Random Thoughts

Direction of the Heart (3987 words) by Flamebyrd
Fandom: Onmyouji | The Yin-Yang Master (Movies)
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warning: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Abe no Seimei/Minamoto no Hiromasa
Summary: In which our heroes solve another case and philosophise on the nature of love.

Terrible title and summary, even for me. I had fun plotting this out and playing in this universe - it was entirely new to me but I'm glad I finally got around to watching it.

My gift was written by the wonderful DivineMadness - if you're reading this, thank you so much! ♥

PS: This makes me three for three on writing Japanese fandoms for Yuletide.

Written and Completed in 2011

Thieving Jackdaw and Other Stories (Original, for Case Story Big Bang)
Magic's Path (The Last Herald-Mage by Mercedes Lackey, Vanyel/Tylendel)
Yuletide 2011*

...yeah, that's kind of pathetic, isn't it?

Part of it is that I've been busy, part of it is that I didn't write anything for SSBB this year, and most of it is sheer lack of inspiration. Plus I had some unenthusiastic responses this year, which I tend to be philosophical about but it does make it harder to find the time to just sit down and write. Anyway, this isn't intended to be a pity party and of the two things I did finish this year, the first of them I'd glad to have finally finished and thrown out into the world, and the second I am still utterly bemused about but was a great deal of fun to write.

Published in 2011 (but written in previous years)

Five People Who Broke Arthur's Heart (Inception)
Hoof and Feather (Original)

Other

NaNoWriMo 2011
Unfinished SSBB f/f science fiction
The Adventures of PM Ambrose (the Merlin-as-PM fic)

Plans for next year:
Maybe write for SSBB again (we'll see how I feel), work on brushing PM Ambrose into a coherent work, and do the same for the DC College fic sequel I worked on a bit during NaNoWriMo.

*I would post the usual "guess which story is mine" thing but unless I've already talked about it with you it's probably going to be a little tricky, since I didn't write the fandom I matched on, I didn't offer the fandom I wrote and hadn't consumed the canon I wrote until after I received my assignment (I downloaded it a number of years ago, though).

I think I just had a dream where Frederick Algernon Trotteville AKA Fatty, one of the children from Enid Blyton's Five Find-Outers and Dog series, grew up to become Richard Castle.

(...Except that you'd have to wrangle things so that Castle grew up in England. And time-shift the books forward a couple of decades, of course.)

They Might be Giants supported by Jonathan Coulton

Last time I saw Jonathan Coulton he was headlining, so seeing him do a half hour set to a bunch of people who didn't really care was a little depressing. Still, he handled it pretty well. I've never seen TMBG before, and I wonder if playing to a nightclub crowd is what they've always done. Anyway, I enjoyed it a lot.

This was at the start of November so I've forgotten a lot of it.

Music: TMBG started with a lot of songs I didn't really know, presumably from newer albums, and then they played all of Flood, starting with the first few songs, then playing it in reverse order from the end so they could finish with the Big Ones. This was great. They didn't play a couple of my favourites, but idek which songs are TMBG "hits" so I'm not too bothered. Coulton's set was too short, but what can you do?
Stageshow: Weird interval with puppets...?
Location: I don't like nightclubs because I'm not a fan of dancing, but we managed to secure a corner with couches and a sticky floor, so that was okay.
Banter: TMBG have obviously had a lot of practice at this. They're pretty funny guys.


The National

I last saw these guys in an outdoor concert last summer. They were awesome then, and they were awesome this time too. I hadn't heard of the opening act and the sound was so bad I couldn't tell if their music was any good or not. (The sound was better for the National, so I assume it was mixed for them.)

I bought my first band shirt here. :D I don't usually bother, since I hate crowds and making split second decisions on items that may not fit, but owing to the vagaries of public transport I got to the venue way early and I was first in line. And they had womens sizes and a design I liked and a price I didn't mind paying!

Music: STILL MY FAVOURITES. Really I'd be happ with whatever they played, and since they did my two favourites back-to-back I'm stoked. They ended with "Vanderlyle Crybaby Geeks", played with the band at the front of the stage on acoustics, with no mikes, and the audience singing along. AMAZING.
Stageshow: Screen with random images; lights. *shrugs* (Why do I even document this?*)
Location: The Orpheum, which is the theatre the symphony orchestra plays in. It's really pretty! The sound didn't really impress me, though. I should have brought earplugs to take the edge off the speakers topping out...
Banter: Still terrible. XD I feel like being witty on stage would be out of character for these guys anyway, but the singer is insanely awkward. Someone from the crowd called out to offer a hot tub orgy, and he... started talking about how he hates hot tubs but orgies are okay? And then he fluffed the beginning of the next song.

*I do actually know this. It's because I saw Muse last year.

Previous Yuletide Letters: 2010 | 2009

Hi! We share tiny fandoms! That is awesome!

With regards to my tastes, I love romance but I also love plot and platonic friendships, so if you're not comfortable with romance please don't feel obligated to write it. I've tried to provide prompts for both types of story.

I love light-hearted things, but I also like things that make me think. I don't like things that make me cry. I am easily squicked and not at all comfortable with graphic violence. I love it when characters support each other in uncomfortable situations (eg. reunions). I love competence. I am not particularly kinky.

( Read more... )

Things I have written in the last few days:

- 3155 words of the Adventures of PM Ambrose (ie. the Merlin reincarnation fic), bringing the total to 5714 and potentially a candidate for a Big Bang next year given how much other stuff in that 'verse is floating around in my head
- 3242 words of a sequel to Hoof and Feather (the winged person / centaur story)
- 2378 words of a random new urban fantasy with a rather Mary Sue main character (you know the type, kickass halfbreed woman) that is nonetheless a heap of fun to write

I'm still about 3500 words behind but I'm a lot happier, so that's something.

I wrote a fair amount of that on the iPad, and while it isn't exactly a good writing implement, it's tolerable and more convenient for the train than a laptop, at least when you have an app that provides an extra row of keys for punctuation.

Tomorrow I might try starting a sequel to the Bart Allen in college story of rampant self-indulgence...

In excessive detail:

Flight out of DC was overbooked, as seems to be Delta's modus operandi, and after boarding they were still desperately asking for a volunteer to give up their seat so some poor woman could get to Edmonton, which "is very difficult to get to". When a guy finally stood up he got a round of applause from the other passengers. Finished my book on the flight. Landed in Minneapolis, dashed across the terminal, loaded onto a tiny plane with not many other passengers, watched an episode of QI, dozed a bit, landed in Vancouver ~11:30pm. Talked our way through immigration/customs, picked up our bags, dropped by 7-11 for some milk, caught a taxi home, walked in the door at 12:30. Collapsed into bed, then up at 7am for work the next day.

( Book review: Chocolate Chip Cookie Murder, by Joanne Fluke )

Finally, in honour of the most recent episode:

I forgot to mention, on Day #2 we left the convention centre to do The High Line, which was fun. Every city should have an elevated walkway garden.

Went to a Tiny Titans draw off with Art Baltazar and Franco Aureliani (the art/writing team), which was fun except after the first round they started really hamming it up and not actually trying to battle (it was in the kids stream). Tiny Titans = still awesome. And it was neat to see how each artist interprets the characters slightly differently, even in that simple art style.

Did a final spin of the show floor; managed to talk myself out of buying a Nendroid (it was a close call, but I didn't want to take the risk that it was a fake).

Went to a panel on early Jim Henson works and an upcoming graphic novel based on an unreleased screenplay. It was the best thing ever. Jim Henson had a strange and varied imagination, and some of the stuff they showed was quite unsettling. But very good! I'd seen clips of Time Piece before but never the whole thing - it really is quite brilliant.

When I got back to the hotel i decided to see if I could find Adventure Time streaming anywhere, only to discover that Cartoon Network only has the most recent episodes and Hulu and Netflix don't have it. Also it's not out on DVD yet. Protip: this is why people torrent TV shows.

Yes, Day #3 just finished, hush.

Bought a cute t-shirt from the show floor. My one and only purchase at the con, mostly because we're trying not to fill our apartment with Stuff.

In the Artists Alley I recognised Amy Mebberson and mentioned I'd read As If!, and she laughed and fetched a free As If! pin. :D There was so much awesome stuff in the Artists Alley and I wanted to buy ALL THE PRINTS but it would be too tricky to get them home. (Suitcase full, taking the train on Monday, etc.)

Went to the preview panel for a Steampunk documentary called Vintage Tomorrows (trailer available here), which I thought was great. Very informative, and even the rough edit was fun to watch. (For the curious, it did touch on some of the issues around steampunk, not so much the environmental but definitely on the inclusiveness aspect and emphasised that the movement doesn't want to recreate life in the 19th century, with all its problems.)

Then I went to a panel called "Girls Kick Butt: Strong Female Heroines in Young Adult Fantasy", with Tamora Pierce, Caitlin Kittredge, Esther Friesner and Kate Klimo (of which I've only read Tamora Pierce). It was pretty cool - I didn't learn anything as such, but it was great to hear the writers talk about their experiences in writing heroines and why they do it. ( I do have one little rant, though (about world-building) )

We queued for 1.5 hours for the Masquerade before we eventually decided that it was getting late, we were both hungry, and the line hadn't moved in 20 minutes so we were probably not going to get in. May have been wrong about the last and I do regret it a little, but it was nice to get off my feet. Hoping the highlights will end up on YouTube (I haven't looked yet).