Hold Fast Films

2012-02-11T11:12:00.000Z

Fly to Berlin:
Door to door, 8 hours - £230

Sleeper Train to Berlin
Door to door, 15 hours - £165
(plus the cost of lunch - soupe a l'oignon in the Marais watching snow fallng
over Paris)

Yes - I made it through a mad January and all the way to to Berlin for the
Film Festival. It's minus 12 outside, which makes the stone caravan almost
tropical, and the snow looks like falling diamonds.

It's been a trying few weeks - since January 3, when I went to work to find
that our sister company in the US had celebrated the New Year by losing our
domain name (and therefore our email) I have been working 70 hours weeks.
Every week. 50-60 hours a week at the corporate grindstone producing reports
and brochures, 10-20 hours a week writing script draft number 5 in time for
the festival.

Oh - and successfully breaking into the Stone Caravan and fitting the locks.

In comparison navigating transcontinental railways and negotiating a Prussian
winter is as relaxing as a week at the beach!

I'm taking as much time off as I can - sneaking out of the film market to
climb the Pergamon altar, or to gaze at Caspar David Friedrich's Moonrise at
Sea.

Which it is a Christmas Tree, triced up and well braced.

2012-01-07T18:29:00.001Z

So, it wasn't actually up until Christmas Eve, and it came down on Twelve Night, and, apologies for the late posting, but I did manage to assemble a Patrick O'Brian tree, just in time, and get pictures....

(The house isn't mine, btw - one of the reasons why it went up during radio-silence.)

So - there were admirals -

Frigates

A ship of the line (I suspect it's the Mary Rose...)

Globes and Union Flags (correct from 1801 onwards)

A Nutmeg of Consolation

(I dipped a nutmeg in glue and fine silver glitter and attached it to the stray clasp of a old tree bauble)

And Bonden's own gun....

I couldn't find a sloth - but a venomous platypus seemed the next best option - and here he is, contesting ownership of a duff with Testudo Aubreii

There were also ship's biscuits - made much as I suspect the originals were - and marked with the broad arrow -

These are about 2cm squared, baked in an aga overnight - alas, the photo of them on the tree hasn't come out.

"At the present moment, the whole fleet is lit up. When I say 'lit up', I mean lit up by fairy lamps."

I'm pleased to say it met with the approval of a Royal Marine who dropped in on New Year's Eve, and has offered to help me start a collection for a Peninsula tree - so Jack can share honours with Dick Sharpe next year.

Sorry it took so long to post (- rather like a serial letter to Sophie...)

Homeless - I lost the keys to the cottage...

2011-12-28T14:11:00.000Z

... somewhere, somehow, somewhen... out of the pocket of a big coat borrowed
by two people and finally found (sans keys) in a neighbours house.

A locksmith is required - one who doesn't mind climbing the last mile to the
door.

Greetings from Long Haugh Shiels on the shortest day of the year

2011-12-22T10:33:00.000Z

Tanya x

Plot point solved

2011-12-15T16:32:00.001Z

The real breakthrough was recognising the problem in the first point - for
which I have to thank Scrivener, which I only installed a few weeks ago.
Being able to break the outline down into smaller and smaller units without
having to juggle dozens of new documents was the key to identifying the lack
of jeopardy in the third act, and start the process of finding a solution.

And as is almost always the case, solution is to be found somewhere in the
very first drafts of the story ...

In other news - the office Intern had the classic office party experience. He
can't actually remember exactly what happened, but it involved the MDs PA,
being delivered home at 1am in a bicycle rickshaw, and waking face down in the
hallway to find his girl friend stepping over him with her suitcase packed
after waiting for him to come home for dinner since 6pm the previous day.

I've made him tea.

I'm making Aubrey/Maturin Christmas Tree

2011-12-10T10:18:00.000Z

I've been quietly collecting 18th Sailing Navy related Christmas decorations
for what almost 10 years, and never had the chance to pull them out - until
today.

So far I have

2 dashing captains in dress uniform (they are actually nelsons)
3 gold frigates
1 ship of the line
a silver nutmeg of consolation
6 small terrestrial globes
10 drums (to beat to quarters, obviously)
bags of coins as prize money
lots of sugar rats

Any other suggestions?

I'll try to make little signal flags, and some sealed orders, and bake ships
biscuits in the slow oven overnight.

Now I'm on the look out for ship's lanterns, weevils (lesser and greater), a
debauched sloth, some duff (double-shotted), tortoises (Testudo Aubreii,
natch) and, of course, some boobies.

There is a sort of connection to the stone caravan; although the valley is
landlocked great parcels of bleak fell and bog were gifted at some point
Greenwich Hospital, who, with the peace of 1814, thought it would be an
excellent idea to recycle their surplus of naval chaplains in the local
livings.

The poor sots were translated from the warm intensely crowded debauched fug of
the wardroom into isolated hamlets 30-40 miles ride from the nearest town,
where their entire congregation would consist of nine shepherds and their
dogs, and where months might pass without a single visitor. Most - already
accustomed to drinking a pint of grog a day - turned to drink and went mad.

And to complete the "misery"...

2011-12-10T07:16:00.000Z

... moths have munched their way through my new (second hand) cashmere
sweater, which I was relying on to keep me warm over Christmas, while it was
in the ironing basket.

And the knitted donkey made for my first ever Christmas.

On a tangent, I'm reading Ellroy's alternative American history, "The Cold Six
Thousand" - which opens seconds after JFK assassination, and therefore shortly
before the first ever episode of Doctor Who was broadcast, and therefore
minutes before my mum went into labour...

2011-12-09T18:59:00.000Z

Here it last is the bone of the problem with my story, the hard rotten core in
which I keep chipping my teeth.

In the first working draft "Paul" was smuggling political dissidents and
refuges out of the city in the expectation of a government crackdown.

The stakes were therefore exceptionally high; if "Lily" inadvertently revealed
during interrogation information that led back to "Paul", he would lose not
only his freedom, his career, possibly his life, but also his ability to
protect his family.

So he mistranslated her confession to deflect attention away from his
involvement.

Alas, further research, plus condensing the material so that it would cohere
as cinema made "Paul the people-smuggler" a non-starter. Not so much because
he couldn't or wouldn't have got involved, but because I couldn't see how
"Lily the forger" could have knowledge of it.

And the 3rd Act no longer worked, because everyone was behaving badly without
sufficient motive. The stakes were just not that high for Paul any more, and
he came across as a neurotic shit.

Every thing I have tried to invoke to replicate that original jeopardy -
without making the story over-complex* - has failed.

(*Good film is simple, not simplistic. The emotional journey can be complex,
the obstacles can be complex, but the hook for the story is simple.)

I'm feeling very Yul-ish

2011-12-06T16:37:00.000Z

I seem to have come over all innocently ridiculously Christmassy this year.

I find myself this morning sneaking into the office at 7.30am to heap
chocolates and clementines on the desk of my German colleague. (I couldn't
find his spare shoes)

And I have an audio version of A Christmas Carol on my MP3 and took it to
enliven the walk to (and queue for) the Post Office yesterday.

Oh, well, I'm sure it will wear off and normal grinchy-ness will resume before
the end of the week.

The Woodburner, Electricity and the loo will have to wait

2011-11-28T10:11:00.001Z

All trumped by the need for transport.

Since the family moved over the river the cottage is one to one-and-a-half
walk from the bus
stop/shop/shower/baby-sitting/nice-cup-of-tea-and-recharge-the-laptop-while-sending-email.

And the landrover I borrow from time to time is heading west.

So - the next BIG expense is a road-legal quad bike.

Which (let's face it) is MUCH MORE FUN!

Dear Family: I love you, but...

2011-11-28T08:49:00.000Z

... if you call me at 7.05am on a monday morning for a "chat", and don't pick
up the "It's lovely but it's not a good time..." hint, while I try to wrangle
my knickers on onehanded, well, then:

I DON'T get to dry my hair - I DO get to travel to work, in November, with wet
hair and the start of a chill headache;

I DON'T get a seat on the 7.15 train - I DO get to stand on the 7.55 train
with my nose in someones armpit;

I DON'T get an hour of writing done before work - I DO get to rush into work 5
minutes late (and with wet hair);

I DON'T get to check my bag before I run out of the house - I DO manage to
leave without my purse, and therefore without breakfast*. Or Lunch. Or Tea.
Or, even (as the fridge is empty after my weekend away) Dinner.

It's my fault. We should talk more often.
I must arrange proper call times for catch up chats.
But not at 7.05am on a Monday morning.
Please.

(Thank you the lovely man in the new coffee shop made me cappuccino anyway. I
love you and I will buy coffee from you every monday for at least a year)

Upgrading the Writers' Cottage

2011-11-26T16:07:00.001Z

Having finally solved the damp, with the combination of the solar dehumidifier
(still going strong) and an annual ditch clearing party with beer and BBQ (a
new addition to the social whirl that is Easter) it's time to move on to the
next BIG improvement to the cottage.

At the moment it is my (almost) ideal writing spot. No neighbours, no
internet, no 21st century chores. Just a warm bed, a big chair, a small fire
and a pot of coffee sitting on the hearth.

But it is a bit tough on visitors, and almost impossible to imagine lending to
other writers, even those who want to try a "Walden Pond" experience for a
short while.

The biggest issues are-

Electricity: I don't need it for lights, or refrigeration, or entertainment.
But I do need to juggle the laptop batteries,and even then have to take a
recharging break every 2 days. I rely on neighbours who don't mind that I
plug-in while babysitting or drinking tea, but that's not really an option for
the average writer with the average battery time plus mobile phone, etc.

Heat: I have a small open fire, built into the redundant hulk of the 1859
kitchen range, supplemented in the winter but two calor-gar heaters. Most of
the heat generated goes straight up the chimney, and the fire is too small to
heat the whole building or to keep a fire "in" overnight or while taking a
walk. It's an inefficient use of fuel (wood - bought and collected), and I
spend most of the winter with my toes on the grate, wrapped in a shawl.

Plumbing: There is none. I have a spring fed cold water tap in the
larder/scullery. Hot water means a kettle. That I can live with. But the loo
is an issue. If I am in the cottage for less than 24 hours - I dig a hole in
the woods. Longer than that, and I set up the folding composting loo, which
works well, and is perfectly hygienic, but is aesthetically challenging.

So, these are my choices for the next upgrade.

My choices are:

a.) a wind turbine - cost about £400
I've seen a turbine that works like one of those whirling signs you see
outside newsagents - it's compact and can be folded away if the noise is
excessive. I'd need to get cabling, a deep cycle battery and an inverter as
well, and experiment with the best way to set it up - but I confess, the
pleasure of trolling up for a weekend and knowing I'll have always have enough
juice stored up to run the laptop/phone/DVD/radio/charge the LED lights would
be, well, game-changing.

b.) a woodburning stove - cost around £1000
I'm thinking of installing this in the alcove next to the fire (currently a
cupboard with a stone floor) and running a flue up through the bedroom and out
of the roof, rather than trying to squeeze a small stove into the existing
tiny fire space. That way I can have the advantage of economic heat in both
rooms and the option of an occasional small fire for cooking, making toast and
indulging my pyromania from time to time.

c.) a composting loo
This is the big spend: I know the lo-tech version of the "seperett" system
works; as the name suggests it eaily and hygienically separates the, umm,
products, into wet and dry, and then composts them using different methods,
well out of sight. It is easy to use, easy to clean, and while the camping
version is a bit challenging for the casual visitor, the upgraded version,
powered by a solar panel, looks and feels, to all intents and purposes, like a
conventional plumbed in loo.
The loo itself is only £500 - but there is no point in upgrading without
replacing (repairing) the combined outhouse/porch in which it would be
installed, as the original structure is on the point of falling down. And as
the cottage is some distance from the road, that means co-ordinating
materials, builder and transport, in the summer, when the ground is dry enough
to bring up a 4 wheel drive.
And then it would make sense to also upgrade to a tiled floor, and to put in a
small cold water sink.
But that feels like a HUGE undertaking right now.

--
Tanya Lees
Holdfastfilms

--
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Ha! On my way to my sister's for my birthday and she's (sort of) forgotten I'm coming!

2011-11-26T08:49:00.000Z

Actually she forgot that she arranged to take the family out all day, so she's
left a key and instructions to buy a chicken.

So - no excuse for not writing this afternoon!

Procrastinatin' in Caffe Nero....

2011-11-23T19:00:00.000Z

It's not as if I have a script to write or anyfink like that, is it? Oh,
wait....

I'll stick it out for a while longer, then go an procrastinate at home. It's
warmer there.

Despicable me and Berlin

2011-11-22T16:43:00.000Z

I just love being mean to my poor characters.

I just sat down for an hour in Somerset House - skaters zooming past the
window - and brainstormed another 50 things that could go wrong for my lead.

Before I even started he was orphaned, impoverished, exiled, alone and hanging
from his fingertips over a snake-infested haunted listening to the lions roar
in the desert.

And then I made it even worse for the poor sod. Fifty thing, including
Typhoid and/or the day of Judgement and all the fire of hell.

Job well done.

Now I have start concentrating on accreditation for the Berlin Film Festival.
Confession: I've never actually bothered to accredit before, just turned up
and blagged my way into parties. There is public access to so much of the
festival, to the shuttles, to the hotels, to the screenings, to the QandAs, to
the bars. Only the market building itself is off limits, and that has limited
appeal anyway, as long as you have contacts inside to score the party tickets.

Ugly writing is a beautiful thing

2011-11-20T19:56:00.001Z

I've just spent the afternoon powering through the 2nd Act of the script in as
deliberately ugly and awkward a way as possible, in preparation for a 4th
draft

The temptation to write beautifully is a terrible curse. You get instant
acclaim, and it certainly helps to sell an idea,but its all to easy use the
elegant handwaving to obscure grotty holes in the structure.

It reminds me of the life-classes I did in the art room at school; I always
got high marks despite appalling draftsmanship because I polished the product
up so nicely that who cared the models elbow was in the wrong place.

Now I am resisting all my instincts to make the prose I am writing atractive.
It's just bits of old words flung together and held up with string and gaffer
tape. Without the glamour and the polish and the handwaving only one thing
will make the story still stay up.

The truth.

If it's true, then it will still be standing tomorrow.

If not - well, I just have to pull it apart and stick it together again, until
it does stand up.

And that will, belatedly, be far more satisfying.

+++++

In other news - I just slid past the bread department at Waitrose and scored
£13.00 worth of poilane for - wait for it - £1.16.

Sourdough, walnut, rye - It will all go in the freezer and come out a slice at
a time for toasting.

I love Sunday nights at Waitrose.

Woah!

2011-11-19T19:01:00.001Z

How did I get to 7pm in one fell swoop!

That day just zippppppppppped past.

S by S East

2011-11-19T12:57:00.000Z

Europe - 1955

Harry Martin has been set up.

An innocent aboard, a loud, but charming American tourist, is approached in a restaurant by a young woman in distress. By dawn he is on the run, carrying a package of nuclear secrets that at least five different people wish to kill him for.

But Harry is not quite what he seems: to survive he is forced to draw on memories of past he hoped he had escaped for ever - as a teenage grifter and runner for the mob. The hard won skills of his childhood - and an unlikely alliance with a KGB assassin - are the only things keeping him alive.

Drama - 90 minutes.

At BAFTA last night to see a screening of As If I am Not Here followed by Q&A with director Juanita Wilson

2011-11-18T14:09:00.001Z

Screening half full, which surprised me. The subject matter is harrowing (the film is a dramtisation of Slavenka Drakulic's novel set in a women's prison camp in Bosnia in 1992) but the film itself is both beautiful and terrible (in the original sense of the word), without a single duff choice in script, casting or direction.

It was good to be reminded that there is nothing so horrific in human experience that we can not look at it, if - and it is a big 'if@ - we are guided to the right vantage point.

Wilson's achievement is all the greater in that she was working in Macedonia, with Macedonian crew and extras and Serbian and Bosnian leads, with very little in the way of shared language.

As If I Am Not Here already has a slew of well-deserved awards, and will undoubtedly collect more in the months to come.

T'sion

2011-11-10T17:19:00.000Z

T'sion - the Ark of the Covenant, palpable evidence of a God's promise to Man - and gift to Ethiopia.

In Berlin, 1947, Mikael Desta, an African war hero, battles the ingrained racism of his European allies to win the extradition of Paul Arendt, who seven years earlier, in occupied Ethiopia, tortured and killed Mikael's lover.

His goal is not only justice for the murdered woman, but the possession of evidence which he hopes will document other fascist atrocities in his home land.

The unexpected reappearance of a woman claiming to be Paul's victim, Lily, throws an uncomfortable new light on events in Ethiopia in 1939-40 and Mikael's own complicity in the massacre which brought these three individuals together and led to Lily's disappearance from History..

"When I was cast in the pit I pondered over the folly of the Kings of the World, and I asked, ,in what doth the greatness of kings consist? Is it in the multitude of soldiers, or in the splendour of worldly possessions, or in extent of rule over cities and towns?

In development with Corazon Films UK and 27 Films, Berlin

For more information: tanya.lees@holdfastfilms.com

Tanya Lees - writer

2011-10-05T22:07:00.001+01:00

I wrote my first book when I was two and a half.
I have since mislaid it, but I seem to remember that it was a single sheet of paper, folded and carefully filled with random letters in imitation of the mysterious and wonderful volumes around me, like so:

ETRCOS JASDYLAKYF JXFLIUSADFU G AJKUE SAHDKJHEF JSHDKJHE
DFKJAHDF ASDG DKJDHF SDJAKD BSD SIENNSBSDE SDEDA JASWEJU

Luckily I learned to read soon after and my own readability statistics improved.

Now, more than 30 years later, I am writing professionally, as a copywriter for American Express Business Travel, and as a screenwriter, with the generous support of Screen West Midlands, who are sponsoring my feature film script Translations, and my mentor and producer Anita Lewton who is still patiently badgering me to improve seven years after I first walked into her screenwriting class.

Selected Credits include:

2008 Everyday Heroes short film Writer/Director London, Mexico

2007 Catas-trophe short film Writer/Director London, New York, Beijing

2001 No Way Out theatre Director UK tour

2000 Gaveston multi-media Director London

1999 Frankenstein multi-media Writer/Director London

1997 Dracula theatre Director London

1995 The Changeling theatre Director London

1995 Ines de Castro theatre Director London

1994 La Gioconda theatre Writer/Director London, Edinburgh

1992 Eaten multi-media Writer/Director Leeds

1992 La Gioconda short film Writer/Director London, New York

1991 This Way Up theatre Writer/Director Leeds

1990 Leonce und Lena theatre Director Leeds

At last - Lime icecream on South Bank

2010-08-25T15:53:00.001+01:00

It was OK.

But now it's broken.

My batteries refuse to recharge

2010-08-01T12:13:00.000+01:00

- and for once I'm not talking about the laptop.

I feel like crawling back into bed all the time. It's 12pm on Sunday,
and I already want a nap. Again.
My brain is fuzzy, my eyes are heavy, I've barely done more than load
the washing machine and walk to the High street.
Even espresso has no effect.

Whole Foods Store - sucky customers

2010-08-01T12:09:00.000+01:00

Came to the Kensington Whole Foods theme park in search of gelato** and boy, these have to be the whiniest set of customers ever. I know its a tiny entitled minority, but seriously - in the 10 mins I've been here - 2 separate snowflakes , one male, one female, standing in the middle of the floor screeching for assistance. And I mean, screeching.

And then, as I pass through a narrow aisle past someone choosing "tea flowers", the paper bag I'm carrying brushes the back of her legs, and I hear "She pushed me - she just pushed me".

I'm more used to hearing that kind of WASH!!!! from 4 year olds, and I swear all of these darlings were over 40.

**Ended up trying the Buffalo Milk Ice Cream instead; big mistake, it coats the tongue like lard, and has a very nasty after-taste. Ugh. Threw most of it away. Will go to Scoop instead.

Can anyone recommend a cheap, small but robust digital camera?

2010-07-29T10:14:00.001+01:00

I can't use a camera-phone; not one that I've tried in the past was any
sodding use as, you know, an actual PHONE.

(I couldn't understand why the signal in my London flat got worse with
every passing year, until I was unable to make or take a call at all
unless I walked 50 yards from the front door - then I realised it wasn't
the signal, it was the annual phone upgrade. I bought a £13 Nokia 3310
- the model I had 7 years ago - and BINGO! - a working phone! No
camera, no mp3 player, no apps, no internet, but dammit, I can call the
fire brigade if I need to.)

Anyway, back to the camera - I want to be able to carry something small
that will snap household snakes, and the lesser known North Tyne turkey
bird, and the fairy castle I found in the woods.

There are freaking TURKEYS in the woods!

2010-07-29T08:46:00.000+01:00

I though I must be seeing things - that the weird beast dodging among
the sheep was just a very ugly pheasant.
But no, the woods are full of turkeys. Escapes from a local small
holding? No such luck.

Someone has deliberately released turkey chicks onto the land so that
they can run a novelty "shoot your own Turkey" event in December.

Because of course, the practise of releasing non native species into the
wild for sport and profit and shit and giggles has never caused
ecological disaster before now.

After all, it's not as if the land is in a NATIONAL PARK or anything.
It's not as if the local river bank is invested with imported mink, the
water with imported signal crayfish, or that the red squirrels of
Northumberland are disappearing under pressure from imported North
American greys - oh wait!

Luckily for everyone (except the poor Turkeys and unwary drivers) the
birds haven't mastered the green cross code, and are being squished
flat, daily.

Turkeys. Wild Turkeys. Released in the Northumberland National Park.
Without even touching on the ethical issues of shootin' huntin' and
fishin' - who does that?
WHO DOES THAT!!!!

In honour of my Adder

2010-07-28T15:53:00.001+01:00

A snake came to my water-trough
On a hot, hot day, and I in pyjamas for the heat,
To drink there.

In the deep, strange-scented shade of the great dark carob-tree
I came down the steps with my pitcher
And must wait, must stand and wait, for there he was at the trough before
me.

He reached down from a fissure in the earth-wall in the gloom
And trailed his yellow-brown slackness soft-bellied down, over the edge of
the stone trough
And rested his throat upon the stone bottom,
And where the water had dripped from the tap, in a small clearness,
He sipped with his straight mouth,
Softly drank through his straight gums, into his slack long body,
Silently.

Someone was before me at my water-trough,
And I, like a second comer, waiting.

He lifted his head from his drinking, as cattle do,
And looked at me vaguely, as drinking cattle do,
And flickered his two-forked tongue from his lips, and mused a moment,
And stooped and drank a little more,
Being earth-brown, earth-golden from the burning bowels of the earth
On the day of Sicilian July, with Etna smoking.
The voice of my education said to me
He must be killed,
For in Sicily the black, black snakes are innocent, the gold are venomous.

And voices in me said, If you were a man
You would take a stick and break him now, and finish him off.

But must I confess how I liked him,
How glad I was he had come like a guest in quiet, to drink at my water-trough
And depart peaceful, pacified, and thankless,
Into the burning bowels of this earth?

Was it cowardice, that I dared not kill him? Was it perversity, that I longed to talk to him? Was it humility, to feel so honoured?
I felt so honoured.

And yet those voices:
If you were not afraid, you would kill him!

And truly I was afraid, I was most afraid, But even so, honoured still more
That he should seek my hospitality
From out the dark door of the secret earth.

He drank enough
And lifted his head, dreamily, as one who has drunken,
And flickered his tongue like a forked night on the air, so black,
Seeming to lick his lips,
And looked around like a god, unseeing, into the air,
And slowly turned his head,
And slowly, very slowly, as if thrice adream,
Proceeded to draw his slow length curving round
And climb again the broken bank of my wall-face.

And as he put his head into that dreadful hole,
And as he slowly drew up, snake-easing his shoulders, and entered farther,
A sort of horror, a sort of protest against his withdrawing into that horrid black hole,
Deliberately going into the blackness, and slowly drawing himself after,
Overcame me now his back was turned.

I looked round, I put down my pitcher,
I picked up a clumsy log
And threw it at the water-trough with a clatter.

I think it did not hit him,
But suddenly that part of him that was left behind convulsed in undignified haste.
Writhed like lightning, and was gone
Into the black hole, the earth-lipped fissure in the wall-front,
At which, in the intense still noon, I stared with fascination.

And immediately I regretted it.
I thought how paltry, how vulgar, what a mean act!
I despised myself and the voices of my accursed human education.

And I thought of the albatross
And I wished he would come back, my snake.

For he seemed to me again like a king,
Like a king in exile, uncrowned in the underworld,
Now due to be crowned again.

And so, I missed my chance with one of the lords
Of life.
And I have something to expiate:
A pettiness.

Taormina, 1923
DH Lawrence

(Honestly - I haven't got over the intensity of the pleasure at meeting the Stone Caravan's adder at last. It was just so magnificently other and like Lawrence I felt obscurely honoured )

Also I have learned that a small bright fire of twigs will boil a kettle in less than 10 minutes -

2010-07-27T16:13:00.000+01:00

- now I keep a basket of dry twigs and bark, gathered beside the grate,
and throw a few on when ever I want boiling water. It's almost as fast
as an electric kettle.

Picking up an armful while I walk across the field is now a pleasant
daily chore, and they smell wonderfully sweet as they burn.

Shifting challenges

2010-07-27T15:13:00.001+01:00

When I took on stewardship of the Stone Caravan, the issues I was most
concerned about were damp, spiders and mice.

Four years ago the cottage was festooned with webs, great brown bellying
curtains of them, hanging from every window, across the stairwell, from
the low ceiling beams.

I feared they might be one seasons worth - but I've never found the
cottage to need more than two de-webbing session a year, and then I am
only wiping away the very smallest wisps of white from window frames and
keyholes (it's the draught - it carries small insects through the gap,
into the waiting spidey jaws)

Of course this could be the result of the all conker-ing horsechestnut
eco-friendly spider repellent - I've only sprayed the windows twice in 2
years, but who knows.

The first day I visited my new cottage I found a poisoned mouse expiring
on the doorstep (the same doorstep the adder was sunbathing on last
week). As I cleaned I found little splayed out mouse skeletons in hard
to reach places. And later, when I first lived in the cottage full
time, I just managed their presence - keeping them out of food supplies,
using peppermint oil to deter them, wiping down and sweeping daily,
never allowing food or equipment to come into contact with unwashed
surfaces...

They disappeared entirely 18 months ago, when the cottage was left
uninhabitable by floods, and weasels and owls moved in. And they have
yet to move back in...

The damp?

Well, it's a different place now, I open the door, warm fresh air
streams out, biscuits stay crisp, sugar pours, the bed is dry and aired.

But it is summer, and the winter was a dry one, so I have my fingers
crossed for the months to come.

It's pretty noisy at night right now -

2010-07-26T21:15:00.001+01:00

- the ewes are slowly moving away from their adolescent lambs, and no
longer respond instantly to their bleating.

So the dusk is full of horny (literally - they have the cutest iddle
widdle horns) teenagers yelling "Muuuuuuuuummmmmm!
MUUUUUUMMMMMMM!!!!!!" and being ignored.

(I notice that Mum does eventually turn up - when I locked up last night
the sheep were all settling down in pairs and triplets to sleep)

Stone Caravan Summer Pudding

2010-07-26T18:34:00.000+01:00

Step over adder.

Chase sheep out of blackcurrant bush.

Pick a mixed bowl of black- and red-currants.

Pick over the currants, (removing wisps of wool as well was twig). Rinse.

Put 3/4s of the currants in a pan with sugar, and pop on a slow fire.

Make tea. Read "Sharpe's Rifles".

When the currants start to bubble, take off the fire, cover and forget
for a while. Read.

Slice a good but slightly stale loaf of white bread. (I got one from
waitrose, reduced to 20p)

Line a pudding basin with the slices of bread, trimming them to fit, and
filling any gaps. Cut a lid and put it aside.

Fill the breadybowl with the cooled fruit, pop on the breadylid, a
saucer, and a tin can to weigh it down.

Forget about it.

Next day - cook the rest of the currants and let them cool down in their
juice.

Some point in the afternoon - turn out the pudding dish, and pour over
the extra currants and juice.

Admire the purpley yumminess.

Eat.

I 'ad an adder in tha house!

2010-07-26T11:11:00.001+01:00

Yes folks, after 4 years I finally got to meet the snake what lives
under my house.

I found him/her sunbathing on the doorstep on Saturday afternoon - as I
approaches he/she slithered under the door and into the cottage.

Gorgeous creature, pale gold with a zig zag of dark brown down the back

Snake definitely more freaked out than I was - after all, I as a.)
wearing boots, b.) able to step straight over that arrow shaped head c.)
aware that Adder venom, though painful and temporarily disabling, is
almost entirely non-fatal to fit human adults, and d.) snakes dislike
the presence of humans almost as much as they dislike the proximity of
Gruffaloes.

I just sat on the steps watching Ada (or Adalbert) the Adder, turn tail
and slither back outdoors again.

I must get a new camera for moments like this.

Slow sad tears of frustrated greed

2010-07-24T08:41:00.000+01:00

Oh - imagine the anticipation - real life evening events at Royal
Festival Hall! Not just the busy crowded terrace, bar, cafe, gift shop,
exhibitions, libraries, displays and real honest to god mini-favela
built out of brick and leg and fairy
lights...(http://www.southbankcentre.co.uk/find/hayward-gallery-and-visual-arts/visual-arts/tickets/project-morrinho-southbank-centre-favela-1000045
- awesome!)

Surely now, as the sunsets over the river, and thousands of Londoners
flock to play on the decks and terraces, and to dance to the
gutpunchingly wonderful beat of the AfroReggae Experience
(http://www.southbankcentre.co.uk/find/dance-performance/tickets/the-afroreggae-experience-54247),
surely now, they would open up the cabinet and exchange the £2.50 in
loose change hoarded in my hot sticky palm all day for the the
specially commissioned Brazil themed Lime and Cacacha nummy nummy
ice-cream ...

At least that's what I told myself ALL yesterday. The thought sustained
me through weary hours of bookkeeping, tick tock on the clock, fly
buzzing on the dusty window sill at work, "ping - you have mail."

6.30pm, there I am, I'll write for an hour, maybe two, to be sure that
I've earned it.

The hall is rammed, everywhere the "ching, ching" of tills, the bars
serving coffee and wine and cakes and pencils which are also drumsticks,
and hot soup....

And in one neglected corner, an icecream chest, with "Festival Brazil"
sticker, and a listing of wonderful icecreams. Unlit, unloved,
unstocked, just un-, un-, un- icecreamed.

Never mind.

I'll make Summer Pudding tonight, with the currants harvested from the
wilderness behind the stone caravan.

Anyone know about car cigarette lighter sockets?

2010-07-22T18:51:00.001+01:00

All my stone caravan power woes would be resolved if I could charge my
laptop from the cigarette lighter in the (borrowed) landrover.

But I can't find a plug that fits it.

I understand there are two standard sizes for the sockets, but does
anyone do an adapter to help me plug the charger on one standard into
the socket on the other standard.?

And to add to the angst and frustration....

2010-07-22T18:46:00.000+01:00

The Royal Festival Hall is stocking a Caprinha Icecream, by Mingella
Ices, as part of "Festival Brazil".

That's cream, sugar, lime and cachaca - frozen. In a pot. With a
spoon. I want SOOOOOOOO much.

But, because the Royal Festival Hall has no concerts this week, the ice
cream remains locked up in the freezer.

I can buy beer, wine, coffee, sandwiches, soup, pizzery things, and a
selection of gifts.

But no lime and cachaca ice-cream. Even on the lovely yummy HOT
evenings on the river.

All I can do is press my nose to the locked Ice Cream stand and drool a
little, sadly, and wait.

Aghhh Aghhhh Aghhhh

2010-07-22T18:39:00.001+01:00

So having arrived back from Ireland with a mountain of work on the
script and no clean clothes, I am praying for an easy week at the
office.... (and not just me, one of the evangelical flatmate's
evangelical mates offered to pray for the same....)

And well, knock me down, what I get instead is an emergency report to be
completed, and FOUR DAYS working from 9am - 10pm, without a lunch break,
to deliver it.

And still no clean clothes...

I'm cream crackered.

How to start, how to start...

2010-07-13T18:32:00.000+01:00

I've worked everyday for some 30 or so days (time off during the day, but never the whole day)

The deadline was originally July 7. I met that (sort of) and got the feedback, and now I have to respond to that with the rest of the draft by August 1.

So I know I'll be working 10-14 hours for the next 17 days.

And I don't know how to start.

Last week was definitely better spent in Ireland...

2010-07-13T08:17:00.000+01:00

... rather than in an isolated off-road two room cottage in woodland in
the Northumbrian countryside.

I left the North on Monday night, just as the first sightings of the
gunman were being phoned in from Rothbury, and watched the search and
the stand-off the next day long distance, from London and Galway,
between meetings at the Film Fair.

Galway was cold and wet and fun and very very successful.

Now London is cold and wet - and I have a mountain of work to catch up
with and I am feckin' well knackered!

At least I'm used to "cold and wet" - growing up in Wales does prepare
you for a life spent under water!
I have gills!

Trust me, this is one of the few occasions when living in a remote cottage in Northumberland does not feel comfortable!

2010-07-08T12:23:00.000+01:00

The Stone Caravan is not in the area the police are searching - but it
feels close enough.

I was there until Monday night, before heading to Ireland - if I had
stayed, I reckon I'd be snuggled down in my sister's place, with all mod
cons and neighbours in clear sight!

But, as it turns out, I'm in Galway, for the film festival - after
working 25 days without a break on the latest draft.

I hope I don't nod off, mid-pitch!

Jeremy Kyle has not worn underwear for 20 years!

2010-07-03T07:17:00.000+01:00

http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2010/jul/03/jeremy-kyle-interview

AUGH!!
I REALLY DID NOT NEED TO KNOW THIS!

2010-06-01T14:31:00.000+01:00

It's very strange listening to John Humphries announce that the day
"will be dry but not sunny", when I'm sitting against the porch at 7.30
under a blue sky listening to Radio 4 (on solar power to boot).

Proof positive that the North Tyne valley has its own bizarre climate.

I've been pulling moss out of the guttering - or rather, all the
guttering I can reach. The bull wandered over for a look, blinked and
ambled off again.

As I do it, I am pondering the building of a mini-dyke just beyond the
top gate, to deflect all the run-off from the fell and persuade it not
to flow through the porch. It's only a trickle of water, but its
constant in wet weather, and it floods the loo and turns the garden into
a quagmire and washes relentlessly at the wall of the cottage.

It would have to be at least 2 feet high, wide and as stable as
possible to prevent erosion - I'm thinking of mixing in the remains of
some old (organic - wool and hessian!) carpets to strengthen it, and turf.

If I did that, then I could waterproof and repair the outhouse, (which
is rotting) and if I could do that, I could install a proper
composting/solar loo, and if I could do that, I could let other people
stay here.

Which is very appealing - but that's an awful lot of mud ,stones, carpet
and turf to shift.

2010-05-31T19:39:00.000+01:00

This is the first summer for two years I don't have swallows nesting
somewhere in the house.

When I opened the door the breeze blew an irridescent confetti across
the floor; butterfly wings. Red Admirals seem to have settled and died
in every room of the house. ( I rescued two I found bettering
themselves against the window panes. I've no idea how they get in -
perhaps they arrived as caterpillars and pupated in the house?

It's 8pm, and it the sunlight is brighter now than it was at midday.
The last time I slept here was Easter, when sleet was still falling, and
by 4.30 the curtains were drawn. Now I can read on the porch until 10,
and walk through the wood without a lamp at 11.

PS -

2010-05-29T08:59:00.000+01:00

The stench of trainers in an unventilated Italian sleeper apartment is
as the fragrance of honeysuckle compared to the range of whiffs
explosively produced by 3 hungover unwashed squaddies drinking carlsberg
and eating egg mcmuffins at 8am on the Peterborough - York stretch of
the East Coast line.

I also have beer on my keyboard.

Quick Summary of the past 4 months

2010-05-29T08:52:00.000+01:00

January: Frantic writing to meet deadline for "She Writes" - mentoring
program for British Women in Screenwriting.
Also - a long weekend with Corry and John, travelling through London on
the proceeds of a writer's grant. They'll be living in an apartment in
a hill town in Umbria for 3 months (Bastards!). Made faggots.

February: Frantic writing to meet deadline for a careers conference at
my old school. I have no idea what I can say except - "a career in
screenwriting involves 10 years training and practise and something like
90% of successful screenwriters leave the industry within 10 years of
their break through". Not sleeping well - actually, that an
understatement. By the end of the month I am subsisting on 2 hours a
night. Zombification ensues.

March: Frantic writing to produce new draft of old screenplay at
request. Also write, design and print manage new company brochure.
Still not sleeping - except for the 15 minutes face down on the keyboard
after lunch.

April: Volcanic Ash, Flu and Florence: While everyone was talking about
the new Dunkirk, and repatriating brits from Spain via the Bay of
Biscay, I was heading in the opposite direction, by train to Florence.
It rained and I shared an overnight carriage with 4 terrified teenage
boys. Woke up to rain and the smell of feet. No one can produce
trainer- reek as effectively as a 16 year old male. Or sleep so
soundly. Arrive Florence. Eat Gelato.

May: Writing frantically to meet deadlines for Galway Film Fair. Summer
arrives - even at the stone caravan. Then it disappears again. Obsess
about Gelato.

"The moon is like a toenail, floating in a murky glass of wine"

2010-05-28T20:17:00.000+01:00

I was stumbled into a meeting of a group which had "ambitions" to
represent all British screenwriters. It was a glum experience. I had
wandered along with a friend, a producer who had been asked to give an
"update and download" from the Cannes festival, which had finished only
a few days earlier.

It was a glum experience - The venue was a basement, lined many year
before with offcuts of lino and carpet, and furnished with donated
sofas. The audience stayed in their coats (it was cold down there) and
listened politely as the producer described the state of the market,
then, just as politely disagreed with everything he said.

In vain he explained that he wasn't in fact proscribing what writers
should or shouldn't write - he was only describing which scripts - of
all kinds - were making it into production, and how.

I think I understood what was happening. Would be writers spend time in
their heads creating a singular reality. It makes perfect sense to me
that they would continue to do so when they emerged back into the real
world. Sensitive dramas about Polytechnic lecturers facing the mid-life
crisis still not outselling lo-budget horror? La-la-la, fingers in
ears, it's not true.

Then we broke for refreshments. I queued at a trestle table to buy wine
drawn by a volunteer from a wine box. It cost £2.00. I looked down.
There, in my glass, floated the toe nail clipping, a chunky crescent of
keratin that seemed to sum up the evening.

I was invited back a year or so later, by the same friend, who had been
asked by the group's committee to help them increase membership and
income. He wanted them to hear input from a screenwriter who had chosen
not to become a member.

I didn't mention the toenail.

Instead, I told them that I read their e-letter every month in the hope
of finding something relevant, but they only offered the same handful of
classes, recycled endlessly, and which all seemed to be addressed to
small scared animals living in holes under the pavement:

"Want to be a screenwriter? Get over your fears in this friendly
workshop, where we will explore ways of getting your ideas onto the page
- by the end of the afternoon you'll be writing! - £5.00 plus small
charge for tea and coffee"

I suggested that once this might hook beginners, they should attract
working writers to offer master-classes for those were trying to improve
their skills - like impro to improve dialogue writing, or ways to
tighten scene structure, or tips on improving packaging for pitching.
It would cost more - but I, and people I knew, would certainly pay for
the extra value they would offer.

"Oh, no" they replied "writers are poor. And shy. Very shy. Oh no -
we'd never get writers along to classes like that!"

"Most the emerging writers I know are holding down some kind of job, and
are motivated to learn. You can offer concessions if you need to - but
there are also those who can and will pay!"

No - there aren't any writers like that"

"I've met them in screenwriting groups - and at Cannes"

"Writers don't go to Cannes. If they went to Cannes they'd be producers"

"I went to Cannes"

"Writers don't go to Cannes"

It will come as no surprise to you that this organisation, which defined
its membership solely as writers without money who were too shy to
actually, well, write, folded without trace a few months later.

Arrrggghhhh - so unfair!

2010-05-28T19:16:00.000+01:00

- I've had a smear of chocolate ice cream on my nose all afternoon, and
no one at work told me.

And yes, this does mean I made it to the Gelato shop. One scoop of
bitter chocolate sorbet, one of raspberry. Mmmmmm....

No icecream in the stone caravan - at least, not now the snow has
(finally) gone.
Inside it's as crisp and dry as a biscuit.

Ok, ok - I am ashamed

2010-05-26T08:48:00.000+01:00

Euro is teetering on the brink of a second banking crisis - and I am
still fretting about the availability of ice cream.

I sit at my keyboard fantasising about tall cones of soft icy intensity
- coffee, pistachio, rose, lemon, almond - and then settle for a dash to
the newsagents for a tiny tub of Wall's Cream of Cornish.

Or - maybe - just maybe -

If I write 10 pages in the next 24 hours, I will make the 30 minute
round trip and queue at Scoop in Short's Garden!

The worst thing about our little heat wave is...

2010-05-25T14:05:00.000+01:00

... that it is impossible to buy really good ice cream within walking
distance of where I am sitting right now.

I've been spoiled - I spent a weekend in Italy last month, eating gelato
at least once a day - and now a magnum fished out of the freezer bin at
Tescos just doesn't cut it. Too sweet, too rich, no intense shock of
flavour to cut through the milk and ice.

Ahem...

2010-05-22T12:20:00.000+01:00

... normal service will be resumed shortly.

Wet, wet, wet

2010-04-04T09:25:00.000+01:00

As a neighbour noted at lunch yesterday, I have not enjoyed a single
season of dry weather since moving in to the Stone Caravan three years ago.

Well, not quite.

Spring 2007 was gorgeous. I remember limewashing the cottage in
February in shirt sleeves, then sunbathing on the rock behind the
kitchen. By May the National Park issued an early drought warning, and
banned barbecues and camp-fires. Everything seemed set for a glorious
summer - just as I prepared to quit London and move in. I packed the
hammock, and imagined lazy afternoon under the trees.

Then it started to rain - and it hasn't really stopped since (except for
the not so brief interludes of snow.)

The hillside is like chocolate mousse - and the woods are full of new
springs and streams.

Ah well - the third spring is late, but it is just about here; I saw
primroses in the bank yesterday. Perhaps the arrival of the sun will
finally herald a real summer.

Meanwhile - the Solar dehumidifier continues its heroic work keeping the
H2O at bay.

I just met my weasel - nose to nose...

2010-04-04T09:03:00.000+01:00

... over the pond.

I've seen it before - but only as a streak of sleek red fur along the
bank behind the stream.

And I'm certainly familiar with details of its domestic live, having
followed a string a tarry black sprints back to its larder - a dead bird
carefully stashed in a hole in one of my duvets!

But this morning, as I was looking for a sheltered spot to pee in the
little wood behind the garden, I saw a small lithe mammal leap through
the comfrey leaves just below the SolarVenti intake.

And then it popped up to check me out - a tiny ginger critter, with a
white bib and a sharp little face.

Long may he or she (or they) remain, to keep the cottage mouse-free.

oh fer pity's sake...

2010-01-29T23:45:00.001Z

... it's 11.45 pm and she is *singing* again.

To her ipod. The same whining phrase, over, and over, and over again.

I will need more gin to deal with this.

Tonight I am drinking...

2010-01-29T23:03:00.001Z

A double shot of gin, over ice in a collins glass, a generous splash of
absinthe, topped up with indian tonic water.

Delish.

Does this have a name?
I don't believe for a second no one has done this before...

Frantically busy...

2010-01-26T19:41:00.001Z

.... at work, rest and play.

I'm scrambling to finish my application to the Bird's Eye/Scriptfactory
'She Writes' programme - a year of professional development for eight
women film writers.

And I've just waved off guests, John and Corry, who were my very first
(practically my *only*) guests at the Stone Caravan, back in 2007. They
arrived in June in the midst of records rains and flooding. Oh. And
the birth of my second niece (my sister only reproduces during National
Emergencies. It's a hobby of hers...)

This time around I could offer them a better, toad-free, bedroom in
London. Corry is enjoying the fruits of a bursary to finish her novel
about the the regency underworld, and is spending it on practical
research (eating venison at Rules, founded 1797, hot pot at Simpsons,
founded 1757 and staying in Beckford's Tower at Bath).

I wish I could join them in the eccentric old bugger's tower - but I
have the afore mentioned application to finish by Thursday.

Hey ho.

Fear of finishing

2010-01-13T14:05:00.001Z

I recently finished a short story which had been gathering dust on my
hard drive for almost 3 years.

I had put it aside as unproductive when there are so many other projects
which need work, but someone remembered it and asked if it was abandoned
or not, and suddenly I couldn't bear not to have finished it.

The few days of peace between Christmas and New Year helped, as did the
calm that settled with the snow, and it was done, at about 2am on
December 31st.

By then the fire had died past embers, and it was a cold trip to bed,
clutching a hot water bottle and a copy of "Dead Souls". It took a
while I get to sleep, and I was suddenly aware of a nagging grief that
the story was done, and that particular nest was empty.

I've never noticed this before, but wonder if it hasn't been trundling
along all this time. Perhaps I feel happier with a warm hard drive full
of "works in progress" which may or may not be of any value?

I must finish some more, and find out.

Back in the city just in time to catch more snow

2010-01-13T13:57:00.001Z

I can't help imagining all the gallons of melt water which will soon be
tumbling off the fell and straight through my porch.

Well, that was an apocalyptic walk home...

2009-12-31T17:32:00.001Z

I've just negotiated deep snow, sheet ice, 4 inches of slush, knee high

melt water pools, hail stones and at least 4 guns in the woods above the
path - all between me and the next cup of tea.

I tried to look as little like a pheasant as possible, and made it to
the cottage in one piece.

I'm not sleeping here this week; my sister is in the last week of
pregnancy and I am on standby to babysit in case she needs to make a
dash through the snow to a maternity ward in the middle of the night.

Aaaand..... it's snowing again.

2009-12-31T10:34:00.001Z

Thickly.

Actually, I can't bring myself to be bored with this.
Perhaps I should relocate to Lapland.

Things that make day to day life in a stone hovel possible

2009-12-30T13:15:00.000Z

- in no particular order.

The SolarVenti:
No mould. No weasels. No birds' nests. 'nuff said.

Crocs:
as ugly as sin, but over the past 3 years they have survived fire,
flood, burial in several inches of mud, squatters, attack by starving
mice - and, after a rinse, they came up as bright and and yellow and
obnoxious as ever. They are warm, non-slip, keep my feet toes and
practically glow in the dark.

LEDs:
Bright and white and tiny and cheap, and all the power they need can be
supplied in a few cranks of a handle. Who needs electricity?

The wind-up radio:
I just wish it would charge on sunlight while I was away; the old one
did, but this one is stubborn, and likes me to pay attention to its
handle if I want to hear some Handel.

Paper Towels:
I buy recycled and use it for *everything* before it goes into the fire.

Hand sanitiser:

The blow-poker!
This is a superb invention - a long hollow steel tube with a mouthpiece
at one end and two prongs on the other. Wedge it between the logs, blow
- and rouse the dampest fire into action in seconds...

An insulated travel mug:
Keeps tea warm for at least 40 minutes.

Whisky.

It's snowing again.

2009-12-28T14:15:00.000Z

Always, when I start to climb the hill I wonder how I could have ever
imagined living at the Stone Caravan, always, after 2 hours here, I
wonder how I can ever bring myself to leave.

The SolarVenti solar dehumidifier has transformed the place - on the
opening the front door the air that rushes to greet you from the
darkness is as cold as ever - colder perhaps - but fresh and as sweet as
the air of an 800 year old building could ever be. The rugs and
blankets hanging from hooks (beyond the reach of mice) are chilly, but
crisply dry. The matches light first time. The pages of books curl
like dry leaves, not like a day old salad.

There is still moisture here - at least enough to frost the inside of
the windows; even now, at midday, the North facing window is white with
ice flowers.

It's pumping away in the sunlight right now - or would be if I hadn't
discovered how to switch off the fan (cold dry air being a good thing
when I'm out, not so good when I'm sitting 5 feet from the outlet in
thermal underwear, trying to get warm.

Best £500 investment I've made to date. I can now strongly recommend
one to anyone with a dank spot in the house, a cellar, or north facing
wall, or condensation plagued cupboards.

Moving back in was tricky - the ground has thawed enough to leave the
pasture as soft as chocolate mousse under the crust of snow, and the
landrover, stuffed with bedding and warm clothing was bogged down in the
slope within minutes. I had to reverse back, all the way to the farm
and abandon the attempt until this morning, at 8, when there was enough
frost to keep the wheels free.

Now the fire is hissing, as is the kettle, and I have a hot water bottle
stuffed under my fleece to keep the vitals from freezing. Ugg boots
look after one end, a cap the other, and my fingers are left to fend for
themselves while I type (fingerless mittens perhaps?).

I have chocolate, bread, cheese, chutney, beans, tea, cigars (it's
Christmas) and whisky. Oh, and oranges to see off scurvy.

Plenty of work to do (the laptop keeps my fingers a little warmer) and
plans for the next big project - conversion of the old defunct range
into a wood burning stove with cooking rings!

Once in a lifetime!

2009-12-24T16:54:00.000Z

How many decades have I lived to finally glide Northwards through
snowbound fields on Christmas Eve....

Imma gonna have to pull a copy of Pickwick off the bookshelf when I get
in and settle by the fireside!

Oh my good ... I could watch this for ever

2009-12-19T08:07:00.000Z

7.50 am on the train, in Lincolnshire, a dull pink, mauve and gold sky over fields, woods, rivers and farmbuildings, crusted with snow and scattered with crows.

Is this what living in the real North is like?  Because if so, I'm moving!

Writer's resistence is a world-wide phenomemon

2009-12-18T13:18:00.001Z

I had a great time in Dubai bonding with writers from the Middle East
and Asia over all the ways we find *to avoid actually facing the blank
screen/page" in the morning.

You'd think writers had the shiniest kettles and best sorted socks in
the UNIVERSE.

(So why can I never find a matching pair when I need one?)

In other news

- I left bread dough rising in the Saucepan Drawer in the kitchen
overnight. Yummy yeasty smells all over the kitchen.
Will bake it tonight - and take pictures if at all possible.

- Leave for the Cottage at 6.15am tomorrow. Will probably need snow
shoes, Thermos and emergency rescue flares.
At least I'll have bread to keep me alive in the snow drift my train
will be lodged in for the next 36 hours....

Back in the UK

2009-12-15T15:08:00.001Z

Left a city lashed with rain, (heaviest rainfall Dubai has seen in several years, floods, animals lining up on Jumeirah beach Two by Two) and landed in one gripped by frost (at least it's seasonal).

Stayed awake long enough to get through the front door - then crashed on the sofa for 5 hours, stunned senseless by lack of sleep.

Got a text at 9pm, just as I made it up the stairs to bed; one of my producer's other projects, an Iraqi film about a child's unexpectedly dangerous quest for perfect kite making materials, was fully funded - several times over.

I'm functioning - but slowly, and I know I'm going to hit "the wall" before the evening is over.

Dubai - a whirlwind of adrenalin, perfume and strong coffee

2009-12-12T11:38:00.000Z

I was pretty much exhausted when I took my seat on the plane - the week
of preparation, packing the night before and a day of rushing to beat
deadlines for my boss before I left the office for the airport all
conspired together to make me shaky. This was followed by a hour
standing on the tube, an hour in line to drop my bags, 3 security
cheques and 6 hours overnight in the air.

Let's just say - 48 hours after landing, I am still running on empty (or
rather, coffee)

Things keep appearing and disappearing. Today I managed to find my
missing power cable and lose all my business cards.
Oh, and walk into a plate glass door while holding a cup of coffee.
The only person who saw this humiliation was a charming Emirati producer
who swapped stories of similar mishaps with me.

So, it's possible I am hallucinating the whole festival.

Fragmentary impressions.

It's raining - the first rain here in 20 months. Go figure.

I saw "Un Prophete" by Jacques Audiard. It is a masterpiece. Even
after 36 hours without sleep every minute gripped me. Magical, gruesome
without being glum or grim.

Lovely laid back atmosphere - there are none of the scrums of papps,
herds of fans and packs of wannabes that make Cannes so frenetic and
unproductive. (No one is here pitching their trilogy of low-budget
torture porn).

Also, its hugely refreshing not to have the debate dominated by the US
market.

I like doing business in a culture that respects women for what they
have from the neck up rather than down, and is not obsessed with 18 year
olds. It's also wonderful to socialise without alcohol. This leads to
wonderful conversations with some very interesting people - and some
great opportunities to collaborate with writer/directors from the region.

I need a month's worth of sleep.

Juggling too much, I'm going to start dropping balls soon...

2009-12-01T13:16:00.001Z

I suspect it's a familiar feeling at this time of year - the usual
lunacy of life and work and a 60 hour work week, plus preparing for
Dubai Film Festival (prep and print publicity materials, script polish,
dig suitable clothes out of storage, wash/mend, cut hair, replace broken
suitcase, track down missing cheques, order cash...) and for
you-know-what on the 25th (buy presents, pack and post stuff to
Australian rellies, etc), while booking travel for all my clients
(Turkey, Ireland, Bulgaria and Spain this week) and fending off their
flu germs.

Squinting at the timetable, It's doable, but only if nothing goes off
schedule in the next 5 days, and I don't make any bread.
Oh, and I don't try to find time to eat this week.

Ok, back to the schedule now...

Writers are strange wights

2009-11-30T17:51:00.001Z

As are dolls' house makers.

I made bread last night

2009-11-26T17:36:00.001Z

Crackling, chewy sourdough bread.

It *must* have been good.

I decided to take half the loaf into work to distribute at the breakfast
meeting (just showing off really) and flung it into a bag this morning.

Halfway across the park I look down - and there is a small crowd of grey
squirrels (I.e - 3) around my ankles, looking expectantly at the bag.

I half expected one to start tugging on my sock in supplication.

Dubai Film Festival - here I come!

2009-11-25T18:52:00.001Z

Just got the accreditation through - I'll be in Dubai for the festival
next month.
Excited and apprehensive in equal measure - sounds about right.

Recession?

2009-11-24T20:20:00.000Z

I very rarely travel between 5 and 7; I got out of the habit years ago,
when trains were crowded, hot and sticky. I made more sense to stay
close to work, drinking coffee and writing for a few more hours before
heading home.

Today I went home at 6.15 because I had bread dough rising in the
kitchen, and realised that if I didn't get it punched down and shaped by
7 I would be pulling out of the oven at midnight.

I was shocked to get a seat.
The train wasn't empty by any means, but 2 years ago, at 6.15, I would
have been travelling on my hind legs, with my nose pressed against
someone else's back or armpit.

Anyway. The bread is punched down and rising again, and I am in my
local boozer, drinking a very nice red wine and hacking about at Act 3
AGAIN.

Frankenstein

2009-11-18T17:29:00.001Z

Drama - 90 minutes.

Creating life can sometimes be as terrifying as losing it.

I dreamed that my baby came to life again

that it had only been

cold

and that I rubbed it before the fire and that it lived.

I awake and find no baby.

Creating life can sometimes be as terrifying as losing it.

Mary Shelley rattles alone, last survivor in the frozen paper-strew ruins of life, making and waking the dead - husband, lover, child, friends, sister, mother - drawing them out in the wastes of ice and fire and ink.

But the creature that haunts her long lonely night is the little she created 20 years before...

He sleeps; but is wakened; he opens his eyes; the horrid thing stands at his bedside, opening his curtains, and looking on him with yellow, watery, speculative eyes.

Drama, 90 minutes.

16 hours later, on an entirely different wifi network...

2009-11-16T14:24:00.001Z

... and firefox/google is *still* serving all my requests in SWEDISH.

How to get the best tickets to see any show in the West End

2009-11-16T10:55:00.000Z

Method 1: Work in London Box Office: My first job in leaving Uni was as a meerkat, popping up over the counter of the Old Vic to sell tickets... the money was ok, the hours were long, but the perks included access to the secret masonery of ticketsales, swapping unsold seats with other meerkats in theatres all over London. It was an education ...

Method 2: Buy Theatremonkey: A Guide to London's West End - the most comprehensive and userfriendly guide to chosing and buying theatre tickets ever published.

TheatreMonkey is, similtaneously, a website, the theatre buff called Steve who runs it, and now a beautifully designed book, that provides first hand inside information on booking tickets for London theatres.

Not only does the Monkey tells us how to go about get our tickets (even for "sell out" shows), without being ripped off, he has also done the hard work for us - and visited every single venue to test the seats; leg room, vertigo, that little bit shaved off by a pillar or a balcony (often, ironically, the most exciting seats as well as the cheapest) - the Monkey has been there and checked them for us. Above and beyond, I call it

The quirks of each theatre building (and they are odd and quirky, believe me) are lovingly detailed, and each has been given a new, beautifully designed, seating plan - for the first time in a standardised format

What the Monkey has missed (and that's not much, as far as I can tell!) is been supplied and supplemented by comments made by other theatre goers via his website.

The book itself is comprehensive enough to allow to plan almost every aspect of your visit, and just slim enough to fit inside a pocket or handbag.

I've long been in the habit of buying pocket A-Z maps of London for overseas guests, with my mobile number and a pre-pay oyster card taped to the front cover.

Now I will be throwing a Theatremonkey: into their bags with it, along with admonition to "get lost, have fun and come home in one piece!"

I'm guessing you are single -

2009-11-16T10:54:00.001Z

- balding guy sitting 10 feet from me in Cafe Nero.

Because I can still hear you suck your teeth at this distance, and if I
want to smack you over the head within 5 minutes, it is clear that any
marriage would have ended in spousi-cide over the breakfast table a
decade or so ago.

Also, woman sitting opposite. If I can tell from the tinny thud from
your ear buds not only that you are listening to Maggie May by Rod
Stewart, but *also* recognise the exact recording....

a.) you are playing this much too loud.
b.) you will be deaf before you reach 25.
c.) if an irate commuter doesn't kill you first

Swedish is not one of the languages I read...

2009-11-14T10:06:00.000Z

... so why the £*ck does the East Coast* line WiFi route all traffic via
Sweden, ensuring that all google results are served in Swedish -
including my Blog dashboard.

(* until 10 hours ago the National Express East Coast line, now
re-nationalised!)

What makes writing "cinematic" rather then "televisual"?

2009-11-10T14:31:00.001Z

My own (very) rough rule of thumb...

When you express of the essence of the script-

- is it an image -

- or an idea?

2009-11-06T10:43:00.001Z

I have always loved November; it starts with Halloween, which growing up
in Wales was celebrated with turnip head lanterns and apple bobbing),
then the local fair used to park outside our front door for 2 days of
thumping disco music, hot dogs, and ancient rides and dodgems. Barely
is the last candy floss stick swept away before Bonfire night and the
lovely smell of gunpowder ... and then the rest of the month unwinds in
a flurry of red and ginger foliage, early frost, slick mists and coal smoke.

The best, is of course, at the end of the month, when for once the
entire world does revolve around the correct axis, in a stupendous
celebration of the anniversary of the birth of - ME!

Why, I believe in the US they are so overwhelmed by the amazing event
that they call the festival of my birth "Thanksgiving" - and sacrifice
many Turkeys in my honour.

Colour me impressed!

2009-11-03T20:18:00.000Z

The Ethiopian script, T'sion, has, in the 2nd and 3rd acts 6 distinct
narrative lines to follow, and I have always found it hard to
concentrate on fine tuning one without fracturing the others, or
breaking the script apart like a engine on the kitchen table.

In the past I have tried tagging and colour coding them on the page to
visualise they way they interact... Or writing 6 different threads and
reintegrating them.

But just like that engine on the kitchen table, I always end up with a
widget that gets left behind.

But I have just started to "grey out" any scenes that don't relate to
the thread I am concentrating on - literally changing the colour of the
words on the screen to the palest grey MSWord can provide. I can still
see the other scenes, I can still calculate the rhythm, the counterpoint
of one character's story against the other, while only editing the
single story as it winds it's way across 8 years and two continents...

Then, when I'm done - highlight the whole document, chose black - and
voilà! the whole script reappears.

I can't believe it took me so long to work this one out!

...my head hurts...

2009-11-01T11:28:00.001Z

I don't know if the pounding is my hangover or the rain hammering on the
roof.

Either makes the idea of going out to stack my woodpile very unappealing.

On the other hand...

2009-10-31T10:16:00.000Z

... now that I have actually reached the North, it is as bonny as ever,
blue sky from edge to edge, green and gold and ginger.

And I get to spend tomorrow stacking my woodpile!

More mechanical disasters...

2009-10-31T08:41:00.001Z

The alarm clock finally gave up the ghost last night - I had ordered the
new part, but unfortunately the postal strike has held it up.

Luckily I noticed in time - I had a 7am train to catch this morning, so
tumbling out of bed by 5.50am was a must...
Unluckily, I only noticed at 1am, when I turned over and woke just
enough to register the weird display...

So - new alarm method needed. Easy - mobile phone... uh-oh, phone down
to one bar (was planning to recharge on train).

So, light on, unpack, find USB charger and laptop, plug in both, start
to charge... Just enough juice to ensure that the phone will wake me in
time.

Try to get back to sleep. No go. The minutes tick by, trips to
bathroom, check on phone, try again...

Finally fall asleep at 2.30, wake at 5.50, repack all the gear, dress,
sneak sleepily downstairs, cross London, catch train with 5 minutes to
spare.

Of course, if I had been 5 minutes late I would have forfeited the train
ticket and been forced to buy a £110 return to get North.

Which makes it even more ironic that the Train I worked so hard to catch
is now running... 45 minutes late, and the best National Express can
offer for the inconvenience is £15 worth of non-negotiable vouchers,
which can not be used for online bookings.

- Yawn -

2009-10-30T15:04:00.001Z

As I recover from the week of mechanical suckiness and generalised rage,
I realise that the huge difference between the systems at the Stone
Caravan and the wider world is not that those in the wilderness as
simpler or less likely to fail (although not having electricity
certainly makes life calmer) but that when anything up there goes wrong
- I am wholly responsible for the disaster and its resolution.

And that makes life so much more pleasant.

Alarm clock fail? Well that means the sun didn't come up, so either the
world has come to an end, or it's raining.
Why would I get out of bed for either event?

Radio fail?
See above for lack of sun. Get cranking on the handle if I want to
listen to the Archers.

Plumbing fail?
Splash to spring with bucket, and remember to boil the water for coffee.

Coffee fail?
Well that will teach me to forget to put the coffee in my backpack,
won't it. Where's the rum.

Transport fail?
The landrover's stuck in the muck again. Gravity is my friend - on a
slope this steep it will just it will roll out again. And then, walk
dammit, 'cos that's the only way I'm going to get coffee today.

Today I have an overwhelming desire to hit people.

2009-10-29T15:15:00.001Z

That is all.

Facebook hates me...

2009-10-28T16:52:00.001Z

... over the past two days it has ground to a halt.

The mechanical suck continues...

2009-10-28T14:29:00.000Z

At work...

One of the firedoor release mechanisms jams during the fire drill I am
marshalling, so that all my ducklings are trapped at the bottom of a six
storey iron staircase, and I am left outside in a stupid tabard,
wondering where they are....

Also, the scanner is down - just when I have to rely on emailing scans
of invoices/receipts/expense claims etc because of the ongoing postal
strike...

The embankment cafe has stuck a plastic hawk on its signage

2009-10-28T08:58:00.000Z

This is presumably to dissuade pigeons from crapping on the outdoor
tables. I have no idea if this works - but it seemed to have very
little effect on the grey squirrel that was perched on its head eating
something filched from the cafe bins...

Is there a Deity (or Saint - I'll be ecumenical here) of small but essential mechanical objects?

2009-10-28T08:55:00.000Z

a.) 6am: - My alarm light fails to light.

b.) 7am: (having overslept because of a.)above ) - The bathroom light
switch snaps, and I have to brush my teeth in the dark.

c.) 7.50 am: (running late because of a.) and b.) above) - The cashpoint
is out of order.

d.) 8.05 am: (running still later because of a.), b.) and c.) above) -
The coffee machine at the cafe is out of order.

e.) 8.10 am (now 60 mins behind because of a.), b.) and c.) and a touch
irritable in light of d.) above.) - My propelling pencil ceases to propel.

f.) 8.30 am Finally, with cash and a coffee in front of me - my netbook
starts to grouch in the few minutes of writing time left before I clock ...

If you know of any entities I should sacrifice, pray or plead to, please
send forwarding address, plus a list of suitable bribes for said being.

2009-10-27T12:41:00.001Z

I was going through some writing exercises I scribbled in a class 2004 - when I was rather scarily unemployed and trying not to panic.

One of these was to describe an ideal environment…

I couldn't read the whole page (at some point coffee must have leaked into the notebook) but what there was described the Stone Caravan.

The fire, the coffee pot on the hob, the book, the sound of water, the view of the sky, the bench by the door for watching weather…

the only thing the Stone Caravan lacks from the list is access to the sea for walks and swimming.

The only thing the list lacks is - a toad under the bed.

I never showed the list to anyone, and I wouldn't discover the Stone Caravan for another 18 months after I wrote it.

But my sister must know me very well, because as soon as she saw it, nestling high above her new home in the North, she said "this is Tanya's".

So Jealous...

2009-10-26T12:15:00.001Z

I have Hungarian friends staying, who arrived loaded with produce - including their own Plum Brandy.

This is when I learn the following:

When Brits have a glut of fruit - plums, cherries, apples etc - they make jam. Or chutney.

When Hungarians have a glut - they ferment the fruit at home, and then take it to a local distillery, where it is legally and expertly turned into 60% proof spirit…

This is taxed, and there is a limit by volume - but how a wish we had the same civilised system here!

Meanwhile - at least I can toast Hungarian good fortune in some seriously fiery brew.

Cheers!

2009-10-23T15:02:00.001+01:00

I got a phone call at lunchtime yesterday from Angela (a lawyer when she isn't writing) "I have just been given two tickets to see Spandau Ballet at the 02 tonight - are you coming."

Hell yes, (even if the response from the infant American lad sitting next to me, born while I hanging out at Blitz, was, "Um, who? What sort of music do they play…?"
(My dad did better, by the way - he remembered Spandau Ballet as the soundtrack to the Falklands Conflict.)

Well, last night they seemed to be playing very old music very well, and a good time was had by 20,000 40 somethings (and a few daughters) reliving their youth.

But, oh, my generation has not aged well. It was an extraordinarily matronly affair, with a lot of pillowy bosom, echoing the Dome, and more cigarettes than HRT.

Seems to have had a strange subliminal effect. Last night I dreamed of a decidedly ex-boyfriend, from circa 1988. The dream was neutral enough, but the recollection in the morning made me want to gargle with something strong and minty. Ick.

This village has the nicest Jehovah's Witnesses

2009-10-20T12:46:00.001+01:00

One just came to the door while I was visiting.

"Hello, we're just going about the area delivering literature. Here is
a list of questions some people ask and the answers, with scripture.
Goodbye!"

And she was off with a cheery wave.

2009-10-20T11:58:00.000+01:00

Of course, urban/rural hubris makes for better reading…

You know, the chick-lit about the prada wearing latte sipping urbanite
who decamps to a damp mould sprunkled hovel in the country, expecting
agas and dog roses and free range eggs from fluffy hens - and gets
instead toads and outdoor plumbing and a shop which only sells parmesan
ready grated in cardboard tubs and an industrial pig unit moving onto
the land next door.

The deep contented sigh of this happy rural slum dweller, toasting her
dirty toes while necking rum isn't all that entertaining… but the life
is perfect.

Now if I could only get the toads to wipe their little feet when they
come in from the rain.

Guilty secret

2009-10-19T17:45:00.001+01:00

I'm not sure anyone really understands just how luxuriously indulgent living in a tower on the edge of the wildwood actually is.

I mean - curling up in the sun warm heather with a book and an orange and sleeping the afternoon away?

Walking by starlight in ancient oak woods, while a Tawny owl hunts overhead, all the while knowing that there is a fire, a bottle of rum, a lime and a kettle of hot water waiting at the end of the pull uphill? (Not to mention a teeny-tiny little saucepan of venison stew on the mantelpiece, poised to hop down and nestle itself between two blazing logs.

Or Sunday morning, curled in a big wooden chair, wool blanket wrapped around the shoulders, toes propped on the fender, a pot of coffee on the hearth (ok, not so great coffee, but still hot and black), two fat rashers of bacon and a piece of bread toasting on the log, and a really absorbing brick of biography of Hogarth to sink into…

All dinner and no responsibility.

It's a hobbit's life, I swear. Except that the toes on the fender aren’t as furry as those of some other members of the family.

Don't tell anyone else how much fun I am having up here!

damnation

2009-10-18T09:39:00.000+01:00

If it takes an hour in the morning to build a fire, heat a kettle and
make a pot of coffee, you really do want it to be *good* coffee, not
peely-waaly stuff.
Should've ground some new on Friday, instead of packing a scoop from the
tin on the fridge.
And I've finished the all the rum!

2009-10-18T09:35:00.000+01:00

At 5pm I walked down to the hamlet to pick up a duvet - I'd forgotten to
collect one when I loaded the landrover at lunchtime, and I didn't fancy
facing the first frost of the year without it.

The sun was still above the horizon when I started, and the woodland was
still, with patches of gold/green between the long shadows. Almost
nothing was moving, even the sheep were content to let me pass through
them, and I saw no birds excepts the raptors, kestrels and kites above
me, crows below in the valley floor.

By the time I emerged, with the duvet on my back the sun was gone, and
the valley was in shadow, although light still lingered on the fell top
to the North, where the cottage was waiting, about 30 minutes walk away.

I'd thrown a large log on the fire when I left the cottage an hour
earlier, and hooked the kettle against the bars, so as to have a mug
full very near boiling when I got home.

As I passed the small holding behind the hamlet, a little party of geese
were forming a conga line around their water trough, wandering wither
and thither in a patient waddle, quite unlike the mild curiosity of wild
geese at dusk. They didn't even look up as I passed.

It's amazing how much you can see in the dark. The colours have gone,
but the form survives, in close-up, in shades of grey. I just couldn't
see more than 10 feet ahead - except where, in the distance, the
landscape rolls away in places towards the river, and the last last from
the west made a bank glow a ghostly silver some way ahead. An owl
swoops past my head, westward.

I do always carry a headlight at night - with a red light setting, so
that if I have to use it my night vision won't be too badly affected.
But I didn't need it. I must know every step of the route by now, even
if it is eighteen months since I last walked it past nightfall. And I
have a mobile phone, so if I did roll an ankle...

Anyway, I didn't need the light on the railway track (although in place
the cutting is deep and almost all in shade. And I didn't need it on
the footbridge over the cutting towards the hay meadow.

That's where I stopped to check which stars are out. There were one or
two - but a sense of the billions points of sun waiting just beyond the
veil of atmosphere, thinning to nothing, second by second.

Now that is a lot more terrifying than being the only human being in the
sheep's line of sight - being the only apparent human being on a patch
of rock in sight of all the suns.

I only needed the light once; after crossing the oak wood and the Roman
ruins the paths (carved out by sheep) divide and dip down to a small
stream, which is bordered here and there by wire. Hit in the wrong
place, or at the wrong angle, and you get wet, or stuck, or both.

But after that, it's a short walk up and through two pastures to the the
clump of pines which hides the cottage from almost every angle. Not even
fire light spills out - until I open the door - because from this angle
the cottage has no windows...

When I've made the tea I sit on the bench by the door, watch stars and
listen to the thump thump of falling leaves, and the rustle of small
unseen animals.

The cottage as bright and clean as the sky.

2009-10-17T14:48:00.000+01:00

Genuinely welcoming and comfortable for the first time in more than a
year. Something large got into the back room - something large and
slimy! - but I can close that door, and forget the room until the
building work is complete.

Northumberland is in its most gorgeous outfit - "bonny" as the guy who
picked me up at the station said. Tunnels of gold and red oak crowding
over the sun-lit road, a blue sky full of crows and kestrels. But cold
- it will freeze tonight!

My toad-love is sealed when a find a toadlet - smaller than the first
joint of my littlest finger - on the door step. It glares at me a
wiggles away with adolescent energy.

Door open, into the hall - and I discover that Crocs are not quite as
destructible as I'd believed - there is a little pile of bright yellow
chewed Croc resin, as much as a mouse could produce if it worked very
hard - next to one, the right I think. I hope it was tasty, as I doubt
it was nutritious!

But oh crap - I've remembered the rum, but not the duvet. I'll have to
trail back down the hill to collect if - if it can even been found after
10 months in storage!

Shopping list for weekend

2009-10-16T17:18:00.001+01:00

Socks
Whisky
Matches
Bread
Cheese
Coffee (the last batch grew mould!)
Bacon
Green stuff and oranges - to prevent scurvy!

2009-10-16T17:14:00.001+01:00

Sleeping in the Stone Caravan tomorrow, and the weather just turned a
tad chilly. I know I've slept up there in cold weather before (hell,
I've slept with ice forming on the walls around me), but that was when
the cottage was well aired, and when I had been well seasoned by living
up there all the way through the autumn.

I'll be packing thermals and whiskey, just in case.

Of course I will also be taking the new netbook, and a sack full of
battery. So when I'm not scrubbing the kitchen floor (sharp sand, to
clean off generations worth of mud and mould) I'll be writing....

I just discovered "write-or-die" by Dr Wicked
http://lab.drwicked.com/writeordie.html

Fabulous - gets me typing every time. Just try out those eeeevil sounds
on the normal mode.
And he's working on an off-line version, which will be even sweeter!

2009-10-15T17:11:00.001+01:00

Working hard to finish the Ethiopian script, it just seems to crawl along.

I'm also transcribing a stage script which I put together 10 years ago (Oh crap, 10 years? I am soooooo old!) - which exists only as a photocopy of the Stage Managers notes, some scribbled diagrams and a handful of excellent photographs.

My Lead Actor was single but dating at the first read through - by the last night he was pregnant and engaged. I bumped into Mrs Lead Actor a few months ago, and the strapping pre-teen who was conceived one night after rehearsals. So old! So very very old!

Making a stage play is so much quicker than writing a film - you just need a room, some people with excellent memories for movement and language, and lots and lots and lots of gaffer tape. You can do it in a weekend.

I wonder if carrying gaffer tape will speed up the writing?

The wind has shifted to the South East...

2009-10-13T12:36:00.001+01:00

... bringing London a sudden shocking lungful of cold, bright, blue,
briny air.

Best day of the year so far - I have to get out of the office and down
to the river bank.