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 |   A tentative blog to test the temperature. |
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Ten years ago I was writing several blogs on various subjects - F1 motor racing, Music, Classic Cars, Great Romances and, most crushingly, a personal journal that included my thoughts on America, memories of England and Africa, opinion, humour, writing and anything else that occurred. It all became too much (I was attempting to update the journal every day) and I collapsed, exhausted and thoroughly disillusioned in the end. So this blog is indeed a Toe in the Water, a place to document my thoughts in and on WdC but with a determination not to get sucked into the blog whirlpool ever again. Here's hoping.     |
| Name That Tune There is a piece of music that I have heard many times in my life without knowing who wrote it or what it is named. It cropped up again in the funeral scene in a television show I was watching a day or two ago and I decided that I had to find out what it is. With Andrea’s detective skills to assist, I discovered that it is Rachmaninoff’s Prelude in C Sharp Minor. Now, thanks to YouTube, I can listen to it whenever I want. It is simple yet haunting, understated yet compelling. I’ll embed it below this piece so that you can hear it too. You’ll have heard it many times, I’m sure, but there will be those who, like me, never knew its source. What an excellent opportunity to turn to a friend when it comes on and say, “Ah yes, Rachmaninoff’s Prelude in C Sharp Minor!” Word count: 150 |
| Another YouTube Gem Chris Isaak introducing the band members at a gig: “Scott Plunkett on the piano…” |
| Passing the Mustard How exactly does one cut mustard? Or crack corn, for that matter. |
| Writing Fears The family that does things together, stays together, or so they say. That was certainly true of my little family last month, for December found us all (even a sister of my beloved wife) in the grip of the dreaded covid. We all survived it adequately enough, being still here, but it did prove a severe disruption to our plans for the end of the year. For me, the terrible thing was that I found myself unable to write. This passed in stages as January dawned and I have been back in the swing of poetry for a while now. Short stories proved more difficult, however. It was not just the greater amount of time and effort required by them. The small matter of inspiration was a major obstacle. The old brain stubbornly refused to come up with anything, even at the prodding of the most interesting of suggestions. I suspect that the real problem was not some imagined departure of a mythical muse. It was more likely that the mind, on finding itself on enforced vacation, began to enjoy the peace and quiet, refusing to go back to work when the nauseating symptoms lessened and drifted away. Yesterday I succeeded in forcing the brain back into harness and dashing off a story for SCREAMS!!! This was occasioned by a dream I had in the early hours that morning. It left me wide awake at four o’clock, thinking about the events in the dream. And then I realised it could easily form the basis for a story and that was the end of any possibility of further sleep. I rose and bashed out something with just enough time for a quick edit and prettification before the deadline. The thing is, I can’t count on having a dream every time I see a contest I want to enter. This apparent breakthrough is really just a flash in the pan until I manage another story. The whole thing may well have been the brain’s way of fobbing me off so I’ll stop nagging it. It remains to be seen whether I’ll ever be able to write anything longer than a few lines again. Ever. Such are the terrible fears of the writer in the low points of life. Word count: 376 |
| Digging around in the archives, I came upon this: Walpurgisnacht One of my favourite literary tricks (although frowned upon by the powers that be) is to seize the readers by the lapels and talk excitedly into their faces. So, if I, for instance, were to decide upon a chief character by the name of Chariadne, I might suddenly insist upon accurate pronunciation of the word, emphasising that the first two letters be spoken as a K, rather than the obvious options of CH or SH. Pointing out that each vowel is intended to have its day, none being silent, I would then have to maintain that the last two letters be sounded as NEE and not NAY or NUH. In similar fashion, when prompted to write a story about Walpurgis Night, I am immediately compelled to change it to Walpurgisnacht, the German being the way I first heard mention of the feast. It is, after all, a strange thing to English minds, the festival never having gained a foothold in Britain apart from a brief moment in the villages of Lincolnshire, amounting to no more than hanging a few cowslips to ward off evil. The Germans make much more of it and have built an atmosphere both dark and forbidding around what was once a Christian festival. In my memory, it is the inspiration for a scene in Goethe’s Faust that relies heavily upon witchy influences. Oh, those jolly Germans. Imagine my disappointment, then, on being advised by Wikipedia that the whole thing began as a feast day celebrating a Saint Walpurga. I suppose it’s mildly satisfying that, after centuries of being accused of stealing pagan festivals, Christianity can at last level the same accusation at the opposition. But the threads of meaning become too complex for me to bother with when in search of a short story and I think I need to consider instead the other prompt, “A test of courage.” All that remains it is to think of something horrifying in that context. And to stay well away from Wikipedia! Word count: 343 |
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I've always remembered that episode and thought that was a fun idea.
Quite good is quite a good compliment 
As someone who just reviewed an item in your port, I can't help but wonder, Did I pick an item that you'd throw out? 