I was meant to attend the Beltane Festival at Butser Iron Age farm, but it never happened, though it caused plenty of inconvenience all around (my particular apologies to the gallant theoclarke for his generosity and prompt kindness) Fortunately, you can take the witch out of the fire but you can't take the fire out of the witch. Chums of the broomstick persuasion promised that they would visit me next day at my new lurklair in Hither Green, bringing miniature wicker men made of bound hay and straw to burn in the beautiful grove at the bottom of the garden.

The idea was that we would write little notes describing negative emotions/situations we wanted to get rid of, pin said notes to the wicker men, and immolate them. It is this aspect of witchery that I so enjoy, childish, artistic, a little sinister. My childhood landscape owes as much to Saki as to Narnia. I didn't like dolls but would never dream of harming one nor even cutting its hair; I didn't like them, they didn't like me, I would go to my books and they would sit pristine and untouched in a corner. Making my own would be different, I decided. I had a morning to create myself a wicker man and had neither wicker nor clue. But I had an awful lot of nettles.

Nettles are wonderful things really. Great tea, great hair conditioner, and for my literary soul, just perfect for the carrier of my sorrows cos of course they sting.

( The Nettle Man )

I need footage, lots of it. Creating it is not so easy, so if you know of fascinating events, tattoo parlour openings, gigs, rallies, anything unusual like that, where they might let a strange wandering woman interview hapless passers-by, let me know - and of course, anyone who wants to practice their camera work give me a shout.

Wonderful friends are helping out, but still, I should be scripting my next adventure and I'm not. I should be preparing for the holiday next week but I'm not. I should be washing my clothes for the next batch of shows but I'm not. I should be contacting the lovely nyarbaggytep re a portfolio but I'm not. I should be talking to the ever patient elevenwords re the drafting of the Spiders Bride webpage but I'm not. I should be writing my next book but I'm not. I should be checking with my mini-isa to make sure the right amount is going in but I'm not.

This is ridiculous. I can't move. This entry is meant to galvanise me into action, but it doesn't. I sit here and notice how cold my coffee has got. Can't go down to the kitchen to microwave it or make a new one. Instead I'll just grimace over it and stare at the screen.

How did I reach this state of exhaustion? There's been a lot of stress. I will know I am less stressed when I can unravel my head and write about it here, but for now, it's another thing my body won't let me do.

I have left the Tower now, abode of colonel_maxim, ellefurtle and caddyman with gratitude for their courtesy over my extended sojourn there. Now I have somewhere to stay in South London and I am very much in love with it; I know I am going to be happy there. My very first night I locked myself out, came home at 3 in the morning from the evening show to discover my mistake, and had to call out an emergency locksmith. £120 poorer at 5 a.m I finally went to bed only to get up 4 and a half hours later to be in for a briefing re the day show. Ironically, the show was brilliant, but since then I have collapsed good and proper.

There is so much to do, so much important stuff. But I just can't move. I just finished my disgusting coffee. I must get dressed or go back to sleep. Get up, boot, get up!

Zzzzzzzz.

If anyone knows where I can get a cheap/free battery power and nicely portable mike before 3rd May, can you let me know?

I appreciate how unlikely it is, but thanks for any help you can give.

Lots of Love

Sleepingboot

Edited to add: And this is the glory of lj. I have just been rescued in record time by the extraordinary theoclarke with irdm gallantly just behind, both offering microphonic assistance! Thank you gentlemen:-)

Been there less than a week and already you're causing trouble http://news.bbc.co.uk/

I have been exceedingly cool and constructive this morning, and am now entitled to do nothing til I come back from holiday!

This morning I've been watching the corvixian equivalent of Elizabeth Bennet and Mr Darcy...they flew, they fought, they jumped at each other and eventually ended up in a heap of bashful black feathers. Afterwards they hopped around all embarrassed. Crows manage to be loud and coy all at the same time. It's weird.

Strange dreams, rather nice...a garden in the Himalayas, I was there with larians. Noticed how beautiful it was, full of trees, one Sequoia especially, with another growing round it, not a parasite, just a spiralling tree, plus many others including a tree full of pears nyarbaggytep was there while I tried to pick the pears before they grew too ripe. It occurred to me that every tree I planted had grown. Then I was in a market where a lady tried to sell me two crude fish shaped sharpeners/pointless objects. She wouldn't sell them unless I took a small exercise book with them, and paid a tenner for the lot. When I took the exercise book away, I discovered that it had been written in, small notes, diagrams, all sorts of things, larians was angry that I had wasted my money on it and I can't recall properly but I think I threw it away.

Too much stuff in my head, and some of it just going round and round. colonel_maxim introduced me to the Easter Island concept of Tingo . Tingo means 'To borrow from your neighbour until they have nothing left.' Someone (not the colonel of course)has been practising a little Tingo on me and I've let it go on way too long. Time to say no and mean it. The more I think about this, the grimmer I get, so that will do for now.

Tonight the moon is the colour of the sea.

The temporary butterfly house outside the Natural History museum is just wonderful. A few of us went to check it out, and we had our doubts. See, you have to go through the maze to get into it, and the maze is full of education. It is also inevitably full of children with deely boppers on their heads, doing caterpillar walks and butterfly dances; they fled the fearful raven and played table football with ants; they may even have learned something. All we learned is that we would not be great mums. We ran into the butterfly house to get away from their enthusiasm only to find ourselves suddenly transformed into 8 year olds cooing 'Oooohlookatthatoneisn'titbig/pretty/lookatthe colours/ ohlookhe'seatingbanana
throughhiscombything /there'soneonthegroundoooh/thatonesamothinnitcositshairy/there'sloadsofthem ooooooo!' There was a wardrobe with hundreds of different sized pupae hanging in it; the whole thing looked like some leprechaun cobbler's workshop. It was magical.It's a good thing they weren't offering face painting at the end of the experience, we'd have gone for it.

http://www.nhm.ac.uk/visit-us/whats-on/temporary-exhibitions/amazing-butterflies/index.html?cam=hp-promo

I found some tiny violets growing on a small plot of land inhabited principally by old cans. It's the first time I've ever seen them in the wild.* Sweet.

I've decided I like Spring:-)

*No, not the cans. We've all heard of feral can colonies.

My boyfriend's birthday happened recently; I bought him an aquarium, and then backed off. None of this was going to be about me, he was going to choose everything, fish, colours, rocks...all his own work. Knowing his love of all things oriental, I was expecting tank pagodas and little bridges straight out of The Mikado, but no. There's only one ornament apart from the plants and rocks and that is a huge purple and yellow striped kraken sitting at the front. How do I know its a kraken and not a normal octopus? Because of the way it is gleefully wrapped around what appear to be the remains of the Black Pearl. Subtle. The monstah's orange eyes follow me around the room. When we finally get fish in this tank, I can guess which corner they'll avoid.

In other matters, whenever I let the cats in via the window, I keep thinking there's a third out there, wanting to come in. Into my minds eye flashes a shape on the windowsill, black and feline...maybe some enterprising moog keeps leaping on to the sill just long enough to catch the corner of my eye, or it's a strangely real memory of Chavcat who used to come visiting, or perhaps the basket of foliage on the ledge is casting strange shadows. Or maybe this caffeine free/milk free/alcohol free diet is doing strange things to my brain...

At work, this gentleman hit me in the eye and nearly took my head off:



In Sussex I got photographed up a yew tree. Never a great model, on this occasion I nearly broke my neck, right ankle, and the camera.

Over the last two days on a windy hilltop I nearly caught pneumonia.

Coming home last night I nearly fell asleep on my doorstep, which would have been a bad move cos this morning I was nearly snowbound.

Now I am nearly ready for bed. I don't care how early it is, the last fortnight has nearly killed me.

After a long stint of shows I came home to find our baskets and tubs full of Spring flowers, and our old broken side gate replaced by a pretty white picket one, all courtesy of the mighty home-making powers of larians!

The old gate has depressed me for years, broken and scraped like a rotting tooth...but this new one is so pristine, and we are surrounded by narcissi and primroses, happy little heather plants and pretty purple and white croci, plus some strange bobbly little plant I like but can't identify.

Added to all this is my early morning discovery that I'm back to 9 stone exactly, the weight I was at 19. In those days, no-one talked about BMI and anorexia nervosa was something that happened to very few while bulemia was unheard of. Then you had a 'fashionable weight' and a 'healthy weight', and in Britain, it was all about feet and inches, stones and pounds. The metric system turned up and I was too lazy to care. For a woman of 5' 4, yeroldetypedocs would say the healthy weight was 9 stone (58 kilos? something like that) and I gently wandered away from that, with the pill and chocolate love, and years of eating far too well, and lots of fats and sugars to ward off the rain and cold.

They tell you dreadful fibs about the pill. I remember going on one brand that was supposed to have minimal side effects - I put on masses of weight and within two months, my breasts reached Venus of Willendorf proportions. They said it was because I was so much more relaxed I was probably eating more. I promised them I never get that relaxed - that short of stuffing my face on cake and beer from morning to night, nothing could explain my new and frankly alarming voluptuousness.They just laughed, and changed my brand to one that gave me free migraines and heavy periods instead. Sometimes it is not so easy to be a girl.

All long ago.Now, here I am again, sans pill if not exactly chocolate free, and I love the way my body looks! My tum's a bit softer than I would like, so if anyone knows good exercises for keeping that bit flat and trim, I would love to hear. But it's nice to look at myself and smile again - this is the me I remember, a light girl with neither too much nor too little. This has all come down to adrenalin, night shows run on caffeine, and larians ability to cook fantastic weight watcher meals.

In fact, just about all my new found delight is down to larians efforts, one way and another. Spring is here and I am home again. Time to sleep!

I'm deeply indebted to those who have written reviews for The Spider's Bride. The professional ones take ages to come out; here is the first.

I'm so happy I'm crying. What a wap!

http://www.fantasybookspot.com/node/2422

So larians kindly offered to fix one of my necklaces for me; it's a cheapo, just a little green glass heart on a bootlace, but I am very fond of it and I had sundered one of the links by accident. Checking it over, he asked me to go and get the pliers resting on the tool box. I came back with the secateurs and a vague sense that the tools seemed awfully thick for the job.

I'm a genius you know, it's just sometimes I'm not very bright.

Harsh frost, heavy mist, ivy under snow, so pretty. Only shapes beyond the gate are gulls spilling out of the white sky over the gate. There's a tiger in the sunset, a moonrise clear and blue, and our garden is full of frozen poultry. OK, they're not frozen yet, but the whole garden has the look of a hospice for desperate avian tramps; I never feed the birds because our neighbour puts loads out for them, and her dog keeps our cats out, so why the brainless chirpers are ignoring her efforts and hanging out en masse in the haunt of their local serial killers beats me.

It cannot be left though. I'll dash out and buy birdfood, and try to keep the cats in. They have more sense than their victims, they just watch and chatter excitedly while staying in the warm. Come to think of it, they have more sense than me.

Amended to add So now I have braved the cold and bought some hanging thing full of birdy banquet. Naturally, not one of the feathered imbeciles is going near it.

Cardiff has a lot of parrots in it. I mean a lot of parrots, more than I've ever seen anywhere else, including Egypt and Nepal. They live in a brightly jewelled castle, full of funky carvings and neat decorations. The Marquis of Bute, who redecorated Cardiff Castle in the late 1800s picked a dazzling architect/designer, who made the place a tribute to the Marquis' interests and his own. The marquis liked biblical study, language, and medieval times. The architect liked parrots.

It wasn't just parrots, though clearly they held pride of place. Pillars with beetles and flies and seahorses painted round them, fountains of bronze beavers pointing their fish at you like little gatling guns, crabs and butterflies dotted all over the walls...I'm such a kid about this stuff.

We were in Cardiff to celebrate the 15 years greatbigshowoff and wildwinter have spent together. The party was something of a cunning ruse organised by greatbigshowoff, as her partner had no clue we were all going to be there until shortly beforehand. Then the band played, the dancing started, old friends talked and people munched at the huge buffet...it was a much simpler night than their beautiful Notwedding 5 years ago, but very satisfying. We had decided to make a weekend of it in Cardiff, and though I enjoyed shopping and the waterfront (must confess I cannot be as rabidly devoted as Russel T DrWhoAteChipsHereCoolOrWhat?) the castle was the biggie for me.

One room was not medieval; it was kept very simple and elegant with portraits, including a one of a young man in the jodphurs outfit of a first world war officer. Perhaps the painter had imbued the canvas with forlorn knowledge, as I could find no date for the painting, but it had a great pathos to it; one looked and instantly knew the gentleman had died in the war. He was handsome in a terribly English way, all rose bud cheeks and blue eyes and full lips hidden under a terrifying moustache - the sort of thing a very young man attempts to look strong and older. A delicate face, eyes with a gentle expression, Ninian Crichton-Stewart, one of the sons of the house. All gone. While he lived he was wealthy and loved and I reminded myself of the millions not immortalised, poor, plain and forgotten. But still, I couldn't help a sadness for Ninian. I waited till the others went into the library, and told him goodbye before we left the castle for sunshine.

as I proved after a long day show in which I got myself told off again for dropping microphones (I only do it on one producer's shows, because he makes me nervous by never shuttng up about it). I was stupifyingly tired, have been for weeks. But a friend's party called so after a dodgy risotto with chums we went off to a party/bowling alley/karaoke room thing with lots of music and we danced, or rather they danced and I hid behind a pillar doing the zombie shuffle.

I am used to moshers and goffs. I am not used to a world of shinypretties dancing like S Club 7 with uppers in their J2Os. Were the Aids Aware 80s responsible for a generation of yoof who never move their hips just in case? But they jump around which is always good in a kicky wholesome lose weight sort of way. And mostly everybody got very very drunk.

I never got to the bowling alley because, to quote the same producer I had antagonised that day, if I could do so much damage with a microphone, it was just bloody dangerous to let me loose with a bowling ball. I didn't care. Some fool or demon or just excellent chum bought me wine and sambuca and I bopped from here to eternity.

Then our beautiful and beloved hostess made us all slaves to a karaoke machine, which kept cutting out three quarters of the way through every song. We were all too far gone to individually sing. Instead we melded into a discordant carousal entity, and yodeled horribly alongside each other until we were all bunged into cars and taxis in the early hours.

I didn't want the night to end like this. I left the others as quickly as I could, just wanting to wander the streets. Nothing to it, I thought, down to Trafalgar Square and catch a night bus...the venue was near Russell Square and I wanted to walk down by the British Museum.

But no. Here comes the producer (show's over buddy, we're miles from the studio and streets away from the party) and he asks me what the hell I'm doing and am I crazy? Don't I know this is the middle of London? They tell me it's changed. I remember an old friend who lives across from the flat I had in London 4? 5? years ago... She told me the kids carry guns around there now. But still, even supposing nowhere is truly safe, middle of London, it's going to be drunks and pickpockets. For real trouble, you want rabbit warren housing estates and quiet little sidestreets. I had nothing worth stealing, except my cash and my bastard mobile phone, and frankly, the latter is so rubbish I ought to pay someone to take it off my hands. I told him this and he looked at me as though I was a maniac. He said it was dangerous.

I didn't argue because he was a)well meaning, b)sober and c)perfectly capable of folding me up and putting me in a car boot. So I enjoyed the hospitality of friends, even though my nostalgic heart wanted to see the old stomping ground. It was a wonderful night, but I can't help wondering, has everything really changed so much? London is a capital city and of course there's always been crime, but I still love the place, or the memory of the place. I don't know which is which really.

Now I am back in Manchester, living in a dressing gown. Today the bathroom door clicked and locked behind me. I was trapped in there until larians came home over an hour later. He had to nearly break the door down to get me out. Now that's what I call dangerous.

I must sleep.

Lots and lots and lots of shows, surely the audience is sick of me by now! I love my work, but I'm a bit dizzy. Imbolc is a strange time for me. Traditional paganism calls Halloween the time of the dead, but all my mentors seem to die around now, Gerald and Asphodel, and in less than a month, the anniversary of Rick's passing.

I haven't forgotten a thing. The measurement of time is a demi-fiction. I blame it on the druids and Stonenjjj. We were all fine until some fool decided we needed calenders.

So I was prepared to treat this as my time of mourning, except that little Miss Evie, daughter to the_lore, was christened on St Brigid's feast day, candlemass itself. As Brigid is a favourite goddess of mine and Lore is an excellent chum I took the hint and recognised that the cycle moves on and I move with it, death, life, babies, all that stuff. We had a lovely day.

I have an admirer, a producer/director with some success behind ready to be my, uh, friend. He doesn't work for the studio, I just bumped into him. Now I have seen the big house and the friendly dogs and the help ready with scripts etc, etc...now my mobile is jammed up with messages from him, delete, delete, delete...

I can't do the etcetera. Twenty years beyond the moment when he would have been attractive, twenty years beyond the moment when I would have been impressed or at least pleased at being pursued, I don't want to offend this charming and pleasant man, I just know what I want and what I don't want. Will I be sorry to have refused him, when there's no more work and the TV game is over? Never.

Cycles indeed, almost a fitting epitaph: she never got the plot and she never knew wisdom, she was always crazy and emotionally overloaded. But at some point, with a lot of joy in her heart, she kinda sorta grew up.

1) Being woken by rain and wind against the panes, feeling snug in bed.
2) Paying that furnshlugginer tax bill this morning, no hassle.
3) Organic liquorice sticks with mint fondant running through the middle; 'pandas' they're called, and I always get one (though I could easily eat three) when I walk down to Royton.


Wild skies and tumbling weather... sometimes it's depressing but not today; today is fresh.

I love a good horror story. Sometimes it helps to know it's a horror story in advance.

When larians bought 'The River Cottage Meat Book' by Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, I was prepared for my usual sneers regarding the author, a man whose tv series about his smallholding, 'River Cottage' down in Dorset, resurrects every Famous Five cliche except the dirty stinking low class villains who always get caught in the end. His is a pure sweet Dorset populated by men with cider enhanced sideburns and their practical peahen wives, incubated in jam jars at the local women's institute. There are no children in Dorset; people are born at the fine age of 53, safe from new ideas, loving the old and playing skittles when they feel daring.

I watch the show with a kind of dreamy contempt that veers between wanting a smallholding of my own full of fine fat pigs and lambs, and obliterating the whole smug little fib with a death ray from Mongo. I am a fan.

So then, this book. I was expecting an homage to darling Dorset, far from the evils of the city. Well, now I know.
( meat )

It's strange that my inability to read let alone write lj has been brought to a halt by news of the death of Heath Ledger. It was bound to hit hard - how many repeats of A Knight's Tale have I watched on Sky? - it isn't even that great a film, it just makes me feel good. Brokeback Mountain,for all its lack of pace, really haunted me; Ennis Del Mar was a lumpen crag of inarticulacy, don't know how I ended up feeling so much for him. Well, yes I do I guess; Mr Ledger's acting. Goodbye Mr Ledger, and thanks. I'm sorry it got so tough. I'll watch the Dark Knight and remember you.

xxx