Coldness in Love
On October 30, 2016 by Speranza And you remember, in the afternoon The sea and the sky went grey, as if there had sunk A flocculent dust on the floor of the world: the festoon Of the sky sagged dusty as spider cloth, And coldness clogged the sea, till it ceased to croon. A dank, sickening scent came up fromWinged Messengers
On October 27, 2016 by Speranza
The last few days I have been noticing that I have a few tiny, tiny holes all in a row on some of my clothes; the pure cotton ones that I really like.
This has not pleased me.
At first, I thought the material might just have caught on a zipper or torn without me realizing, (yes, this is the kind of ridiculous self-talk that can happen when one really, really wants to keep watching The Durrells in Corfu snuggled up with The General, rather than skivvying out a clearly infested closet;) but finally, yesterday when, alas, I noticed that my prized Ann Taylor white shirt had been damaged, (rather like a tiny skater had been in winter training) I knew that I had to do the google search to see which particular plague was now upon me.
Sadly, I have since learned that this is most likely the handiwork of the common clothes-moth (not to be confused with his much uglier, foodie counterpart with whom I am very familiar with (I’m looking at you, bulk-store walnuts!) nor the dreaded carpet beetle fellows (who masquerade as fat grains of rice till the gig is up) that I did battle with a few years ago, after losing several corners of my pure wool area rugs to their gluttony. These tiny villains were eating carpet rows like corn on the cob, the wee bastards, and I had to freeze the rugs outside over the winter to get rid of them …
And, afore ye judge, let it be known that I am a devotee to the Dyson vacuum, and vacuum regularly so all this seems most unfair, puzzling and not a little unsettling.
Club Django and More
On October 9, 2016 by Speranza
Last week a friend (actually, two separate friends, who both know me well) invited me to come along and hear Club Django. I do love hearing bands play live and I particularly like this kind of music but sometimes it seems like too much trouble after a long day at work and the concept of coming home and going out again seems unbearable.
Still, as noted here before, I find Klezmer (or so-called ‘Gypsy Jazz’) reliably cheering so my friends collected me at the especially odd time of 2pm and we moved out of the glinty sunshine into a darker venue to catch Club Django in concert.
And from the opening notes, I was so, so happy that I did.
Insomnia
On September 21, 2016 by Speranza
I was just stretching luxuriously in bed, thinking I would get up in a moment or two since I was feeling so uncommonly refreshed, when The General told me it was 1 am.
He then promptly went back to sleep.
After trying everything I could (and feeling guilty for disturbing the cat, who was cuddling with me in a perfect donut-shape) I decided to get up and try to make the best use of the time, safe in the knowledge that I would be wrecked by lunchtime and feeling/looking like a zombie.
Creeping about an old house without making a sound is an art form and I zig-zagged my way down the hardwood stairs, with Dresden following dutifully behind (I never realized that cats do actually frown) and then, once installed on the main floor, I decided to bake the cake for my niece’s birthday this week. After a while, the cat decided it was obviously just a really, really early start to the day and demanded breakfast (kedgeree, broiled kidneys, lightly coddled eggs but settled for FancyFeast in the end) before trying to make his usual routine fit, which to be honest, is just a quick wash and then more sleep, although at least he wanted to be in the same room as me.
And I appreciate that support.