For Auld Land Syne

On this troubled New Year's Eve, let me take a moment to wish everyone a safe New Year, and I'll add a personal wish. May 2022 be a garden, tranquil, restful, peaceful, filled with the scent of flowers, the hum of bees, birdsong, and a cat on the lap or a dog at feet, or both. To family and friends everywhere -- be happy, be safe. And as the saying goes, "See you next year."

Merry Christmas to all!

Marking the date, on Christmas Night, after a curious day. It's been fraught with so many problems, one would have thought a gremlin was on the loose! Technology refuses to work -- Blu Ray players, plural, graphics tablet, phone, computer drivers, so many technical issues, I'm speechless. The net result is, though we just put a Blu Ray player under the Christmas tree, we'll have to buy another immediately; and the graphics tablet won't be online for weeks, till we order, and receive a cable. 

And against all of this, of course, it's the C word. South Australia opened our borders and invited the virus in, four weeks ago. To go from "Covid-Zero" to a runaway infection rate in so short a time has been disconcerting to say the least, and downright scary, to put it more honestly. The future has become tremendously uncertain. It's an odd feeling, at Christmas of all times.

Dave is working right through this season again -- the fourth consecutive year. He's an essential worker, and I rather think that even if he'd booked holiday time, he'd have been called in to work ... things are so dire, essential workers (and their families) are making all kinds of sacrifice, of necessity.

There's not more more to say here. I hasn't really been "Christmassy" at all, but we do what we can and hope for the best. Perhaps 2022 will be better ... but I have the traditional "bad feeling about this." I think we'll need to be flexible, and just roll with it, see where the new year takes us.

La Nina decides to stay for the summer

Photo by Dave, and his amazing camera phone!

What November blog would be be complete without some mention of the weather? This is beyond absurd. With seven days of the month left, an Aussie summer about to start in one week, it's chilly and bucketing down. The plan for today was coffee at the Aldinga Aerodrome café, where they do excellent cappuccino, and then on to Belair NP for a picnic, a walk, "pitch camp" at our favourite area, and spend a quiet hour or so reading. Well, we got as far as the coffee at the airfield part!

It's settled in to rain all day; there "isn't enough blue in the sky to patch a sailor's jacket," and it's not even warm! A week off summer, and I went out in my winter coat! La Niña. What can you say? The forecast is, it's here for the summer, for the seond consecutive year. Sooo ... I'll just settle down and spend the rest of the day with artwork...

Lately, since writing has been impossibly difficult, I've been concentrating on art, and reading my old stuff, trying to reawaken the literary muse. I think I feel it starting to stir awake and whisper into my ear, but all I've been able to produce lately are drabbles and poems; though one or two of those poems, I'm rather proud of. Especially this one ... pentameter is extremely hard to wrangle. But since the computer upgrades in May - July, the software has been bouncing me around like a rubber ball, and it's tiresome. I now have a computer that's faster and faster at doing less and less, because the software has become uncooperative, due to some subtle incompatibility with the hardware, post-upgrade. So --

Writing is becoming more attractive! I'm also going to try a different software system, something called Unreal Engine. That might make it possible for me to do stuff that, lately, has become ridiculously impossible, when it used to simply be slow, before the upgrade! Who'da thunkit?! But yes, writing is becoming more and more attractive, as the art becomes increasingly problematical. I have a short piece to finish, a novel to finish editing, a novella to begin, a number of flash-length items to do, then (gulp) a novel to write. There's plenty of work waiting for me --

And with the pandemic about to reach South Australia at last, I shall have nothing but time on my hands. The state opened its borders about fifteen hours ago, at a minute past midnight this morning. We're about to go from zero covid cases, none at all, to many thousands, with many hundreds in hospital, thousands in quarantine, and scores dead. I guess it had to happen sooner or later, but the fact is, we've kept it out of SA for twenty months, and some of us don't want to let it in. Sigh. 

The personal plan at the moment is to "go to ground," lie low, and watch what happens. What can you say? Nothing. Grumbling doesn't help. Much. What can you do? Subtract yourself from the equation, focus on art, writing, reading, go for walks in the national parks, and just don't go anywhere people are t be found in the mass ... and watch how it plays out over four to ten months. Yes, months. 2022 is shaping up as a long, slow year.

I'll post again soon, when the Christmas tree goes up ... yep, it's that time again. I haven't written much here in 2021, because I couldn't find much to write about; also, anything I write, and stuff that's published, lands on my writing blog now. On top of that, I'm about to float an art blog, to showcase my work. Oh, yes, I can keep myself busy, no question of that! 

Jen Downes Writes ?!

Just a quick post here to mark the date when I decide to hive off a writing blog, rather than cramming writing, art, photography, travel and personal stuff into the same blog. Which of course indicates that I'll be hiving off a photo blog and a new art blog ... and I really must put some time into the travel blog, which hasn't been updated in about twenty months! So here's the link to the fiction blog: https://jen-downes-writes.blogspot.com ... and as the name suggests, it's Jen Downes Writes. Not quite a blog; more of an anthology of on-going works, and a second-life venue for items which were published years ago and are now forgotten. 

I'll be back on my personal blog here soon enough, with an update covering the last couple of months. We did manage to get a road trip to Eyre Peninsula, but little has happened outside of that. Certainly nothing momentous enough to be worthy of a post! But I'll at least synopsise the last couple of months, just to keep in touch with this blog before it goes the way of all others. 

Starting the writing blog off, I've produced a new suite of art for the old vampire story, and posted it for Halloween. Invitation to the Crypt -- somewhat rewritten also, reedited and brought up to date. It hasn't been posted afresh in five years! Time surely does fly. 

The July Report -- so late!

It's safe to say that spring has sprung, even if it doesn't actually feel like it, much of the time, to humans. The paddocks are full of lambs, birds are nesting ... yep, it's spring. Humans feel the cold -- or is it just me? Grey skies and rain only have so much charm, even if we also deplore the summer heat and our potential for a wildfire. Warmer, brighter days are on my mind now. Every year, we promise ourselves we'll get out more on nice winter days, use that parks pass and spend lovely mornings at Belair NP. Four years ago, Mom was in her final days and I was sooo ill, so it didn't happen. Three years ago, I was hopelessly lame following an accident. Two years ago, we did manage to get there, as I recall ... last winter was a bust, since we spent it mostly in lockdown! This winter, the weather has been so awful, we didn't do much at all, with the result that I'm sure I have an attack of what Alaskans call "cabin fever." You're just sick and tired of being inside, starting to feel claustrophobic about walls, even though it's so cold, wet and windy out, you can't go out for very long! The human condition. Check. But I have been managing to get out now and then, and get mobile and motivated --

A couple of weeks ago, we got up to Laratinga, at Mount Barker ... naturally, I managed to fall down in the muck (it was slithery after rain) and bash up my right knee. That took a week to come good enough to try again, and this time we found ourselves at the Swanport Wetlands, where I got some reasonable birdie pics, including a Personal First ... this, right above, is a Swamp Harrier. Never managed to capture one before, and even though this isn't a closeup (which won't, can't, happen before I get a very much better camera than this one!), it's actually a fairly good picture. It was a day for photographing little birds, but they weren't going to cooperate. I've never had so many images of birds' tails as they run or fly in the other direction! They just wouldn't cooperate! But I did get some good shots...

Yes, I know, it's "only" a sparrow ... but he was up among the swallows' nests, with not a swallow in sight. This year's nests seem to be ready for occupancy. They're right on the underside of the road bridge at Swanport Wetland, the bird sanctuary, and I'm amazed these birds can tolerate the noise and vibration. Swanport is nice, but the noise from the road, and bridge, is colossal. It bothered me, walking around there for a couple of hours, but these birds live and breed there. Nature never ceases to astonish. There's nothing to be done about the noise; the bridge is just there...

Otherwise, the last month or six weeks has been about the computer ... the new one, still under warranty, which isn't working properly, and has been in and out of the workshop like a yoyo. New CPU. New PSU. New motherboard. New GPU. Crash, crash, crash. It's under warranty, but there's still a lot we have to pay for, and it's not coming cheaply. Every time it comes home, it comes back upgraded and more powerful, but all you can do is hope. It's under warranty for another four months, and one would imagine its problems will all be sorted by then! In between breakdowns, it's doing fabulous work; the art is better than ever...

I've got a gorgeous fantasy world going here. I love living in it, and having the computer in the workshop is a jolt of reality I don't appreciate, and don't like. I'll survive. There is one more piece of news which is The Big One, so I've saved it for last:

Note: not my picture! Borrowed from the interwebs.

Finally, finally ... "In the Company of Ghosts: is going to appear! It'll be in the October 24 issue of Sylvia Magazine, and I'm thrilled to bits about this. Sylvia is a an eZine, so there'll be no print copy, but the online mag is beautiful, and my little story is a terrific "mesh" with the spirit of the e-publication. This is marvelous news, and I'll blog it again, when the page goes live. Save the best for last? This report is so late, we're almost in the the middle of August, and in fact this news is really August's news; but I wasn't going to wait, to blog it in The August Report! However, I will try to get that one done before September wears away...

Bagheera's Day, again. It's been seven years...

 

It's that time again ... and it seems to come around faster every year. Bagheera left us seven years ago today. It seems like yesterday -- a gray, rainy, cold morning, well suited to calling it a life and throwing the gates wide open to the next adventure. He was almost fourteen years old, which isn't terribly old for a cat, but he'd lived a fabulous life. It was Freddie Mercury who said words along the lines of, "It's more important to live a fabulous life than a long one." There was a time I didn't know what he meant, but now I do. Wish age comes wisdom, I suppose. So ... remembering the Black Prince, who could be a holy terror as well as a little angel ... champion ratter (yes, he caught, killed and proudly displayed an absolutely enormous rat that wouldn't have gone quietly). He was a fighting cat, carrying is scars with pride, long legged, lean and sinuous, right to the end end of his days. Also a lap cat, a snuggler, a five a.m. bandit ... a shelter kitten who came with us from the Lonsdale shelter at New Year, just a few weeks after Dave arrived in Australia. And we miss him still; we always will.

The June Report ... late

 

Here's the June Report coming in a week late ... the computer has been in the workshop. Verdict: malware, picked up from regions unknown. I don't go anywhere to get malware -- the only sites I download from are safe, even the "second tier" ones, like Polyhaven.com, Brushezy.com and VHV.rs -- I know, I checked. From those sites, I download things like HDRI images to use as environment lights for 3D renders, .ABR Photoshop brushes to paint with, and PNG files for combination into projects. Yes, they're free resources, but they're from kosher sites; so ... who knows what's safe these days? Bottom line, it cost me $99 to have the system back home, malware-free and reconfigured to be a) screamingly fast, and b) Win11 compatible...

For some reason, I've struggled this last month. My health isn't what it should be -- pain levels too high, energy levels too low. So I'm not getting the exercise I need, and am noticing that my fitness is slumping. But how do you walk those distances, up hill, on screaming feet and hips? It's getting more difficult as time goes by, and every day my body reminds me that I'm ploughing through my sixties. Not my forties or fifties, my sixties. The thought is enough to chill your blood. Ack. We solider on.

Soooo ... I get out when I can (which isn't nearly often enough; another downside to disability), and get all the walking I can (ditto), and I can only hope the body will improve naturally as spring comes in. This is the dead of winter, after all. The big hope I'd had was that the new camera would be really, really good, and give me the impetus to get out there, hike many miles, get the great photos ... well, it didn't happen. The Panasonic Lumix FZ-80 is something of a compromise camera. They loaded it with technology, but skimped on lens quality, and when it got to high-end technology, again, they shorted the unit. The sensor is too small; the processor is too wimpy; there aren't enough megapixels (they opted for 18MP, not 20.3, as in the TX-90); the lens elements are ... not Leica. And you can tell. Put the whole shebang together, and you get a $450 packet of "Hmmm" moments ... in other words, it's a good stopgap camera, to get me through a couple of years when I simply cannot afford something better. But my sights are set on a range of Nikons, and which I buy in 2024-ish, will be down to how, and even if, my writing is turning into a cash flow!

At the moment, writing isn't turning into cash, but I still have to hope. If you didn't hope, you'd drop the whole effort! I look at Mike and see how he's succeeding ... but I also look at the sheer volume of work he's investing in his career. And I realise how burned out I am. I got through Dark is The Valley, and I seem to have stalled. I don't seem to be able to find the resolve, energy or inspiration to write -- and writing doesn't just happen by itself. So ... art.

And the art is getting better than ever, bigger and more complex, better executed. Yes, of course I've thought about trying to turn art into a cash flow! But the competition there is just as fierce as in the field of writing and trying to sell stories -- the pay checks are about the same, but I doubt there are a tenth as many art (card?) publishers as there are indie magazine publishers, while there are more artists trying to get through the door with them. So yes, I've thought about trying to turn the art into cash, but how can I not be a realist about this? Hmmm.

So ... at the moment art is purely a hobby. It might become more, it might not -- and the same could be said of writing. Both of these hobbies tend to pivot on my state of health, which is a bit dodgy at the moment; and writing is the biggest challenge of all. I know I can do it ... but do I want to? That's the huge question right now. I suspect I'll feel better about it when the Analog issue is published, and my name appears in it. Has to happen sometime in the next six months or so, because the story was accepted on my birthday last year. I tell myself, "Hold on, things will soon look different." And I still trust myself -- more or less. 

...and so ends the June Report, about a week late!