Francesca Forrest's Blog, page 77

Rampisham Down

Rampisham Down is where, from 1939 until 2011, the transmitters for the BBC World Service in Europe were located--"twenty-six iron giants stand ... with a grey cat's cradle in their hands," in the words of Talis Kimberley in her song "Rampisham Down." They were so well known that when my mother came to visit us when we were living in Dorset--where Rampisham Down is located--she was excited to drive by them.

A friend gave me Talis Kimberley's wonderful song about them, which starts with a messa...

Day 4: "underwater"

Another possibility I considered was a world of huge inverted mountains--icebergs, as seen from underwater, a world of floating mountains. But it was too cold; I didn't want to draw a cold thing. (I haven't checked ahead to see if there's a prompt "cold" or not.)



When we imagine the world above water, we focus (usually) on the floor of the world--the ground underneath our feet and the things that spring from it and, like us, walk on it, but when we think of the world underwater, we focus (usua...

Inktober Day 3

Today's prompt is "Poison." I was going to draw, maybe, a destroying angel mushroom or some water hemlock, or maybe some water hemlock growing by a destroying angel mushroom, with a coral snake sliding by.... but in the end I decided to go with ...



What can I say; I really loved Zeffirelli's Romeo and Juliet.

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Inktober days 1 and 2

I've never done Inktober before, but I always enjoy looking at other people's offerings. My oldest daughter got one list of possible themes, and that's what I'm working from. Here are Day 1, "swift," and Day 2 "divided"





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when the curtain parts

When the curtain parts, when the doors open, when unknown beings from there come here, they always arrive in an empty parking lot, at twilight, when the sky is glowing but the earth is dim, and the electric lights of humankind seem as weak as a last breath.



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You can grow ideas in the garden of your mind

I'm doing a little bit of writing with some adult learners (there may be some high school students in this class as well)--just ten minutes or so. I don't have any pedagogical reason to believe this is beneficial, except for believing that when people have pleasant experiences doing something, then that thing becomes less daunting. In other words, maybe, if the students enjoy this time writing, they'll feel more able to tackle the sort of writing you need to do to clear the hurdles in front o...

Meeting an actual hero and statesman

If you're going to meet an actual hero, a freedom fighter and former political prisoner who helped birth a new nation--that's YOU, Mr. Xanana Gusmão--you would do well not to be 45 minutes late. Alas, Google maps misled me about how long it would take me to drive from my house to the Pell Center, in Newport, Rhode Island, where Mr. Gusmão and a panel of distinguished experts were going to be talking about the future of Timor-Leste. And then I made a wrong turn at the very end and got lost. By...

a Garnet fan

I was driving to the post office, and I noticed that the car in front of me had a sticker of Garnet, from Steven Universe, on the back of the car. Also, the car was from out of state.

Garnet



I haven't watched much Steven Universe, but I've really enjoyed the few episodes I've seen. I felt warmly toward that car. Then, coincidence of coincidences, it turned into the post office parking lot too. "Wow, someone from New York is going to the post office here in B'town," I thought, and also, "I can t...

slow gin

Actually it's sloe gin, after the dark berries ("her eyes were sloe black") that flavor it, but I've always liked thinking of it as slow gin, moving so leisurely, like this phantasmagoric swan metamorphosing slowly, genie-from-a-bottle style, from? I guess? the still in which the gin was made?

Wakanomori brought this bottle back--full--from England, and I did drink it slowly, in tiny sake cups, but somehow now it's gone! Maybe that means the swan is now free, but I missed its triumphant depart...

Classrooms around the world

The British Journal of Photography has a post featuring classrooms around the world, taken by Julian Germain.

I found them so attractive and thought provoking that I went to his page for the classroom project, which includes photos not included in that article. The international photos start around image 9.

They conveyed a lot not just in what each photo contained or lacked (though my eye was drawn to the stamp "donated by Ogean Energy" on a desk in a captionless photo--donors always having to...