Boringly and frustratingly, Patrick and I have both felt worse over the past few days than we had at the end of the week. Bleaghh. I am so tired of being sick. I ran out of antibiotics last night, feeling about the same as I had when I started them, and I've got another doctor's appointment tomorrow. So it goes... With luck, Patrick's blood tests and X-rays should come up with some info for us in the next week or so. In the meantime, I'm just hoping we can both summon up the energy for a really good Worldcon. (And a good one-year anniversary! Our first wedding anniversary comes on August 7, yay us! We'll be back at the con for the Hugos that night, so that we can support Ben, Ellen and others, but we're definitely doing something celebratory in downtown Glasgow first.)

In the meantime, I've been on a Georgette Heyer kick, which has been good for lots of giggling, inspiration for my fun-novel, and general consolation (especially The Grand Sophy, The Reluctant Widow, and The Talisman Ring). I'm also re-reading Virginia Euwer Wolff's YA novel The Mozart Season, which is one of my favorite books in the world. I read it over and over again as a kid, identifying hugely with the heroine, and now I read it, love it in a different way, and feel nostalgic for the days when music really was my central focus (apart from writing). I'd been neglecting the recorder over the last few weeks because I was paranoid about playing it while ill (I know how to disinfect a metal french horn mouthpiece but not a wooden recorder mouthpiece, and I don't want to re-infect myself with this plague once I finally lose it), but I picked it back up today, inspired by The Mozart Season. It's amazing how much difference it makes to my mood to be playing music again--it's just incredibly soothing, nowadays. (As opposed to tense and full of stress, fear of humiliation/failure, and seething ambition, as it used to be during my conservatory days. I sound worse nowadays when I play, but I feel a whole lot better.)

And I'm on page 43 of my Fun Novel (currently-known-as- Congress of Shadows), hurrah. The rapscalliony hero has just stepped into a Kaffeehaus, and I'm feeling intense Vienna-nostalgia. Must get back there! Must! Soon!

Now I'm off to go lie back down, finish The Mozart Season and start Georgette Heyer's False Colours. A nice program for a Sunday afternoon.