Music | Ludovico Einaudi

Thanks to a recommendation by Mark Newton I have been listening to Divenire by Ludovico Einaudi - a collection of piano pieces that are so fantastic and sweeping that I've had it on repeat since I downloaded it from iTunes on Saturday.
Einaudi is an amazing composer and pianist (I already had the album Echoes, bought because I initially wanted a couple of tracks and ended up loving the whole thing) and his music is incredibly moody; not in the sense of being dark and angst-ridden, rather, in the sense that it can inspire moods as all the best music can. It can uplift you, make you contemplative or imagine you're on the prow of a huge sailing ship ploughing through the waves. Wait, maybe that's just me?

It also makes me wish I'd never stopped playing the piano, or that I knew how to dance, but I did and I don't so I shall have to do what I always do with music: use it to relax, to recharge the mental batteries and to provide an avenue to daydream down, to fuel the scenes in my head by giving them their own music as they play out.

What do you use music for? Daydreaming? Blocking out the world? Background as you write/ paint/ read?

Revisions | Slice 'n' dice

Yesterday was fairly successful on the revision front as I managed to get through 21 pages on various breaks throughout the day - I didn't get home until late so I didn't do any more then. The last few pages (about 4, I think) I'll do today and then there'll be a final read-through before sending off. Then it's: tweaking Earth and sending it back out; a non-fiction article; and then--finally--back to the UF and the dreaded read through of the 235 (MS format) pages I've written so far.

However, while lying in bed trying to get to sleep last night, I realised something about my main character which would (a) excise two characters and a fair amount of words and (b) increase tension a bit more as there really won't be anyone to rely on. I decided not to depend on my brain to remember what I'd thought so I dutifully lurched out of bed, navigating round the cat and two of the dogs, who just drop wherever their energy runs out, and wrote myself a note. I love notes. And lists. Lists of lists. Lovely. ::hugs lists::

Ahem. Anyway. I'm on holiday in a week so I've booked in the UF kick off for then. I want the first, full, draft completed before the hell of induction etc. starts in mid-September, as for the first 4 weeks or so I'll be zombie librarian instead of incredibly alert and well-rested librarian.

Hmm. I need a zombie librarian avatar.

It's that Friday feeling

We're halfway through the day and the weekend is almost here! Chum #1 is working 'til 22:00hrs on the literature festival so I shall have the duty of picking up the dogges from the grandparents (it is a duty rather than a joy because they do not like my car. Henry only has two doors, whereas the Chum's car has four which means the collies have their own door onto the back seat. (They also have their own electric window button which Mama Bear uses whenever she gets too hot.) When I walk Baby Bear out and he see's it's my car he tries to run back into the house. ::sniff:: I could take it personally.)

Anyway, I have another four-and-a-bit hours before the end of the work day and then it's dogges! washing up! dogges! & cat! (the feeding of)revisions! dogges! (the walking of), and then it will be sleep - hopefully early because I'll be up at 06:30 to take the dogs out for another walk before heading off to alt.fiction for the day.

Lunchtime tomorrow should be interesting as the Quad is near the Big (TV) Screen and, according to East Midlands Today, there's going to be a demonstration there to protest the fact that the council won't be paying for the public to watch the World Cup on it. Police, cordons etc. Let's just hope that they're either not too rowdy or that the Quad has got good soundproofing. The last time I went to alt.fiction I attended a panel by jemck, Sarah Ash, desperance and someone else?) and they had to compete with the Ladyboys of Bangkok singing in a tent outside! With any luck it'll be quieter this year.

Anyone else going to alt.fiction tomorrow? I still haven't decided which panels I'm going to so that will have to be added to the jobs list - something to discuss with Chum#1 when she gets home.