dee - viscerate.com

GIRL
Diana Evans
called Dee
since May 25th, 1980
terrorising inner-city Melbourne
consuming flat whites
producing words, hers and other people's
contact dee [at] viscerate [dot] com

SITE
viscerate.com
consisting of personal reflections
photography by Amy Q
archives here

Saturday, April 07, 2001

Gee, I'm having weird dreams lately. I don't know what to blame it on. The cold disturbing my sleep? The fact that despite all thay my (new! fluffy!) doona seems to make things actually too hot? It could be anything, I suppose.

Thursday night, I was a sul'dam. (I just finished reading Winter's Heart, the ninth Robert Jordan, I told you that, right?) I, and my fellow sul'dam were taking our two damane and escaping. We were also taking a geranium in a pot. The geranium was important. I don't remember why. We were escaping from my parents' bedroom back in my old house in Gladstone. I thought we were busted for sure when another sul'dam came up the corridor and went to the toilet, which is directly across from the bedroom, but I shoved my friend into the cupboard (which was still full of all my mother's clothes) and pretended to be going to bed, and shut the door. Aren't I clever? Then I packed all my clothes, which for some reason were sitting in a hamper under my father's desk. Just as we were jumping out the window (a tight squeeze; I could barely make it through when I was breaking in at 15), I woke up.

And now I don't remember what I was dreaming an hour ago. Damn. But it was weird. Trust me on this.

8:30 AM - link to this - (0) comments

Friday, April 06, 2001

Dee succumbs to pop culture in her own twisted way (aka If I had any money instead of being flat broke like I am, I would buy):
CD wishlist:
- Rammstein - "Mutter"
- Dope - Anything, especially if it had either/both of 'Spin me round' or 'Debonaire' on it. These guys are growly rock goodness!
- Lash - Whatever the CD with 'Take Me Away' on it is. I heard these guys the other day on the way down the Clyde and immediately sat up and paid attention. They're good.
- And, at a pinch, something by Rob Zombie. I heard one of his songs tonight that isn't on a soundtrack, and within eight bars, I almost shouted: "Damn, that's good." (The song was 'Spookshow Baby' for those who care.)
Book Wishlist:
- My standard academic books, some of which are actually on my Amazon wishlist. Sun Tzu's "Art of War", Machiavelli's "Prince" and "Art of War", Clausewitz's "On War". And Confucius' "Analects". (One of these things is not like the others, one of these things just doesn't belong...)
- Robin Hobb's Assassin series, so I could re-read it. It was so brilliant.
- Sean Russell - "The One Kingdom" or the first book or whatever it's called. It looks damn good.
- Sara Douglass - "The Nameless Day" which I still haven't bought or read and it's driving me barmy an inch at a time.
- Juliet E McKenna - "The Gambler's Fortune" before the bloody shop sells it and I'm thwarted forever.

Of course, it's standard that at any given time I want to strip the fantasy shelves of the local bookshop. And the above list presupposes that I could actually manufacture the time to read the blasted things, and since I'm well behind on the reading list of books I already own, that's even more unlikely than the money I need spontaneously generating. Sigh.

11:42 PM - link to this - (0) comments

A day of gastro-intestinal wobbles (you'd think by now I'd have figured out that what I'm doing with my body obviously isn't what the designers had in mind, but no, apparently I haven't) and apparent time-wasting. I played Warlords, Heroes and silly-buggers of varying kinds. I raided a friend's MP3s, giving myself a few hours more of music. I finally managed to download 'Sister Salvation' from Napster, after getting eight transfer errors in a row.

But also, despite all this, a day of important first steps. I saw a lecturer about an essay, which means I can now begin writing the damn thing. I cleaned up my desk, which hasn't been done since I dumped all the stuff there in February. And then it had just been transplanted directly from the room one floor below. I reopened the folder that contains all my work on the Amorphous Novel Entity (hereafter to be referred to as the Novel). I skimmed and reread the work I completed on this idea months ago. A year ago, in some cases.

I feel so removed from it. Aloof. Separate. How do I reconnect with this creative entity that fired my imagination previously, and that I am sure is my ticket to a name in raised gold print on a bookcover? How do I begin reconnecting the wires in my head that previously transferred all those ideas that boiled at the mere mention of the principle actors, or places, or events?

I feel like I've dropped a giant egg, and the shell has shattered, the pieces covering an area two-metres square around my feet. But, if I work carefully, and concentrate, I can gather up all those shards and maybe, just maybe, piece them back together.

Of course, I don't have to get them all. I can leave out the bits that look silly, that don't seem to fit in the egg anymore. And should I think that the remaining pieces would look better as, say, a peanut, then there's no reason why I have to put them back together as an egg.

The creative process is a beautiful (traumatic, scarring, liberating, comprehensive, enthralling, infuriating, awe-inspiring, impossible) thing.

10:55 PM - link to this - (0) comments

I have just returned from seeing Gone With The Wind. On the big screen and all. Oh my. What brilliance. I actually don't like the storyline much. I think it's long and dull and melodramatic and all those things that it actually is, but those characters... Scarlett and Rhett are two of the best characters in fiction. Anywhere. I don't care who, or what, or where you care to mention. Those two are the pillars.

But marvellous as Scarlett is (and she is, even bearing in mind the small dissatisfaction (only small) that I have with Vivien Leigh's portrayal), it's Rhett that really does it for me. I cry precisely three times in that movie.

1: When we see Rhett after Scarlett's fallen down the stairs. He's dying inside over what he's done.

2: When Mammy is telling Mellie about Rhett's reaction to Bonnie's death. Because behind that simple relation hides a whole world of pain.

3: At the very end, when I think how much he has gone through, how much he has hurt, and how much it must hurt him to say those so-frequently quoted words: "Frankly, my dear, I don't give a damn."

The character is amazing. Clark Gable is incredible. I have a headache from cold and tears and tiredness. I'm going to bed.

12:24 AM - link to this - (0) comments

Thursday, April 05, 2001

It happens once in every cold, no matter what. That moment of panic when you reach into the tissue box to find that there aren't any more bloody tissues left. And here you are, about to drown in mucus.

EW!

This being sick thing really brings out my disgusting side, doesn't it? But seriously, what's a girl to do? I've got two bucks in my purse and a full day's lectures ahead with no time to duck off to the bank to get the money required to purchase more mucus-absorbers. It's a conspiracy. Stuff that spy-plane bull shit, the world-changing events are going on right here.

Ah... toilet paper!

10:41 AM - link to this - (0) comments

Wednesday, April 04, 2001

I can gain an international reputation as the woman with the quick, witty answer to everything, and yet I doubt I have the intellect to pursue serious...