The Lair of the Emerald Serpent

The sizzling summer has well and truly arrived in dreary Dursleyville, WA
The mercury reached at least 38 and there’s apparently another 3 or 4 more such days in store. So the only reason to get out of the serpent sack this morning was the zombie job. It was warm at 8 in the morning but a normal sort of day. By noon or so it had become quite hot. Not horrid in that so far it is a dry heat. Not icky sticky muggy which is the real hell. But still if you are not careful you can get sizzled. Especially the poor cricket players out in the field in the middle of the day. Sure they get paid loads of loot but it’s still barbaric to be out and about in the full glare of the midday sun.

After 3 or 4 days of that the lot of them will be melted or simply sizzled to a crisp especially the Barmy Army all the way from wet and wintry England

It’s prudent to abandon all plans for pottering about in the city. Will be lying low for a while and simply slinking about in the lair watering the weeds and trying to keep them from getting sizzled to a crisp. After one such hot spell lost a ten year old macadamia tree that had taken 8 years before finally delivering big fat juicy nuts. So no desire for the same thing to happen again
This is the time of year for all the Christmas art and craft markets. Tonight there was one in the city full of strange, weird and very expensive stuff. The Izzie slinks about mainly for the atmosphere and inspiration as they are full of arty creative critters. Was especially drawn to one stall with lots of hand made books and journals including one with a very creepy gothic lady bearing the intriguing title “The Dark Arts”. Some of the journals were even made from envelopes accumulated from assorted bills. Now that was seriously scary indeed but a very clever way of reusing stuff that would have otherwise ended up in landfill.

Her neighbour was selling strange jewelry also made of assorted recycled items like keys, beads and bits of spoons. Especially interesting were the little skulls. Some were black and others were white. Ever so innocently asked what they were made of. The black ones were horn and the white ones bones. How appropriate. They were very very tempting but resisted the urge. But it is interesting to see the sort of stuff out there

Maybe the inner muse will be inspired. She’s been a bit neglected since the end of November. Maybe another chocolate crawl might wake her up. In the meantime will be doing mundane stuff like tidying up the Lair, attempting to keep the weeds watered and alive over the next few days of hellish weather, snoozing and doing a rather big catch up on posts and such in Cyberia

It's taken two months or so but seems the serpent has finally escaped the embrace of that dozen amorous dementors
Life is gradually returning to abnormal.
Still another week or so of seemingly eternal sunshine and 30 degree days predicted. That would be wonderful and very welcome news in January or February but at the beginning of April is most scary indeed.
Four months of stinking sizzling summer and not a drop of rain and even the weeds are looking the worse for wear.
The gorgeous Old Bakery cafe which the serpent visited today - even its very pretty and large patch of herbs is looking decidedly wilted.
So it's not just the serpent who has got brown fingers

Finally making the progress on the book front that should have been happening during the six weeks of the book binding course at our favorite ex lunatic asylum
Been making stacks of 'stuffing' for books and by now seem quite confident of the tricks and techniques. Reading instructions is a rather different thing than actually following them. That was where the practical demonstrations came in so useful. Just such a pity that the serpent was too psycho and brain dead to make the most of them

So the next thing is to put the stuffing in pretty little boxes and decorate them. Done very little of that at all in the last few weeks.
Also resumed the original new year' schedule of doing at least one new or different thing each day - be that trying out different cafes or munchies or pottering around different parts of town
Some of that happened in the process of searching for supplies for the latest bookish indulgence.
The serpent's vegetarian credentials are looking most dodgy indeed. While not nibbling or gobbling the flesh of wee beasties, not averse to searching for bone folders for book binding, luscious leather for covers or kangaroo hide string for tying the bits and pieces together
Today paid a visit to the shop belonging to one of the regulars at the medieval festival. Funny how leather and such seems to be associated with bikies, bogans, tattoes and assorted Tea Party sorts.
Next door was a cheap and cheerful Indonesian eatery. Resisted the craving for deep fried tofu drowned in satay sauce and tried the basic mie goreng instead. Will definitely be back for more.
All these adventures were enroute to the little shopping strip where a certain fortnightly discussion group meets.
Last time was completely and totally off the rails. Was a jittery and neurotic basket case and every attempt to shake off the dementors failed miserably. It was such a pleasant change to be able to remain in the present and get quite a bit done as well as having an enjoyable day
After a few weeks gathering dust, brought along a certain Victorian Romantic tarot deck and did some Nanowrimo plotting and planning
Also finished squiggling some snail mail and pottered around the various cafes

But apart from the craziness at work which has become a complete and total freak show, the main event of the week was employing the sneaky trick of external deadlines to get stuff on that 101 list done
Booked for a scrappy marathon starting from 6pm until midnight. Will need to leave around 9.30 to get the last bus home but that is enough to get started
Scrapbooking is such a slushy sentimental hobby but it does have its uses. While everyone else will be cooing over that infernal royal wedding and their baby photos, the serpent will finally start work on her own personal edition of "Advanced Potions Making"
Got four weeks to sort the stash of spooky papers, potions recipes, stickers and stuff and to sniff out the store to see what interesting rubber stamps and other arty things they have available

There are also other possibilities too such as a Tarot journal or Addams Family photo album. But slushy and sentimental it will certainly not be.