Comic Books, Cuddly Science and Music and More (by sarah)

So I've been a busy bee but I kind of forget to blog about stuff which is stupid as then people don't know it is happening. Anyway I have just finished writing another 50,000 words in a month as part of the summer CampNanowrimo - a variant on the Novel Writing month challenge. Everything was based in the Punk's Universe which is now epically big and pushing to get out there to the public but apart from a few flash fictions and short stories which you can read here, it simply is not yet ready!

Second there has been great progress with Cuddly Science thanks to help from Mum and there will be an unleashing of more puppets soon plus a website etc... this next month is going to be about really pushing that project forward which is really exciting 🙂 Though I have to confess Ada puppet has managed to scare a few house visitors especially when I forget to move her out of the guest room. To fully realise the vision of Cuddly Science though I now need to be looking for some external funding and also kind of finish the very last piece of my Science Communication course. For those of you who don't know Cuddly Science is a series of scientist, engineers, technologist, medicine and maths peeps in puppet form who can either run shows and/or interact with kids showing and helping them through games, experiments and sci-craft activities. Using their own stories they explain the wonderous discoveries that have been made and show just how much there is still to find out whilst giving the children a gentle taste of some actual science.

And Universe In A Box has arrived to help run Cuddly Science workshops and a few other bits which I am very pleased with 🙂 And also part of the money I spent on this fab kit will help poorer schools and things get hold of the same kit on a global scale which can only sit well with my idea of science for all 😀

I have also been working on music and have produced a song called Somebody Please which came about as I was so distressed to learn of the children from the single mother's homes that were neglected and disrespected even in death. It was a song that had to be - it isn't a happy one and it reminds us that there are still children that can be rescued - it was one of those that had to be written and also has my first ok attempt at guitar.

I think I kind of forgot to blog about the last few songs as well - so here is I'm at the Bottom of the Sea - were I attempt to play the Temple drum out friend Seth gave us.

And Little Ghost of Parade.

Then we get to the comic books, I have discovered that Gloucester Library has lots and lots of comic books and graphic novels which I think I mentioned before. Well I've started taking them out of the library rather than flicking through them whilst in situ as it were. When I was little the library in Hornchurch did not have such things and I couldn't afford them. This week I read Neverwhere which I loved but kept kind of remembering bits of it in a very specific voice. I know it is a novel as well but I think it must also be an audio book or radio show that I've heard before. Anyway I really liked it.

Hmmm amazon has a BBC series so maybe that is what I am remembering!

Anyway I have also been working on my own comic and due to feed back etc... I now have two covers and am toying with the idea of there being a black and white version and a colour version.

I also have the light core of the optronic super computer which is a mix of water colours and computer jiggery pockery which I worked out and did all by myself without asking Alaric how to install stuff etc...

I have also drawn the Punk walking - this picture looked better before I inked it in and rubbed out the pencil as the pen splodges so I need to look at materials again - maybe different pens or paper or both. But it is supposed to be a fusion of the "traditional" DC/Marvel comic book styles and the Japanese Manga and the old old cowboy comics and fantasy art stuff.

I'm still mucking about with how I'm going to colour the pictures but feel I am making great progress!

I also painted a flamingo as a last minute birthday present for Al's aunt. It was one of those wake up at five in the morning ideas - I have really only just started with the water colours but it seemed to work.

So as you can see things are busy busy especially if you add events and life in on top! But I think it's all going well - though sadly at the moment due to health stuff I'm only going to paid gigs which has made me feel like I am slightly letting people down but I can only do so much stuff at the moment 🙁

There is a lot more fun stuff I need to blog about - the girls and the chickens and what not so hopefully I'll get a chance to catch up soon!

Blood Pressure and stuff (by sarah)

So I've been suffering from headaches - not the ones I had before where my eye kept spasming but like an almost constant one making me feel sick and grumpy which would then splurge into a completely crippling can't do anything, brain being squeezed and sliced and lights and shapes and halos and little white spots and stars.

My skin has also gone all mottled and stuff again, in a way that has happened before but this time it is everywhere and no matter how much sunlight I show it has just gotten worse!

This morning I finally got to the Drs - the skin is the same as before and is worse as the weather is humid so I have shampoo for it and breathing a sigh of relief that it isn't SOMETHING else to add!

Headaches it turns out are actually two different types of headache - one a tension induced headache - my neck, back and shoulders are all locked down tight - unsurprising as I am currently limping from the muscles in my right leg doing the same - same old same old. Then the really bad head aches which feel like what I had in labour - are migraines. But my blood pressure is up and it turns out I should have had my blood pressure monitored since I had Jeany (who is about to turn 9) as I had the pregnancy induced hyper tension and stuff and so may be suffering from hyper tension.

So I have the number of an acupunturist and some tablets for when the headaches are really really bad.

Of course I'd also meant to mention the fact that my bleeding has gone from being low level all the time to two weeks on two weeks off to two weeks at random points. We had a big enough gap that we got a pregnancy test (which was negative). But I forgot - same with the swelling up throat thing (I keep looking like a bull frog!) - I'll have to go back for those at some other point and hope they are not related to the other stuff!

I have this nagging feeling that I was supposed to have a bleeding diary and a pain diary for the Drs but I can't recall if that is recent or not :/ This is why I got her to write everything down and handed it all straight to Alaric explaining what each was once back in the waiting room - which was just as well as I was missing one of the prescriptions and had to go back!

I'm now monitoring my blood pressure and have an appointment for a couple of weeks time. Dr was concerned that I throw up with the headaches but I pointed out that I tend to end up chucking alot anyway between periods and food allergies and what not. Also had to point out that the shoulder grinding and crunching stuff is an old injury and that I have chronic fatigue so yes I'm getting enough sleep as I kind of struggle staying awake to be honest.

I hate going to the Drs and just have this sinking feeling that it will be another round of stuff but hey I am still alive which without modern meds I wouldn't be so I shouldn't complain but you know I will! :/

Music, Muse and Marvel (by sarah)

I am 33 yrs old - for my 30th it was decided that I would attempt the music I had never really had the chance to do. Al got me the Purple Vin and a tone of plectrums. I was going to and indeed started singing lessons. But really I have not done as much as I had hoped.

I've sung 4 times, five if you include my own birthday bash (not including campfire singing here) and my guitar practice is sketchy at best.

Alaric got me a microphone for the valentines just after we moved in here - so 2012 - and I have been producing songs which are slowly ending up on my bandcamp page - this really got going when I got a place on a song writing workshop with Paul Murphy. To date we have:

Windy Gloucestershire which I won the creative olympics bronze medal for song writing:

I Want To Know About Everything - which is about science:

Shy - which is actually my poem set to the hammond organ we accidently bought instead of a bed settee.

Bubble of Bone - where I muck around with the echo and zynergy charms

Ivy - I kind of wanted this one to be a dance track but it kind of is a fragment instead - a ghost of what it could be.

I knew Him So Well - where I experimented with putting a half there narrative over the top.

Flowing - a song about war and one I sung at the open mic at Wychwood

Firey Redemption - a song and painting I produced in response to the homophobic attacks and discrimination in general - both voices are me and I wanted it to sound similar to Billy Holliday in a little shake recording naked sound - I know most people do not like this song - I however am happy with it - it says what I want.

Hey You - I actually wrote this whilst at school as a 'protest song' when I found out in GCSE business studies that women could expect to earn less than men for the same job - plus general teenage punk 'where do I fit in society' - I decided to add in a disjointed thrash/death metal voice as well.

Love Song From The Gutter - what it says - about childhood discovery of love that can't happen. It is a twin to Bubble of Bone and I think it still needs a backing.

Little Ghost on Parade - which is about prostitution and living on the edge but still fighting for a future.

Summer Sun - a love song for walking around Gloucester with my husband 🙂 It needs guitar backing or something still.

I have a couple of other songs to come yet that involve drums, me singing three parts and the guitar etc... But there is a real issue - I have lost my ability to sing one my own in front of people - ok so the on my own has always been a bit of an issue but I swear it's a lot worse now :/

I went and did a couple of lessons and joined a group at Centre Arts but things where too complicated at the time as it was around when we were trying to move and I was still on crutches and stuff.

So you can imagine Al's surprise when I started to sing and sing and sing the song Let It Go from the Design Film Frozen. I announced that I was going to an audition for the Gloucester Pride with the group Jean does her drama with. And I got the song sound LUSH - really dam hot. My throat kept closing up when I thought of people though, so I got Jean to sit and be a staring audience and at first I struggled and then it was good and then I got Al to join in and the same. I even worked out bits of it for the guitar - gave up looked on the internet and amended someone elses chords until I was happy with it but discarded the guitar as I'm not at the point where I can sing and play well enough at the same time. I focused on singing it my way...

And it was fab.

And I have the perfect outfit.

Then I got to the audition and I was shaking, I stared at the page of words and could not look up and I squeaked my way through the song. And I mean squeak - the power and depth had gone, most of the notes where in tune (I think though wobbly). I think I croaked on one of them though and so on.

I apologised and they were lovely and put on backing music and I sang it lower in my 'camp fire' voice and they said I was much stronger in my lower register (not as low as I sing Firey). But I'm sure I don't sing in tune in camp fire voice - my mum always used to moan about it when I sang like that and it kind of doesn't take any effort and is almost talking. I'm also still not sure I'll be able to sing it infront of people.

SO it was a bit of a flop - on the other hand I am singing with other for the event and that is great 🙂 I have missed MTSoc (Musical Theatre) since leaving Imperial and until I moved to Gloucestershire I was always singing. I can't read music and I don't understand the technical side of things - I have confidence issues over it all due to being told in primary school that real musicians do not play by ear and having started off thinking music was something you felt as I initially could not hear as a small child and so on.

Anyway I have been trying to sing the Frozen song lower with the result of a scary Nick Cave style version earlier that made Mary very cross - she didn't like my high version of Let It Go either - she likes the Camp Fire voice as long as I don't hit and wrong notes - she sulks if I do and starts singing over me.

For a 3 yr old she is amazing at tonal stuff.

Anyway I have always gone with confronting my fears - scared of heights become a climbing instructor, dyslexic - become a writer, social anxiety? chronic shyness? - get your bum on stage.

The photo at the top of the post is my new plectrum collection - or rather what has already arrived - I broke my second to last one at the weekend and kind of found that you can now get really amazing ones - they are all the different Marvel Comic book character ones 😀 I am still awaiting, shiny, sparkly ones, space themed ones and dragons. I kind of didn't realise how many there were but am happy especially as Jeany has asked to start learning again so she can have a plectrum - good job I got an extra pack so it wont break my set up then 😉 Also this means Comic Book Plectrum Jewellery - three of my past times in one thing 😀

(Don't worry Clare the last plectrum is the wonderful engraved silver one you got me!).

Moping, Tori Amos and Death (by sarah)

Post is not about suicide honest!

I am sitting here moping around in a hello kitty onsie listening to Tori Amos and reading a graphic novel called Death written by Neil Gaiman. I have lots of stuff that needs doing but it is the weekend and I have already done a huge chunk of domestic stuff this morning.

I am trying to frame my thoughts, to prepare them for some comic book art later today. I haven't worked on the comic since Monday and I need to work on Cuddly Science as it now has a second booking. The issue is I am feeling very nervous about all of it - about my own capabilities and talents.

Alaric normally boys me up with this sort of thing but he has gone to London today and I am missing him and am also feeling strangely alarmed that I have been with him for over a third of my life. I wrote this and I think I may end up constructing him a poem out of it at some point - I posted the first bit on twitter and then when I put it on Facebook it grew - he liked it which was a relief 🙂

I don't like my men to be beefcake - oh no I like them to be nut roast.
I also like my coffee like I like my men - white, sweet and tall preferably with caramel but I'll put up with vanilla, decaf but not weak
Must also have dodgy dress style and be able to be cast as an elf in LoTR
Add in the brain power and the essential we must be FRIENDS and I think it's a good job I found Alaric Blagrave Snell-Pym
Next month is 10 yrs of marriage, I've been with him for over a 1/3rd of my life - this morning I felt this was an insane fact - now feeling lonely as he's gone to the big smoke and the girls are playing on their own and the cats have gone out

I am annoyed with myself and project jumping - true I get the projects finished but it takes longer than other people as I'll focus on one thing for six weeks and then jump to another project. They tend to be the same projects that I flit between but it means instead of getting a finished thing and then moving on, I get three things all finished at the same time.

This is not the best tactic for several reasons - firstly there is only so much of my stuff everyone is interested in and I need to give each one a far chance and not over load people and what I do is kind of the worst of both worlds. What I should do with my varied focus and projects is do a bit of each, each day or week to keep the skills honned or to just learn the skills do the project and then move on to the next thing. What I actually do is spend 6 weeks on something, the first week or so being me remembering what it is I was doing with the project/cleaning the rust of my skills.

And at the same time of course I can't actually focus on what I want to for those 6 weeks as there are workshops, performances, stuff I've promised to people, kids and animals and health problems.

Alaric doesn't see my way of working as a problem but I also get incredibly distracted once I am in the 'zone' with a project and start to resent time not spent on it. He says this is just how my brain works.

I am also being mentally hungry at the moment - I want new things and everything seems to just be combinations and reiterations of what's gone before (yes I know its the combinations that make things new, it's just the way I feel at the moment). This goes for books, films and music - I found Tori has produced a whole new lot of music since last I looked hence the morning marathon!

At the same time I feel incapable of learning at the moment - my mind just flits away or I forget what I was doing, like the first half of the instructions etc... this happens if I don't get to focus on a project, it's like my mind can't hold anything else - I obsess about a project but only for a limited amount of time. I think that is why things like NaNoWriMo appeals to me so much - they fit in with how I'm happiest working and so far I've gone back repeatedly to the same project but that means my life has to worked out on an annul basic and not weekly/monthly etc... and EVERYTHING is long term :/

I'm feeling elated and panicky about performances and fear that I'll stop coming up with ideas.

It's kind of bizar. Also I seem to have lost the ability to sing in front of anyone :/ Just thinking about it makes my throat clam up - my solution to this is that I am dam well going to start singing again - some way, some how. I fear it will affect the way I do my performances as well so I have been making myself practice the guitar and have attempted to learn the Let It Go song from Frozen - it seems to kind of be helping.

And...

One blog post without a focus - I love Tori's music and I love Neil's work and this entire thread of thought was sparked by 'oh look I'm reading him and listening to her and they are at the British Library together today looking at comic books - ooo comic books wasn't I doing something with that... or was it a song I was supposed to be recording?'

Now I am off to spray the chickens as one of them is being naughty and pecking the others :/

A Special Kind of Stupid (by sarah)

So I have basically failed my course due to a stupid stupid mistake. After being so proud of not submitting right at the deadline, it turns out I submitted the wrong file - W00t go me - and of course UWE is really strict about deadlines so I can't just submit the correct file now. It was the last piece of course work for the module as well.

Issues were three fold 1) I had made a file naming system to nest all my UWE stuff which unfortunately meant that the file names where really similar and next to each other, b) I am dyslexic so my brain saw it as the correct file, c) I had little Mary on my lap snugging whilst I was trying to submit.

It is completely my fault but at the same time I feel that if I had been able to just submit old school and had a sheath of paper in at the office, the mistakes here and the issues with the files I had with the previous lot of course work, would not have been issues. Electronic submission is great especially for distance learners etc... but for me it means there are more potential mistakes to make.

So it looks like I am on for a resit and being very angry with myself. It is such a typically me thing to do - like ending up on the train to the wrong city or getting lost in a one road village. How is it that I produce prize winning work and have a zillion ideas and understand stuff that others think is too complex and yet I leave the house with my jumper inside out?

If I didn't know the damage it would do, I'd be banging my head on the brick wall right now!

GRRRRRRRRRRR - I am an IDIOT!

On the other hand I am now comparing some events at The Cheltenham Poetry Festival and I drew / wrote / created this and lot of other stuff last night.