Panormitis Week
[Today’s photos are from this time last year; it looked remarkably similar this weekend.]
This week sees the festival of Panormitis, the celebration of the archangel Michaelis (of Panormitis), the island’s saint. There will be special boat schedules laid on to bring pilgrims and visitors from Rhodes and Kos, the buses will be going back and forth across the island, and the taxis, some people will walk there, and others will come to stay for the week or a few days, some staying at the monastery cells. I expect they have been booked up for a long time. There will be a market, our school has its souvlaki stall already set up, and there will be others. Some local businesses will set up stalls too, while others will consist of off-islanders and their… wares, or bewares perhaps.
Apart from a few basket weavers, a candle seller and a smattering of other arts and crafts, the market tends to be plastic toys, underwear, household goods and things you never realised you needed until you realised you didn’t have one; multi-purpose tools, plastic implements for the kitchen and novelty desktop knickknacks. The atmosphere of the market is usually more entertaining than the things for sale, and I don’t mean the local business like Michaelis’ pet supplies, or the school’s and others souvlakis and fast food stands, of course.
I’m not sure what our plans are this year as the festival is on a working day. I think we’ll see how the mood takes. A couple of years ago we walked there, taking the not so short short-cuts (and still coming out ten paces behind a lady who was walking the road in front of us). One year we celebrated up at Kokimides, actually, two years, one of which was blowing a gale that nearly swept us off the road. In other years we have: travelled there in the back of a transit van, gone there in the back of a flatbed truck, and we’ve even stayed at Marathunda for the festival weekend, making a holiday of it.
If we don’t make it this year I’ll see if I can rob some photos from someone to share with you. I only say I might not because a lot is going on at my desk. In a nutshell: one book is 90% ready to release, just waiting on a cover. Another is at 70% of the editing stage (this is an old one, re-edited which is going to be re-released under a new cover), another is at the 80% draft one stage – that one’s just been pouring out for no apparent reason, and ‘The Saddling’ follow up, ‘The Witchling’ is ready to go into final draft stage next, when some of these other tasks are out of the way. I am also 80% towards the end of a screenplay, first draft. All that is one of the reasons I’ve not been keeping up my author’s blog (must get around to it one day), and a reason why I’ve been at home in the office a lot. At this time of year, I can.
Saturday was a perfect day for me. Up at six and to work: a few hours on the screenplay (too many hours in one sitting and the writing becomes unfocused), a couple of chapters edited for the rerelease, some discussion with cover designers about two covers currently on order, and a chapter or two of the other thing that’s currently snowballing towards its denouement. While I am doing time at the desk (nine hours), Neil is tidying the house, putting the laundry away, making mugs of tea, nipping to the shops, dusting things, and preparing lunch, which he later feeds me and washes up so I can get back to the writing. I heartily approve of this marriage lark. No, seriously, if you enjoy what I write (there must be one of you) then you’ve Neil to thank because he gives me the time to do it.
Anyway, enough ramble. Have a good week! Now it’s back to the edits and the plotting and the typing…
