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I'm two scenes (out of six) into chapter five and I'm already feeling the foreboding writer's drop, not in energy levels or motivation, but in mood. Man, I'm one cranky writer today. I love this story and I don't want it to be over, yet I really, really want to finish it. What a conundrum.

I realized, just two seconds ago, that my Giovanina voice is totally ~~based on~~ inspired by Marzia from the book version of Call Me By Your Name. Same down to earth, kinda simple, but emotionally very sensitive and mature voice. So, now that I've figured that out, what's the first thing I do? Considering what exciting AU's and canon mergings could happen from that, of course. Marzia/Giovanina should be a thing. Or maybe Teresina/Marzia... Hmm. We'll see if I'm not barfing Napoli once this story is done and won't wanna touch it again for a while, or if I take the other extreme. Cling to it like a koala baby to its mother.

I did take a quote from CMBYN and used in this scene, though. I must remember to credit, when we get to posting time. It's one sentence, not much at all, but very essential to the whole core of the scene, so yes. Definitely crediting. /makes note to self

5am-ish

Very early morning.

Judging by the sound of rain on the office window, fall weather has finally come to bust our asses. Maybe my system will acclimatize to the new season easier that way. Or it won't. You never know with this disorder, honestly.

I could really use a cup of tea, but should probably wait an hour to an hour and a half with making it, not to wake up K. She has a long day ahead and needs all the rest she can get.

So, for now I'm just sitting here, having replied to various comments I had sitting and spent the past hour on writing the first scene for the last fucking chapter of my Napoli fic. Can't believe that's where we're at, now. At 35k words, I have a chapter and an epilogue left, so I'm guessing, we'll land around 45-50k words when I'm done with the first draft. Pretty much as planned, but the process of writing this fic has been sooooo much easier than anything I've tried before. I'm very satisfied with it. It's been fun and not draining, like working on the Omina fic was at times.

And I've really come to develop a soft spot for Giovanina as a character, her narrative voice in my interpretation is just so straight-forward and, probably not pleasant, but earnest. Honest. She says things like they are and there's so much strength to that, especially for someone like me who wraps everything up in poetics. Not gonna lie, there are definitely poetics enough in this fic, too, but the language is still different from the compact, complex prose poetry style of The Year of the Wolf.

I'm hoping to write at least one more scene today, but now that I got up in the middle of the night, we'll see how much energy I have left for writing throughout the rest of the day.

8.45am-ish

I went to grab an hour of sleep. An hour became two. That's how these things go. K.'s gone off to work, she has a long day today, so I'll be home alone for much of it. Once I wake up a bit more, I'm still a zombie rn, I'll make sure dinner is taken care of and such, so she doesn't have to worry about that on the way home.

Breakfast is done, at least. Eggs on toast, very simple. I'm rarely that hungry in the mornings, so I just need something that goes down easily and doesn't need much chewing or I lose my appetite completely. Still, I need to eat something with my pills, so eating is a requirement, not a question. Needs must and all that.

I don't have any other plans today and don't intend to make any. I had a very busy weekend and kept the momentum up yesterday, so today it's just... as much relaxation as possible. Take everything extra slow for emphasis, because my whole system still needs to wind down. It'll probably take the rest of the week before I'm really back at a comfortable state, but that only means I should relax every day this week!! Except Sunday, when I'm going to my friend, S.'s place, and we're watching Napoli together. Very excited for that, tbh. She's a very analytical and sharp mind, watching ballet with her is like getting new doors of interpretation absolutely kicked open.

Didn't wake up feeling much like writing, I can sense that, but I guess maybe if I sit down and read what I wrote in the dead of night, a little urge might rear its head anyway. It usually works that way, seeing where I let off inspires me to work onwards towards the next, and the next... That's pretty much how I manage to churn out five-ten pages every day, me who's otherwise such a slow writer.

Probably, from the other side, it doesn't look much like slowness, the pace I'm writing at, but that's because I have nothing but time to work with. If I had a job of any kind or many obligations otherwise, trust me, I'd write half a page a day and probably not every day, that's the pace I get words down at.

And that would be completely fine under those circumstances, but my life looks different now. I have the time. So I use all the time I can.

It's also a part of my medicine, after all.

Our weekend trip to Copenhagen went really well. K. had booked a hotel very close to the venue and we honestly only walked, like, five minutes to get there which was a big stressor off our shoulders. The hotel itself was super nice and was located in an old town house type of building and kept in an old-fashioned style with 19th century painting-replicas on the walls and such. The restaurant was excellent and the room was beautiful. I haven't slept as well as I did in that bed for years, not kidding you. It was soooooo good.

The performance was amazing. I am still not sold on the sets and costumes, although some of them are okay-ish, I guess, but mostly it felt like a whole cast of eye sores running around in really colourful clothes where the eye couldn't really find rest in anything. The lighting would have been extremely effectful if the colour scheme of the rest had been more demure. I missed the look of the black/white La Sylphide greatly that night.

However, the dancing, storytelling and acting of this performance was through the roof. Completely other level. Especially the first act, oh wow. I loved Stephanie's sylph, she was flimsical and airy and light, very alluring and paired with Alexander Bozinoff's James, I just bought the whole story of his downfall 200 percent. He was a very conflicted and devoted James, devoted to Effy (or trying to be, at least), devoted to his own dreams (the sylph) and devoted to doing what was right, by himself and by his community. In the end, he picks himself and that becomes the end of him. It was amazingly clear and well told.

What really won me over for this cast, though, was Christina Michanek as Madge!! OMG, she was amazing. I completely loved her. She was old and young and magical and a force of nature and strong and ugly and beautiful, all at the same time. Never have I seen a better Madge. She was spectacular. Along with a very strong Effy in Camilla Ruelykke (who, fun note, was actually Effy in the very first production I saw of La Sylphide on stage twelve years ago as well, she has grown so much into the role), this cast was completely on point with everything.

I loved it.

La Sylphide was shown alongside a short Balanchine work called Scotch Symphony and I liked parts of it. Holly danced the lead and she was completely in her A game. So well danced by her. I also really liked the solo Scotch girl danced by Tara Schaufuss, her part was my favourite part. But all in all, it wasn't the best Balanchine I've seen and the ballet itself felt a bit... fragmented. Somehow. Good fun while watching it, not something I'll remember for very long afterwards, except maybe specific moments.

Being back in Copenhagen was lovely, but stressful. Neither K. nor I are strong travellers and walking about with luggage and such is just always a hassle that takes more of our energy than it gives us back. Besides the hotel which was nice, we didn't get to see much. We did a very brief visit to the Glyptoteque, because there were so many people there and I simply couldn't stand it in my head. Ugh. But we did see the familiar sights and that was nice. Then, we got lunch. Lots of walking around, waiting around, then ballet and sleep. Probably not how most people would spend a weekend in CPH, but we do what we must.

I did enjoy myself and I hope we can do just a few more of these kinds of trips in the future.

Not this season, though. Besides La Sylphide there isn't anything I really want to see. Next season, then!

What did happen when we were on our way back by train was that I suddenly, for the first time in almost a week, had a raging urge to work on my Napoli project again, so although I was dead tired once we got off the train and got back to our place, I actually managed to get started on the next scene and today, after a good night's sleep, I even managed to finish it! It's one of the longest scenes in the entire fic and I really like it, I think. I need to read it over again, start to finish, but it ended exactly where I wanted it to and leads onwards seamlessly.

I only need one minor scene now to finish this chapter and then, there's only one more chapter left along with the epilogue and then, I'll be done. I hope to have first drift finished in a couple of week's time.

Still loving the process of working on this very much. Which is a relief, because most of last week, I was done with it.

Started out the day with some laundry, it's hanging out to dry now and I'm trying to think of what to do until K. gets home and we're supposed to clean the apartment for the weekend. Probably pack a bag, though I'm not bringing much except medicine, a book and a change of trousers for travelling home. I'll be wearing my evening wear all Saturday.

Before going to the hotel to check in tomorrow, we're visiting the Glyptoteque which is my favourite museum in the whole universe. I can't wait to go there again. I used to visit regularly back when I spent more time in Copenhagen. I loved it. I haven't been there in years.

I wanna bring a La Sylphide book (I have a stack, somewhat of a collector/hoarder, here) for the train trip, but I can't pick which one to take. The one I'd like to bring the most is too big and clunky to carry easily, so the choice is down to just the libretto for the ballet which is very tiny and light-weight or the slightly heavier, but same-size English-language La Sylphide introduction with three different historical analyses of the ballet, one by a Danish scholar who's very revered in ballet circles in Denmark. I've never read that one back to back, so might take that and give it a go.

Last night, when I was up due to nerves around one o'clock, I decided to take all that La Sylphide noise out of my head and put it on paper, so I made a document with my general idea for the Madge/Effy story I'm so obsessed with right now. It actually helped, and I was able to go back to bed and get more sleep, so although I've slept in intervals last night, I still feel pretty rested, because I slept between half past two until half past seven, which is a long stretch by my standards. Usually I need the bathroom at least once in that time.

I think both K. and I slept really well last night, but we were also completely knackered around half past nine when we went to bed, hahaha.

I'm not 100 percent sure what I'm going to wear tomorrow, though. I have a midnight blue/white patterned dress that is really elegant that I might go for - but we just washed the black dress that I also really love, though that one is thinner (summer dress) and I'll need to wear something underneath, though I have something that fits, so... I really love the black dress, it's super comfortable and for such a trip, I might prioritize comfort over style (the black dress is pretty, don't get me wrong, just not as fancy-pansy as the midnight blue). I dunno... I guess I'll try both sets on tonight before bed and decide there.

Under any circumstances, something I need to get done this afternoon before K. gets home is a proper hairwash so I won't have to deal with that in the morning tomorrow and my hair has time to dry, too.

I'm considering contacting

smallfandombang mod and ask to have La Sylphide verified as an acceptable fandom (it has, like, 3 fics on AO3 - 1 is a poem by me), so I could consider leaving the Napoli fic on the sideline for a while and write this Effy/Madge thing, and if it gets long enough to pass the 10K word count, I'll make that my contribution rather than the Napoli one that I'll finish some other time, possibly for

bethefirst, next time that comes around.

Hmm. It could be a plan.

Anyway, the general idea for the Effy/Madge fic is inspired by the prompt, Ghosts and Hauntings, on my

ladiesbingo card!

( Some details under here, mention of some sexual themes... )

I think that's what I've got for now. I should go for a walk while the weather is good, still.

Got a card and I couldn't have asked for one better.

Minorities / Characters of Colour / Women in Canon	Soulmates	Heights and Depths	Day-in-the-life	Ghosts and Hauntings
Pre- Slash / Femslash / Het	Sleepovers and Pyjama Parties	The Nature of the Soul / Consciousness	Deities and Followers	Chosen One(s)
Confessions	Relative values: Families	Wild Card	Case / Mission Fic	Heat
Afternoon	Dreams, Daydreams, Wishes	Exothermic Reaction	Neon	On the Balcony
A Battle / Fight / Confrontation	Antarctica	Dark Alley	Trapped!	Worst case scenario

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