We've all left Rome for Lalage's sake

And then I came home from Arisia and collapsed. There was an exciting moment when it looked as though the town of Lexington was not going to get its act together and repair the water main that had burst and flooded and frozen up the street, i.e., we were going to be in a snowstorm with no running water, hot or cold, but to my immense surprise the plumbing reconstituted itself around one in the morning, even if it ran tea-colored for some time longer than ideal. I didn't have much of a chance to sleep in, since an inordinate amount of snow had to be shoveled out of the driveway, but at least I didn't have to express any cogent opinions while doing it.

The answer to my previous post was apparently yes, since the "Anchor Song" went over quite well: this made me happy, because it's one of my favorite things by Kipling. For probably obvious reasons, I suppose, but it's also the mix of language—Mother Carey and promises from the sea with tongue-twistingly technical details of tall-ship maintainance. But the Kipling sing as a whole was quite wonderful. Everyone knew "Oak and Ash and Thorn." I finally got to hear Leslie Fish's "Rimini," so I have another song for the classical shelf. (Now if only someone would come up with a solid tune for "The Girl I Kissed at Clusium.") We were each asked to sing "Follow Me 'Ome" for someone we had lost, which is as it should be. But the best were the singers who brought their own settings: "Jane's Marriage" (with chorus from "The Janeites") to Playford's "Heart's Ease," "The Ballad of Minepit Shaw" to "Queen Eleanor's Confession," and three verses of "M'Andrew's Hymn" to another tune I need to learn. And by way of a bridge into the Dead Dog Filk, a very funny three-part parody of Leslie Fish's "Recessional" with the recurring line, "Still may the Force be with us yet . . ."

And today I did not very much except run errands, mostly library-related, and vote. My contributor's copy of Mythic Delirium #21, containing my poem "Silk Sleeve Song," was waiting for me in the mail—this is the trickster issue, and while I am especially partial to Anna Tambour's "Cooks' Tricks Nix Sticks," Theodora Goss' "The Gentleman," Jeannine Hall Gailey's "The Animal Heart: She Warns Him," Samantha Henderson's "Egyptology," Erzebet YellowBoy's "Tricksters Are Spinning My Hair," and Ann K. Schwader's "Maiden & Raven," your mileage (and what is stolen from you on the journey, or what turns up in your pockets years later) may vary. Regardless, it's a beautiful issue. Michelle Lineberry Mullins: her memory for a blessing.

(And as I was finishing up this post, the doorbell rang and it was UPS with what appears to be a DVD of Peter Lorre's Der Verlorene (1951) from teenybuffalo! Dude. I'm going to make dinner: I'm quitting while I'm ahead.)