A pretty busy few days

It was a hectic weekend, and Monday was pretty heavy too. Good hectic, in the main, but it has still left me feeling a little wambly-legged with tiredness. Never mind – I can get early nights for the rest of the week now, and I’ve had a bloody good time in the meantime. Of course, trying to have a rest during the week isn’t always feasible, but I'm doing my best, round the edges of the busy "start of the school hols" patch at work.

Saturday I met my mum for lunch and the terrific new English National ballet programme of ballets by the late Roland Petit. Sunday I went to the Ealing Global Music Festival in Walpole Park (a sort of one day mini-WOMAD) and danced my feet off all afternoon and evening. Monday was unpleasantly frantic at work, a classic “we’re short-staffed and the ‘phones won’t stop ringing” day, but in the evening I met my stepmum Jane for supper and the last Harry Potter movie – oof. At the London IMAX, so double oof.

I am now reeling slightly from the amount of activity; a lot of talking, a lot of eating out, three late nights, lots of dancing and a sort of cultural information-overload.

Mum and I found a new place to eat near Covent Garden, which is always good news; a small but pleasant bistro with the unimaginative name of “Bistro”. Mixed meze, pancakes stuffed with creamed spinach and goats cheese, salad, ice cream, a glass of wine; all very straightforward stuff, fresh and healthy (well, apart from the ice cream) and a bill of under £15 each.

ENB can be very happy with their Petit triple bill. Some of the newspaper reviews have tended towards the sniffy, but to me as a common-or-garden ballet-goer this was a cracking programme, full of energy and drama; the only thing that really looked dated was the copious amount of onstage smoking…

It was hard to believe, watching Erina Takahashi’s shy tenderness in “L’Arlesienne”, that the last time I saw her in action was as a practically fire-breathingly evil Odile in the Black Swan pas de deux. Her partner was the febrile, sexy Esteban Berlanga, doing a good line in wild-eyed distraction and frenetic leaps. Around and behind their doomed-love-story, a small corps de ballet dances lovely, folk-dance inflected rounds and chains that somehow convey both the contentment and the blinkeredness inherent in a tight-knit community.

“Le Jeune Homme et la Mort” brought another terrific young bloke on stage; Anton Lukovkin, a handsome young man with an unusually pointy chin, hurling himself with abandon around the stage in a pair of off-the-shoulder dungarees. It was short but very exciting stuff, and a tour-de-force for the two leads.

I’m not very familiar with Petit’s work. I’ve never seen either of these first pieces before, though I saw “Carmen” (the final piece in this bill) once on television when I was about twelve. I could remember being impressed then, but no particular details of what I was impressed by. Part of what grabbed me, then as now, was the sheer theatricality of it all; the sexiness, the aggression, the high drama of the final duet-cum-duel. My exposure to ballet back then had been very much of the order of “Swan Lake”, “Fille”, “Nutcracker”… Not chic-yet-vampy women in corsets standing on chairs and shouting, and certainly not erotic violence and murder.

I can only begin to imagine the impact this had on a London audience accustomed to the delicacy and classicism of the pre-Macmillan-era Royal Ballet… Not just the unabashedly sexual pelvic movements, but the furious energy, the stamping of feet, grinding out of cigarettes, slashing high leg extensions, all must have seemed like the proverbial bolt from the blue.

I loved in particular the way that even in the central love scene, as Carmen and Don José move through their highly sensual pas de deux, there’s a constant undercurrent of muted aggression that suggests their essential incompatibility as effectively as any amount of speech could do. A corking good show altogether.

Sunday afternoon was spent in the boiling heat, with a large water bottle, a couple of pints of Hobgoblin and an assortment of the usual Festival Food – Thai street nibbles, a crepe, some popcorn, veg curry, fruit sticks with chocolate sauce… Plus bluegrass, ska, Cuban rock, Balkan gypsy music, Hungarian traditional dance and Congolese soukous. Great dancing stuff, and one filthy, sweaty, tired and very cheerful Dent at the end of it all.

To finish off on Monday night with “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows part two” was a very welcome finale to the weekend (especially coming after a pretty trying day at the office). It’s excellent; fun, exciting, a bit emotional, good battle scenes, cliff-hangers and great special effects. It was my first time at an IMAX, too – corblimey, now that’s what 3d cinema is good for! My only problem was that Jane and I had been to Sagar in Catherine Street first and eaten an enormous supper of aloo chaat and spicy creamed wheat and dosas, and super-rich creamy mango lassis, and we were both absolutely stuffed by the time we got to the cinema, trying not to entertain our neighbours with burping - such a ladylike pair we are...

At least yesterday evening I stayed in, wrote, and flopped. Pushing on with the revision of “Ramundi’s Sisters” I’ve noticed the spacing in my typing is all to pot. Between full stop and capital letter I've got one space here, two spaces there; it’s all over the place. Trying to make it uniform must be just about the most boring job out, but it has to be done. I like to know I’m producing clean copy. Chuntering through it I had a sudden good idea for solving something that has been bugging me in something else; it necessitates a bit of a rewrite there as well, but what the heck. So I think I’ll have a look at that tonight, for a change. And then an early night.

Heavenly music

...and thank goodness for it, too.

This week is Cardiff Singer of the World week. Cardiff Singer is a biannual competition for budding opera and lieder singers, held at St David's Hall in Cardiff and televised by the BBC. Good old BBC! - I'm so lucky to live somewhere where public service broadcasting will toss me a bonne bouche like this every once in a while.

The first heat was last night, and was won by a sumptuous-sounding Russian mezzo. There are three more heats to go, then the Lieder final is on Saturday evening and the Grand Final, for the overall title Cardiff Singer of the World, is shown live on Sunday evening on BBC2. For anyone who loves great singing, Cardiff Singer week is a week in heaven.

I filled the only non-Cardiff evening of the week, on Monday, with another of these Covent Garden cinema broadcasts; Verdi's "Macbeth" (or Macbetto, as he becomes after enforced Italianisation). A luxury cast, Pappano in the pit, and for £16 a chance to see everyone really close up. In the title role Favourite Baritone was giving it his all. He was a much subtler, more troubled and confused Macbeth than Thomas Hampson, who I saw in this same production a few years ago. Where Hampson played Macbeth as a bear of very little brain, not bright enough to realise he isn’t very bright, FB gave us a guy who isn’t very bright and is aware of it, and confused about it, but lacking the resources to handle it; he gave off a bitter, volatile quality that was truly nasty, and sang heroically as well. The Lady M., Lyudmila Monastirska (I may have mis-spelled that), was vocally the real mustard, but her acting was of the Pavarotti-school – roll eyes, flare nostrils and tip head back… yay, dat's acting, dat is...

Steven Ebel’s Malcolm was good, I loved Raymond Aceto's Banquo, and there was a lovely cameo from one of the Covent Garden Young Artists, Lukas Jakobski, as the doctor - I wouldn’t expect to say “delicate and silky” of a bass but those are the words that spring to mind. I'm still not sure I like the production, though; it has some great visuals and also some deeply silly ones.

We also got the felicity of a subtitle c*ck-up; at the beginning of Act 2, the curtain rose on a stage full of whirling, writhing witches stirring their toxic brews, who then began, with expressions of the most poisonous evil, to sing "Welcome back to the Royal Opera House..." With a keyed-up audience, of course, it got a huge laugh. I know they were really singing "Double, double, toil and trouble..." etc (in Italian), but "Welcome back..." was such a glorious disjuncture with the scene.

Work is a bit hassley at the moment, the third revision of "Ramundi's sisters" is causing me trouble as it has thrown me into facing the need for a big re-write >sigh< and I have ballet withdrawal symptoms. Otherwise muddling along.

At least the linden trees are in flower; that heavenly scent comes raining down on me as I cycle in and back from work. "Ich atmet einem lindenduft" indeed... Apologies if that is also spelled wrong, my German has never progressed beyond the "Guten tag" and ordering-things-off-a-menu level...

Hectic, but with ballet and more ballet...

Well, it’s been a hectic couple of weeks since I got back from my holiday. Work is at a busy time of the year and our department as a whole is still very short-staffed, although my team is slightly less stretched now that someone has come back from a long period of sick leave. The new computers are still causing hiccoughs assorted; every time I think I’ve got the hang of things I am brought up against another baffling change to the simple “how you do this” issues, with the result that I still feel like a cat chasing my tail a lot of the time. Fire-fighting the illogicality of Windows 7 is a big draw on one’s time and energy.

I haven’t been completely without fun, though. I’ve had a lovely trip to the Wetland Centre, some ballet outings and concerts to go to, plus a trip to the cinema (“Thor”, totally daft but entertaining; nice to see Tom Hiddleston, one of my ideal Gabriel Yeatses, getting a good high profile job, too) and a highly enjoyable birthday party – the sort where intelligent people talk about intelligent things and laugh a lot over a few pints. I’ve been trying to keep on top of the garden, not an easy task in this drought. And I’ve started the tricky and rather emotionally-draining business of giving “Ramundi’s sisters” a third revision. >sigh< It needs to be done, but it’s a job that gets slightly more sticky with each turn around the block.

My ballet outings were all very enjoyable. The latest Triple Bill at the Royal Ballet was a lovely package, except for being too short – none of the three pieces was particularly long, and the first came in at under twenty minutes. Even with longer than average intervals to pad it out, I was home soon after ten pm; but it was a good enough evening that I didn’t feel short-changed. “Ballo della Regina” was the “please sir, I want some more” opener, with Lauren Cuthbertson in lovely, shiny, smiley form as the lead ballerina, skipping through some fiendish footwork as if it were a playground game. She had a scrumptious quartet backing her up, and Sergei Polunin, all huge leaps and cheekbones, was classy as the sole fella.

Next up came a new piece by Wayne McGregor, which has got the critics all at sixes and sevens; like retsina, it seems, you either love it or loathe it. I was high enough up in the house not to be overly distracted by the video backdrop of exploding trucks, and could concentrate on the dancing. I’m never entirely sure I’m convinced by McGregor’s intellectual ideas, but he certainly choreographs incredible stuff from the dancing point of view; elastic off-centre bends, weird shapes, strenuous lifts and general frenzied athleticism all round. Ferociously tricky, it was danced by the small cast with a bravura that was slightly scary.

For a finale we got a revival, much longed-for by me, of Christopher Wheeldon’s “DGV”, a gorgeous non-narrative piece whose lack of a story does not preclude a heartfelt warmth in its series of fluid duets and final, powerfully uplifting ensemble. It’s a thrilling ballet that I could happily watch over and over; and with a cast like this it simply sings. Duet number one brought us a sensuous Laura Morera and Steven McRae’s customary febrile dynamism, duet number two, Zenaida Yanowsky’s long limbed elegance and the steady, modest strength of Eric Underwood. For duet number three I was lucky enough to see Gary Avis and Melissa Hamilton again; this is a luxury partnership of astonishing chemistry, and their ease with one another in this tender, soaring, probably hideously-difficult material is simply dazzling. To finish off, replacing Sarah Lamb and Federico Bonelli, came a decidedly high-calibre piece of back-up casting in the form of Itziar Mendizabal and Nehemiah Kish, two new recruits both of whom I am warming to rapidly. They hadn’t originally been slated to dance this at all, seem to have been put in fairly late in the day, and both looked as though they were loving every minute.

Then came the saga of the “Manon”s. MacMillan’s “Manon” is one of my all-time favourite ballets, and I went to see it back at the beginning of the run in April for a performance featuring the sexy Steven McRae, passionately intense and technically dazzling, and his regular stage partner, the beautiful and elfin Roberta Marquez. Gorgeous!

When I discovered that a performance featuring Alina Cojocaru and Johan Kobborg was being put out on the Big Screen in Trafalgar Square last week, though, I decided I had to go to that – after all, Cojocaru and Kobborg are pretty damned special together, and it was free, and Big Screen screenings are tremendous fun in a slightly surreal way (double decker buses circling, sirens wailing by, aircraft heading into Heathrow as the night sky darkens to deepest phthalo blue…). So I went along, with a fleece and a picnic, and failed to link up with a friend who cried off at the last minute, and was thrilled all over again.

It was a totally different interpretation of the leading roles, with Kobborg playing Des Grieux as an intelligent, mature man of almost heroic decency, and Alina’s Manon the most thoughtful, even moral, I’ve ever seen. I know it sounds odd to call a girl who elects to become a rich man’s kept woman “moral”, but really, you could see her struggling between the choices facing her, knowing that both are, in one way or another, wrong – forswear the man you love and become a whore, or let-down and disobey your beloved brother (and know you are losing your one chance at financial security as well)…

And then my mum called me on Friday to say the friend she was going with to the Saturday matinee (scheduled to be danced by Laura Morera and Federico Bonelli) had called to say she couldn’t come after all, and would I like to join her? Well, Morera and Bonelli were a stunning Tatyana and Onegin last autumn, so I was delighted to say yes. Only to find, on arriving at the Opera House, that Mr Bonelli was injured and was being replaced by Mr Kish – who’s only danced the part once before, and that not with Ms Morera.

Mum was vocal in her disappointment (she feels about Mr Bonelli rather as I do about Messrs Watson and McRae, tall dark Italians being catnip to her in the same way ginger toms are to me); “Who’s this Nehemiah Kish, then? Never heard of him. Where’s he from? How long's he been kicking around?” etc etc – rather embarrassing as one cringes and hopes her well-pitched and rather carrying voice will not reach the ears of a parent, wife, girl~ or boyfriend, or anyone else who’s there to support Mr K... I tried to reassure her but as I hadn’t seen him in action very much, all I could say was fairly bland things about him being tall and a good partner.

So into the theatre we went, and the lights went down, and we were treated to what was for me, completely out of the blue, the best of the three “Manon”s I’ve seen this year, by a good margin.

It’s always hard to explain it, when it happens, but it was one of those performances when everything just comes together. By the time they got to that final terrifying pas de deux, hurtling into despair and death in the Louisiana swamps, I was crying helplessly into my binoculars, totally harrowed.

With two leads who hadn’t been set to dance together, and who therefore can’t have had much rehearsal together, one could have forgiven the odd hesitation or over-careful lift, but in fact they seemed pretty much unfazed by it; there was hardly any sign that they hadn’t been dancing together for years. To my eyes they were well-matched physically, technically and emotionally; their acting styles were complementary (both are subtle and inward actors rather than grand-standing and full-on) and they brought the whole thing alight for me.

The rest of the cast was batting down the order, too, and there were lovely little touches all over the place. José Martín was an excellent Lescaut, perhaps less virtuosic than Ricardo Cervera had been but more complex as a character; Valentino Zucchetti was a terrific Beggar Chief, Gary Avis a really nasty Monsieur GM, Bennett Gartside a really nasty Gaoler – I could burble on for ages listing every bit part who got a credit, as there wasn’t a duff performance to be seen. And from our leads there were lovely clean lines and confident sweeping lifts, kisses that looked as if they were really meant, and all the time that sense of real feeling, of something not thought-thru’ and rehearsed but fresh and immediate.

Laura Morera’s Manon came across as a girl who at the beginning is only just discovering the power her allure gives her, making a journey from innocence to a painful adulthood – a Juliet-like character, trying to make the right decisions, to solve the pull between irreconcilable longings. Mr Kish’s Des Grieux was a classic nice guy, simple and straightforward, kind-hearted, devoted, even perhaps not terribly bright; exactly the sort of decent, honest boy-next-door type she ought to have been able, in a better world, to marry and be happy with.

She knows how to use her stillness to say more than one would think possible; he knows how to use his very beautiful hands and wrists to finish a long, aching line; they both have the technical skill to let the choreography do the talking, rather than trying to over-characterise. The final pas de deux was about as no-holds-barred as I’ve seen it, Manon’s death a shattering moment, Des Grieux not screaming silently as most do but slumping back on his heels, staring at her body in shock; exhausted, bereft, and knowing he’s next.

I’ve been haunted by it ever since.

Good things today

It’s turned windy, but the sun is shining.

I had a very nice lunch of cheese and tomato salad and rye crispbread.

The first flowers are opening on the myrobalans, and their sweet honey-and-clean-skin scent is filling the air.

And last night I finished the revision of “Ramundi’s Sisters”.

It’s been sticky going, as the final scene had to be totally re-written from scratch. I’m still not entirely sure it works, so I have to treat that last scene as “first draft” level, when the remainder is now at “third revision” level. This is a bit frustrating, to say the least, and I’m pretty sure it isn’t really right yet. But it’s a lot better than the original, which was a really bad example of characters pushed into actions that served the plot with no regard for what would be natural to the characters themselves.

Anyway, it’s nearer to done than it’s been in a long time. Now I’ll sit on it for a few weeks and then try to give it a first revision all of its own.

Steady, there we are, nearly home...

I'm really tired today after another late night typing. I've nearly licked the re-write of the last chapter of "Ramundi's Sisters". It's proving to be tricky going, but I need to get it right - it was all so wrong to start with, it was embarrassing. I've had to scrap a large chunk completely and start again from scratch. But I'm onto the home straight and I can see the light at the end of the tunnel, and all the other clichés - gathered at the end of the road, cheering me on. Nearly home...

I really want to get this sorted out because I've started on something else, too (as well as the two projects on the go, plus the back burner project). I was reminded recently of some short stories I started a few years ago and abandoned (because the linking structure was derivative drivel and proverbial pants). I looked them up and found my notes for another one, and suddenly saw how it would go better than the original plan; and it took off.

Rah, there's nothing like having a story straining at the leash! I love it when my creativity flows like that. And when it does, I've learned I need to go with it as much as possible (given the constraints of normal life). The energy of the Muses is an erratic one, it flows at unexpected intervals; like the Nailbourne, only not made of water and not in Kent.

I promise to get the Ramundis sorted out soon. They deserve it; they've been very patient.

More writing difficulties... and a daff

I went on with the writing yesterday evening; got through the next scene okay, then got bogged down again. I want to yell at it, but know this wouldn't help. I have committed one of the classic beginner's bad-writing errors, right at the end of the story, and I have to sort it out.

The characters do what I had decided the plot required, rather than what real people would do in their situation. Ah, horsehit and a pile of it, to quote Rhodry Maelwaedd. I have to completely rewrite the last two scenes. Sorry, this may take a few days, and I have to resist the distraction urge meanwhile ("Why not make a start on those short stories again?" "Why not put on a U2 album and draw?" "Why not make muffins?"...).

Never mind; it will get there, in its own good time. Meanwhile, the first real daffodil is out in my garden. Kew has quite a lot of them by now, of course, but I'm a lot more proud of my own personal one.

Writing difficulties

I’ve been feeling rather dopey today after being up till after midnight, writing and rewriting something that simply wasn’t working; a love scene. Gods, I hate love scenes!

Don’t get me wrong; I’ve no objection to being involved in a love scene (¡ojala que sea!)! But writing them is another matter. It is, to be blunt, bl**dy difficult stuff. I’d rather write about any amount of things I’ve never seen or experienced (what’s research for, after all?), I’d rather kill off a major character (been there, done that, easy-peasey), than have to describe two people making love. It’s not that I’m not particularly prudish; I am irritated by the way so many love scenes are either coyly sugary or jarringly (and gigglily) explicit, and frequently out of keeping with the rest of the writing as well. But trying to write a love scene that is true to the characters involved and is honest about what’s going on, but without being either fluffy or embarrassing, is really tough.

I’ve been working lately on typing up and revising something called “Ramundi’s Sisters”, which was first written a good long while ago. It needs a deal of revision in places, as some of it is dreadfully purple. I’m almost at the end now, and the last chapter needs more work than anything else. It has three tricky scenes between two of the protagonists, which are meant to bring their relationship to a natural conclusion. The first of these scenes is the love scene I was struggling with last night. It isn’t particularly intense, in fact all they do is kiss. But the characters in question have each been carrying a torch for the other for a long time; they are both very fired up, and very awkward, with one another. There’s also the fact they are both good Catholics, and it’s 1927, so nothing particularly vigorous is going to happen, but it is going to seem absolutely momentous to them.

The original version was desperately overwrought. I struck a line through it last night and started again from scratch. Version 2a read like Barbara Cartland on hallucinogenic drugs; version 2b, like Barbara Cartland trying to write porn. 2c isn't too bad; tighter and shorter, with almost all the adjectives chopped off. When I went to bed, I was feeling quite happy about it. But I may re-read it tonight and think "Oh no!"

I've also finally managed to put right a couple of the points when the narrative point of view shifts mid-scene from one person to another. This is very sloppy writing, technically speaking, but I had not been able to see my way through to how to handle the narrative from just one PoV at these particular points. When struggling with something tricky, like the aforementioned clinch, the mind springs up with distractions. Ironing and filing begin to seem appealing. I think "Hey, why don't I set up a still-life with the fruit bowl and the guitar and some glasses, and draw instead?" I get up to change the cd, to make tea, to dance to the cd (I was writing to early Bill Nelson, very danceable stuff)... So I made myself go back to these other revisions, instead; when stuck on something tough, try something else tough. There, now the first problem doesn't seem quite so isolatedly awful! It worked rather well; by midnight I had solved two of the PoV glitches and typed up version 2c of the kiss.

Off to see "The Magic Flute" tonight with my stepmum. By the time I get home there'll just be time to open up the file, look at version 2c, and scream... and then start again.

A good weekend

On Friday we bade goodbye to my line manager Curlywoman; blast. I liked Curlywoman and she was a good boss, but she’s got a “dream job” selling hotel bookings - her idea of a dream job, not mine! – and in the end you can’t blame someone for pursuing their dream job. We all had a good evening at The Botanist, one of the local pubs, and I made the most of feeling okay again after my gyppy tum of earlier in the week. Many jokes were told, a fair number of glasses of wine were drunk, a lot of nachos and chips were eaten, poems were read, I bought a drink for someone I barely know because I thought she looked sad (only to find she looked sad because she was Very Very Drunk and feeling ill) and one of the Press Office suddenly cornered me with a barrage of questions about why-are-you-still-single-Imogen, to which I couldn’t give a satisfactory answer, largely because I don’t have one.

Got home at midnight, slightly tipsy despite having been sensible and had plenty of fruit juice as well as nice Aussie plonk. Dan v amused – “I’ve never seen you drunk before!” – I think he had a picture of me as a sober, wholefood-eating, sketchbook-wielding yoghurt-weaving type who never lets her hair down even a teensy bit...

Saturday – posted a birthday present, sent “Gabriel Yeats” off to the third agent on my list, fixed a problem with my rent payments, bought groceries, ran the washing machine, tidied and weeded in the garden, typed up some more of “Ramundi’s Sisters”, made cauliflower cheese, and watched a lovely sentimental movie.

Sunday – sorted out a lot of stuff, cleaned and tidied my bedside cabinet and my desk, typed up a lot more of “Ramundi’s Sisters” and dealt with a tricky revision, made braised quorn with lemon and herbs, and watched the last part of “Lark Rise to Candleford” (largely to report on it to my mum, who was out and whose video is out of action) and the latest episode of “Being Human”; then to wind down after that I finished another of the "back burner" project summaries, and started yet another. It took a while to wind down, truth to tell, as “Being Human” was a cracking good episode, funny and touching and thoroughly scary. When they get the balance right, they have a lovely little series there...

Typing and revising doesn’t leave anything concrete behind, the way working in the garden does, but it is very satisfying to see the pile of dog-eared manuscript getting smaller, and the size of the typed file getting bigger. I’ve got to the last section of “Ramundi’s Sisters”, I’ve reached 1927, and I’m just five scenes away from the end of the story.

Then I’ll need to re-read the whole thing, clean up typos I’ve missed, decide how much further revision it needs, and finally try sending it to the first agent I sent “Gabriel Yeats” to, since she did say that if I had anything more mainstream she’d like to see it. I’d be a fool if I passed up on an offer like that; as a tyro writer, I’m incredibly lucky to have that chance of further attention.

“Ramundi’s Sisters” is a different kettle of fish from “Gabriel Yeats” in many ways. I guess it is still magical realism, though; but it is at the end of the spectrum that has relatively little magic proportional to realism – “Gabriel Yeats” is right at the magic end, and possibly a little off it - the deep end, that is - as well. The other major thing they have in common is that they are both very romantic. It’s perhaps an embarrassing admission, but clearly I still Believe In Love.

Perhaps an even more embarrassing admission today. This Feb 14th I have had, for the twelfth year in a row, no Valentine cards. The frenzied month-long promotion of Valentine’s Day does get a little grating when one is long-term single; the only good thing about it was seeing the flower stalls I pass on my way into work, all packed with extra flowers today.

Finally, and I know this is a bit of an odd segue, but here’s Mr Orchid Nursery himself, telling you how to trim and repot your Phalaenopsis. A few nice shots of the interior of the Orchid Nursery (& a lot of footage of Mr O. Nursery’s hands – perfectly nice hands, I hasten to add, but the orchids are better).

Luvverly Bit Of Kit, Missus?

I've been given a gadget, and it has made a small revolution in my life.

Normally I'm not a gadget person; my father was, Baby Bro is; I'm a bit gadget-shy and also not at all keen on the "latest must-have" side of the consumer society I live in. I would literally never have gone out and bought one of these things, because a) I'm gadget-shy, b) I would have expected it to cost £200, and I could get a long weekend in Paris for that, and c) I didn't know they existed in the first place.

It's a thing called a portable diskette drive (I think that's the right name). It's a wee black box with a bit of cable hanging off one end and a slot for a floppy disk on the other. And using it, I can take the floppy disks that are all my ancient laptop at home will use, and transfer material from them to this slightly-less ancient computer at work. So I no longer need to trail out to West Ealing to London's scrubbiest internet café in order to upload or print off any writing I've been doing at home.

This probably wouldn't mean much if I weren't steadily trickling my way through typing up and revising "Ramundi's Sisters" and working on two other magnum opuses (magni opi?). But to a writer with out-of-date equipment, being able to get those bits of equipment to talk to each other is wonderful. So I love my gadget; it's a lovely Bit Of Kit! And if anyone wants to read two thirds of the aforementioned sicilian romantic epic, or fancies about half of the very loco real-world/fantasy clash "Midnight in the Café Tana", or the first four chapters of fairly straight (if slightly talky) SF "Fortitude", just let me know...

The "back burner"...

A few nights ago something made me wonder about just what constitutes the contents of my mental back burner. Turns out it's a big old burner and no mistaking...

Some of the things sitting macerating there date back to my days at Art Colllege. I'd still love to make and film an installation of found objects on a beach; film it being built and then washed away by the tide, on a brilliant sunny day, add a soundtrack of summer beach sounds, and call it "All summer in a day". I'd still love to film the train journey from Charing Cross to the coast and synchronise it to the "Death and the Maiden" quartet. I'd still love to draw all the activitiy at a big theatre or concert hall; the spaces both empty and full, the rehearsals, the auditorium, the fly tower and storage areas and the stage in use and deserted...

There are stories that are ancient and stories that appeared very recently. The oldest dates back to my teens, the latest to just a few weeks ago, to a dream image of someone walking into a wood out of which blows thickly whirling snow, though there is no snow at all on the ground in the open. There are the stories I've been working on lately, and stories I have previously worked up into what I now realise was the wrong form. I've written three film scripts and three stage plays in my time and the Gods only know what possessed me to do so, since all of them would be better off re-written as straightforward narrative fiction.

I have, in total, besides "Ramundi's Sisters" and "Gabriel Yeats", both of which are finished and require only revision, another eight very promising stories, eight that are not quite ready, and eleven that are definitely not ready, but that still intrigue me. Plus three that are not fit for purpose, but have a grain of possibility lurking - a good central idea or a strong character waiting for the right home... twenty-nine healthy items all told, and three duds.

It's a slightly scary total. I've decided to make proper notes about the state of each idea, to see if that clarifies how "cooked" they are, and which ones I should start on next. Wish me luck; it's a big undertaking I've got there.

A nibble!...

A few months ago I took several metaphorical deep breaths and sent "GY" to the first of the literary agents on my list; today I heard back from her. It's a "no", which is a pity, but it's traditional for tyro writers to get many "no"s before they get a yes. So it's realistic to expect and accept a "no". The good thing is, it's a good no. Yes, there is such a thing...

Firstly, it's a personal message, not a standard response. It's clear that the agent has read the material and considered it, and then taken the time to give me some personal feedback. As I understand the business, this is pretty unusual nowadays.

Secondly, the feedback is very positive. She thinks I write beautifully and am a wonderful writer. Those are not my words - they're verbatim quotes. The problem - the reason why she's saying "no" - is not the quality but the "fantastical aspects of the plot". She's tried to sell a magic realist novel without success recently, and says she doesn't want to raise false hopes when she would struggle trying to get a me a deal.

Thirdly, she says she'd be interested in seeing anything else I have written that might have a more straightforward story.

I have of course written straight back to say "Thank you for your time and your feedback, and I may take you up on that". And I've had a reply already, saying "Best of luck and yes, please do".

So although it's a "no", I'm feeling pretty chuffed about it. I have had something moderately close to a nibble, on my first try. And I may send her "Ramundi's Sisters" when I finish revising it, since there is nothing fantastical in that plot, just a lot of painting and stifled Sicillian passion.

New Year, New Me; or, better still, can I just have the Old Me back, please?

I have already noticed it’s a new year; in fact I don’t think I’ve forgotten and written last year’s date once, which I’m rather proud of. But my chief focus at present is on getting back the use of my right hand and arm, and I hadn’t really thought about New Year’s Resolutions, New Year New Me, etc. Time to rectify that, maybe?

Of course, getting my arm back is a Resolution in itself. I gather that it can be anything from a couple of months to a couple of years to recover fully from a broken wrist and the associated surgery. So that is Resolution no. 1, then; getting back my right arm, flexible, strong and fit. I’ll never be able to lift a fully grown woman over my head, I know, but I’d like to be able to play badminton again, and swim, and use a handsaw in the garden, and knead bread dough, and return to my Scottish Country Dancing group able to cope with a fast swing in a right-hand hold…

Resolution no. 2; I want this to be the year of actually looking for an agent, instead of simply talking about it (& then panicking). Gulp. I’m panicking slightly just thinking about it; but writing needs to be read, otherwise it is just distilled daydreams.

Resolution no. 3; do more drawing. I was having so much fun in November, drawing at "Re-Rite" and working from my drawings, and now I have lost momentum, for unavoidable reasons, but I had managed to remind myself of what utter bliss it is, and I want to do more. This is dependent on Resolution no. 1, above, of course. Get arm back, then draw.

Resolution no. 4; see all the cultural events I want to get to. Don’t look at brochures and websites and then say “Oh, I can’t afford it and I’ll probably be too tired anyway.” A great concert, exhibition, ballet or theatre performance boosts me up and fires my spirit. Embrace it. Living in London has its down-sides, after all; so enjoy the rich and hugely varied up-sides as much as possible.

Resolution no. 5; more time out of doors. Seeing the beauty and the sweet ceaseless changing cycle of the natural world also boosts me up, and fires my spirit, just like watching dancers or listening to great music.

I don’t think I need to resolve to write more, since until the broken wrist I was getting on with that fairly steadily. Typing since then has been such a drag, and writing by hand almost impossible, that I have stopped writing temporarily, but I am itching to get on with things. The protagonist of “Café Tano” and her tree surgeon friend have been stuck in a fairly sticky situation for the last seven weeks, and I want to get them out; “Ramundi’s Sisters" is three-quarters typed up/revised; and Iain Siward, Aietes and the android professor are sitting in a shuttle, deep in outer space, worrying about who they are, where they are going, what has been happening, and why Iain is still alive (well, Professor Maddix isn’t worrying exactly, being an android; she’s just terribly, calmly, unexcitedly interested).

Oh, I want my life back! I want my right hand back! I want my arm, I want my arm!!

I am working like mad at my exercises, and the residual post-operative numbness is fairly minimal now, and all my tendons except the one in the thumb seem to be working fine. It’s not long now; on Friday the cast is due to come off. Gods, get me through this last push, these last few days of prison; get me through, get me through…

Aftermath...

One of those odd post-pub things...

My right foot hurts. It's puffy, tender, and just starting to turn faintly purple under the tan. In a couple more days I think there's going to be a socking great bruise there. At some point on Saturday night, someone or something must have landed on my foot - on the scale from "gentle bump" to "horse trod on me" this is shaping up to be close to the horse end of the spectrum. A sheep, perhaps.

I have absolutely no recollection of what it was. A sheep, perhaps? In Ealing on a Saturday night, anything is possible...

I've been trying to get a nice picture of a bruised foot off the internet to paste here, but bizarrely everyone who has posted pictures of their feet with bruises has made them not-public-copy-able. Weird. One of the Press team made some suggestions but none of them had pictures of bruised feet. Oh, life is a weird place sometimes.

Spent yesterday evening going back through the first half of "Ramundi's Sisters" doing rewrites and trying to excise purple. After getting some very useful feedback from one or two people I am now on a mission to try and see my writing as if I were someone else and not me; not to feel precious about my purple but to see it coolly and chop it out when it serves no purpose (ie, a lot of the time).

Better...

I now have eight tiny weeny baby tomato seedlings through – they are about five millimetres high and look like bits of green thread. It’s so hard to believe that actual whole tomatoes will come eventually from plants so miraculously small and delicate…

I had a good weekend; went to the Wetland Centre in Barnes to sketch birds and enjoy the sunshine (and a disgracefully indulgent lunch out); did some gardening; did some sewing; got on with the typing up and revising of “Ramundi’s sisters” and wrote a big chunk of “Café Tano” (the last was done under the influence, but this is actually quite appropriate as the narrator is in a fairly weird state of mind and is recounting a vision). Also made some more headway on “Fortitude” but as this is currently onto a prolonged conversation taking place between two people who are rather awkward with one another, it is proceeding rather awkwardly! However I feel I achieved a good deal – and I even got an early night last night.

Thoughtful on Tuesday

No progress on the messy business with solicitors and wills; possible progress on the somewhere-to-live front (I’m going to look at a place in Turnham Green after work tonight); steady progress on the typing up of “Ramundi’s Sisters”. I’ve also been back to the new piece (must give this a working title – GY is an abbreviation of “The Eternal Love of Gabriel Yeats”, so why don’t I follow the same principle and call The New Piece “Fortitude”? Okay, that’ll do for now) – I’ve been back to “Fortitude” and tidied up some typing errors, and I think I see how it goes on from where it got stuck. I had a brainwave relating to another story this morning while walking to the bus stop, so am now wanting to get going on that. And I’ve restarted another piece, which had been started and abandoned twice before, when I suddenly realised it would work better as a first person narrative.

Good grief. It’s a bit scary; I’m typing up “Ramundi’s Sisters” and working on two other written projects, and contemplating starting on a third, all at the same time. Will this work, or will my brain collapse under the strain? Watch this space!

It’s odd how it comes and goes like this, in phases. I feel at the moment a bit as if I’ve opened a door and found a lot of things crammed in behind it, squeezed together to the point of severe compression; suddenly there’s space to expand into, and everything comes bursting out. My problem is to keep up with the onrushing flow of ideas coming through this door (sorry, slightly odd mixed metaphor there) while still holding down my job, having some sort of social life, etc. I have a ballet ticket this week, and two evenings I’m meeting friends for a drink, and tonight I’m going to look at some prospective digs, and I do want to do all of these things. But I want to be sitting down at my cranky little old laptop, writing, too. Because when it’s going, and it’s flowing, like this, there really is no feeling as good as this. Creative work is more precious and more exciting to me than almost anything else I’ve ever done; better than getting drunk, better (just) than swimming in the Mediterranean, better even than being in love… Admittedly being in love is the route into all sorts of agonies (or it always has been, for me, at any rate, largely because I am a complete idiot in love). Doing creative work is pure, consistent bliss. If only the aftermath weren’t sometimes such torture…

Monday...

...and a bad dose of that Monday-feeling.

I've decided to bite the bullet - I need to move away from the place I'm living at the moment - and I've started looking for somewhere new. I hate house-hunting, and the bizarre experiences I had eighteen months ago when I had to move at short notice were fairly traumatic, which only adds to the sense of doom and dread. If anyone reading this is thinking of letting their spare room or knows someone who is renting out a room in the Ealing, Acton, or Turnham Green areas, or in Richmond upon Thames or Mortlake, please let me know!

On the good side, saw the wonderful ENO production of "The Magic Flute" at the weekend, and was totally knocked out and blown away by it. It's perfect, everything a "Zauberflöte" should be - and since it is one of my all-time favourite operas that is saying something! Their only problem is a rather dodgy, swoopy Queen of Night; but to compensate they have a truly marvellous Papageno (better than Keenlyside, believe it or not) in Roderick Williams. I could burble for ages about how wonderful he was, and about the whole production, which is magical and fairy-tale-like and yet profoundly moving. The trials by fire and water are really believable for once - I think every other production I've seen (including the first, at my elder brother's school!) has come a cropper with staging this bit. The sets and costumes are lovely. It's extremely funny in all the right places, yet brings up goosebumps of real awe in all the right places, too. The Tamino and Pamina (Robert Murray and Sarah-Jane Davis) are both excellent. I cried with joy at the end. And Roderick Williams is, I repeat, wonderful. And decidedly gorgeous!

How incredible it must be, to have talent like that; a voice like warm dark honey and that kind of acting ability, plus good looks, and then on top of all that to possess the strength of character to realise your abilities and make full use of them... Lucky, happy Mr Williams...

On a more creativity-inclined note, I'm startled and rather proud to announce that I have I think finished the last revision of GY; and promptly got stuck in to typing up something else, an older piece of writing that is in need of some serious revision itself but stands up well to the re-examination. Title, "Ramundi's Sisters". Watch this space.