Drugged wooden giraffes in my living room

Winter is looming and the days are getting shorter and decidedly colder. I have re-stocked my sock drawer and even raided Barry's old pairs in a desperate attempt at warmth. The cats are no longer lolling around on the lawn, but rather, they find the spot where the heat pump's warmth is optimal and then squabble about who sits there. I now switch on the lights in the lounge early to be able to read my books in the afternoon. I do have a lovely floor lamp, third or fourth hand, that Barry saved from the rubbish heap and fixed up for me. But sadly it has broken and I do not have the skills to repair it. I think it has finally reached the end of it's life. Sorry Barry, it is beyond redemption. I decided that today I would look for a new lamp. But not the boring old ones that litter my garage. No, I saw this amazing lamp that had a bronzed giraffe with its head poking out through the top of the shade and I thought, yup, that is my taste entirely. Sadly, the lamp is not available here in Kiwiland and they were made for a specific five star hotel at some exotic location. I suppose I could buy one if I was prepared to travel overseas, oh that is right, no one is travelling anywhere at the moment. I can purchase knock-off Tiffany lamps by the dozens, and even a few art-deco pieces, but none with animals or even nice flowers. So, ever resourceful, I dashed to the shops and looked at resin animals that I could drill a hole in and thread through a long pipe of some sort ... with a light-bulb on the top for light of course. Nope, all the cute animals were gone. This doesn't mean I can't find other, less kitsch ones, but at a much more inflated price. Which my bank manager assures me I cannot afford. There was a whole heap of gnomes and I did consider liberating some into cute lamps, but no, they were just too scary. Even if I gild them all over, they would still be nasty. I looked for plain carved animals online and yes, lots of those, but would the artists enjoy me attacking them with a hole drill? And surely there are better things I could do with my time than look for silly lamps. Go into the garage/shed and unearth that monstrosity that you bought in the eighties and thought was the best thing since the Eames chair, you silly woman, I can hear Barry's voice telling me in my head. Okay, I will, because seriously, trying to read in the dim light of a winter day is straining my eyes. I could just use a felt tip pen and draw giraffes all over the lamp, but even I know that is pushing the level of stupid to unacceptable standards.

Talking about gild ... what is the past tense of that word? Obviously not geld because we all know that means neutering colts and it has nothing whatsoever to do with golden stuff. I was watching a programme about the DNA of murder and the presenter was talking about a girl's body being drug across the ground. I thought 'what'? Drug? But apparently it is quite acceptable in some areas of the USA to use drug instead of dragged. English sure is a funny language that only makes sense to us English speakers. But even we don't all speak the same words for similar things. I know when we arrived here and people said we should put on our togs to go swimming, it freaked me out because togs are shoes you wear to soccer in South Africa but a pair of swimming outfits here in New Zealand. And then there are the words like 'sheep' where the plural is 'sheep' not sheepies or sheeperies or any of the variations people use. Confusing? Much.

I am in the process of writing a novel about horses and their riders. It's a love story and as I know nothing about horses or their upkeep, I have spent hours watching Youtube videos of how to artificially inseminate mares and using a long rein to train young colts and fillies. I have made some glaring mistakes in the novel and just hope that the horse folks out there will look past my nonsense and enjoy the characters and story line. My brother-in-law is writing a risque novel with lots of explicit sex scenes. And another brother-in-law tells me that he is writing a best seller murder mystery. Well good luck to them. Let us hope that neither of them go into the in-depth research that is my normal mode of writing. Who really wants to live through an episode of Fifty Shades, or experience an actual murder? Well obviously not me. But then again, I am not an equestrian either. So why write about horsey stuff? Well, who doesn't love a good cowboy story or two. It is a bit of a homage to Barry and his love of Louis L'Amour novels. I am half-way through the novel. 25,000 words down and about 20,000 still to go. At about this stage of proceedings I start feeling like an impostor. I wonder who, if any, would find my characters believable or the story enjoyable. But then I get out my own library book off the shelf and realise that my work is as good as some of the books I routinely purchase. I start to mentally edit their writing and critique their styles and endings. It is a silly thing to do really. I know that I do the same with my paintings. But in that case, I often stop painting something because it does not stack up against someone else's work. I look at the beauty of my friend, David Johnson's creations and decide that I will never be as good as him, and put down the chalk in disgust at my lack of skill. But how stupid is that? We all have to start somewhere. None of us went to school on day one and were immediately accomplished calligraphers. We all started reading the simplest stories and learnt words one by one, step by step until we could read on our own without assistance from an adult. Okay, I can hear some of you snickering about my writing love stories. I might not be an expert on the art of falling in love or lust, but I can imagine and remember from my youth in ancient days gone by. So stop snickering or else I will ask you what makes you an expert? I write dreams. Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty and even Beauty and the Beast. Some of us associate with one or two of the fairy stories we were told. Do we want love to appear out of the heavens and wake us with a kiss? Or do we have to find love behind an ugly exterior. Maybe the most common theme people write about is Cinderella. The Billionaire pursuing you to save you from a life of drudgery and then lavishing you with luxury all the days of your life. None of this is reality, but we flock to the cinemas and book stores in search of this fantasy in different forms. I think we would all love to believe in a fairy godmother and handsome prince in our future. Or if you are a male, what about a Stepford wife that does your bidding and makes you feel like a hero. What we often get is the Shakespearean version of the fairy tale. Death and witches and lies and even madness. Well, parts of the weirdness of Shakespeare's imagination manifests itself in our lives at times. Look at Romeo and Juliet to get an idea of the bard's twisted mind behind the stories.

Last week was Mother's day for us. I made some sugar free treats for friends, but the caramel slice flopped. I threw in extra cream cheese and it split. (That is where the oil separates from the rest of the ingredients.) So I threw in some more coconut flour, all to no avail. I did not give up though. I put it into the fridge and left it to cool off. I find that cool heads often give you the answer you want, so why not a caramel slice? It looked great. And tasted divine. Anyhow, I packaged up my little boxes of various treats without the slice, and went to drop them off at friend's homes. Yes, I did keep my distance and washed my hands carefully. But most of my friends had escaped their homes for various reasons and I left the boxes on their doorsteps. I did feel disappointed. I had hoped to at least see a friend or two and be able to chat. After all it was mother's day and I too needed a bit of interaction. That was supposed to be my gift to myself. I came home feeling very depressed and yes, my caramel slice had set. Yay. I have now re-named it the Lazarus slice, because it was raised from the dead. Sadly the slice did not stay resurrected for long and I managed to eat my way through a good portion of it during the week. But would I be able to make it again? Heck no. What with me throwing stuff in willy nilly and not measuring anything at all ... well we all know, that it was a lucky dip at the best of times and I was incredibly lucky that it was edible.

Well folks, I am off to join the cats in front of the heat and maybe watch a movie or two. I have worked my way through 'The Two Popes', 'Faith, Hope and Love' (that was research) and even a story about Tricky Dicky and the Man in Black (Johnny Cash) ... today I might watch 'Sweet Magnolias' with a rug tucked around my knees and a cup of hot chocolate in my shivering hands.