It is slightly worrying that if I don’t have some tea after dinner, my eyes play hide-n-seek with each other. I am, however, quite aware that it is probably my mind hoodwinking the rest of me into believing that I deserve a nice cold pearl tea or an ice cream every evening. Yesterday ended at 10pm, and I dreamed of having to pack, within an absurdly short 30 minutes, for a trip. To where, I don’t remember, but the ship (ship!) was leaving in half an hour and that was all the time I had to pack, which included having to decide what DVDs and CDs to bring. It was a rather stressful dream, so today when I woke, I decided that I should start planning for the Siem Reap trip next weekend. I should start planning an itinerary right about now, but somehow writing about it has absolved my worries a little and I had some tea earlier, so I should still be awake for a few more hours.

Comments on an earlier entry led to a Favourite Haruki Murakami Books list. I am yet to be done with all of his books, and I am dreading that rather inevitable day. It is funny that barely a month ago, all I had read from him was The Elephant Vanishes and Underground and now, just a little over a month since then, I am rather well-versed in his lands of all-knowing sheep, wind-up birds, wells (covered and uncovered ones), alternate universes, enigmatic girls with great ears, and late-night whiskey drinks. Frankly, I wouldn’t mind packing for a trip to those worlds.

Sad as some of his stories may be, I think I would like a short stint in the following places:
- Midori’s bookstore/house in Norwegian Wood
- the Dolphin Hotel and the Sheep Man’s house in A Wild Sheep Chase
- the love hotel in After Dark

Yours?

So leave her.
Let her be their spoils, go wrap
Your head in the snowy rivers
Of the Brooks Range. Cover
Your eyes with the writhing airs
Off the Nullarbor Plains. Let them
Jerk their tail-stumps, bristle and vomit
Over the symposia.
Think her better
Spread with holy care on a high grid
For vultures
To take back into the sun. Imagine
These bone-crushing mouths the mouths
That labour for the beetle who will role her back into
the sun.

The dogs are eating your mother, by Ted Hughes. Looked that poem up after reading an article on Nicholas Hughes in NYT earlier this week. “Bloody sad,” a friend had said, and bloody sad it is. Not exactly sure why I am posting this here (and seemingly out of nowhere); I don’t read a lot of poetry but I, like all, know what I like. And this is just heartbreaking, and I can’t quite get it out of my head.