Lyras

...although I am back on antibiotics to hopefully kick out the last of the infection that caused the pneumonia last month. Life is kind of frustrating at the moment - I'm trying to take it easy, but also need to earn money, so any energy I have is going on paid work, and if I overdo it, I end up in bed again. Feh. I have tried to pop in here and there, as some of you've noticed, but I'm sorry I'm not around more. Hopefully that will change soon, especially as the Christmas fests are due to launch in the near future.

In the interests of telling you at least a little of what's going on with me:

Reading and loving: Charlotte Mendelson (When We Were Bad is possibly a perfect book), One Foot Wrong by Sofie Laguna, more Patrick Gale (The Facts of Life), Adrian Tchaikovsky's fantasy novels, Pamela Freeman's Castings Trilogy and some Swedish thrillers by Åsa Larsson*.
Reading and head exploding: Stuffed and Starved by Raj Patel (about the global food industry) and quantum theory.
Reading and meh: translations (I am not going to blame the man himself until I see the Swedish original) of Henning Mankell's Wallander books. Jesus Christ, the dialogue is excruciating.

Listening and swooning to: Mumford & Sons, Broken Records, Loch Lomond and The Young Republic
Listening and bouncing to: The Dropkick Murphys (am going through an Irish/folky phase)
Looking forward to seeing live: Jarvis Cocker and Grizzly Bear

Writing: not much, unfortunately. Am working on various fannish commitments, and generally pissed off about my inability to spend much time at a computer without getting ill again.

Watching: have decided that if I am still ill, that justifies me starting my rewatch of BSG.

*Can't remember the English titles, but they have been translated, so google her if you like decent thrillers with strong female protagonists.

How about the rest of you? Tell me what you're up to!

Thanks, everyone, for your comments on my previous post; I am definitely starting to feel better, although my mum has come out with her mother hen feathers flying. I suspect she's secretly rather pleased that she got me for another week, and I must admit that, while I miss my boyfriend even more now, it's been great to spend some extra time with my niece and new nephew, as well as all my friends with kids around here. Baby central, it is!

I'm slightly embarrassed about barging into my mum's party all grey and pneumonic with a drip in my hand, but I still think in retrospect that I'd rather have done that than missed it altogether. Also, I never knew that painkillers could give you such interesting dreams, even while you were awake.

Have been catching up on British telly - I wish we had QI, Mock the Week and Dalziel and Pascoe in Australia! Also caught the end of the Martha series of Doctor Who, and another episode of True Blood, which reminded me that I have the DVDs with me. Perhaps I'll watch them during my free evening tomorrow.

The interesting thing, though, has been the shift in my mental process - I do seem to be thinking of Australia as home. I'm not sure how my mum is going to react when she realises this, but I really am looking forward to getting back.

Fannishly, I think few things are going to have to change. Last night, after finishing the series, I went online and hunted down a load of BSG comms. But I still really have no idea if I'll be joining the fandom. I've loved a lot of books and TV programmes before now, without really getting involved in their fandoms. But I've also realised over the past few weeks that my life has become far too dependent on the latest flist entries, and on guilt over whatever fic exchange I'm involved in. So clearly I need to set some new rules for myself. Wish me luck with that, all of you who've tried it before. *g*

Wow, this is very much a nothing entry. Sorry! I just felt I owed something to those of you who aren't BSG fans.

Writing-wise, I now have to gather myself for my ownficfest entry, which remains half-done. I've a couple of fics on my hard drive that just need a final edit before posting, but I also need to work on Darkfest and Smutty_claus, both of which assignments I'm pretty happy with. I just feel a bit out of touch at the moment, so hopefully that'll change shortly.

What's everyone else doing? Slogging away at HP Christmas fests? Gearing up for Yuletide? Veering off to foreign shores? Tell me what you're up to!

( Spoilery thoughts under here )

*weary wave*

BRB, convalescing from pneumonia.

Short version of long story: felt ill on Friday, developed chest pain overnight, sacked off the wedding I was supposed to go to on Saturday am, went to doctor instead, doctor sent me to hospital, I asked when I could go home (I just wanted some antibiotics and to go and lie down) and was told that a temp of 39 degrees was very worrying and I wasn't going anywhere that day; I raised hell because it was my mum's birthday party (ie the main reason I'd come over from Oz); they let me out for a couple of hours, I realised exactly how ill I was as soon as I left the ward, spent a few days lying in bed grateful that there are such things as painkillers in the world, and wishing that said painkillers didn't make me throw up constantly, and have just got home, late on Monday night.

I was supposed to be on a plane to Australia at this moment...luckily, it was very cheap to change the flight, so I have an extra week in the UK.

*another wave* Hope you're all better than I am!

I'm doing something terribly egotistical here. I'm posting a single scene from my longest story to date (The Lions of Gryffindor). It works as an outtake, I think, and I also think it's one of the best things I've ever written. It's a scene I'd had in my mind for years, and it was wonderful to finally have the opportunity to write it (for Springtime_gen).

Sorry, I know it's pushy of me. But I don't expect many people to work through a 16000-word story, and I think this can stand by itself, thanks to JKR's wonderful scene-setting. I hope this will make up for the fact that I haven't posted any fic in weeks.

Title: Lions at Bay
Word count: 400
Characters/pairings: Alice and Frank, Bellatrix (yes, it's that scene).
Warnings: torture, although hopefully it's not too graphic. The torture isn't the point.
Summary: When Alice came to, the agony was mostly in her memory...

( When Alice came to, the agony was mostly in her memory... )

+ Spending time with my (now six-year-old!) niece is just lovely. She's so sweet: brave and a little bit cheeky, but just vulnerable enough that you know she's growing up into a wonderful person. And she's so excited about her little brother, who is due to be born any day now.

- My (ninety-nine-year-old) nanna looks to be on her way out, so my visit is very well-timed in that respect. I'm not upset, or anything - she's been saying she's ready to go for about fifteen years - but obviously my mum is pretty down, and the waiting is hard for her.

( The rest is cut for length. )

By the way, when I preview my posts in Dreamwidth, they come up in a tiny, narrow window on the left of the page. This isn't happening when you read them, is it? I'd hate to think I'm subjecting you all to some dreaded friends page abuse.

I aten't dead, but I'm a little preoccupied just now. Sorry if I've worried anyone. :)

Am in the UK (yay!), so will be trying to catch up with a few people in person soon. Also heading off to Sverige, and possibly coming back via Norge, plus entertaining niece and worshipping new nephew, who looks like popping out any day now (for which my sister will be very thankful).

Er, also, there is work to do, sadly. This is not a holiday, although I'm sure it sounds like one. But I'll pop in here when I can.

Ficwise, I desperately need to do a final edit on my femgenficathon story before posting, plus I'm working on ownficfest and a couple of other stories. I have beta-read two Bigbangblackout stories, and if the rest are anything close to that standard, readers will have some wonderful stuff to look forward to. And I'm going away to research my original novel later this month. \o/

As I said, I'll pop in here when I can, but if you want me to see anything, it's probably best if you drop me a comment or email me at i.in.the.door@gmail.com. And UK/Scandy people, let me know if you want to meet up if you haven't already!

Take care, everyone.

x

OK, no one's replying to my sensible post, so I give up - you can ask me for top five stuff, too, if you like. :)

Title: Taking Stock
Character: Horace Slughorn
Rating and warnings: PG-13, unsavoury implications
Summary: After his Christmas party in HBP, Horace takes stock.
Notes: Written for hbpchallenge and originally posted here. This voice started murmuring away to me and wouldn't shut up until I wrote down the words. Link goes to my fic journal.

When the last guest has floated away...

My fic-reading time is limited at the moment, so it's a good thing there's lots of short fiction being posted! Here are two I enjoyed this morning:

Situation Normal by shocolate. 999 words, PG-13, canon pairings but it's basically Harry and Ron arseing around. They survived! They're happy! It's a lovely, smiley read.

I'm sure everyone who's interested knows that dogdaysofsummer is back. There's SO MUCH being posted there, from evocative, image-heavy snippets of sunny days to more dramatic, character-heavy stories. As I said, I don't have much time to read at the moment, but I'm making a point of reading rosemaryandrue's series of ficlets, set during the summer of 1976. She says: "It's the summer the Marauders come of age, a time of violence and destruction, of the beginnings of the Order of the Phoenix...So, this is a story which begins in a place where injustice and resentment are woven into the very landscape. It's hot and oppressive and Remus is waiting under the constant threat of disaster for something to finally break.

Part one is here; she's now up to part four, but they're only short, so there's plenty of opportunity for latecomers to catch up.

(Interestingly, both of these stories I'd term gen with shippy overtones, despite the pairings I've used in the tags.)

Oh, Bobby, you were always my favourite. :(

Bobby Robson dies of cancer.

I'll just be in the corner, sniffling a little.

I may regret making this public. Anyway, I read (and loved) Crystal Rain recently. I thought it was a brilliant book that incorporated Caribbean culture into the sci-fi world really effectively.

I was reading it as part of my 50books_poc challenge...but when I reached the end of the book, I found a photograph of the (to me) very obviously white author. His author picture on his website makes him look equally white.

Yet I remember people talking about him as a reason not to boycott Tor during the Racefail discussions a few months ago.

I'm just...confused, I suppose, as to how someone who is white can be described as a person of colour.

This is similar to my misgivings about Isabel Allende: she may be Latin American, but she is very much part of the ruling elite of Latin America, and the people she writes about also belong to the ruling elite, for the most part.

To me, a white person, even if they live somewhere in which people are generally marginalised, has all kinds of advantages that people of colour who lived in the same place would not receive. Am I wrong in this assumption?

*pressing post rather nervously*


Sorry, I updated the LJ post but forgot about this one:
ETA: OK, I guess I've learned one basic rule here: before questioning a person's ethnicity, look into what they say themselves. Sorry for being dim about this!

Just a quick note to suggest that you all check out hbpchallenge over the next few days; there are some absolutely wonderful ficlets there, with an average word count of around 500 words, I reckon.

When I signed up (not that I've submitted a ficlet yet - or have I?? All will be revealed in a few days), I thought it might be a fun way to write a short piece on HBP. I wasn't expecting to see so many incisive, beautifully written takes on the various issues of HBP, from Slughorn (who is definitely the star of the show IMO) to Merope Gaunt to missing scenes from the book to Minerva McGonagall. Seriously, this little fest has been a treat for this reader.

Too busy with work and social life to do more than keep afloat here, and I keep forgetting to crosspost my stories. :(

This is mostly a list for my own reference, because I have a mounting list of fics to post here and at my fic journal, plus a few others in the works. However, if they're already posted I'll also mention the relevant community, so you can go off and find them yourself if you're interested:

Repost to fic journal: 30 days of Neville ficlets from xnevillelovingx

Repost here and at fic journal:
Remix fic (from remixredux09)
hg_silverlining fic
percy_ficathon fic
hp_beholder fic (several months late, which is ridiculous, because I'm proud of this fic, and it went down brilliantly during the fest)

To post very soon (ie when I finish editing them):

hbpchallenge ficlet (or ficlets, if I find time to write the second one I'm pondering)
femgenficathon fic. A couple of days ago, I decided I wasn't taking on enough issues in the story, so added another section (it will become clear how ridiculous this is when the story's posted). I'm getting a bit obsessive.
Augusta ficlet for shiiki
Wells ficlet for rosina_alcona
Book Thief ficlet for trude
Bleak House ficlet for donnaimmaculata

Also working on:

Sirius fic
Story for ownficfest, which I am loving. I think I've found a second genre I want to write in.

( Brief UGH on female characters and interview canon )

I'm also wondering about the sexual politics of the word "wizard". JKR seems to start out using "wizard" for males and "witch" for females, but somewhere along the way, "wizard" becomes a generic term for men or women - sort of the way "actors" has become the preferred term and "actress" has become politically incorrect. That said, she isn't consistent, and I'm fairly sure "witch" is still used occasionally in the later books (not to mention things like Witch Weekly. In HP stories, I tend to use "wizard" as a generic term (ie for both men and women), but now I'm wondering whether I am correct in this. What do the rest of you think?

Finally, Remix! Last time I did Remix was three years ago, and I was a much callower writer then. I really don't think I produced a very good Remix (I found the process very intimidating). This time around, it's a completely different (if still slightly scary) experience. I'll be amazed if anyone guesses which remix is mine, but feel free to guess if you like. *g*

As for my remixed story, the author has taken a ficlet I wrote years ago, set immediately post-HBP, in which Snape offers Draco a choice, and drawn it out to encompass DH canon. Draco has made his choice, and the results are not what he expected. Poor Little Lamb (The Draco's Choice Remix) - check it out! There's added Neville, in case that persuades anyone. :)

Hmm, I have no music icon. I shall have to correct that. Anyway, I'm feeling a bit spammy, having given myself the day off because I am still down with flu, and ended up spending the entire time writing fic, reading fic or responding to HBP reviews. Oh, well. That's what sick days are for, I suppose!

So: that guess the song from the first line meme, nicked from dolabellae.

1. Well, we're standin' in the kitchen, and we're cookin' us some chicken.
2. Dark descends through the promised land, down kingdom come and the acid ban.
3. Flies are buzzing round my head, vultures circling the dead.
4. Susan catches a bus into town at 10.30 am and sits in the back seat.
5. If you were a season, you would be in bloom, I wish I had good reason to see you soon.
6. You would say anything, you would try anything.
7. Spare me the psychobabble, the mental rub-down.
8. Our conversation was short and sweet, it nearly swept me off my feet.
9. I Roslagens famn på den blommande ö, där vågorna kluckar mot strand... (OK, I know nobody will get this, but I HAD to post it because it is one of those songs that means an awful lot to me, and you never know, one of my Scandies might have a clue.)
10. Fall into old habits. Talk about giving it up after getting right on.
11. Crawlin', I don't know where to or from, the centre of things from where everything stands is not where I belong...
12. Just behind the station, before you reach the traffic island, a river runs through a concrete channel.
13. My oh my, I'm seeing the potential, let's just see what we can do.
14. Where are those happy days, they seem so hard to find. SOS - ABBA, guessed by minnow_53
15. Is it April yet? I forget sometimes how slowly summer passes...
16. A friend in need's a friend indeed, a friend with weed is better. Pure Morning, guessed by minnow_53
17. Well, it happened years ago, when you lived on Stanhope Road.
18. In sleep he sang to me, in dreams he came, that voice which calls to me, and speaks my name.
19. It's six o'clock, the birds are singing, I'm wide awake, whilst you're still fast asleep.
20. Wakey, wakey, rise and shine, it's on again off again...

Damnit, I'm having too much fun to stop.

21. Don't know what to do by myself, 'cause all of my time was with you.
22. As he sits on the wall with his newfound friends.
23. You think you're young, you're middle-class. They say it doesn't matter.
24. If I should stay, I would only be in your way. (I would like to point out that this is NOT the godawful cover from that godawful film.)
25. Cosette, it's turned so cold, Cosette it's past your bedtime. Come to me, from Les Miserables, guessed by minnow_53
26. These silent words of conversation hold me now this adulation.
27. They took me to the battlefield and I saw the mushroom cloud.
28. She's a streetlight in the evening rain, an empty seat on the rush hour train.
29. I've got one good song left in me, and it's pouring out like oil.
30. If I should die this very moment, I wouldn't fear, for I've never known completeness like being here. Gorecki - Lamb, guessed by snowandsunshine

I woke up this morning and my flist was full of fic and HBP reviews! *flails*

Some fannish activities for you:

hbpchallenge is taking HBP prompts (either film or book-based) until 25 July. Leave your prompts here (but beware movie spoilers if you haven't seen HBP yet). The idea is to take a prompt (even one you leave yourself, if you like) and create something small - I believe the maximum word count for fic is 1,000 words, although, magnetic_pole being who she is, I'm sure she won't smite you if you go over the limit.

I am also participating in the Most Epic HP Story Eva, which is a tag team fic over at azkatrazathome. The story so far can be found here!

My reactions are very much under the cut, but firstly, I went to the imax, so we were all given 3D specs, and I was totally not expecting them to be so cool! I looked at the girl who handed me them in a "are you sure I really need this, I am not twelve" kind of way, but when the trailers started I put them on, and oooh! The images really do become three-dimensional. Very impressive.

Anyway. ( Observations on specific storylines. )

( On the relationships )

( Favourite moments )

( On the acting and actors )

Ahem. Long post is long. Anyone else want to chime in with opinions?

I have seen HBP and will put up a post with my reactions shortly. But first:

hbpchallenge

As explained by the wonderful magnetic_pole:

"... a community for the harried and commitment-phobic Half-Blood Prince fan.

Here's the challenge: create something (anything!) about HBP, movie or book, by July 29. The catch? It's got to be short, and you've got to do it (relatively) quickly. Maximum word count for fic and meta: 1000 words. Drawbles and icons and other fanworks also welcome! You've got two weeks from the movie's opening date."

More info here, and the prompt post has just gone up here (NB: movie spoilers will appear in the comments to this post!).

Like all Maggie's fests, this one is low on stress and hot on fun!


Also, for anyone who feels that they're missing out by not attending Azkatraz:

azkatrazathome will be hosting a drabble fest, round table discussions and more over the next few days.

Plenty to keep everyone occupied, I think!

Spoilers for episode 17, Maelstrom, ( under the cut )

Onto the next episode.