July 2nd
In trying times, when writing proves rather beyond my capabilities and I am too exhausted to drag myself onto my feet to indulge in a frantic, stress-relieving house cleaning, music becomes a solace incomparable to anything else. Many a night I spend sleeping curled around my laptop, since sleep is impossible without something going, and last night was no exception. Granted, sleeping on a loveseat, even a broad one, does not allow for much room, and, as I played something off of YouTube and therefore had to leave the laptop open to keep it from glitching, I am now paying the price of indulgence with my aching hips. (Speaking of indulgence, there is lemon tart on the kitchen counter, the wheel half gone, and I want some before it disappears entirely. This means I should go fetch a sliver before other people venture into the kitchen; however, I am not quite certain that my digestive system can handle the food quite so early in the morning. And yes, eight-thirty a.m. is early, and I never thought I would see the day when I would say that. Considering, though, that bed-time has hovered somewhere between three and six for the past handful of days, it makes perfect sense; when one has only had four and a half hours of sleep eight-thirty is early.)
While several songs from Within Temptation and Evanescence are my go-to pieces when in need of emotional reinforcement ("Lost", "Lithium", "Missing", "A Shot in the Dark"), I have recently rediscovered the depth and power of simplistic instrumental music, a la Helen Jane Long. Her album Intervention is one I have played repeatedly over the past few days, even going so far as to use it for sleeping instead of my traditional Night playlist. Some of the songs are better than others, but the whole album is worth hearing, unlike some of the other piano albums to which I've listened. Of course, George Winston is excluded from that; his albums so far have been entirely worthwhile, with no song easily discarded to slim down the playlist. This may or may not have something to do with the fact that I have been raised on his CDs. It breeds good taste, it does, when one has such music entwined in the fibres of one's soul.
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Supper has been made and consumed, and the clean-up awaits. I would be at the dishes if such a thing were allowed, but I have been informed in no uncertain terms that, while the house is cleared for cleaning to my heart's content, the dishes are not to be touched. Therefore I will not, on pain of death, wash them. However, I have so far gotten away with organizing the dirty dishes on the counter to my heart's content, and, if I am very, very good, I may even be allowed to do a token dishwasher load, offered as a gesture of kindness and bribery from a certain royal highness. Though I should like to know when being allowed to load a dishwasher constituted a bona fide bribe.
July 5th
There is nothing quite like falling asleep at three-thirty a.m. only to be waked before seven by a fly with a disturbing fixation on your facial orifices. As I know well the fruitlessness of attempting to roll away from an intrusive fly in order to grasp at three more hours of sleep, I dragged myself up off the dining room floor and marched upstairs to take care of washing my face and brushing my hair before returning to my waiting laptop. (Yes, yes, I am aware that the fly swatter should have first been obtained and an execution ceremony commenced; this I would have done with pleasure had not the quiet time of someone else been at stake. Diving after a tiny buzzing creature, brandishing a well-used swatter, is not exactly behaviour conducive to a satisfactory personal Bible study. Of course, if one is being bothered by such a persistent fly during personal Bible study, the only action preserving the last fragments of quiet time would be the immediate termination of the miserable creature's existence; however, as it departed upon my rising and did not seem to be afflicting the other occupant of the room with such intimate attentions, I chose peaceful coexistence over a potentially bloody -- though swift and just -- killing. Next time I shall not be so merciful.)
Last night before falling asleep I had pulled up an OpenOffice document on my desktop and marked it as a word storage file. While I usually prefer to jot down interesting discoveries on paper, I am currently lacking my word notebook (Why ever did I neglect to pack my notebooks when those, apart from my laptop and my books, are the most important possessions I have? Facepalming hereby ensues.) and the impracticality of preserving any number of paper scraps has been firmly impressed upon my memory by a series of losses. So I have capitulated at last and formed a computer document for the collection of eccentric and previously unknown words.
Some people take morning strolls through the neighbourhood; I believe I have just discovered the pleasure of meandering through the dictionary at an early hour, and it is an addicting pleasure. Instead of finding one or two to tide me through the day I ended up tripping over another every time I attempted to extricate myself from the clutches of the word finder, one word leading to another until I found myself elbow deep in a document scribbled full of exciting new adjectives, nouns, and verbs. No, I do not have a photographic memory, and no, I am not going to recall more than two of those by the end of the day, but the delight of laying hands on words that I will most definitely be learning and using in the very near future is not to be questioned.
Getting caught up in the 'S' section proved a helpful change of plans, as I proceeded to stumble over such gems as 'sockdolager': a hard hit (this word belongs unquestionably to Kit Baxter), sordor: refuse, and sophomania: the delusion of exceptional intelligence. Despite the dullness of the sentences themselves (how is one supposed to be eloquent at seven in the morning, I wonder) I had fun constructing a few just to be able to use certain words, like 'somniloquacious' (Try as they might, Charlie's parents could not break him of his somniloquacious habits, and he continued to ramble about any and everything that entered his mind as he slept.) and 'slubber' ("Don't slubber that tablecloth, boy!" Molly shrieked, flapping her hands at him as if to shoo him off like the common crows that pestered her laundry, attempting to prevent him from spilling his slumgullion over her freshly pressed linens.). Engaging these words in quotidian conversation will be even more gratifying than playing half-asleep with contextual sentences, pleasurable as that employment may be.
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It has been suggested to me that I attempt to assume the voices of various friends and write pseudo-blog posts from what I would perceive to be their perspective. While I do not think I have the capacity for such a venture, I am curious about what it would be like to shift focus enough to write, as it were, from the mind of someone outside my head. Perhaps if I lack inspiration on a sunny day I shall pick up my pen and indulge the idea.
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