Since starting at the bookstore, I haven't had much time to cook. I seem to run through the kitchen, stopping long enough to make a cup of tea, or dissolve a packet of miso soup, or throw an apple and a block of cheese in my bag for work. I have become a devotee of the microwave (horror!) and the Japanese appliance that keeps water on the edge of boiling at all times.
However, tomorrow is Thanksgiving and I have to make cranberry sauce. We're having Thanksgiving with friends in southern CA, so the actual cooking is happening down there while I'm in the car, driving one of the most boring freeways in the world. But I have to make cranberry sauce. I always make cranberry sauce. I think only about three people even eat it, but my sister adores it so much that she'll spoon it out straight from the container and eat it like pudding.
So the cranberries are on the stove and I'm feeling proud of myself for finding the zester, for remembering to put in the cloves, and for getting it all started before midnight. I haven't even gotten any cranberry juice on my clothes yet. Yay.
Showing posts with label sleep is irrelevant. Show all posts
Showing posts with label sleep is irrelevant. Show all posts
Wednesday, November 26, 2008
Wednesday, July 30, 2008
tiredness
Hullo. I'm just back from getting one of the lovely custodians here to unlock my room. I popped into my room to check on my computer and popped back out to go for a walk, and the second--the very second!--that I shut my door, I realised that my keys were still sitting on my desk, no doubt luxuriating in their uselessness.
My head is all foggy with too little sleep.
I had to turn in a story this afternoon, and because my head was being stubborn and resisting thinking in "story", I couldn't get down to it properly until yesterday afternoon. Then I had to write and write and write. The story came out all lumpy and amorphous, but at least it's on paper (though I had to delete some TRULY awful and maudlin lines that probably occurred to me at three o'clock in the morning), and that makes it easier to think about. Someday, I want to be able to tell a proper story, something with characters to love and a real yarn down the middle. Right now, it's hard for me to think of anything even remotely like that, but once a story is out of my head, it's so much easier to look at it and see where the wobbly bits are.
Neil says that you have to walk a fine line between giving a reader everything and leaving them enough space to make art. I've been thinking about that quite a bit lately. I don't think I've been able to work that balancing act properly yet, but it's a thought that's fascinating to poke at from different directions.
My head is all foggy with too little sleep.
I had to turn in a story this afternoon, and because my head was being stubborn and resisting thinking in "story", I couldn't get down to it properly until yesterday afternoon. Then I had to write and write and write. The story came out all lumpy and amorphous, but at least it's on paper (though I had to delete some TRULY awful and maudlin lines that probably occurred to me at three o'clock in the morning), and that makes it easier to think about. Someday, I want to be able to tell a proper story, something with characters to love and a real yarn down the middle. Right now, it's hard for me to think of anything even remotely like that, but once a story is out of my head, it's so much easier to look at it and see where the wobbly bits are.
Neil says that you have to walk a fine line between giving a reader everything and leaving them enough space to make art. I've been thinking about that quite a bit lately. I don't think I've been able to work that balancing act properly yet, but it's a thought that's fascinating to poke at from different directions.
Thursday, July 17, 2008
Clarion, or, why sleep is irrelevant.
Hullo.
I haven't been writing here, mainly because I am very lazy. I am incredibly lazy. Supremely lazy. Extraordinarily and over-the-top lazy. Writing in any kind of journal is one of those projects that are doomed to fall by the wayside for me.
However, right now I'm at the Clarion workshop in San Diego, and since I have been a horrible friend and fallen behind on all phone calls, I thought I'd write a bit here, make it a big letter of sorts. Six weeks is a long time, especially when you're drenching yourself in an unfamiliar world, and I feel like I've crammed in more new thoughts and ideas than could possibly fit.
So. Clarion is kind of fantastic. Right before I left for San Diego, I got really unenthusiastic about the idea of spending six weeks writing instead of dancing. I even thought about pulling out so that I could spend the summer in the studio doing boring physical therapy and moping about (when I look back, I'm not sure why this seemed so tempting, but dancers are crazy). But then I told myself to get it together and go. At least I'd be able to find out whether writing stories was really as fun as I thought it was.
It turns out that, not only are stories fun, they're also fascinating, frustrating, and addictive. The way you can create a version of a truth out of all the loose scraps rattling around in your head is interesting to me. In dance, you can't really stand apart from what you're making, so having something that sits outside of you when you finish working is really odd, but wonderful to me.
A recommendation to all of my bookish friends: try some Kelly Link. Kelly was our instructor for week one and I hadn't read any of her work before I got accepted to the program, but I'm now a solid fan. Her stories are flat out weird, but they're also intensely honest. Sometimes I don't understand what is going on in her stories, but it doesn't matter because, somehow, they slip in and make sense in all the shadowy, dreamy parts of your head. She introduced me to the term "night logic," which is now my favourite way of saying, well, that was weird, but I completely got it.
The people here are wonderful. I won't describe them now because it will take too long and it's so beautiful outside that I want to run out there and take a walk while it's still afternoon. Just take my word for it and know that they're great. Except for when they tempt you into staying up all night and going into workshop the next morning on zero sleep. Just say no. It may be fun, but the words start to come out of your mouth in the wrong order.
I haven't been writing here, mainly because I am very lazy. I am incredibly lazy. Supremely lazy. Extraordinarily and over-the-top lazy. Writing in any kind of journal is one of those projects that are doomed to fall by the wayside for me.
However, right now I'm at the Clarion workshop in San Diego, and since I have been a horrible friend and fallen behind on all phone calls, I thought I'd write a bit here, make it a big letter of sorts. Six weeks is a long time, especially when you're drenching yourself in an unfamiliar world, and I feel like I've crammed in more new thoughts and ideas than could possibly fit.
So. Clarion is kind of fantastic. Right before I left for San Diego, I got really unenthusiastic about the idea of spending six weeks writing instead of dancing. I even thought about pulling out so that I could spend the summer in the studio doing boring physical therapy and moping about (when I look back, I'm not sure why this seemed so tempting, but dancers are crazy). But then I told myself to get it together and go. At least I'd be able to find out whether writing stories was really as fun as I thought it was.
It turns out that, not only are stories fun, they're also fascinating, frustrating, and addictive. The way you can create a version of a truth out of all the loose scraps rattling around in your head is interesting to me. In dance, you can't really stand apart from what you're making, so having something that sits outside of you when you finish working is really odd, but wonderful to me.
A recommendation to all of my bookish friends: try some Kelly Link. Kelly was our instructor for week one and I hadn't read any of her work before I got accepted to the program, but I'm now a solid fan. Her stories are flat out weird, but they're also intensely honest. Sometimes I don't understand what is going on in her stories, but it doesn't matter because, somehow, they slip in and make sense in all the shadowy, dreamy parts of your head. She introduced me to the term "night logic," which is now my favourite way of saying, well, that was weird, but I completely got it.
The people here are wonderful. I won't describe them now because it will take too long and it's so beautiful outside that I want to run out there and take a walk while it's still afternoon. Just take my word for it and know that they're great. Except for when they tempt you into staying up all night and going into workshop the next morning on zero sleep. Just say no. It may be fun, but the words start to come out of your mouth in the wrong order.
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