Sound and vision

Sorry about the technical glitch. I put a post up and then took it down again.

I’m editing my new novel at the moment, a process best described as re-eating your own vomit. I constantly tell myself how lucky I am to make a living writing books – it’s what I’ve wanted to do since I was six-years old – but the editing part of it is hard. I have to practically nail myself to my seat to get it done. The temptation to go out and buy paperclips, re-sort my receipts, or do the ironing can be overwhelming. Oh look, the light switches need polishing.

As Flaubert said, sometimes I ‘spend a whole morning putting a comma in – and a whole afternoon taking it out again…’ It’s always fantastically satisfying when it’s done and you know the book is exponentially improved by it, but still… eurgggh.

So this one’s not so much about the words as the pictures.

Here are some videos I’ve enjoyed recently. (And don’t miss darling David at the top there…)

P.S.

Phewee, what a flume ride, I’m exhausted but although it was scary at times, I’ve learned a lot from this experience.

I’ve learned a lot about what people get out of burlesque and why they love it. I’ve learned that people feel very strongly about their right to wear very high heels and a strong individual look. I’ve learned that there is a self-defined proud ’vintage tribe’.  It’s been really interesting.

But the best thing of all was finding out – when I got up this morning and opened the comments, almost scared to look – that there are a lot of wonderful people with strong opinions, who are willing to have a conversation and talk things over. Who would rather come to an understanding than keep slugging it out.

Thank you so much for that. It’s really strengthened my faith in human nature. There are far far more nice people  out there than nasty ones.

I’ve now amended the post, taking out the specific term which caused offence and which I honestly didn’t know was a derogatory term. I’m so grateful to Indiyesreally in comments for spelling that out to me.

I’ve also edited the rest of the piece in a way which I hope makes the points I was trying to make clearer and takes out some bits of nonsense that clouded the issues.

Next time I’m going to post about fluffy kittens (in killer heels…)

xxx

Why Miss Piggy? She’s the only woman, er, pig, more glamorous than Dita von Teese.

Who DIDN’T I offend? To all of you, there’s only one thing to say: sorry.

I don’t subscribe to the opinionist posture of never apologise, never explain – I’m happy to do both. I don’t want to offend people. Not my thing.

But right now I want to devote my energy to replying individually to all the comments. So for the time being my explanation is on there.

And here’s what I should have written, to avoid all this rancour, because this is all that I meant:

Dita von Teese is one of the world’s most elegant and perfectly turned out women.

And for those of you who don’t want to – or can’t – wear very high heels, here are some pictures of her looking just as great in flat shoes, as she does in her highest Louboutins.

OK?

PS 28th January: I’ve amended the post, taking out the specific term which caused offence and which I honestly didn’t know was a derogatory term. I’m so grateful to Indiyesreally in comments for spelling that out to me.

I’ve also edited the rest of the piece in a way which I hope makes the points I was trying to make clearer.

xxx