Marie Brennan's Blog, page 137

A Year in Pictures – Miners on a Rope

This work by http://www.swantower.com is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

The miners in the Wieliczka Salt Mine used to descend to their work hanging from slings on a rope. Near the end of your tour of the mine, they have an animatronic setup to show you how it was done.

(Oh, and that lamp? It’s made of salt. Of course.)

Originally published at Swan Tower. You can comment here or there.

This entry was also posted at http://swan-tower.dreamwidth.org/708067.html. Comment here or there.

A Year in Pictures – Sundial at Shurijo

This work by http://www.swantower.com is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

I took this picture in the full knowledge that I was almost exactly replicating a photo taken by my brother and sister-in-law on their trip to Okinawa. But I wanted my own version! I have a thing for sundials, and the cement between the tiles gives the roofs a weirdly stripey look.

Originally published at Swan Tower. You can comment here or there.

This entry was also posted at http://swan-tower.dreamwidth.org/707704.html. Comment here or there.

A Year in Pictures – Snake Charmer

This work by http://www.swantower.com is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

This fellow was performing on the street in (I think) Kumarakom, in the Indian state of Kerala. As cheesy as it is, I have to admit that watching somebody actually do the snake-charming thing is pretty awesome.

Originally published at Swan Tower. You can comment here or there.

This entry was also posted at http://swan-tower.dreamwidth.org/707579.html. Comment here or there.

A Year in Pictures – Delos Poppies

This work by http://www.swantower.com is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

Too many years have passed since my honeymoon for me to remember the significance of this bit of ruin on the Greek island of Delos. The bright contrast of the poppies, however, remains.

Originally published at Swan Tower. You can comment here or there.

This entry was also posted at http://swan-tower.dreamwidth.org/707149.html. Comment here or there.

A Year in Pictures – Tower Cannon

This work by http://www.swantower.com is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

I am much less sentimental for artillery than I am for swords and other such personal weapons . . . but I liked the lion chawing down on this cannon.

Originally published at Swan Tower. You can comment here or there.

This entry was also posted at http://swan-tower.dreamwidth.org/706956.html. Comment here or there.

A Year in Pictures – Signpost in the Middle of Nowhere

This work by http://www.swantower.com is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

I can’t tell if this picture is at all funny without the story behind it.

My husband and I spent a day and a half on Inis Mór, and the morning we woke up there, we decided to go to Dún Dúchathair — the less famous cousin of Dún Aengus. We were told to go along the coast road and then turn right at the sign — well, there was no sign at the coast, but we turned right at the first chance we had, and there was a sign a little ways in. So we follow the road . . .

. . . which turns into a track . . .

. . . which turns into a footpath . . .

. . . which dead-ends at a low stone wall. Which we go around, and at that point we’re lost in the wilds of Inis Mór (note: the island is only about a mile wide). We head on in more or less the same direction we were originally going, hoping to find the fort, and eventually we find this sign: Dún Dúchathair, thataway. Sitting all by its lonesome in the middle of a limestone moonscape.

As I said to my husband, “I hope the lads don’t get drunk of a Saturday night ane come out here to give that sign a spin around its post.”

We went thataway, and we did indeed find the Black Fort, so all was well. But the sign itself still amuses me.

Originally published at Swan Tower. You can comment here or there.

This entry was also posted at http://swan-tower.dreamwidth.org/706701.html. Comment here or there.

A Year in Pictures – The Moon at Kiyomizudera

This work by http://www.swantower.com is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

If I had planned this whole thing better, I would have saved this picture for today. It is the shot that sparked this post, and today is my father’s birthday, so it would have been a nice bit of timing! That post references the light-up at Kiyomizudera, though, and so that is what I give you today. with a cameo appearance by the moon.

Happy birthday, Dad. You are my favorite pusher of drugs expensive new hobbies.

Originally published at Swan Tower. You can comment here or there.

This entry was also posted at http://swan-tower.dreamwidth.org/706337.html. Comment here or there.

A Year in Pictures – Not a Stave Church

This work by http://www.swantower.com is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

This isn’t actually a stave church, but the thing it reminded me of most was the churches in Norway that my mother has pictures of, so my brain insisted on tagging it “that stave church in Zakopane.” Probably because those are basically the only wooden churches I know, other than the New England white clapboard type. Regardless: autumn color, nice vertical framing between the trees, me likey, yes.

Originally published at Swan Tower. You can comment here or there.

This entry was also posted at http://swan-tower.dreamwidth.org/706179.html. Comment here or there.

tonight's writing lesson

Do not end your day’s work with a line like this:

Lord Rossmere was not speaking to inform us, though; all that was prelude to his next statement.

Because when you come back to the text, you will not remember what that next statement was supposed to be. (Possibly I never knew, and that was just me reminding myself to justify the “as you know, Bob” dialogue that precedes it. I haven’t worked on this bit since before my NY/DC trip, so I really don’t recall.)

On the other hand, I am pleased with this line:

I did not say to him that I had kept the information secret precisely to avoid our current situation. First, because it was only true in part; and second, because Tom was stepping firmly on my foot.

Would you believe that Tom was originally a throwaway character invented solely because somebody like Lord Hilford wouldn’t travel alone? The stuff about his working-class origins came later, so that he and Isabella wouldn’t be nonentities to one another. And then I decided, almost on a whim, to have him become an actual colleague, at least to the extent of going to Bayembe with Isabella. Next thing I knew, he was a fixture of the story, and one of my favorite characters in the entire series.

It only looks like we plan this stuff. Half of it happens by accident.

Originally published at Swan Tower. You can comment here or there.

This entry was also posted at http://swan-tower.dreamwidth.org/706038.html. Comment here or there.

A Year in Pictures – Oxford From Above

This work by http://www.swantower.com is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

Some places, you can really only capture from a high vantage point. While we were climbing the tower of the University Church, we got this lovely view into the courtyard of (I think) All Souls College. I’m sure I could have taken some nice photos from within its bounds, but to get the whole thing, you really need to be outside and above.

Originally published at Swan Tower. You can comment here or there.

This entry was also posted at http://swan-tower.dreamwidth.org/705720.html. Comment here or there.