Got back to the States less than 36 hours ago, and I've already attended two meetings and spent two hours barreling through my mail (which included some truly lovely cards and birthday gifts -- *loves on you lot, individual thank-you notes coming*). And I've still got a manuscript to lasso under control before the next wave of work hits -- one of these years I will get a handle on getting my obligations sufficiently out of the way
before I get on the plane - but considering that said obligations help pay for cute shoes and French manga/bandes dessinees, I can't resent them too much.
I also have a dozen postcards from Aix/Paris I didn't quite manage to mail, what with the post office (or at least the branch I stopped at) being closed for Whitmonday (but the people-watching sure was fun -- so many people out enjoying the sun). Some of my people-watching on Monday also took place just outside of Roland Garros, where (against my usual instincts) I waited in line for an hour for an evening pass -- to no avail. There were at least sixty people ahead of me and a hundred behind me, and I'm guessing maybe twenty of them got in before the officials came out and said the rest of us were out of luck.
I could be grumpier about it, but I'd had fun discreetly ogling some of the other, ah,
extremely fit would-be spectators, and the two women in front of me (one of them a
very chic and attractive older woman) cheerfully chatted with me about the Southern and Californian cities they'd visited once they realized I could understand both French and English, and there were kids leaving the stadium with giant tennis balls, and I consoled myself on the walk back to the Porte d'Auteuil Metro station by stopping at a garden that featured tons of roses in bloom, assorted plaques engraved with poetry, kids playing badminton and soccer, and dozens of other Parisians napping, necking, reading, and just generally lolling about in the sunshine. Photos later (I don't dare upload or caption them now, because I won't be able to force myself back to work if I start).
I have a longer rant brewing about tennis coverage (and about sports/competition in general) that I will probably redirect into poems or flashfic instead, and maybe my crankiness has to do with the ongoing sleep deficit, but honestly, some of the recent stuff on Federer vs. Nadal, Federer's status in history, etc. has been the stupidest, perspective-out-of-whack misuse of pixels I've seen lately. And the much-linked
Slate essay on insane tennis parents -- was it intended as satire? It didn't give off that vibe to me, and thus it makes me want to throw up, or else write twenty drabbles in honor of
Roger Federer, who from what I can tell adores his parents (who have lives outside of tennis) and,
when asked by a fan as to his "greatest quality," answered "I'm a very happy person."
(Considering how dour and dark I often get -- and how much I generally despise people who insist that happiness is the be-all and end-all of existence -- yes, that
Slate article seriously made me angry.)
In a tennis-HP intersection, there's
an essay at
bleacher report titled "Roger Federer-Gael Monfils: Taking a Leaf from 'Harry Potter.'" It's awfully superficial and I don't agree with it at all, but it was at least an amuse-bouche for thought -- if I were to sort Fed into a house, it would be Ravenclaw or Hufflepuff. But that's me and my anti-all-heroes-are-Gryffindor bias for you. Your thoughts (on him or any others)?
In tennis fandom RPS,
Roger Rafa Dubai Mallorca actually showed up in the Yuletide story-of-the-day listings last week or the week before, so I couldn't resist rereading it, and it's so lovely. And Louise Lux's
Breathe Out (Roger/Rafa, NC-17, 10K) is an amazing story as well -- deft, detailed, and nuanced (those of you who like stories that manage to combine lyricism, romance,
and a measure of infidelity-angst, I fancy you might enjoy this).
[P.S. To the Youka Nitta/FAKE peeps -- I'm not deserting you for tennis, honest! I foresee several long weekends later this summer catching up on your comments, fics, and RPs... *glares at heap of real-life tapping its boots* *clings*]
restless![[info - personal]](http://s.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
distressed
