Yep, it's Summer

Happy Summertime, everyone! Well, except for my NZ friends, that is, who are now enjoying their winter. I still can't quite wrap my head around that, partially because summer is in such full swing here. Every day for a couple weeks now the sky has been cloudless and blazing, and the air so thick with heat it burns against your skin. Normally I'd be hating it. As it is, however, I'm enjoying it as much as I can because once I return to Hawaii the heat will be humid instead of dry (dry heat being much easier to bear, in my opinion) and at least here at home I have a working air conditioner which I don't have in Hawaii. So I'm trying to be philosophical about things. Same with the insect-life; sure the June bugs have started buzzing around, but if I was in Hawaii it'd be cockroaches, so I should be grateful for what I have--or, rather, do not have--right now.

Anyway, the heat also provides a fantastic excuse for both cold drinks and cold desserts and going to the local theme park to get drenched on their water rides, so I'm feeling rather kindly to it on the whole.

It will be overwhelmingly strange and sad to leave home again to return to college, but I know once I am back in Hawaii I will settle quickly and easily into my routine there again as though I had never left. In a way, this saddens me more than it reassures me. I'm scrambling in an attempt to get my driver's license before I have to go back to Hawaii, but I'm not sure if it's happening or not, we'll see. I am a much more confident driver now and can handle myself well on the busy main roads, but I have not yet ventured onto the freeway (nor do I want to) and my parallel parking is . . . not as parallel as I would like.

Movies! I'm looking forward to seeing "Captain America" so much, and am interested in "Cowboys and Aliens" but am not yet sure whether I'll pay to see it in theater or just wait until it comes out on DVD. More films I'm eagerly looking forward to: "The Artist", "War Horse", and "Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy", the first because it just looks absolutely amazing in every way, the second because of the gorgeous music and the fact that it's a WWI story (and I also want to see the play but since I can't anytime soon this'll have to do), and the third because of the cast. Gary Oldman, Colin Firth, Mark Strong, Tom Hardy, and BENEDICT CUMBERBATCH all in one film together?? Really??

Speaking of film, I recently watched "This Gun for Hire" for the first time, and it's really good, I'd recommend it. The very end was a little too staged for my liking, but other than that it was a very enjoyable film, and Alan Ladd is awesome.



Okay, that's all from me for now, but I'll be trying to write more regularly. Cheers!

"Tangled" Tomorrow!

I am so extremely excited about this film, it's unbelievable. It's an obsession. I'm terrified it won't live up to my expectations. Augh, why do I do this to myself?

Here's a shiny new trailer--Japanese, no less!--which is a million times better than the standard American trailers. Why couldn't the American trailer been more like this one in tone? It gave both me AND my 16-year old brother goosebumps. Take a look. The audio is in English, never fear, although the voiceover is Japanese. I tried to get my brother to translate for me, but he was able to manage translating only about 60% of it.



I've been kidding my younger sister and saying that we shouldn't comb our hair until we watch the film. My younger sister is 10 and has never had a haircut, and my own hair is down to my knees, so we are major Rapunzel fans.

Sacramento was gorgeous and fun. The drive there and back went pretty well, all things considered--we got a new 12-seater van, which was really strange, especially since I was sitting in the back and found out the hard way that my parents in the front seats can't hear me when I'm way back there unless I yell at the top of my lungs. HR, my 6-week-old baby sister, cried sporadically but overall was extremely well-behaved. I'm very proud of her.

I did not recall in my championship, but I did place 22nd. To be ranked 22nd in the entire Western Region is not a bad thing; sure I wish I had placed high enough to be recalled, but I am grateful I was able to dance at all, and enjoyed myself. I haven't been to any big competitions in a long while.

My little siblings weren't that excited about the competitions, since they go to feises all the time; dance is old news now. Instead, they were excited about other things: a horde of cows we saw (and smelled) on the drive; trying to translate the Latin painted on the walls of the cathedral we attended Mass in; howling with laughter when the wind blew my umbrella inside-out during a rainstorm; seeing magpies for the first time; collecting the bright-red fallen maple leaves. I liked all that too, as well as the cold weather; it was nippy, but so refreshing a change, especially seeing all the fall colors.

There was a basketball court at the hotel we stayed at, so my dad got a basketball from the front desk and we all trooped outside to play. The littlest kids have never played basketball before, so it was fun teaching them and seeing them attempt to dribble and shoot a ball which is basically as big as them. Then we had an impromptu game after dividing up into teams. It was fun until my 16-year old brother for some reason decided to pass the ball to me by throwing it as hard as he could at my face while I was standing about two feet away from him. I was afraid I had broken my nose at first, but it seems okay now, though still very sore if I touch it. That was the end of the game for me, anyway.

Now I will spend the rest of the month focusing on exercising, "Tangled" (I am saving to buy the soundtrack and graphic novel), Thanksgiving, and my NaNoWriMo novel. Said novel is currently only at 15,000 words, partly because I spent the last week or so devoting all my writing energies to writing a birthday story for one of my sisters (it ended up being 38 pages long), and partly because of how dance has been eating up my time this month. I wrote a lot more on the car trip though, and I'm determined to get back on track. Somehow. I'll do it. I WILL.

Daytime Thunderstorm!

There's thunder. Really, really loud thunder. And lightning. Very bright lightning. And rain. Lots of torrential rain. All happening outside my window right now.

I'm not sure yet whether to be scared or excited about this, to be honest.

. . . Okay, I'm excited :D

7 Days

In one week at the most I will have another little sibling to cuddle! I had lots of fun today spending time with other siblings. We played outside: A challenging game they invented called 'Hen, Chickens, and Fox' which was basically a complicated, crazy game of tag and surprisingly fun; hide-and-go-seek; a game they invented based on 'How to Train Your Dragon', and a few others. I then took the two youngest on a walk, which was so relaxing and pleasant . . . I should go on a walk every day. Everything just seemed to mellow down, become peaceful and calm . . . I made lemonade for them as a treat when we got back to the house, and then we all made cupcakes together! I had never tried this particular recipe before, but it was delicious and chocolate-y. I had such a wonderful day today, and the little ones were talking and talking about how much fun they had. I hope to make my newest sibling as happy once she is born.

Now I'm going to grab a half-hour or so of writing time before bed, and then will probably read more of my Revolutionary War history book before actually turning off the light. That's another luxury I've been starving myself of lately, in addition to taking leisurely walks: Reading in bed.

I just finished watching the latest episode of "Fringe", which is why I'm up so late. Seriously, "Fringe" has been amaaaazing this season. I'm so glad I decided to stick with this show after the lacklustre opening episodes of the first season, because it's incredibly good now. Especially Torv; I really disliked her character in the beginning of the show and thought her acting was horrid, and now I both love BOTH versions of Olivia and am consistently wowed by Torv's acting. So good.

All right, back to my book now!

Hot . . .

You know how I mentioned it was chilly a little while back?

Scratch that. Yesterday broke records with a high of 113 or somesuch insane number. It is hot, hot, hot, HOT. When the wind blowing feels like an open oven scorching your face, you know you have problems.

And this is the beginning of autumn? Sigh.

It's Sunny Today

. . . which is nice, of course. And it's also a bit chilly, at least inside. That, to me, is the best sort of weather: chilly, crisp, and sunny.

Tomorrow is one of my little sister's birthday, and she has requested that I make her pretzels for reasons that I'm not aware of. I've never made pretzels before. But I'm going to give it a go anyway! I'm working on a few art projects right now, one of them being her birthday card. The other is a crossover project I challenged my brother to, where we have to combine the two films "Ratatouille" and "How to Train Your Dragon"--both of which are among my very favorite films, and both of which are rather similar to each other if you think about it. That's not a bad thing :D

I've been playing "Lego Star Wars" on the Wii--it's very, very fun--and in the game, if you shoot C-3PO, he loses a leg and starts hopping around, leading my littlest sister to start calling him 'The Hopping Droid'. It's pretty funny.

Work on my novel continues apace, and it's coming along. Very exciting. Even more exciting is the prospect of doing NaNoWriMo again this year, I can't wait! I am so determined to reach the required word count this year. Mm-hm.

And that's all really, nothing much else has been happening. Oh, I finally went to the library last weekend, only to discover that the library had absolutely NONE of the many books I was looking for. That was a huge disappointment. Hawaii libraries are SO much better than the ones here. Sigh.

Okay, I'm off to go dig the yeast out of the back of the fridge now . . .

It's September Already? Wow.

Hello again, everyone, it's been a while! Life's been keeping me busy--mostly battling off one infection after another, it's ridiculous--but I hope to start blogging more regularly again now. If I were back in Hawaii now, this would be my second week of my Junior year; as it is, I am keeping the brain cells busy by writing, dancing, studying for my driver's license, and, of course--reading!

Sadly, I have STILL not managed to snag any new reading material. An entire summer without one trip to the library--I just might explode with the frustration. As a result I STILL have no Book of the Month feature to regale you with. I will, however, list for you all the books that I have been reading. I've read them before, which is why they don't count for my list of new books read this year, but they were good enough for me to read them again--some for the second time, some for the umpteenth time--so perhaps you'd be interested to have a list of titles:

• The Shield Ring, by Rosemary Sutcliff
• The Amulet of Samarkand, by Jonathan Stroud
• The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents, by Terry Pratchett
• Neverwhere, by Neil Gaiman
• The Pearls of Lutra, by Brian Jacques
• The Alchemist, by Paulo Coelho
• Watership Down, by Richard Adams
• The Book of Three, by Lloyd Alexander
• The Last Unicorn, by Peter S. Beagle

So, as you can tell, I've been re-reading a lot, and mostly lighter books too. Perhaps that is what comes from being around kids 24/7 now; I lapse back into enjoying books written for young adults and children instead of centuries-old literature. This is in no way a bad thing, as all the above books are among my favorite books ever (or at least most of them are) and settled snugly on my shelf next to my Iliad and War and Peace and Moby Dick, but it's still interesting. I go through 'reverting back to obsessing over childhood favorites' phases at time. I guess this is one of those times.

Dance is going well, but I'm trying to figure out a design for my new competition dress; mine is about 4 years old now, and in a competitive arena where dresses go out of style in mere months . . . yep, I'm wearing a relic. My family and I always design and sew my own dresses instead of shelling out a fortune on designer dresses like most other people do, so my dress has lasted longer than most, but it does look old now. Sigh. I've also promised my little brother that I'll dress up as Toothless the Dragon for Halloween so he can ride on my shoulders as Hiccup, so I have that to figure out too!

(Absolutely not-relevant side note here: I'm currently watching Star Wars on my computer as I type this, and just realized that one of Vader's officers is the same actor who played that American rocket captain in "Tomb of the Cybermen"! The one with the annoying fake accent who kept calling Victoria 'Vic'! This just made my day.)

I've been writing a lot, and even though it's pretty hard considering I've got a spot of writer's block, this means my novel is coming along now almost despite itself, haha. Yesterday I baked banana bread; my six year old sister was disappointed initially, but now says she loves it, especially with cream cheese. My little four year old brother however loves banana bread, and basically was asking me if he could eat it every five minutes after it came out of the oven until it was cooled enough to be cut. I do like baking! And making soups, too. I really want to make this lentil soup from a recipe I found recently; I like lentils almost as much as I like baking :)

That's enough rambling from me from now, so I leave you now only with a promise that I'll try to post more regularly and interestingly this month. Oh, and I've been drawing and doodling a lot, so I'll start posting those too.

And I'm 19 1/2 today. I should have made a cake or something, haha. Does this mean I get a wish half-fulfilled today? Hm.

Hello Again

So I'm on episode 2.17 of "Fringe" now, and the second season is miles better than the first. Not that the first was bad, but the characters are more comfortable to watch now for some reason, perhaps because they've finally settled into themselves, grown comfortable with their own personalities. I'm seriously loving all the 'alternate reality' stuff.

Today I took the siblings out to play on a grassy field by my house. My youngest brother begged me to take him, so I did, and then only a few minutes after arriving at the grass he threw an enormous tantrum because he wasn't chosen as the first person to be 'it' in our sibling game of freeze tag, so I had to cart him back to the house. I think he's napping now; he was in need of a bit of sleep, I think. It was pretty embarrassing to be walking down the street carrying a squirming, shrieking child who kept yelling 'NONONONO' at the top of his very-strong lungs. He's had a piercing scream he can summon at will ever since he was very small, though he hadn't used it in a while . . . not until today, anyway. I was afraid someone would think I was kidnapping the kid.

I'm typing this at my desk, which is situated right beside my bedroom window. Outside the sky is pink and purple with sunset, but it's a bruised and dusty sort of sunset, not a glorious one. There isn't any wind. It's been very hot the past few days.

I'm pretty tired myself, actually. I haven't been getting as much sleep as I should; I'll try to rectify that tonight. Just remembered that I have an optometrist appointment tomorrow, and I don't want to have weary eyes for that!

And the Days Go By . . .

I seriously need to start working on my novel. I mean, I've been writing, sure, but not as much as I should. Starting tomorrow, I'm determined to treat this like it's my full-time job. The fairytale is coming along nicely; I hope to have the next part posted tomorrow, but we'll see; I have dance and things tomorrow that will take up time.

Dance is actually taking up a lot of time lately; I'm determined to get into the best condition possible for Regionals this year. Of course the practicing and training is hard work, but to my own surprise I'm finding it rather fun. Not that I don't usually enjoy dance anyway, but it can be wearisome to drill and work and work like that. Now, however, I'm enjoying the hard work. I think it's a side-effect of being forced to be largely inactive for long periods of time. After not being able to practice every day while in Hawaii, I better appreciate the simple fact that I CAN train hard, and am thus more likely to make use of that fact.

This week I finally got around to watching "Fringe", something I've been considering for a while. The first couple of episodes didn't really grab me, but I kept at it and, eleven episodes in, I'm enjoying the show a lot more than initially. It took a bit of time for me to warm up to the characters, I guess . . . or something, maybe the show's tone or pacing. (By the way, I was both delighted with and distracted by the usage of music from "Sunshine" in the Pilot episode. One of my favorite science fiction films ever!) Anyway, I'm having fun with it now. Even if I keep squealing "Denethor! Denethor!" every few minutes, hahaha . . . Still, this Walter Bishop fellow seems like the sort of guy Denethor might have been reincarnated into if such things happened . . . father-son issues, high intelligence, a dangerous interest in dangerous and weird powers/sciences . . . need I go on?

Anyway, now that I've wrested the keyboard back from my inner geek, I can turn my attention to other recent news. Nothing really important, I suppose: I stayed up until 3 AM baking cookies a few days ago, painted my younger sisters' nails, am now almost halfway through "Portrait of a Lady", and have been drawing a lot lately. I've also taught myself to crochet, so perhaps I can finally make those Doctor Who dolls! I made a little mad scientist already; I will post a photograph or two of him later. I still need new charcoal, drawing paper, and calligraphy ink. This weekend I hope to see "Inception", after looking forward to it for months. But first, of course, I need to attend to that writing. So much life to do, but so little time to do it in! Life sometimes just doesn't seem big enough for itself. But I'm sure it is; it's just I have to train my mind to use it properly and to its full potential.

Rambling and "The Big Bang" [NO Spoilers]

So I watched "The Big Bang" today. I won't give out any spoilers apart from saying that I liked it. And so did my little sister who had never watched a full episode of DW before. Her verdict was that it was clever.

I'm currently slogging through yet another horrid cold, which is hateful, especially the racking coughing. This does mean I'm getting more writing done, which is the silver lining I suppose. At least I'm beginning to breathe normally again, so I'm hoping to get some dance practice in tomorrow.

I had a great time at the Irish fair last weekend; I bought a wooden sword that looks like Anduril, since my mother still won't let me get a real sword on the grounds that there are too many little kids in this house. It's a simple thing, but I mean to sand it and paint it and stuff to make it look really good. I also got really sunburned because I was busy putting sunscreen on little siblings and so forgot to get my own shoulders . . . they're peeling, and it's really irritating me so I'm trying to ignore it.

Nothing else much of note has happened lately. I went to a used bookshop today and nearly bought the first 3 Aubrey-Maturin novels, but that's a slippery slope considering how many of them there are, so I didn't buy them after all. My two-year-old sister was talking a bit about Mario from the Nintendo games (my younger brothers are obsessed with those games and she likes to watch), and she told me quite seriously that "Mario is the bluest boy in this angry world." It almost sounds deep, but I don't know what she meant. You can puzzle over that until next post :)

In the Kitchen, Mostly

Nothing much to report about the last few days. I baked biscuits today, and yesterday I made cream of mushroom soup for lunch. All my siblings of course didn't want to eat it, so I tried to think of a way to get them more enthused about it. My solution: Dye it green!

The end result was that half of them loved the colour change and ate it happily, while the other half only became more adamant in saying they didn't want it. So I guess the experiment was a success?

I was watching "Tombs of the Cybermen" today with Lathspell, who had previously never seen it before. He's enjoying it so far, which makes me happy. Oh, and I practiced dance for about forty minutes today, and would have worked longer, but my toe is really hurting me again, so I decided it'd be most prudent to go ice it instead. I hope I can compete in top form at the competition in a few weeks' time. My left ankle is also being a bit dodgy.

Nothing else to report, really. Life's just moving along at a nice pace, and I'm starting to study the DMV manual, and perhaps am thinking seriously about getting my driver's license at last, oh no! Yeah, I'm nineteen and don't drive . . . I happen to like the bus system in Hawaii, but now that I'm back home, where things are a lot more spaced out, I really do need to start transporting myself places under my own power. I just don't like the idea very much. Drivers are crazy here. The only other bit of daily life that could possibly pass as news right now is that I got distracted while adding sugar to my tea at breakfast this morning and as a result ended up with three heaping spoonfuls of it, haha! It tasted like tea-flavored candy . . . I was very energetic the rest of the day, and put that energy to good use by cleaning up the kitchen, the front hall, the living room, and most of the dining room. I have to learn to not talk about books while preparing breakfast; it never ends well!

Hey

No time for anything more than a quick hello right now, I'm afraid, but a quick hello is better than nothing at all! My laptop's still messed up, but I'm probably going to start using it again soon anyway, which means I'll be able to post more frequently. Also, I am aware that my monthly book review post is late. However, my reviews and stuff are all on my laptop, so I've been unable to access them! Look for the review post soon.

I played hopscotch with my siblings yesterday; it was very clear and hot outside, but in a very different way than in Hawaii. The sky was more white than blue, and the air was very dry. We also blew bubbles and drew chalk pictures. And Lathspell and I both speedily drew our own versions of Faquarl the djinn from the Bartimaeus Trilogy; mine's better, of course. Maybe I'll post it later, haha.

Also, I still want to post photos of my artwork that I did over the course of last semester! All the pictures are, you guessed it, on my laptop. So expect a flood of posts in the near future; I have a lot of catching up to do.

I'm really, really home.

My grandmother left to go to the airport about an hour ago, so now I really am home, settling back into normalcy, my old pre-college routines. It's a bit weird how comfortable it all feels. I thought I'd be experiencing a bit more of a culture shock or something, but nope. I haven't gotten as much writing done yet as I had been planning, but this week is when I really settle into a new schedule instead of just sleeping in every morning and watching my favorite films on dvd repeatedly, hehe. The new daily to-do list:

1) Practice my dance at least an hour
2) Read
3) Play with the siblings
4) Write at least a page of my novel
5) Go running

Of course I'm also going to mix baking, needlepoint, and art in there too, along with schooling my siblings. I haven't been able to draw since coming home because I used up all my charcoal in Hawaii, and left all the art supplies I bought in Hawaii there too, which is sad. I hope to make a run to a good art supply store soon!

Also, I hope to go to the library soon. I really miss the school library and even the Hawaii public library system, because it was so easy to keep a fresh supply of new books in my room at all times. Now I'm stagnating and hunting the backs of my own bookshelves for reads I never completed or forgot to complete. So far my search has turned up "Rob Roy", "Portrait of a Lady", and "Warrior Scarlet". A nice selection, sure, but I also want to finish the Aubrey-Maturin series and read some more Faulkner after falling in love with "As I Lay Dying" last semester!

Still, being back at home is mostly pleasant. I'm really enjoying my dance practices again, and am feeling much more motivated at classes than I used to, I think because after being starved for so long, I really appreciate anew just how much I love Irish dancing and how much it means to me. I've also enjoyed hanging out with my siblings again; today in the car Lathspell and I spontaneously burst into a rousing rendition of a medley of songs from "Les Miserables", I introduced my youngest brother to the joys of playing in a ball pit at his cousin's birthday party despite his initial reluctance to jump in (having a very serious four-year old cross his arms firmly across his chest, glare at you, and say "I refuse!" to your suggestion that he play in a ball pit is an extremely adorable and hilarious experience!), my two-year-old sister saw I was wearing a necklace and a straw hat to the party and so insisted I find a necklace and straw hat for her too (I did), and my dad is borrowing "Eagle of the Ninth" to read while he chaperones my eldest brother at a home school high school ball tonight (I can't wait to hear what he thinks of Sutcliff's writing when he comes home!). Also, I really enjoyed taking the siblings to see "How to Train Your Dragon" last week, and they've already scoffed the first batch of chocolate chip cookies that I baked and are demanding that I now prepare scones, lembas bread, and watercress soup. I think I'll tackle the lembas bread tonight. We haven't had it in a while, and it's very good!

Home Again

Already Hawaii feels like sooooo very long ago. I've been home a few days now and have begun to settle back into the routine here. It's fantastic to have little kids everywhere again, and although I'm still jetlagged, I'm still managing to get a lot of stuff done. Yesterday I took my siblings--most of them, anyway--to see "How To Train Your Dragon", and they loved it. It was their first time watching it, but I was also enjoyed seeing it again. I've promised my youngest brother a batch of cookies, and am determined to figure out how to make a cupcake version of Zippy's delicious haupia cake. Also, I have discovered so far that I got an A in Art, an A in Nutrition, and an A+ in English 321, so my grades are very satisfactory so far, even to my perfectionist self.

The only damper on all this happiness is that my grandmother spilled soda on my laptop on the plane, and so I'm terrified that he (yes, my laptop is a he, his name is Gareth--in hindsight I should have perhaps given him a less ominous name) is damaged. He's been shut off since the incident, so I do not know yet. He has all my writings and photographs and videos on him, and is infinitely precious to me, so please pray that he is unharmed--It's not really just a hunk of electronics you'd be praying for, it's a very important part of me.

As a result, I have not yet embarked upon the 'write a page every day' odyssey that I had set myself for my time at home. I did save my novel onto my flash drive before shutting down my computer, so hopefully I'll transfer that to our home computer soon and can get started on it.

I'll catch up with you again later! I am about to catch up on my weekly episode of "Lost" now. Oh, and I saw "Amy's Choice" on Sunday, due to me being in the air over the Pacific on Saturday, and it was excellent. The next two-part story looks great too--the return of the Silurians, yaaaay!

Done!

I've actually survived finals week yet again! I still find it hard to believe . . . I guess the Doctor is right, we humans really are capable of amazing things ;)

I'm utterly exhausted, so I'll leave you now to take a quick nap before getting all my packing done. I got three hours of sleep last night and three the night before, so I'm pretty wiped out. And I leave on the plane early tomorrow morning, so all that packing that I've been unable to do due to being busy studying? That needs to be done pronto.

I wrote nine pages of essay for my last English exam today, six for yesterday's exam, and two for Tuesday's. That's a lot of essays in a very short amount of time. My wrist still hasn't recovered. Oww.

Christmas Holiday So Far

"Let me explain. --No, there is too much. Let me sum up."
-Inigo Montoya, The Princess Bride


My Christmas Holiday (Thus Far) 'Sum up':

1. Watching “(500) Days of Summer” on the plane and coveting a little boy’s jester cap
2. Eating my dad’s amazing pancakes for breakfast
3. Realizing my baby sister’s vocabulary is a million times more advanced than I had imagined it to be
4. Realizing I lost all my Mario Karts Wii skillz over the past semester
5. Baking chocolate chip cookies and then scoffing them
6. Typing, printing, and then decorating menus for my little brother’s play food café
7. Tossing frisbees at the park
8. Eating carrots and watching “Star Trek” with Lathspell at two in the morning
9. Staying up until four in the morning writing a chapter of my novel with my quill pen and inkwell
10. Singing Christmas carols at the family Christmas party
11. Running around outdoors blowing mist from our mouths and pretending to be dragons
12. Attending dance lessons again
13. Trimming the tree with plastic leis
14. Reading The Pioneers, All Things Bright and Beautiful, The Mark of the Horselord, and Eagle of the Ninth all at once without getting too confused
16. The promise of Rollercoasters and Rembrandt
17. Dancing a silly sibling dance to “Cat and Moon”
18. Finalizing the menu for the Second Annual Tolkien Birthday Feast
19. Taking a nap on the sofa with Elhendur
20. Looking forward to “It’s a Wonderful Life” and mochi on New Year’s Day!

3 Cheers for Randomness and Reading!

I finally woke up before nine in the morning today. Isn't that wonderful? And the day just got better from there. A little bit of everything: family, cleaning, playing, books, silliness, writing, rats, film, the great outdoors . . .

My writer's block is finally clearing. I am writing again! So look for a new installment of 'The Sons of Cwendor' to be posted here sometime this weekend! The issue that's been bugging me is getting ironed out, so it's moving fairly smoothly now. Not the swift, dreamlike smoothly that I like best, but a steady sort that does what I want, instead of doing things of its own that I have to catch up to later. The writing kept me locked in my room for two hours after I woke up, so some people (namely, my brother oldest brother) refused to believe I wasn't asleep all that time. But I was awake, and now it's in print, which makes it true, right? 

After a late breakfast of toast--it's still strange to me how much I am craving toast after being in Hawaii, as I never really craved it before--and sliced apple which I ended up feeding most of to my cute little toddling siblings (who have an uncanny sixth sense when it comes to sensing that I have food to share), I determined to take all the sibs outside to a square of grass behind our house. Living in suburbia limits one's contact with trees and green things outdoors, but fortunately we live in a pretty quiet neighborhood, and the grass behind our house, though not extremely large, is large enough for a few tall trees and gentle hills, which we roll down. Yep, I still roll down grassy hills.

So we trooped out there and began a game of Peter Pan, as my youngest brother is currently obsessed with Pan. I was Captain Hook, since I had the long hair and was wearing a huge coat, and my second brother kindly found me a curled leaf to use as a hook. There were a few difficulties due to Elhendur preferring to use is Pan powers to fly instead of save Wendy, but fortunately (for my Sister No.2, I guess, not for me) he decided at the last moment to swoop in and save her from walking the plank (ie. jumping off the stone bench at one end of the grass), and then Brother No. 2 showed up as the crocodile and I was soundly trounced. In the excitement, everyone forgot about poor Tiger-Lily sitting on a hilltop as the fictional water came in, and I suppose she drowned, so my Hook had at least a little triumph. Sister No. 1 was a little put out, though.

Anyway, eventually Brother No. 1 and I tired of being restricted to only Peter Pan's universe, so we suddenly whirled around, yelled out that we were Ols from 'Deltora Quest', and swiftly dispatched Wendy, Tiger-Lily, and the Ticking Crocodile. Little Elhendur kept his wits about him, however, and decided that if we had entered the realm of Deltora, he was Lief and keeper of the Nectar of Life, with which he swiftly restored our fallen foes. These, upon springing up from the grass, bellowed that they were Jasmine, Barda, and, um, Wendy again, and charged us, taking us by surprise and felling us. But Elhendur was impartial, and so revived Brother No. 1 and I both, and I decided I had come back as Bigwig from 'Watership Down', and Brother No. 1 was Speedwell. This worked out fine, and I had an amusing time hopping on the grass, until Barda killed me for no reason whatsoever. Whereupon I came back as Feanor and after a brief stick-duel defeated Barda/Brother No. 2. 

And so on. The game became what my brothers later called 'A Literary Mario Bros. Smash Bros.', with each person strategically changing upon death into a character more likely to defeat the other characters, and Elhendur, who created an ingenious cup from bark with a twig for a straw, went about reviving fallen characters who would then regenerate. Brilliant fun and utterly mad. During the course of the game I transformed into Madame Defarge, Robin Hood, Eilonwy, Anne of Green Gables, Frodo, Nathaniel, Bartimaeus, Sherlock Holmes, Watson, Marley's Ghost, Ged, Fflewddur Flam, Radagast the Brown, Farmer Giles of Ham, Farmer Maggot, Amalthea, Achilles, and Cluny the Scourge, among others I have now forgotten. It was great fun impersonating these characters, almost as fun as watching my siblings impersonating theirs.

The best part probably--for me, anyway--was when we ended up engaging in an Encyclopedia Brown vs. Sherlock Holmes fistfight. As Brother No. 1 said happily: 'Now this is something that I've always wanted to see!' Sorry, Brown fans, Holmes won.

When we had all tired ourselves out, we assigned each person a character of the Fellowship of the Ring (yours truly was Aragorn, of course . . .), linked hands according to the order of march in Moria, and trooped off back home while singing 'The Fellowship' theme from the film. There was a bit of trouble when I addressed my mother at our door as 'O Lady Galadriel, we seek refuge in Lothlorien,' because she thought at first I said 'Old Lady Galadriel', but apart from that the whole thing went remarkably well for being so random and mad.

Later in the afternoon I was left at home with the youngest three kids and Brother No. 2, so I put on 'Ratatouille' and we watched that together for the first time in a long time. Elhendur fell asleep, but he had been getting cranky, so just as well. I then led the other kids in a cleaning effort and thereby cleaned the kitchen and dining room, which was fun when all the little ones were pitching in. Now all I have to do is muster what vestiges of my energy are left and go practice my dance, and my day will be complete. Oh, and I'll probably stay up a little late writing. Then it will all have come full circle.

How good it is to be alive, book-crazy, and the eldest of seven children!

Pic

Half-awake Nonsense

I should not be awake yet. Not judging by the amount of sleep I snatched last night. But now that I am awake, I dare not go to sleep again, for fear of missing when I need to take my medicine. Bah.

I fill the dull intervals with blogging. And, hopefully, writing on more creative topics as well. My two Faerytales are still coming along, and I really do want to get my novel more organized and further along this summer. I had wanted to do some art too, but I do not know now if I shall . . . I find there are so many things I want to do, I scarcely know where to begin! I have promised my youngest brother a batch of cookies, so I'll have to do that sometime. I found a recipe for white chocolate macadamia nut pineapple cookies online, that sounds interesting and tasty, doesn't it?

Right now I am lying curled up on my top bunk of the bed I share with two of my sisters, and I have a pillow under my feet for no real reason that I can think of. It is strange, after sleeping on an air mattress at my grandmother's apartment all semester, to sleep so close to the ceiling. Some childish part of me is absurdly pleased with the fact and enjoys stretching up a hand to touch the ceiling just because it can; the more mature, grown-up part curses inwardly every time I wake up in the morning, forget the ceiling is right there, and crack my head against it. I could extend this into a philosophical ramble, but I am too sleepy to seriously contemplate it long enough, so I just leave the issue to your very capable pondering. I only wish to add that it certainly illustrates the fact that there are two very different ways to look at everything.

As to my illness, as some of you already know, it now looks as though surgery will not be needed, but that extensive antibiotic treatment will continue for some time. Still, most of the swelling and essentially all of the pain is gone now, which is an immense relief. Thank you, Lord. It looks like the Irish Dance National Championships are on the table again, although considering that due to exams and ill health I have not dance in about three weeks, I am not as optimistic about my chances of placing as I could be. However, I shall devote myself to working hard all summer until competition, and will just be grateful for the health that allows me to dance at all.

I have two hats and a set of fairy wings hanging from my bedpost, as well as a large collection of medals. The hats fit me; the wings do not. I bought the wings for my sister back in the days when she wanted to be a fairy princess. Now, I believe, she wants to be a teacher. She's eight years old and starting to grow up.

On a completely unrelated note, I believe the ending of Devdas is among the best endings of any film ever. 

On another completely unrelated note, I'm thinking of trying to cook some soup today, if my back will be able to handle me standing and walking to and fro in the kitchen for a couple hours.

. . . Sorry, I'm just getting randomer and randomer.

See, this is why I shouldn't post as soon as I wake up in the morning. My head is still too full of dreams for coherence. I'll try to post something sensical later to make up for this, okay?

Kal Ho Naa Ho

This is a great song from a great film. I never thought I'd start liking Bollywood, but now that I've given it a chance . . . it's catching :)

And this film helped make today bearable. Sorry I haven't posted anything in quite a while now, but my life has taken an unexpected change for the worse, thanks to a really nasty infection that may (though I pray not) require surgery and has kept me in excruciating pain for almost a week. So. Anyway. Have a good Memorial Day, y'all!

I'm Home!

Summed up in the title, pretty much. I am really, really tired, as I had only about two hours of sleep last night and slept not on the plane. I got a lot of writing done, but not as much as I might otherwise have: Slumdog Millionaire was showing on the plane, so I watched that instead. I still got about three hours of writing in, though. 

And now I'm home. The kids are all very happy to see me, which is gratifying, and my room is rather a mess. It's dispiriting, as I just finished cleaning my room in Hawaii, but I'll just buckle down and clean up here too. It's like an alternate reality.

Tomorrow, however, is definitely a sleeping-in and not doing much of anything productive sort of day, huzzah! I haven't had one of those in a looooong time.