More notes and queries

[raven]

1. You know when someone does something so utterly kind for you that you're a little lost for words? I mentioned to the South African Siren that I was having trouble in my flat - my upstairs neighbours keep on making noise until three am, work has collided with excessive sleep disorder so the place is a tip but I don't have the time and energy to tidy and it makes me feel anxious just looking at it, etc., etc. She said, I have a spare room, I'll come and pick you up. She has installed me on a comfy bed, enough room for all my things, peace and quiet, wireless internet, and instructions to just do my thing and sleep as late as I want. I am working on next week's conflicts and feeling. Well, at ease. it's a blessing.

2. Today is a day of birthdays! It's brightlywoven's birthday, and I had a kind of melancholy about not being home for it, which lightened somewhat when I got a Skype-window into the party when I was sitting in the library earlier, reading about conflicts for next week. And, you know what, Skype is time-travel - at any rate I was sitting in the shadowed law school, at the top of the atrium with frantic 1Ls running around below murmuring about civil procedure, and it was all muted, seven o'clock in the evening, and in the window there were drunk people waving pink cocktails and playing the ukelele telling me they loved me, because for them it was midnight and they already knew that today ends well.

So I went back into the law school and felt horribly homesick for a little while (there's a reason, I think, why homesickness is an emotion with its own name that isn't just sadness or whatever - it's that way it's this horrible inconsolable grief that is actually also quite, quite trivial, brought on and off by scents and letters and not being able to tell nickels and quarters apart) and worked on conflicts and mostly wished I were at home. And then I went out into the night and had a very nice dinner for thingswithwings' birthday, and drank white wine and made silly jokes, and now it's past midnight and today ends well.

3. Just one week left, now. I have written first drafts of both of my research papers and in so doing, have realised a fundamental truth about myself: I don't do first drafts. All these years I have been mildly worried about other people talking about first drafts, or even rubbish first drafts, and I'm like... well, I always hand in my first drafts, what's wrong with me. It took until yesterday for me to realise I edit as I go along. I write and re-write paragraphs as I go, I occasionally pause and pull what I've got so far into shape. Two papers down, now the two exams. I have so far resisted making this a post about Why I Love Conflicts of Law. Be grateful.

4. Speaking of writing, I have two ficlets up from yesterday - 12/24 (Sports Night, Natalie and Dana, for gamesiplay) and Grace (Chronicles of Chrestomanci, Mordecai Roberts, for highfantastical), and am intending to get to the others.

One week, one week.

4. And lastly, the query part. Does anyone reading happen to speak Arabic, enough to translate a couple of sentences for me? I'm not sure I trust Google Translate. It's for a fic, as usual. Many thanks.

Comments

[msilverstar]

It occurs to me that the first draft thing is somewhat an artifact of the pre-computer writing world. With typewriters and longhand, the messy first draft was almost necessary, and that may have extended to students of the pre-computer generation.

Golly I remember when we first encountered WordSTAR and could make changes without fuss! It was like magic.

I'm sure there are some people who like process, who will always use a first draft as an interim between outline and coherence. Just a lot fewer.

[raven]

That's a very good point, actually! Not being able to edit as you go is really, really constraining.

[msilverstar]

The first word processors were like magic!

[yiskah.livejournal.com]

How quickly do you need the Arabic, and what kind of Arabic do you want (Modern Standard, or related to a particular country)?

[loneraven.livejournal.com]

It's not urgent, or anything - I'd like it in a week or so, but really, anytime's fine. Ideally I would like Egyptian Arabic, but Modern Standard would be fine. It's just for two sentences.

[yiskah.livejournal.com]

Provided the two sentences are nothing scandalous, I could get it for you on Monday - email me! (The livejournal address works.)

[dr-biscuit.livejournal.com]

Darling it was lovely to have you almost here!

I'd almost go so far as to say that every day should end with pink cocktails and music and laughing friends. But on the other hand, maybe not every morning should start like a morning after.