Ok, turns out being in grad school is a bit harder than getting into it. Not by much, mind, but enough. I totally suck at keeping up with this journal, and to be honest, my reading pattern has changed--I simply don't have the energy to read every gem that comes along. I'm mostly visiting rec sites these days.

Also, I got facebook, which, what? I have been facebook's greatest antagonist for years. But my cohorts go to dinner and shopping a few times without me, and I cave like a house of cards built on sand.

Keep on rockin.

If my icon-fu were a shelf, it'd be covered in dust. If it were bread, it'd be green and fuzzy. If it were a window, it'd give you tetanus just from looking at it. If it were a patient on House, it'd be wheezing through an oxygen mask and on it's third MRI.

I need the paddles, people.

I've also realized that I have been very self-absorbed and have not been paying attention to things like Dreamwidth and OTW. Bad fangirl. (My excuse? I've been sleeping my way through the CW-and six degrees fandoms. Supernatural, J2, Smallville, Wellingbaum (We're still doing the namesmash thing? Ok, didn't know it was still 2005) as well as Leverage and Band of Brothers. Also, I'm naturally self-centred. Mea culpa.)

I've also taken my real life by the horns and gotten myself into grad school in London. I'm moving in about two weeks, and the prep work has been, to say the least, involved.

So, in recompense and celebration (or however you want to play this), I offer two things:

1. Iconfest. Remixes, requests, essays, comments, what have you, I want it.

2. My RL bloggy-thing is on blogspot, because I really don't need my boardchair/mentor finding my wincest squee. It is available upon request.

Peace out, folks

Been giving Smallville a chance (I'm on 1x11), so that I could understand the awesome fic.

Ok, this show? THIS SHOW?

Is not well written. Lighting techs, directors, gaffers, actors, production assistants, everyone else, I'm very sorry to say this. But writers, script supervisors, and producers? Go stand in the corner.

And I'm pretty comfortable with holding this show as an exemplar of how NOT to write female characters. Observe.

1.1: This is all about meeting characters. It's not too bad. Rejuvenated hazed nerd comes back to torment bully jocks. Lana's fetish for pink established.
1.2: Lana trapped in a grave.
1.3: Some male victims, and Chloe trapped in a burning room by an angry coach.
1.4: Lana threatened by a doppleganger/single white female.
1.5: Player jock given perpetual hypothermia, survives by picking up a random girl, stealing her body heat through sex, and shattering her frozen corpse. *gag*
1.6: Rejuvenated murderer exacts revenge on the daughter of his enemy. Martha Kent trapped in a grain cellar. She does fight back like she has a real brain though. Half points.
1.7: Fat teenager loses weight via krypto-veggies. Eats everything in sight and moves onto humans. Slightly satisfying when fat-joke dispensing character gets eaten.
1.8: Haven't seen this one.
1.9: This one is the first episode with a decent plot and villain. But almost no women on screen.
1.10: Lex's servant girl has a crush on him, and her brother goes invisible man trying to preserve her fantasy. She spends the episode stealing watches and building a Lex-shrine.
1.11: Lana is attacked and can't remember anything, so the boys fight over what they think happened to her. She threatens to end her friendship with Clark not because of anything he did/failed to do with her, but because he doubts the honesty of her boyfriend.

Will report if it picks up from here, but as a show, the misogyny is strong with this one.

In the not-sucking category, Tom Welling's eye teeth, Pete and Chloe (who are singlehandedly saving the show from being a docile, whitewashed, Heartland nightmare), and the way Michael Rosenbaum makes me want to take bubble baths and roll around in silk. And the fic. Oh. The Fic.

Did Frank Zuko go free at the end of Juliet is Bleeding?

He went away in handcuffs but Vecchio says "it was an accident".

So...what happened next?!

When I revere the hard work a human being is capable of, the quiet courage of unfailing duty, when my tiredness, my hunger, back pain and acid reflux make me all the prouder of all the asses I totally kicked today, when I’m absolutely certain that age doesn’t take away from life but enriches it, deepens it and makes it more vivid, I’m reading your Harding Welsh

When I believe that we are always better on the inside, when I believe in the endurance of friendship, of family, when I believe that the best, most shiny, most valiant and noble part of myself will shine through no matter how hard I try to pretend it’s not there, when I smell cashmere and kid leather, or have silk around my neck, when I can almost feel a loving hand on my shoulder, a sweet, shiny paint job or a polished mahogany balustrade, when I have the strength to secure the happiness of others, when I feel protected, when I’m filthy with the remains of a hard-earned victory and when I know that there are heroes on every street corner, I’m reading your Ray Vecchio.

When I can see the radiance that a little girl gives off as she is becoming an adult, when I think fondly on pink suede, when I when I have the courage to be myself, when I’m sighing over some pretty-boy, when I remember that any pretty-boy worth my time oughta be sighing over me, when I’m holding a child, when I’m reading admission requirements, when I’m standing up for myself, I’m reading your Francesca Vecchio.

When I see that a hard person can soften, that I can make a home in the smile of another person, when I remember that every day is a quest, when who I am has nothing to do with what people call me—except for when it totally does, when I can feel divorce like a piece of broken window in my chest, when my shoulders are twitching out a rumba, when I can hear the velvety, virile engine rev of a classic car, when I’m curling my lip and slouching and howling “shake bad guys shake”, when I can see the people in my life and know that I’m trying my hardest to love them as they deserve, I’m reading your Ray Kowalski

When I believe that there are no pieces too small to build up a family, when I’m looking for the road back home again, when I think maybe I’ve found it, when I can smell the smell of ice carried on the wind, when I’m totally perving over the uniform, when my heart feels like it may break from beauty, when I can’t feel my toes or my nose, when I’m getting through the day without accruing regret, when I’m looking up at the sky and wondering who else is doing the same this very second, I’m reading your Benton Fraser.

When I know I am equal to the work before me, when I when I’m stretching out aches in a gym locker room, when I cross the stage to collect my diploma, when I making eyes *back* at the cutie making eyes at me, when I believe in myself, when I’m standing straight and tall and proud and not faking any of it, I’m reading your Elaine Bresbiss

When I love my country, when I’m making a home for my heart in a damned good story, when I’m laughing over rubber ducks, cops with wings, talking dogs, identity crises and Canadian folksongs, when I’m *crying* over rubber ducks, cops with wings, talking dogs, identity crises, and Canadian folksongs, when I see what can grow when one stranger offers another stranger a single piece of kindness, when I love what comes of it when that kindness is offered again and again, when I am mindful of those who lack the luxuries I enjoy, when I remember which side of the tree moss grows on, when I long for a really big hat, when I am among friends and when I can see my small life in all it’s verdant and promising colour, I’m reading you, writing due South.

Peace, guys. I love you.

If: after 3 weeks of yoga, one decides one must practice standing on one leg to improve balance and put an end to one's crashing *out* of natarajasana, or dancer's pose and *into* the mat with a sweaty reverberating thud,

and if: one has reservations about taking part in the workshop one's dance company is producing,

and if: one desires a few days just to sit around, read slash and knit socks,

one therefore must: twist one's calise de maudite ankle while crossing the fuck ostie de street.

Merci, et bon nuit.

1. dS "reunion". Do you remember your first impression/interaction with the fine people of this fandom? I do! First person I talked to was china_shop. It was the rimming challenge for ds_recsredux, and I had just come from a moderately unkinky fandom where one of my stories went down like a lead balloon. That's my first memory of the due south fandom: china_shop assuring me that rimming is totally cool and everyone here is ok with rimming and yay for rimming!

2. anonymous sex fantasy meme. I played this at pro_f_iler lj a looong time ago. It is seriously thrilling to post your secret kinks, fantasies, and wild stories with absolutely no fear of retribution or freaked out looks. And reading these posts is just...whoo baby *fans self*

3. Secondary character love-in. Maria. Bruce Spender. Janet Morse. Mort. Buck Frobisher. Innusiq and June. Sven the interior decorator. Uncle Lorenzo. Sgt Sam Thorne. Come oooon, bring the love!

ETA: Zabira, I *am* working on the icon. I just have to...study up. Re-study. You know. *coff*.

Though for the life of me I can't think why. It's not like there's any sort of good story shortage.
But I live to make her wear out her caps lock button, so have some scratchings from my fic file. Surprising absence of slash. I must not be getting enough fluids.

Mid-to-late section of heretofore unwritten Vecchio family epic:

( In the end, Mama named me Rosa. Rosa Beatrice Concetta Sanfelice, of the Acerra Sanfelices. I was born, of course, in Acerra, near Napoli, in 1943. Now I live in Chicago, and my name is Rosa Vecchio. )

From the jettisoned fic "Five Times Welsh Hated his Job"

( Four )

Dear schools: If you post a date, I will meet it. If you don't, I'm going to go at my (and my referees') speed. These spring-loaded deadlines are giving me ulcers. I'm sure you are staffed with well-meaning and patient admissions officers. They'd get less stressed out if you post, on your multi-functional and Daedelus-coded websites, the date when "gimme your documents nowNowNOW" goes into effect.

Dear Canada Post: Seriously, what have you got against Devonshire? It is by all accounts beautiful and serene, and even if it isn't, what happened to that "rain, snow, sleet, or hail" thing attached to your profession?

Dear FedEx: Thank you. You saved my bacon. My bacon thanks you. But I maintain you charge too much.

Dear postal code EX4 4QE: please be in Exeter, or Whitestone. Not both. I'm having nightmares my application will be posted to some lovely stone cottage on a bluff. I'm sure the inhabitants are wonderful, but unlikely to be interested in teaching Masters students.

Dear application: please weigh less.

ETA: This? Totally true.

B.O.R.E.D.

Scores of fic, meta, art and memes flying past my f-list of late. Too antisocial to really take part. Fannish activity at an all time low.

I'm working on:
1. an icon for Zabira (aka fit everything wonderful and hot that draws a Canadian breath into ten thousand pixels)

2. thinking about a Band of Brothers picspam (aka spotting the Curled Forelock of Great Daring and differentiating enlisted and officer-grade pouting),

3. planning a field guide for navigating foreign fandoms/lists/archives (aka Educated Slash Fanfiction Trawling aka Avoiding bad fic:How to spot ‘em by she what wrote ‘em). Am slightly hesitant because, though tongue in cheek (mostly), am full cognizant to the amount of wank it can potentially produce.

An excerpt from my notes:
( Read more... )

Let's have meme-soup!

Any thing you want explained, written, meta-ed, iconned, extemporized, revealed, contemplated or knit, now is the time!

In meatspace news, 1/6 grad school applications in the postbox, I am in love with my new Moleskine planner, and I want to have Tilda Swinton's redheaded babies.

I've been trying to hack my photobucket account for *days*. No dice yet.

I started playing around with some new caps to get back into practice for a few commissioned icons. Behold, the return of moon_brain the graphicist!

But first, my thingmas present from piig

(  I can't take my eyes off Vecchio's butt )

Aaand, for those of you who are into this sort of thing (china_shop's boy is suddenly laughing for no reason known to him), have some art:

( Combat Action Report )

It blows things up.
It makes soup in helmets.
It runs low on morphine.
It leaps into lakes fully clothed.
It keeps a compass in its pants.
It hides VAT 69 in footlockers.
It kisses Dutch girls in the street.
It steals silver candlesticks.
It wears its cap at an whimperingly rakish angle.
It gets shot in the butt. Repeatedly.
It should know better. It is an officer, and a grownup, and it should know better.

It will jump out of a plane because the world cried out for help.

Though I've been in one fandom or another since I was 11, I didn't have a community till I got into Due South in 2005. To have one, now, finally, at all, is pretty damn awesome.

1 The Promised and the Delivered. R/R and F/K/V may have started with three fictional cops written by other people over a decade ago, but these pairings were built by fans, out of the scars of our conflict, the strength of our collaboration, and our determination to keep the characters in love snarking giggling arguing dancing angsting lying in the wet spot alive. They're ours. They're something that never should have existed but does, and that makes them special.

2 Knowing that I'd taught myself enough Photoshop to get there from here (Warning: non-explicit 'cest and pretensions to iconage)

3 Realizing that, in this fandom, sometimes even luke-warm fic brings all the rockstars to the yard.

4 Blogging in the shadow of china_shop, spuffyduds, mergatrude, and the rest of you.

5 Being asked to make the banner for ds_match team reality.

6 Reccing this, and utterly, utterly meaning it.

7 Every icon that practically made itself and every icon that required coaxing, teasing, meditating and dragging into existence. But that's a whole different list.

8 Fell in love, as Fraser, with my own Ray. Knew that if I ever got up the nerve, I would know what not to do, and what to do, by reading Speranza’s Enduring Distance.

To be a list forever, I hope, in progress.

For amusement, excerpts from the correspondence of moon_brain, piig, and rattyfleef

( That just ended in tinkly clattery hell )

1. from thefourthvine

If one member of your pairing can forget who he is and go on the lam, and the other one can track him and predict where he'll be next, your pairing has passed the Chicago's Most Wanted Test. I can think of few pairings that could pass, frankly. I mean, of my OTPs - Blair Sandburg could absolutely do this for Jim Ellison, but not vice versa unless you allowed senses-related trickery, which is a rules violation. Rodney McKay and John Sheppard likely have a 50/50 chance, but if they get it wrong, someone ends up in prison or something blows up. And, oddly, I don't believe Jack O'Neill and Daniel Jackson could do it alone, but any three members of (original) SG1 could easily find the other. I just think it would take all of them. </i>

So what about yours?

2. As per the advice of rattyfleef, schools who accept me will get a bunny; those who don't will get a box of dead fleas.

3. Addicted to the NYTimes. Ok, what?

4. There's something bubbling up in me since I read spuffyduds latest post. Not sure what it is, but it takes place at the intersection of a memory, a social experiment I heard of, and the prospect of Prop 8. It may be a fic, it may be how I change the world.

Yes you did.

From Canada, with rediscovered respect,
with surprising affection; unburdened
by cynicism, lightened by joy,
crying, and with hope in her heart,

me




ETA: Ok, lets get to work reversing those Ballot Measures.

moon_brain's gay.

Last seen: in the company of this man.

Possibly aided and abetted by this man.

If you see these men, or anyone who resembles them, please notify the owner's remaining, and now unchecked, straight. Be warned. These men may be kissing.

In other news, the role of moon_brain's gay will be played by someone else's ability to not only sit through, but thoroughly enjoy an evening of chamber music. *puts hand over microphone* Seriously, kid, we're glad you bailed us out, but where the hell did you come from?

Thank you, and good night.