Happy Feast Day!

I have remarked upon my affection for St. Nicholas before on this blog, making particular mention of the story of himself and Arius at the Counsel of Nicea. I shall not rehash the story, fond as I am of it, but I shall share with you all a fine old icon of the event:

I am intending to celebrate St. Nicholas's day right properly, by placing his picture in a place of honour, lighting a candle before it, and brewing up a Bisschopswijn by way of making merry, for all it is still the season of Advent. It is only fitting that a saint with so warm and strong a spirit should have his day marked with the drinking of warm and strong spirits. I shall, however, refrain as far as possible from giving blows to persons who eminently deserve them.

November 30th

Well, golly! To my amazement, I did it. I managed to write better than 50,000 words this month - 50,377, to be exact - and so have fulfilled the challenge of National Novel Writing Month. The thing I have created cannot properly be called a novel. That is far too grandiose a title. What I actually have is a rough draft - and exceedingly rough draft, of something that will potentially be a novel someday. (Soon hopefully.) Still, this is something of a mile-stone for me, as I actually have all the key point of the novel written out, with a proper beginning, middle and end. It is the closest I have ever come to actually writing one of those books I am always threatening to write, and as I result, I am feeling so pleased with myself that I am going to indulge in a little bit of blowing my own horn. I present to you all, my award:

On a totally unrelated note, today is the feast day of St. Andrew, who is the patron saint of Scotland. Being the ardent Scotophile that I am, I celebrated the day, at least in a small way. I am the owner of a very fine Royal Scots cap badge:

which I pinned in my hair, along with a white rose, which I generally break out on days of Scottish national import, since the white rose - along with the thistle - is the national flower of Scotland. I wore my little pin with the American flag on one side, and the Scottish flag on the other. Oddly enough, though St. Andrew is the patron saint of Scotland and has been since the Battle of Bannockburn, and though the Scottish flag is a composed of a blue field, with a white, St. Andrew's cross emblazoned on it, St. Andrew's day is not really a big deal in Scotland. No doubt we have the Covanenters and their legacy to thank for that, and it is rather a shame. I wanted to post a video or a music clip in praise of St. Andrew, but decent music in honour of this great saint and apostle is very hard to find. There is a polyphonic Gregorian chant in his honour here for those who are interested.

Catching Up

I have been neglecting this blog dreadfully. I apologise. I have been taking part in National Novel Writing Month instead. Yes, that is correct. I am endeavouring to write a 50,000 word novel this month. Why, you ask, when I can barely keep up with my blog? Well, insanity, for starters; a desire to force myself to write, even if I don't want to; a need for some mental distraction from the travails of Life; and a sudden, mad urge to prove that I was up to the challenge.

I must admit I have been fighting to keep up with the daily word goals. To reach 50,000 words by November 30th, I must average 1,667 words a day. I don't always manage that. Indeed, I am spending a good deal of time falling behind - and being informed by my handy word tracker, that I shall not be finished until December 2nd... December 4th... December 6th! And then, thank heaven, the weekend comes, and I apply myself to serious catching up, and manage to obtain the happy forecast of finishing by the appointed date of November 30th. At present, I am pleased to say, I am set to finish on time. Wish me luck.

Well, That's Interesting!

One of the most persistent myths about WWII, is that the Catholic Church, somehow, aided and abetted the Nazis. Poor Pope Pius XII, who saved thousands of Jews during the War, is branded as "Hitler's Pope". Contemporary histories tend to accuse the Church of sitting idly by whilst millions of souls went to their deaths. Some particularly bitter folk even suggest that Hitler was disproportionately influenced by his Catholic upbringing, and that his anti-Semitism is a result of a thousand year old Catholic tradition of the same - conveniently overlooking the fact that he has ceased the practice of his Faith long before he reached adulthood. The ironic thing, is that the Jews of that period were unanimous in their praise of the Church's efforts on behalf of their people. Indeed, Albert Einstein goes so far as to say, "Only the Church stood squarely across the path of Hitler’s campaign for suppressing the truth." High praise indeed, but current opinion still runs vigourously against her. It is, therefore, eminently satisfying to come across something like this, to back you up in your defence of the Catholics. A picture, they say, is worth a thousand words:

In Memoriam...

Greater love than this no man hath, that a man lay down his life for his friends.....


To the memory of all those brave souls who died that day, that others may live....

Award

Well, look at that! Amanda over at Old Fashioned Girl has given me an award. It is an award to acknowledges wee little blogs like this one, with under 200 followers. It is very kind of her. There is only one thing that I can say about it:


Thanks Amanda!

How Beautiful A Day Can Be....

Every once in a while a day will come along that is as nearly perfect as it is possible for things to be on this Earth of ours. Today was just such a day for me. To begin with, the World Pipe Band Championships were being streamed live on BBC Scotland. The Worlds began at about 9 am British Standard Time, which would have put it at about 1 am here. I had to go into work at 8:30, so obviously pulling an all-nighter was not going to work for me. However, I did get up at a little past 5 and got in a solid couple hours of listening some really superb music, by the best bands in the world. This is the first time I've seen the broadcast for the competitions, and I found it tremendously exciting. Indeed, even if no other pleasant thing happened to me for the rest of the day, that glorious beginning put me in so fine a mood that it wouldn't have mattered.

In addition to getting a really good dose of piping, however, I also discovered that Celtic FC, out of Glasgow (my favourite football team*) beat out Dundee United 5-1 in their first serious game of the season. They beat Manchester United in a friendly match last week too, so they are off to a brilliant start.

And my own piping practice today went like a dream. I have been struggling with my pipes all summer, and practices have mostly been something of a purgatory for me. Today, however, everything seemed to lock in. I cannot remember the last time I sounded as decent as I did today, nor the last time that piping was so much fun. Och, there were still issues, don't get me wrong. I have a fiddly reed that takes forever to settle in when I'm playing, and which is highly sensitive to the slightest variances in pressure, so I was still cutting out a little bit, and the tuning, while acceptable, was not all it could have been... but, oh, I had the tunes, and my fingers were doing what I wanted them to do, and the over all sound was really very presentable indeed. I felt like a million dollars by the end of that!

Last but not least, when I was going for a quick stroll during my afternoon break, I passed a birch tree that shed a couple very lovely golden leaves on me. It is too early for autumn, and, indeed the day was quite warm. I think that this particular tree is changing colours more because of the abuse it has endured most the summer, with drain work and road work disturbing it continuously, rather than because it is a herald of cooler days. But the leaves were very fall-like, and as I paused in a golden shaft of sunlight to look at the birch in surprise and delight, a little breeze wove around us, and the lovely, intoxicating bitter-spice smell of autumn came wafting from it, making my happiness complete.

* soccer for those of you who think I meant a sport involving tackling and massive shoulder guards.