Rain, rain

[brigdh]

Yes, yes, so I'm apparently spamming livejournal today. I'll stop soon.

I am so tired today. Possibly because it's that time of the month; I'm lucky enough not to get cramps or mood swings, but massive blood loss wears me out terribly. I should be writing a paper, but I can barely manage to stay out of bed, so I'm not certain if that will happen. I can always write it next week instead, though it would probably be a better decision to do it now.

I think I'm tired because of the rain, and the cold. It's been raining since last night, in a drizzle that occasionally fades to merely a heavy mist and occasionally increases into a real storm. My apartment has an air conditioner in one window, and when it rains hard the water drums on it, echoing in the hollow metal box like someone tapping their fingers on a table except ceaseless and without rhythm. There's the sound of cars on the road too, softer and distant, the shushing they make as they drive through puddles. All of it seems the soundtrack for sleep.

The city looks different in the rain too, of course. Smaller, because the clouds and rain blur anything far away, or hide it completely in faded gray static. And everything is colorless, except for the few trees that have started to flower already: magnolias, all vivid pale pink compared to everything else. I've started to dread the rain because it always lowers the temperature. A few hours of rain mean days of cold weather to follow, even if the sky clears.

It's day for fireplaces, and soft places to sit- the kind you sink into when you flop down- with pillows and blankets. Maybe someone else to share the seat with, to fall asleep with a head on a shoulder. People do make excellent heating pads, after all.

Come and tell me interesting things so I'll stay awake, since I unfortunately don't actually have a fireplace. I do have coffee and an interesting coffeeshop with wood floors and big glass windows, but it's not at all an adequate substitute.

Comments

[p-zeitgeist.livejournal.com]

I'm having exactly the same problem. I even got what was technically enough sleep last night, but it doesn't help: I've spent the entire day feeling as though I were not quite awake.

But that isn't what I started out to say, which was that I have the Springkink story you were apparently fretting about open in another tab as I write this. And it proves yet again that I'm right in my serene conviction that while you may worry about these things, somehow you always manage to pull them off in lovely style, no matter how last-minute it may get. I am so jealous. Last minute does not get me gorgeous and evocative images of light in hair. Last minute only gets me total mental shutdown.

[wordsofastory.livejournal.com]

I got eleven hours of sleep last night and it didn't help! Although, now that I'm thinking about it, I had early meetings both yesterday and the day before, and so have probably been running low on sleep for a few days.

Aw, thank you. I suppose it's years of practice at procrastinating on homework. *laughs* I'm glad you liked it; it took me a while to think of a way to do the prompt that felt appropriate to the characters.

[vom-marlowe.livejournal.com]

It's cold again here. *wimper* I just don't enjoy the cold the way I used to. Interesting things, hmm. Well, here's a question I've been pondering. What do you do if your character seems to have a kink you don't necessarily share? And is it empowering to write out fic that you're embarrassed about, or not?

[wordsofastory.livejournal.com]

Hee. I never enjoyed the cold, so I am firm in my surety that it could be done away with without any great loss.

Oh, interesting thought. I don't think I've ever struggled with that problem, because I find it fairly easy to slip into a character's headspace. For instance, I generally don't actually find men physically attractive, but the vast majority of my stories include someone or other waxing poetic over a guy's hair or eyes or body or whatever. If it was a kink that I not only didn't share but found icky, that would be pretty hard. I could probably still do it by focusing on what the character would think rather than what I think, but I might end up a bit disturbed or grossed out just by having to think of it in detail for so long. I think I'd just have to forget about my own opinions and spend a while focusing on why the character likes it.

I find embarrassing stories empowering if other people like them, and not if they don't. Which seems shallow and like I'm too concerned about other people's opinions, but that's not quite what I mean. The things that embarrass me in fiction are nearly always that I worry that something appeals so much to me that I've accidentally ascribed it to a character for whom it doesn't work; that I've gotten so caught up in wanting to do something because of my personal preferences that I've written something unbelievable for the characters. And finding that line between 'this seems good because I like the idea' and 'this seems good because it fits the character' can sometimes be hard from the inside of your own head, which is why I value other people's reaction to the story. I figure if they like it also, I must have done something right.

[pineapplechild.livejournal.com]

Apparently, the "between a rock and a hard place" saying is supposed to have come from The Odessey, where Odesseus is stuck trying to get home between a giant whirlpool and a giant monster, Scyalla.

Supposedly.

Also: There are some REALLY dirty Roman poems. I was looking for poems for my latin club (being poetry month and all) and the most notable find was dirty poems. Which I will not supply, them being in Latin, and dirty.

[wordsofastory.livejournal.com]

Cool! I always liked how, in The Hobbit, Tolkien pretends the saying 'out of the frying pan and into the fire' comes from Bilbo.

Dude, you say dirty like it's a bad thing. *grins* Though I suppose Latin would make it hard for me to read them.

[pineapplechild.livejournal.com]

Well, since I was trying to find poems for a bunch of 7th and 8th grade girls to translate, I didn't want to have to explain some of the truly terrible puns that some poets would use to keep from being outright obscene, or explain what they were translating in general, or you know, at all.*grins* So we're sticking with Ovid.

[wordsofastory.livejournal.com]

Ah, yeah, I suppose if it will be kids reading the poems, you do have to be a little more careful.

[rm.livejournal.com]

We're so on the same cycle.

[wordsofastory.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I know, isn't that bizarre? I'd say there's no way we've spent enough time physically together to be having an effect, but on the other hand, I was six fucking days late this month, so clearly someone's pheromones were influencing that.

[rm.livejournal.com]

I send them thorugh the Internet.

[wordsofastory.livejournal.com]

Ha! Now invent a way to smack people through the internet and gather will become really fun.

[rm.livejournal.com]

It would be just like Survivor, if it were with celebrities who have to eat whoever gets kicked off the island.

[wordsofastory.livejournal.com]

You know, the very first rumors of this "weird new TV idea"- which turned out to be Survivor- popped up right after I had read Lord of the Flies. I thought the show was going to be so different from what it actually was. I mean, no talking pig heads at all!

[veleda-k.livejournal.com]

Not to interrupt and be all creepy, but I just started yesterday.

Of course, the pain's been actually manageable, and I haven't thrown up even once, so whatever effect you're having on me, I'm down with it.

[wordsofastory.livejournal.com]

Heh. My whole flist must be coming together! Though I suppose that could explain why people have seemed irritable for the past few days.

Glad to help! I really don't know how you poor people with intense pain manage to deal with it every month. I had a friend who had such bad periods she ended up going on the pill just for that.

[petronia.livejournal.com]

I'm uploading albums wholesale, so have one: The Go Find - Stars on the Walls (http://www.kekkai.org/sabina/070405/The%20Go%20Find%20-%20Stars%20on%20the%20Wall%20(2007).zip) (64.5MB)

Good music for this weather; everything on the Morr Music label is destined for cozy insomniac nights while it's miserable outside. I was listening to it on the bus home a couple of hours ago. It's snowing up here - usual early-April spring blizzard - hopefully for the last time. :P

[wordsofastory.livejournal.com]

Eeee, music! Thank you so much. ♥!

[kessie.livejournal.com]

It's sunny here, actually, and warm. Has been for the past few days. Very summery, and I keep waiting for the world to end.

You make me want to live in New York so badly. :(

[wordsofastory.livejournal.com]

Heh. Well, you make me want to move to Dublin, since it's SNOWING HERE WHY GOD. *grins*

But thank you. I do love the city a lot, really, though plenty of people seem to find it irritating instead.