Sandy's Chatterblog

Knock, Knock (Round 2)

2012-01-26T21:28:00.004+01:00

And who might it be this time?

It's Miss Very Pink Bunny!

I sewed her as a Christmas present for the daughter of our secretary. Miss VPB turned out somewhat pinker than I had planned, but apparently, that's a good thing since the little girl in question luuuuuuurves pink! :)

In other news: today would have been Weigh In Day, if it hadn't been for that dratted migraine that caught me unawares this morning. Duh. But I will go tomorrow morning -- not simply because our coach is fantastic and the meetings are extremely motivational, but also because there's a distinct possibility that I have reached the 10% goal this week. When I started with Weight Watchers last November, the 10% mark seemed so far away -- out of reach basically. But in the end, it's taken me only eight weeks to come to this point. Needless to say that I'm mighty happy!

Knock, knock ...

2012-01-25T07:53:00.003+01:00

... anybody there?

KNOCK, KNOCK ...

Ah, there she is! :)

Hello everybody! I hope you all had a great start into the new year! Mine was certainly fantastic -- I had a sweet baby on my arm (though not my own, alas).

As you can see, I still haven't been abducted by slimy green aliens, haven't travelled back in time to snatch up Mr Thornton (oh wait, he wasn't a real person to begin with ... too bad! No wonder I didn't travel back in time!), haven't fallen into the duck pond. Instead, I have been hard at work at ... well, myself. After gaining 25 kilos in the past four years (that's 55.1 pounds for you), I'm now determined to get rid of all that weight until summer. Why summer, you ask? Well, because I'm going to RWA National this year (at this point feel free to imagine me jumping around the room and yelling WOOHOOOO!!!! at the top of my voice). I haven't been since 2007, and I really don't want people to say things like, "Have you seen Sandy? Wow, she's become fat, hasn't she?" No, I want people to say things like, "Have you seen Sandy? My, but she's looking good, isn't she?" :)

Incidentally, I also didn't want to buy bigger-sized trousers yet again. So, on 25 November I joined Weight Watchers, and I haven't looked back since: not only have I lost weight and am eating healthier food, but I am also enthusiastic about food again. I have discovered new dishes (how could I ever live without oven-roasted veggies???) and old favourites. Better still, I feel that I have finally taken back control over my own life. I'm looking forward to things again (RWA National!!!!), and I'm hopeful about the future (despite the Euro crisis and all that).

One thing I want to do over the next few weeks and months is to document my WW journey. So without further ado here's the first set of pics. They were taken on 13 January, when I had already lost 6.6 kilos (14.6 lbs):

By then, the worst of the wobbliness had been reduced, which was in part also due to umpteen hours spent on the Wii balance board. There's nothing like riding the bike around the Wii Fit island to improve the shape of your thighs! *g*

Happy Holidays to all of you!

2011-12-24T15:01:00.002+01:00

Pretty Christmas gift tags, cards & ornaments - the internetz has it all!

2011-12-22T11:32:00.005+01:00

Today we briefly interrupt the Harewood tour to marvel at the heaps of awesome Christmas freebies that can be found online. Let's start with Kirsty Neale's sweet Christmas cards. You can find the angel and many others on Papercraft Inspirations.

If you'd like some gift tags to go with the cards, you need to look no further than Kirsty Neale's blog (make sure to check out her Etsy store, too -- she's got some adorable stuff! Bunny garlands, anybody?).

The next gift tag comes from Amy Moss on Eat Drink Chic. Isn't it cute?

The next tags are really special -- or have you ever heard of feather gift tags? As you can see from the picture below they look simply amazing when paired with simple brown packing paper. Find them on Love vs. Design.

If you prefer classic design, have a look at these pretties, which you can find on The Sweetest Occasion. They were designed by Jen of Blush Printables.

Last but not least, what about some birdie ornaments? Lisa Rupp is offering these two sweet birds as a free download on her blog. You could use them as gift tags or even as Christmastree decorations.

Harewood House Part 2: The Terrace

2011-12-21T18:56:00.005+01:00

Madame Sphinx greets you at the entrance to the terrace. (Have you ever wondered how a spinx does her hair? Perhaps they've got servants for that kind of thing ...)

And here it is -- ta-daaah! -- the formal garden on the terrace.

This is the view from the house, across the formal garden, with the landscape garden in the background.

The view from the balustrade that you can see in the picture above:

They're kind of difficult to see, but all these black spots on the lake and on the lawn? Geese. Hundreds and hundreds of geese. I could already hear them while walking down the drive.

Back to the formal garden. There were pretty fountains, like this one:

And rather cold stone (marble?) benches to the left and the right. You can just about see one of those benches on the picture below. It nestles in the inner ring of the curved hedge in the back.

And then there is the very large, very neikkid man. Right smack in the middle of the terrace:

It's Hercules with a leopard, and it's a modern statue. The original statue was destroyed by severe frost in 1982.

So when you now look out of the window up at the house, you've got a very nice view of Hercules's very nice, muscular bum. Not the worst thing to look at early in the morning, I should guess. ;)

In the next installment I'll take you to see the ice house, the landscape garden and the walled garden.

Harewood House Part 1

2011-12-20T19:44:00.004+01:00

In early October I attended a conference in Leeds. The conference was called "Thackeray in Time", and I presented a paper on "Mocking Nostalgia: W.M. Thackeray, Richard Doyle, and The Newcomes" (yes, Dicky Doyle again!) (that's not going to be my last paper on Doyle: at least two more will follow next year). I basically discussed the relevance of remembered history in The Newcomes and how the text and the illustrations deal with, and comment on, nostalgia. Thanks to the research I've done for my novels, I was able to present new findings and insights into the novel (authors do make better scholars *g*).

I had reserved the day before the conference for a bit of sightseeing, and as the weather was simply FANTASTIC (it was hot! in autumn!! in Yorkshire!!!), I decided to leave the city and look at Harewood House, a grand estate near Leeds.

The bus dropped me off in front of the entrance to the estate:

And then I walked down the drive.

And I walked ...

... and walked ...

(pretty meadows to the left)

... and walked ...

... and walked ...

... and walked ...

(Oh look! Pretty neo-gothic church to the right!)

... and walked ...

... and walked ...

(more pretty meadows on the left)

... and walked ...

... and walked some more (which definitely drove home the sheer vastness of such large estates) (and if that's not great research I don't know what is!) before I finally reached the house itself:

It was built in the 1760s for Edwin Lascelles. John Carr designed most of the outside of the house, while Robert Adam (then a relatively young Scottish architect trying to establish himself in London) designed most of the inside. The famous Lancelot 'Capability' Brown worked on the landscape garden, and Thomas Chippendale on the furniture and furnishings throughout the house (whew, that reads like a Who's Who of 18th-century architects and designers, doesn't it?).

Edwin's cousin and heir became the 1st Earl of Harewood in 1812, and his grandson, the 3rd earl, married Louisa Thynne, who had great plans for Harewood. She ordered a reconstruction of the house, enlarging the building and adding a grand terrace to the south side. For this, she chose one of the star architects of the Victorian Age, Charles Barry, who had designed the new Houses of Parliament.

The next picture shows a smallish formal garden at the east side of the house:

And here we have another bit of formal garden at the south side:

Turn right, and this path then leads you to what Louisa must have considered the crowning glory of the house: the south terrace! (To be continued ...)

From my Sketchbook

2011-12-16T19:39:00.004+01:00

In the past months I tried several things to kickstart my creativity. Sewing is a great creative outlet, but ultimately, it didn't help me to get back into writing. So at the beginning of this year, I started a sketchbook. I blame this on Amazon and Amazon's book recommendations: among the books that appeared on my page were several about mixed media designs and creating sketchbooks of one's everyday experiences. I loved the idea, thought it might be helpful, and bought a shiny new Moleskine notebook as well as some fancy pens.

First thing I did was to create a title page:

You can see the starting date on the bottom left corner -- dating my notebooks is a habit from the time when I used to write poetry. (Oh wait, did I say notebook?)

Anyways, I dutifully dragged the sketchbook to university to start on drawings concerning my everyday life. As you can see, I decided that the dirty tea mug on my office desk would make a great still life AND could be combined with a still life of my tea mug at home. Cool, eh?

That was kind of fun. Alas, at that point I realised that the paper of the notebook was actually too thin for the fancy pens I had bought. (Duh.) So I started to use a pencil instead. (Oh wait, did I say notebook again?)

Next I tried my hand at a collage kind of thing. Well, not really a collage. More like, "let's take a glue stick and glue something into our shiny bright sketchbook". Tea mug, tea bag, gettit?

For my next everday object to sketch, my choice fell on Teh Kitteh. The strange drawing on the right side? The snow-capped mountains and the lush valley inbetween? That's Cara sleeping in her kitty bed, and the snow-capped mountains are in fact the corners of a pillow. To fill the page I also did a study of her kitty nose and her kitty paw and ... Uh, that's kind of boring. And the results aren't too good either. (I spare you the sight of the next page where I tried drawing with my left hand.)

And then something really wonderful happened: on the page after the unsightly left-hand drawings, I started to play around with words. And the words turned into chapter headings for the WIP.

And then suddenly, I was scribbling away at a scene ...

And after that, the sketchbook turned into a notebook, which I filled with scene after scene, interrupted by some odd comments like this one:

Or maps, like this one:

To my delight I found that my plain black Moleskine notebook is also useful for other things apart from drafting a novel: it is also extremely helpful for drafting the acknowledgments of the dratted diss:

In short, I LOVE my little black notebook!

Lovely, lovely books

2011-12-15T18:33:00.002+01:00

Today I bought/received these two books:

The first one has been written by the wonderful Laura Vivanco, dragonslayer assisstant extraordinaire (i.e., she was one of the poor people who volunteered to proofread my PhD thesis). Laura has been reading and studying Harlequin Mills & Boon romances for a long time, and judging from her postings at Teach Me Tonight and our e-mail discussions, I am certain that her book will knock my socks off. I'm thrilled to pieces for her, and even though I wanted to wait until the POD edition would become available, I've just bought the Kindle edition because I simply couldn't wait.

The second book arrived in today's mail:

As you know, I've become a bit obsessed with sewing lately. So far, all I've ever sewn are bags and softies and some really simple quilts, but I do love the idea of sewing my own clothes. So for the past two or three years, I've been steadily building my library of sewing handbooks. All I need to do now is to brave the actual process of sewing clothes.

Which, to be honest, scares me witless.

Sewing softies is fairly easy and cotton is a very forgiving fabric, too. If you've made a mistake in the construction of the softy, you can always improvise and the result will still look good (well, except for that one doll pattern) (and the sock kitty with the strange head) (hey, but the embroidery on said kitty's belly is rather good!). But with clothes? That you want to wear???? Uh-oh.

So I'm still scared, still not sewing clothes, and still finding excuses. Ah well ... one day ... :)

3rd-Advent-Sunday Goody

2011-12-11T15:33:00.006+01:00

Are you all enjoying the crispy-cold wintertime (well, or summer, depending on where in the world you live) (and if it's the latter, I hope it isn't crispy-cold right now ...). Here in Frankfurt, we had the first dusting of snow last night -- apparently St. Peter thought this part of the globe could do with a sprinkle of his version of confectioner's sugar. :) By late morning, the winter-loveliness had already melted away, but it was nice while it lasted.

As a 3rd-Advent-Sunday Goody, I won't give you cookies because most of you insist on living so far away, which makes giving people cookies a tad difficult. No, I'll give you a sneak preview of my brandnew, soon-to-be-launched website. I hope you'll love it as much as I do!

On the pages about Castle of the Wolf, you will also find some new pictures of the Black Forest:

And some pictures of me when I was still little and we lived in the Black Forest:

(I'm standing in front of an old organ that used to be played at fairs. In the 19th century Waldkirch -- the town where we lived and on which I modelled Kirchwalden in Castle -- was famous for organ building.)

My love is like a red, red rose ...

2011-12-05T18:24:00.007+01:00

... or rather a green, green fir tree that's newly sprung from a Bundt pan. A circle of fir trees, even! Clasping hands ... eh ... branches.

In other words, today I have once again succumbed to the lure of a Nordic Ware Bundt pan, in this case the holiday tree pan. But isn't it adorable? And please note the choo-choo train at the bottom rim. How could I possibly resist???

Okay, so I joined Weight Watchers two weeks ago, and cake definitely does not belong into the category of zero-point food, but I'm altruistic here: I'm thinking of others and the pleasure a cake baked in such a lovely pan will bring to them. Indeed, the purchase of the pan might turn out the perfect excuse for hosting a pre-Christmas tea party! :)

John Denver & The Muppets

2011-12-04T22:03:00.002+01:00

I know it's not Christmas yet, but hey, I've only just discovered this, so please bear with me: John Denver & the Muppets singing "12 Days of Christmas" -- how cute is that?

New Academic Website

2011-12-01T21:41:00.003+01:00

My new and improved academic website is now up and running (smoothly, I hope!):

www.sandramartinaschwab.com

A new and improved author website will follow soon!

Goody for the First Advent Sunday

2011-11-27T12:07:00.003+01:00

Since I can't invite you all for Advent afternoon tea, I've decided to give you another kind of goodie: a snippet from the WIP. In this scene my heroine, who spent the past few years at a (finishing) school far away from London society, attends her first ball. Enjoy!

This, this wonderful ball was magical -- from the candles blazing from the chandeliers, bedecked with crystals that glittered like icicles, to the sweet sounds of the small orchestra.

Imagine that! An orchestra playing the music for a ball! It was so much more ... refinded than Miss Riggs's efforts on the piano during the dancing lessons at St. Cuthbert's.

And best of all: to dance with a gentleman instead of a fellow student! Why, her insides had been all aflutter during the first few dances (even though she had told herself sternly that such silliness was the first step of becoming an utter henwit).

Loads of Cuteness for Mirabel

2011-11-24T17:20:00.004+01:00

Here are some examples of softies that were donated by other people to this year's Softies for Mirabel. The sight of so many sweet handmade softies always gives me a warm and fuzzy feeling.

1. Daisy for Mirabel 2011, 2. Lambkins, 3. DoodleGirl , 4. OWL Parade, 5. softies for mirabel badge, 6. Pumpkin, 7. DSC_5099, 8. Posie for Mirabel 2011, 9. Purple Dino

I particularly love the "Polly" pattern (No 1 und 8). It's from Softies only a Mother Could Love, and I can't wait to try it out myself! It seems to be rather popular in the crafting community as well: you can find oodles of pictures of Pollies online. What's your favourite? The sweet lambkin? The little miss in red? Or perhaps the row of owls?

Three Musketeers for Mirabel

2011-11-22T20:09:00.003+01:00

It's that time of year again: Softies for Mirabel, the handmade toy drive organised by Pip Lincolne from "Meet at Mike's" to benefit the Mirabel Foundation, which "assists children who have been orphaned or abandoned due to parental illicit drug use and are now in the care of extended family (kinship care)". The dolls and softies are exhibted in the shop window of "Meet Me at Mike's" in the first week of December before they are given to the Mirabel foundation. It's a charity project I'm more than happy to support.

So this year, I sent along three softies:

The giraffe might look familiar: Corduroy Wes (remember him?) was made from this pattern, too. The doll is a Tilda Christmas angel minus the wings, and the little guy is Henny House from the fabulous book Softies Only a Mother Could Love (= Most.Adorable.Softies.Ever!!!).

The patterned fabrics are from Tante Ema, a fabric design studio based in the Black Forest of all places! Naturally I have to support them by buying many, many, many yards of their fabrics. ;-)

There and Back Again

2011-11-21T21:57:00.003+01:00

In case you were wondering: teh Kitteh and I haven't fallen off the edges of the earth, nor have we been abducted by horrible aliens, nor buried under an avalanche of crafting books (though mountainous piles of crafting books seem to grow in my library these days ...). What happened was that I didn't have proper internet access. Or rather, it took me ages (two years to be exact) to install my new computer. But now the 'puter is connected to all the important stuff (except for the printer -- still need to buy a new printer) (there's a pattern emerging here, can you see it?), and I'm properly back online. Yay! So there's hope that I'll get back to posting regularly. :)

Much has happened while I was away from my blog:

I bought a Kindle
I got addicted to Kindle books
I started to think that the Kindle is the best thing since the invention of chocolate
I sewed softies for Softies for Mirabel
I went to academic conferences in Canterbury and Leeds and at a castle on the banks of the Rhine.
I also went back to the Black Forest for the first time in 25 years and visited the small town in which I spent a part of my childhood and which was the model for Kirchwalden in CASTLE OF THE WOLF.

Helpful Advice for Crafting Minded People

2011-04-08T09:52:00.002+02:00

Do not sit on the pincushion (especially if it's still full of pins!). This is painful and embarrassing.

Do not step onto the plastic rulers. They tend to slide and make you fall. This, too, is painful and embarrassing.

Do not trip over your sewing box. This is horribly painful and embarrassing, and you foot will be black and blue for days to come.

Lightbulb Moment

2011-03-30T21:37:00.004+02:00

After some serious thinking and heavy browsing of my Oxford Dictionary of First Names, I've finally found the perfect nickname for my unfortunate secondary character in the WIP: Dodo! (From rabbit to extinct bird - that's not such a big improvement, is it?) And here he is, the Honourable Adolphus Fenton Cole:

With a thunder of hooves the man who was rumoured to be the least well-favoured gentleman of all of London rode up to their landau. His light-blond hair, or what could be seen of it below his hat, bore a strong resemblance to straw; his nose had once been called a potato-shaped appendage; and his hands were as big as the blade of a large - a very large - spade.

Howards End is on the Landing

2011-03-30T14:01:00.007+02:00

This morning I stumbled across Susan Hill’s HOWARDS END IS ON THE LANDING – though "stumbled" is perhaps the wrong word as this book sits comfortably on my coffee table, on top of THE FOLKLORE OF DISCWORLD and THE LORE OF THE LAND. Hill’s book is about books, about the books she owns, the writers she has met, the books she has never read. Some passages are somewhat snobbish, and she could be accused of rather heavy name dropping, but still, I like her book because it always makes me think about my own library. (Besides, you can’t really blame her for babysitting Arnold Wesker’s children back in the 1960s.)

And thinking about my library this morning, made me realise that, for somebody teaching English Lit at university, I have rather plebeian tastes. Sure, I love Ludwig Tieck’s "Blond Eckbert", and I adore E.T.A. Hoffmann’s KATER MURR as well as Gaskell’s NORTH AND SOUTH and CRANFORD. I have read and enjoyed Austen’s novels (yet I don’t like all of them). I prefer Thackeray to Dickens, and thought THE NEWCOMES a lot of fun. I’m very fond of Anna Seghers’s DAS SIEBTE KREUZ, which I once knew by heart (years I helped to prepare the centennary edition and had to read the whole novel about six times in as many weeks...). I have always enjoyed medieval literature, and thanks to Dorothy Dunnett I have fallen head over heels for late medieval and Renaissance poetry as well. Despite his suicidal maidens, I’m also very fond of Tennyson, and love a score of other poems and ballads.

Modern literary fiction, however, leaves me stone-cold. As a student I gave up on a seminar on Virginia Woolf because I considered her books tedious in the extreme. Robert Musil – dear heaven, when I struggled to get through DER MANN OHNE EIGENSCHAFTEN, most of the time I didn’t have the faintest, foggiest clue what the author was talking about (if any novel ever deserved the title of "loose, baggy monster" it’s this one!). Ondaatje, THE ENGLISH PATIENT – uhmm .... what’s the point??? And A.S. Byatt’s POSSESSION bored me to tears because I thought it was so utterly predictable. I’m currently reading Alan Bennett’s THE UNCOMMON READER, which is funny, sure, but IMO, a short story would have done the trick just as well, or rather, even better. I’ve reached about the middle of the book, and I’m already getting impatient and wonder what the point of this story is. Where does it go? Indeed, I find that this is my biggest problem with a lot of mainstream as well as literary fiction: a story that kind of ambles along without a clear goal (e.g., solve the crime, get the two lovers together, kill off the hero, etc.) makes me itchy. What’s worse, a lot of it is pretentious and utterly depressing. Why the heck would I want to read a book that’s utterly depressing? If I want to get depressed, I switch on the news, thank you very much.

I wonder why literature written by dead people works so much better for me. Probably because said dead people were dependent on writing stuff that actually sold (don’t get me started on publishers‘ policies in regard to advances for literary fiction vs advances for popular fiction! sufficient to say that it makes my blood boil). Hence, they had to be entertaining. Moreover, I can more easily stomach the world view of dead white men, whereas I really don’t see the point of involving myself with the world view of living white men.

See? I admit it: when it comes to reading I’m a shameless sexist, with only a few exceptions, among them Terry Pratchett and Guy Gavriel Kay

This might not be so very obvious in my study, where the classics live and all my books on literature and British history. The other, the older, half of the inhabitants of the study are, perhaps, much more interesting: there, books on on doll houses and on building castles huddle next to books about wolves, dogs, and snails. There are books about nineteenth-century fashion, cooking and historical erotica, about Roman plumbing, mythological creatures, the history of gardening and about European china. This is the collection that goes back the furthest into my own history, the collection that was started twenty years ago or even more. No wonder then that I always get a warm, fuzzy feeling when I stand in front of these shelves and contemplate their contents.

Though the study contains the majority of classics I own, traces of classics can also be found in the library: Louisa May Alcott lives there as well as Frances Hodgson Burnett. WINNIE-THE-POOH hangs out somewhere, too. But for the most part, the library is filled with rows upon rows of romance novels (which can hardly come as a surprise to anybody who reads this blog!), some fantasy novels and mysteries. There’s Christie, of course, but also Sayers (a more recent addition) and Kerry Greenwood’s wonderful Phryne Fisher series. Next to Phryne, you’ll find some old green Penguins squeezed into the shelf. I got them secondhand a few months ago and thought about starting a collection of green Penguins, but quickly abandoned the idea once I saw how grubby the copies were that I got (and they had been deemed to be in good condition on abebooks!).

On another shelf rests a string of Mrs. Pollifax novels (written by Dorothy Gilman). I got the first of them ages ago on a holiday in Spain back in the 1980s. It was so hot that summer that all you could do was sleep or read, and naturally I chose to do the latter with the result that after a few days I had run out of reading material. So I snatched one of the novels Dad had brought with him. Now, THE PERFUME is a book that’s not exactly meant to be read by young teens, and so, not surprisingly, my parents took it away once they figured out what I was reading (that was the one and only time they forbade me to read a particular book). The very next day the family drove to Benidorm in search of suitable books for me. There wasn’t much on offer, really, that might interest an adolescent girl. I chose an anthology with short stories about cats, I believe (or was it an anthology about hobgoblins and ghosts?) (anyways, it obviously didn’t make much of an impression), and an omnibus edition of the first three Mrs. Pollifax novels. The subtitle read "3 heitere Romane in einem Band“, i.e. “three amusing novels in one volume“. “Amusing” sounded nice enough, if slightly old-fashioned, and the book certainly didn’t disappoint. A few years later I was thrilled to discover that Gilman had written even more Mrs. Pollifax novels, though none of them, imo, is quite as charming as THE UNEXPECTED MRS. POLLIFAX

Several of my favourite novels are grouped together in a cabinet in my hallway, right next to the dining table. It contains some childhood favourites – Rosemary Sutcliff, Auguste Lechner, and Henry Winterfeld, who made me fall in love with historical fiction. There are the German editions of Gillian Bradshaw’s Arthur trilogy and her BEACON AT ALEXANDRIA, Diana Paxon’s WHITE RAVEN, Penelope Williamson’s KEEPER OF THE DREAM, and Margaret Hodges’s AVENGER. On a lower shelf you can find Anne Rice’s vampires, Diana Gabaldon’s Outlander series, and German translations of Susanna Kearsley’s novels (for some strange reason, I’ve never read her in English). But the best-loved shelf of this cabinet is that which houses Dorothy Dunnett’s novels. I simply love the sight of the bright, colourful spines of the Penguin edition of the Lymond Chronicles (another sight that is bound to give me warm fuzzies). On top of her Johnson Johnson mysteries rest Tom S. Hall’s TRAMPING HOLIDAYS IN SCOTLAND, which I bought because it once belonged to Dunnett’s husband, Alastair Dunnett, and Mary Stewart’s THE WIND OFF THE SMALL ISLES, which I bought because it came with a letter from Dorothy Dunnett: in 1974 she had sent the book to a friend after a dinner invitation. “I don’t know anyone else,” she wrote, “with such a gift for sending their friends away at the end of a dinner not only full of lovely food and drink, but pleased with themselves in the bargain! Bless you both.” Judging from the letter, Dorothy Dunnett, bless her heart, was just as charming in real life as her novels lead one to believe. :)

Election Day

2011-03-28T17:15:00.005+02:00

Yesterday there were town council elections in my tiny corner of the world. The ballot paper looked like this (minus the cat): (The monstrous thing Teh Kitteh is sitting on is not the actual ballot paper; it's what we were sent in preparation for the ballot so nobody would freak out in their booth on election day.) Why was the ballot paper so large, you ask? Because there are 93 seats in the Frankfurt town council, and the Powers That Are decided it would be much more democratic all around if everybody had 93 votes. (Teh Kitteh was much puzzled)

To make matters more confusing, you could vote for a party list or for individual candidates, and you could give each candidate up to three votes out of your 93. (At that point, Teh Kitteh gave up and started to attack the ballot paper instead.)

You could also rule out specific candidates (though not in the manner Teh Kitteh employed, by ripping off parts of the ballot paper.)

It kind of makes you wonder how many people did not go to the elections because they didn't understand the procedure or couldn't decipher the relatively small print of the ballot paper. (Teh Kitteh, for one, decided to hide beneath the ballot paper.)

And even when you had carefully studied the lists on this paper, a somewhat nasty surprise awaited you in your election booth: in addition to the broadsheet monster, you also received another, similarly sized ballot paper (which The Powers That Are had not sent out beforehand) for the town council of your suburb.

For which you had 19 votes....

Still alive and kicking

2011-03-23T17:57:00.003+01:00

I have to apologize for my prolonged absence this past autumn and winter. When I came home from my splendid Toronto adventure and the even more splendid conference of the Research Society for Victorian Periodicals at Yale U, I fell into a big, fat, black hole, and it’s taken me all these months to crawl out of it. For the most part, I felt like this unfortunate kitty ...

... with bouts of self-pity of the locked-into-the-bathroom-and-bawling-one’s-eyes-out variety thrown in for good measure. Assembling the aformentioned unfortunate kitty didn’t help, even if the result was rather pleasing, if I may say so myself ...

Not even hosting two tea-parties helped (despite the huge amounts of yummy left-overs) (people went home with doggie bags and I was told I had baked too much cake) (this is not true, btw; it's just that my friends didn't eat enough cake!).

And no, buying two more Nordic Ware bundt cake tins didn’t help either. What’s worse, the fir trees surrounding the Fairytale Cottage cake broke off when I attempted to free the cake of the tin. Thus the fir trees became strangely shaped bushes, but thanks to copious amounts of chocolate icing you (almost) couldn’t tell they were supposed to be trees. Ah well ...

In the end, it was the writing that did the trick: one day I sat down with my AlphaSmart and took up the threads of a story I started back in ... uhm ... 2009, I guess. It’s a rather over-the-top story, BUT (and this is really the most important bit) loads of fun to write, and thus I threw myself into it with gusto. Naturally, I once again committed a naming faux pas, yet thanks to my ever watchful, native-speaker friends, they were caught in time (unlike poor Heavens to Murgatroyd! Troy). So my poor, homely, potato-nosed, cousin-to-hero secondary character is NOT nicknamed Flopsy after all (due to the Beatrix Potter connection) (having been reared without Beatrix Potter, I had no idea of the existence of a fluffy rabbit called Flopsy – see that’s one of the dangers of writing in a language not your own: you never perceive the pitfalls until you’ve stumbled straight into them!)

Anyways, I’m having a great time with my still titleless WIP – so far the heroine has managed to shock a carriage-load of strangers, the hero and the hero’s sister (who fainted, poor girl) and I’ve high hopes that she’ll manage to scandalise the hero’s mother in no time at all. The hero surprised ME by suddenly talking dirty about things not to be mentioned in the company of ladies.

Now I only need to find a title for the WIP – must be a title suitable for the first book in a trilogy. "Irresponsible Pleasures"???? Hmmm ....

Must also find suitably silly new nickname for the unfortunate Flopsy. I first thought of Grannie, but alas, my hero’s called Griff, so we wouldn’t want another male Gr-name in the novel. (This just shows you with what kind of difficulties we writers have to deal with. Names! Silly names! Titles! Characters behaving shockingly!)

Autumn

2010-10-13T15:24:00.004+02:00

On Monday the sky above my town was filled with geese.

Lots and ...

... lots ...

... and lots of them.

Goodbye, geese! Have a save journey!

Softies for Mirabel: Miss Rosie Red

2010-10-11T22:18:00.005+02:00

Corduroy Wes has got a new friend:

It's little Miss Rosie Red (made from a Hop Skip Jump pattern)!

She likes music.

Veeeery much so. And if you give her a few books to sit on, she can even play the piano!

Here she shows you the itty bitty (red!) flowers that adorn her stylish trousers:

A ribbon of tulips! Aren't they cute?

But for now, little Miss Rosie hasn't got much time to think about tulips or other flowers. Instead she dreams ....

.... of foreign shores. For in just a few days, Rosie will go on a long journey to Australia - more specifically to "Meet Me at Mike's" in Melbourne for the fourth annual Softies for Mirabel project: people from all around the world send them handmade softies, which will be displayed in the store window during the first week of December. Afterwards, the dollies and stuffed animals will all be wrapped up and donated to the Mirabel Foundation.

Miss Rosie can't wait to hop on that plane to Australia!

Mr Punch has arrived!!!

2010-10-04T18:12:00.003+02:00

Today the lovely UPS man brought me five packages filled to the brim with books, and thus I spent the afternoon dusting and squeezing 70 kg of Mr Punch into my bookshelves. For such a short man, he sure is heavy!

(The image is "Mr Punch portrayed by different hands" from Spielmann's History of Punch)

Some numbers and a rant

2010-09-29T15:52:00.003+02:00

Carolyn has a post up today (or yesterday, depending on where in the world you are) with a link to an article from the Wall Street Journal that made both our heads blow off. In essence, authors of literary fiction whine that nowadays they get a "pittance" in advances compared to the $50-100,000 (for debut authors!!!) they used to get in the good old days. $100,000 for a book with a print run of 10,000 copies. $100,000 for a book with a print run of 10,000 copies!!!!!

$100,000 <=> 10,000 copies.

$100,000 for a book that will never sell out is print run and will never EVER make a profit for the publisher.

So who's making a profit for the publishers and enables them to publish literary fiction? The stupid authors of commercial fiction. Whose works are frowned upon by the literary establishment. Because it's not, you know, proper literature.

Anne Mather, The Reluctant Governess

2010-09-28T09:11:00.003+02:00

Several years ago I bought this in the British Bookshop in Mainz. Thanks to the decade-long presence of the US army nearby, the shop had accumulated a nice collection of older Harlequin titles (most of them in desperate need of a dusting - or, in more severe cases, of a wiping down with a damp cloth), so consequently I've accumulated a nice collection of older Harlequin novels as well. Most of which I haven't yet read, I have to admit.

But this morning, I was in the mood for an older romance and picked Anne Mather's The Reluctant Governess, first published in 1971. As you can probably tell from the cover it is set in what today would be deemed an "exotic" location for a category title: in Austria. In winter (hence the lovely snow-covered views of steep rocks and the castle). In a remote castle. And I have to say, the castle on the cover even looks like an Austrian castle!

Our dashing hero is Horst von Reichenstein, an embittered and impoverished baron with a ten-year-old daughter, Sophie, the bane of all governesses. Victoria Monroe, the heroine, comes to the castle as -- guess what! -- Sophie's governess and is somewhat appalled by the lack of central heating and electricity in the majority of rooms (most certainly in her room). There are also big, huge wolfhounds around (one of which is called Fritz). And a pair of elderly servants, Maria and Gustav, who seem to inhabit the kitchen. So far, Victoria hasn't had much success in making Sophie behave and instead is currently going for a walk around the castle, with Fritz on her heels.

More to follow!

Crafting International

2010-09-26T21:36:00.004+02:00

Two centuries ago, women sent their friends on the hunt for worsted wool and new crochet patterns when they visited the big city (lovingly described by Elizabeth Gaskell in Cranford) and American scrap-quilt enthusiasts placed ads in the newspapers to find other women with whom they could exchange fabrics. Needlework wasn't just something that women did. It allowed women to be creative; it formed the basis for friendships; it resulted in acts of charity; and, indeed, it could even become an expression of patriotism (the picture shows the cover of a knitting book published in New Zealand during WWI - you can find the whole story here)

Two hundred years later, the "gentle arts" still fulfill similar purposes (with the exception that needlework is no longer considered a necessary female accomplishment - today most of us sew, knit, crochet, etc. because we want to and not because we must). What is different today is the scale: thanks to the internet, the world is quite literally open to us. We swap patterns on blogs with people from all corners of the world. We can buy books and magazines and fabrics from Japan, France, Australia, the Netherlands, the USA, etc. Styles and techniques easily cross borders, are adapted and re-interpreted, cross borders again, and so on and so forth. Private charity drives reach enormous dimensions online as people from different countries rally together to knit blankets, sew softies, make quilts, and so on. (You only have to read Craft Hope or Quilting for Peace to know what I'm talking about!)

If you stop to think about it, it's astonishing and amazing and vastly thrilling and gives you a warm, fuzzy feeling inside. :)

Acres and acres and it's all MINE!

2010-09-25T22:20:00.004+02:00

One of the bad things about going to conferences is that you might run into people who are working on similar things as you do and who are very, very enthusiastic about what they do. If bad comes to worse, they might actually pass this enthusiams on to you. Or, if you are already enthusiastic yourself, might rouse your enthusiasm to fever-pitch. If you hate it when something like this happens, you should better steer clear of the conferences of the Research Society for Victorian Periodicals. For these people are bad: they not only fill your head with ideas (oh dear!), but they also inspire you to do research (oh dear, oh dear!).

In case you wonder where this all leads, well ... I just want you to be in possession of all facts in order to show you that I'm blameless. Completely blameless. Because, as you all know, I have generally an abhorrence of books and never buy the things (after all, they fill up your shelves in this rather disorderly fashion and then they start to mulitply like rabbits and that creates an entirely new set of problems! ghastly things, books!!!). That leaves only one possible solution: during my last stay in the US I've been bewitched by these Victorian periodicals people. In other words: IT'S NOT MY FAULT!

For today I've finally succumbed and bought these: 26 volumes of Punch. *happy sigh* (It's a good thing my shelves are so empty - because I never buy books, you know - because where would I store those beauties if it were otherwise?)

Decisions, decisions, decisions

2010-09-23T10:39:00.005+02:00

One of my friends is expecting her second child (a baby boy) and this time around I plan to finish the quilt for the baby in time for his birth (and not months afterwards!). So I immediately started looking for suitable baby fabrics. Because of the uber-cuteness of available fabrics, I've decided to go for another panel + border quilt - it's quick to finish (so there is indeed a chance that I'll manage to finish the quilt before December!) and it's kind of difficult to mess up (except if you start sewing needles into the quilt back, of course!). I fell in love with the Farm Corner line from Andover a while ago and so I decided on a Farm Corner quilt to welcome the little one into this world.

Imo, the fabrics are ideal for a baby: they are made in bright, cheerful colours and there are lots of things to discover:

But (of course there's a but!) I also fell in love with the Kate & Nate line from Northcott Fabrics. There is not only this adorable alphabet panel:

... but also this sweet stripe yardage:

I simply couldn't resist those little boys with their puppies. :)

However, I don't think they're quite as nice for a baby quilt, so I'll keep them for a 1st birthday quilt. It pays off to plan ahead! ;)

PS: I ordered the Farm Corner fabrics from etsy and -- as you can easily see -- the Kate & Nate fabrics from the fabulous Fat Quarter Shop.

Currently digging: Jacqueline Gilbert

2010-09-21T11:43:00.000+02:00

... and it's all Laura's fault! :)

Between 1976 and 1994 Jacqueline Gilbert wrote twelve novels for Mills and Boon. I started with Poppy Girl (isn't that a sweet title? note that there's no mention of Spanish billionaires, French millionaires, or Greek tycoons!), fell in love with Gilbert's writing (how can I not love somebody who's a fan of Dorothy Dunnett?) and thus ran to the computer to order more or her novels. So far, I've read The Chequered Silence and Capricorn Man (still no tycoon! nor any secret wives or babies!!) and really enjoyed these, too.

More to come!

I iz back!

2010-09-20T21:42:00.005+02:00

This summer I crossed the Big Pond once too many times, for when I came home from New Haven last Tuesday, I was hit by a wave of jet lag of epic porportions. A big, old, giant, beastly dragon of jet lag. It swallowed me whole and didn't spit me out for several days. Hence I barely managed to crawl out of bed in the mornings (mornings? ha!) and was on the verge of falling asleep for the rest of the day. I properly woke up only after 6 p.m. or thereabouts. Gah!

This time, my visit to the USA was a bit of an adventure: not only did I take the train from Newark International Airport to New Haven (& caught a glimpse of Manhattan during the journey!!!), but I also trod the hallowed halls of Yale University. To be honest, I felt somewhat daunted by the prospect of giving a paper at Yale. I mean, Yale!! And I was considerably more nervous than I usually am. Especially as I had to shorten my paper, like, five minutes before the presentation (uh-oh!) (for whatever reason, the whole "8 pages of double-spaced text = 20 minutes of talking" so didn't work for me this time around -- duh!). In addition, it was considerably warmer than I had reckoned with (aka I sweated like a pig). And if that wouldn't have been bad enough, this was also a conference where I didn't know anybody AND I was to give the first paper. (Oh the pressure!) (And I'm not just talking about the pressure on my poor little academic soul, but also the one on my bladder!) But I needn't have worried: Richard Doyle's illustrations always make people smile and chuckle (even if the presenter has some problems with the stupid Power Point presentation!) Yay for Dicky Doyle!!!

Naturally, I was impressed by Yale. Who wouldn't be? It's a beautiful campus; the university owns several museums; and the libraries are so gorgeous they make you cry. But on the other hand, Yale is full of strangeness, too. Take the buildings: somebody took great pains to copy Oxford and Cambridge as well as to make everything look really, really, really old. Think treating the individual stones with acid and/or putting them in the river to artifically age them. Think false cracks in the windows. Think medieval turrets. You get the picture. It made me chuckle.

A lot. :)

And then, there are the secret societies and their buildings, which aren't shown on campus maps on account of them being, well, secret. Very secret. So secret that each (huge!) building only has one entrance and no windows. Obviously, secret societies meet in the dark (on account of them being so secret, of course!) and don't like other people peeking in on their secret business (makes you think of Terry Pratchett's Elucidated Brethren of the Ebon Night, doesn't it?). Now, don't get me wrong, I'm perfectly fine with secret societies in fiction (and the Elucidated Brethren are rather sweet in their own twisted way), but in real life? What do secret societies do? Apart from hanging out in places to which nobody else has access??? It's all a bit cloak and dagger, and very odd indeed!

What shocked me was the rather noticeable contrast between Yale and New Haven: on the one hand, you have this very rich university; on the other, there is a rather poor town with an appallingly high number of what looked like homeless people. Very disturbing!

The conference itself, though, was fantastic. The RSVPers are a bunch of knowledgable and thoroughly nice people with great enthusiam for the Victorian Age in general and Victorian periodicals in particular. Not only did I learn an awful lot, but I also met people who had actually heard of Richard Doyle. There even was a paper on Doyle's father, John Doyle, the political caricaturist "H.B."! Not to mention the paper on needlework patterns!!! Attending this conference was a heady and thrilling experience and exactly as academia ought to be, but as it, alas, so often is not.

Lavender Sachet

2010-09-12T23:45:00.001+02:00

Who says practical things can't be pretty and smell good? ;) French lavender = bliss!

While I'm away, meet Sue Bonnet

2010-09-09T23:31:00.001+02:00

At the moment I'm in New Haven, CT to attend a conference on Victorian periodicals. My paper deals with Richard Doyle's illustrations for Punch. Like this one. Or this.

So while I'm away, I'm going to entertain you with some pictures of my recent redwork projects. Here's little Sue Bonnet and her duckie (this reminded me of the duckie in our backyard):

She was placed on top of a jar of homemade lemon curd:

Corduroy Wes

2010-09-07T23:00:00.004+02:00

This is Wes ...

Corduroy Wes.

Wes lives on one of the bookshelves in my mini-library. He likes to climb on boxes:

Here he is galumphing around the table:

Wes is one of the softies from Hilary Lang's brandnew book Wee Wonderfuls:

I've been reading Hilary's blog of the same title for several months now, and I couldn't WAIT for her book to be released. I'm happy to report that so far it did not disappoint. :)

I chose Wes as my first project from the book because A) he looked cute ...

... and B) because he consists of only six main pattern pieces (not including the ears) and it looked all very straightforward and easy.

Ha! Famous last words and all that! (If you've been following my blog for a while, you might remember the pin I sewed into my first quilt. Or what happened when I decided not to make my quilt back bigger than the front.)

This is my first softie consisting of more than two pattern pieces, which might explain why I had some trouble at first to figure out how Wes ought to be put together. There are pictures in the book, of course, but sometimes I'm a bit dense and therefore it took me some time to realise what the underbelly pieces were for. (Duh.) When the penny had finally dropped, it was indeed all very straightfoward.

HOWEVER ...

My cutting technique left something to be desired, and as a consequence I had some problems fitting the gusset(s) to the side pieces. To make matters worse, I ended up with two different-sized head pieces = not good. (Note to self: Tracing, cutting, you needz to improve itz!) Luckily, it's relatively easy to improvise when you sew softies. So I improvised, and I have to say I'm quite happy with the results. :)

Friendz Forevah!

And Even More Pics

2010-09-04T09:07:00.000+02:00

On Canada Day, I intended to visit one of the Harbor Front Festivals, but as it turned out, nearly all of Toronto had had the same idea, and me + crowds + heat = not goodz. So I decided to take the ferry to the islands -- not that this did me any good: What I had not realised was that the islands are basically a small-scale (and charmingly quaint) amusement park. Instead of nature, I encountered even more crowds. But after I had bought some candy and had done some brisk walking, I eventually found some spots where the crowds had thinned (yay!). As you can see from the pictures, it was a beautiful day with a lot of sunshine and a deep blue sky, and I immensely enjoyed walking along the lakeshore.

There were seagulls ...

And swan boats ...

And dreamy canals ...

And some kind of farm / mini-zoo thingie with loads and loads of peacocks ...

And lovely views ...

And even more lovely views ...

Indeed, there's even a small colony of people living on the islands in wonderfully old-fashioned houses (see the flag? It's Canada Day!) ...

But in the end, the crowds and the sunshine did get to me and I developed a monstrous headache. Stopping at one of the restaurants, drinking a bit pot of Earl Grey and eating a slice of cheesecake helped (pouring half of the tea into my lap didn't, though). Tea and sugar always helps! (Well, quite often anyway.)

The Name Is Bunny, Mr Bunny

2010-09-03T10:14:00.000+02:00

Take a cute pattern and a cuddly fabric, add some thread, pins (please notice my lovely tomato pin cushion which I got from my Mum!) and a sewing machine ...

... and you might end up with this:

Mr Bunny is one of the crafting projects I finished last week. He is a variation of Miss Chibi-Kitty and of this little bunny (I found the pattern here) -- only this time I used the sewing machine. I wasn't quite sure whether I would be able to do all the tight curves on the machine, but me and the Carina managed just fine.

For the bunny's body I used some of the leftovers from the fabric with which I filled my first quilt (LINK). It's very soft and so was perfect to make a present for a baby girl. I embroidered Mr Bunny's smiley face ...

... and also added the initial of the baby girl's first name in order to personalise the gift. I sure hope she and her parents will like Mr Bunny!

PS: Sorry if the colours in the photos come out weird on your computer. The 'puter that I normally use to work on photos has died (which is also partly the reason for my lengthy absence), so I have to use another and for some reason or other, I've got difficulties with the picture editing programme. Hmph.

Pictures from Toronto

2010-09-02T09:03:00.000+02:00

Here are a few more pictures I took in Toronto.

Before the G20 madness started and Downtown was closed off, I went to the Black Creek Pioneer Village, a lovely open air museum. I'm not really used to the amount of concrete that I encountered in Toronto, so visiting the museum became a rather enchanting mini-holiday.

Signs of Life

2010-09-01T22:53:00.003+02:00

Given my lengthy absence, I'm sure that you must have thought that I had either been devoured by a grizzly bear or mauled by a racoon. I'm happy to report that neither happened. Instead my mini-me netbook caught a virus while I was still in Toronto. Though I managed to get rid of said virus, nearly all programmes suffered (aka wouldn't work properly) and I simply couldn't risk to go online with the mini-me again when I still needed it to show films in class (which turned out to be a bit of a challenge because the mini-me's volume adjustment was one of the things that no longer worked ...).

So what did I do these past few weeks (apart from torturing a bunch of Canadian students, that is)? Obviously, I managed to survive the G20 and all encounters with Canadian wildlife (I only ever saw a grizzly bear bum -- and that was at the Toronto Zoo) and returned home safe and sound at the beginning of August (all my Canadian students survived their encounter with the German visiting professor, too!!!).

After only two days I was off to the IASPR conference in Brussels, where I found out that romance readers do indeed make better scholars. ;) For this was one of the best academic conferences I've ever attended: not only were most of the papers very good (and Pam Regis's keynote was utterly fantastic AND funny), but a spirit of community also permeated the conference. We chatted, we bounced ideas off each other, and we went to dinner together (and the food in Belgium? oooh, yum!!!). It was intense and absolutely lovely. An Goris, Sarah Frantz and Eric Selinger did an awesome job with organising this conference!

One thing I like so much about this new generation of romance scholars is that we're all (well, most of us, anyway) widely read in the genre. As a result, the discussions on our various subjects are very fruitful. And because most of us like reading romance and are fluent in "romance lingo", you can get some very strong reactions from your audience when you present a paper. A nice example for this was Sarah's paper on the history of the alpha male. You could feel several ripples going through the audience, for example when she mentioned the AAR polls and several all-time favourite books. And when she analysed one of the sex scenes in Loretta Chases "Lord of Scoundrels" (woohooo!) as an inverted bodice ripper scene (she's ripping his shirt), well, that was one of my favourite moments at this conference. We didn't exactly shout "woohooo!", but I tell you, it was a near thing. :)

Then back home I went to battle against monster dust bunnies in my flat and to catch up with grading. Now I'm busy doing some more research on Dicky Doyle for a conference paper I am to give at Yale University (v. cool, isn't it? obviously, I'm thrilled to pieces that I've been invited!) next week. Doing any kind of research on Punch magazine can be very disconcerting -- especially for the person sitting next to you in the library or standing next to you at the photocopying machine: you're bound to laugh out aloud at one point or another. (Oh gosh, more laughter in academia, how very shocking!)

As you can see, my summer has been very busy. All in all, the six weeks in Toronto were a great experience. As you might remember, I had been rather worried about the 72 hours of teaching, and so it was an enormous boost to my ego to find that I didn't have any difficulties at all with the teaching load. I also realised that since I started teaching in 2003 I have rather mellowed and am much more relaxed in the classroom now. Instead of stressing and freaking out when my students didn't manage to read all the texts, I managed to find a way to work around this. For the very first time I also fully realised that over the past few years I've gained a broad enough knowledge of British history and literature (especially of Victorian lit!) to improvise. The only thing I need to do is to improve my singing ... *ggg*

P.S.: For some reason or other ALL of the postcards I wrote while in Toronto apparently never made it to their destinations. They've all disappeared! Duh!

Things I've Learnt This Week

2010-07-06T19:27:00.003+02:00

It's entirely possible to spend an indecent amount of money on chocolate and feel guilty for only about one minute.
It's equally possible to spend an indecent amount of money on cake and feel very annoyed with yourself when it turns out that the cake isn't even very good.
Having a room on the 22nd floor has serious disadvantages. Especially when the elevators are not working....
Generally speaking it's not a very good idea to walk long distances in the heat when your are wearing a skirt. (Unless your legs are so skinny that your thighs don't touch, that is.) (Hint: I am not skinny at the moment.) (Though that might change if the elevators at the hotel are not working on a regular basis.)

Week 1: The Weekend of the G20 Summit

2010-07-03T03:04:00.007+02:00

As you know, last weekend the G20 took place in Toronto. In Downtown Toronto. With the western end of the security fence right next to my hotel. I kid you not.

Street view of the Fence during the week before the summit

As my room faces east, I had a clear, unobstructed view of The Fence down Wellington Street:

And a clear, unobstructed view of all the cops stationed at that part of The Fence:

Thus, through Saturday afternoon and evening (when I had finally managed to get back to the hotel), a mere look out of the window told me when it was time to switch on the TV (note that by then The Fence was closed):

When they started to close off all streets facing north, like this ...

... I got a bit (uh-hm) worried and started packing my rucksack, just in case the hotel had to be evacuated. I already saw myself wandering through the streets of Toronto at night, on the run from a mob of rioters. (Hey, I’m an author! And authors tend to have over-active imaginations. Sometimes this can be a bit of a disadvantage ...)

For me, what was most surprising about the whole weekend was how little Toronto as a whole was prepared for the violence that erupted. On Saturday one of the protest marches attracted a bunch of people whose sole intention was to wreck havock, and they trashed several shops (most of them on Queen Street) and torched four police cars (despite the presence of 19,000 cops in Downtown Toronto). When this happened the city was a in a state of shock (as well as in a state of complete lockdown; public transport in the downtown core came to a standstill), and from the news coverage you might have thought that the whole of Toronto was going up in flames.

Though numerous, protest marches in Toronto seem to be typically rather peaceful, and everybody expected the same for the G20 protests, which, I guess, was a bit naive. But then I live near a city which has seen its fair number of violent protests and in which water cannons roll down the streets whenever there is to be a protest that might get out of hand.

First Week in Toronto

2010-07-01T01:28:00.012+02:00

My first week in Toronto offered a lot of excitment: fire (possibly) (I'm pretty sure I smelt fire when I ran down the stairs in the hotel), an earthquake (a tiny little one), a severe thunderstorm (with flooding) and riots (more about that in the next post). And here are some of the things I discovered during Week 1:

Funny little creatures frolicking across the green, green grass

Old and new side by side:

Lovely pictures on buildings:

Beautiful decorations in a street full of pretty shops:

One large market hall, stuffed to the brim with people:

A birdie bath:

A church (which, strangely enough, doesn't smell like European churches - none of the churches in Toronto smells like a European church, not even the Catholic one!) (most disconcerting to walk into a church and to realise that it doesn't smell right)

A very nice shopping center (these are not real birds!) (but aren't they pretty?):

More nice houses:

REFLECTIONS!!!!! (I am quite taken with them):

More beautiful decorations (is that supposed to be a squirrel or a beaver?):

Oh, oh, look: reflections ahead!

But first: sunshiny prettiness:

And now the reflections:

Pretty houses:

Other pretty houses

Giant creepy-crawlies climbing about a house:

Gargoyles on the tower of the Town Hall:

Some TV trucks (picture taken especially for Matze):

And here's the sight from my window:

Safe & Sound in Toronto

2010-06-19T14:22:00.002+02:00

Robinson and I have safely arrived in Toronto. Robinson wanted to take the ship, but I told him he had such an appalling track record where sea voyages were concerned that I would never EVER go on board on a ship with him. Never mind that he knows all kinds of nifty things, like to survive on a desert island for years on end.

I mean, really, would YOU like to spend several years on a desert island, with no internet access, no Twitter, no Facebook, no Blogger, and worst of all: no amazon deliveries!

Getting through immigration at Toronto airport was surprisingly easy, and in no time at all I was in possession of a work permit. Cool!

After collecting my very large and very heavy suitcase, I took a cab into town - it felt a bit like going to an RWA conference hotel. :) Alas, there were no other romance writers in sight when I arrived at the hotel - too bad! Yet despite the lack of romance writers, the hotel is lovely, my room is gorgeous and very spacious (with a small kitchen, a dining area and a sitting area), and the staff is super-friendly.

Spent ages unpacking my suitcases. Realised I had forgotten all my skirts. Duh. So, skirt-shopping is the order of the day today!

After having found a place to store all my belongings, I went food shopping and nearly dropped dead when I saw the prices for food. $ 2.49 for a litre of milk!?!?!? What's up with that?!?!?! (I consoled myself that perhaps I had ended up in a very expensive grocery store...)

Bought something that looked and felt like a very large German Broetchen, was called "European bread" and was absolutely tasteless. Ah well. The blueberries more than made up for the roll desaster!

With the food shopping done, I went out again and walked towards Queen Street. Spotted a Chapters. The sight of all the lovely, lovely books lured me inside and I ended up spending an indecent amount of money on books and magazines. But how could I resist a book called "Jane Austen's Sewing Box"? Or "Jane Austen: An Illustrated Treasury"? Or "Old Houses of Toronto"?

Lugging several kilos of books, I walked back to the hotel, ate my tasteless roll, checked out the TV channels (hu?), before my body decided that it had had enough and now wanted sleep.

Off to bed - until the sounds of the fire alarm woke me up around 2 a.m. Via the loudspeakers we were informed that the alarm had gone off on the seventh floor and that we would be informed shortly about what was going on. I debated whether I should leave my room or not, but being on the 22nd floor and thus probably the last person who would be saved in the case of a roaring fire, I decided that I should better. Leave my room, that is. So I did and had the chance to admire big Canadian fire trucks. And fire fighters wearing their full gear.

The hotel did NOT burn down, though.

Lucky me.

Packing for Toronto, Part 5

2010-06-17T15:05:00.002+02:00

Started packing at ten this morning.

At around noon, I realised that I had chosen a suitcase that was much too small.

Fiddled with my cabin luggage.

Realised I had too much stuff to put into cabin luggage.

*head desk* *sob*

Fast reorganisation ensued aka I dragged one of our HUUUUUUGE suitcases down from the attic.

Put everything in the small suitcase back onto the bed. Kicked small suitcase. Then started packing all over again.

Finally: packing triumph at 3 p.m. Yay!

Packing for Toronto, Part 4

2010-06-17T00:28:00.001+02:00

12.30 a.m.

I'm giving up.

Packing for Toronto, Part 3

2010-06-16T22:56:00.002+02:00

HELP!!!!!!

It's 11 p.m. and the piles are still sitting on the bed, the suitcase is still in the attic, and I'm still not finished packing. *sob*

(See? I told you I would be reduced to tears before the end of the day!)

Packing for Toronto, Part 2

2010-06-16T18:12:00.003+02:00

How to uphold the morale when packing suitcases:

Call friends.
Download clips from Spooks 7 & 8
Download interviews with certain cast members of Spooks 7 & 8 (certain cast members who also had roles in Robin Hood and Strike Back)
Download certain CBeebies bedtime stories
Stuff yourself with cookies

Packing for Toronto Part 1

2010-06-16T15:36:00.002+02:00

On Friday I'll fly to Toronto, where I will teach a six-week, 72-hour seminar on "The Rise of the Novel" to a bunch of unfortunate students at York University. These past few days ... uhm ... weeks I've been a bit of a nervous wreck, whereas today I'm surprisingly calm and collected while packing my suitcase. But don't worry: packing my suitcase always reduces me to tears at the end of the day.

At the moment, I'm busy carrying clothes to our downstairs flat, where I spread them out in neat piles on the empty bed. Said piles are alarmingly large, and what's even more alarming, they've joined company with equally alarming amounts of tea, chocolates, shoes and VIBs (= very important books). And all of these I need to stuff into one suitcase.

Hmph.

Following the advice of my dear friend Kathleen Givens, I've put aside a change of underwear, socks and a nightshirt to be put into the cabin luggage in case my suitcase ends up in China.

Or Timbuktu.

Charming, Indeed!

2010-06-09T20:23:00.004+02:00

Didn't I tell you that the world is full of meanies? Here's another one: Susan Elizabeth Phillips. Not only does she have a name which I never know how to spell (Is it two Ls? Or two Ps? Or both???), no, she also writes books that you can't put down, like this one:

How mean is that?

Last night, after a long period of not reading or buying any e-books, I switched on my Cybook once again and browsed the titles I have stored on the reader. That's when I stumbled across NATURAL BORN CHARMER, which I hadn't read before. I just wanted to have a little peek inside the book. Read the first chapter perhaps, as a kind of Betthupferl (you know, that itty-bitty piece of chocolate that you eat just before you go to bed) (only this was a Betthupferl of the non-chocolate variety, of course). So, just an itty-bitty peek. No more.

Then I read this first sentence:

It wasn't every day a guy saw a headless beaver marching down the side of a road, not even in Dean Robillard's larger than life world.

Now that's mean, isn't it? Uber-mean, in fact. How can you start a novel like this? It's so not fair to your poor reader!

But that's not the worst! This is what follows:

"Son of a"" Dean slammed on the brakes of his brand new Aston Martin Vanquish and pulled over in front of her.

The beaver marched right past, her big flat tail bouncing in the gravel, and her small, sharp nose stuck up in the air. Way up. The beaver looked highly pissed.

She was definitely a girl beaver because her beaver head was missing, revealing sweaty, dark hair pulled into a scraggly ponytail.

See what I mean? Things like this should be forbidden. Not only is it highly unfair to other authors, who might turn green with envy while reading this novel, but it's also highly unfair to the poor reader who gets sucked into the story before she even knows what has hit her.

As you have probably guessed by now, I found NATURAL BORN CHARMER highly enjoyable. What's more, it reminded me why I love romance so very much. It reminded me that a good romance displays an optimistic attitude towards life and leaves the reader with a big, happy smile on her face. :)

Happy Anniversary!

2010-05-26T22:36:00.002+02:00

I've just realised that yesterday was my blog's 5th anniversary. Wow! Time flies, doesn't it? Back in May 2005 when I started blogging, I was working on CASTLE OF THE WOLF and poor Cissy had been stuck on a steamship on the Rhine for weeks on end, poor girl:

As to my writing life, I'm happily (or not so happily) working on my next novel, The-Book-after-the-First-Publication, which, people keep telling me, is the most difficult book to write. (So this certainly gives me something else to worry about!) The story is again a historical romance, set in 1827 (I needed steamships on the Rhine, and there weren't any before 1827). Cissy, my poor heroine, got stuck on that steamship on the Rhine for weeks on end because her author was having panic attacks and suffering from severe bouts of insecurity and self-doubt. In the end, I decided to go for the "patchwork approach" and depart from the linear way of writing. So, while she still hasn't reached that deuced castle in the Black Forest yet, she has at least had some fun in the bedroom! Yeah! *G*

I more or less sold this book (and BEWITCHED) during RWA 2006 when my editor walked up to my table during the big Literacy for Life signing and asked, "Have you talked to your agent?" -- "No." (Cautiously.) "Why?" -- "I made an offer for the books." For the rest of the conversation I was babbling nonsense and tried very much not to hyperventilate. Then Chris walked on and I sat down, still trying not to hyperventilate. My neighbour leaned toward me and whispered, "I know, he's really cute, isn't he?" *g* I think that was the point where I started to hyperventilate, after all. "That's not it!" I shouted. "I've just sold TWO MORE NOVELS!!!!!!"

One of the first persons I told the news was Kathleen Givens. She was such a dear friend, and I still miss her very much.

The Bunny Who Wanted to Be a Mouse

2010-05-24T22:28:00.006+02:00

When you write a novel, strange things happen sometimes. Like, you're planning this fantabulous gothic romance and then - bang! - in walks this female character with sturdy boots and proceeds to stomp all the gothicness to dust. (That's rather disconcerting, let me tell you.)

Sometimes characters talk to you. (If they actually call you, like, on the phone, you might want to consult a doctor, though. Just saying.)

Sometimes characters insist on being somebody else.

Did you know that exactly the same thing can happen when you do embroidery?

No?

You want proof?

Then let's have a look at a little bunny from that super-cute Japanese crafting magazine I got a few days ago:

This little bunny:

Do you see the cute little ears? And the cute little bunny tail? And now, may I draw your attention to this little bunny:

*cough*

Well, as you can plainly see, the little bunny didn't want to be a bunny. It wanted to be a mouse. I made two attempts to rectify the situation, but it still looked like a mouse. So I finally decided to go with the flow and let the bunny be a mouse.

The bunny was happy.

I was happy.

And I hope the recipient of this little bag will also be very happy.

Here's the inside. I lined the bag with a very smooth, satiny cotton:

Do you remember the fabric? I also used it for my very first sewing project last year. :)

Bloggers' Quilt Festival Spring 2010: My Very First Quilt

2010-05-23T18:59:00.005+02:00

Once again Amy from Amy's Creative Side is hosting a Bloggers' Quilt Festival. And this time, I even have a quilt I can enter (woohoo!). Granted, it's not the craftiest of quilts and the quilting is a bit of a laugh (it's of the let's-see-whether-we-can-feed-this-through-the-sewing-machine-oh-look-I-can-quilt-a-straight-line! variety), BUT it was sewn with much love (and that is what counts, isn't it?).

I sewed "Rebecca's Quilt" for the baby daughter of a very good friend of mine. Rebecca loves animals and so the fabrics of Moda's "Love U" line were perfect for her quilt. This is the front:

And the back:

And the cute label that was included in the Love U ABC panel:

This was the very first quilt I finished (so far, it's also the only quilt I've ever finished - I do hope I'll have some more time for sewing later this year) (in autumn, perhaps), and sewing process was full of "yay, I can do this!" discoveries. As can be expected, there were also a number of ooops moments as when I sewed a flower-head pin into the quilt ....

(See how neatly the flowerhead has been attached to the back of the quilt?)

... or when I realised after the quilting was done why the back and the batting should always be a bit larger than the front.

Ooops, indeed. But hey, all you need to do in such a case is to adjust the size of the binding. ;)

Despite all the quilt's minor (or major, depending on your POV) flaws, I am very happy with the finished result. And more importantly, Rebecca is, too.

And now please head over to Amy's and have a look at all the other wonderful entries!

More Mean People :)

2010-05-18T15:46:00.005+02:00

After I turned into a crafting-loving person, it was only a matter of time until I would stumble across Japanese craft books. They're so mean, the Japanese. Really, really mean. They produce craft books filled with such cuteness it hurtz. Huuuuuuuurtz!

You don't believe me?

Then have a look at the following pictures. This is an embroidery magazine called Stitch Idées:

I ordered vol. 11 a few weeks ago on ebay and it arrived yesterday. As if the projects depicted on the cover weren't already cute enough, these are the kind of projects you can find inside:

Embroidered bunny stamps!!!!

After this terrible cuteness-attack, I was forced to order the following today:

Fairy tales! Of course I have to have an embroidery book featuring fairy-tale projects! I'm a folk lit scholar, after all!

A peek at the inside cuteness:

And here is an edition filled with spring projects:

And then there's the stylish birdie issue:

So now, I only need a bit of time. :)

Mean Authors

2010-05-09T11:55:00.004+02:00

Some authors are incredibly mean. Really, really, really mean.

Take Lisa Kleypas. Boy, is she mean! Not only did she distract me from reading those medieval romances (btw, did you know that when you are a royal baby in disguise, you glow in the dark? Really! That's what I learnt from reading medieval romances this week! *g*) by producing books like this:

No, she then also made me buy those:

And if that weren't enough, I was also forced to buy all the Lisa Kleypas books which I have already read in digital format as dead-tree books. Just because they're so good. If that isn't mean, I don't know what is. :)

Still There, Still Busy

2010-05-07T16:05:00.003+02:00

I'm a bad, bad blogger these days. That's because I'm trying to be a good, good teacher and visiting professor: we're in the middle of our summer term here in Mainz and I'm currently preparing a course for the summer school at York University in Toronto, where I'll be teaching "The Rise of the Novel" from 21 June to 30 July this year. 4 days a week, 3 hours a day. That's 72 hours all in all. *gulp* This will be the most intense course I've ever taught (she said in slightly worried tones).

In addition, I also have to prepare my presentation for the IASPR conference in Brussels as well as a presentation as part of my application for an assistant professorship (no tenure track, alas) at Mainz University.

What's more, last week I had two moles cut out of my arm and leg, and next week my dentist will be busy filling two holes in my teeth.

In other words, these days there's little chance that I'll ever get bored. But I guess being busy is better than having fallen off the edges of the earth. :)

Goodies

2010-04-04T12:24:00.004+02:00

You can probably tell that I'm going to teach a class on drama and (most likely) a class on the 18th- and 19th-century novel this summer. :)

I iz still alive!

2010-04-03T19:46:00.004+02:00

As you could probably tell from my prolonged absence, the past weeks have been pretty busy for me. This summer I will go to Toronto and will spent six weeks as a visiting professor at York U, and there are still oodles of things to organise. In addition, I was in correction hell for a week or two and realised once again that I apparently speak Chinese in class. Without noticing! That's how good my Chinese is! And on top of that, the Kitteh has been the cause for several sleepless nights. First she refused to eat her regular kitteh food; then she refused to eat fullstop; then we did a blood test to find out what is wrong with her (thyroid hyperfunction); and then, after she was seriously sick, she was diagnosed with giardia. That's right, the same wee beasties that eventually killed Lady and were the beginning of the end for my lovely Jago. To say that I was devastated is putting it mildly. :-/ At the moment, though, she's holding up, even if she has lost a lot of weight (but then she was seriously fat to begin with).

To distract myself, I've been buying books.

And fabric.

And books.

And more fabric.

And a large sewing box.

Isn't it pretty?

I also got a nice recording of Bernstein's "Candide" (with Loriot as the narrator!!!). Unfortunately, the rather fantastic DVD "Leonard Bernstein's Candide (Live at Lincoln Center)" is only available in the Region 1 format. AAAAAAAAARGH!!!! Not fair!! Because look at it, look at it, it's simply brilliant:

Button Love & WIP

2010-03-13T18:40:00.004+01:00

O, the things you do to keep yourself from grading papers! I, for example, are in the process to succumbing to red hot button-lust. Aren't these darlings pretty?

I've already got these - I love the slight retro touch. They would look lovely on a pastel pink Sencha blouse.

But these are very cute, too:

And these:

And these, too:

Apart from succumbing to button-lust, I'm also smooching with the Muse again these days. (Yay! She's back!!!!). And I'm happy to report that I've got names for my hero (George Augustus Frederick Griffin) and heroine (Carlotta Staunton, short Charlie), for her best friend (Emma-Louise, short Emma-Lee) and that I've finished the first chapter this morning. :)

O What a Circus!

2010-03-12T23:26:00.004+01:00

Got those today. Ain't they pretty? And I've bought enough fabric for two quilts! :)

In other news: My heroine has now got a gun in her carpet bag. O the things you pick up on the journey from Edinburgh to London!

And more: Yesterday I blogged about the Pre-Raphaelites on Unusual Historicals.

My Very First Clothing Project

2010-03-08T13:28:00.003+01:00

Here's one of my sewing WIPs - my very first garment project, to be exact. It's the Sencha blouse by Colette Patterns.

The blue cotton/poly blend was on sale at Karstadt (for just 1,50 € per metre!!!!), so it doesn't really matter whether I mess up with my first blouse or not. (Though it would be nice if I wouldn't mess up, of course!) The fabric is very smooth and has a beautiful drape. Unfortunately, the colour makes the result look like an ER shirt. *sigh*

I'll try to save it by sewing a round of decorative stitches around the neck and the sleeve hems.

Apart from the small matter of the colour, I'm rather satisfied with how this blouse is coming along - by now all the darts as well as the shoulder and side seams are sewn, thus I could already try it on, and it seems to fit. Hooray!

The Muse Talketh through the Alpha Smart

2010-03-07T21:18:00.003+01:00

And it happened here:

All the necessities for smooching with the Muse in one little corner: comfy chair, Alpha Smart, cup of tea, research books! :)

This is the beginning (you might remember this bit from last year) (please ignore mirror image of top of my head after a writing session - I do terrible things to my hair when smooching with the Muse!):

Here we meet the hero for the very first time:

And here you can see the influence of the Manchester conference on the cultural production of disability which attended in January:

The hero's dilemma (or, let's say, the reason for his dilemma):

More smooching sessions to follow soon!

My new shoes

2010-03-05T22:35:00.004+01:00

They're red. With a retro-touch. And very comfortable. And did I mention that they are red? I love them to pieces! Now I'm all ready and eager for spring to arrive. (Do you hear me, St. Peter? No more of that white stuff!)

After I had bought the shoes I went and got some lovely dark denim to sew a dress for the shoes. If the sewing doesn't work out, Plan B is to steal Amanda's adorable denim dress.

How to ruin your hero's day (no branding involved this time!)

2010-03-04T19:46:00.003+01:00

Let him wake up with a hangover ...
... in an uncomfortable chair
... with an unpleasant interview ahead of him.
Let him almost be run over by a heavy, horse-drawn cart.
Put him into uncomfortable clothes ...
... and make him wear uncomfortable shoes.
Give him a family who hates him.
Lay massive guilt on him.
Make somebody force him to marry ...
... and to relocate ...
.... and to give up his beloved flat in the heart of London.

Considering what my other heroes had to go through (imprisonment, branding, almost-castration, leg whacked off ...), this one is actually quite lucky. :)

Kitteh lends a helping hand ... eh ... paw

2010-03-01T19:07:00.004+01:00

Here I sit, helping my human with the course schedule for her grad seminar in Toronto.

See? I do all the hard work, while she just stands there and takes pictures.

I do.

I do.

If it hadn't been for me, my human would have never finished that schedule!

My very first quilt

2010-02-28T21:42:00.003+01:00

This weekend I finally finished my very first quilt - just in time to give it to my friends' toddler daughter when I went to them for dinner on Saturday. The quilt was a big hit - hey, there are birds and butterflies, what's not to like? :)

And here it is, freshly sprung from the sewing machine after quilting:

All nicely cut and laid out on the floor of the mini-library. Front looks good, but ...

... the back, oh the back. Why have I bought umpteen quilting books when I don't properly read the instructions? The batting and the back should always be cut somewhat larger than the front before you start quilting. And here's why:

But don't worry, if you choose a relatively large binding, nobody will notice that you've messed up with the back of the quilt! :)

And here's the completely finished quilt with binding:

And the back:

And the cute label that was included in the Love U ABC panel:

And what do you do with the selvage? You keep it and use it as a ribbon around the folded quilt.

Duck in the Snow

2010-02-22T13:45:00.001+01:00

Friedo was here. :)

How to secure a pin

2010-02-21T20:34:00.004+01:00

When you prepare a quilt sandwich for quilting, it's really important that you make sure that the pins don't shift around. The best way to secure a pin and keep it from shifting? Sew it onto the quilt, of course!

Like this:

See how neatly the flowerhead has been sewn onto the quilt? That's how it's done, people!

Not.

But hey, that's my first quilt sandwich, so a few accidents are to be expected.

Isn't the fabric adorable? It's Love U by Deb Strain for Moda. And that's only the backside. Wait until you see the front (= Blue Sky panel + Rosy Red Flowers & Butterflies)!

Sunshiny Birthday Bag, or, How to Celebrate the End of the Winter Term

2010-02-18T17:36:00.006+01:00

The winter term ended last Friday with the graduation ceremony. I served as the entertainment program, or rather, my speech on "Doctor Hat & Featherboa" was the entertainment program. I talked about being a university lecturer and romance author, and about doing research for historical romances. The lecture hall the graduation ceremony was held in had been outfitted with new technical stuff, and as a result the pictures I showed the audience during my talk (like the pic of the pineapple folly below - isn't that folly just wonderfully absurd?) were ginormously big and looked simply awesome. So all in all, it was a very successful afternoon. :)

To celebrate the end of the term, I spent Saturday smooching with my sewing machine and put together this sunshiny birthday bag as a present for a friend, who gave a party on Sunday. (All right, I admit it: I hadn't expected that it would take me the whole day to sew this rather simple little bag. But it did and it was great fun all the same.)

I learnt lots of new things when sewing this bag - not just how to sew a bag! I learnt how to make button loops ...

... how to make yo-yos ...

... how to sew letters and keep the fabric from puckering ...

... how to use one of the decorative stitches of my machine in order to create an edge with lots of little curves ...

... how to make fabric-covered buttons.

And as you can see, the Kitteh was eager to help.

I love how the yellow lining looks against the dark denim.

And here's the finished birthday bag, filled with goodies from Britain:

Twinings' vanilla tea and Whittard's Hot White Chocolate. Yum.

Duck Tales and Other Things

2010-01-30T09:35:00.006+01:00

Despite what you might have heard, I have neither fallen off the edges of the earth, nor been abducted by horribly slimy aliens, nor got lost in the snowy north of England. No. I've been hibernating. In a manner of speaking, that is. Not really, you know, because, obviously, I'm not a brown bear. :) I've been hibernating in regard to my online presence, which has done me loads of good. It's so nice to watch the latest scandals and flame wars from the distance - or rather, not at all. I've found that I have no patience anymore for all these online quarrels.

So instead, I dipped into the world of computer games (love, love, LOVE Geheimakte Tunguska!), started handpiercing the itty-bitty fabric samples from my Moda Bake Shop Sampler, admired the handmade clothes of other people, lusted after lovely patterns and heavenly notions, and finally took advantage of the current sale at Vogue patterns. Furthermore, as you can see, I've given my blog a little facelift - I hope you like the new design! Though be prepared: Now that I know that changing the skin of your blog is not rocket sience, I might start fiddling with the design again at any time. I'm like that. :)

Now as to the Duck Tales - do you still remember this little family:

And these adventurous little guys:

Then you might also remember that one of the little ducklings broke its wing at one point during the family's extended stay on our fishpond. The poor little guy - well, at that point, we still thought he was a little miss - wasn't able to fly away with his siblings and so he stayed behind on the pond. After a short, overnight stay at the bird clinic in Ludwigshafen (no, there's no possibility to set the wing), he returned to us for good and now lives happily on our pond, munching fish food. As his true sex became more and more obvious, he also got a new name: he's now Friedolin (instead of Frieda).

In winter, our pond is always covered by umpteen-hundred plastic balls for isolation, with just a bit of the water left uncovered for feeding the fish. This bit is considerably larger this winter to accomodate a duck, but as you can see in the following pictures, Friedolin is not adverse to going swimming among the balls either:

Stay tuned for further adventures of Friedolin the duck.

Falalala

2009-12-22T22:16:00.005+01:00

Okay ... *rubbing my hands* I'm ready to have some fun again in Regency England. But I can't decide which book to write next. ("Argh! Argh! Argh!" she cried and ran around in circles, pulling her hair.) I'm in the mood to do something lighthearted (so no dark & gloomy paranormals for the time being), and I've got a choice of two stories: one is a straight historical (well, as straight as my historicals turn out to be, which isn't too straight after all *g*) (you might have already read the beginning here), the other a time travel (with a hero who looks like Richard Armitage and a heroine who steals something from a museum) (at first I thought she would steal something from the V&A, then I decided I'd use the Pitt Rivers in Oxford after all - it's so much stranger than the V&A!).

One heroine is still nameless, the other is called Gilly (short for Gillian, of course) (or perhaps for Gillianna?) and her hero is Richard *nudge nudge wink wink* Shirley, whose estate is called Brooksby Wirce. I haven't decided yet whether to make him an earl or not (isn't it nice to be able to decide things like that?). The other hero has an aunt who has travelled through exotic lands and wears big hats.

Hmmm .....

In My Library

2009-12-20T08:32:00.003+01:00

In middle school I drew a picture of bookshelves peopled by fantastic creatures lurking between the books, chatting among each other, climbing from shelf to shelf. Clearly, these creatures had just climbed out of the books and were now busy discovering the world outside.

The concept of little people living on my bookshelves has always held a great fascination for me, and it is one that I've always put into practice when it came to decorating my shelves. So here are some of the Little People whom you can meet in my library.

Two curvy little madams ...

... who are currently admiring the TBR piles on my piano.

Pile 1:

Pile 2:

On the other side of the room, this kitty (a gift from my parents) lives among my Mills & Boon Modern Romances (between Sharon Kendrick and Sarah Craven, to be exact):

The shelf below is reserved for Totoro, who was a gift from a reader:

Another kitty, a gift from Teresa, sits on another shelf, guarding Teresa's books:

On the shelf above you can find this happy little miss:

A rather fat kitty sits in the fantasy section:

As do this sheep (which I bought on the Aran Islands) and the clay elephant (a gift from an honorary aunt).

What about your bookshelves? Have you got Little People living among your books, too?

More Pictshoores

2009-12-19T13:02:00.002+01:00

This was another gift from my colleagues: while I was being examined as to my PhD-worthiness, they installed a new door plate:

And here's the box with the toy theatre I brought to uni for the exam (on the right, you can just see the last three of the six Champions of Christendom):

The Remains of the Day ... eh ... the party:

Horse Day!

2009-12-17T20:48:00.006+01:00

May I present: Dr. des. Schwab (which basically means that you may call me Dr. Schwab, but I can't call myself Dr. yet):

(The robe is an old, moth-bitten one that one of my colleagues brought home from St. Andrew's; now all new doctors of our section have to wear it for the big procession through the humanities building to the big bronze horse in front of said building. The hat is a gift from my colleagues.)

Oh lookz, zere R dragonz on ze hat!

More dragonz (another gift):

(Can you tell I felt much loved yesterday afternoon?)

'Tis me, climbing onto the aforementioned horsie:

Sitting on the horsie while St. Peter threw snowflakes at us.

Group picture with horsie (I look a bit like St. Martin, don't I?).

And that was that. I still can't quite believe that it's all over now. No more Horribelz Dragonz to slay. No more headless chicken runs. How will I stand it?!?!?!

'Tis the Day

2009-12-16T09:54:00.002+01:00

... the day to slay the dragons once and for all! :) Please keep your fingers crossed for me this afternoon, 3 p.m. Berlin time or 9 a.m. EST. If you live near Mainz, come and see me fall off the horse in front of the Humanities building just in time for five o'clock tea.

And then please send me some good vibes that I'll conquer the mess in my flat and vanquish the dust wombats:

books in the library-cum-music-room:

pile of books and papers with a desk buried underneath:

things to look forward to in the exam: Beowulf, Thackeray, pantomime, the seven deadly sins:

And this evening I'll finally be free!

The Countdown has started

2009-12-14T00:02:00.002+01:00

Three days until the dratted exam.

Need lots of Richard-Armitage clips to keep me calm and prevent me from performing the headless chicken run. Scheme not always altogether successful.

Want, want, want, want!!!!

2009-11-29T22:56:00.002+01:00

For a baby quilt. The line includes different panels, either depicting tree surrounded by ABC tiles or only ABC tiles. Very pretty. And isn't that little owl adorable? So far, my favourite fabric store only has the layer cake and the jelly roll. I hope the rest of the line arrives soon!!!

In other news: I want to crawl into a hole and never come out.

Proof!!!

2009-11-28T15:40:00.002+01:00

Here's the irrefutable proof that I am indeed turning into a chicken:

You might say, "But you've still got your head." Which is true, of course. You can clearly see it on the picture: I've still got my head. BUT -- for how much longer? I ask you. By now it can only be a matter of days, perhaps hours even, before it's going to fall off!

Academic Tablescaping

2009-11-27T19:17:00.002+01:00

Essentials:

1 cup of tea
1 primary text
1 sheet of paper for mindmapping
1 table

The Result:

I spent the afternoon planning my paper for the Manchester conference (for some reason, they want the papers well in advance) (no finishing the paper on the evening before the day you're going to present it for this conference - drat!). As you can just about see, my mindmap looks ... eh ... interesting - I hope I'll still be able to read my own handwriting tomorrow morning!

In case you're wondering: the topic of my paper is "'It is only with one's heart that one can see clearly': The Loss of Sight in Teresa Medeiros's The Bride and the Beast and Yours Until Dawn".

My Favourite Soup: Kallaloo

2009-11-23T22:39:00.004+01:00

Three weeks from the day after tomorrow I'll have my final oral exam. If I pass it, you can then call me Dr. Schwab (I won't be able to call myself Dr. Schwab yet as I'll have to find a publisher for the Dratted Diss first). But in the time until then I'll probably enter Lala-Land again and keep running around like a headless chicken, shouting "Waaaaargh! Waaaaaargh! Waaaaaaargh!" (Not an easy feat, given that the chicken is headless!) As this might be my last sensible post in a while, I'd like to share the recipe for my favourite soup with you. It's yummy and will keep you warm on cold autumn evenings. :)

Take 400g pumpkin, cut into squares, put into a large pot, add three potatoes, also cut into squares, then add some water and cook until pumpkin and potatoes are tender.

Take that thingie-dings with which you can stomp and mash potatoes. Stomp pumpkin and potatoes (or simply purée them), add vegetable stock, finely diced ginger. Mince 500g of spinach (or simply take a large package of Rahmspinat *g*), then add to soup. Add 200 ml of coconut milk, salt and pepper (and some chili, if you like - me, I don't like).

Heat and admire the marvellous greenish colour. And when the soup is all nice and hot, it's ready to be enjoyed.

I got the recipe from a friend (hello, Matze!), and the pumpkin that was cooked in these pictures had grown in the garden of another friend (hello, Anna!). The pot and the kitchen are all mine, though. :)

Tablescaping with Books & Kitteh

2009-11-22T14:14:00.005+01:00

You will need:

one pile of books

one kitteh.

Artfully arrange both on the dining table. Like this:

Try different angles.

With kitteh looking left ...

... looking right ...

... looking embarrassed.

(Do we have to continue with this? asks the kitteh. I feel a little bit stupid. - Yes, I say. - Ah, well, says the kitteh.)

Hmm.

Hmmmmmmm.

Hmmmm hmmmm hmmmmmmmmmmm

Hmm - ooops!

Sew & Tell Friday ... er ... on Saturday

2009-11-21T17:59:00.004+01:00

or, On the Search for the Religiously Neutral Christmas Present :)

Take: One of the patterns from Gail Pan's lovely A Christmas Wish BOM.

Trace, stitch, cut out, add a backing and a nice ribbon, stitch together, turn, stuff - finished!

Nice, easy, oh-so-fast, and the result is just lovely. Instead of the normal cotton stuffing, you could also use some dried lavendar and thus transform your pendant into a moth repellant. :)

~*~~*~~*~

Sew & Tell is organised by Amy. Click on the button to see what kind of projects other people finished this week!

Remembering my Sweetie

2009-11-14T17:53:00.003+01:00

One year ago we had to say goodbye to Jago. I still miss him so very much.

Temptation, Temptation, Temptation

2009-11-13T21:51:00.006+01:00

I haven't even finished my first quilt yet, but I'm already thinking about the second ... and third ... and fourth ... And it's all the fault of the Fatquarter Shop and their fiendish newsletter which leads me oh-so-much into temptation every single time I find it in my inbox. (Poor little me!)

But how to choose? Not just which pattern (I'm thinking about trying out some sort of scrappy log cabin), but, more importantly, which fabrics? Here's a selection of my favourites. What do you think? Any favourites?

Rouenneries is, hands down, my current favourite. The prints have been inspired by old French fabrics - don't they look wonderfully elegant, but in a somewhat faded, shabby way?

~*~

And here's Nostalgia. Aaaaah, Nostalgia. Makes you think of an English garden, doesn't it? To strengthen the impression of a garden, one could always go with the greens only. Like this:

~*~

Or perhaps another Glacé quilt? (Minus the blue again. I don't think it really fits with all the other colours.)

~*~

Blessings is more earthy and looks as if it would keep you nicely warm in winter. :)

~*~

Aster Manor - very feminine.

~*~

Alliance - another collection in more earthy tones.

~*~

And now some collections which would make fantabulous coin quilts (small stacks of colour against a solid - quite often white - background):

Thoughts? Ideas?

Preparing for Winter

2009-11-11T16:40:00.003+01:00

Each month the arrival of the credit card statement tells me that I'm spending too much money on books. It could be worse, I guess. Like other women, I could have a serious passion for shoes. Or bags and purses. Or jewellery. Books are relatively cheap by comparison (welllllll, if you love buying rare 19th-century editions of the Brothers Grimm's fairy tales, you might find that books can be horrendously expensive, too!).

So the piles on the top of my piano continue to grow and make me smile with satisfaction whenever I enter my little library-cum-music-room. (The Kitteh is less satisfied, I'm afraid, since the piles tend to be in her way when she climbs about on the piano and the lower bookshelves.) The sight of books has always filled me with warm, fuzzy feelings and thoughts of happily snuggled up on the couch with a cup of tea and a nice book (and a Kitteh).

Of course, at the moment I don't really have time to actually read all these new books thanks to the Dratted Exam that will hit me over the head in three or four weeks' time (*gasp* so soon??? Waaaargh!). So for now I regard those lovely piles as my winter hoard to be enjoyed over Christmas and in the new year. :)

Which reminds me of this lovely story:

Not that I would ever need an excuse to drool over the lovely Mr. Armitage. :)

Good Bed-Fellows

2009-11-08T14:06:00.007+01:00

In one of the last chapters of Susan Hill's Howards End Is on the Landing, titled "Bad Bed-Fellows", you find the following passage:

A child's nursery rhyme books does not have the language in which to speak to a Latin dictionary. Chaucer does not know the words in which Henry James communicates but here they are forced to live together, forever speechless. [...] Does Elizabeth Bowen find Swift congenial company? Ah yes, surely, they were both Irish, they have a lot in common. I should like to sit here on the landing in the last glimmer of daylight and listen to them whispering together. [...] Can books learn from one another? Can they change as a result of sitting on a shelf beside another for years?

What an intriguing thought, isn't it? To test the idea I'd want to sandwich Anne Bronte's (please imagine those two dots over the e; I've no idea how to insert an e with dots here in Blogger) The Tenant of Wildfell Hall between Elizabeth Taylor's At Mrs. Lippincote's and Frances Hodgson Burnett's The Making of a Marchioness. One hopes that this would improve Bronte's angelic heroine (hey-ho, I run away from my husband because he's a beastly sadist, but when he's about to kick the bucket I'm going to return to mop his brow and make sure he doesn't kick the bucket after all *head desk*) and that, upon opening The Tenant the next time, one would find that Helen has bashed in her beastly husband's skull with the chamber pot.

Not that Burnett's heroine isn't any less angelic - in fact, she's a much better person than Helen: always smiling, always being grateful to other people, always happy to run errands for others. No, in The Making of a Marchioness you have to turn to the secondary female characters to get women with some more bite (and, eventually, one dead beastly husband).

Reading both At Mrs. Lippincote's and The Making of a Marchioness has finally convinced me (if I needed any convincing at all!) to teach a course on women writers of the early 20th century. Next winter, perhaps?

~~*~~*~~*~~*~~*~~*~~*~~*~~

The picture was taken inside Barter Books in Alnwick, a gigantic UBS inside an old railway station. I could have spent hours inside there (instead I went to see Alnwick Castle and then travelled on to Berwick-upon-Tweed - that latter point definitely not one of my finer ideas)

Sew & Tell Friday: The Little Red Bag

2009-11-06T17:31:00.004+01:00

Remember the little blue bag, my very first sewing project? This week I finished a little red bag (one of two):

Take a few stripes from a Moda honey bun (I used Aster Manor), sew them together.

Choose lining fabric, layer with batting, sew, turn right side out, hand-stitch opening closed - and voilà:

Quilt in the ditch (aka along the seams of the honey bun stripes) with nylon thread, fold, hand-stitch sides closed and as easy as that the itty-bitty bag is finished:

This is what the inside looks like.

It's just perfect for small gifts like a CD or some bags of tea or a nice card with a gift certificate. And don't you just love those reds?

~~*~~*~~*~~*~~

Sew & Tell is organised by Amy. Click on the button to see what kind of projects other people finished this week!

Edited to add: I cut the jelly roll / honey bun stripes in half before sewing them together!

Post Without Words: Piano Stairs

2009-11-05T17:42:00.002+01:00

The Sexist Reader

2009-11-04T16:29:00.003+01:00

I freely admit it: I'm a sexist reader. With a few exceptions (Michael Ende, Terry Pratchett, James Patterson's romances), my pleasure reading consists of books written by women. Granted, my favourite novella ever is Ludwig Tieck's "Der blonde Eckbert", I love Tennyson's "Lady of Shalott" and E.T.A. Hoffmann's stories are always charming, but for real flop-onto-the-couch-drink-cup-of-tea-cuddle-cat pleasure reading I inevitably turn to women writers.

In former years this was done entirely unconciously - first there were Enid Blyton, Auguste Lechner, Rosemary Sutcliff, Helen Cresswell, Joan Aiken, Tamora Pearce, and Susan Cooper; then Anne Rice, Anne McCaffrey, Marion Zimmer Bradley (of course!), Mercedes Lackey, Jennifer Roberson, Dorothy Gilman, and Victoria Holt; eventually Diana Gabaldon, Susanna Kearsley, and Dorothy Dunnett; and then I discovered the world of romance fiction.

By now, though, it is a conscious decision. I know I prefer the way women tell stories to the way men go about the business. Women's stories are much more relevant to my experiences and to how I see the world than men's.

A few weeks ago I read Joanna Russ's How to Suppress Women's Literature, and it made me feel sick and angry all at once because the same mechanisms she describes in that study are still at work today. And so, I decided to act. Inspired by Jane Brocket's The Gentle Art of Domesticity, I'm now collecting books by forgotten women writers which I intend to read once the Dratted PhD Exam Thingie (DPHET) is over and done with.

Among the authors on my list are:

Nancy Mitford

Elizabeth Taylor (not the movie star!)

Jan Struther

Dorothy Whipple

Marghanita Laski

Winifred Watson

Julia Strachey

Barbara Euphan Todd

In addition, I'm thinking of offering a course on "Lost Voices: Forgotten Women Writers" next winter.

And now let's all say WHEEEEEEE!!!!

2009-11-03T20:15:00.004+01:00

Richard Armitage is going to read another Heyer novel, namely Venetia. Here's the blurb from amazon:

In all her twenty-five years, lovely Venetia Lanyon has never been further than Harrogate, nor enjoyed the attentions of any but her two wearisomely persistent suitors. Then, in one extraordinary encounter, she meets a neighbour she only knows by reputation - the infamous Lord Damerel - and before she knows better, is egging on a libertine whose way of life has scandalised the North Riding for years.

Yay! :)

Treasure Box

2009-11-01T15:08:00.003+01:00

The buttons from Miss Sock Kitteh came from this old sewing box:

My Mom found it in a thrift store a few days ago and bought it for me (for 5 €!!!). It turned out to be a veritable treasure box, filled with old thread, buttons, little hooks, bits of wool, needles, more buttons, cut-off bra straps, elastic, ribbons, and miles and miles of pinkish embroidery thread of the expensive kind. (Which I used for the lazy daisy on Miss Kitteh's belly.)

Needless to say that I was thrilled when my Mom brought the box home. :)

Sew & Tell: The Sock Kitteh

2009-10-30T23:44:00.004+01:00

Earlier today, the kitteh still didn't have any arms or ears. (Poor kitteh!)

But hey! Look, there's an ear!

-- "Hello, other kitteh! Could I borrow your ears?"

-- "Uh ... hm ... let me think about it ..."

-- "Have you thought about it?"

-- "Yes."

-- "And? Will you lend me you ears?"

-- "No."

Despite this lamentable lack of support and cooperation, the sock kitteh finally got her ears and arms (made from yet another sock) this evening.

Happy kitteh sitting in front of a pile of new books which I got this week:

The inspiration for the kitteh came from this book (also brandnew):

SOCK AND GLOVE by Miyako Kanamori.

The sock kitteh then made friends with the other kitteh.

"Yes, indeed. We R friend 4evah!"

The End

~~*~~*~~*~~*~~

Sew & Tell is organised by Amy Lou. Click on the picture above to jump to her blog & the Sew & Tell party. :)

Saturday / Sunday Tablescape

2009-10-25T19:22:00.003+01:00

Saturday, 2 p.m.

Saturday, 3 p.m.

Sunday, 3 a.m.

My brunches tend to last 16 hours, my tea parties mere 12 hours. :)

Still Re-Reading N&S

2009-10-17T17:27:00.003+02:00

Yup, I'm still at N&S (and am quietly freaking out about that final oral exam *sob*) (No, I'm not exaggerating: I'm already having nightmares about the stupid thing! As in, I'm in the exam and they're asking me questions for which I'm totally unprepared. Or questions about books I haven't read. Like Dickens. (I'm not a huge Dickens fan; I've read Oliver Twist ages ago + Mystery of Edwin Drood + beginning of Pickwick Papers + that's about all I remember.) Or questions about those big, fat 18th-century novels, which I haven't really read either. In other words: they're going to find out that I'm a fraud. *sob sob sob*)

Okay, so I'm still reading N&S (and lusting after Mr. Thornton) (especially when I think of Richard Armitage as Mr. Thornton!!! Yum!). You can, of course, read the novel as a romance, and if you do, the dynamics in the relationship of Margaret and Thornton make so much more sense. In many ways, the relationship resembles that in Pride & Prejudice: At the beginning, the hero is attracted to the heroine (against his better judgment), while she thinks he is some kind of lower life form that has crawled out from beneath a stone. Consequently, his first proposal comes as a shock for her and she rejects him (and takes the chance to tell him exactly what she thinks of him). Yet almost immediately afterwards, our heroine begins to wonder whether she has misjudged the poor hero (who's broken-hearted; poor thing). Despite her rejection, he still cares for her, and when she / her family / her idiotic siblings run into trouble, he tries to help her. She realises that she has utterly, utterly, UTTERLY misjudged the poor man and herself (for she's actually quite in love with the hunky hero), but she assumes that her hunky man now detests her and thinks she is the lowest of the lowest and will never ever speak to her again. But he does! (yay!) And proposes again!!! And they lived happily ever after. :)

But Margaret & Thornton's story also reminded me of Loretta Chase's Lord of Scoundrels. As with Jessica and Dain, sparks fly whenever M. & Mr. T. meet. They've got these very intense discussions, arguments even, but Thornton simply can't stay away and always comes back for more :)

*happy sigh*

Sewing Soothes the Soul

2009-10-15T09:43:00.004+02:00

Yesterday was a day full of worries and general panicking, which made it rather difficult to properly concentrate on my work (the yummy Mr. Thornton notwithstanding). So during my lunch break I took out my sewing machine and started on another pouch, this one in deep burgundy reds from the Aster Manor line by Three Sisters.

I'm happy to report that it no longer takes me 10,000 hours to pin together two strips of fabric (yay me!). Consequently it took me a little less than an hour to put together the outside of the pouch, consisting of seven small strips. I love the ratta-ta-tatt of my sewing machine, and the moment when you unfold the fabric you've just sewn together and there it is - a nice straight seam, all neat and lovely.

For me it's extremely soothing to concentrate for once on something that doesn't have anything to do with literature, books, or computers. And it's enormously satisfying to see something grow under your hands and to imagine the pleasure it will give to the person for which it is intended.

After an hour at the sewing maching I always feel refreshed and full of energy, ready to return to the world of books.

And now let's all say "Awwwwww!"

2009-10-14T19:29:00.002+02:00

I know I've mentioned Gaskell's NORTH & SOUTH several times when I first read it, but the novel is simply so good it deserves to be mentioned again and again and again and ... well, you get the picture. :)

Though Gaskell complained that she had to hurry & shorten the ending so it would fit into the serial format of Dickens's HOUSEHOLD WORDS, I still think the ending of N&S rather sweet and definitely worthy of a happy sigh or two.

"Margaret!"

Sill lower went the head; more closely hidden was the face, almost resting on the table before her. He came close to her. He knelt by her side, to bring his face to a level with her ear; and whispered - panted out the words: -

"Take care. - If you do not speak - I shall claim you as my own in same strange presumptuous way. - Send me away at once, if I must go; - Margaret!"

At that third call she turned her face, still covered with her small white hands, towards him, and laid it on his shoulder, hiding it even there; and it was too delicious to feel her soft cheek against his, for him to wish to see either deep blushes or loving eyes. He clasped her close.

*happy sigh*

1000th Post: Yes, I Can!

2009-10-13T08:13:00.002+02:00

Sew, that is. :)

So last week I got my lovely, new sewing machine. Hitherto I didn't have a very good relationship with sewing machines (this was probably due to the fact that I had absolutely no clue what things like "thread tension" meant ...), consequently I approached my shiny new Carina with considerable wariness.

What if I couldn't work with it?

What if it wasn't a good machine after all?

What if ...

(As you can see, I suffered from acute buyer's remorse.)

I unpacked it, stared at it, felt intimidated, decided I would have to study the owner's manual, watch the DVD that came with the sewing machine, and then study my sewing books. And after that, the owner's manual again. That was about eight in the evening.

About two hours later, I had finally worked up enough courage to switch on the sewing machine.

After that, it took me one hour to figure out how to bring up the bobbin thread. *head desk*

And after that, I could finally practice sewing. :)

A few days later I put together my very first project. I took a few stripes from the Glace jelly roll:

Sewed them together, then sewed together four more stripes of backing fabric, made a mini quilt sandwich (front, back, batting), sewed it together, turned it inside out and -- deep breath -- quilted it. With my sewing machine. And it totally worked!

Then I folded one side up, closed the side seams by hand (cleverly using invisible thread!), and ended up with this little pouch:

Then I realised that I had forgotten the button and the button loop. *head desk* As my little bag looked a bit naked without button and button loop, I added a little ribbon and tied it into a bow. Like this:

This is what the inside looks like:

So I guess this proves that I can indeed sew. Even with a sewing machine! :)

Planning a Simple, Simple, Simple Quilt

2009-10-05T17:43:00.004+02:00

When I bought the Moda Glacé jelly roll, I was a bit skeptical about the brown fabrics. But - oh my gosh! - they're gorgeous! And they look fantastic with the reds, don't they?

My Preciousssssss

2009-10-03T17:59:00.005+02:00

Next week this lovely darling will be ALL mine. 101 stitches, 7 or 8 different feet, super-easy to use (well, let's hope that this will turn out to be true ...).

Planned crafting projects: baby quilt with Aviary honey bun (from Moda Fabrics; picture snatched from the Fat Quarter Shop, my favourite online fabric shop where I've ordered my Moda fabrics) and the daisy chain quilt from Jelly Roll Quilts with Aviary and cream-coloured sashing. Here's the picture from the book:

Isn't it pretty? It's (apparently) very easy to make (sew stripes from jelly roll or stripes from jelly roll and stripe of sashing together, then cut into striped stripes, arrange stripey stripes so they form the daisy chains, then sew together). Nevertheless, it might take some time though until you'll get to see a picture of my quilt draped so prettily over a fence (and not just because it'll take me ages to find a fence such as this one *g*).

Reading for the Dratted Exam

2009-10-02T19:20:00.003+02:00

Now that I no longer have the Dratted Diss to worry about, it has become necessary to find something else to worry about: the Dratted Exam (though this doesn't have the nice, alliterative sound of the DD word) (speaking of alliterations, Germanic people seem to have been particular fond of them, hence all those lovely alliterations in Old English and Old High German literature; the German language has retained quite a number of alliterative phrases - e.g. "mit Maus & Mann" as in "the ship sinks with mouse and man", or perhaps even better, "with mice and men" - and within these alliterative phrases there are several words which are no longer used in other context, e.g. "mit Kind und Kegel", meaning "everybody". The "Kegel" in this phrase does not refer to one or more skittle pins; instead it is an old-fashioned word meaning "illegitimate children".)

Despite the missing alliteration, the Dratted Exam is a wonderful thing to worry about. I even had nightmares about it already! (Yay me!) (*snort*)

Apparently, for the most part the DE will deal with the dissertation (no worries there), and after that there will be another two topics (one for each examiner) to muddle through. I've chosen early English drama and the nineteenth-century novel. Last Tuesday I talked with examiner No. 2 about the latter topic, and we already settled on some texts:

Elizabeth Gaskell's NORTH & SOUTH
Elizabeth Gaskell's CRANFORD
W.M. Thackeray's VANITY FAIR

Now I only need one last novel. Prof. Erlebach suggested JANE EYRE, but I later remembered that Charlotte B. and Emily B.'s novels are a bit too melodramatic for my taste. Anne's THE TENANT OF WILDFELL HALL would be much more to my liking. But then I thought, How about some Jane Austen? After all, the topic is the nineteenth-century novel, not the Victorian novel! NORTHANGER ABBEY would be nice because it would allow us ... eh ... me, mostly, to talk about the gothic novel.

Oh my. Talk about difficult decisions! :)

At the moment I'm re-reading CRANFORD, and I'm once again marvelling at the wealth of detail in these stories. For somebody who's about to buy her first sewing machine, it's quite lovely to read about the Cranford ladies swapping knitting patterns and forming friendships over tartan wool from Edinburgh. And who could ever forget the cat & lace incident? (Well, apart from my students, most of whom weren't able to answer the test question relating to that particular scene from the book. *sigh*) For those of you who've never read CRANFORD, here's the cat & lace scene from the BBC mini-series. Enjoy!

Signs of Life

2009-10-01T17:55:00.003+02:00

In case you've wondered, I still haven't fallen off the edge of the earth (yay me!) so I still can't tell you the sex of the Great Turtle. (Besides I wouldn't know what to look for to ascertain the sex of a turtle anyway.) No, last week I merely did my taxes for 2008. Which was hellish (granted, not so hellish as that thing with the dragons, but there were numbers involved which is bad enough).

I also watched Morse.

Or rather, I'm still watching Morse - getting through all the 33 episodes takes a bit of time, after all. :) Obviously, I love the series not only because it's well written, but also because you can play many entertaining games while watching it. Like, "Spotting Colin Dexter" (he's the author of the Morse novels, and he has cameo appearances in almost all episodes of both Morse and Lewis) or (my favourite!) "Spotting actors who also appear in Lewis (but in different roles and with greyer hair)".

Karen White, The Lost Hours

2009-09-18T22:19:00.004+02:00

I spent the better part of this afternoon and evening (except for the ... eh ... 10 minutes it took me to re-read the first chapter of Nicoll's British Drama and for one pee pee break) reading Karen White's The Lost Hours. This is the first time in years that I literally couldn't put a book aside, and read it in one go instead. It's a great book, a wonderful book. As expected, it put me through an emotional wringer, but in a good way. I enjoyed every minute of it, even when I was crying my eyes out towards the end of the novel.

More tomorrow.