Smokey the Magnificent

So, I’m writing the Great American Novel. So far it goes like this:

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The Skeezels

A weasel, a Cheezel and a sketchbook got fused in a horrible explosion. And into its eyes were placed blazing jewels.

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Thoughts? Personally I think all authors should begin their stories that way, but YMMV.

Saw Coraline last night. It was good. It was very, very, very good. Impeccably paced, visually stunning, strong and quirky characters, thematically deep, technically accomplished, you name it. I would even have enjoyed it if I weren’t such a wimp… as it is, I heartily recommend it to all those cinephiles valiant enough to contemplate sewing needles and eyeballs in close proximity.

This week is likely to be busy - a girl from a message board I used to frequent is coming to visit and possibly stay overnight on Wednesday, and I’m hoping to go to Mainly Music again with the pig in hopes that she’ll actually click that her singing and dancing skills might be put to good use there. I also need to write a bunch more Suite articles. I got out a bunch of books on Victorian fashion from the library which I should be able to glean for hairstyles. A fascinating topic, historical fashion; I never really got into it, but I’m starting to. Learning how to sew makes it more interesting, I think. It’s hard to believe that an entire nation of women adopted the centre-parted-hair-dropping-down-into-dog-ears-by-the-cheeks look for years at a time, but they did…. and those bizarre dresses that dropped from the shoulders to give a hunchback impression. Most odd. I wonder if I’d have dressed more elegantly if I were born a hundred years ago, or would I still wear faintly gimpy and anachronistic clothing? One always thinks of women at the past wearing identically tasteful, contemporary clothing, but that’s just stereotyping; presumably there were geeky women back then too, who wore bustles eight years out of fashion in girth or inappropriately large crinolines because they were to busy pretending to be Anglo-Saxon warrior maidens, or something. I mean, I know today’s culture is technically a good one in which to foster individuality and subcultures and subvert the fashion norms, but if Victorian women could wear Elizabethan ruffs or faux-Grecian draperies (and according to my Illustrated Guide to the 19th Century, they did)…