Because I didn’t get on the Downton Abbey wagon…er, I mean…motor during the first season, I’ve had to play catch up. This means I’ve watched a season and a half in about two weeks. This means I am drenched to the bone in early-twentieth-century estate hierarchy, upstairs decor vs downstairs decor, upstairs meals vs staff meals, and the clothing (my god, the clothing!). I’m also being shuttled back and forth between the hospital drama at Downton Abbey and the mire of the Great War, hoping (futilely perhaps?…no, don’t tell me) that Matthew comes home safe and sound, while wishing evil Thomas had put more than just his hand in front of that bullet.

This morning, during my routine morning write, I was reflecting, as I often am, on the sensation of being stuck with a certain essay or poem, or, on my bad days, with writing as a whole. I realized, as I wrote, that the voice in my head finding its way down my arm and out of my pen onto paper was in a crisp, clear English accent (more the sternness of Lady Mary than the kindness of Anna). The accented voice wrote:

One must not spend her days thinking more about her art than she does actually doing it–else she might as well discard of the idea altogether.

It may as well have been followed by, Isn’t that right, m’Lady?

Of course, one should refrain from stating the obvious (but one won’t):
A lady might solve her die-lemma by watching less television and, in its place, taking to the study to bury her nose in a book.

Alas, if one did that, she wouldn’t be thinking in an accent any more. Plus, one doesn’t have a study, one has a one-room studio apartment. It is, thank the heavens, in Great Barrington, which, after watching hours of D.A., has a very different ring to it.

…of my photo folders on my PC. One of the collections I found was made up of these photos taken during a particularly lonely time in my life, when I was watching West Wing and A LOT of Friends episodes on DVD (I know, I know). I kinda like ‘em (especially knowing they were taken of the television with a crappy cell-phone camera).

Here they are:

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When you get sick, it’s easier to let the outside world sort of dissolve (especially if you live alone). And this last week during what felt like the slowest recovery from the common cold in history, I settled into something familiar from my early adolescence: binge reading and candy (sure, the latter may have hampered my recovery just a little, but we’re going to ignore that for now).

I recommend both when holed up with a cold…entering an eerie imaginary world and some bright sweet colors on the tongue.