It's 20:10 and here's to a better year than 2009 for everyone.  What an odd year that was.  Some awfully good things happened (we moved, prof's big fat brick of a book was finally finished and got into the bestsellers and he has moved papers, this time to Expresso, I had a couple of nice jobs to do) and most of everything else was a speeding but damp squib, for us and an awful lot of friends.

This morning I saw a cedar tree with about 40 egrets sitting on it.  I was driving past it on a main road so I couldn't take a picture, but it was so weirdly beautiful.  My daughter was with me, she saw it too, so I know wasn't dreaming... and I was so annoyed that I hadn't got a picture of it, so I could stick it on flickr and say WOOOO, LOOK what I saw!  and then I berated myself for being annoyed... ten years ago it wouldn't have mattered to me whether anyone else saw it or not.... I was enough.  I think the internet needs to give me some space.

I'm going to spend a lot more time away from this internet thing this year.  I need to go back to the drawing board in more ways than one.  I may find that in a couple of week's time I have so much to write about that I go back to illustro-blogging daily, but I doubt it.  I feel rather spent.  Although my head is full, it is also stuck.... full of ideas and thoughts, but needing some space and time to get any of them out. I want to work on some bigger things, get a whole book done (god knows what about), get this house underway, work out where the hell it's all going.  It has much to do with the utter chaos that has abounded since we moved into this odd and quite crap house that we shall hopefully be demolishing this year.  The drains are abysmal, the lectrics are hanging by a forty year old thread, strange things happen when it rains, and it's full of the junk that I didn't have time to dump when I had to move us and 20,000 books all of a sudden in the summer.  I'm de-junking this week.  I used to live with an Aussie friend in London who used to say "I just going to de-spunk" when she was going to take a bath.  This didn't sound wrong to her sweet young antipodean ears.  Anyway, I'm not de-spunking, I'm de-junking.

Twitter has utterly done for my attention span, so that's going to be accessed only when I'm standing in a queue with nothing else to do, I am rather fed up with it.   After six years of an awful lot of blogging, my site will probably morph into more of a portfolio site... everything will still be here, just different and there will still be things to be writ in stoney gibberish, but gosh, sometimes I do feel like I've said everything.  The more outrageous or disgusting things I want to say or paint will go on Unkempt Women... which I created for just this eventuality, when a gel just wants to write from time to time or do something different.   I'm not giving up, just going a bit easier on my non-internet-self

So here's to a gloriously creative ten past eight for me as well as all of you.

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written by Ria , January 05, 2010

I heard on the radio yesterday that we are subject to the equivalent of 32 gigs of information per day. That does not include actually doing stuff like shopping, cooking, cleaning, etc.

So check out for a while. I look forward to the distilled version of LP in 2010.

Sympathies for the houseworks. We visited many old houses, 17th/18th century ruins, but so charming ... before settling in a place built in 2004. (And still there's a leak in the roof and a funny smell in the sous-terrain.)

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written by Célia , January 05, 2010

Although we have to stand in queues a lot here in PT i think this are sad news for Twitter world...

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written by Daddy Papersurfer , January 05, 2010

There are a lot of egrets in Surfugal ........ and quite a few eejits ...... just sayin' - have a good 2010 young Pepperoni - perhaps we'll finally manage to meet up this year?

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written by guyana gyal , January 05, 2010

Ha, I like the sound of Unkempt Women...I'll toddle over...

I hope 2010 brings you lots of goodies. I like saying that, I sort of think / hope that it will all come back to me [that is, goodies will come my way too] :-)

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written by kim , January 06, 2010

well, put that way... yes, twitter will be less interesting, and maybe that's good for the rest of us.
I'm sure Unkempt Women will be lively, including your contributions and that'll be good for all of us.
have fun. stay happy. and whatever else is called for. of course.

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written by emma , January 08, 2010

from one crap house to another... good riddance 2009! 2010 could not possibly be as bad! This year I'm going to read your blog, get more serious about writing a book, and of course lose a few kilos like every other year. Nice to know there are chicks like you out there too...

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written by Ariel , January 28, 2010

Spending more time away from t'internet is probably not going to be something I can ever do, but as for getting more creative, hell, I have been trying for a bleeding year!!! Since 2009 was success on a plate (not), clearly 2010 can only be grandiose... Let's go for grandiose, and creative, and all round lovely and fab. Will that do? Actually, I think I haven't twittered for nearly two whole weeks. Clipped wings and all that. Bleurgh.

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written by valia , March 03, 2010

loved your site, loved your illustrations and reading you is great!!!love the biting humor!