Tag Archives: happy

A small thought…

Small thoughts 11/01/2013 Comments: 2

But a BIG moment

Screen Shot 2013-01-11 at 21.14.47

I’ve just had my first short story accepted for publication by Here Comes Everyone magazine. I’m SO excited.

Are you sitting comfortably? Then I’ll begin…

The Dress

‘Oh it’s you,’ he says, ‘thought you’d forgotten.’ He’s known her as long as I have so he ought to know better. I can feel her bristling as she walks in. ‘Are we ready?’ She says. ‘You up for this Mum?’ ‘Yes… Give me a minute,’ I say. She sighs. When did she become so impatient? I know – it’s different these days – life runs at a faster pace. I blame video and the invention of fast forward. Now you can skip the boring bits (…)

When it comes out I’ll post a link and you can read it if you’re interested… Now, pass me that wine honey…

A small thought…

Home, Small thoughts 02/07/2012 Leave a comment

Smiles!

Update… The happiness engineers at WordPress have helped me sort out my programming problems. Hoorah!

It’s easy when you know how guys – Thanks a million :)

It was down to the fact that I customised my last theme. All I had to do was get rid of the CSS style sheet I’d saved, and hey presto, sorted…

I’m rather happy with my new blog now – hope you like it too.

 

Saturday 24th March 2012

Diary, Home 24/03/2012 Comments: 4

Summer’s Coming…

Less than 3 weeks to Coachella and only 109 days till Latitude… Smell the canvas :)

Oh my… How beautiful is England today? Hazy, warm, golden, growing, green shoots exploding, buds bursting, my heart sings with the love of it all.

I apologise for such hyperbole, but y’know… I’m a poet… What do you expect?

I’m alone – a rarity nowadays – and I’m loving it. I dropped the man off at the train station at 6.30 this morning. He’s chairing a writing panel at a conference in Manchester and I left him on the platform looking exquisite in pristine white linen. I’ll eat ‘is ‘at if he don’t turn a few ‘eads ‘oop north today…

And… All my children, including a weekend adoptee, have disappeared into Leicester for the day under their own steam… No taxiing required! Isaac drove! How wonderful is retirement from a job that was only ever foisted upon one? Very, I say… Forsooth… ought that to be verily? I’m so excitable and I don’t quite know why. Must be the moooooooon. Or maybe just the sun?

I’ve washed three loads and hung them all out to dry, written two more sonnets for my collection, early drafts of course, and I’m about to shower and go walk the dogs. The railway cutting beckons I think. Otto is on A course of steroids in an attempt to cut his itch/scratch/itch cycle. I’m fed up with his bald patches. They make him look like he has mange and you know how superficial and shallow I am. I have warned him… Ugly things offend me… I said, but he took absolutely no notice, as is his want, and kept at it. So… A general anaesthetic, biopsy and a 150 quid later, still none the wiser. Four weeks of antibiotics, a course of steroids and another 125 quid later still… We’ll see if we won’t cure him, but all these drugs are making him sleepy. A walk is definitely what we all need, I think.

On Thursday we attended a talk on e-publishing At Leicester Writer’s Club and very interesting it was too. I particularly enjoyed Christ Meade’s vision and enthusiasm. Catch up with him and his peeps on the following links:


http://bookfutures.blogspot.co.uk


http://ifbook.co.uk

My mind’s revved into ballistic overdrive with wonderful ideas about ways to publish poetry on the web… Images, sound, text… All very exciting. Will try some sound immediately. Maybe with one of my sonnet collection… (sixteen now. Been working like a Trojan!) We’ll see.

And just to leave you with some chilled sounds – my current obsession – Nicolas Jaar – a Chilean beaut…

Some of his output is a little difficult I admit and I downloaded his album recently to the complete confusion of my synapses… But stick with it. He’s amazing. Try these for size and see how you get on.

Enjoy the weather… And always remember – this is England and this may be our summer…

Thursday 19th January 2012

Diary, Home 19/01/2012 Leave a comment

These are my new baby girls… Tomasina and Hunca Munca. After the sad demise of Sanchez I rather missed the whirring wheel and the patter of tiny feet in the corner of the kitchen. He was my late night writing companion before the man returned from his travels. So… today we purchased his replacements- gerbils- a lot cuter and less smelly than old Sanchez. (sorry mate, I know you’re hardly cold in your grave, but the truth is often a cruel place.)

Isaac and Michelle bought two males last week, one for him to take back to Leeds and one for me… He named his Sanchez jnr, (somewhat unimaginative, I know) and I named mine Mr Rochester. But after much internet based research he discovered they really don’t like to be alone, so we couldn’t split them up. Hence, they both travelled up to Leeds by train in a large holdall (and a cage, of course) on Sunday, and I was left with an empty nest which was crying out to be filled. They spotted two females at the pet shop and I knew they would be just right for me.

This evening I let them loose on the table. Sanchez used to love running around, exploring, scooting in and out of the triangular tunnel formed by my iPad cover, skittering across my keyboard, nibbling sunflower seeds I’d just hidden for him and on Saturday night we’d let Sanchez and Mr Rochester have some table-top fun too, so I was quite relaxed about letting my girls free. However, within fifteen seconds of letting them loose I heard a soft plop as Tomasina leapt over the edge and scurried off under the vegetable rack. Shit… It took me half an hour of (im)patient leg-cramping-kneeling watching her hiding in the corner amidst potatoey dust balls and otto hair, a new loo-roll innard and a trail of sunflower seeds before I could entice her back into her little house.

Since then they’ve been completely hyper, running amock, scratching sawdust everywhere, turning over their house, climbing up their cage and leaping from the top of their wheel, burrowing great piles of fluff and shredded loo-roll into a vast nest and hanging off the roof bars like tiny cat burglars. Very entertaining, I must say.

FYI Mr Rochester has been renamed Jam. Is the literary connection just my thing, or is it, perchance, that pragmatic Northern sensibility? Isaac said he could only remember the mister bit and Jam seemed to suit him better…

This was my favourite story when I was a little girl and for some reason the line, “the fish was glued to the dish…” used to make me giggle uncontrollably. I note with some dismay that particular line is missing from this animation but it’s still rather lovely.

 

Talkin Tarn

Poems 29/12/2011 Comments: 10

Another seasonal and previously published offering… I remember both the evenings that inspired this poem quite intensely at this time of year; two very special times separated by almost thirty years.

Talkin Tarn is a small lake in the Cumbrian Fells where I grew up and in the coldest of Winters it would freeze over…

 

Talkin Tarn

Stumbling forth much cider-addled

swaddling-wrapped in Christmas cheer,

festive tunes beat marching rhythms

sung by luteous fuzz-blurred moon.

Light our tallow-faced meanderings.

Light our way to Talkin Tarn.

 

Hill-top guardians, black-limbed stanchions,

iron giants, arms outstretched,

spitting fizz, bright brittle crackling

arcs electric, purple hiss.

Walk the line of skeletal monsters.

Walk the line to Talkin Tarn.

 

Snow lined hollow, sleepy sheep all

fallow-buff like sugar lumps

fuddle thrown, sweet huddle-muddled

piled in china, white as bone.

Trudge our way in caravan.

Trudge our way to Talkin Tarn.

 

Bristled tines, pine scented arbour

succours snowy lunate shore,

underboot, soft-footed needlings;

seriatim rendered mute.

See the glistery icy vista,

see the mystery. Talkin Tarn.

 

Moon-loon madness overtaking,

dancing arm-linked can-can craic,

thwacking echo, snap-snap bull-whip

ricochet deep down below.

Risk life’s brittle carapace.

Risk the kiss of Talkin Tarn.

Saturday 26th November 2011

Diary, Home 26/11/2011 Leave a comment

Ghostpoet

Passed another milestone today… 
Took Fergus to buy his first suit. And in typically familial fashion, like Mother like son, we’d left it till the last minute, or to the last afternoon, to be more precise. The suit was required for a Casino Evening, tonight, at school.
And, like Mother like son in more ways than one, son had a vision of said suit, or at least what he would look like wearing it. Son is notoriously, sartorially fussy, and why not!
Top Man had a couple of nicely cut styles, ‘it’s got to be skinny, Mum, and I mean skinny…’ but not in the correct size. The only 36″ chest was a rather shiny, Jimmy Carr affair that we weren’t too keen on. We traipsed the length and breadth of Highcross trying on any slim fitting suit we could see, but Yuk, a badly cut bunch, the lot of them.
‘Let’s try All Saints,’ I suggested.
‘Bit expensive,’ middle son said, (such a responsible boy, that one, and never, ever greedy.)
‘Oh, come on,’ I said, ‘It’s worth a try…’
No suits as such, but nice jackets, lovely trousers and when I told the, very helpful, very lovely, sales assistant what we were after, she said she thought she had matching trousers out the back, to the jackets on display and matching jackets to the trousers. (The mind boggles somewhat, but who am I to question the logic behind their sales technique?)
Anyway, as soon as he tried it on we knew. Perfect. Cool, modern, slightly washed and rumpled looking, low at the crutch, slim at the ankle, neat shoulders and very, very skinny. Just right. A beautiful, soft, white cotton shirt and very slim eighties-style tie later and we were done. I didn’t look at the price before punching in my pin, just the look on my boy’s face. Worth every penny.


Just had a look on their website to see if I could find a pic (no) but found this great link to creative stuff and videos made in conjunction with GQ magazine. Follow the link and enjoy. The video at the top of this post, Ghostpoet aka Obaro Ejimiwe is one of the artists. Lovely track. The GQ session is even better I think, but I couldn’t embed the video. Do check it out. There’s sets by Tricky and Gary Numan among others.

http://www.allsaints.com/basementsessions_x_gq/ghostpoet/

And finally, just to warm the cockles of your heart… DJ Fresh- Gold Dust.
(I don’t remember playground skipping being that clever when I was a young thing but that makes me sound old, so I won’t say it out loud…)

Julius’s team won their first match of the season this afternoon and Isaac and his friends (Isaac doesn’t do ‘solo’) are home, so all in all it’s been a lovely day and it will be a full house for Sunday lunch tomorrow. I smell Yorkshire’s. Life is good.
Night night.

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