Imaginal Casements

Watching Elisabeth has caused me to expand my historical knowledge. I now know what the Austrian-Hungarian Compromise was. Well, more or less. As long as I'm not asked to explain it.

Pictures of two quilts I've been working on, both at the "awaiting handsewing round edge" stage:

http://incandescens.livejournal.com/pics/catalog/2279/108402 - about a metre by a metre and a half. (This one's reserved.)
http://incandescens.livejournal.com/pics/catalog/2279/108114 - about six feet square. (This one's going to take a while to sew round the edge.)

Now where did I put that DVD of The Seven Per Cent Solution...

This is the stuffed snake I made the other day:

Snake
Close-up of snake head

And these are two quilts I made recently, which are now up on etsy, so I might as well give the link to that rather than upload more photos:

Rail fence quilt in red, black, and white roses
Tiffany-esque quilt in red, black, orange, and green

Finished another quilt, which was a gift for the friend of a friend. You may remember that a few weeks back, I was making happy noises because someone had given me a pile of fabric, mainly men's shirting stuff? I felt that I owed something from it in return. Blue, she said. So I went with blue.

Front view
A bit of the back view

It's been a good weekend. I feel quite nicely rested. (This feeling may last a whole five minutes into Monday morning. Possibly even ten minutes.)

---

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way -– in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only.

-- A Tale of Two Cities, Charles Dickens

Tiring day today, and probably another tiring day tomorrow, as there's a deadline to hit.

Finished knitting a scarf for a friend. If the emanations of whatever we're watching/thinking of while knitting got into it, then it contains the residue of several episodes worth of Criminal Minds. Interesting thought.

Here are a few photos of the cat quilt that I made for a friend's granddaughter. You may recognise some of the fabrics, archangelbeth . . .

Front view
Close-up
Showing a bit of the back

I must have twisted my back a bit at the weekend; it's been a bit painful the last couple of days. Must try to sleep straight tonight and not curling up.

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Remembrance of things past is not necessarily the remembrance of things as they were. -- Proust

Another busy day.

Also ... well, one of my coworkers is leaving. She's just given in her notice and made a general announcement. (I knew about it yesterday, but it wasn't public at that point.) Which means we've only got her for another 12 weeks. It's going to be really hectic when she's gone, as she's in my particular area of the team (cross-mapping). I understand her reasons totally -- her mother lives down south and is not well, and she's managed to find a reasonable job down there -- but while I'm glad for her, I'm selfishly annoyed for myself. Though trying not to show it, of course.

Oh well. Que sera, sera.

I will console myself with having cultivated my Suspicion until I got sent to New Newgate Prison in Echo Bazaar. There are things which can be done/obtained there which can't be done/obtained elsewhere in the game. (Rubs hands together and cackles.) Really, that is such an excellent game.

I think my common sense is telling me to have an early night tonight. I think I may even listen to it.

Also, the hand-quilting is Within Measurable Distance Of Its End, which is very good news. Hand-quilting is even more annoying than whipstitching the back of a quilt binding, and it has to look tidier. Only one more pink flower, two edges of grey/brown flowers, and four patches of leaves. Whee. I would not be working on it so continuously, were it not for the fact that coworker's wife is due in mid-June, and it would be nice to have the quilt ready to hand over at around the time that the baby arrives. Otherwise I would definitely be diverting myself with more entertaining/easier stuff for a break.

I have a curious urge to imagine a Chalet School/Laundry crossover. Yes, the Charles Stross Laundry, and yes, the Elinor M Brent-Dyer school story Chalet School. It'd be easy enough to have the doctors doing something interesting up at the Sanatorium which the school always stays close to. And don't tell me that all those multiple childbirths of Jo Bettany's (or Maynard) aren't suspicious.

No, what's clearly going on (again the "clearly") is that someone is collecting people to use their minds/brains for a distributed processing network. The girls are got at while they're young, trained/programmed while they're at the school, and then released across the world, though admittedly mainly in Britain/Europe (though we've also had girls from Australia, America, India, Kenya, and so on ...) So who is it, building up this network? What's the connection with whatever's being worked on in the Sanatorium? And what happens when They (whoever They are) finally activate it?

---

What happens at the Royal Bethlehem Hotel?

The manager of the Hotel offers free rooms to guests of particular note or interest. He irritably denies the suggestion that he might be 'collecting' them.

-- Echo Bazaar

Why weren't more Art Nouveau pictures of men? Yes, I know, obvious answer, it wasn't what the art style was about. But it would still have been useful for some current plans.

But doing some art research online does broaden my nodding acquaintance with various artists and pictures, and introduces me to some completely new stuff. Like this -- Kunstformen der Natur (German for Art Forms of Nature), a book of lithographic and autotype prints by German biologist Ernst Haeckel. Frogs. Lizards. Hummingbirds. They're gorgeous.

(Though possibly not that many other people would be considering getting fabric made up in those designs and making cushions or quilts. Then again, maybe they would.)

---

The Twelve Moons

[...]

Fourth Moon

Cool at dusk and dawn are the trees on the earth.
In depths of green a thousand mountains hover beneath the clouds.
The faint-scented rain falls among evil mists.
Teeming leaves and round flowers shine on the curved garden gates.
In the stone ponds the water shakes off leisurely green ripples.
So heavy is this summer the blossoms are not surprised to fall.
Faded red flowers on the earth glow in the shade of the trees.

[...]

-- Li Ho, translated by Ho Chih-yuan

Dinoquilt is done! (And I will be taking it into work tomorrow to show off.

Front view
Back view
Corner view

Other than that I am extremely tired and had a rather annoying phone meeting this afternoon in which one of the participants had a very bad crackle on the line, and have a team position meeting tomorrow.

But. There is a craft show on Saturday in Manchester.

I will have to try to be thrifty and good. But not too good.

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Lord Lundy

Second Canto


It happened to Lord Lundy then,
As happens to so many men:
Towards the age of twenty-six,
They shoved him into politics;
In which profession he commanded
The Income that his rank demanded
In turn as Secretary for
India, the Colonies, and War.
But very soon his friends began
To doubt is he were quite the man:
Thus if a member rose to say
(As members do from day to day),
'Arising out of that reply . . .!'
Lord Lundy would begin to cry.
A Hint at harmless little jobs
Would shake him with convulsive sobs.
While as for Revelations, these
Would simply bring him to his knees,
And leave him whimpering like a child.
It drove his colleagues raving wild!
They let him sink from Post to Post,
From fifteen hundred at the most
To eight, and barely six-and then
To be Curator of Big Ben!. . .
And finally there came a Threat
To oust him from the Cabinet!

The Duke - his aged grand-sire - bore
The shame till he could bear no more.
He rallied his declining powers,
Summoned the youth to Brackley Towers,
And bitterly addressed him thus-
'Sir! you have disappointed us!
We had intended you to be
The next Prime Minister but three:
The stocks were sold; the Press was squared:
The Middle Class was quite prepared.
But as it is! . . . My language fails!
Go out and govern New South Wales!'

The Aged Patriot groaned and died:
And gracious! how Lord Lundy cried!

-- Hilaire Belloc

Very quiet day. Decided to have a day in, and do my regular grocery shop tomorrow.

Finished two more cushion covers, one of which I'd already started yesterday:

Blue cushion, Endless Path block pattern
Asian-style fabric cushion (yes, I know, very pseudo fabric)

I have to stop messing around with these neat short-term projects and actually start sewing on dino-quilt. Perhaps tomorrow.

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An Immorality

Sing we for love and idleness,
Naught else is worth the having.

Though I have been in many a land,
There is naught else in living.

And I would rather have my sweet,
Though rose-leaves die of grieving,

Than do high deeds in Hungary
To pass all men's believing.

-- Ezra Pound

Moderately busy Sunday today.

a) phoned second branch of local shoe shop to see if they had a pair of the boots I wanted in the colour I wanted. They didn't. But at least that spared me the decision of whether or not I wanted to go out this afternoon to try and get them. And there are branches of said shop all over the UK, and I can always order a pair after Christmas if I don't mind waiting. So no big deal.

b) cleaned bathroom.

c) made earrings for coworker (for his wife - he requested "Bollywood style"). http://pics.livejournal.com/incandescens/pic/000a1852/g38

d) finished small purple quilt.
http://pics.livejournal.com/incandescens/pic/000a528b/g39 - front view
http://pics.livejournal.com/incandescens/pic/000a639r/g39 - back view

(And here are photos of the cushion from a few days ago.)
http://pics.livejournal.com/incandescens/pic/000a31rz/g39 - front view
http://pics.livejournal.com/incandescens/pic/000a422y/g39 - back view

e) watched Patrick Stewart in A Christmas Carol.

f) wrote Christmas cards and wrapped presents for coworkers.

Tomorrow involves a long meeting. It also involves work Secret Santa, which should be more fun.

---

“Spirit,” said Scrooge, with an interest he had never felt before, “tell me if Tiny Tim will live.”

“I see a vacant seat,” replied the Ghost, “in the poor chimney-corner, and a crutch without an owner, carefully preserved. If these shadows remain unaltered by the Future, the child will die.”

“No, no,” said Scrooge. “Oh, no, kind Spirit! say he will be spared.”

“If these shadows remain unaltered by the Future, none other of my race,” returned the Ghost, “will find him here. What then? If he be like to die, he had better do it, and decrease the surplus population.”

Scrooge hung his head to hear his own words quoted by the Spirit, and was overcome with penitence and grief.

“Man,” said the Ghost, “if man you be in heart, not adamant, forbear that wicked cant until you have discovered What the surplus is, and Where it is. Will you decide what men shall live, what men shall die? It may be, that in the sight of Heaven, you are more worthless and less fit to live than millions like this poor man’s child. Oh God! to hear the Insect on the leaf pronouncing on the too much life among his hungry brothers in the dust!”

-- A Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens

Reasonably nice day today, if also reasonably quiet, which is very reasonable.

Here are some photos of the recent baby quilt, now finished:

http://pics.livejournal.com/incandescens/pic/0009hryz/g39
http://pics.livejournal.com/incandescens/pic/0009ke56/g39

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Fifth Month rain --
the five thousand five hundredth
rented umbrella

-- Issa