To provide ambience, my guide, The Artists Way, tells me; I should light a candle or somehow infuse a favourite perfume into my working space. I scrabbled about this morning, wondering how I could fulfill this and found a Christmas present candle entitled 'Seychelles'. Wrong group of islands and entirely the wrong ocean, but the candle-maker's approximation of a tropical island is providing a wonderful counter-active smell to that of wet dog which usually pervades the house.
It is, however, at odds with the weather outside and my constant thought of which pudding I could make next! With my added layers, hot drinks, heated cushion and smell of the islands I have my story laid out on the floor around me; post-it notes flagging scenarios and dates, note-books and endless arrows and exlamation marks to remind myself of the next thing to research and/or to think about with regard to character development and conflict resolution, and I'm trying really hard to immerse myself in the tropical heat of the novel.
The window-cleaners arrived, dressed in michelin layers and, a new development, fluorescent jackets; dogs barking and the bash of brush on glass did nothing for my concentration. The post-man managed to enter and exit the garden without his usual welcoming committee, but not without the alarm being sounded that he was about. I have had three sales calls in one hour. Ordinarily, I wouldn't bother traipsing across the room to pick the 'phone up if I'm working, but I'm expecting a call from the damp-man, without whose words of wisdom the study may never be operable. And at the back of my mind is a constant Yo-sushi! style conveyor belt of apple crumble, rice pudding, bread and butter pudding, bakewell tart, spotted dick, sticky toffee pudding, lemon delicious; all steaming and with pints of custard and cream; kind of hard to feel the ice-cream necessitating heat that my characters are immersed in!
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