20150611.1034

I realize that I am later writing this than I normally am. Ms. 8 needed attention, and she is more important. She is also down for a nap, now, and so I have a little bit to do the writing that I try (with less success than I would like) to do each day.

I have heard the news that Christopher Lee has died. I have made the following comment in a few places: "Why mourn? He is clearly in Valhalla or something equally gloriously metal!" I supposed I will need to address the issue on Travels in Genre and Medievalism (to which more contributions are decidedly welcome) in the next day or so.

In the meantime, a freelance piece has come up, and I am at work on it now. This time, I get to read Diana Gabaldon's Voyager, the third member of the Outlander series. It is not the first book in that series I have treated; I actually had to deal with Written in My Own Heart's Blood upon its publication, having previously read none of the series, and I later read the second novel, Dragonfly in Amber. It is, after all, a bit later than my usual field of study, although I am certain that I could mine the works for their medievalist impulses. Holdovers from the medieval lingered into the eighteenth century in abundance, even as they still linger in the twenty-first.

Weather around Sherwood Cottage continues to approach the summer. Temperatures range into what even I, Texan by upbringing, acknowledge as "hot," and the humidity is high enough to make the experience entirely unpleasant. Unlike The City and Cajun Country, in both of which I have had the pleasant experience of combined heat and humidity, there is little to distract from that heat; The City at least had enough to do in the cool to allow for pleasant diversion, and Cajun Country has food that makes enduring the climate worth doing. (I do miss easy access to boudin and fresh cracklins.) Here, there is not so much. I am not certain why there is not, but I do not appreciate it.

I do appreciate having run the grill last night, however. Last night saw chicken breast get cooked over charcoal and mesquite chips, along with sweet potatoes and a garden salad. (I did not grill the last.) There is a fair amount left over; I think we will be having dinner salads tonight, eating the leftovers sliced over the remaining garden salad makings, possibly with some grated cheese in the offering. It seems a good way to go, as well as a way to have dinner without heating the house. Robb Walsh's comments about peculiar perversities in summertime cooking are spot-on, after all, and Sherwood Cottage already suffers from a lack of insulation and too much openness to the outside world.

Today will not likely be exceptional. It will likely be productive, though, and that is something else I appreciate greatly. I like having work to do; I simply wish to have it be more stable than is currently the case.