- The New York Times calls me a collaborator. (Second page, near the end, a brief mention. I’ll wait.) Thanks to Zack, January & others for letting me know!
- I’ve jumped onto the Scrivener bandwagon. So far I am intrigued but feel sort of dumb about how best to exploit all its fascinating capabilities. Any of y’all who are using and liking it, please tell me your favorite things.
- I finished Can You Forgive Her? and am now looking forward to filling my life with more Trollope. Why I am liking him so much, in brief: the precision and sensitivity with which he describes both characters and landscapes. Here’s a passage that really struck me, from Chapter 31:
It was a delicious afternoon for a winter’s walk. The air was clear and cold, but not actually frosty. The ground beneath their feet was dry, and the sky, though not bright, had that appearance of enduring weather which gives no foreboding of rain. There is a special winter’s light, which is very clear though devoid of all brilliancy — through which every object strikes upon the eye with well-marked lines, and under which almost all forms of nature seem graceful to the sight if not actually beautiful. But there is a certain melancholy which ever accompanies it. It is the light of the afternoon, and gives token of the speedy coming of the early twilight. It tells of the shortness of the day, and contains even in its clearness a promise of the gloom of night. It is absolute light, but it seems to contain the darkness which is to follow it.
The idea of slowing down enough to give the reader a landscape like that is intriguing.
Speaking of slowing down: I won’t be, any time soon. I have two more trips coming up in the next few weeks. I’m excited about them, but Snag is not.
Despite Snag’s strategy, his sitting on the suitcase will not prevent me from packing it again.