conosco até o pescoço
Mar. 11th, 2024 08:30 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
nnozomiNew orchestra music includes Sibelius 3, which I can do without—like so much of Sibelius, it’s both strenuous and unrewarding to play. On the other hand, I hated #7 the whole time we rehearsed it but now I quite like listening to it, so maybe there’s hope, we’ll see. The main symphony is the Rhine, Schumann 3, an old friend—I think this is the third, maybe fourth time I’ve played it, and while there isn’t much new to discover what’s there is wonderful, especially the exuberance of the first and fifth movements, and the sad, stately glory of the fourth (between the minor-key start and the counterpoint, I always think of it as if captioned with “The people mourn as Bach ascends into heaven”).
In other recent listening, Elis Regina singing Cartomante—I think I link to this here every time I listen to it, but it’s just that good. “Porque na verdade, eu te quero vivo…”
Also I went back to some half-forgotten William Bolcom songs recently—I have mixed feelings about Bolcom, but if you need something to make your day a little brighter try Amor. The linked recording is one I found more or less at random on YouTube, with Adèle Charvet singing; I looked her up and found that her grandfather, Charles Ewanjé Epée, is a singer-songwriter from Cameroon, this is one of his songs (watch out for flashes in the video).
Reading a nonfiction Japanese book about women graduates of the National Defense Academy (the college for the Self-Defense Forces). A little too much in the way of broad strokes and for-public-consumption (I also can’t help wonder if the women in the book would have been more natural and forthcoming if the author weren’t a man), but interesting, especially the account of daily life at the Academy itself, obviously modeled on West Point (I have a thing about unique educational environments and own a handful of books about West Point, where I’ve never set foot), and reacting in essentially similar ways to the initial introduction of women cadets (in 1992). Among the other points that strike me is that, while I’m not halfway through yet, three out of the four women profiled so far ended up divorced; the exception, married to a fellow SDF officer and stationed separately, is managing childcare with help from her father-in-law (not her mother-in-law), who moved in to share the load. Also, there’s a family of four sisters who all went to the Academy, good grief.
Rereading various things in English.
I found some deleted scenes from one of my LTR fics (written when I thought the fic was going to be Bai Haotian/Huo Daofu/Liu Sang, which it ultimately refused to be), and actually I kind of like what they’re doing? I’m not in the habit of writing AUs of my own fic and also porn is not my forte, so this may never go anywhere, but here’s a bit to get it out of my system.
They were both dressed to the nines and it was a complicated process, not helped by the fact that both of them seemed constitutionally incapable of just dropping a piece of clothing to the floor once they took it off. When she saw Huo Daofu fold his waistcoat, crisp as new lettuce, and look up to make eye contact with Liu Sang, who was hanging his jacket carefully on a padded hanger, Bai Haotian started to giggle and didn’t even try to stop herself.
She was no longer concerned about whether either of them really wanted to do this: it was there in the heightened color across Liu Sang’s cheekbones, in Huo Daofu’s elevated breathing. He was the first to finish undressing, and Bai Haotian settled back on the palms of her hands to watch as, the last step, he took off his wristwatch with deliberate care and set it on the tidy pile of folded clothing.
Liu Sang, who had started by taking his watch off, was down to boxer shorts and undershirt. He hesitated, as if a little unnerved by suddenly finding someone else naked in his bedroom, and Huo Daofu went to him and slipped his glasses off.
“What--?”
“Take your shirt off,” the doctor said, in a reasonable facsimile of his usual crisp tones, and Liu Sang did. The color in his face was spreading down to his throat. He tried to reclaim his glasses and Huo Daofu pulled them away. “You’ll manage without them.”
“Then—” The one word came out husky and he cleared his throat. “Then you’re taking yours off.”
Huo Daofu hesitated.
“You heard him, Huo-ge,” Bai Haotian called from her windowsill perch.
Huo Daofu took a visibly deep breath and took his own glasses off, setting them carefully down along with Liu Sang’s on the bedside table. That meant neither of them had anything left to take off. Bai Haotian slid down from the windowsill and stood where she was, suddenly breathless with tension.
Photos: Various flowers, a canal, a very old photographer’s studio, a cat on a warm roof.
Be safe and well.
In other recent listening, Elis Regina singing Cartomante—I think I link to this here every time I listen to it, but it’s just that good. “Porque na verdade, eu te quero vivo…”
Also I went back to some half-forgotten William Bolcom songs recently—I have mixed feelings about Bolcom, but if you need something to make your day a little brighter try Amor. The linked recording is one I found more or less at random on YouTube, with Adèle Charvet singing; I looked her up and found that her grandfather, Charles Ewanjé Epée, is a singer-songwriter from Cameroon, this is one of his songs (watch out for flashes in the video).
Reading a nonfiction Japanese book about women graduates of the National Defense Academy (the college for the Self-Defense Forces). A little too much in the way of broad strokes and for-public-consumption (I also can’t help wonder if the women in the book would have been more natural and forthcoming if the author weren’t a man), but interesting, especially the account of daily life at the Academy itself, obviously modeled on West Point (I have a thing about unique educational environments and own a handful of books about West Point, where I’ve never set foot), and reacting in essentially similar ways to the initial introduction of women cadets (in 1992). Among the other points that strike me is that, while I’m not halfway through yet, three out of the four women profiled so far ended up divorced; the exception, married to a fellow SDF officer and stationed separately, is managing childcare with help from her father-in-law (not her mother-in-law), who moved in to share the load. Also, there’s a family of four sisters who all went to the Academy, good grief.
Rereading various things in English.
G. Willow Wilson’s The Butterfly Mosque, which is a gorgeously written account of becoming a Muslim, marrying an Egyptian man, and living in Cairo (not actually in that order). Her description of having learned all the things she needs to live as an adult in Cairo (shopping for live ducks for dinner, sharing Friday prayers with other women at a shrine, dancing at family weddings, mastering Egyptian Arabic idioms, choosing tomatoes without maggots), and how little she knows about living as an adult in the US, her home country, got to me.
Kate Gilmore’s Remembrance of the Sun is also about a romance in a Muslim country, this one a novel rather than a memoir: Iran on the eve of the revolution, where Jill and her pleasantly weird family are spending the year, and Jill meets the proto-revolutionary Shaheen because, improbably enough, they both play French horn in the high school band. Funny, sad, and romantic, full of incredibly evocative descriptions of the setting, pulling no punches about the fucked-up complexity of the political and social situation, using the Egmont Overture beautifully to link Shaheen’s revolutionary vision and the passions (for music as well as each other) he and Jill share.
Also a novel by Kate Gilmore but totally different is Jason and the Bard, set at a professional summer stock theater putting on a repertory of six Shakespeare plays, where the titular Jason is one of six high school apprentices taking part. There is a plot, having to do with a string of practical jokes and an actor with poor recall, and there is some romance, but basically they’re just excuses to write a whole book about the joy of Shakespeare summer stock, and it works. The discussion of the plays is sometimes really moving and always thoughtful, especially Antony and Cleopatra (the image of the dawn light shining onto the dying Cleopatra in the last exhausted moments of a tech rehearsal!), and the description of all these strong and disparate personalities—technicians as well as actors—coming together to make them happen is a delight. It’s a book from thirty years ago, but I think it stands up. Two of the major characters are Black; their characterization is not limited to being Not White, but the narrative is aware of the microaggressions they run into as well. Some of the adult actors and at least one teenage apprentice are heavily implied to be gay—in a 2024 edition I think this would be much more up-front. (The treatment of hapless twelve-year-old Colette, the villain of the piece in many ways, is pretty ruthless, but always makes me smile on account of I knew a dead ringer for her, who by her mid-teens had become a thoughtful, sardonic, attractive person with many talents, so I have hope for Colette too.)
Kate Gilmore’s Remembrance of the Sun is also about a romance in a Muslim country, this one a novel rather than a memoir: Iran on the eve of the revolution, where Jill and her pleasantly weird family are spending the year, and Jill meets the proto-revolutionary Shaheen because, improbably enough, they both play French horn in the high school band. Funny, sad, and romantic, full of incredibly evocative descriptions of the setting, pulling no punches about the fucked-up complexity of the political and social situation, using the Egmont Overture beautifully to link Shaheen’s revolutionary vision and the passions (for music as well as each other) he and Jill share.
Also a novel by Kate Gilmore but totally different is Jason and the Bard, set at a professional summer stock theater putting on a repertory of six Shakespeare plays, where the titular Jason is one of six high school apprentices taking part. There is a plot, having to do with a string of practical jokes and an actor with poor recall, and there is some romance, but basically they’re just excuses to write a whole book about the joy of Shakespeare summer stock, and it works. The discussion of the plays is sometimes really moving and always thoughtful, especially Antony and Cleopatra (the image of the dawn light shining onto the dying Cleopatra in the last exhausted moments of a tech rehearsal!), and the description of all these strong and disparate personalities—technicians as well as actors—coming together to make them happen is a delight. It’s a book from thirty years ago, but I think it stands up. Two of the major characters are Black; their characterization is not limited to being Not White, but the narrative is aware of the microaggressions they run into as well. Some of the adult actors and at least one teenage apprentice are heavily implied to be gay—in a 2024 edition I think this would be much more up-front. (The treatment of hapless twelve-year-old Colette, the villain of the piece in many ways, is pretty ruthless, but always makes me smile on account of I knew a dead ringer for her, who by her mid-teens had become a thoughtful, sardonic, attractive person with many talents, so I have hope for Colette too.)
I found some deleted scenes from one of my LTR fics (written when I thought the fic was going to be Bai Haotian/Huo Daofu/Liu Sang, which it ultimately refused to be), and actually I kind of like what they’re doing? I’m not in the habit of writing AUs of my own fic and also porn is not my forte, so this may never go anywhere, but here’s a bit to get it out of my system.
this part is more or less SFW
Bai Haotian perched on the windowsill, feeling the curtain ruffle her hair, and took the opportunity to wriggle out of her tights and panties while she watched the two men undress.They were both dressed to the nines and it was a complicated process, not helped by the fact that both of them seemed constitutionally incapable of just dropping a piece of clothing to the floor once they took it off. When she saw Huo Daofu fold his waistcoat, crisp as new lettuce, and look up to make eye contact with Liu Sang, who was hanging his jacket carefully on a padded hanger, Bai Haotian started to giggle and didn’t even try to stop herself.
She was no longer concerned about whether either of them really wanted to do this: it was there in the heightened color across Liu Sang’s cheekbones, in Huo Daofu’s elevated breathing. He was the first to finish undressing, and Bai Haotian settled back on the palms of her hands to watch as, the last step, he took off his wristwatch with deliberate care and set it on the tidy pile of folded clothing.
Liu Sang, who had started by taking his watch off, was down to boxer shorts and undershirt. He hesitated, as if a little unnerved by suddenly finding someone else naked in his bedroom, and Huo Daofu went to him and slipped his glasses off.
“What--?”
“Take your shirt off,” the doctor said, in a reasonable facsimile of his usual crisp tones, and Liu Sang did. The color in his face was spreading down to his throat. He tried to reclaim his glasses and Huo Daofu pulled them away. “You’ll manage without them.”
“Then—” The one word came out husky and he cleared his throat. “Then you’re taking yours off.”
Huo Daofu hesitated.
“You heard him, Huo-ge,” Bai Haotian called from her windowsill perch.
Huo Daofu took a visibly deep breath and took his own glasses off, setting them carefully down along with Liu Sang’s on the bedside table. That meant neither of them had anything left to take off. Bai Haotian slid down from the windowsill and stood where she was, suddenly breathless with tension.
Photos: Various flowers, a canal, a very old photographer’s studio, a cat on a warm roof.
Be safe and well.
no subject
Date: 2024-03-13 04:26 am (UTC)In other news, I loved this news story and thought you might like it too:
https://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/en/ondemand/video/5003238/
Cheers!
no subject
Date: 2024-03-13 01:32 pm (UTC)Perfect! I don't know--our first cellist loves Sibelius, and obviously he's playing the exact same sheet music as me, so (in either direction) there really is no accounting for taste.
and that is a lovely story! Thank you for passing it on--