you don't own me

Fact: King Charles VI of France was insane for much of his reign. At a masquerade in honor of the wedding of his queen's lady-in-waiting, he and several other dudes dressed up as 'wild men' to perform a dance for the amusement of the court. Their costumes were, for whatever reason, made out of linen soaked in pitch, and then covered in hemp to make them look bedraggled. Pitch, hemp, and fire do not mix well, and as these were the days of torches and candles (not to be confused with the days of Vikings and dragons, although that would have been equally fatal), King Charles had enough sense to order the torchbearers to stay close to the walls. However, his brother, the duke of Orleans, approached with a torch to get a better look (or, as some sources suspect, to kill his brother), and accidentally set all the dancers (who were chained together as part of the dance) on fire. The duchess of Berry managed to put out the king with the train of her dress, but four of the dancers died. History is fascinating, no?

As you may suspect from that (or perhaps not, since this blog never makes sense), I spent some quality time tonight researching masquerades -- as things stand right now, the climactic scene in my book takes place at a scandalous masquerade ball, and I want to make sure I get the details right before I discover after submitting the book that, say, there weren't actually any masquerade balls in England during that time period. Of course, I know that there were masquerade balls then -- but still, I find historical accuracy to be important.

On the whole, though, my day was not what I wished for it to be. I woke up with a sore throat and a headache, and took the criminal move of canceling on Alyssa before promptly going back to sleep. I definitely need more sleep than I got this weekend, and so sleeping in this morning helped (although my throat still hurts; hopefully it comes to nothing). Then, I woke up, ate some oatmeal, and spent the late morning/early afternoon taking care of the usual first-of-the-month financial tasks. I made myself some lunch with whatever I could find in my fridge (in this case, sort of a tostada/huevos rancheros with scrambled eggs, refried beans, corn tortillas, and salsa - delish), then procured groceries for the week ahead.

I was supposed to see "True Grit" with Chandlord this afternoon, but I wasn't really feeling it, and so spent several hours working through the end-game of the book. I think I've got the final plot figured out, and while I'm a couple of days behind my writing goals due to the unexpected lack of productivity this weekend, I should be able to finish the draft by this weekend at the latest. However, when Adit called at eight to see if I'd eaten (I hadn't), I was ready for a break, and I can't turn down free food. So, he bought me supper at Tofu House (thus satisfying my craving for Korean soft tofu soup), and then I came home and did some more masquerade research until now.

So, from a wordcount standpoint today was a waste, but I have a plan for tomorrow, and absolutely no plans other than to write maniacally. I think I'm going to check out one of the public libraries in the area, since I could stand to get out of the house. Also, I'd like to try my hand at knitting -- I realized that I don't really have a lot of hobbies, probably because I feel that they're a) unproductive and b) I will never be world-class at them so don't feel it's worth the effort, but I'm trying to get over that Puritanical viewpoint and try something just because I want to. So, I got a knitting book from Amazon, and I'm going to seek out a knitting store tomorrow to get some recommendations for beginner needles and decent/cheap practice yarn. Because really, living alone in a cabin in the woods and becoming a hermit requires learning how to knit, right?

Okay, I should sleep if I have any hope of getting up tomorrow morning and finishing this major scene -- goodnight!