This and That and Sandy's Teeth

Thanks bunches everybody for commiserating with poor little me and my teeth that turned into craters. After two days of soup and pudding, I found out that I can eat (suck) yeast rolls, so I baked some yesterday, and today I even managed to eat mashed potatoes, salad (yay!) and chocolate (yay! yay!). So things are looking up! :) By now only the big crater in my upper left molar is still hurting.

At the moment I'm supposed to finish the aforementioned article for the conference proceedings. I so don't want to. But -- I'm almost there: only two more pages. :) Still, it's 10:30 p.m. by now, so I better get going.

Thursday Thirteen #3: Thirteen Sachets of Instant Soup

I still wasn't able to chew properly today (or at least not without feeling a considerable amount of discomfort or even downright pain). Therefore I braved the elements ('twas raining cats and dogs today!) and went to the supermarket (okay, okay, I drove) and bought a considerable amount of rice pudding, semolina pudding, and, well, soup. Lots and lots of sachets of instant soup. And here they are:

Thirteen Sachets of Instant Soup 1) creamy potato soup 2) potato-and-leek soup 3) all-natural tomato soup 4) creamy tomato soup 5) tomato soup with ricotta 6) tomato soup with mozzarella 7) creamy mushroom soup 8) chanterelle soup 9) white mushroom soup 10) creamy shrimp soup (tasted crap) 11) alphabet soup 12) alphabet soup 13) alphabet soup

P.S.

Have I already mentioned I've found out this evening that I can't chew because it fricking hurts? So it seems it's going to be soup and cream rice for me for the next few days until I'll get those stupid inlays (no idea whether that's really the correct English term) next Friday.

And have I already mentioned I'm really afraid of brushing my teeth thanks to those craters?

Last of Wednesday

Ouch.

Sh*tty Day

Went to the dentist last week and she found two holes in my molars (one on each side). Went to the dentist again today and she drilled two enormous craters into my poor teeth. Spent the rest of the day sitting on the couch and feeling sorry for myself (especially when one of the crater teeth began to hurt. Duh.) instead of finishing that article for the conference proceedings thingy.

Sunday Night Musings

It's a bit unfortunate that both of my jobs involve working at the computer and writing, especially when I'm pressured for time. There are days when I can't even stand the sight of my poor 'puter. When the mere sound of the ventilation makes me want to scream. In these cases it is always a good idea to grab a pencil and a pad of paper, and to sit down to work in another room without the computer (while the poor thing stands all alone in your office...). Sometimes this works. Sometimes it doesn't. But it's always worth a try.

Did some more dissing yesterday, and today I worked on an article for the conference proceedings of the comic conference two of my colleagues organized earlier this year. Even though I only have to revise my original paper, I still would have preferred to spend this afternoon lazying about on the coach and to watch TV or simply to read. Actually, I even would have preferred to work on my PhD project. I spent Wednesday afternoon leaving through several volumes of Punch, and now I've got a pile of illustrations to work with for my chapter on Richard Doyle. Some of the sketches are so beautiful! And some of them are terribly cute, too! *g*

The Trials and Tribulations of a Travelling Scholar - Part 2

Here we go: the next bit of Sandy's epic journey through the north of England. :) (It might still take a while until YouTube has the video fully processed.)

Thursday Thirteen #2: Thirteen Cities

Thirteen Towns & Cities I Have Visited 1. Frankfurt (well, that's no big feat since I live in a suburb of Frankfurt 2. Mainz (work there) 3. Freiburg (I used to live in the Black Forest when I was a child) 4. Florence (during a summer vacation with my parents) 5. Siena (during the aforementioned summer vacation with my parents; Siena's church is striped like a zebra :) ) 6. Vienna (saw my first musical there, Andrew Lloyd Webber's CATS) 7. Prague (on my very last school excursion; the Charles Bridge at night must be the most romantic place on earth!) 8. Birmingham (during my teens I had an English penfriend who lived near Birmingham) 9. Oxford (oh, I love Oxford! Not only have they got a whole street full of bookstores, but there is also the wonderful, the magnificent Pitt Rivers Museum!) 10. Berwick-upon-Tweed (in the rain; you'll get to see it, too, in one of the next episodes of "Trials & Tribulations of a Travelling Scholar") 11. London (of course!) 12. Edinburgh (the City of Wonders) 13. Reno (in the month my first book was published, for RWA National 2005)

Sandy mutates into jam-making Earth Mother (or something)

Making the cranberry compote got me hooked on cooking jam. So, for the first time in my life I made strawberry jam today. Unfortunately the 2:1 gelling sugar STINKS! Duh. Next time I'll have to try the 1:1 version.

What else did I do today? Well, I took my oven apart in order to clean the door. Remember when the milk boilt over? Milk ran between the two layers of glass of the stupid door of the oven. Hence, the disassembling of the oven, followed by vigorous scrubbing.

What Sandy Did

I missed TT13 yesterday -- oh duh, my second week with TT13 and I already missed it. *head desk* But actually, I've got a really good excuse: I was cleaning up my sitting room (which was not only unbelievably dusty and dirty, but also full of junk). The whole day and evening, more or less.



Today I stewed some cranberries (I felt a craving for something sweet, but the only thing I had at home was a container of boring vanilla icecream -- and frozen cranberries). They turned out lovely -- except ... well, the only thing the stupid recipe didn't say was that you'd better sieve the stuff before you put it away if you don't want spiky cranberry skins in your compote. Duh.



And now it's back to dissing. Dicky Doyle is calling for me. Adieu.

Be still my heart ...

In the past few days I've been digging into books about Richard Doyle, one of the leading illustrators of the early Victorian age. And guess what I've just discovered: the National Library of Scotland offers a digital version of a journal of his on their website!!!! *swoons with happiness* The thing is called the "Log of the Ladye" and covers a journey into the highlands in 1859. And, of course, there are pictures, too! Woohooo!

Ha! I'm scary after all!!!

Today, when I opened the door to get my mail, I told my postwoman, "I'm so happy whenever you ring the bell because that means you've got another parcel with books for me." Well, actually, today she had two. *g* Wide-eyed, she handed them over and said, "This is getting scary. Will you get any more of these soon?" -- "Yup," I told her with a beaming smile, and her eyes widened even more.

See? I do scare people! Wheee!

So I clutched those precious parcels to my bossom (bosom or bossom?) (or bussom??) (bossom -- I'm sure it's bossom) and raced upstairs, where I inspected them first, read the return addresses, felt the books through the padding, before I finally tore the envelopes open. I tell you, this is better than Kinder Surprise (when I checked out the Wikipedia page just now, I've found out that those wonderful, wonderful eggs aren't sold in the USA -- you poor people, you!)! Today I got two books about the Fens in Britain -- I figured I might need them for the revisions of BEWITCHED. For some reason or other, it didn't occur to me to buy any books about the Fen District back when I was writing the dratted novel. Instead I worked with info and pictures I found online. But working with books is of course sooo much better! *beam*

Today I also had the first Lebkuchen of the season -- hmmmm. If you've been reading my blog for some time, you know how much I love those! (Only my hips don't. But who cares?)

And later today I ate my last peanutbutter cup. *sniff* No more peanutbutter cups for two years, for I probably won't go to RWA National next year. *sniff-sniff*

A Magical Day

I saw three rainbows on my way home. Surely this is a magical day (even though I spent most of it correcting awful exams). I also spent another small fortune on used books at abebooks. :)

The Trials & Tribulations of a Travelling Scholar

I was wondering what to do with my Newcastle pictures. To simply upload them to flickr would have been a bit boring, so here's what I came up with instead:

The Almost-Midnight Post

I've just got my yellow LibraryThing Author button. Wheee! :)

Nighttime Ponderings

It's really great when the depths of your cupboard yield those cookies you hid so carefully three weeks ago and then completely forgot about. :)

Great British TV Series

I love, love, love British documentaries and bought quite a number of them on DVD in the past few months. Here are some of favourites:

The British Isles -- A Natural History
presented by Alan Titchmarsh



There are some repetitions of clips and pictures throughout the series, but all in all it's a great overview of how the face of Britain has changed in the course of several thousand years.




A Picture of Britain
presented by David Dimbleby

David Dimbleby travels through Britain, following in the footsteps of artists, writers and composers and looking at the landscapes that inspired their work.




Coast
presented by Nick Crane (Season 1)

Nick Crane's team is made up of a geographer (himself), two archaeologists, a medical doctor and a zoologist. Together they explore they explore the coastline of the United Kingdom. Great series! They're now in their third or fourth season.

Di-di-Dissing

I'm surrounded by books. They probably plan an attack or something. Actually, they've already passed the stage of planning: I've got paper cuts (is that what you call them?) all over my fingers. *sigh*

Historical Tidbits: Victorian Theatricals

In the 19th century people were terribly fond of amateur theatre (well, they didn't have TV *g*) and staged plays in their drawing rooms. But there were also larger-scale amateur productions, for example the production of Bulwer Lytton's costume drama NOT SO BAD AS WE SEEM Dickens organized in aid of the Guild of Literature and Art, a charitable fund for artists and writers in need. Among the actors was Sir John Tenniel (yup, I found this tidbit while doing research for the PhD project). The whole thing was staged in the library of Devonshire House and eventually premiered before the Queen.

As you can imagine, such an important amateur production could result in rather trying rehearsals. And thus, Dickens whined,

My legs swell so, with standing on the stage for hours together, that my stockings won't come off. I get so covered with sawdust among the carpenters, that my infants don't know me. I am so astonishingly familiar with everybody else's part, that I forget my own. I roar to the troupe in general, to the extent that the excellent Duke (who is deaf) thinks in the remoteness fo his own little library that the wind is blowing hard.*

Tee-hee! :)

* quoted in Rodney Engen. Sir John Tenniel: Alice's White Knight. Aldershot: Scolar Press, 1991. 28.

Sandy's Thursday Thirteen #1

This looks like fun, so here we go: Sandy's first Thursday Thirteen list:

Sandy's Thirteen Novels 1. Dicki und Tomi 2. Dick und Tom (the sequel!!!) 3. Der Wildfang (The Tomboy, written Dec 1987- Dec 1990) 4. Der Wildfang 2 (The Tomboy 2 -- another sequel!) 5. Der Flug der Rabin (The Flight of the Raven, written in Jan 1996) 6. Tochter des Einhorns (Daughter of the Unicorn, written May - Oct 1996) 7. Im Bann des Wolfes (Wolf's Spell, written Oct 1996 - August 1997) 8. Wolfswald (Wolf's Wood, sequel!!!, written August 1997 - Oct 1999) 9. Highland Love (written April 2000 - February 2002) 10. Straight to the Heart / The Lily Brand (my first published novel! 2005) 11. Castle of Wolfenbach / Castle of the Wolf (2007) 12. Bewitched (will be released in April 2008) 13. Betrayal (the current work in progress) Links to other Thursday Thirteens! 1. Carrie Lofty 2. Sandee 3. Qtpies74. Lost in Wisconsin5. Lori6. Michael Schurmann7. Seeley DeBorn8. Thomma Lyn9. Jendi10. Camille Alexa (leave your link in comments, I’ll add you here!)

Get the Thursday Thirteen code here!


The purpose of the meme is to get to know everyone who participates a little bit better every Thursday. Visiting fellow Thirteeners is encouraged! If you participate, leave the link to your Thirteen in others comments. It’s easy, and fun! Be sure to update your Thirteen with links that are left for you, as well! I will link to everyone who participates and leaves a link to their 13 things. Trackbacks, pings, comment links accepted!

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The Lion and the Unicorn

Today I got two more book packages, one of which contained Frankie Morris's ARTIST OF WONDERLAND, a book on the life and art of John Tenniel. It has already turned out to be a great find: one of the most exciting things, imo, is that Morris argues that many characters in Tenniel's illustrations are simply children or adults in costumes instead of a "real" rabbit or a "real" Duchess with a really big head. One of the illustrations he uses to prove his point is that of the Lion and the Unicorn, with Alice holding the plumcake inbetween:

the Unicorn clearly has a human body and it's easy to imagine it as a human / an actor wearing a mask (reminds me a bit of the Royal Ballet's Tales of Beatrix Potter). A closer look at the Lion reveals there's also a human body (with a little potbelly) under his skin -- which is too big for the "actor" and thus baggy around the ankles.

The First of September

Made some good progress with the PhD thingy this past week. At the moment my desk is covered with piles of books on Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass, and I'm still waiting for some more to arrive next week (at least I hope they'll arrive next week!). Today I mostly worked on the footnotes, which is always pretty frustrating because the text is 10 pt (instead of 12 pt) and single spaced (instead of 1.5 spacing), which means that you write and write and write and write and write (and writeandwriteandwriteandwrite), but the total amount of pages doesn't considerably grow. Duh. Still, I love footnotes. :)

Had the most curious dream tonight: went to a conference in the USA, the conference hotel wasn really big, and I couldn't find the floor with my room. It was horrible: I stepped into the elevator, but then I realized that there was no button for Floor 671. Most of the other people got out (lucky devils!), and I decided I would get out on Floor 670 and take the stairs to 671. However, Floor 670 turned out to be a big warehouse and there weren't any stairs (or escalators) to be seen. One of the employees told me I needed to get into another elevator, but when I was in that one, I found it didn't have a button for Floor 670 either. Instead, it brought me to the multi-storey carpark in the hotel. By that time I was totally agitated and decided I'd go back to the lobby -- only that the elevator didn't have a button for the lobby either. Just when I was about to burst into tears, I woke up. Drenched with sweat.