Various things

[nineveh_uk]

(1) After my "maybe I should" angsting, I have now resolved that I am not going skiing at Easter. It's disappointing, but the right decision. I applied the lottery test* and confirmed that if being paid for out of a finite source, the guided bit of a guided trip really needs to be at exactly the right level or I'm going to feel frustrated. So that's that. Instead - and how's this for glamour - I shall go to the Turkish bath at Swindon and at least get a decent sauna, and save the holiday money (and the annual leave) for the summer.

(2) Writing seems to be progressing. Last night was not a success, but I think that's because the next scene is a significant one , and I am anxious about writing it not so much because I think it will be technically difficult, but because it’s a big step in the story and I’m thinking “but have I done everything I need to do in preparation”. Which is silly, because I can always go back and add material if necessary. And also because it is an essential part of a murder mystery that somebody die.

(3) From the department of "the old ones are not in fact the best", an episode summary from the back of a free disc of Upstairs, Downstairs episodes. So much for its being more realistic than Downton Abbey:

Elizabeth and Rose return home one evening after a concert to find that a certain Baron Klaus Von Rimmer, a friend of the people she stayed with in Germany,* has called on her parents. The Bellamys like their guest and invite him to stay and assign Albert to be his valet. It soon transpires that the Baron is actually a spy who has tried to bribe Richard into helping his armaments company to get a contract from the British Navy. This is not all, he has also seduced Albert.

I am absolutely not writing a Red Dwarf crossover.

(4) I have been listening to random Handel, as you do. Endless Pleasure, from Semele. Seldom has a song been better named.

*"What would I do about this issue if I won the lottery today?" It's excellent for addressing how one feels about all sorts of things, though I usually use it for analysing how annoyed or otherwise I am at work in the form of "how much notice would I give?"

**I think that must mean Elizabeth. Rose is the servant.

Comments

[antisoppist]

Decent sauna....

I continue to admire the way the murder is the least essential element of your murder mystery.

If you won the lottery, wouldn't you do all sorts of things that you wouldn't otherwise? Or is it that if you still wouldn't do it if you won the lottery, then you know you really really don't want to? I favour the Miranda West method of tossing a coin and seeing whether you are disappointed or not by the result. Or there is the bit where I write lists of plusses and minuses and analyse things to death and then do it anyway just to see what Fate produces next, which is how I ended up applying to teach English to Finns in the Arctic Circle, and having children.

Handel made a nice change from Elijah on repeat.

[parrot-knight.livejournal.com]

I wouldn't put a bit of espionage past Rose...

[slemslempike.livejournal.com]

I am absolutely not writing a Red Dwarf crossover.

BOOOO.

The lottery test is a great idea. I shall have to remember it next time I am having decision angst.

[a-t-rain.livejournal.com]

I started watching Upstairs, Downstairs to cope with the DA withdrawl, and came to the same conclusion pretty quickly.

[sonetka.livejournal.com]

I'm slightly embarrassed that I remember this, but it was Alfred, not Albert. Alfred returns a few seasons later having stabbed his employer/lover to death and ends up holding another servant hostage before being arrested and finally hanged. I loved watching UD, but yeah, it's a soap.