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Still not lying in the gutter. Still looking at the stars.
Having moved rapidly through the many stages of grieving (I think it goes swearing, more swearing, serious swearing, LOUD swearing, tears, sulking, acceptance) regarding the fate of my beloved Spurs, I’m now restored to living under the tyranny of (probably false) hope.
May 2nd? I’ll take that. Yep. I’d have bitten the hand off anyone who offered that at the start of the season. More so, after the first two games.
We are not yet lying in the gutter, after all. And we are still looking at the stars. Manchester (whatever flavour) can have the moon. But if we can get a share of the stars, that will have been a season well lived. And if not at least we tried and didn’t just bore everyone to death.
We haven’t just lived a little this season, we’ve lived a lot.
It’s all good.
Catweazle Watch: Day 3
No whiskers on my chinny chin chin.
Catweazle Watch: Day 2
Still no whiskers on my chinny chin chin. So I’m quite chirpy about that. But ever vigilant.
Enchanted, Ms Wynne Jones
Inspired by all the celebrating of the wonderful and so much missed Diana Wynne Jones that is going on on tumblr this weekend, I decided to rent a shot review I wrote of one of her books on my old BookGasm blog which I haven’t posted on for……some time. When I wrote the review I was hoping that the future would be filled with many more wonderful DWJ books. Sadly that future ever showed up and we got the rubbish one, with no more DWJ books, instead.
I might link/repost a few more old reviews from the BookGasm blog. Perhaps the Dark Tower/Losty related ones. Or perhaps not. I don’t know. Anyway, here’s the link to the original piece on Enchanted Glass which is also reproduced below.
Diana Wynne Jones is my favourite author. That deal was closed a long long time ago - in the late 1970s, when I first read Wilkins’ Tooth - and I have never seen any reason to re-evaluate my position on this.
Inevitably, a new book from DWJ is An Event in my mad little world. Will it be another Hexwood, or Deep Secret? Or, you know, not?
Enchanted Glass is not another Hexwood. And it’s not another Deep Secret. But it is a wonderful, charming, inventive and engaging book in its own right, with a beautifully drawn cast of characters and location and an intriguing mythos backing it up. Is it set either in Chrestomanci’s world or one of the related worlds? Quite possibly. But equally, it could easily not be. Which is refreshing. I like Chrestomanci, and certainly The Lives of Christopher Chant is in the top 50% of DWJ’s output, for me - but all my other favourites are non Crestomanci books. I prefer DWJ when she stretches her wings and tries something new. And if she really wants to go back and revisit old triumphs - well, I wish she’d either consider sequels to Hexwood or Fire and Hemlock, or revist the Magids’ multiverse once more.
But I digress. Enchanted Glass appears to be not only written a fresh slate for DWJ it also seems to be nicely set up for one or more sequels, ending as it does on a semi- cliffhanger with some plot threads still trailing. Which is Good News, I’d say.
It’s not the most complex book she’s ever written. It’s not the most challenging. It is however beautifully constructed and played out, and the overall effect is as enchanting as the glass windows which give the book its name. When I finished Enchanted Glass I loved DWJ even more than ever. I hope there are sequels - I want to find out what happens next. I want to find out more about the folk who will not use iron, about the Puck, about Groil and Rolf. I want to know what happens to the counterparts - are they safe? There’s plenty of scope for sequels. But *as well* as those longed for sequels to my favourite books though, not instead of ………Here’s hoping, anyway.
Please please please let me get what I want…..
Right now, what I want is for this not to be as good as it gets. I want this to be just the start of the goodness.
I love Spurs. I always have, I always will, this love is not in any way dependent on results (obviously. They haven’t won the league in my lifetime). I love them because my dad loved them and my mum supported them too (she didn’t love them, but they were always her side due to loving Blanchflower). Spurs have always suited me - neurotic. Capable of being fabulously brilliant yet shooty-in-the-footy most of the time. Self defeating. But never ever boring. And never ever bored. High functioning dyspraxia illustrated through the medium of footy. My lovely, frustrating, gorgeous boys.
Danny Blanchflower got it almost right when he said the game is about glory. Almost right. What it’s about most of all though is JOY. Not fear. Last year, my boys discovered (or grew) a backbone. This year, they have found their joy. Watching them play is like listening to (or playing) great music. They play with joy, panache, style, complete confidence, artistry and skill in every fibre of their beings. They really get it. And they have got it. Finally. They are jazz. They are Bach. They are Rachmaninov. They are Dizzy. They are Tchaikovsky They are Streisand’s voice. And watching them produces joy too - joy in the soul, joy in the gut. Visceral, churning, clashing diminished 7th crunchy chord joy. That feeling before the brass crash in. That feeling when the piano goes mental. That feeling when the voice soars and there is no break between registers. Angel sounds.
I love them so much. I love watching them so much. I love how they are playing. So very much.
So what I want - and please please please let me get what I want (because in context yes, it would be the first time) - is for them to keep in playing like this. Just like this.
If they do, they will win the league. If they don’t I’ll be so broken hearted I won’t care about the league anymore.
I did care about the league. When we were almost good enough. Last year. The year before. Because I thought that was plenty enough to make me happy. Now I know different. Now I know what I want, what they should want, is to carry on playing like this. The game is about joy, not fear. And if this team - this fabulous, relatively cheap, team of players who combine to make something so much better than the sum of its pretty decent parts - do that, then they WILL win the league.
Happiness is a sparkling de-cluttered bathroom
Although we are not yet properly doing the flylady routine, we are definitely still making new baby steps towards a transformed house every day. This evening I had a real blitz in the bathroom - it’s always sort-of-clean (swished every morning) but rarely tidy and there was a lot of clutter everywhere, especially on the windowsill and the shelves. No longer! The bathroom is sparkling, and declutered to a point that I can live with. And you can’t ask for more than that, really. Barry has agreed that we should reprint the windowsill and the walls (there is vile wallpaper where there isn’t tile) and I’m really looking forward to doing that (love love love the smell of paint). I’m really pleased with the results from less than an hour’s effort. This is good. Basically, every night I’m at home when the footy is on, from now on, I’m going to do a ‘detail clean’ (I think that’s what they call it) or some de-cluttering, in either the kitchen, playroom, lobby, our room, or the bathroom (once it has degenerated again as it surely will). That way, I get to listen to the footy (as tonight) and something positive gets done too. Clearly we will have to devise an alternate strategy for the close season but that’s a long way off yet. We might even have a house removed from CHAOS by then. That would be nice. The possibility makes me happy.
It’s about GLORY
…..of course, tonight’s game doesn’t sound like it was very glorious. Spurs ground out a 1-0 victory over decidedly inferior opposition *on paper* (not so inferior in practice). But we won. And we are still playing lovely attractive attacking glorious footy, just not taking all our chances (and that’s very us). So our quest continues. Is it a quest for a champions’ league spot? Is it a quest for third? Or are we really realistically going for the title? I’d like to think so. While the economics of the modern game dictate that to finish 3rd or 4th is a better prize than the league, FA or UEFA cups………the romantic in me, the SPURS in me, says you might as well live a little. Honestly, what is the point in setting your target at 4th? How petty and mean spirited and antithetical to the majestic, quixotic and frankly glorious traditions of this wonderful, infuriating, exasperating, joyous club. I think ‘Arry wants to win the league. I think Levy wants to win the league. I think the players want to win the league. I know many of the fans do. Pipe dream? Maybe. But people seldom get anywhere by dreaming *limited*.
So, I’m still believing. We are going for the title. And that makes me happy. While we are still in it.
And the fact that we are now safe from relegation makes me happy too! ;) (Once a Spurs fan……)
Babysteps
The best thing about today was driving up to Hay Tor listening to The Sirens of Time, and then not getting out cos it was pissing down. I honestly don’t think that we will ever tire of driving to Hay Tor and then not getting out of the car, due to the weather. We don’t mind getting out. Getting out is fine. It’s perfectly enjoyable going for a yomp around the Tor. But it’s infinitely more satisfying driving out there and then deciding ‘fuck it, it’s freezing, let’s go home again’. This is our unique family activity. It’s our tradition. It makes us who we are. Derangetrons.
The babysteps approach to transforming the house continues (at a babystep pace). The kitchen is definitely looking better. So is the bathroom. And to an extent, the living room. We just have to focus on what we achieve each day, not what remains to be tackled. We are tortoises, not hares. But that’s fine. Because of xeno. And Aesop.
Managing Expectations 2012 edition
1. I will have a tidier house and a cleaner house
2. I will try to be less negative and defeated by gloom
3. I will try to be less hard on myself
4. I will be less shouty
5. Something about my teeth
6. I will be less enraptured by shininess
7. I will live within my means
8. I will try to be less needy
9. I will eat a food other than toast at least once a day
10. I will forgive Judi Dench for not being Maggie Smith
ALSO
1. I will not let others upset me.
2. I will not look to others for validation
3. I will not chase after friendships that are dead
4. I will not pretend to be someone I am not to try to con others into liking me
5. I will not leave it a whole year before I do my next expense claim
Again with the 1 and the 9
Today was a quite good day. But that’s irrelevant because I finally started reading 11.22.63……and it’s Dark Tower. Very Dark Tower. And I am ridiculously happy. Put the record on again…….
