Le chateau de vent

Just take some time to watch this, it's amazing ... A very good interview "from way back" with Jeanette Winterson "Face to face with Jeremy Isaacs" BBC, 1994, now available on Youtube. In pieces of course, due to Youtube's bloody 10 minutes policy. Part 1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zgSsDdd2gIg Part 2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WNVVTzap5Ko Part 3: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NKMkukxUWCg Part 4: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sJVYIfHMBQM Part 5: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z3B647tMhKI

She lights candles and whispers softly into the fire’s open ear. ‘Work for me,’ she tells it, seducing it to life with her marvellous tongue. She is a deputy of fire, a keeper of the flame. I want her to burn me. I want her to hurt me and for me to do the same to her. An excerpt from the beautiful story " Gun-metal day " by LOUISE McCLEMMAN. Read on MSLexia .

When I came to wake you up with coffee this morning you were still sleeping. While you turned around and slowly opened your eyes you sighed and told me what you had been dreaming. In your dream you were making a nipple out of clay. Your hands circling endlessly. You stayed in bed with your eyes closed for another half hour.

Break up sex is one of the hardest ways to say goodbye. You hurt most in the softness of the arms of the one who just dumped you. But when she started the obligatory “We can’t continue like this” - routine, the only thing I thought was “Please let her get into bed with me just one more time.” She did bring me home after she had told me it was over. Guilt. I felt so miserable she had no choice. So she stayed. Not on the couch, but in my bed. “We can sleep together, but I don’t want to make love. That wouldn’t be fair to you.” She said. That made me feel even more miserable. I put out the light and turned to my side, away from the body that rejected me. Hurt. All night when I had tried to kiss her deeper and with tongue she had avoided me. But now in the bed, we were on dangerous grounds. The mind can be strong but the flesh is weak. Familiar flesh is even weaker. I felt I was caught in a pantomime of breaking up, not able to change anything about what was going to happen, but I knew s...

We’re sitting at the table, finishing dinner and we talk about insurance. I think that the insurance you have might be inadequate. “I’m hardly ever ill.” You say.”It’s not worth paying an extra fee for.” You pause. “Don’t worry.” You add. “I’ll get extra insurance before I’m fifty.” Fifty. I look at you and a gap in time opens. “I’ve got time.” You say. ”Still more than 10 years to go.” 10 years. I’m not sitting at the table in our house, I have been sucked away in a black hole of fear. “What’s ten years.” I think. “And then another ten. Sixty. And another ten.” I wish I could draw you into this black hole with me, this hiding place against time.

Dykes and the City asks me about songs that make me happy. The song that definitely makes me happy these days is Feist's Inside and out . Other feel good tunes: - The Gossip - Standing in the way of control - Katerine - Louxor j'adore - Joan As Policewoman - I defy (with Anthony) Funny: - Lezzies on X - 30 large (Their excellent heavy metal version of The L-word's theme song.) - Gretchen Phillips - The reluctant butch I'm tagging Ysengrin and Sortof . >> I forgot Heidi Mortenson .

Not fiction, but sounds like poetry: "Vagus" means wanderer -- the nerve wanders through the body. Previously, it wasn't thought that it goes as far as the pelvic region. But our research and that of other laboratories is showing that it does in fact go to the cervix and uterus and probably the vagina. It carries the impulses from those regions, travels up through the abdomen, goes through the diaphragm, through the thorax (chest cavity), up the neck outside the spinal cord, and into the brain. An excerpt of an article in Wired .

I've been looking at your X-rays. They were in the old trunk upstairs. I was looking for wrapping paper, but before I knew it I had opened the large brown envelope that had the name of a hospital printed in one corner and your name in capitals. I held them up to the light: 3 parts of your spinal column, one thigh and your left wrist. I looked at them for a long time, but I couldn't find anything broken.

"Are you happy?" my grandmother asks me casually, brushing past on her way to the toilet. Her heels scrape over the floor tiles when she stops and turns around. Her dark eyes lock on mine. The question is crucial. I know it is. My grandmother never asks anything. Nothing personal. She has an identical twin sister. But though they look so much alike, they compare like darkness and light. My grandmother hates flying. She needs to be firmly connected with the earth. She never tires of walking. She walks miles without taking a rest. I can't hardly follow her on my bike. One day she was violently stumping down the stairs when she suddenly rested. Sweat was pearling on her forehead. "What's the matter?" I asked. "I'm not ill." She answered, "I have never ever been ill in my life and I intend to keep it that way." She keeps sugar, flour and canned meat stashed in the cellar. Just in case. A war. It could start all over again.

"Edith," he says. "I have daydreams about losing my mind. I am afraid that one day I'll wake up, like in that movie Lost Highway, and discover that I have murdered my family. I drive home from work at night to the sound of the screen wipers. I can't stand listening to the radio. And every night I fear I will crash into a tree or the vehicle in front of me. My wife is upset. She buys pickles every time she goes to the supermarket. She walks around there for hours and comes home with big bloody steaks. She eats them rare. When I open the fridge, the smell of blood spreads through the house. The pets get restless and the baby cries. I wink all day, a nervous affection of the eyes. I see more darkness than I see light. I look at people only asking myself one question: will you have regrets when you die?"

Mercury in retrograde from March 2nd to 25th. "Mercury rules over the mind's processes, studying, communication, businesses, travels and the like. When Mercury reverses its direction, all these areas are affected as well... Businesses, travels and communications tend to experience delays and different problems. Computers and other processes that work with information may experience crashes, unexpected failures. Don't enroll to courses, don't buy expensive Mercurian items (books, cars, mobile phones etc.), don't sign important contracts and do not marry." And remember: Mercury runs your television set (that's what I read on the internet) source: Astrology Weekly Here , here and here Mercury is blamed for all kinds of things. And I'm going to blame Mercury some more.

Life passes by and we forget the details. I remember the bike ride home. The house you stayed in. A beautiful, old house with a big bath where we saw eachother's bodies for the first time in broad daylight. Days we slept. You worked late. And then you left for the mountains. Mountains permanently covered in clouds. And when you phoned me I desperately tried not to hear you.

I wondered if she had already decided that she was going to leave last time we saw them together. She looked radiant. She was wearing blood red pants and her face shone. Eyes-nipples-cunt. That’s all you feel when you’re in love. She had lost weight. A lot. He was shaking in the freezing cold outside and shivering all through dinner. Said that his toes were ice cubes. He couldn’t get them to warm up. It hurt. Did he know she was laughing, glowing, sweating, open, free for another woman? It’s shocking to learn how easy it is. How you only need one moment to say: "I’m in love with someone else. Now get out of my life. Clear space. I’m transforming myself. Our room. I’m having her on the bed. And when she fucks me it tears me up deep down inside where I haven’t felt anything for such a long time. She’s what I need. She makes me complete. Compared to her full colour love, you and me, we’re history. Old newspapers on a pile. I’m taking the kids. Goodbye." I’m appalled. How can th...

The eight worldly dharmas are: Wanting to be praised. Not wanting to be criticized. (praise and blame) Wanting to gain. Not wanting to lose. (loss and gain) Wanting to be happy. Not wanting to be unhappy. (pleasure and pain) Wanting to be famous, Not wanting to be infamous, or ignored. (fame and notoriety)

Autumn makes me tired and moody. I lie in the bath for hours and stare at my pubic hair, simulating an alligator farm in the New Orleans marshes before and after Katrina (seen from the air, I love miniature. Mm, I have to check the map of the US ...). I am confused and distracted. Yesterday I flushed half a cup of cold coffee in the toilet and peed in the sink. My sense of humour tumbles into a bottomless pit, while leaves discolour and waltz with the wind…. Which reminds me of Patrick Swayze. I don’t know why. But the word s-w-ai-z-ee embodies all that autumn is today. It’s like the word” sole” when I stand on the beach in Northern France, staring at the white cliffs of Dover in the distance. I can only think of that word. Sole, sole, sole. With every step in the sand I have to repeat it. And nearby seagulls pick it up. Sole, sole, sole, screaming it into the air. When I was little, I used to wonder about the language of birds. But then I discovered that the mistake we make is to is...

datelinehollywood.com featured an article last week saying: ROBERTSON BLAMES HURRICANE ON CHOICE OF ELLEN DEGENERES TO HOST EMMYS Hollywood – Pat Robertson on Sunday said that Hurricane Katrina was God’s way of expressing its anger at the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences for its selection of Ellen Degeneres to host this year’s Emmy Awards. “By choosing an avowed lesbian for this national event, these Hollywood elites have clearly invited God’s wrath,” Robertson said on “The 700 Club” on Sunday. “Is it any surprise that the Almighty chose to strike at Miss Degeneres’ hometown?” It was a hoax, evangelist Robertson ( yes the one that called for the assasination of President Chavez) never said this in his Sunday television program. But Pat Robertson reacted to the satirical article in a very strange way. He wrote a letter to the editors of datelinehollywood.com : In the letter he states that New Orleans was destroyed because it's the "epicenter of sinful jazz music"....

I bought Camille Paglia’s essay collection “ Vamps and tramps ” in 1994 and after reading it again and again for about a year, it remained on the shelf for more than a decade. Ten years mean a lot of changes. But today I find myself reading “ Vamps and tramps ” again. I forgot how much I liked it. Paglia’s writing style is aggressive and direct. She drags you along, then surprises you with her bluntness. The essay “No law in the arena” is Paglia’s “ pagan theory of sexuality ” and largely explains her views on homosexuality, lesbianism, gay activism and theory. In 1994 I had sex with men, not with women. I could understand Paglia’s abhorrence of the closed lesbian community of the ‘90s. I was labelled “straight” by lesbians. Not even the fact that I am a woman granted me any sympathy. Maybe I was just another straight, dick-loving traitor to them. Ten years later, I have seen a fair deal of the lesbian community. I’ve discovered – for example- that lesbian bars are the same all over th...

I don't give in to her pleas. I don't even touch her. I just pull off the few clothes she is still wearing and turn up the heating. Then I sit down and drink whisky. Quietly. That gets her angry. Rage is building up inside her. Her arms are becoming heavy and she' s running out of patience. But she knows we haven't finished yet. For the first time I can see insecurity in her eyes. She has the most beautiful hips: round and brown and soft. When she moves, I can see the muscles in her upper arms move under her skin. I observe her and enjoy. She's standing upright, kicking and cursing. She's too proud and stubborn to admit that she has lost the game. I approach her and push her against the wall with my body. Brutally. She struggles and pretends to be disgusted. Our breasts touch and I shiver. She's breathing heavily into my neck, but she doesn't bite. I massage her nipples and cup her breasts in my hands. I know this turns her on. She’s getting wet now and ...

She pushes her fingers in between my legs and I can feel water entering my cunt, its heat slowly spreading itself. Each time her fingers enter me, she pushes my head deeper under water. I want to resist, but I know that the more I struggle, the longer this will take. She wants to be the boss. I will make her think she has broken me. She's fucking me rhythmically. Slow and deep. I try to concentrate on her fingers and the heavy pulsating beat of blood in my cunt. I try to relax and move with her. She reacts and pushes her hipbone against my lower back. The water level is rising and she keeps pushing me under water for longer and longer periods. The more I gasp for breath, the more she seems to enjoy it. Her breasts sway with every move. She laughs at me and tries to push 3 fingers into me. Too short, bad angle. Does she think I can come like that? She doesn't even give me a fair chance. I become frustrated and angry again. Suddenly I remember how she snapped at me in the bar. Bi...

Early sunlight is seeping in through the kitchen window. She breathes heavily into my ear. I can't move. She has me in a tight clamp. Her knees are pressing into my thighs. She tightens her grip and contorts my wrist until I yell out with pain. "I hate you." I growl. She bangs her knee into my side and I fall onto the floor, panting for breath. Then she throws herself on top of me and pushes her wet hair into my face. I can't breathe. Whisky stings my eyes and throat. I grab hold of her thighs and she starts to move. She stumbles to the bathroom, pulling me along with her. She opens the taps and tries to tear off her wet clothes. Meanwhile she pulls me by the hair and pushes me into the bathtub. I try to bite and scratch, but she's strong enough to push me under the tab. Ice cold water pounds onto my skull. "You miserable bitch...", she breathes into my ear. "I should have known. Why the hell did I come with you..." "This is why." I a...

The city has become a maze of unhappiness and loss. I'm tired of going out. I'm tired of the dark sleazy discotheques, the hard stares of strange women, the smell of old beer and stale cigarettes in my clothes. I hate the lonely weekends. It's late and I'm sitting at the counter in a lesbian bar, observing 2 angry butches pushing each other around. They're ready to start a fight any minute now. I'm thinking about going home. As usual, just as I reach for my coat, I notice her walking in. She is out hunting. She's tall and strong and moving gracefully. Her eyes lock onto mine and I try not to reveal the mixed up feeling of desire and fear inside me. She lures me out of the bar, into the black night. I can't help following her. We walk through the small streets in silence. We enter late night clubs, spy around and leave out of restlessness. Bar after bar. I know she hates to be alone. She’s always looking for company. I'm almost sure she will come home...

"Hussain Osman, one of the men alleged to have participated in London's failed bombings on July 21, recently told Italian investigators that they prepared for the attacks by watching "films on the war in Iraq," La Republica reported. "Especially those where women and children were being killed and exterminated by British and American soldiers...of widows, mothers and daughters that cry." >> Read Terror's Greatest Recruitment Tool by Naomi Klein "94,000 people -- over half of them African American --were on a "scrub list" in Florida, resulting in their being blocked from voting in the 2000 election." >> Read The Nazification of America

The end of the world. They have sheep there.