skip the light fandango

Sigh. My cake didn't rise, and worse, it tastes like failure.

*crosses that recipe off the list*

On the upside, there was reviewing of yuletide source. Now I just have to figure out what I'm writing.

***

This entry at DW: http://musesfool.dreamwidth.org/98189.html. people have commented there.

Pick a paragraph (or any passage less than 700 words) from any fanfic I've written, and comment to this post with that selection. I will then give you a DVD commentary on that snippet: what I was thinking when I wrote it, why I wrote it in the first place, what's going on in the character's heads, why I chose certain words, what this moment means in the context of the rest of the fic (fic series, fic universe), lots of awful puns, and anything else that you'd expect to find on a DVD commentary track.

This entry was originally posted at http://alixtii.dreamwidth.org/315995.html. There are currently comments there. You can comment there, using Open ID (prefered), or here.

Okay, this is the plan for hiatus:

1. yuletide
2. Broken Toys
3. the 5.10 story I'm working on right now (I keep having to stop because it's making me cry! That never happens to me when I write!)
4. The Dean-Michael dream story
5. Drought Conditions (casefile)
6. Nothing but Winter in my Cup (casefile)
7. the Dean/Sam/Pam story

That's quite a lot, considering November and December are usually the time of my fannish malaise.

This song is not helping with the crying, iTunes!

Now, though, I think I am going to bake a cake.

***

This entry at DW: http://musesfool.dreamwidth.org/98022.html. people have commented there.

White Collar continues to make me happy even though I'm pretty sure I'm watching a totally different show than the rest of fandom.
- the Pete as a younger less worn down Bill Maxwell vibe remains strong, so strong
- El is my favourite character
- Pete is my second favourite character
- I totally believe that El has a younger brother named Charles
- show is competing strongly for my favourite OT3 grouping ever
- I keep forgetting the main character's name, but oh my, he's ridiculously pretty

I'm reading a nice Leverage - Eliot angst - WIP. I do not read WIPs if I can avoid it, but I do sample them sometimes. This one sucked me in. Now I have to wait for the next installment. Why do I do this to myself?

( I haven't seen Supernatural yet. )

Oy, this day. Or, well, yesterday, at this point. The less said, the better. And did I mention I got my period this morning? oy.

I left work late - I think I was the only person left in the office - and all I wanted was to come home and watch this week's Friday Night Lights. But the file I dl'd wouldn't play on WMP or QT or even VLC. I updated DivX and it wouldn't play on that either. So I deleted it, rebooted, and redownloaded, and it worked.

I thought I might actually get through the episode without crying. I don't know why I thought that. I don't think it's ever happened, and it certainly did not happen tonight.

Friday Night Lights: A Sort of Homecoming

( spoilers )

***

Okay, I just asked this in meret's comments, but ( spoilers for SPN s5 that's aired so far )

***

*yawn*

Man, I totally need to sleep.

***

This entry at DW: http://musesfool.dreamwidth.org/97606.html. people have commented there.

Supernatural: Abandon All Hope

Okay, so I tried to do a rant section and a non-rant section of this post, but the ranty stuff kept intruding. So while I really liked many aspects of this episode, the rage kept intruding. Just so you know.

( spoilers )

***

This entry at DW: http://musesfool.dreamwidth.org/97045.html. people have commented there.

It's been a long day, but New Show tonight! As always, I am hopeful.

Here are ten Dean/Victor Henriksen fics recs via . I don't think I've read any of them! I've found the quality of recs at this comm to be fairly good, but I'm happy if I end up liking even a quarter of what gets recc'd at a comm, YMMV.

On Sunday I nabbed season one of Wire in the Blood, a BBC production, starring Robson Green and Hermione Norris. I'm currently nabbing season three as I'm on the last epiosde of season two. (One thing about British dramas is they rarely have many episodes per season.)If you like police stories that don't involve high speed chases and explosions (I love those too!) this could be worth checking out. If you don't mind a certain level of violence and gore - less than what drove me from Bones and Criminal Minds - you might enjoy this. The story telling isn't perfect, but the characterization is golden and the acting very capable. It's worth a try.

White Collar fic and vid linkspam compiled by noracharles via white_collar.

Donny Osmond RPF. By "pros". This helps to explain why I never understood the upset over RPF. 16 and Tiger Beat were staples of my tween years.

Originally seen at dotfic's journal and continuing to spread the news: Chuck will be back on Sunday, Jan. 10, at 9 p.m. with two episodes. The show starts in its regular time slot, Mondays at 8 p.m.on Jan. 11. Hurray!

Chapters is now taking interact online. I may end up with less available cash, but at least I won't be using plastic there from here on out.

Nearly ten years after it was published, I'm finally reading Stephen King's On Writing and thoroughly enjoying it. So far he's not saying anything new, but what he says is worth reading again and he says it in an entertaining fashion.

Farscape is my comfort viewing. I didn't even decide to start watching. I just wanted to see John get zapped by D'Argo that first time. Now, I'm halfway through the first season. Again.

So I watched the Space promo for tonight's SPN.

( spoilers for the promo, speculation for the episode )

On a similar, but not quite the same note, faye_dartmouth has an interesting post about the issues she has with the show in s4 and s5, and while I don't agree with a lot of it (I am more optimistic about how the end game will play out, at least in terms of Sam and Dean and their relationship), I think her point about the apocalypse is sound.

The thing is, they used to connect with the people they saved - they used to save people because people needed saving, and they used to get some satisfaction out of it. At least Dean did, and I think Sam was getting there.

Stopping the apocalypse means, yes, saving 6 billion people, but it also tends to make them 6 billion faceless, unknowable people. I said this way back in season 2, but this kind of arc always draws things inward and narrows the world when it should expand it out - instead of concentrating on saving people! hunting things! Sam and Dean are themselves hunted and in need of saving, and the lack of connection with the people they are saving hurts the show as much as the fact that they can't really go all out and give us a real apocalypse. Last week's episode was a nod towards earlier seasons, when they did connect with the people they saved, but now they spend too much time being backed into corners and having to save themselves, and it's just less compelling to me that way (the same thing happened in the later seasons of BtVS and Angel, so it's not like I wasn't expecting it).

( casting spoilers for tonight's episode )

Meh. I am PMSing and cranky. Hopefully tonight's episode won't give me more reason to be.

***

This entry at DW: http://musesfool.dreamwidth.org/96852.html. people have commented there.

Criminal Minds

( spoilers )

Glee

*facepalm*

Could we have one woman on the show who isn't crazy, scheming, manipulative, or simply around to serve the men's storylines?

Also, ( spoilers )

***

This entry at DW: http://musesfool.dreamwidth.org/96738.html. people have commented there.

So I was all, "How the heck did I end up with 27 items in my Hulu queue?" (It was basically empty last week.)

Then I realized--Stargate SG-1 Season 9 is up!

This entry was originally posted at http://alixtii.dreamwidth.org/314474.html. There are currently comments there. You can comment there, using Open ID (prefered), or here.

So, some other concerns raised about the AoOO's tagging system concerns the genre system. Namely, the two following interrelated concerns have been raised:

1. The distinction between "Multi" and "Other" is unclear and/or ambiguous.
2. There's not a sufficient distinction between, on the one hand, a story with multiple pairings and one with an instance of polyamory, and on the other, a story with an instance of polyamory and a one with pairings between non-traditionally gendered individuals.

The most popular temporary solution put forth is to further refine one's classification of the story with freeform tags. However, as I've set about to do so, I've realized I don't really have a sufficient working understanding of polyamory to do so. Largely this is a result of a monogamocentric (I'm assuming that's what the word would be, and Google attests hits) worldview, in which any relationship can be reduced to a set of pairings. (This, undoubtedly, is the source of the "Multi" tag.) Even a threesome can be reduced in this way: A/B/C becomes A/B, B/C, A/C--but admittedly, this reduction is a distortion, because the threesome is a fundamentally different thing than just the sum of its parts. That's the main complaint as I understand it: the "Multi" tag simply doesn't capture that extra richness.

So take a fic like What the Caged Bird Feels, which has two pairings: Dawn/Ethan and Dawn/Giles. Is this an example of polyamory, multiple pairings, or both? (In that story, Dawn is married to Giles. Does it make a difference that's she had sex with Ethan before, and may see it as likely that she'll do it again, or would the dynamic be the same if the relationship with Ethan was a one-time thing. Does Giles' perspective on the whole thing matter?)

Or how about Substitution Rule, which manages to be A/B, B/C, and A/C without being A/B/C (and to make it more complicated, C thinks A and B are the same person)?

Restricting a poly tag to just threesomes or moresomes doesn't seem to be in accordance with the way real polyamorous people on my flist use the term.

But I'm afraid that identifying all (or even most?) cases of a single character being involved in more than one pairing would be too broad a use, which could end up being appropriative.

So I'm throwing this out to those on my flist who know more about these issues than I do, in hope we can work out (and/or you can help me work out) a helpful, accurate, and non-appropriating tagging practice for me to utilize, because I've come to realize that my thoughts are much less clear and much more monogamocentric than I had previously realized. (ObDisclaimer: No one is required to help me do this.)

This entry was originally posted at http://alixtii.dreamwidth.org/314288.html. There are currently comments there. You can comment there, using Open ID (prefered), or here.

( spoilers )

Work = busy and will be from now until 12/1, when we have our board meeting. I just wish they'd stop springing surprise!committee meetings on me at the last minute. The time to tell me you need a committee meeting is two months ago, when I was scheduling all the other committee meetings. Not yesterday afternoon. Oy.

So my writing brain is pretty fried and probably will be until after 12/1. At least yuletide source has been acquired, and will probably be reviewed numerous times.

Tonight, I left work right at 5 pm (usually I saunter out at about 5:15) so I could get home and change because I was meeting fleurdeleo for a super sekrit sneak preview of "Nine". Except that apparently, the super sekrit sneak preview of "Nine" was last Tuesday night, and she'd confused the dates. So we went to the diner for dinner and chit chat.

Since I was home by 8, I stopped off at Associated and bought some dried cranberries and slivered almonds and an orange so I could make innie_darling's orange-cranberry-almond loaf, and it smells absolutely fantastic. Tastes good too, although my oven apparently runs hot and I probably shouldn't have cooked it the full 55 minutes, because the edges are overdone. Ah, me. I should have learned from the banana bread. But otherwise it is very tasty.

So writing might not be happening, but at least there is baking?

In TV news, I watched The Good Wife and ( spoilers )

***

There's something adorably failtastic about Peyton Manning and Alyson Hannigan in those MasterCard commercials.

*hides from amberlynne*

***

This entry at DW: http://musesfool.dreamwidth.org/96271.html. people have commented there.

( embedded video )

OMG, so good. Venom is my favorite Axis of Anarchy member (and I just looked her up, and the part is actually played by a disable actor!), and was awesome, but what was best about the episode was the way all the characters were utilized with great moments and great dialogue--the only person who was really missing was Tara Caso's character, Dina.

ETA: The more I read, the more awesome Teal Sherer seems to be (although I must admit my interest is fairly shallow). And I know that she and Felicia would have first worked together on Warm Springs (which I'll probably now move a little bit farther up my Netflix queue). Which makes me want The Guild RPF all that much more.

This entry was originally posted at http://alixtii.dreamwidth.org/313900.html. There are currently comments there. You can comment there, using Open ID (prefered), or here.

1. I understand "Choose Not to Warn for Some Content" as meaning that, if no other warnings are selected, then there is a nonzero number of primary standardized warnings which don't apply to the story (most likely noncon)--because if all of them applied, and the author didn't warn for all of them, then the phrase "Choose Not to Warn [full stop]" comment would apply and, in accordance with Grice's Maxim of Quantity, the author would have used that tag.

Apparently, not everyone shares this understanding.

2. I'm very uncomfortable with the implication, given by the existence of the primary warning tag "noncon/rape," that dubcon isn't rape. "Rape," as the term is used more or less uniquely in contemporary usage, is a legal-ethical concept: it identifies a certain type of illicit sexual activity. "Noncon" and "dubcon" pull out certain aspects of these acts which are relevant to the needs of fanfic readers and writers, but not to a legal or ethical understanding, and involves knowledge unavailable to people who are not omniscient narrators (e.g., the precise mental state of the victim, and what what that state would have been in other circumstances). But any circumstance in which consent is in any way dubious--whether through the use of alien influence, or power imbalances, or social pressure, or drugs or alcohol, or through not being of legal age--is rape. Period.

"Noncon" and "dubcon" identify out types of rape, in much the same way the term "statutory rape" does. (ETA: Actually, they don't even do that, I think; they measure something which is on completely different axis than what "rape" measures. It just happens that there is an incredibly huge degree of correlation.)

Now, one doesn't have to read the "noncon/rape" tag as implying that "noncon" and "rape" or synonymous or equivalent. But if not, the meaning is ambiguous: does it cover for cases which are "noncon AND rape" (but not dubcon) or cases which are "noncon OR rape" (which would include dubcon). ("Noncon XOR rape" can be safely ruled out.) Praxis seems to support the first usage as being dominant, but I think this somehow covertly encourages the (problematic equivalence between the two terms discussed above. (And both usages are fundamentally redundant, because "noncon AND rape" = "noncon" and "noncon OR rape" = "rape.")

And, continuing to read the post linked above, I'm not the only who has thought of this (not that I had assumed I was).

This entry was originally posted at http://alixtii.dreamwidth.org/313665.html. There are currently comments there. You can comment there, using Open ID (prefered), or here.

I woke up this morning at 4:52 am and had one of those middle of the night freakouts. Ugh. Then I fell back to sleep and dreamt that the train I was on derailed. Thanks for that, brain! Nobody was hurt - it was just a convenient excuse for me to be unable to get to work. Clearly I need to be independently wealthy so I can stay home all day and watch dvds and read fic. WHY HAS THE UNIVERSE NOT SEEN FIT TO PROVIDE ME WITH THIS LIFESTYLE?

***

I am not a Sheldon/Penny shipper (or, as some of them call it, Shenny. Which will never stop being hilarious), but if I were, last night's Big Bang Theory would have put me over the moon. As it was, I thought it was hilarious. ( spoilers )

Actually, I did read a casting spoiler for BBT, ( casting spoiler )

Castle as always, was adorable. ( spoiler )

***

So I am victoria_p aka musesfool at AOOO. I've been fiddling around with uploading stuff and I think the importer is nifty, even if you still have to do a shitload of editing once you've imported stuff (stripping out headers and code etc.) and adding fandom and character tags etc.

I will probably attempt to upload the year of stuff that I never managed to put up on my site before I switched to the WordPress version, but I just can't be arsed to move everything. I've got over 700 stories, and even if I don't bother with drabbles and first line ficlets etc., that's still probably, like, 500 stories. That just ain't gonna happen.

Otoh, if there's some way to import the non-LJ remix archives, I would be all over that, because I don't want to lose those stories but I also can't maintain that database. Hmm...

***

This entry at DW: http://musesfool.dreamwidth.org/96042.html. people have commented there.

copracat gave me the following words to talk about:

discussion
I love discussion! Debate! Argument! I have been known to debate whether it's day or night! I've been known to dispute things I agree with, just to keep the conversation going! I have been known to pull out the dictionary to win arguments! To me, it's a normal mode of discourse, the back and forth, the rambling tangents that help me figure out what I think about things, and that occasionally change my mind. I started out in online fandom on discussion newsgroups, and discussion of the sources I love is what I came to online fandom for, and even more than the fanfic is what makes me feel engaged and excited about a source. I mean, fic can be a solitary pleasure - amirite, lurkers? - you never have to interact if you don't want to, but discussion - you need someone else to bounce ideas and theories off of, to multiply squee and talk you down from rage. At least, I do. Once I don't have someone to discuss a source with, I don't stop loving it, but I may stop being fannishly active about it. It's the lifeblood of my fannishness. Even fic, in a way, is a discussion - with canon, with fanon, with my own stories and other people's - and it certainly fosters discussion and relationships - a lot of the people I am friends with now, I met through leaving or receiving comments on fic, or on posts about sources we have in common. Discussion! It's what's for dinner awesome!

Xander
Okay, so I mentioned above that I came to internet fandom via discussion newsgroups, and the second of those was alt.tv.buffy-v-slayer, soon after Becoming 2 aired. That was the summer of Xander Lied! A flamewar discussion that went on so long as to become legendary. I was on Xander's side, of course. I still don't think he did anything wrong in that particular situation, but I don't really want to revisit the topic here and now.

Anyway. What I love about Xander is that even though he has no special powers, no special destiny, he's just a nerdy loser who somehow never even gets trained in basic self-defense, he throws himself into the fight over and over again, because once he knows what's out there in the dark, he can't not. He can be bitter and angry and resentful, he can hold a grudge, but he's also loyal, funny, and kind, and smarter than he looks, and he will have your back when you need him when the apocalypse comes knocking, and he'll find a way to help you win. Because he's awesome like that. Xander! ♥

rock
I don't even know what to say - music is so fragmented these days, so niche marketed that it seems almost ridiculous to talk about rock'n'roll and have it mean something. I mean, the history of rock, of R&B, of country, of doo-wop and Motown - it's all rock to me on one level, before it splits out into genres. Most of what I listen to is rock - alternative rock (or modern rock, as we called it in the '80s), classic rock, hard rock, southern rock, angry chick rock, pop rock - right this minute, my iPod is playing "Love Reign O'er Me" as covered by Pearl Jam. I am less hung up on genre than I was as an indier-than-thou teenager - nowadays, I like what I like, mostly without regard to the labels the music comes with - and I wish there were more public outlets for that kind of mixing and mingling. Have I mentioned that NY radio sucks? So I don't really listen to it anymore, and that makes me sad.

New York (it's one word, Frank says so)
Frank! I love New York! There's just something wonderfully alive about walking down the street here - on one of those unexpectedly warm days in February, or when it's a beautiful spring day in March, or a cold crisp night in November - there's an energy, a powerful belief that anything could happen at any moment, and that even though we don't know each other, on that street in that moment, we are all in this together. It's corny, but I do feel like my heart swells with love sometimes when I walk down the street, even when I'm just going to CVS or picking up my laundry or whatever. I love the neighborhood I live in, where I can walk to the movies, to the bookstore, to a great bagel place and more restaurants than you can shake a stick at. Where I can hop on a bus or subway to go to someone else's neighborhood. I find it energizing, even though it is also very fatiguing sometimes to live here.

poetry
I love poetry. I find the way it uses language fascinating, the way words and images can double back on themselves, invert, subvert. The way so much emotion can be packed into something tiny, something regimented, something that is both subject to and free from rules. I love that it can contain itself and its opposite, ideas that seem jumbled but with the right rhythm, it all makes sense. I think my fascination with playing with structure and tone in stories comes from my love of poetry. I write to the rhythm in my head.

***

*yawn*

I am very tired. I dreamt last night that I woke up late for work (at 8:46 am, which is usually when I'm arriving at the office), and called in to say I was late, and then I woke up *in the dream* and went to work and told one of my co-workers about it. Even in my dreams I have anxiety dreams. I don't even know.

***

I posted a story last night:

swim in my blood when it's warm
Supernatural; Sam/Dean; pg; spoilers through 5.04; 3,434 words
Sam's seeing everything clearly now.

Talking about playing with structure - this is built around the five senses, and started out mostly as a way to make myself write more sensory detail, more vivid imagery, so it's pretty plotless and very schmoopy and features the staples of my oeuvre: boys doing laundry,brotherly banter, insults, and references to Pinky and the Brain.

***

Ugh. I suppose I should work now. Sigh.

***

This entry at DW: http://musesfool.dreamwidth.org/95836.html. people have commented there.

swim in my blood when it's warm
Supernatural; Sam/Dean; pg; spoilers through 5.04; 3,434 words
Sam's seeing everything clearly now.

Thanks to luzdeestrellas for betaing and to angelgazing and amberlynne for handholding.

( swim in my blood when it's warm )

~*~

Feedback is adored.

~*~

This entry at DW: http://musesfool.dreamwidth.org/95677.html. people have commented there.

Holy shit, you guys, I was so panicked about a couple of the sources I offered to write (not being able to do them justice) that I totally blanked on some of the things I did offer, and OMG YOU GUYS, I GOT THE BEST YULETIDE ASSIGNMENT EVER!!!

Ahem.

Assuming it's not like two years ago, where they snatch the awesome from my greedy little hands, that is.

Of course, I realize now that I don't actually, um, own the source. That shall have to be remedied shortly. But ZOMG! YULETIDE ASSIGNMENT = AWESOME!

I mean, I'm sure 500 words in I will hate it with the fiery vengeance of a thousand suns, but, you know, right now, the shiny hasn't worn off yet. *g*

If otoh, you have stumbled over here because I am your (probably not very awesome, sorry!) yuletide assignment, here is my dear writer letter.

To reiterate, optional details are optional, and please have fun. I'm sure whatever you do will be awesome, because I asked for four awesome fandoms!

***

This entry at DW: http://musesfool.dreamwidth.org/95265.html. people have commented there.

I woke up at 8:20 this morning and that was it, I was done sleeping, even though I went to bed at 2 am. Sigh.

Since I was up, I made these popovers, which came out really well. Only one of them deflated. Hopefully they freeze well.

Last night I made apple cake again, with Fuji instead of gala apples this time (not planned - just what I grabbed in Food Emporium on the way home), and it is good too. Plus, the whole apartment smells like cinnamon while it's baking.

Then I watched this week's Friday Night Lights.

( spoilers )

In slightly fewer words, oh, Show...

***

Maybe I will take a nap now.

***

This entry at DW: http://musesfool.dreamwidth.org/95123.html. people have commented there.