoh-SEE-mee I told you a thousand times now get it right you braindead troll.”
Anyway, let’s wrap things up with a couple pics from the garden. The flowers are in a lull, though the roses are full of buds for another flush in a week or so, so we’re almost at the point where I have to either stop posting garden pics for a while or just post evergreens.
Even so, there’s still some color:
The cosmos and rudbeckias are still going strong, but I’ve posted those a ton in the last few weeks, and they still look the same.
