I’m hoping I can find a good photo to put with this post. The charity gig for St Barnabas House Hospice in Worthing raised £200 and I now have some pictures of some of the musicians and readers but I am going to try to show you the lady who won the lucky ticket prize – a funny bear clutching a bottle of red wine. Some of my photos won’t come on and I don’t know why. Here goes!
I remembered to take my camera phone down town when I went Christmas shopping yesterday and took a picture of the centre of Worthing. I didn’t find any Christmas jumpers that I liked. They all had sequins on, which I am trying not to buy, just as I have stopped buying Christmas cards with glitter. All these things that ruin the planet and it is only this year we have been told it is a problem!
Then I walked all over town looking for a specific toy and it was only in the last half hour that I remembered the Guildbourne Centre and, of course, they had loads to choose from! What a pity this place is underused.
There were adverts for the pantomime everywhere. Maybe we could start promoting ourselves as a year-round holiday destination, not just a sea-side day trip place. Here’s hoping we keep the department stores. Happy Christmas, folks!
It seems to me I’m stupid, dim witted, dozy, daft
As age begins to rob me of the essence of my craft.
The gift I have of language, developed over years
Is gradually eroding, one of my greatest fears.
I try in vain to capture, and use, the perfect word
But similes escape me, fly, like a mocking bird.
A river of my best ideas flows gently out to sea
A metaphor for loss that shows what’s happening to me.
No longer with the freedom to choose, invent and write
Vocabulary fading, my mind losing the fight
To cling on to my memory, to produce and create
A work that is commended, but I fear it is too late.
Well, we had our charity gig last night and about 30 people turned out to hear the Sea Scribes read their stories and poems and the folk singers do their bit. We had a lovely mix of entertainment and a good raffle but I don’t have the official photos yet.
We made £200 for the local hospice, St Barnabas House and people seemed to like the mix. We had books for sale and sold a few anthologies but it isn’t easy to find an event where the public flock to buy your wares.
As this was also the week when I recorded my short story I was exhausted by the end. One event a week is enough for me! I’ll add the picture of a local folk duo who always put on a good show. Jo and Graham.
Nothing ever goes right, does it? Two of us went leafletting the area round the venue for Tunes and Tales this week and the next day I came down with a heavy cold.
Then one of the musicians pulled out and a reader who had said she couldn’t be there said she was coming after all so I’ll have to redo the programme.
Tickets are selling slowly so I’ll have to go out this afternoon when I don’t feel like it and try to badger some more folk into attending. Well, it is for a local charity.
Do I dress as I did last time, the Master of Ceremonies look, ( see photo)or wear a fancy skirt that I bought in Mauritius and can never find a time to use it? It’s covered in colourful jungle and animals but it’s long and frilly. I don’t know.
Some of the readings are Christmassy although it will still be November. It seems to come earlier every year. Maybe I’ll be able to think more clearly when this cold goes away.
Atishoo!
I had a challenge from the man in the mobile library when I was bemoaning the fact that rhyming poetry was unfashionable. ” No-one writes rhyming verse any more,” I said and then discovered at least two authors who are doing it successfully. He replied, ” Nobody has written a poem about a mobile library,” How could I resist?
You don’t need a flying carpet or a ship that sails the sea
For every kind of magic’s in the Mobile Library.
Let your imagination feed on tales from yesterday
Or solve a crime or find a love to wash your cares away.
You’d like a book with big, bold print? There’s plenty here to take
And picture books and paperbacks a thirst for knowledge slake.
Or in the Land of Might have Been, when you’ve a book to try
Give your imagination wings and, as a wordbird, fly.
The UK Southern Book Show is on in Worthing next Sunday, 28th October and I have been up in the loft to get some more books down and making a price list. I still have to find a tablecloth and sort out the little book holders I have to stand copies in.
I gave Natasha the title “Write What You Know” earlier in the year and she published that as my talk although I had forgotten all about it. It probably wouldn’t have been what I would choose now but it will make a good debating point as I expect any other writers there may be ready to argue the opposite. In fact, I have made my talk short so that others may make the point that we couldn’t write fiction unless we elaborated on what we know.
I’m struggling to decide what to wear, although this is easier than the conference in London next month. In the old days we used to dress up to go to London but I don’t think that happens any more. I need to find an outfit that makes a statement and that could mean buying something new. I wanted to go in pink but the weather looks like turning cold and that might not be suitable. Sorry there’s no poetry at the moment. I’ll try to think of something when all this marketing activity is over.
