a conspiracy of cartographers

I got TWO Yuletide fics this year!

Okay, Then, The Wicked & the Divine -- a lovely little post-canon fixit fic for [spoilers redacted, but it's the only part of canon I was unsatisfied with]

& as a treat: Excerpt from Book 22 (lost) of The Noniad by Ortus Nigenad, Locked Tomb Trilogy -- Ortus/Nonius, IN TERRIBLE EPIC VERSE, I was absolutely dying laughing (the best part is that my Locked Tomb request was for literally any character and for the author to follow their heart, and by god they DID)

Family FaceTime was lovely; we've received many holiday cards this week; it's dismal and raining out, but we baked tons of cookies yesterday and there's a whole Yuletide archive to deep-dive into. Also I seem to have said this everywhere but dreamwidth, but: Amiel and I are engaged! I probably have a longer post in me about that, but today is for lounging and reading. Happy Yuletide and whatever winter festivities you celebrate, everyone <3

For New Year's Eve I convened with many local friends, all of whom had drawn up D&D characters, and we chose characters at random in order to play an all-night campaign. My first character got red shirted and died in literally the first thirty seconds; my next character, a pixie barbarian named Tankerbelle, survived the night and was incredibly fun to play. Now we're making brunch, and will probably play yet more D&D!

For Yuletide this year, I wrote Exorcist fic! Batter My Heart, Marcus/Tomas. I loved writing it, and I want to write so much more Exorcist fic now. (Like, WHAT IF I WRITE THIRD SEASON, is more or less where I have landed on wanting to write more Exorcist fic, of fucking course I have.)

Happy new year, pals <333

Happy December 25th! Under the virtual tree I still have a mystery Yuletide Madness gift, and I woke this morning to a lovely little offering:

The Most Worth It, which is, indeed, Worth It fic -- Steven and Andrew go on three dates at three different price points, Steven is enthusiastic, Andrew slowly comes around, it's adorable.

This morning I did small family present exchange with my parents, and this afternoon we're ... going to take a break from the usual Christmas tradition of Muppet Christmas Carol and/or Love Actually to instead watch The Mask? and maybe Muppet Treasure Island? Apparently once a year is too often for the same movies over and over eventually! In the meantime, I'm tearing happily through the Yuletide archive and compiling a small recs list.

<333 hope y'all are having nice quiet days.

Hi, anyone newly subscribed! Say hi if you desire :D

I'm honestly delighted that I have had to do skip=60 to read back through what everyone has written since the last time I checked. Also, there seems to be an active Thor/Loki DW comm now? so all my dreams are coming true?? (Fun fact, I still think of Harry Potter and Doctor Who as my longest-running fandoms, because when you're a young teenager everything feels like it takes forever but I was only truly immersed in HP fandom for about four years, and similarly everything feels very high-commitment when you write 50k about something two summers running, but for all that I was also only really immersed in Who fandom for about three years. Meanwhile: started having Thor feelings the summer the first movie came out, here we are seven years later and not even how thoroughly I don't care about Infinity War can actually quell my feelings.) In any event, I am sad that tumblr is tanking in the sense that I'm going to miss the easy doses of good fanart, or gifsets if I want something low-maintenance but still fannish. And on the other hand, journaling is 1000% my social fandom interaction of choice and I am pretty overjoyed DW has life in it again.

Fannishly I am:

- over 1000 words on my Yuletide but not remotely near done with it; I signed up before I got a new job that is less part-time this month than I expected, but I have enough of my Yuletide done that I think I can manage without defaulting

- reading through my two Shame Shelves, as I have dubbed the bottom two shelves of my book case, wherein live all the books I still need to read; I finally felt like I was in an emotional place from which I could securely finish NK Jemisin's Broken Earth trilogy, and yesterday I finished The Stone Sky, which was so good, SO GOOD, and when I was done I gently set it down next to me and sobbed into my hands for several minutes -- highly recommended if you're prepared for how unflinchingly brutal it is

- admitting to myself that, given the number of times I've loopingly rewatched both with thewrongkindofpc, I am no longer just casually watching either Buzzfeed Unsolved or Worth It; the three separate fics I appear to be writing might also be a clue that this is an actual fandom of mine now. I have never had an rpf fandom before! how does one even cope with these real humans constantly generating new canon!! (one presumably copes with the fourth wall by locking all the fic the fuck down or getting a sock for it.)

- sloooooowly writing the Will/Hannibal fic of my heart; every scene takes a billion years because Will Graham is extremely difficult to write accurately, but I really love what I have so far, especially how deeply spot-on bizarre I have managed to make the dialogue

Anyway how are YOUR Yuletide fics going?

And then today I woke up to a Yuletide treat!

More than Gold, Road to El Dorado, a lovely little post-movie Chel/Miguel/Tulio fic! Chel is great at grifting, Tulio is maybe jealous of Miguel and Chel kissing, Miguel is maybe jealous of Chel being in their con partnership, everything works out very well and is what I always want from my El Dorado fic.

Christmas Lord of the Rings marathon, incidentally, was AMAZING -- by now we've seen it so often that we talked through the whole thing, mostly about our endless feelings and about several AUs where Boromir lives, though I did also make the mistake of early on saying "Name of your sex tape!" I think in response to Saruman's portentous "the union of the two towers," and by the back half of Return of the King we were all yelling NAME OF YOUR SEX TAPE at every viable opportunity. I'm just ... so happy about that? Lord of the Rings was deeply special to me when I was twelve and alone in a small town, and now I have friends who come over and make many weird inappropriate jokes and love it with me, and it's the very best.

It's that time of year again! YAY YULETIDE. ( Letter beneath the cut. )

First things first: Yuletide!! I received not one but TWO Babylon 5 fics this year, about which I am very pleased, because it means that my request and my lovely writers have upped the number of Londo/G'Kar fics on the internet, which is ... one of my sillier life goals, but even so.

In Vino Veritas, a slice of life with drunk Londo and long-suffering G'Kar on Centauri Prime. It is silly and serious and sweet by turns, and very much a Yuletide fic in the sense that it made me feel all warm and fuzzy first thing on Christmas morning.

In Flagrante, three times Londo and G'Kar were caught in the act: one happy, one angry, one sad. Each time is utterly charming, but because I am me and I love how hugely and tragically in love they are, the heart-punching last section is my favorite. Oh, and also there is tentacle porn, which is what Londo/G'Kar is for, really.

Meanwhile my recipient seems thrilled with my offering, so an excellent Yuletide all round! I haven't had time to read any other fic yet, but I'm hoping I'll be able to get through at least a good chunk of the archive in the next few days.

Most of the reason I haven't gone through any Yuletide fic besides my own yet is that I went out to see Les Mis today! Shenanigans ensued and, though I set out for a noon showing, I didn't actually get to watch it until 2:15. But it was totally worth switching theaters and waiting! I cried buckets and want to see it a thousand times.

Christmas Eve service was lovely, and Christmas morning was good too -- after the delight of Yuletide there was leisurely breakfast and the opening of presents. I got practicalish things, and some ornaments, and unexpectedly the first two seasons of Downton Abbey; I was not anticipating the number of gifts and may have to slightly rethink how much book space I'll have in my suitcase for the return journey, but this is an excellent problem to have.

Hope you're all having a lovely holiday/good Tuesday generally. <3

My Yuletide assignment is PERFECT & BEAUTIFUL. I always get really excited about my Yuletide assignment, but this year I've been specifically asked to write delightful found-family narratives and some characters that I already ship like burning, so this year I am REALLY, REALLY EXCITED.

I just started rereading Cloud Atlas (with the vague plan to perhaps go to the theater, pay for another film starting at the same time, and then sneak into Cloud Atlas instead, because I really want to see it on a big screen, but I feel really squodgy about giving the film money? so a reread seemed in order) but I may throw it over for a thorough canon review of my assigned fandom.

Yuletide reveal time! I've just the one story: Taking In, Young Wizards. I am the water, and the waves, or Ronan Nolan's Ordeal. Just a short character sketch, but I am fond of it. Also I am a bit proud of myself for actually writing something reasonably short for once.

And happy new year! On this the advent of 2012, I have made a number of small resolutions, mostly along the lines of finishing various writing projects and making an effort to take better care of myself. That's just the usual nonsense, though; the important thing is that I am looking forward to this year so much. I am switching cities and moving in with my BFF, I am determined to expand my social circle in said city, I have two cons to go to (and I'll probably engage in the yearly debate with myself over whether to try for VividCon, and probably decide yet again to go next year) and a delightfully large number of my US friends to see. I fully expect this coming year to be challenging and sometimes exhausting and a bit scary, and also delightful and full of adventure and deeply rewarding. Bring it on, 2012, I'm armed with all the determined enthusiasm I have. Let's do this thing.

As usual, Christmas morning is a glorious explosion of joy thanks to the magic of Yuletide. Not only did I get my main Yuletide gift, but I have a treat yet to be revealed. Those go live ... tomorrow? Greatly looking forward to it, anyway.

Have done with sorrow [Demon's Lexicon]
This is Nick/Alan, post-series, and EVERYTHING THAT I WANT. (Seriously, I would have been happy with any of the fandoms that I asked, but I wanted DL fic most, and of all possible pairings, Nick/Alan most too. Finding exactly what one wants under the virtual tree is so great.) Nick's narrative voice is perfect, angry and half-articulate and viciously funny; it's lovely to see the Market a few years in the future, and the ways in which everyone hasn't stopped being damaged. My author is either someone on my rlist or someone who researched me but good after being assigned me, because this hits all my narrative kinks. I just want to read it a million times and bask.

My gifts under the proper tree were quite excellent too: I got a slew of Sandman, and two lovely thick Sherlock Holmes anthologies, and a truly alarming amount of chocolate. Also polarisnorth sent me these little guys (Sam, Dean, Cas, and Impala art charms); I plan to hang the boys on the tree and use the Impala as a keychain. So adorbs.

I would plan to use the rest of today to start sinking into the Yuletide archive, but actually I will be baking pies and watching Muppet Christmas Carol and Love Actually and the Doctor Who Christmas special. Perhaps I can sneak a bit of Yuletide between times.