The lyf so short

Alles Liebe nachträglich zum Geburtstag, fusselbiene,
und Herzlichen Glückwunsch, zorn und joyful_molly!
It also appears to be Neil Gaiman's birthday. And the first day of carnival. And Martinmas, of course! Next year, I'll probably start attending Martinmas parades again. That I'm actually looking forward to - Martinmas was one of my favourite feasts as a child, but alas, at some point you're too old to go a-parading and a-wassailing with a lantern unless you have to accompany and protect someone younger...
Oh, and it's poppy day too, eh? Well, let rest their quarrel with the foe. It's a new world after all.
Finally, thanks to shadowbrides for pointing this out, it's clearly Elf day! Why? Because in German (OR Dutch), the word for "11" is spelled and pronounced elf, and today is 11-11-11.
Do something elf-y today! (No pun intended, elfy). I did - I finally uploaded two pieces of CfL art (oh, that takes us back...) to my dA. (heartofoshun, I still owe you one, btw... otherwise, laurenia gets her chance if she's still interested!)

- - -

Saw the first episode of the American Borgia series yesterday. After watching the European Borgia series just a few weeks ago (well played, ZDF), this is the weirdest thing ever, what with everyone being the same person but played by different actors, and with the story told in a different way (or with a focus on completely different episodes). My brother said (when the European series was running) that he much preferred the American version. I don't think I do, in spite of Jeremy Irons. So far, the story feels terribly rushed. Lucrezia is badly over-acted in both versions (though the European was even worse). It's funny that the same period in history can look so completely different, clothing-wise. I'm tempted to research which version is truer to actual costume history; somehow the American version feels too modern, but who knows! I don't care enough about the political history to research which version is taking less liberties with that...
What absolutely, utterly made me laugh and point my finger in disdain at the American version, however, was the coronation of Alexander VI. WITH HÄNDEL'S "ZADOK THE PRIEST" PLAYING IN THE BACKGROUND. I am not kidding you. Zadok the Priest. That British coronation anthem. I may be wrong there, but I always thought that they wouldn't have 18th century music in 15th century Rome. But maybe that's just me. At any rate, that was the most ridiculous choice ever. There surely are hundreds of festive anachronistic anthems one could've chosen, instead of taking one that so many people will recognise (... right? right?). I mean... Zadok the Priest. Dude. Dude.

On the whole: Unwise of our tv channels to show two different versions based on the same historical events so shortly after one another. (They're two different channels.) Unwise of me to watch them like that, too, of course - but our recorder hard-disk is almost full, so now we have to watch and delete stuff as fast as we can or it'll stop recording! :P (You'd think a terabyte would last a while, and then suddenly it's all full. It's like having a huge barn - you'd think 200 m² will always give you loads of spare room, and four years of building later everything's full of junk, tools and materials...) [/aside]

What also made me laugh out loud, but for personal reasons, was Lucrezia's "seahorse" scene. Not because of her stupidity, but because of the seahorse pendant. See, a looong time ago in a RPG, our group had to steal a seahorse pendant from the Vatikan archives. IT WAS THAT SEAHORSE I'M SURE.

In garden news, yesterday I actually managed to do two hours of weeding while Felix babbled (later on, slept) warmly wrapped in his bouncing cradle. Maybe we'll manage to do that today, too, as the sun has just come out, which means it won't be quite so ghastly cold outside.
On the whole, this late fall is much sunnier than all summer was this year, but there is so much work to do in the garden that I probably won't manage to do it before the first snows come. (We've been told that about three weeks after New York gets the first snows, we can expect snow around here. No idea if that's true. If it is, that'd give us one more week...)

In Felix news, he's growing nicely and learning new things every day. His latest accomplishment is grabbing things and pushing them into his mouth. I'll make a doudou doll (security blanket doll, Schnuffelpuppe, whatever you want to call it) for him and hope that he'll like it. (Perhaps if I carry it around in my bra for a while...?) So far he seems more interested in things that the grown-ups use (cleaning rags, plates, newspapers) than in toys actually designed for his use. Oh well. He also feels comfortable sitting on my lap while turned away from me (as opposed to sitting on my lap facing me) so he can watch the cats, his daddy, the fireplace or whatever else is going on - or, at table, so he can try to grab a plate and push it around. When he is lying on his belly, he'll try to move forward but doesn't yet manage it --- his movements look like he's trying breaststroke swimming, which, alas, doesn't work on a blanket! (Perhaps I should take baby-"swimming" classes with him?) Sometimes he's lucky and manages to push off something firm (a wall; my legs) so he actually moves forward. Most of the time, he just turns in circles. A few times he rolled over onto his back, but so far it seems to be an accidental side-effect of trying to move forward rather than a succesful attempt to roll over.
At nights, alas, he still wakes and cries frequently. By now I'm happy if he only cries for food every three hours.
The last weekend we visited relatives in Jena. My aunt said (to Jörg, not me) that it was no wonder Felix cried so much if we always reacted at once - "he's got you trained!". At the same time she agrees that babies of Felix' age aren't mentally capable of associating a certain behaviour or action with something else, so he can neither be trained (yet) not train us (yet). Why she does not notice the inconsistency, I do not know.
But the trip was fun. A little picspam may follow.

Next week he'll get his first vaccination shots. It's funny - I'm not afraid of needles myself, but feel uncomfortable about Felix getting his shots. Mostly because he doesn't understand the need and purpose of them yet, though. If I could explain it to him, everything would be fine. (I'll explain it anyway, though - I just know he won't understand it! :P)

NaNo-wise, I'm sooo behind. I can't even be bothered to care, which is quite relaxing. When I have time to write, I write. Unless I don't feel like it, in which case I'll read or sew. If I have a chance to do the laundry or the dishes or the garden or some cleaning, I'll do that. If I don't manage to write 50.000 words in a month, oh well. Motherhood is such a re-arranger of priorities...