Come the glorious day Checking my bank account this morning to find tax rebate had appeared. I blessed my accountant Seana's little tigerprinted socks. The French however, have only managed to pay a third of what they owe me, the rest will come 'later this week'. I have sent about 20 emails about this already, had various conversations etc. Their lateness is due to inefficiency, not malevolence however. Hamstering at the gym earlier than usual today, listening to Stalin ate my homework . Louisa, one of the Twittenites , shaking her head from inside a taxi as I crept home, saying I looked exhausted. Home to work on the doppelganger piece: and was rewarded with a major breakthrough, and a fresh direction now seems achievable. In my interview for Guernsey's Island Ink I said something about turning up at your desk regularly and inspiration will come. I felt vindicated. On that note I heard back from the editor Gabi, who was delighted with my piece. In the evening off to...
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A day of two halves By the time I had sent off my biography to Island Ink this morning I was busily detesting everything I've ever written and viewed life as a heap of rotting beans. When the storm outside abated I went for a walk in the rainy Laines and bought, in a slightly self-flagellating way, excellent books by Mario Petrucci and Mimi Khalvati, poets I knew well who have gone on to become quietly famous. Things started to cheer up moments later when I randomly bumped into Cathy and we went for a coffee and fairly wide-ranging discussions about life and portfolio careers. I went for a cobweb-blasting walk by the sea. I loved being on the wind-lashed pier. The fairground rides were all closed, and I stood by the merry-go-round, which creaked and shifted in the wind. My clothes were flapping, the wind roaring in my ears, closed shutters rattled, and the sea seethed below the boards. Quite suddenly all my petty concerns were blown off like a clump of sea spume, and I felt myself ...
Sloe Working for a few hours first thing. Then to the doctors (to have an identical conversation to last week) and before my buns had grazed a waiting room seat a woman started talking to me about how her boyfriend was on holiday in Thailand and that he hadn't phoned her, and how, 'as a bloke' did I interpret his actions. A theme she enlarged on with great anxiety and without stopping for a half an hour like some character from Dostoevsky. Purchased a large bottle of Gordons sloe gin from Sainsburys along with other vittles. My first nod towards Christmas. Then home again to work on the Island Ink interview, which is taking an infernally long time and I seem to be emerging from it as a self-inflated buffoon. I can't waste much more time on it. Also working, painstakingly, on the Libretto. Everything seems to be taking ages. Below More Antigravity. I'm always pleasantly surprised when people find this blog. Steve Geliot, creator of Antigravity which featured in the ...
Double talk Working on the Libretto this morning, slow but steady progress I think. I am finding it helpful to 'sing' the words as I write them. Brooding about doubles. Matt brooding about doubles too, and we were full of double talk this evening in the Evening Star. I blame Toby, who turned me onto doubles in the first place as he studied them for his MA. Fingers Capra and Richard Gibson were there too, and Fingers about to make a new record with a cellist of 18th century Russian music, while Richard's project of setting every Shakespeare sonnet to music is coming to fruition, and he is beginning to try them out in pubs. Not a gym day today, but my knee ballooned and hurt after a stroll around town. Weirdly the thing that seems to keep it under control is excercise. In the afternoon writing an interview for Guernsey's Island Ink magazine. Have been sent some questions and all I have to do is answer them. But trying not to sound like an egotistic buffoon is a stern chal...