But oh, what I wouldn't give for Hyde Park again...

I took a few pictures during my jaunt in the garden the other afternoon. It may not be Russell Square, but it's a little corner of sunshine that catches the breeze once in a while, so I think I'll be spending quite a lot of time out there with Declan or my drawing book. Or lunch. I'm a big fan of lunch.

A ceramic teapot used as a planter for mint. I like to roll the leaves up in my fingers and chew on them -- they taste wonderfully fresh and springy!

The terracotta dish has small flat stones in it. Fill it with water so that the stones aren't quite covered and you have a perfect place for butterflies to stop and drink!

Paper lanterns and hanging ivy.

A little upturned tin bucket. I'm pretty sure toads live underneath it.

There's one of them now! Eeek! ...No, he's only a sprinkler.

These little pretties attract hummingbirds sometimes.

An old bicycle with ferns in the basket. I'm not sure where this came from, actually. I just came home once and... there it was.

My lovely big tree in the front yard. Shade is very precious on some of these hot days!

I found this little guy clinging to the wall near the door. It didn't show up so well in this picture, but his shell was all metallic greeny-browns.

I was sorting more things for the garage sale this weekend all day today. I hope to make enough so I can put aside a decent chunk with which to buy my own camera.

I haven't made a list in a while. Maybe I'll do one tomorrow.

Beautiful notebooks! :covet covet:

You, too, can have your very own Necronomicon!
Photo by Modofly.net.

In my interwbez trundling last night, I found that Modofly.net has reopened, and with a whole new awesome style of notebook to boot! They used to make etchings on the covers of Moleskines, but since then they've apparently switched to a new kind of notebook and are printing wraparound colour covers.

I liked the look of the etchings, but some of the new designs I may not be able to resist. They've come out with a couple of delightful steampunk covers that I quite like. This one reminds me of my current read, Dune. My favourites though are these two. I can just see them sitting together on my shelf and full of interesting nonsense! Even better, they make both lined and blank versions, so I don't have to throw fits about my sad, uneven writing (Seriously. I draw lines in my sketchbooks. I just can't handle blank pages sometimes.).

As far as notebooks go, though, I should really stop buying them... I have too many notebooks I need to fill as it is. That does not, however, keep the Modofly ones from tempting me terribly, not in the least. But I am having a garage sale this weekend, so I'll see how much I can earn off that before I consider one (or two, or six...) of these babies.

You are my sunshine, my only sunshine...

I felt a bit better this morning and decided to go outside and enjoy the fresh air for a while. I laid a blanket out on the front lawn and just relaxed in the shade of the big tree I have -- on a second thought, I should've taken my lunch out there and had a little picnic!

It wasn't nearly as hot as I expected it to be, so I felt that today deserved some springy pale green and pink. Declan (my trusty laptop) gets to be in the blog today, instead of the blog just being in *him*, since he's the same nice perky green colour.

I would have liked to go to the bookstore today, but it's taking some adjustment to not being able to just walk out the front door and reach anywhere I need to go within ten minutes on foot. I have my bicycle, but my favourite bookstore is even too far for that! Woe.

Not all those who wander are lost.

Photo by Striderv at Flickr.

I have returned home from my foray into the Wide World, and feeling somewhat that Orlando rather does not belong to it. People come here for Disney and beaches, to escape from all that lovely Culture in the Old World into a plastic bubble of temporary fun-fueled obliviousness. They buy more tacky souvenirs than they need with their favourable exchange rates and drag their kids around on leashes to get sunburned and scream.

Now, I'm not entirely jaded about Disneyworld. There is some sort of fairytale still in it for me. I enjoy the parks, particularly Epcot; drop my sister and I in the Magic Kingdom and suddenly we're squealing princesses. But I've also hiked up and down International Drive in the early evening, when the tourists have gone back to their hotels and all that remains are the ugly closed-up strip malls and dirty baked bus stops. There is no "behind-the-scenes" outside Disney. I know the tourists see it, but somewhow they ignore it, because they fly out 5000 miles away the next morning and it's no longer their problem.

So when someone asks me "how it is to live at Disneyworld" (yes, verbatim), I don't feel fun or lucky... I think about $10 for three beach towels and Midwestern moms in huge jean capris and Mickey seeing an endless line of kids who don't know there's a tired twentysomething in that costume and bright red European men who should be wearing more bathing suit than that and cigarette butts in the sand at Daytona and the heat that makes all of them simmer like sausages and I feel grimy. Grimy like a 1970s car that's had a dog in it for a while.

Welcome home, it's a real Orlando summer.

When the sun and the moon get together, it's going to be a good time...

Photo by Sound Cannon at Myspace.

This entry has been a little while coming. This happened a couple of weeks ago, but I think I'm ok to write about it now.

The Monday after everyone got back from the Wales coasteering trip, I woke up early to check my email before going to class. I got on Facebook and did the normal thing, y'know... and I saw a couple of guys I knew from high school talking on there about their old group of friends... and how much they'll miss him... and rest in peace...

I knew instantly who they must have been talking about. Zach. Zach, the singer of Sound Cannon. The same Zach who took me to the beach at midnight on my last day in Orlando. The Zach who was the Romeo to my Juliet in our 8th grade Shakespeare project, which sure gave us a lot of laughs in the last few months. The Zach who mailed letters to me here in London, the only one who's sent me any mail at all and promised to meet me at the airport as I came back.

My mom called later in the day and told me that Dad had found out certain things because he works at the police department down the street from Zach's house. Apparently, the morning of Friday the 13th the week before, he took his own life and left us for greater adventures.

I spent the rest of the day falling apart.

A couple of weeks later, things aren't as bad. I cried hard for a few days, but my teachers who know anything have been really understanding about me being a zombie in class. Tom looked after me during the worst days. Not really any of the other kids knew.

I've crammed most of my misery into my photography project. I changed my topic with about a month to go until the showing. I'll keep it a little secret until I share my photos on the blog. Needless to say, it will be a remembrance.

Rest in peace, little brother. I love you.