for james

my favorite mikado quote, in which ko ko and pish-tush and pooh-bah all gather 'round the campfire and put their heads together and sing this ole cowboy melody:

"To sit in solemn silence in a dull, dark dock,
In a pestilential prison, with a life-long lock,
Awaiting the sensation of a short, sharp shock,
From a cheap and chippy chopper on a big black block!

A dull, dark dock, a life-long lock,
A short, sharp shock, a big black block!
To sit in solemn silence in a pestilential prison,
And awaiting the sensation
From a cheap and chippy chopper on a big black block!"



there it is!

a friend of mine is in prague filming the magician's nephew. she took us on a tour of a workshop where aslan was getting puppeted together back in van nuys. it was an fx lab/workshop, actually special effects makeup and that robotics thing they do in movies now. it was in a bunch of old warehouses in a stretch of san fernando valley so ogly you'd never know anything would be going on up there. the day we went it was hotter than hell which makes it even uglier, even if you have excellent ac in your car. there was a fighting aslan head, a dying aslan body and head, aslan just standing around, and so on. my friend was on minotaur detail and we'd been seeing her come home with glue and dyes under her nails for weeks before she went off to shoot the first movie. and now: the next installment! i was thinking of her today, wondering how prague is this time of year. the tour of her workshop was her way of cheering me up three summers ago when i felt like the sky had fallen into a puddle and was drowning.

it's time for next things, tho, and time for a cup of pg tips with some cake juliet and i baked last night. what else r ya gunna do?