Month: June 2011

Lovely weekend

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Wet and yechhy outside today, with rain – serious rain, not the light misty stuff we had all weekend. It was a fantastic Queen’s Birthday weekend – we taped the French Open tennis semi finals and finals, and watched them across the whole three days.

While we sat on the couch Steve worked on editing some of his POV mountain biking movies, and I started that sweater I think I mentioned last post. After doing a fair bit of fine-gauge knitting (an ysolda shawl, plus a pair of socks), knitting on bigger needles feels both weird and awesome, as the work just goes so fast! I must be half through already.

Oh, and the food: I whipped out my Nigella Express cookbook, which I haven’t actually used that much (though her sour apple martini is one of my staples), and planned out the weekend’s eating:

  • Tuna and bean salad for lunch (Sun – Mon)
  • Coq au riesling for dinner on Sun
  • Croque Monsieur bake (Monday brunch)
  • then for dinner last night we had a Brandied bacony roast chicken, with a potato and mushroom gratin, and green salad :))

Needless to say the fridge is crammed with leftovers, so we’re pretty much set for the week as well.

I got lots of writing in – my SocNoc novel is up to 8,800 words, most of which I actually like. We sauna-ed twice, I finished Haruki Murakami’s What I Talk About When I Talk About Running (which was lovely), and yesterday we went for a hike in the Wright’s Hill Reserve – up Salvation, and down Deliverence, a couple of mountain biking/walking trails. It was so muddy though we only came across a few bikers, and everyone was happy and chatty.

Now it’s a work day – though I’m working from home, which means I’m still in robe and PJs – and the drizzle isn’t quite as charming as when you’re on holiday. Still, the cats like that I am at home, and I’ve started a new writers.com class, the Novel for Beginners (or something similar), with Dennis Foley, which I’m really looking forward to. It’s not a “how to write” class as much as it is a “how to structure your own approach” class, a “find the bones of your novel” class.  So no critiquing but hopefully a lot of new ideas.

June, Moon, Tune, Loon, Spoon….

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Sometimes I really hate having to come up with titles for these things.

It’s June.

In the southern hemisphere that means (I think) that we are at the start of winter – at least if I count backwards six months to the northern hemisphere equivalent, it should be the same as early December. I know the seasons are all messed-up-to-buggery at the moment, but my memories of December in the Pacific Northwest include icy weather, snow, skiing, christmas carols, sparkly lights and all that other good stuff.

The equivalent in New Zealand is pretty mild really. Few of our trees lose their leaves when it gets cold, so it’s still really green everywhere (with only the odd highlights of gold, smuggled in among the native evergreens). Plus May was apparently the warmest one on record, which meant in some ways our late-autumn was almost better than our summer. Things have been really stable. Big fat gaps between the isobars coming across from Australia. Wellington’s quite lovely when the wind dies down.

Evenings are getting cold though, which in many ways I’m enjoying. My knitting’s surged ahead again (socks, a shawl, with a short-sleeved t-shirt sort of sweater scheduled next, with some nice natural Utiku yarn), and it’s real soup and stew weather. (Mmmmm, soup and stewwwwws.)

Still doing game reviews; I’ve had a TON of them lately, including Fable 3, Sims 3 Generations, Brink, and a few other littlies. I think the mad rush has died down a bit – at least I’m hoping, as I’ve signed up for SoCNoC; effectively a southern hemisphere NaNoWriMo, in June. What’s nice is that it’s a little less restrictive than NaNoWriMo, in that it’s ‘allowed’ to work on multiple things at once, so the focus is more about the challenge of writing every day. So far I’m on track, but hey, it’s only day three. The first and last weeks are always the easiest.

Speaking of which – I’d better go mosey on over to that open Word document and get busy!

:::

Reading: A State of Siege, Janet Frame; St. Lucy’s Home for Girls Raised by Wolves, and Swamplandia! by Karen Russell

Reviewing: nothing at the moment!

Listening: Bill Evans, Conversations With Myself

Watching: Game of Thrones (woop!)