Inkwell: Authors and Artists

    
Mousester -- Thanks for asking about the instrumental thing, and thank
the boy/roommate for answering!  I like the idea that they used an
anvil in one of their dads' shop.  I'm still not sure we're talking
about the same "klink," unless they sampled it into a keyboard and then
played it at all different pitches... I'll have to listen to the song
again (oh the hardship!).  Haven't heard it in years.

Ahh, chocolate *liquor*, that's it!  I knew it wasn't cocoa butter,
but that's all I had.  Thanks to all for the chocolate info.  (Great
site, Tara!)

Vanilla is good, and a good companion to chocolate.  Lead, however --
not so good.  But I guess you can find trace elements of anything in
food if you look hard enough.

Mary -- Aren't "blue elfy person"s Smurfs?  >;)

Maure -- Wow, good for Anthony!  What does he play?  You Chicagoans
know some awfully talented people!  Glad to hear you're still doing the
radio show.  (But followed by working at 5:30... ugh.)

Tara -- Instead of a Maure mask, you should get an Ursula mask!  I
hear they were all the rage at the Nebulas.

Pafety sost.
  

    
Those randy blackboards, whatcha gonna do?

John <635> -- Great definitions.  (Didn't I say in <97> that he could
probably come up with good ones?)

Erynn -- Funny you should mention milking goats.  I heard that on
_Fear Factor_ this week they had contestants milking goats -- "the way
a baby goat would do it," as a local radio host put it.

Davey -- I like the idea of "throwing the old windows out the
windows."  Could even make a good pseud.

Pam -- No wonder Walker never seems to be able to see the Endless
perform!

But... but what about the time you and Walker were supposed to go
visit SF and, at the last minute, *you* couldn't go?
  

    
Mary, if you're the mother hen, I'm the big sister.  (Over a
quarter-century of experience, thank you very much!)  I haven't had
much time to read Neil's blog lately, though (beyond skimming it just
to make sure he's OK).  What I saw of the tour schedule didn't look
*that* densely packed, but maybe I've missed stuff.  Ah well, gotta
discharge my duty to my finely honed protective instinct....

Neil -- I, too, hope you're making sufficient sleep a priority,
staying hydrated on the plane rides, and all that stuff.  You know we
want you home in one piece.  In any case, what I *have* skimmed sounds
like you're having a good time.  :)  Have fun.
  

    
Not so fun today, though.

Neil, sorry to hear about the wallet.  That just blows.  I am glad
that the damage was minimal.

I am up so far past my bedtime, that if it were Monday, I'd have to
get up in half an hour.  Good God.

Mary (reading Wee Free Men)
  

    
I'm sorry to hear about the wallet-snatching, too, Neil.  Grrr.  I am
glad it wasn't as bad as it could have been.

Happy Mother's Day to all the mothers!  (Including Mrs. Gaiman, if you
talk to her, Neil.)  Just got back from my mom's house after playing
with her new kitten a bunch.  He's small.  :)
  

    


Holley Nowell writes:


Dodge (hnowell)

Erynn-miles: Only the problem wall is painted. I'm still working on the
little rose red wall. Did you know that when you are painting very dark
paint, it is very hard to do it without putting brush or roller strokes? I
found that out. So. I decided to paint roses on it. Rose red roses on a rose
red wall. It looks like textured wall unless you stand just right so
the light hits it right and you can see the roses. The front wall will be
plain old pink like the back wall then I'll be finished with the living room.
I may paint the carpet also but that's down the line a bit.
I know. Y'all are probably very tired of my walls by now.

Started reading some Lemony Snicket books. But I don't think I like them.
It's a series about three children whose parents died in a fire. The writing
is good but I find the things that their cousin Olaf does to them very
disturbing. I guess that the child abuse is just something I find hard to
deal with. The adults in the book are so incredibly stupid. In the first
place, I find it amazing that a couple of wealthy people should have gone to
the trouble to make out a will that leaves their children so ill cared for.
They MUST go to a relative (any relative no matter how awful without checking
them out) and there is no money set aside for their care. Until the oldest
girl is 18 (she is 14) they are destitute & wholly dependent upon the whims
of their distant relatives - none of whom they've ever met before. They
didn't have anybody named to take care of their children. There is no
provision for schooling. No provision for their clothes and food and so
forth. The executor of the will is a banker whose job it is to take care of
the money until the eldest girl comes of age and then she will take care of
the two younger children after she gets the money. He doesn't care about the
children. He just dumps them on whatever relative he can find to take them.
So they go through a series of horrible abuse. I had to stop reading them.




(This was emailed May 8, but I have been traveling so I ddiidn't get to post
it til now.  My bad!   - <tnf>)1~
  

    


From Jouni Koponen:



Hi all!

Busy (yeah, so what else is new...)

Go see

http://www.geocities.com/jouniac/aikido.html

(that'll explain some of it...)

Jouni-san
  

    
Dodge, the rose textured rose walls sound incredibly cool...

my apartment seems so boring all of a sudden.
  

    




Dodge (hnowell)
Friday
Wow. Third best-selling fantasy author in Poland. That is so cool.
I notice They are being very careful to see to it Neil gets lunch from now
on.

Monday
Man what a pain about the wallet.

Got a new antique china cabinet that's so big it covers the whole entire
pepto bismal wall so I don't have to repaint it. It's about 7 feet long by 8
ft tall. It's great. I've emptied 8 or 9 boxes of stuff that were dishes and
glassware and dust collectors that has gone into that cabinet and it's still
not full.

My son & his wife & my grandson came over for mothers day. Yay. I showed them
my Barbie doll collection & gave my daughter-in-law a Bewitched Barbie as I
had a spare. See. I collect the ones that are modeled after famous people or
from TV shows or movies or books. I have the Munsters B&K (which I was
delighted to see came with green skin). Also the Arthur & Guinevere. The I
Dream of Jeannie Barbie & the Lucille Ball & Elvis & James Dean and so forth
and so on. My son's favorite was the Jessica doll from Who Framed Roger
Rabbit. Though the Wonder Woman came a close second. The detail on these
dolls is absolutely amazing. He wanted to know why I stopped buying them.
When you collect books & dolls & figurines & tea cups & salt & pepper
shakers & posters &Videos & DVDs & music CDs & ... Well. space. You run out
of it.

He was also amazed I'd kept all his Star Wars stuff & his comics & so forth.
He took them home with him. (Yay! More space for me.) So now he has the
Millenium Falcon model & all the figures from the first SW movie. I told him
to take care of them. They're worth real money now. But he'll never sell
them. It's nice when your kids get old enough to once again appreciate the
things they once loved. I told him he can never fault my packrattery again
now. Oh, & the George Jetson soft doll went to my grandson.

My grandson just got a kitten. Cleo, my cat, gets nervous of him. For a cat
that is always demanding I give her attention, she gets her limit with him.
My 4 year old grandson came to me & asked me wistfully why my cat doesn't
like him. Dear me. Well, she played with him for 3 hours before she
disappeared for a nap. That's not too bad for an adult cat not accustomed to
other people.

Looks like I'm going to have a neat, liveable - and more importantly
visitable - place soon. I can have friends over! I can cook & eat on the
table with real dishes & napkins & everything! Yay! I might actually have
this done by the time my birthday comes around. In October.

Am reading the Sandman Companion. And am reading Wee Free Men. Which I am
enjoying immensely.
  

    
Dodge -- _Painting_ the carpet...?  Good idea about the rose patterns.

Wow!  It must be kitten season!  And yeah, I'd never sell my original
Star Wars stuff either.

Speaking of action figures, now I finally have what I've always wanted
-- a Jouni paper doll!  lol

nite.
  

    
Yay!  Jouni!  <<waves frantically>>  I love the paper doll, too!  You
do the most beautiful work.

Dodge--yay, big china cabinets!  I wish I had one.  Someday, maybe.

X-Men rocked.  Kurt was just right.  And I was amazed at how Catholic
he was, and no one made fun of it.  Yay.  

I finished Wee Free Men while I was home sick on Monday :-(  But the
book was really good.

I got passes to a free screening of "Down With Love" tonight.  It will
probably stink, but I'll let y'all know.

Mary (on Alka Seltzer Cough & Cold, at the moment)
  

    



Froom Holley Nowell:




Wednesday
Wee Free Men was great. Am still reading Sandman Companion. It's slow going
because I have to get out the issues they are talking about to see stuff.
Next is the Agatha Christie Compendium which I found at Barnes & Noble. That
should be interesting. I'll probably have to get out the Christie books and
read some of them again.

I'm also embroidering the scene with Dream & the king on the flying carpet
onto one of my favorite casual shirts which had acquired a stain that
wouldn't come out. This way I can still wear the shirt, see. My son saw the
big piece I did on the back of another shirt and thinks I should go into the
business of custom embroidering things but I'd have no idea how to go about
starting. Or even if there would be a market for it. I did do that for the
guys in the Coast Guard when my ex-husband was in and we lived out in the
middle of an island nowhere on a base. They'd bring me their jackets or a
shirt and I'd embroider things like the caterpillar from Alice in Wonderland
sitting on the mushroom with a hookah.

Painting the carpet. See. The carpet is this boring gray Berber type woven
carpet. The cheapest one she could install. It's in the dining room, the
living room, and hall. The bedrooms have dark blue shag carpet (the condo was
built in the early 1980s). The dining room has a large colored rug on top of
the carpet. But the living room is so big, it'd cost a lot of money to buy
one big enough. Overall in pretty good shape. It's just ugly. There are types
of fabric paints that can be used that & will take being walked on. I'd have
to come up with a large pattern or one that repeats & stencil it on the
carpet at regular intervals. Since the rest of the room has rose patterns (on
the door and wall a bit) I may do a rose stencil and use that. That will have
to wait though until all the walls are painted. Have the kitchen and the two
bedrooms left to do. This is so much fun. I think the interior condo work has
replaced my garden work since I don't have a garden.

Was able to unpack several more boxes of material and craft thingys into The
Cabinet. It suddenly occurred to me that the drawers could hold other things
besides dishwares. Yay. And all the decorative hatboxes I have around. Not
All of them have hats in 'em. I packed winter clothes into them. More boxes
emptied and things put away albeit in odd places. I am learning to Utilize
Storage Space.

I need to go get some poster frames too. I didn't realize I have so many.
They'll go into my craft room/office. I got the Zulli Sandman one. It's very
nice.

Busy. Busy.

Wonder what ideas they came up with on the black t-shirts. He could sign them
in silver or gold fabric ink with little drawings of rats and the sandman and
a wolf or something on them & I bet they'd go for a lot of money. What was
the final price on that signed skirt?
  

    
Actually, I'm quitting smoking.  Shoot me now.

     *

Walker: As long as you bring that eminently sqeezable fluffy tail,
your Big Bad Bunny don't scare me none.

Martha: Well, I know you were hesitant about writing the lyric, so I'm
hugely happy for you that you went through with it!  I'm sure it's
fabulous.  And many support beams for the playwriting.

Erynn: God, I miss thunderstorms.  Be sure and give us some warning if
you decide to run away off to San Fran, so we can gather!

Davey: Well, Walker more sort of didn't convince me *not* to do it, so
it's still mostly your fault.

Bill: Hope you can make it!  (Big hugs to Sarah.)

Dan W: I'm glad you're feeling better.  Emus!

Mary: I couldn't help it.  I kept waiting for Nightcrawler to stand up
and say, "I am invincible!"  Alan Cumming is a strangle little
creature, but I LOVED him in _Anniversary Party_.

Maure: Are you doing the radio show regularly, now? 's cool.

Tiny: *sideways glance*  Well, you see that would have required
*stagewalker* and *me* to be in the same room, as we were supposed to
meet up that weekend.  Instead, no one ever saw us together.  Make of
that what you will.

*shrieks* YOOOOONI-SAN!!!  As always, it's mucho fun for us to see
your beautiferous artwork.  Kisses to Yoonas.

Dodge: I'm mega-jealous of your gigantic antique china cabinet.  We
desperately need one, but have precious little room for it.
  

    

Holly - Neil donated a laundry basket with tons of black tees at a
reading he did for the CBLDF at New York University and IIRC they were
a best selling item.  It's a great idea to bring them back again.   

Haven't seen X2 but MATRIX RELOADED was awesome!  
  

    
Yes... it was all about The Matrix: Reloaded.

<swoon>
  

    <scribbled>
  

    
Walker 'n me took on Citywalk last night.  

Lotsa black clothing and a coupla margaritas at Hard Rock, where I saw
Fatboy Slim's "Weapon of Choice" video for the first time.  It made me
screamingly happy.  I think that I could get high and watch that video
rapturously on a repeat loop for at least 3 hours.

Then we put on our techno shades and went to see MATRIX: RELOADED. 
And I hate it when people foist preconceptions of new movies on me, so
I won't say anything.

Except, well, maybe...

that it's a mind-locking, adrenalin-screaming, devastatingly sexy, hot
hard rush through your veins ride of a thing.

With heart.

But that's all I'm sayin'.

    *

This post expresses the views of Pam's disreputable darker side and is
not to be interpreted as having been sanctioned by her officially
approved persona.  Any resemblance between Pam's Evil Twin and any
other person bearing her name is purely coincidental and may not be
used against her in a court of law.  This post may not be reproduced by
mimes.  It has not been sanitized for your protection.  Some assembly
required.  
  

    
Heh. And I was there to witness. <grin>

<swoon... THUD>
  

    
Heh, I got my pince-nez shades in the mail yesterday, and had already
donned my black dress shoes, black socks, black jeans, black dress
shirt, black vest and black leather trenchcoat. I swung by Miss
Mousey's work on the way to an Improv Jam and got the bestest reaction.

"Holy shit, you're wearing more black than ME!"

Of course, everybody at the jam had just seen the movie, but I
wouldn't let them talk about it cause I'm not seeing it until Sunday.
  

    

Hahahahaha! That's good, Dan.
  

    <scribbled by miko-chan>
  

    
Just got home from watching *IT*...

*ADRENALINE*!!!!!! *GYAAAAAAA~!!!!!* I'm on such a high I can't even
think straight...! ^_^;

All I have to say is, did everyone stay till the very end of the
credits?
  

    
Mimi: I *just now* got your voicemail! ARGH! Sorry about that. My
cellphone has been weird-iffy for a few days.

...and we almost didn't stay! The credits ended, and we got up... and
as we were leaving, we turned around to see what the fuzzy, crackling
noise was, and sat down real quick to watch.

I'm going out and buying the soundtrack today... after I see it again,
of course!

Rrar! Sexy, adrenaline, mind-twisting, hardcore yumminess! 
  

    
Martha - Yay for the award! And I'm sure you'll do fine. Not so
positive that you could do it standing on your head, but there's no
doubt that you most definitely could while lying down (or with your
hands tied behind your back).

Maure - Yay for RJ! (Let the endorsements begin!)

Dodge - I'd say 'I wish I could paint the walls in this place', but at
this point I don't think it would make much difference, as the whole
of the apartment (except parts of the ceiling) is covered in art of one
form or another. There may only be about 10m^2 of actual wall that you
can see in the entire living room, and I think some of that will even
be covered by the time I'm done putting EVERYTHING up. Sounds like your
painting project went well! I like the idea of stealth roses. :)


Miss Pamela, I would say something about having seen both Adriana and
Walker at the same event, but not having seen them at the same time, I
think you might be onto something. Let me just leave you with these
disturbing images (since you put them in my head)... Walker, in a
pretty dress, on stage, with lilting voice. Adriana, saying 'I like
cheese' in a strange nasal whine.

re: Neil's shirts - I don't even want to know what mine went for.
Suffice to say, Neil's fans are the best people. And no one looks at
you like you're quite the geek you are until you're walking around with
a Neil sig in puff paint on one of his old shirts. Excellent for
starting up discussions about the CBLDF too. :)

Pam, re: your Matrix post - You forgot to mention whether or not you
were a choking hazard, or non-toxic to carbon-based life-forms. :) I
have virtually no expectations for Matrix. I'm only going to count how
many times my friends made it onto the screen as extras (and
considering there was a Newsweek photo in which I indentified one of
them, it should be a fun count).

And Dan - It wasn't just the jacket, but the pants, the shoes, the
shirt, the shades... the only thing left on you that could have been
black was your hair. *I* don't even wear that much black when I'm spook
clubbing. I was merely impressed is all. ;)

Um, so I was kind of away for a while, trying to find a place to put
all the rest of my stuff (it's now happily sitting in boxes at the foot
of the bed, where they can be tripped over daily). Glad to see
everyone seems to be doing well. :)

And now that I've killed 2 hours reading posts and catching up, I need
to go do laundry. ttfn

squeaks, the thing with no clean socks
  

    
Damn it all to hell. Ever since this kidney thing started I've been
unusually susceptible to mild fevers. I was supposed to go see the
staged reading of a friend's first play and I've got a 100 degree
fever. It'll probably be gone by tomorrow morning, but I'm going in to
the hospital one last time and don't want to risk having to postpone it
because I'm sick.

grrrrrr

On the plus side, since I'm not going out tonight, I finished War for
the Oaks. I started it yesterday and finished it a few minutes ago.
Absolutely delightful. So many things I've tried to read lately have
left me cold, that to be able to immerse myself in a story was like a
drink of cool, clear water. It isn't even that the story was unlike
anything I've ever read before... in terms of simple plot elements it
read kind of like a combination of Mike's "The Last Hot Time" and
Mercedes Lackey's "Children of the Night"... but what grabbed me was
the characters. So many books I've been reading have characters that I
just don't care about. I don't like them, I don't identify with them, I
don't care about them. There were parts of this book that made my eyes
get all misty.

That's just a wonderful thing. So thanks to all who recommended it to
me!

Squeaks - the fact that I could impress you in any capacity makes me
all happy inside. BTW, today I was at the house of a friend who is hard
core into video games, and I mentioned that I wanted to get a copy of
Soul Reaver because of your Boy's involvement in it. I had been hoping
he would tell me a little more about the game, but he just brought out
his copy to loan me. It's for PCs though, and my poor little Mac and
Playstation can't do a thing with it. He delightedly scanned the
credits, though, to see who I was talking about.

Neil - Please make it back in one piece. I know about burnout and it's
not fun. 
I have decided, on a totally unrelated note, that next time I see you
at a signing I will wait around until you are finished and exhausted
and then come over and speak Portuguese to you just to see what
intresting english it turns into. Then again, my Portuguese accent is
extremely poor so it may just give you nightmares.

Mary - Happy Birthday tomorrow!

...
Wombat!