Dullness, Danger and Dubai

Book News:

Much to my delight, my latest gay short story, Brady's Choice, has been accepted for publication by Amber Allure Press on 23 January, so it's nice to have something to look forward to in the post-Christmas lull. Still much to look forward to this year however, as A Dangerous Man is due out on 15 October and can now even be preordered at Barnes & Noble, well gosh. You can find out more at Cheyenne Publishing, including a full blurb. I'm also happy that for a brief moment of time, Tommy's Blind Date found itself at No 79 in the Amazon Gay Fiction charts so that was distinctly nice while it lasted.

Meanwhile, this week, I have just finished the dullest poetry book I have ever had the trauma of reading so thank goodness that's over. I daren't say who the author was to avoid their blushes but it was pretty bad. So bad it made my skin itch. I'm hoping my next poetry book will be better, but really that shouldn't be too hard ...

This week's meditations are:


Meditation 436
Sometimes the god
of the mountain

is also the god
of the plain

and what you say
to the sky in secret

will come down
to destroy you again.


Meditation 437
If the bible
has taught me one thing
it’s this:

that lions and prophets
simply don’t mix.


The Sunday haiku is:

All week long the sky
lets fall its burden of rain,
soothing all my dreams.


Life News:

The redecoration of our spare room is now nearly done. We've tackled the last alcove and added two coats of paint to it today, plus I've put an undercoat on the skirting board there. We're also slowly putting the rest of the spare room together again, including bookshelves and book cabinets but are reorganising it  to make best use of the space. Today, I've done another run to the council tip and also got rid of 4 more bags of books, and have this afternoon created another three book bags to go. It's so cleansing, you know, and the good news is that the spare room that we've basically used as a dumping ground for 17 years now looks like a room someone might want to buy, hurrah. Ooh, and yesterday, we drove round looking at places we might like to live, and our favourites so far are Normandy, Fairlands and Wood Street Village (the latter two are in the outskirts of Guildford). We also liked Ash and Ash Vale/Ash Green, but it does depend where in those cases. We also looked at Tongham, but I think that's third level on our list.

Church this morning was good too, especially as it seems like we haven't paid God a call for ages (we haven't), so nice to catch up. He's having a quiet time before Christmas kicks in, if you're asking. In addition, the poor vicar has apparently contracted pneumonia whilst on holiday (holidays: they're not good for you, you know) but is being ministered to by the ladies of the parish (Gawd bless 'em) so every cloud does indeed have a silver lining. In our absence, the church also seems to have given birth to a music group, which K and I looked at with horror when we turned up as any whiff of evangelical happy-clappyness and we'll be running to the door screaming. However, we needn't have worried as it was clarinets only adding to the whole ambience of the hymns (very good indeed) and the singers sang a marvellous Latin chant during Communion. Bliss. Bring back Latin chants - they really do put the zing back into church-going. So the music group gets our vote, and I hope they keep that whole approach: it was great.

Alas however, next week I shall be sad and lonely as K is going to Dubai on business tomorrow and isn't back till Thursday, so I will be Queen of this old Victorian house in truth. I can't decide whether I want to be Miss Haversham or the Mad Woman in the Attic, but they are probably much of a muchness anyway. Thank goodness that Strictly Come Dancing is back on TV to keep me company or I shall indeed run mad. You have been warned ...

Anne Brooke