It’s Monday morning here in Gutenberg Land.
Time to report all the newest on the weekend Gutenberg scene.
Not.
Sorry.
I find that formulation so bizarre,
I sometimes play with it.
Like to describe what I did with my long awaited long-weekend vacation.
As in:
Nope,
Nobody dead,
Like in tv movies.
And nobody dead at a country house murder game,
Like in the classic murder mysteries.
(I am reading one of the first Martha Grimes,
to get a perspective on
(well-deserved, in my opinion)
grand masters,
ie
they that carry the small jeweled scimitar shaped dagger.
Boy, don’t mess with them
if you meet up at a Bouchercon.)
And don’t wear long hair.
The rule of thumb is a giant hat
with demonstrative hat pin,
and preferably with a veil,
if you can walk into a discussion room in one.
(Sorry, I’m a little touchy since one of the biggest names in mystery fiction
once asked me if with all that long hair I could play more than three chords
on the guitar.
(Actually about twelve instruments, but,
I have to admit,
she IS a grand master.)
(Not Martha Grimes, by the way)
(If you haven’t been to a Bouchercon, go)
So anyway,
since I was,
on the weekend,
Not:
as in:
not here in Gutenberg Land,
What DID happen,
in this case of the
more or less
not-weekend,
is that
we got a last-minute call from some cousins,
who,
bless their hearts,
we will never forget it,
had collected the last bits of junk
that had to be removed and stored,
before we could sell my husband’s ancient family house.
And I couldn’t do
after I had a car wreck
and couldn’t drive for a while.
Again, and since they are very active,
but still over seventy,
bless you both.
So there we were,
weekend off,
being reasonable and adult
(I want a weekend off some time)
riding through the incredible beauty
of the multi-colored fall leaves
of the Hunsrück mountains,
a stony, traditionally not very fruitful area,
(think pine trees, not corn)
populated by kind, warm-hearted (pig-headed) people
who,
by a freak chance of mother nature,
found,
and now mine
agates,
and gemstones,
and make their living trading,
cutting,
polishing,
and setting.
And since the tourist season is now finally over,
we had the place to ourselves:
long walks in the hills,
alongside small brooks,
a supper of potato specialties,
the main crop here,
and home-brewed beer
in a small inn,
and the next day a discussion of gemstones
with some very bored
and brilliant,
gem designers,
about who they sell to,
what the state of the local economy is,
ie good,
even though most of the cutting is being done cheaply in foreign countries.
The trick is,
that the worse the political situation in the world is,
the more gemstones are sold.
And our political situation,
and the Brexit,
have people half-way around the world buying gemstones again.
Which makes me wonder what the queen is now keeping
in that small safe
in the Corgies’ quarters.
Not?
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Quahog on a Tightrope 