under another sun

Oh for those sultry days of February... Pouring all day and freezing. Worked all day on implementing edits and rewrites on the  The Second Kind of Darkness . This is making big improvements. Still selecting a new name. Nothing from the London agency, about the work this week. Not a great sign. Spoke to Anton today, who told me a hilarious story about being locked out of his room at midnight in a Cotswold's pub, where he was staying after a long walk. This followed by lots of hideous creeping about in his boxers, including going outside the pub, and spying someone still working inside, and having to be persuade the unfortunate barmaid to let in. To the gym at lunchtime in moderate rain, home again in stair rods. Scooped up some nice miso soups from the Japanese shop en route, and home to a hot shower as I was sodden to the skin. Had a poem accepted for a website called the poetry village. Noticing yet again how having poetry rejections is more negative than acceptances are p...

A cold and rainy day. I had a minor sinus/ears/throat/headache thing going on, felt wussy when I woke up. However worked all day, having received the text of The Second Kind of Darkness from Charlotte Norman, the editor. Hundreds of wee changes in the copy edit,  plus she made a few thoughtful suggestions about bringing the story into better focus. Really helpful, to get a fresh perspective. Her changes were very helpful. I decided that the title is too long, before I sent it to Charlotte. Now before I brief a cover designer, I need to think of a snappier name. Freelance job working with Keith to be confirmed for next week, and just a cheeky three-dayer if it does, starting midweek.  Sonia arrived with a bashed face, arms and knees. She quickly told me this was after falling nastily a few doors from her house, while starting an early morning bike ride at the weekend. Typical of Sonia, she laughed lots while telling me how she had literally crawled back covered in blood,...

A pinch and a punch. Spent all day monkishly writing to ten agents about the kids book again, this time incorporating my learnings, man, from last weekend in bloomsbury. A couple of brisk walks just to clear my head and get away from my desk.  Lorraine home a bit late, after another hard day. I cooked excellent meatballs to go with pasta. Below, they are setting up a bit of a funfair in the park, and in the walled garden with puddles.

Quite motivated this morning, sent my children's novel off to a U.S. literary agent, entered Sin Cycle into the Magma pamphlet competition, among other stuff. Then walked over to see Janet in Hove, as there was a respite carer in to look after Ken. Janet somewhat tired, so she hopped aboard Ken's wheelchair and we trundled up the road to a restaurant called Third Avenue, where we had a bite to eat, and two glasses each of a non-alcoholic berry and crushed ice drink. Service was snailish, but we had a good chat, and Janet is wisely getting her affairs in order. Back at Janet's house we sat in the back room, as Ken and Janet shared a crafty cigarette. I saw that the tomatoes Janet had put in were full of fruit, and she asked me to pick them. She has always had green fingers, and her new little garden was full of  stripy, and red, and yellow tomatoes. When I picked them, the smell took me back to childhood. Janet gave me a big bag of them to take away. I hopped on a bus...

A curiously excellent day. I hadn’t been looking forward to it at all, as my first job was to walk down to the doctor’s office and be wired up to my 24-hour blood pressure test. I have appalling white coat syndrome when it comes to having my blood pressure taken, so I always get an alarmingly high reading. Having half hourly blood pressure checks is not a perfect recipe for a happy day. Much to my own surprise I did not get hysterical all once. Every time the automatic sleeve inflated, I just said to myself, imagine how pleased you’ll feel when this comes back as normal tomorrow.   On the way to the surgery and on the way back I was beset by several good creative ideas about how I can make the most of projects I have been working on. Once home I simply spent the day executing one of them, a short story assembled from previous material, that I think works far better than I had hoped. I also had the idea of how I would start the sequel to The Second Kind of Darkness (now in an...

Sent off my novel to an agent specialising in children's books today, selected mainly on gut feel and intuition. This felt like a significant moment. Having spent much of the day sorting it out, and asking Lorraine to read through everything before I emailed it off. I will also send it to a publisher, and once this is done there is nothing more to be done for the time being. I would love to work with an agent though. Despite my attempts not to build my hopes up, I have a weird optimism about this story. In the evening, Lorraine and I had a cheery date night in Brighton as a date and celebration of sending the story off. To The Cricketers, which is a pub she and I used to have a Friday night drink in when we were dating. Then across the road to Gars Chinese restaurant, where we shared a Chef's feast and a couple of Asahi Japanese beers to wash it down with. Generous portions, and we did some serious chopstick work. Our fellow diners not of the most restful sort. A table o...

Tired today, I am due to get new blood tests soon to adjust the meds for my gout, as this triggers your immune response and you feel like you are fighting something off all the time. A dreary rainy filled day as befits the first day of school holidays. So a pleasant day in the study. I made some good progress working on my proposal, and synopsis for The Second Kind of Darkness . Dawn told Lorraine today that the kids in her class have been lapping it up. Dawn is coming around tomorrow, with comments from the eagle-eyed children. I watched the Mark Leckey  Dream English Kid 1964-1999 , again online, plus Fiorucci Made Me Hardcore . Great when you discover something new and interesting. The blurred soundscapes on these films is as if a microphone was lowered into the part of a brain to do with memory. Also made time for meditation. When I have done it in the past it has brought me so many benefits, it seems brainless not to do it, especially when it is free and only takes a bit...

Lorraine very tired this morning, so we had breakfast in bed. Then I had to slink off to The Boots for a four and a half hour rehearsal. Beth's good pal Emily gave us some of her time. She has been training to be a voice specialist at Central, and provided us with some good notes on voice, and some other feedback too. I like her a lot. Everyone working hard. To slim A Glass of Nothin g down to fifty minutes, we've had to make a few cuts which, if anything, are improving the play. Another cut happened this afternoon, Beth and I thinking the same thing without even discussing it. Matt the intensive focus of what we are doing, and he is bearing up with great fortitude, and good humour. I felt a slight cringe buying some drinks downstairs, asking for a diet coke, a glass of soda water, and a cup of tea, which the owner gave us for free. He lets us use the room for free, and I like to buy drinks there to payback a little. I walked home to find Lorraine reading The Second Kind ...

So up with the sparrows this morning, the sky still threatening rain. I mooched off the doctors to discuss blood pressure, gout, a persistent ear infection and a weird lump in my chest. Came away reassured, and with a few routine tests lined up. I like my doctor very much, and we tend to have a bit of a laugh. I told him its not you it's me, on my white coat syndrome. Off next to get my haircut as it was suddenly unruly and sprouting sideways like a clown. This dealt with, off to the ideologically unsound Starbucks where I celebrated with large cup of coffee, and fiddled with some poems. Then to Specsavers for an eye test. I need a slightly stronger prescription, but my eye health is good. Together we compared the red photos of inside my eyes to last time and it all looked healthy. Then the difficult business of choosing specs with a woman called Raquel, whose head I did in by rebuffing her suggestions. We had quite a laugh about it. Then a bus home, and I sorted out the last o...

A Happy Monday. I hit the ground running today with a good sense of purpose. Working on getting my proposal in focus for The Second Kind of Darkness . Lorraine heard from Dawn today, that she had been reading it to her class and the children were enjoying it. Went into town for a change of scene, and went to Starbucks. I sat next to two teenagers, whose conversation amused me. As I put on Facebook: Sitting in the non-ideologically sound Starbucks. Two teenagers next to me, talking about one of their friends. "Yeah. He's always been four years older than me." Quite reassuring that nothing has rippled the space time continuum here at least. Enjoyed walking back through the park, a lovely sunny day and although I have a lot to be getting on with, I felt a real sense of my privilege and freedom.  Lorraine, however, with one full week of slog ahead.

Felt odd not to be working on the children's story. A day of bits and pieces. Dawn dropped by this evening to pick up the manuscript of The Second Kind of Darkness and said she was going to read it to her class. This is fantastic of course, but made me feel nervous. She invited me to come and talk to the kid. Weasel that I am, maybe I'll wait to hear if they hate it or not first. Otherwise I wrote a long overdue blog  about Richard's Stone Witness collection . Also did some admin for Edinburgh and worked to put together some video stuff for the play too. Beth went to Lorraine's school to look at some drama work this morning. She was very disappointed that the flat she wanted was gone, despite her phoning the letting agent at 9:00am. Apart from doing this kind of stuff, went out to buy a bag of delicious cherries. I like them, and they are good for gout apparently. I am feeling pre-gout tingles again. I'm disappointed to have flare-ups after being free for two...

So working from first thing, and finally stopped working on The Second Kind of Darkness around lunchtime.  There are still a few hopefully minor typos in I imagine, but there comes a time when you have to declare that, for now, you are done.  Lorraine printed off three copies, and I am going to give them to Dawn and Rosie. Lorraine will look at it when she gets time, and Amanda had already read the first chapter down under by the time I went to bed. Then I sent some spreadsheets off to the accountants, and then sauntered down to the gym, feeling that all in all I'd done a pretty good day's work. Home again, and Calliope balked at the vital moment when I was administering her cat drugs and I sprayed liquid around the kitchen. Drinking a glass of fizzy water later, I felt that it tasted a bit odd. Beth home this evening, all cheery at having found a flat with John that she likes. Lorraine home and fed quickly as she was hangry. Then the dystopian joy that is The Handmaid...

Off to the gym for the first time since the Monday of the previous week. Otherwise, did work on The Second Kind of Darkness , and then sorted out some facts and figures for the accountant. I am feeling like finishing my story is somehow like the orbit of some slow moving planet. I have learned lots through the process. The buddhist in me feels that I shouldn't be attached to outcomes, just focus on the job at hand. This is quite hard when you've been working on something off and on for so long. The story feels like the tip of the iceberg, in that I have loads of plot lines in my head for the characters in it. Anyhow, Lorraine, Rosie and Dawn, all of whom work with children of the target age and have bags of expertise in literacy and children's books, are going to read it for me next. Mandy in NZ will read it too. And anyone else who fancies it really. A spot of anxious cat wrangling with Calliope this afternoon. I had to squirt two lots of liquid medications into her mo...

Working on The Second Kind of Darkness still. Sat under the tree in the corner of the garden this morning, Lorraine kindly printed me it out again yesterday, and I am doing an absolutely bloody final edit on it before I share it. This edit much lighter, but means I have to re-read the script yet again. As I set about this a large fly was gradually lowered down, half wrapped in a spider's web over the little table. I took two photos of it but both were out of focus. Beth came back in the afternoon and she and I did some Edinburgh work together in the afternoon. Today, I realised I have do get my books shipshape to send the accountants, before the weekend too. Putting myself under pressure to get everything done. Not quite as hard as Lorraine, of course, who was running the school sports day, which was enlivened by the hedge between the school and the Church catching fire at one point. Everyone okay and the children clapped the firemen who came to sort things out. Beth cooked th...

Up to visit Mum and Mas today, as Mum due to have an overnight stay in hospital tomorrow. Got a fairly early train and headed straight for faux first class, where I made the final changes to the draft of The Second Kind of Darkness. All I have to do now is print it out (again) and have a last sweep then pass it onto people who are prepared to read it for some final feedback before I start sending it out. Should you, as a reader of this blog, want to have a squint at it, then let me know. Foot, which is not entirely better, held up remarkably well today, and when I got home my step counter told me I had walked roughly 6 1/2 miles. Hung out with Mum and Mas. It was a frustrating day for them as the occupational health person had organised a firm to come around and fix a handrail up the stairs. They were supposed to be there before 3.00pm, but never showed up. Mum phoned them to discover that the company had been bought out today, so all the jobs were cancelled at the last minute. ...

Now able to stand without yelping. Still feeling low on energy however, and attached myself to the gold sofa, and started transferring the thousands of changes I made in pencil, to Scrivener. Got half way through. After this is done, one more print off, for absolute bloody final changes, and then I am done with it. Then for the hard bit of trying to flog it, I believe in the quality of story The second kind of darkness . It took an age to get it into its current shape, and very different to how it started. My conundrum is how you can be any kind of an artist without having self doubt. It stops you from thinking that tripe is gold. But self-doubt has little to do with the selling process. I am going to be as resilient as I can be in my attempt to get this sold. Betty back home after many adventures today. Vagabond Skies went really well apparently, and the cast had a good party afterwards in London. Let's hope someone picks up on it. Beth cooked  courgetti -- which is courgette sp...

Phew what a scorcher! So hot today, that I decided to forgo the air-conditioning-free gym, or as yesterday an arduous walk. I simply stayed home and worked. They are saying this is the hottest June day since 1976 (33.2° in London apparently, a wee bit cooler on the coast here). I remember that summer well. I was doing my O Levels, I also had a job at Hammersmith Hospital which Gerald had got for me as he was working there in its immunology department, where I was subject to the advances of a male Chinese student who was also working there. Although we were working in the same building, Gerald refused to drive me to work, so I had to leave an hour and a half before him, walk to Kingsbury station, an hour or so on the tube, and another long walk up Du Cane road past the Prison. I was doing some admin type thing, filing I think. I also had a girlfriend that summer and did most of my socialising in The Bunch of Grapes on Duke Street, by the side of Selfridges on Oxford Street. I think it...

Like last night, we slept with the Juliette windows open. But because of Brian's suicidal tendencies we have to close the bedroom door. This means the infernal Calliope scratches at the door like a poltergeist after five o'clock. Up early with Lorraine, and watering the hanging baskets at seven. The jasmine smelling lovely in the garden. Then working hard on The Second Kind of Darkness  despite the soporific heat. Also uploaded digital banner advertising for Edinburgh. A long walk late in the afternoon, still very hot.  Climbed up to the Hollingbury golf course high behind us, and looked at the downs sweltering in the heat, and Brighton below. Listening as I walked to my Tim Winton book of autobiographical essays, The Boy Behind the Curtain . Listening to one where he stayed in Ireland through the winter near what the locals thought of as a tremendously haunted castle. Quite a contrast having your head full of damp winter Ireland while in a heatwave. Home and I griddled s...

Working from just after seven on the final two chapters of the novel, which is now called The second kind of darkness . Some of my favourite ideas have to be given the Herod treatment, but after all these years, the end of the story is literally is in sight.  After four or five hours with blood on my hands, an omelette for lunch (made with turmeric as standard now). Then I slunk off in the gorgeous weather to sweat in the gym, where I had a good workout, doing the cross trainer but adding in a bit of rowing machine and one or two weights machines. Doing this gingerly as I am unfit. But things are slowly improving. Thence to the ideologically unsound Starbucks where I drank tea and worked till gone five. Walked home and spoke to Bob about various hypochondriac subjects, and then to Mum, who showed me the new rose arch in the front garden when I got home.  When Lorraine got home, we no-brainered down to the Preston Park Tavern for some cold beer and a bite to eat and...