Update (news, movies, gardening)
Yesterday was a good day. Work was productive, and short (short is always good), due to a doctor's appointment. The doctor's appointment was painless and a clean bill of health was obtained. I called and ordered some plants for the front garden. It was Parent's Night Out, and due to mixed wants, R and I did separate things. I went out for dinner, and to a movie (Sex and the City, see review below--spoilers for those who care!). R finally got his podcasting mixer thing working, which made him happy, and by extension, me happy too. I may have found a neighborhood babysitter, which would free R and me to do Things Together and Have Grown Up Fun. I finished a lovely book by Anne Lamott on writing which gave me the feeling I Am Not Alone. Add that to my little post on meeting Peter Beagle (and his kind response) and I am feeling pretty chipper. Maybe I'll stop writing all that angsty stuff?
Oh, and I ordered ALL THE B5 SCRIPTBOOKS!!! I will get #15! And I can look stuff up! (hugs self).
The front yard has three large trees; a pinkish crepe myrtle that blooms July through September, a bronze maple with purply-green leaves, and a lovely dwarf Japanese maple that looks like a giant Bonsai tree, a veritable green carpet of leaves in the summer, turning to orange splendor in the fall, and then leaving twisted gnarled branches in the winter. I love that tree. But it makes for dry shade, that most dreaded of conditions for most of the yard. The soil is very sandy too. The very front of the yard next to the street gets full sun, and is sloped. So, poor acidic soil, good drainage, full sun...I'm putting in a heather garden! There was a heather garden in Fort Tryon Park in NYC which I loved to visit when I lived there. I had a small one in Boston (clay soil and shade--they nobly grew, but not so well). There's a small company on Cape Cod I got my plants from back in the day, and I've kept getting their catalog, waiting for when I'd finally have a good place to put a full blown heather garden. And I ordered a set of plants yesterday, mixed height and spread and year round color. If I can figure out how to post pix, I will show you it.
Anne Lamott's book Bird by Bird was terrific. For example, she gave one quote from E.L. Doctorow (I wrote a term paper on E.L. Doctorow once upon a time) that writing was like driving a car at night. You can only see as far as the headlights show...the story reveals itself as you write. My longer pieces are pretty much like that. Even if there' s an outline, things happen as you write; characters butt in and demand their stories be told, some plot twist works itself in that changes everything downstream, etc. But I think that I also have some stories that appear by lightning flash, rather than slowly appearing in the dusk as the headlights pick them out. That bright illumination shows the whole thing at once, and often there's a great rush to get it all down before you forget the details you glimpsed in the flash.
Y'all don't know me but I am the antithesis of the SATC girls; I have no interest in fashion, or shoes (hard to fit, and most shoes hurt and the ones that don't aren't what you'd call fashionable). I never dated much, and although I did live in NYC I was not part of The Life. i was more bohemian than cosmopolitan, and more bourgeois than either.
I loved Sex and the City. I watched most of it on DVDs from the local library when I was home on maternity leave #1, which is odd timing in one way, but understandable in another. As your life closes in and gets intensely focused on feedings and diapers and Gorgeous Glorious Sleep (unattainable, but greatly desired), it is nice to contemplate another way of living that involves shopping and lunch and parties and, well, sex (also unattainable, but greatly desired.)
So, there I am, opening night, buying a ticket for the 10 o'clock show, because all the earlier ones are sold out, then hanging out until it starts, then getting in a humongous line which rushes for the seats like a sold-out concert when they remove the ropes at 9:55 pm. I loved almost all of it, although I was very worried for Miranda and Steve (my favorites) and cheered when they got back together. I was never really sure about Carrie and Big, but it was still nicely romantic for them. The clothes were gorgeously weird and unwearable, as is most high fashion. The apartments were beautifully outfitted, and I noticed everything (or will when I can watch at my leisure on DVD); the colors and fabrics and accessories and furniture; whether Fifth Avenue penthouse, funky upper West Side brownstone, downtown East Village brick walk-up. The men were Very Pretty, and often unclothed, and mostly loving and respectful. There were even children and babies (although I could have done without those; the younger set in the audience oohed and ahhed. Little do they know...)
I got in after one in the morning, which I haven't done in ages, and R waited up for me (a bit worried, I think, which was charming rather than annoying). Fun was had!
Oh, and I ordered ALL THE B5 SCRIPTBOOKS!!! I will get #15! And I can look stuff up! (hugs self).
The front yard has three large trees; a pinkish crepe myrtle that blooms July through September, a bronze maple with purply-green leaves, and a lovely dwarf Japanese maple that looks like a giant Bonsai tree, a veritable green carpet of leaves in the summer, turning to orange splendor in the fall, and then leaving twisted gnarled branches in the winter. I love that tree. But it makes for dry shade, that most dreaded of conditions for most of the yard. The soil is very sandy too. The very front of the yard next to the street gets full sun, and is sloped. So, poor acidic soil, good drainage, full sun...I'm putting in a heather garden! There was a heather garden in Fort Tryon Park in NYC which I loved to visit when I lived there. I had a small one in Boston (clay soil and shade--they nobly grew, but not so well). There's a small company on Cape Cod I got my plants from back in the day, and I've kept getting their catalog, waiting for when I'd finally have a good place to put a full blown heather garden. And I ordered a set of plants yesterday, mixed height and spread and year round color. If I can figure out how to post pix, I will show you it.
Anne Lamott's book Bird by Bird was terrific. For example, she gave one quote from E.L. Doctorow (I wrote a term paper on E.L. Doctorow once upon a time) that writing was like driving a car at night. You can only see as far as the headlights show...the story reveals itself as you write. My longer pieces are pretty much like that. Even if there' s an outline, things happen as you write; characters butt in and demand their stories be told, some plot twist works itself in that changes everything downstream, etc. But I think that I also have some stories that appear by lightning flash, rather than slowly appearing in the dusk as the headlights pick them out. That bright illumination shows the whole thing at once, and often there's a great rush to get it all down before you forget the details you glimpsed in the flash.
Y'all don't know me but I am the antithesis of the SATC girls; I have no interest in fashion, or shoes (hard to fit, and most shoes hurt and the ones that don't aren't what you'd call fashionable). I never dated much, and although I did live in NYC I was not part of The Life. i was more bohemian than cosmopolitan, and more bourgeois than either.
I loved Sex and the City. I watched most of it on DVDs from the local library when I was home on maternity leave #1, which is odd timing in one way, but understandable in another. As your life closes in and gets intensely focused on feedings and diapers and Gorgeous Glorious Sleep (unattainable, but greatly desired), it is nice to contemplate another way of living that involves shopping and lunch and parties and, well, sex (also unattainable, but greatly desired.)
So, there I am, opening night, buying a ticket for the 10 o'clock show, because all the earlier ones are sold out, then hanging out until it starts, then getting in a humongous line which rushes for the seats like a sold-out concert when they remove the ropes at 9:55 pm. I loved almost all of it, although I was very worried for Miranda and Steve (my favorites) and cheered when they got back together. I was never really sure about Carrie and Big, but it was still nicely romantic for them. The clothes were gorgeously weird and unwearable, as is most high fashion. The apartments were beautifully outfitted, and I noticed everything (or will when I can watch at my leisure on DVD); the colors and fabrics and accessories and furniture; whether Fifth Avenue penthouse, funky upper West Side brownstone, downtown East Village brick walk-up. The men were Very Pretty, and often unclothed, and mostly loving and respectful. There were even children and babies (although I could have done without those; the younger set in the audience oohed and ahhed. Little do they know...)
I got in after one in the morning, which I haven't done in ages, and R waited up for me (a bit worried, I think, which was charming rather than annoying). Fun was had!