Monday 28 March 2011

Come on weather, be nice!

It worked!!!! We beat Australia! Now if only we can manage to do that against Pakistan. Easily the biggest match of the Cup, and I'll be in transit. Hopefully, I should say. Weather's been pretty crap lately. It's supposed to be nice here, the weather. But I'm beginning to trust these things less and less.

So I finished Juliet. That's about it really. I'm wondering whether to rate it above or below How to Be Good, which is the only Hornby I properly hate. It's a close run thing :|. Might be the way I read it. Or might not.

It's been one of those trips. The ones when a lot seemed to have happened, but when I try to put a finger on it, I keep drawing blanks. And through it all, somehow, managed to run over a 100k listening to exactly one song.

Really wasn't expecting to spend these last two shifts this trip on the back deck, but I suppose that makes time go by quick. Doesn't feel like it, but it does.

Currently: ready to leave!
Listening to: Flunk - Play

Thursday 24 March 2011

Chords, discord and Julie Beatty

For a few days now, I've been struggling through Juliet, Naked. Well, perhaps struggling is a bit strong. I'd start reading, laugh away on my own for a bit at some particularly original bit of wit, and then be unable to carry on any further. Good thing the book's quite short. I'm well over halfway done already!

But the trouble really is of the noise inside the head variety. Static, rushing wind, that sort of thing. Happens an awful lot when I've got things to do, but can't really be bothered. Which isn't the case at the moment, come to think of it. So maybe I've got that one backwards. Either way, trying to drown it out with music. Working only some of the time.

On top of that, for some reason this time the whole "Oh my god! It's time to go on break!" thing's started building up way too early. Normally it's a couple of days. Maybe. This time it started with well over a week to go!! It's quite annoying to be honest, gets in the way of things. And there's still four and a wake-up to go!

Anyhoo. It's not that I've forgotten about the India quarter-final that's going on right now. I just decided that since I can't watch it, I will not follow it at all. At least that way, in my head, the possibility of a longer run to the finals, and Sachin's last chance at that trophy, stays alive and well till tomorrow morning. It would appear that the only match I have any hope of catching a live telecast of will be the final :(.

Feeling: lost-ish, but in a good way, sort of
Listening to: Charles Atlas - The snow before us

Monday 21 March 2011

Moonshine

I like 20-25 knots of wind. You can quite comfortably lean into it. Of course, if it were to suddenly drop, or change direction for a moment, you would be left clutching thin air as you fell forward. And beyond that speed it gets a bit annoying. Especially so if it's cold :).

It's been a while since I've been out on deck in the middle of the night. Provided you position yourself right, all you see is the dark expanse of inky ocean, fading into a somewhat lighter darkness of the night sky. Barring the twinkling of the lanternas and maybe distant lights from ashore, when you can see shore, that is.

On occasion, there are other boats, lit up, sometimes quite festive looking from a little distance away. But recently, after a space of a couple of years, we are working solo. No more keeping pace, alone, somewhat unfettered even.

But on some nights, others intrude on the brooding darkness. The moon, for instance. Giant, at rise and set as it hovers near the horizon. Or merely bright, melting part of the world into a flow of liquid moonshine reaching out towards the edge of sea and sky. Or dusky sometimes, flitting between ghostly clouds.

Did it really look any bigger than every other night? Any closer? Not that I could tell. Probably the trouble there is that the moon is kinda far away to begin with :).

Currently: single digits!!!
Listening to: Mumm-Ra - She's got you high

Friday 18 March 2011

Fires in the distance

This World Cup's been a bit of a hopeless situation so far :(. First I discover that none of the stupid sat TV channels airing here are telecasting the matches. Live or otherwise :|. And then the two India matches I try to follow, on Cricinfo over a very flaky net connection, end up in disaster. There's even a possibility we might get kicked out in the group stages again I think, isn't there?

It isn't too long before I manage to get off for the first proper break I guess. Should be interesting...

There's just that slight inkling of falling. Not like a rock. More like a somewhat wet feather. One of these days I need to get on a roller coaster. Just to see how much it is (or isn't) like being on a boat in rough weather, or a flight through turbulence.

Beginning to feel a bit like doomsday, isn't it? What with floods and earthquakes and tsunamis and nuclear disasters and god knows what else just around the corner. Not to mention war, either actual or simmering beneath a sea of unrest. What is the world coming to, one wonders.

Currently: brooding, possibly unnecessarily
Listening to: Coldplay - Warning sign

Thursday 10 March 2011

Hazy horizons

Wow, it seems to be going pretty quick, this trip! (Oh no! Please let the Seismic Gods not hear that! :S) (Yes, there is such a thing, and even those who do not believe in God(s), or any other form of conventional supernatural interventionist entity, believe in the Seismic Gods. They are scary and are always listening in case you do something stupid. Like mention in passing that the trip has been going by pretty quick :|. The consequences can be trying, at the very least.)

Anyway, enough of that. I did finish with The Girl Who Played with Fire, and now I'm in serious pain. I mean, come on!!! How can you do that?! Leave it hanging like that?! Point being that my copy of The Girl who Kicked the Hornet's Nest is sitting in my book shelf at home :|. On top of that, Juliet, Naked is proving to be a pretty difficult switch of gears. Should I nip into Turbulence instead? Hmm, that's a thought.

By the looks of it, we're about half way through with the Arabian campaign, so to speak. But since that means another couple of trips, and with absolutely no clue as to where we might be headed next, that doesn't really mean much by way of anything. Except that we have a good chance of exiting the Red Sea sometime in the middle of summer. I keep hoping one of these days I'll make it through the Suez. On a boat. Maybe it'll happen. One can always hope.

In the mean time, here we are, with this super awful weather to keep us company, close to the tip of Sinai, where the Gulf of Suez and the Gulf of Aqaba empty into the Red Sea. (End of geography lesson.)

Currently: agonizing over possible consequences of a .22 in the head
Listening to: Vetiver - You may be blue

Sunday 6 March 2011

Sunstroke

It's been very quiet on the reading front for a while. But something caught my attention the other day and I found myself laughing quietly at the memory of a certain grammar lesson. And the incorrigible Jess from A Long Way Down. Somehow, re-reads don't seem to add much to Hornby, but the first time was definitely an experience :).

Which is probably why I'm once again ploughing through the last few pages of The Girl Who Played With Fire. I don't have book three here with me, but with five other unread books on my cabin shelf, lack of material is really not the worry. Once I'm done with this one, I think I'll start with Juliet, Naked. Yes, still haven't gone past the first page on that :|.

Then of course there's the news on A Song of Ice and Fire!! Apparently in three months the next book will be out. Of course, this is no longer the last volume, so the wait continues :-<. I tried to recall the last part of the story that I remember reading. It was a doomed enterprise, obviously, but I think I'll hold my horses on the full re-read till a more opportune time :).

It's a shame The Ring of Solomon isn't releasing in paperback for ages!!! Evil publishers X-(. I'm rather happy this is a prequel. Still trying to shake off the feeling from the end of Ptolemy's Gate, and I think a bit more of Bartimaeus would definitely help with that!
--

So the question really is, I suppose, whether things do indeed feel any less hectic now. Yes and no, actually. This trip's been fairly eventful already, barely a couple of weeks in! Blinking solitons and what not. It's quite intriguing, the concept of a gigantic ball of water intent specifically on causing us grief :).
--

A flicker of a fleeting feeling. Untended, fading away into nothingness. A sun gliding in-between strangely insubstantial yet dark clouds. The sliver of a rising crescent moon, precariously balancing over the leaping, foaming waves. In the midst of the onrushing tide, moments of serenity, life in slow motion.

Feeling: nothing
Listening to: Flunk - Play