The Cooler King

The King, The Castle Builder and the Magician (cont.)

The Magician is at a loss and feeling buffeted by winds sent to test his patience and his resilience. The magician can’t wait for the Castle Builder to send a new agreement, as there are many bills to pay and things to buy at this time of year. In fact the magician is at the point where he wonders if the magic will ever happen now, as the winter approaches with the first phase of magic scheduled for installation in the New Year. The magician knows the Castle Builder’s men have prepared the site for the magic to take place. This was undertaken many moons past and place lays empty. The magician wonders whether other buildings planned have also stopped…..contrary to the words of the Castle Builder who insists the agreement is only around the corner and a mere formality…. the magician sighs…..Yeh…whatever….but deep deep down the magician still believes that one day he will be asked when his back is turned to jump into action as time is of the essence!.

So what is a magician to do? Supply the magic he has agreed with two other existing patrons whose names are ‘The Keepers of History’ and ‘The Managers of the Land and Minder of the Animals’.

Magic for both these patrons has halted due to site conditions or availability of materials. All of which will be resolved and unfold in the fullness of time, but the magician can’t be paid for work he has not done yet. Only yesterday, correspondence from HM Customs asking (rightly so) for monies due in six weeks hence.

So what is a magician to do? Snookered on all sides, impasse, surrounded by Cul de Sacs? Agree to supply even more magic…… Indeed; This is how the magician has busied himself and it is ideas for magic that the magician grows weary from supplying. The magician has spent much of his time advocating that magic is the answer, and that this particular kind, or that specific sort of magic will be perfect. He has drawn pictures about magic, written about it, travelled and spoke about it. Presented ideas for it and met other magicians to create more than one type of magic. Several new patrons are interested and need details of what the magic will be made, and what benefits it will have, and how much does it cost, and when will it be delivered?

But the magician is weary at the moment as grows cross with frustration. In fact he even wonders what the Fkuncig Hlel good magic is anyway…. and why are magicians asked to repair a broken society when they wern’t even the ones who broke it!

Now listen though, the magician has had a wonderful year really, and seen many things. He has put together a slide show of things he has worked on, things he has done and places he has been in 2012.

My Year in Pictures. http://www.flickr.com//photos/rob-turner/sets/72157632183946008/show/

And here is a page link to the magicians website which shows a different spin on the story he just told you. http://rob-turner.blogspot.co.uk/p/news.html

And he wishes fellow magicians and bloggers a very Merry Xmas. The xmas card shows the Robin who lives in the bushes outside the Magician’s study window.

Fiddling While Rome Burns

Why oh Why does this happen, I think the word is procrastination. Suddenly other irrelevant things seem really interesting and I start messing about with random stuff and what really needs doing seems very unattractive!

I been drawing little stars and shuffling photos about, why? http://www.flickr.com//photos/rob-turner/sets/72157631984819828/show/

Tommorow I will have to start applying myself and prepare ‘The Cooler’ for a period of intense work. I will need to re-organise the layout in there. I need more table top workspace, I did make a 12 foot x 4 foot table once, and I need to get that back up and running.

I think I will have to change the system so I don’t spend time on my PC in what I call ‘the study’. I will have to base myself in the cooler with my phone and not keep walking in to get a biscuit, bacon sarnie, cup of tea, check emails, look at website stats, twitter, blogs etc. Keep the distractions of the internet out of the day. Base myself in the cooler and get on with it.

I have the time bomb which has been ticking for something like two years and I expect it to go off soon, but still no contract at the moment. But I do have sculptures and all sorts things to make for a sculpture trail in Winchester which includes some stained glass (its been so long since I made any windows I can hardly remember how to make them. Two boxes of glass, lead and tools, materials arrived today. It looks like mosaics for Caerphilly, and designs for Tonbridge. I have a booklet to produce, workshops to organize and even finished artwork to install. Its bonkers and I’ve been drawing little stars and shuffling photos. Accounts….a years worth to do. I have a second time bomb in Mid Wales, but I dont think that’s going to go off till next spring. Now is when I have regrets that I was not brave enough to train an apprentice or someone to help me. Scared to invest in someone who I thought would probably leave and I would never gain from my investment. Just a pipe dream, and never acted upon. I regret that now and face a fair spell of solitary in the cooler, though I will be working with a good friend in Hampshire.

So I have been down the builder’s merchant already and got some treated 3×2 for the ‘Road of Memories’. Regime change….and a making era starts in earnest today and I notice Rome may still burn as I am writing not making…….but I am publicly telling myself to get extract the digit.

The King: The Castle Builder and The Magician (cont).

The castle builder has contacted the magician today to say that the papers will be likely to be re-written this week. The magician had asked for the wording of the contract to be changed, so that any unexpected behavior by the magic due to unforeseen irregularities in the construction work done by the castle builders appointed men will not be the responsibility of the magician. And the magician has done as he was asked by the castle builder, and found someone prepared to pay the castle builder large amounts of money should the magic go wrong and behave strangely in the future, or the magic supplied by the magician turns out to be pinched or stolen from another magician without them knowing about it. The magician has agreed to pay one hundred and eighty four gold coins per year to the provider of this service in case his magic turns out to be stolen or behave in strange unexpected ways. This is the first time the magician has been unable to avoid this extra cost as previous patrons have withdrawn their requests, but the castle builder has insisted.

So things are close to actually exchanging magic for money about two years after the magician was asked to supply the magic in the first place. The magician is mentally preparing himself now to actually make this magic. This will require many months of careful work and will need a considerable amount of commitment and emotional investment to complete and install. These large commitments (under time deadlines) are the ones that the magician wonders if he still has the stamina to deliver.

The magician looked at the designs he made all that time ago and wondered if he would still be able to connect with the ideas he had back then? That is when he remembered that the built environment around the magic was not completed to the original idea. What was actually built was very different but the magic stayed the same. The magician remembered that this was a job and best not waste energy worrying about if this or if that, but just get on with it.

Let me tell you what I learned this week:

1)Just be a little careful about what you let yourself in for

2)Never EVER cut corners on preparation

3) and always use the right materials for the task

If I was only allowed to offer one piece of advice it would be the middle one, Never EVER cut corners on preparation.

Just the other day I wrote a slightly flippant line about the real test of skill if your calling yourself a craftsman is how you fix things when they start going wrong!

So Hephaestus son of Zeus, architect of Mount Olympus, Master Smith and great Artificer, has heard me say this and looked down on me and said, ‘Well…..indeed things can go wrong so let’s watch you deal with this …. and man he has bowled me a googlie, sent me a curve ball.

Briefly: I have agreed to install a set of mosaics made by someone else! Yeah no worries I said.

I can’t even get the tiles anywhere near to where they need to go as they don’t really have any glue holding them onto the paper cartoon, and fall off if touch them. There is no reference system drawn on it for re-assembly. There’s more, there’s so much more, just little things which all added together make real obsticles. Good luck with that then Rob. My words have bit my arse and all I will say is I have not managed to stick any tiles in place yet and my friend has worked hard on these for months and months, and needs help to get over the finish line with this,……………….. and Jesus H Christ I’ll be glad when it’s over.

The King: The Castle Builder and The Magician (cont).

The Castle Builder contacted the Magician to say that sorry the papers were not ready yet, but they were nearly ready and there was one or two small details to clarify before they could be dispatched. The magic has to be cast in two phases and in which order were the spells going to be done?……and the Castle Builder suggested a change to the payment schedule: with the magician getting more for services in the middle of the performance and less at the end.

The reason for the delay was due to the fact that there are two Kings. One rules the town and looks after the good townsfolk, the other King rules the wide spaces and lands around the town. Now your magic falls into the communal spaces that are owned by no-one, but used by everyone and if the magic needs repair or modification later after the Castle Builder has gone away to other lands, which King is the one who will contact you the Magician for magic repair or advise?

The Magician has been busy working with both animals and children in wild places and spent little time in his potions cellar. Some of his recent spells and tricks can be seen without you even having to get out of your chair. The magic is brought all the way to you, as if you had visited the places.

http://rob-turner.blogspot.co.uk/

http://winnalmoors.wordpress.com/

STOP PRESS

The contract has arrived – JUST THIS MINUTE- and is 10 pages long. I’ll read it later.