(Image courtesy S O'Brien.)
Once a year I take a break from the law and writing and housekeeping and bunnies and I TRAVEL.
I love to travel. I don't do it enough now that I have a law practice and a growing library and a house that seems to fill up with crap whenever I glance away and bunnies. But I do love to travel. This year we're traveling around the Med and the first stop is Barcelona.
I've been to Barca before. It's one of my favorite places. Wandering around for the last three days has reminded me why. It's a fabulous city, full of things to see and do.
But it's also an extremely strange city, patinaed with gothic weirdness. It's easy to pin that on Gaudi, but his influence wouldn't be as prevalent and enduring if it hadn't touched on some core of gothic weirdness in the soul of this city and its people. And in the souls of those who visit.
Touching my soul with gothic weirdness is probably a risky proposition. It's pretty weird already. Add some funky gothic buildings and art, and what do you get?
Inspiration.
I've started writing Throwing Fire again. The alligator-men that were the highlight of the crawl through the sewers may have to take second place to the gothic re-envisioning of the sewer-beast itself.
I love Barca.