you know you've been a fairy-tale critic for too long when...

... you vaguely summarise Tolkien's arguments against visual or dramatic fairy tale in two sentences, from memory, then come all over insecure and check it in the actual text, only to:
(a) open the book randomly at precisely the right page first go, without checking, and
(b) discover that your vague from-memory summary is exact, accurate and succinct.

I want a proper lecturing post now. I'm all growed up, I am. Either that, or I'm channelling Tolkien, in which case I've got it made. LotR: The Sequel. Now with more naked Legolas. And, I would imagine, some seriously interesting side-effects (squinting, grunts) as I wrestle my possessing spirit into submission.

Shire political meltdown update: conflict resolution session yesterday. Results:

• Lots of things written down, stuck to the walls and reshuffled;
• a new dismissive catch-phrase among my immediate social circle ("Well, you can just write that down and stick it to the wall");
• running an hour and a half over time;
• me leaving the room twice because I was too angry to trust myself to speak or stay silent;
• a great deal of self-justification, stubborn adherence to personal viewpoints, misunderstanding, refusal to actually listen, and anger;
• my undying admiration for khoi_boi's wife;
• some slight advances towards honesty and dialogue, but no actual resolution, so we have to do the whole thing again on Friday.

Aaaaaaaaargh!