Well, that was a week. I was otherwise engaged yesterday; let me hint at it:

Day	What	How Much	Pen	Ink
25 November 26 November 27 November 28 November 29 November	Second draft of “Grand Finale” Assisting a fallen father My wife’s day surgery (two days) Catching up on the Progress report	690 words Lifted So much waiting You’re soaking in it!	OMAS Arte Italiana Parker Senior Duofold Wing Sung 3013 Lamy Studio Sheaffer Imperial Triumph	Pelikan Brilliant Brown Waterman blue (vintage) Edelstein Topaz Herbin Violet Pensée Skrip black

I had thought to have been here yesterday, probably finishing up on that second draft. Oh, well. For those who are concerned– a long-awaited gall bladder removal was the wife’s lot, and the extension of her hospital stay was an excess of caution on the part of the hospital as she reacted with unusual (lack of) vigour to the morphine. And since we’re in Canada, this all cost a grand total of $2 for parking and $9 for the post-op Tylenol III I picked up from our neighbourhood pharmacy after bringing her home at last†.

And my Dad’s tippiness did him no actual harm. He needed more encouragement than hoisting.

Oh, but look, it’s not only Friday, but Friday right next to my birthday! Let me indulge myself a little–

Ideally, next week will be more normally arranged. My lightness of tone here belies the stress felt, which I’m rather more conscious of now that I’m an official owner of An Depression, and I’d like rather less of that stuff, thanks.

† Full disclosure: The opioid-laced pills would have cost more but for some insurance provided by The Regular Job. Something like $20. So, for those in the US concerned about the insurance industry, take heart– it still has some function in a setting of socialized medicine.

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Nothing Lasts Forever

One of my favourite cartoonists is no longer with us, so that’s what today’s about. I’m probably going to get in trouble for using that image, to which I respond– I’m giving you free advertising, Mr. Publisher. Also in the line of a free ad, here’s a trailed for a biographical film I have yet to see, but will seek out presently.

I started looking at Wilson’s stuff in high school (and to indicate how innocent a lamb I was, I was somewhat surprised to discover how many of them had originally appeared in Playboy) and I’ve been a fan ever since. I believe when I get home tonight, I’ll take down Nuts and read it through while having a small rum and a tiny weep.

Today’s pen: Wing Sung 3013
Today’s ink: Edelstein Topaz

Day	What	How Much	Pen	Ink
18 November 19 November 20 November 21 November	First draft of “Vacation Slides”. Some necessary correspondence	11 manuscript pages. Done and sent.	Lamy Studio Sheaffer Imperial Triumph Waterman L’Étalon Parker Senior Duofold	Herbin Violet Pensée Skrip black Diamine Bilberry Waterman blue (vintage)

 

Topical Humour

Oddly, that’s not humour that is rubbed directly onto the source of irritation.

With all this talk of Peach Mints wafting up from the US, I though it would be nice to cast our minds back to a time when moderately-competent forces of evil were a source of amusement rather than the makers of any nation’s policy.

OK, you got me. Moderately-competent evil has always directed national policies. What’s new is that blunderously incompetent evil has moved in and yet somehow it remains unthwarted.

Today’s pen: Waterman L’Étalon (slightly deformed, occasionally rude)
Today’s ink: Diamine Bilberry (perfectly pleasant… until it’s pen cleaning time!)

Day	What	How Much	Pen	Ink
11 November 12 November 13 November 14 November	The Yearly Remembrance Weep First draft of “Grand Finale” First draft of “Vacation Slides” More health care stuff	Copious Six manuscript pages. Four manuscript pages. A prescription!	Mabie, Todd & Co Blackbird Wing Sung 3013 Lamy Studio Sheaffer Imperial Triumph	Jentle blue-black Edelstein Topaz Herbin Violet Pensée Skrip black

 

Red Planet Venus… wait, what?

I don’t know what I’m doing to be treated so well by the Youtube algorithm, but I hope it persists. I’ve read about this film, and been curious to see it, and all of a sudden, there it is in the suggestions panel– an East German/Polish co-production from 1960 (and thus very very much under communist influence), in which space travelers check out a mysterious message from Venus in the dazzlingly distant year of 1985!

It’s not exactly an edge-of-the-seat thrill-ride, but I think it has some real advantages over… Queen of Outer Space, let’s say. I have no interest in driving a Trabant or standing in a long line for a strictly limited ration of vodka, but I may very well try to chase down some more Soviet-bloc sci-fi.

Today’s pen OF THE UNSPEAKABLY DISTANT FUTURE: Lamy Studio
Today’s DECADENT IMPERIALIST ink: Herbin Violet Pensée

Day	What	How Much	Pen	Ink
4 November 5 November 6 November 7 November	I may have taken a day off. Third draft of “Whistling Through the Graveyard”. Some non-writing stuff to do with last week’s alarming note. First draft of “Grand Finale”	No sleaves (sic) unravelled, alas. Polished and fit to present. Questions answered, future appointments made. Six manuscript pages.	Waterman L’Étalon Mabie, Todd & Co Blackbird Sheaffer Imperial Triumph Wing Sung 3013… which I need to build a page for, it seems	Diamine Bilberry Jentle blue-black Skrip black Edelstein Topaz

 

Case of the Mysterious Spoon Thief

I hope everyone is having a happy Fountain Pen Day. First Friday in November, right? A big event, for people like me.

It kind of snuck up on me. I’ve been at my silly Inktober exercise (which I have decided in an act of vicious ret-conning is an excuse to not participate in NaNoWriMo), but when I realized what today was, my reaction was something like this:

I should get something really splendid out and fill it up. But… I’d have to look back in the blog and see what I had used. And then go all the way down a single flight of stairs to get it out of storage. God, and then it would join all those others that need cleaning. Poo. Too much effort. Let’s just go with this not-yet-empty thing.

Which is slightly alarming, coming from me. Well, it turns out that an inclination to depression which I’ve been nuturing since… oh, about 1992… has finally borne fruit.

You’ve heard the spoon metaphor, I imagine– a person with a fatiguing disability has a set number of spoons to dig through the day’s activities, and once those spoons are used up, that’s it for the day’s activities, regardless of whether they’re onerous or delightful (go to movie with friend and clean toilet are equal demands upon the spoon drawer; indeed, the former may be a two-spoon affair). Well, I have come to realize that someone has been making off with my spoons, and it’s finally at a point where I need to get some outside assistance with it.

I suspect my recent decision to pull back from repairs is also founded in this development. If I’d realized it at the time, I’d probably be happier (ho ho, a joke about depression!) now.

But, realization has dawned at last, and calls are being made. I am lucky, in that I live in Canada and have an employer who has some resources to throw at this kind of problem, so all it took was noticing there was a problem… and then carefully building one extra spoon out paper clips and tape to actually act upon the realization. Because I actually knew I should be doing something about a week ago, but figuring out what that something was required, oh, poo, it’s too much effort and so on.

Anyway. Here we are. Not yet, quite, getting help, but listening to the mechanism for getting help running its motor up. And that in itself is helping.

For those who are right now wondering how many spoons I’ve squandered on this little screed, never mind the whole enormous pile of stories over the past month— it turns out that, at least in my case, writing is no more than tiny souvenir teaspoons of effort. Perhaps it even uses forks instead. I could to a lot of this and not affect the useful spoon count. Another thing I’m grateful for.

Today’s pen, which is very nice and a perfectly adequate Fountain Pen Day observance: Sheaffer Sovereign II
Today’s ink, the maker of which claims to be an avatar of Fountain Pen-ness, so of course it’s right for the day: Montblanc Royal Blue

PS – I suggested yesterday that this would be the usual progess report. Well, I decided to do this instead. That’s not a metaphorical spoons thing, that’s just a question of available time.