Let it Snow!

I am having a beautiful Monday. That is extremely rare because Mondays are usually annoying, having to come to work after weekends, getting up early in cold and usually grey weather. But today is special because I woke up to a snowy landscape.

Just before I went to bed yesterday, the snow was already settled and thick, fat snowflakes were still falling, so this morning, I walked out in the bright, white snow - making my own trail at least for a little while on the residential streets where the snow was still undisturbed.

Bristol isn't exactly known for getting snow in the winter, but last year we had some snow that settled for about 3 days, and this year is looking promising. So hurray for that :-)

Of course England is not equipped to handle snow so traffic becomes a nightmare, buses stop running, trains don't work ---but what the hell....it's gorgeous.

10 Days to Go

Ten more days and then I will be in Arkansas. Granted, at first, I wasn’t too excited about it, because in USA, I prefer East Coast. Having lived in America, it’s also not on the top of my places to visit list. But since my parents have moved to Arkansas, I had to go.

However, a new place is a new place, and as the time for departure gets closer, I find myself getting excited about it anyway. I have looked up things I can do in the area. With family visit, I don’t know how much of sightseeing I will actually accomplish, but it’s always good to have a list handy, just in case there is an opportunity.

But most importantly, at least I should be able to snow during Christmas period, since here in Bristol that’s a rarity.

So forget about Christmas Day…it’s the 27th that I am looking forward to.

Off preparing for NaNo

Sorry, haven't blogged regularly lately. But currently, I am focusing on outlining my book for NaNo challenge that begins in November. For those of you who may not know, it's National November Novel Writing Month. Thousands of crazy people, like me, sign up to write 50000 words from November 1 to November 30.

The rules are simple
You have to start a new project. You can't work on a half completed book, because the idea is to let your creativity flow, and not get bogged down by editing.

You can outline, but not writing anything before November. And that's it.

I am hoping to complete 80000 which would be a full length of a novel, so let's see how it goes.
So blogging might be bit slow until end of November.

One of my favourite places in Bristol

(c)photo by D.G.

This is the beautiful central library. In Bristol almost every area has a local library, and even though these do provide good selection of books to borrow, they are not very good for sitting around. They are quite small and feel like one open room. I prefer libraries to be big, with lots of little rows to roam through, and tons of books all around me. That's what the central library is good for. And it's in one of the old buildings, so the architecture is gorgeous.

Oh God the Horse Cop is Coming...

(c) Photo by D.G.

A cop on the horse in Bristol city centre. Is there a purpose to it? If someone does commit a crime, what are they going to do? A horse chase in middle of busy traffic? I see hollywood cameras rolling! Still, adds a bit of character I suppose to the city look.

A New Perspective for Familiar Places

Do you know people who have been to far flung countries in the world, but hardly visited different parts of their own cities? People who could tell you exotic details and histories of other culture, but might not know if anything significant happened where they live?
I am one of those people. It’s only since the last few years that I’ve realised it.

When you live somewhere, you think you’ve got plenty of time to go around and see things. There is no urgency to do something right now, because there is always tomorrow. It’s home. You will be there forever. No need to hurry. While for a lot of people that is true, in my case it’s not. Home is not a fixed place, or even a fixed country. So far I have lived in 3 countries, and no doubt there will be more in the future. So getting complacent about it means that when I do move away, I probably wouldn’t know much about where I live now.

From a superficial point of view, I am not really a big fan of Bristol. It’s not big enough or cityish enough to suit my definition of a city (think London, NYC, Berlin), public transportation is dreadful to say the least, and historical background doesn’t include the type and events of history that I am interested in. So I haven’t bothered exploring much.

But lately it has occurred to me that there maybe plenty I would like if only I see it as a traveller, and not as a resident. There maybe unexplored gems in the city somewhere, or fascinating stories that I have missed out on, by going only to my regular haunts and routes and nowhere else.

So a new goal then for the next year is to Explore Bristol. I don’t intend to get obsessive about it, but every once in a while, I will make the effort to go out and visit new places that I haven’t been to, and see how that effects my perspective of Bristol.

Autumn Has Arrived in Bristol

(c) Photo by D.G.

Autumn has arrived at least in some parts of Bristol. I am no gardener, but it must be some parts only because a lot of the streets I pass by, shows no sign of these wonderful colours. I went to the South-East last week, and strangely enough, the trees were much more colourful over there. But this gorgeous autumn vision picture was taken just outside my regular bus-stop, coming back from work.