Author: Luisa Perkins
•2:30 PM
First, a gratuitous photo of darling Daniel in his Mumble the Penguin suit, to celebrate that I have finally figured out how to move images around in Blogger:

I paraphrase the Talking Heads in my title because Obsession, not Love, Has Come to Town.

I know that this is true because good grief; how can it already be Wednesday again? I need a Time Turner like the one that Prof. McGonagall gave to Hermione Granger.

Here's what happens when you start devoting as many of your waking hours as possible to writing a novel. The world you've created inside your brain--the one you are struggling to depict using a laptop and all the words you know how to spell--starts becoming as real as the world all around you. Annette knows what I mean.

The other day I had the impulse to turn to Patrick and say, "You should have heard what Eugene said to Sophie today," but caught myself before revealing to my dear spouse just how psychotic I have become. Eugene and Sophie aren't real people, you see. And they aren't even the protagonists; they are somewhat minor characters in this manuscript that I have pledged to have done by May 15th.

Another thing that happens when you are writing a novel is that your blog suffers and begins to waste away. Readers start drifting elsewhere in search of more faithful and entertaining updaters. Ah, well. Maybe they'll all come back when this book is published. Or not.

Yet another phenomenon is that your family starts getting served really monotonous meals. Pot Roast; Rice, Bean & Chili Soup; Beef Stew. Anything that can a) be assembled from as many food storage ingredients as possible so as to eliminate trips to the store; b) thrown into this and then put into this for hours on end; and c) then can be made to last for not one but two dinners, is a possibility. Thank heaven for Adriana, or we'd really be in trouble.

At least knitting can still occur, on car trips and late at night when my WEUs are all tapped out and can only be replenished by watching the Mets on TV with my best friend. Here's the swatch I made for a cool little cardigan named Arietta:


I love this mosaic stitch technique; I love the designer of this sweater, Barbara Gregory. She is so brilliant that I actually obeyed her and blocked the swatch, something I've never done before. I won't save the swatch, though; I'm pretty sure I'll need every inch of yarn I've got (plus some that Carmen is giving me) to finish this. Carmen and I indulged in quite a lot of this pretty sport-weight cotton at La Droguerie when we first went there six years ago. It just goes to show you: you can never buy too much yarn when you don't have a specific project in mind. Feed the stash properly, and it will someday reward you.

Speaking of the stash, which I have reduced by quite a bit so far this year, it's about to get the equivalent of liposuction. Carmen let me know about a very worthy cause for donations of yarn you don't love any more. Interim House is a 6-month drug rehab center for women that includes teaching knitting and crocheting as part of its program. Go visit them and cheer them on. I'm going to send them a box of yarn right around May 16th!

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5 comments:

On 2/5/07 , Jenna said...

Finally! I was about to 'drift elsewhere', but then I remembered that I have no room to talk....and well, that I am addicted to you and will wait it out.

I'm so jealous that you figured out how to move pictures around on Blogger! You have no idea how much time has been wasted in that pursuit!

 
On 3/5/07 , Bill C said...

Drift? Nah! One of the benefits of having a short attention span: I can check back again and again and it never gets old.
;-)

 
On 3/5/07 , Anonymous said...

Oh, you just keep at the novel -- girlie-- you're awesome! I get so involved in books I read--one time I prayed for a character in a book...oh, yeah. Can you imagine if I wrote a book?

 
On 4/5/07 , Anonymous said...

Aww, glad to be of service! I'm always amazed and how much you accomplish. Not at all ambitious, are you? :)

 
On 5/5/07 , Annette Lyon said...

I was wondering where you had headed off to! Nice to see you're back. As for dinners, yeah, my family's been suffering too as I'm knee-deep in edits. It's been various combinations of things that go with buns and chips. Hot dogs or sloppy joes tonight? Or should we do hamburgers again? I really don't care, so long as Claude starts to behave. That boy is giving me fits. And don't even start on the thing that he's not real. He's giving me too many ulcers for that. He'd better be.