October Blues, or Emily is Still Eating Tongue

Often when I post pictures, I will retouch the Fall and Winter pics to lighten them up and enhance the colors so they'll look better, but I thought today I would post something "au naturel" to give an idea just what Brittany looks like for most of October through March. In a word- bleak, oppressive, grey, overcast, brooding, etc (That's several words, but appropriate). The lighting makes everything go grey and faded, causing the colorful village square to look something like the abandoned film set from a black & white Frankenstein movie. I shot today's pic while out on a walk yesterday at about 2pm, the "bright" part of the day. Granted, it does get sunny sometimes, but a glance at the weather link to the right should tell you what we're experiencing the week that I write this. In the ancient days, it is recorded that the Bretons suffered from greater depression than the various other regions of France, and this was the land where the highest number of nightmares and "night terrors" (unable to sleep, waking in paralytic fear, etc) were experienced. While modern Brittany is all highways and bright cities and picturesque coastlines, the character of the land remains, and it seems to throw a thick grey cloak over all the modern flash and sparkle around this time each year.

One of the challenges we've had to grapple with since moving here was the reality of SAD, or Seasonal Affective Disorder - a type of depression that is caused by lack of sunlight. In the absence of normal daylight, the brain begins to produce more melatonin than normal, and melatonin is the hormone that drives us to sleep, go torporous, brood, crave starchy foods, and so on. It feels a bit like one is at the end of a very long day... but the feeling starts in the morning and lasts all day long! Our first winter here was a real nightmare because we were both not only suffering from SAD, but also from intense homesickness and vicious money pressure from all sides to get the business re-started FAST and generating income. Fortunately, a good friend with a similar problem suggested we look into SAD and study its effects, and that led us to eventually get ourselves a light box. This is nothing more than a tremendously bright portable lamp that produces illumination nearly as intense as the sun on a clear day - when we turn the thing on in our workshop, it looks as though the afternoon sun is shining in through the windows. Daily exposure to powerful light sources like this helps the brain to properly balance its melatonin production in the dark seasons, and I can attest that the difference is amazing for me personally - I sit and work by the light each day and my energy levels stay quite high, nothing like the sort of slothful brain-deadening that the dark months induced in us before. It's excellent on two levels, as the heightened spirits help one appreciate and enjoy the heavy days rather than being dragged down by them.... Now, I can quite look forward to stalking the cliffs with a pipe clenched in my teeth and a gleeful scowl.

On another topic, just for the record, Emily ate ALL of the tongue that I mistakenly bought. She reports that it never got any less disturbing in texture...
I must admit, after seeing her fiscal determination to eat even the most frightening of foods once money had been spent on it, I am now tempted to start bringing home other bizarre dishes just for the entertainment value :)

Oh, and I also heard from a friend that my class reunion was last weekend in North Carolina. I was invited, but wasn't too inclined to spend $1000+ for airplane tickets and ten hours on a plane just to see a bunch of folks I haven't talked to in twenty years. Plus, I must admit to some skepticism - while it would be fun to see a few folks and hear their stories, I have this mental image that reunions are mainly places where people gather to see who can show off the most, a sort of convention filled with used-car salesmen in rented tuxedoes brandishing gilded business cards. In any event, my friend (she knows who she is!) emailed me some photos of old friends today, and that was a lot of fun to see. Some people transform utterly (I am probably one of these), others seem to look exactly the same with extra crow's feet.

Today's Halloween movie suggestion is "Legend of Hell House", an excellent scare flick from 1973 starring "Peter Vincent, Vampire Slayer" Roddy McDowell.
(I must digress here for a second to mention that 1985's "Fright Night", also with Roddy, was IMO one of the best horror flicks of the 80's, and still holds up in all its entertainingly wicked silliness today)
"Hell House" was adapted from a story by the legendary Richard Matheson, and along with "The Haunting" was one of the very best haunted house films ever made. Next time you're in the video store, take a visit to "the Mount Everest of haunted houses" and you won't be disappointed.