Things I Think About

In lieu of an actual post today, here are some things rolling around inside my head, in no particular order.

* The Killer as Aesthete. I’ve been kicking around this idea of murderers portrayed with heightened sensory acuity as aesthetes for a while. From Anne Rice’s vampires and their florid sensory overloads to Hannibal Lecter and his refined palate–it’s strongly implied Hannibal senses/experiences things differently than normal people–the killers seem to have all sorts of supernatural senses. Once I started noticing it, it was everywhere. I am trying to decide if it’s a sense of writerly shame at diving into these horrid characters doing transgressive things, or a way to remove said characters safely into fantasy, or…? It’s an inchoate mass of concepts revolving in my head, and fun to think about.

* Often, I find myself looking at very large things–cranes, buildings, jets, bridges–and struck by the thought that hands no bigger than mine put these massive items together. Brains no bigger than mine conceived of it, figured out building it. Human beings are amazing.

* I think the gigantic squirrel who’s been taunting the dogs from the back fence is Beauregard, but he doesn’t seem to recognise me. This…could escalate quickly.

* Of course deciding to cut down on refined sugar means all I can think about are cupcakes. Fuck this noise. *eats cupcakes*

* Reading Rudé on the crowd in the French Revolution makes me wonder about the compositions of current protest crowds. It also made me wonder if der Turmper is analogous (however loosely) to the Thermidorean Reaction. It certainly seems we’re living in a counter-revolutionary (what a loaded term!) moment.

* Being so exhausted everything around you seems underwater, and your face begins twitching in strange ways, is odd. There’s got to be a word in some language for that precise state of being. I’m betting there’s one in German.

* Latin, piano, knitting. Apparently I can only have two of the three. BUT I WANT THEM ALL.

* There is a red bubble on my Slack icon that won’t go away. It distresses me with the idea that I’m missing something. CURSE YOU, TINY TELLTALE.

* A Year’s Worth of Water is a great story title. Grabbed from Cliff Mass’s weather blog, of all places.

* True to form, now that I’m focusing on only two instead of three projects at once, the Muse is trying to tempt me with a bakery witch, her crazy family, and her habit of helping other people fall in love. Goddammit.

And that is an (incomplete) list of things swimming around in my head. The rest would take too long to write.

Over and out.