Dancers and jugglers make houses for faeries

Who dance round a twig-hence all sparkly and airy.

Spinners and twirlers catch grass from below

While signs on park benches cry love for Gio

Yesterday was flowjam on the lamnas land and the weather was glorious. I went along for as long as I could manage (rilly crunchy Joints this week, and lots of sun and I don't mix) and had a goodun spinning under the trees - became a tourist attraction briefly too and ended up in someones camera a bit. There weren't many ov the belly dancers at this one, but I was able to catch up with Demelza and Guy and a couple of other people. sun-baked or not, I think I'm going to have to keep going if this keeps being outside like this.

Next weekend is the Domba event, and I am ridiculously head over heels excited about it. Raindog'll be down here on friday and we're going to make a weekend of it and dance our arses off. I'm also crossing my fingers that something quite pretty I've been bought by my in-laws arrives in time for the veil class - I can't wait. I've got A pair of these coming as well, though they'll take more like a month to get here from Hong Kong. It'll be worth the wait though, I had a go with a pair of Jelenas at a previous flowjam and they blew my mind - so ridiculously fun to dance with. they should also give me something to dance with in daylight other than my poor tailed poi ... which have died on me!

Our wee little holiday continues in gloriously sleepy fashion, today will mostly be spent in the garden hiding under an umbrella (or in my case, sitting in the shower going 'heee, cold water :3'. We've made some plans for tomorrow and tuesday so we can get a proper bit of use out of them, but that is then and this is now. I suspect I will be required to play a game later, but intil then, sssh, you ain't seen me, right?

Once the rain started to come in, we headed off and found ourselves a castle, one of the ones Henry had built to protect the Carrick Roads and the estuary at St Mawes and Falmouth from the Spanish, where a rather amusing English Heritage audio guide gave us a tour . . . In between camera flashes, that is. What with spending so much time on the coast as a child and a fascination with abandoned buildings I've come to love old sea defenses and coastal forts, and this one was no exception.

The rest of the day was taken by food shopping, dinner, daft games and, in my case, a nap on the sofa prompted by throbbing joints and a tumble arse over teakettle outside a pharmacy. I also had a rather lovely conversation during a post prandial stroll that made me aware of the data network I'm using to post this as a living, breathing organism of fantastic complexity . . . I will never look at the radio environment in cities in the same way again . To have something explained by a passionate person who can reveal the magic in it is a rate and beautiful privilege.

I am going to take my aching bones back to the living room to watch movies with Ezekiel and my family now. It seems almost unreasonable for one person to be this happy

Namaste, all is love.

Often when away like this, I find I miss those friends I only get to talk to online. I've become so used to having the net at my fingertips that it sometimes feels as if a chunk of my brain is missing too. My neat little phone thing has stopped all that for this trip though. IRC, Facebook (which I have become rather fond of over the last year or so - moreso than I ever expected to as I used to be on the 'eww, social networking sucks' bandwagon) and sms from a few people in particular have kept me feeling connected with people without chaining me to a laptop. I love it

Anyway, long story short, am having a wonderful time with our families, taking far too many photos of beautiful skies, woodlands, places like stonehenge and dead things (not deliberately, I swear . . It must be the goth in me showing through) and feeling twitchy as all hell because I cant upload them to my project 365 account or Flickr. I suspect I will spend next sunday night pouring over them while I'm on my own (am coming back a day early so I can make it to a hospital appointment on time).

Be well, all. And I will catch up when we get home

A few things have crossed my email/google reader this week that I've not got the energy to post about properly, so I'm dropping you a link in hope that they might interest.

First up is J.K. Rowling writing The Single Mother's Manifesto for times online, a defense of the welfare state from someone who has been both a recipient and a major contributor to its coffers that I found more than a little refreshing.

Next is Holly at Pervocracy talking about how Consent is Sexy. Mildly NSFW for those who need to pay attention to that.

Last of all, have some delightful spoof Tory electon propaganda courtesy of INeverVotedToryBefore at wordpress and MyDavidCameron.com where you can get the photoshop templates to fuck around with them yourself.

(p.s. I have now become one of those adults who should know better, as I am playing enthusiastically with my pokeymans (soulSilver). Anyone interested in some wifi giggles, drop me your trainer code or whathaveyou, or just gush at me about your pokeymans .

I think I must have gotten old; I'm not keeping track of bands obsessively the way I used to anymore. I discovered this morning that I'd missed two Namoli Brennet albums without even trying and that Shikhee is nearly done with a fourth Android Lust album - I'm twitchy and excited as all get out about this and can't wait for the results. To tide me over I've sniffed out some of the Sisters back catalogue and am now shaking my arse to the finest 'not-goth ... honest' that money can buy.

On that subject, any of you who dance should go take note of Lektrik's post at Electric Love Affair about traditional dance to filthy industrial and glitch; shaking your arse in trad style to dirty glitchy industrial filth is an unmitigated pleasure that everyone should share.

In other news, my consultant and I may finally have discovered a combination of drugs that is semi-useful; I don't want to get too hopeful too soon but they appear to be working. Superstitious actions of your choice designed to influence fate (natural or supernatural) to encourage this to keep being the case would be very welcome. This whole thing has been a bit of a mess and involved far more arguing with what should be otherwise sensible people than I'd hoped so having it come to some kind of conclusion (preferably involving amgic words like 'remission' and 'quiet period' would be bloody delightful.

Finally, It has recently been brought to my attention that UK pharmacists are, like their US counterparts, able to refuse to dispense any drug that they feel goes against their religious convictions. Being firmly in favour of an entirely secular state, firmly pro-choice and firmly pro rationality I'm not especially chuffed about this. I can also see this potentially having a negative impact on Aids patients, Trans people and anyone suffering from any condition percieved as being a result of behaviour any religious group may percieve as immoral.. You can read more about it in the Guardian here, and by Laura and Helen from the F Word here and here, covering feminist perspectives on this one.

I have had the most amazing blur of a weekend. I made a dash down to Oxford on Friday afternoon and pounced on Raindog, which promptly lead to an impromptu jam (which was much more friendly once someone gave me a bass. I love you, little guitars, but you just aint as familliar anymore) then a trip out to a nice little Lebanese place to watch Caitlyn dance.

I'd seen her dance before at a little indian place down near london, but this was so much more fun and had swords - swords are always, always a plus. This also lead to meeting a slew of fun people who we later decamped to Coco with for drinks and long rambly conversations ('my best car crash' was an amusing highlight). I ended up talking shop with someone new and I'm hoping we run into each other again because 'twas a lot of fun.

Morning was all about duck egg pancakes and a private dance class (which was fucking fascinating as it was more egyptian/turkish and a little fusion and the vocabulary, the shape of things is different - totally totally doing it again next time I'm down there) with Caitlin which was absolutely gorgeous. We then all promptly fucked off out into a field to play with fire (poi, fans and fakir wands - some pictures probably to follow) before yomping into town to meet Gail for lunch.

We ended up in a little Cantonese place (very yum, despite some worry about nuts at one point) before splitting up so Gail and I could wobble back to hers. There we had all kinds of fun, failed hardcore at risotto (we will have to win another time) and discovered why all the Rum was gone. I was also introduced to Heavy Rain where I learned to press X for Jamie and discovered that this game is a very big reason to own a PS3 - just wow.

Am back home now, after lunch in a lovely little pub hidden away on the other side of a maze of locks and weirs. We were all keeling over and dying a bit by that point so things got a little subdued, but the food was good, and it was a p. decent end to a good weekend. Raindog and I headed back to london and she vanished off to see Himself while I started the long ramble home.

I am now feeding myself the pills I forgot to bring with me (Idiot) and plotting having a shower later - I like to smell nice for hospital appointments, it's just one of those things. I'm actually hella nervous about this one but hopefully it'll go well and we can make some progress with things .. wish me luck.

The last couple of weeks have been slightly fail, my joints have been much worse than usual and various other things have flared up in unpleasant ways so on Monday I decided it was time to do some things about it. I booked an appointment with a different doctor who seemed to look at things differently, took a whole bunch of tests (results coming in a week, then we'll talk again) and actually seemed to understand how I was feeling about things in a way none of the others have. I'm feeling a lot better about some things because of this and have been given access to some physio and a rather significant referral I'm very happy about. I've also picked up some nicer Painkillers (more effective / less chance of certain side effects) that are letting me do more / do things for longer than I would otherwise be able to feeling like this.

I've also got an appointment with someone to do things to my hair on Monday and a rescheduled appointment with my specialist next Monday; both of which I am hellishly nervous about but that should prove helpful as well .. here's hoping.

Other than that this weekend I've got some writing to finish (which I think is going to be doable) and we're going to see some friends tomorrow afternoon to hang out and have tea; I'm rather looking forward to it.

I've been very pleasantly suprised by how many signs I recognise as-is, and am beginning to pick up a few new things as well. I hope you enjoy them as much as I have been.

We're seeing Alice in Wonderland in 3D tomorrow evening, then I'm off to a yoga class. I've not done any Yoga in years, but I enjoyed it a lot back when and it helped me out a lot with my hips. I'm hopeful it may help me with the joint problems I've been having recently by being a low impact way to strengthen the muscles around them, improve my flexibility a little and generally be a reasonably fluffy yet effective form of exercise that'll go well with dance. Trip report to follow ...

Profile slow is the most wonderful trance high when it clicks - a deep, silent space of eyes hips body and being a part of something larger than yourself. It happened tonight and I'd missed it so much. The only drawback is it's very hard to muster conversation afterwards until you've escaped and come back up into the world.

We've focused a lot on coreography today - even moreso than usual, in preparation for the Hafla at the end of March I suspect. The idea makes me more than a little nervous but also feels very right indeed.

Cycling home afterwards with Gibby Haynes crooning into my ear as if he's sat there right behind me, rain in my glasses turning the streetlights into a mess of neon spiderwebs the world feels like a very wonderful place to be.

I should mention also that I am now the proud owner of a Bellynut 18 yard dance skirt, which is quite the most beautiful and fabulous things I have ever owned. The picture at the top shows you the fabric and the detailing on the brocade. If you want to see the full thing, nudge me via email/chat and I'll send you a picture .

I did make it back with a heap of new medicine (currently decorating my desk in a very pretty pyramid shape) and, if with no real assurances of success (or reassurance and encouragement of any kind at all, damnit ¬.¬), in one piece. The unexpected snow this morning had melted, so I was able to hobble home as best I could, and am now having a quiet evening with Ezekiel while we cook things with rice (or she cooks, I plonk dishes and kind of assist), wait for the tendrils of checkdisk and vista sp1 to give us back her computer and I discover a new rule to live by for domestic harmony ...

... do not make up little songs about the Donkey of John Belushi and animal buttes while doing the dishes if someone who picks up earworms easily is listening. that is all .

I have also had a very exciting offer from someone I am dearly fond of to go and see the new van Gogh exhibit the next time I am in London, and the prospect of another friend visiting on Saturday ... two things which I look forward to as soon as mister the plague departs.