a conspiracy of cartographers

Today is I think a good day for many YouTube links!

Joseph Gordon-Levitt sings 'Bad Romance'. And suddenly, without warning, I find him attractive! I have pretty much no idea why, although it is very possible that the joke about Hitchcock references and the willingness to sing Lady Gaga with great enthusiasm have something to do with it. Anyway, I have seen the light! Now, apropos of nearly nothing, I want all the Arthur fic. ALL OF IT.

How Inception should have ended. I usually kind of hate the 'how it should have ended' cartoons, but this one had me wheezing with laughter all the way through. I think it was because it actually used dream logic? Um, obviously, spoilers like crazy all over this.

A Study in Time, or, the trailer for a Sherlock/Doctor Who crossover. It's quite clever, and since I've only seen Sherlock once, I didn't remember most of the context, which made it about ten times more awesome. I'm a bit worried about Sherlock and the Master facing off, though, mostly for the Master's sake.

The Eleventh Doctor at the Proms. It is quite silly, but it is still miles better than that Grask nonsense, and more importantly, it made me clutch my face and shriek a bit about how adorable Matt Smith is. Seriously, adorable. Also, still lovely with children.

Kylie Minogue's All The Lovers. I never would have come across this on my own, but I was linked to it, and it is one of my new favourite things ever. It is the happiest, most beautiful, and casually queerest spontaneous surreal orgy I have ever seen! And then for no good reason a white horse gallops through the streets! I want my whole damn life to be like this music video.

Trigger, Bruce McDonald's new film about lady rockers who happen to be played by Tracy Wright and Molly Parker; Daniel MacIvor wrote it, and IMDb tells me that the other actors with top billing are Don McKellar and Sarah Polley, as you do. And, as the cherry on top of the tiny incestuous Canadian awesomecake, CKR is Billy Tallent again. I may have screamed a bit with joy, and that was before I got to the clip with Billy. I am semi-seriously considering a road trip to Canada to catch this in theatres.

I just made the accidental discovery that I actually have the first two seasons of Stargate Atlantis on DVD. (I did buy s1! And s2 was given by a friend! But it was ages ago and went right out of my head.)

My point here is that I have about a billionty due South fics to write and I'm about to return to school and run out of time to do anything non-academic, but: Canadians! some guy with a gun and emotional inarticulation and funny hair! wacky hijinks! IN SPACE! Despite the fact that the show was generally rubbish unless it was about Rodney being trapped underwater or dealing with his sister or nearly ascending or communing with whales or, y'know, all those other things Rodney does, and despite the fact that I used SGA fic as a gateway into dS fandom and that doing it in reverse would probably be a trainwreck of me never sleeping again from fic overload, I am ... deeply tempted.

I need to just write more of the stuff I'm already working on and not give myself any extra fannish stuff. Otherwise Fraser and RayK will end up in Atlantis (is it just an American military presence? if so, Fraser is civilian crew and does diplomatic missions in a Teyla-esque capacity and wears a red shirt akin to Elizabeth's) and then my brain would explode. Meanwhile Ronon and Dief become friends. I MEAN NO ARGH.

Possibly I will just panic and watch Hard Core Logo again only this time I know I will cry at the end. I want to write the massive s2 AU. I want to write the massive s2 AU.

Callum mini-interview! He's all fidgety and hides behind his hand and doesn't want to be called a sex symbol and deflects questions about whether playing fucked-up people fucks him up and then he becomes slightly less nervous when he gets to MAKE FUN OF PAUL GROSS'S HAIR. I I can't even.

But I am not giving him his own tag.

Also: I am writing Remus/Tonks fic, although it is for the doppelgangers, clones, and evil doubles square on my Cliche Bingo card, so ... when I say Remus/Tonks fic I don't think I actually mean fic that any real Remus/Tonks shipper would like? And I am wondering if there is any Harry Potter fic place from which I can link "emotionally damaged people making bad decisions and not really being in love" fic when it is finished. Help? Mocking of my ability to actually focus on one thing at a time also accepted.

Arriving safely home, I decided it was high time to finish mainlining Flashpoint. What I love about it is that I finally get the appeal of all those ridiculously popular rote procedural shows that I never watch -- the closest I've ever come to getting it is Bones, because I am fond everyone on that show in much the same way; even that, though, I watch in a kind of vague with-friends when-I-have-time way -- but wow, I love this one. I love it in the way where I want there to be more episodes! right now! I love it in the way where I am overinvested in Ed and Greg's buckets of angst and Spike and Lew's hilarious bromance and everything Wordy and Jules do ever. (And I imagine that playing Canadian Actor Bingo makes it more fun too.) In conclusion I am confused that something with so many guns and tense situations is apparently my new comfort telly, but y'know what? I finished the last episode with my hands pressed to my mouth in sheer joy and I haven't stopped grinning yet, so I am really, really not complaining.

Anyway, having now seen all of it, I think I want:

1. Jules/Donna fic. No, really. They're onscreen together for about five seconds total in order to awkwardly shake hands, but I desperately want long plotty shipfic. I want fic where Jules spends her downtime in her newly-painted apartment, staring at the walls and feeling antsy and vaguely guilty about Sam, and eventually she goes out and runs into Donna at some café/bar where they get to talking. They talk about Team 1 and about being women in the SRU, and eventually they start talking about Donna's time undercover and about what they like to do for fun (do we know what they like to do for fun? I think we only really know anything about Wordy's personal life) and they become friends. And neither of them really expect it, but eventually they figure out that when they're hanging out, now at each other's apartments or out on the town, they're basically dating. They really like one another, so rather than freaking out they talk it through like reasonable adults. (I figure this is a universe where Jules is comfortably bi and Donna is an awesome lesbian who is maybe occasionally bi re: undercover.) They decide to stay together, because their relationship isn't interfering with their professional lives since they're on different teams, only of course then the plot kicks in when both Team 1 and Team 3 are called in for the same hot call, and there is lots of ~dramatic tension~ and possibly also Sam in the background being TOTALLY BEWILDERED, Jules, what is this shit?? And I don't know what happens after that, but obviously I don't want this recced to me, I want to write it.

2. Ed/Greg fic. I actually feel mad guilty about this one, mostly because Ed's wife Sophia is made of pure 100% grade-A awesome. But I do not want handwavey fic, I want fic where Ed does not listen to Greg's warnings about continuing on as he is, and eventually Sophia gently files for divorce and takes their son and moves to a different city, because she understands but she's tired of waiting and she doesn't think it's fair to any of them. Ed takes it all extremely reasonably, and is, y'know, totally fine, and keeps doing his job, and Greg hovers worriedly in the background trying to anticipate the meltdown without actually assuming it'll happen. Because Ed's there to pick all of them up, but who's there for Ed, right? Of course in this case the answer is "Greg" but he is not aware of it yet. And, um, *handwaves* then there is plot and they have sex. I don't know! If this fic already exists I want it recced, but if it doesn't I might damn well write it too. Because, unsurprisingly, I am so there for however-many pages of emotional inarticulation and Team and cops in love. /o\

3. Spike/Lew fic! I confess that I mostly want Spike/Lew fic to sort of combat my other two desires, because Happy Fic is sometimes necessary. Obviously Spike and Lew go out and pretend to chase tail and have a grand old time, and then they go back to their place (they can share a place, right? I totally assume that they share a place, see: that one episode where everyone was calling their families to say they'd be working late, and Spike and Lew called each other because they're dooorks and also living together, obviously) and have enthusiastic nerdsex. This fic probably has, like, ice cream and puppies, and also the two of them going in early to the gym and having lots of hilarious banter with Wordy, because I kind of suspect that hilarious banter with Wordy is my favourite thing about Flashpoint. This one I absolutely don't need to write, but since I'm under the vague impression that fandom has lots of Spike/Lew fic, I think I should be fine.

4. SOME MONSTER EPIC WITH ALL OF THESE THINGS. It could be called "How Ed and Jules Took A Leaf From Spike and Lew's Book, & Learned How to Stop Worrying and Love Their Teammates, Nudge Nudge Wink Wink, PS Wordy is Awesome and No One Likes Sam." It would be the BEST FIC EVER.

Sorry, guys, I'm punchy from travel. Recs? Recs not specific to the things I listed but which will still get me to the places with good Flashpoint fic? Any takers for reading that fic I want to write? You've never heard of Flashpoint and have no idea what I'm talking about? Perhaps I should shut up and finish the F/K/V before the polybigbang deadline looms? Let's hear it. :D

In other news I'm now mainlining Flashpoint; I came to the conclusion pretty quickly that I really need to be around comforting people before I can give Durham County a real go, but then I started having, um, Hugh withdrawal. (Oh my god, didn't I say I knew it was a bad, bad idea to watch Hard Core Logo? I want my fucking life back, Mr. Dillon. And also my ability to refrain from swearing every other word; it hasn't been this bad since that time I RP'd an angry British man who liked to blow shit up. Good times.)

In any case, Flashpoint! I am really easy for shows About The Team anyway, and probably nothing in the 'verse can erase my Enrico Colantoni love after the sheer awesome of Keith Mars, so it's all good. On the other hand, I so actively don't care about Sam that every time he's on screen having manpain I want him to go away yesterday, possibly to make room for Ed's angst instead. And to my massive bewilderment, the fact that Hugh Dillon has no hair is not actually making me find him any less attractive. I don't know quite what to do about this, but on the other hand maybe when Hugh has normal people hair he breaks the laws of physics or something. (And I would link to fic to prove my point, but then I would actually be admitting that I was reading fic about Hugh Dillon's attractiveness breaking the laws of physics.)

And look, I have a new goddamn fandom tag and everything.

Durham County: like someone beat the fuck out of Desperate Housewives and shoved it out naked into the cold. Where it made angry friends with Hugh Dillon.

Okay, to be fair, the only way it is really like Desperate Housewives is that Traci Prager is totally an escapee from that show, and also Suburbia Is Creepy. Really my brain breaks a little at the notion of landing Mike Sweeney in the middle of Wisteria Lane. But this is only the first episode and maybe it will be relentlessly not-suburban-USA enough that I will stop having deeply weird double-vision moments.

I wish I could watch Durham County with someone, though. I mean, even BSG I had a bit of trouble with if I didn't have someone there to hold my hand. So after that first episode I decided it really called for some comfort telly. Due South is exactly that, although I'm starting to run out of Kowalski episodes I haven't seen too many times. Happily I also find Vecchio comforting, so I finally watched The Edge, ie the only episode of due South I hadn't yet seen all the way through (besides Invitation to Romance, which I am not actually sure I will ever be able to watch).

( The Edge: in which Fraser has anxiety dreams and goes tracking; probably a slightly higher ratio of squee to coherence than the organized recapping I did in June. )

Okay, this time Hard Core Logo made me cry at the end. Protip: do not watch just before going to bed, or you will end up laying there staring at the ceiling feeling sad, and not particularly astonishingly the Headstones did not actually work as a cheering-up method. On the other hand this morning I have plans to watch kind of embarrassing amounts of My Life as a Dog, which should do the trick.

The point I'm pretty sure I had before I got sad about HCL is that I am kind of floored that CKR was able to sandwich being Billy in between being Johnny for the surrounding year. Good god. And my other point is that I am endlessly delighted by the massive amounts of love I have for various of his characters, so much so that I really cannot decide who is my favourite. Since it is a weekend and days off mean poll time! I figured this was certainly important enough to take a poll on.

(Ray Kowalski is Sir Not Appearing in This Poll, because I know, and I'd probably choose him too.)


If you ticked that last option, by the way, and then your answer turns out to, say, have anything to do with the time he was a vampire with a mutant Pomeranian, I -- well, I'll probably just giggle. But I figure it is perfectly valid to love someone not in that poll the most, even though I'm pretty sure I covered most of the not-a-sociopath options there, and I'm also pretty sure Leoben doesn't even count.

Now I should probably stop dithering and write more of the massive AU, although I would be equally willing to have hilarious conversations about what would happen if various of CKR's characters met one another. (Like, Newbie and Leoben? Particularly hilarious. Okay, stopping now.)

Big Bang that is the F/K/V s2 AU: 6740 words long, most of one episode remixed, maybe one third of part one (of six) completed. Times listened to Hard Core Logo soundtrack on loop: I have lost count. New Canadian Actor Bingo square filled: Bucky Haight as an unexpected tattoo artist in The Promise; I'm pretty sure I've finally stopped laughing. Maybe. At least he did not actually give Fraser a tattoo of a Candian flag with an oak leaf in the middle.

I had a horrible pounding headache earlier, probably because I was busy writing until my eyes crossed and forgot that I sometimes need to do things like eat; I have had toast and apple juice (little kid comfort food is TOTALLY VALID) and the room has decided to stop spinning. I am pretty sure the axiom about laughter being the best cure is still true, though, because I am feeling decidedly better now that I have come across Canada Does Hogwarts. It's basically one big inside joke, and possibly a little to my horror it succinctly explains my love for the C6D fandom -- I say to my horror because I now think that Callum Rennie earnestly explaining that really you are playing Quidditch against yourself is the height of humour. It also seems that I have seen exactly enough C6D stuff to get every single one of the jokes, about which I am irrationally pleased. And the room is still stable, but I am pondering the wisdom of going to bed early (rather than trying to write more, wtf self) and I cannot actually think of a graceful way to end this entry. Read the fic! It is extremely short and quite funny! Good night.

Today it is Unimportant Question Time! Okay, these questions are important to me, because I am curious, but they are not even for very scientific statistical purposes. (Look, I have to do something with my day off.)

Today I bring unsolicited DVD commentary for And Count Myself a King of Infinite Space. It is only thinly masquerading as DVD commentary, though, and when it grows up it mostly wants to be an essay about Billy Tallent. Right now, though, it mostly exists in demonstration of the fact that I have watched both Slings & Arrows and Hard Core Logo enough that I can meta about both of them with reasonable intelligence.

( Commentary! Interactive in the sense that people should totally talk about HCL with me. )