Monday 1st October 2007

Wow, October already! Aren't you shocked? That the year seems to be flying by, so quickly! I went to the post office and the supermarket today, and boy, I couldn't believe how autumnal it was. The trees are turning yellow, and there were a good few leaves on the ground - it was really what they would call dreich up in Scotland, that fine misty rain that soaks through everything without a drop actually forming, so it was wet and slippy underfoot. By the time I got to Sainsburies, I was dripping down the back of my neck, 'cos needless to say, I'd forgotten to take an umbrella with me. The sky was that horrible white colour - low cloud in other words, just horrible. Mind you it was a fair relief to leave the post office and find that the weather hadn't changed, most times by the time I leave, there's a full fledged downpour going on.

Sainsburies was almost pleasant. It was early afternoon, on a Monday - so it was really quite empty. I was able to whip around in a matter of minutes. I bought apples, pears and plums, and I've every intention of making myself a crumble at some point. Autumn crumble - a nice mix of those fruits, and crumble made from the usual flour, butter and sugar, but I'm going to add a small quantity of nibbed hazelnuts, and some pounded gingernuts. I'll let you know how it turns out!

I've been working hard on my Xmas order, and it's coming along very nicely. I've about five of the bookmarks done, and one of the bagcharms - it's a big order (well, big for me!) and I'd like to get it done. I've had some lovely beads arrive to do it with, really nice pink opaque glass 'melon' beads, which are sort of segmented up in the way that a pumpkin sometimes has segments. Most attractive. I made some bookmarks to send home with my brother who visited last week, and had a call from my sister in law last night to thank me for them - it was nice to chat with her on the phone. We don't talk often enough really. Don't you find that the time to just simply chat is hard to find? It's like rushing around from Peter to Paul and back again. I was working over this weekend, but because of a bit of an emergency at the work building, from home. I don't see it being fixed that quickly either, so I guess that I may be doing a night shift from home later in the week - my neighbours won't be best pleased I guess.

I've been reading Darkover books as well. Its funny but when I started reading science fiction, all those years ago, I used to read Asimov and Heinlein, what used to be called 'hard' sf. I used to quite despise fantasy, but as I've aged, I've read more and more of it. I'm lucky I suppose to be making my way through a saga of books that I've not read, classics of sf/fantasy, and I'm thoroughly enjoying it. I have about ten of them, and I've just bought some new one's from Amazon, (and hey, they've arrived quickly!) The biggest one that I got was the Renunciate books, which I'm pretty sure I have actually read - at least two of them at any rate, years and years ago, and totally out of sequence. I have an ambition to be able to read all of them in order, so I can read through the development of the books, the story - the planet. Anyhow after I've read that, I then have the last one to read, The Alton Gift. I say last, but my guess is it was essentially written from notes by the co-writer, after Bradley's death in 1999, and there's some blurb on the book that suggests there may be more to come. I'm not as anti this as one might think, I've read the 'new' Dune books, and they're not that bad - the concept is strong enough to carry them, without the genius of Herbert being actually present. My guess is that the Darkover concept may well be as well, the woman who's written this one talks in her introduction about how you have to fall in love with the original characters to be able to write them, and I'd agree with that. And since Darkover (and Dune, come to that,) are generational stories, you can move on to new characters - but it depends entirely on whether these writers are good enough to be able to create the solid dependability of good working characters to carry whatever plot it is that your working with. After all, there was only ever going to be one Paul Atreides, and one Regis Hastur et al, and (yep, this is the heresy) maybe a new writer will add something new that will actually deepen and enrich the stories. Ok, now in my experience so far this hasn't actually happened (I haven't read the Alton Gift book yet, and can't speak about this) but I did find with the Dune books that there was a coarsening of the stories. It was indefinable, I could no more put my finger on exactly what it was about them that missed the mark that Herbert snr hit every time, but I'd say it was that he lived the Dune world, whereas everyone else is interpreting his vision. But I'm not so entirely anti it as the purists seem to be. I live in hope that one day someone really will be able to enhance a saga - but then of course, with the laws of copyright as they stand it's unlikely to happen, because the people who are writing them are engaged by the publishers, and copyright holders. The person who will truly enhance one of these books is the person who writes from love of the story - which leaves me quite hopeful for the Alton book I was talking about. She does seem to have grasped that point, which you've got to admit is a good sign. So I'm moderately optimistic!