Writing from objects

I took a bunch of objects along to The Bowery for tonight's Creative Writing Workshop - a plastic pirate, tiny football boots, fossils, shells, a feather boa and a bowler hat. It's always liberating to hold an object in your hand, to be able to twist and turn it, to sniff it, rest your cheek against it and then write about it.
I used Pablo Neruda's 'Ode to my Socks' http://knittingrat.blogspot.com/2005/12/ode-to-my-socks-by-pablo-neruda.html
There were some amazing responses when we 'became' an object and imbued it with life and a voice - there was a leather jacket, upstairs in a loft, walking round like a suit of armour, smoking joints and talking gibberish into the loft insulation material, and a rather disgruntled toilet....

Synchronicity

How bizarre. I'm doing character sketches for my new book and I decided that one of them had inherited a rather nice country house, possibly in Hampshire. I've never been to Hampshire, although it felt right for this character.
The name 'Furze House' popped in to my head. I wasn't entirely sure what 'furze' was, so I checked in the dictionary and discovered that it's a type of gorse. Hmm, I wasn't sure if there were any areas of Hampshire where gorse would grow, so I googled 'furze' and 'Hampshire'. To my surprise, there's a place called 'Furze Hill'.
I read somewhere where another writer said guess first and check later and it does seem to work, just letting your mind run loose and seeing what pops in there...worked uncannily well this time, anyway!