[Barbara]

Or maybe it was a dream?
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Barbara

[madameshawshank]

'believing that it might be a little tactless'...ah Griffin!

harpospeaking..can you even begin to imagine what it's like sitting at a table with mr g!!!!! 'n then to walk the rooms of The National Portrait Gallery ...

Griffin...you've coated that image with such a tale...it, the image, is over the moon with delight...before I take off for the not-near-a-computer-for-a-week week...I'll fetch ye another..oh golly this joy!...merci Clotilde for this exquisite space you've gifted us..

How well I remember walking there...Carnac...writing:



what is Siegfried thinking?
these stones sliently calling to him
energetic yet gentle suggestions
'come back and visit that time'
perhaps a thread to here
did the sun guide me to the star-dappled menhir
& there to meet the gals?
I feel the same breeze
as tears of joyous connection appear
our yesterday our todays our tomorrows.....
all one~

in the shadow of a particular menhir
shadow? ~ ah the moment of transformation
shade ~ the resting time
each menhir
complete with the energy of those days
powerful work
simple elegant placements
we visit, we walkers in awe,
our ancestors' understanding
of what it means to BE ~
a bumblebee of Brittany~
playing in thick yellow
wings bumping stones perhaps
do you, too, connect to this place?
momentarily breathless ~
as bumblebee comes to visit me,
bumbling in pre-history....
a delicious burst of sunshine
yellow to yellow

you movers of stones
hello, how are you?
this I wonder and wonder and continue to wonder
Sieg suggests it's all a Harry thing


neolithic postcodes...
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"I've never accepted the external appearance of things as the whole truth. The world is much more elaborate than the nerves of our eye can tell us." - James Gleeson

[madameshawshank]

'n what will Griffin's alphabet make of this:


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"I've never accepted the external appearance of things as the whole truth. The world is much more elaborate than the nerves of our eye can tell us." - James Gleeson

[Griffin]

Sasha moved as quietly as possible along the metal catwalk. Far below her in the warm darkness the robots continued to make more of themselves. They had to be stopped - but how? Who was the mysterious maestro behind these mobile tin cans?

At the slightly opened door she paused. The darkness around the catwalk was inky thick. Only the bleak lighting high above the doorway showed the catwalk in all its steely menace... and the door slowly opening. She took a defensive stance and waited for a moment.

"Come in my dear, I have been expecting you." a metallic voice crackled.

The door opened wide revealing a narrow corridor of gleaming metal and light. Her rubber soled shoes would insulate her to a degree, but she hoped that Gaskin had insulated her clothing or any electric current flowing through that corridor would sizzle her in a jiffy.

She moved cautiously forwards springing through the doorway into the corridor and like a trap, the door slammed shut behind her. She passed through the corridor unharmed. Clearly the metal master wanted her alive for the moment at least. Eventually she entered a high, wide room where at a seat surrounded by banks of computers sat her enemy. A tall woman with a flawless face and steely grey eyes.

"Welcome to the New World, Miss Drummond. Soon my robots will be everywhere and nothing you can do will stop them. You have done well to come so far, but you have - to be candid, been somewhat of a nuisance. So I'm afraid I'm going to have to switch you off."

"Who are you?" Sasha asked backing away.

"I am the Metal Mistress, the Queen of the Scrapyard. I was - Dr Electra Gaskin, daughter of your very own Gaskin. But now I am - Aerialla or to you - Death!"

She moved towards Sasha slowly and as Sasha turned to run, the doorway she had entered suddenly closed. She was locked in with Aerialla and there was no escape. Aerialla moved in slow assured strides towards her victim, but as she did so, Sasha ran about the room in apparent terror. She began to see that this was the control room for the robots. They were not autonomous as she had previously thought.

She reached into her jacket pocket for her revolver, but Aerialla had caught up with her. Grabbing Sasha by the shoulder she flung the young woman across the room. Sasha bounced off the metal floor, the gun flung from her hand and rolled onto her feet. Aerialla laughed and Sasha, hearing the crisp metallic sound gasped in horror. Aerialla was a robot! Where then was Electra Gaskin?

She dodged the robot, dived and rolled until she was within the bank of computers. Quickly she pressed all the buttons she could before the robot grabbed her by the neck and began to crush her. Sasha felt a warmth invade her and spots appeared before her eyes. Aerialla's fingers were inexorable. Quickly she kicked with her feet at the computer consoles, stabbing at them with her steel stilettoes. There was a sparking and hissing. Then she was flung upwards and collided painfully with the metal walls before crashing to the floor.

For a moment all she could do was struggle to breathe. She fought with her aching body, struggled to turn onto her side until she saw within her reach, her gun. She reached for it, her fingers closing with agonising slowness about the grip until it was in her hand. Then aiming at the computers, she fired. Aerialla turned then and with a flick of her body somersaulted towards Sasha. Sasha rolled across the floor and fired at the robot. Then she was up somehow, shooting at the computers until they fizzed and sparked and began to catch fire.

"It's all over Aerialla. Where's Electra?" she yelled.

The robot struggled to rise but the computers no longer functioned and instead the robot was still. Sasha pulled her mobile phone from her pocket but it was broken in the fight. Where was Electra? Was this the end of the Robot Menace? Will Sasha Drummond Secret Agent get out alive?

See next week's thrilly espisoda!
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Confusion comes fitted as standard.

[Donna]

All I can say is:

What a heavenly distraction from 2nd graders!!!!!!!!!!

I have been checking most days at lunch and recess but haven't had time to post...

Griffin - what a way with words - as we well knew! Thank you! I want to know more about all of your characters! A novel - or a least a short story apiece, please!

And Madame! Great quirky, inspiring pics that spark even MY limited imagination!

And the two of you together - it's like a chocolate caramel truffle for the mind! What a combo!

Now - back to work! Thank you for your multiple talents!
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L'appetit vient en mangeant. -Rabelais

[gingerpale]

Griffin! what you can do with whatever Madame offers up...!
And almost immediately, too. Her pictures have gotten sparer (less rich in imagery, from fruit to rock to steel). But it didn't stump you. Haha she owes you a dancing pig or trees with hands & feet & faces or something..

Madame..."a Harry thing"?

[msue]

Griffin, never never never stop writing.

And Madame, continue doing what you do to inspire.

That was beautiful!

And now, because I was transported to another place, I'm late for work!

[Griffin]

Barbara,

It would never be 'just a dream'! Since I was at school and a very important teacher (to me anyway) remarked that having your character 'wake up but it was all a dream' was a lazy way out, I have avoided it at all costs! It's also more interesting if it isn't a dream. The 'what if' scenario is more stimulating to the imagination so it's best to take the folktale approach and let it stand as it is. Yah, boo to credibility as it were!!

Donna,

I have already a finished first draft of a novel set in the alternative historical country of Pomona and concerning the Lady of the Thousand Fires. I'm started on the sequel to that one and have plotted that one and the third. The writing time is all.

There was a time I wrote short stories and I may be coming back to them with the Kit Dorimant Chronicles. Kit Dorimant is a PI and the stories are largely around the Snodgrass-Gaskin device that is supposed to destroy the elementals - faeries - and their magics when attached to the Fairy-Feller Mark 6 also designed by Snodgrass and Gaskin. But these are at present only in handwritten snippets waiting to be defined, plotted and fully written.

Still, who knows. At the moment, Madame is giving me some really wonderful challenges to deal with. A shame she's going to be away from the computer for a while... still, if anyone else has an image for me to play with... Clotilde perhaps?

Gingerpale,

She knows exactly how to challenge my imagination! I admit I wasn't too sure about what I'd written for the steel door, but it was something straight out of a Bond movie or something similar with a smaller budget that I thought of a B-movie kind of thing.

Msue,

I don't know how to stop writing any more!! I'm glad you enjoyed it and er, I'm sorry you were late for work. Tell the boss it was my fault!
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Confusion comes fitted as standard.

[Barbara]

Griffin I guess now we know why I'll never make a writer. It was my worst subject at school.
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Barbara

[Griffin]

Barbara,

Don't let such things stand in your way. Try taking a picture, any picture that strikes you and write. The first rule of creative writing is - write. Get some text down to start with and don't think too much about it. Once you have text to play with... then you can edit it, change it, or even start again.

We are so used to writing that it ought in many ways to be the easiest art to master. I have only three basic rules which I got from Raymond Chandler: short sentences, simple language and no unnecessary words.

If you read a lot and read conscious of what you're reading and how the words work you pick up a lot. Also if you write as you speak it's a little easier. Clotilde is a great example. She's so readable and interesting to read because she just writes. Some of it is natural talent I'm sure of that, but you can only go so far with talent, natural or otherwise. The rest is working at it.

Have a go. You're not at school now so you can just enjoy it. You could even print out Madame's pictures on this thread and try making your own stories from them.
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Confusion comes fitted as standard.

[Barbara]

Thank you Griffin. Perhaps one day I'll sit down and try. For the moment though while the sun is shining you are more likely to find me in the pool or walking on the beach.
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Barbara

[madameshawshank]

_________________
"I've never accepted the external appearance of things as the whole truth. The world is much more elaborate than the nerves of our eye can tell us." - James Gleeson

[David]

oh my, madame---THIS is really going to be a fun read when next our Griff puts fingers to keyboard!!

Thanks for the delightful image---the possibilities are endless!
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Vivant Linguae Mortuae!!

[gingerpale]

Yes, this one screams "Once upon a time."
The moss alone...

[Lilia Dignan]

Madame.

Please don't stop. I could just imagine how much fun you and G had when you and Siegfried visited Europe a couple of years ago. I thought that picture of yours showed a lot of joy. Joy and accompanied by so much talent. WOW!

Griffin,

Please continue. I love reading your writings. I would like to get hold of a copy of your manuscript. It would be so precious to own before I buy the published novel. You can have a book signing organized and I will definitely be there for it.
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"A man hath no better thing under the sun than to eat, and to drink, and to be merry."