Guys, 5 acts is back again and it's super low pressure, you just write down some kinks and people write comment fic for you. Yay! I have a ton of ideas of things to write, now I just need to get down to it. (Note to self: you are not allowed to do any more canon rewatch just to write comment fic.)

femslash12 stories are out! The masterlist is up here.

My favorite one so far: cupid's got a gun by lastwingedthing, which is Teen Wolf, Lydia Martin/Ms Morell (played by Bianca Lawson aka the woman who doesn't age.) But it's really about Lydia and how she's strong and smart and she can't really deal with what's happened but she can do fucking magic and keep her head up. Basically this is what I want for Lydia - to see her come back from being someone else's pawn/object. And Ms Morell works really well as a mentor, someone who can keep up with Lydia and cares about her and won't lie to her. It's just brilliant, beautifully written, sweet and sad and hopeful. And the whole teacher/student thing is dealt with in the best possible way if that is a squick. GO GO READ IT.

Aaand... it is way past time for me to go to bed. The boy is sick with a cold and I really need to try to avoid getting sick too. But I was determined to post this before I get busy and forget.

At some point I will make the post about what is going on with my life these days (I has jobs!) and try to catch up with folks. I do not understand what LJ has done to filters - every time I try to read my flist, I am pulled into the vortex of fanficrants or something like that. I'm guessing that means it's time to do some housekeeping. Ehhhh.

femslash12 is coming up and there's a poll open to determine what fandoms will be on the Big List (you can request/write in other fandoms but have to offer/request at least one fandom from the list). So go vote for Teen Wolf in the Polling Post if you're interested in writing or reading in the Femslash Ficathon! The anime and manga fandoms especially could use some votes.

Okay, fandom! Sometime in July, maybe even on July 1st, control of Delicious will transfer to AVOS. Any Delicious account that has not explicitly opted in to the transfer will be lost forever. I would like to generate a list of fannish accounts that have not opted in and back up all their PUBLIC bookmarks. To do this, I need a lot of help, in not a lot of time. That's where you come in. Things you can do to assist in this endeavor:

1. Link this post around!
2. Comment to this post with any fannish Delicious accounts that you know of. Don't worry about duplicating someone else's suggestions, or listing accounts that have maybe already opted in. We're aiming for maximum coverage in this step. I'll be filtering the lists programmatically. To that end, please keep your lists simple and consistent, with each account name on its own line and no extra text.
3. Feeling ambitious? Volunteer to help do the actual backing up by emailing me at my gmail account, verymurklins. You need to have Java installed on your computer and be willing to use a command line interface to run a script. More detailed instructions will be provided, of course, but since we're short on time, I won't be able to walk people through installing Java, so volunteers will have to get that part done on their own. Note: If your computer runs Mac OS X, it already has Java.

And what will I do with all the archived accounts? I don't exactly know yet. For now, I just want to be sure that someone, somewhere, has a copy of all this fannish data. Once the transfer to AVOS goes through, we'll get a feel for the new landscape of Delicious and weigh the options.

Read the post here
How to find out if an account is opted-in

This afternoon, I was listening to a long Clark/Lex podfic and started to drift off (the fic isn't boring, I was just sitting in a warm room.) So, I went to lie down in the bedroom where it was cooler and lo, several hours later, I woke up all discombobulated and headachey. Note to self: you're supposed to be sleeping at night! I seem to have trouble with this concept.

Jean Auel (Clan of the Cave Bear author) has the final book of the series out. I think I read the first three books and then got a bit bored, but I might check out it because... CAVES! I was amused by this part of the interview:

GR: Describe a typical day spent writing. Do you have any unusual writing habits?

JA: A typical night. I'm a night person. Generally what happens is that I get up about two in the afternoon, and I make what is my husband's lunch or dinner and my breakfast, and we spend some time together in the evening. Then he goes to bed and I go to work. I often catch the sun rising. Mornings are terrible for me, so I'd rather sleep mornings.

I haven't become that extreme yet but there have been a lot of days where I go to bed just as the boy is getting up. (He points out that you can really only do that if you're a best-selling author. Or unemployed.)

Speaking of the boy, he discovered a new source of amusement that rivals lolcats: British Royals Hats. OMG, so ridiculous! The Ascot seems to draw the most awesome/awful hats. This is Princess Bea in what is colloquially known as "the guitar pick."



If you want to see more, the Mad Hattery is a blog dedicated to crazy royal hats. The most recent posts are not that interesting but I knew when I saw The Queen's pimp hat that we had stumbled upon something truly amazing.

There's this pink monstrosity and something that is possibly the ugliest hat I've ever seen (it looks like pieces of lemon peel glued together.) And hey, Princess Anne giving the camera a very we are not amused look. :D



Oh, my. How did she ever think it was a good idea to attach that to her head?

After you look at enough of them, you start to get desensitized and something like this seems fairly normal (despite looking like a spaceship and covering half her face) just in comparison. Then it takes something truly bizarre like The Queen of Denmark in costume to really make you rofl.

I have no idea what's going on here.

Threats Against LGBT People Persist in Rural America... [and everywhere else]

One of the most moving moments in Out in the Silence occurs when C.J., the gay teen who has been tormented for over a year at his small town high school, says: "This place isn't like New York or DC where everybody's liberal. I get threats to be killed."

In August, the OITS Campaign was starkly reminded of just how real the threat of anti-LGBT violence is, especially in small towns and rural communities where even a small minority of intolerant individuals can poison the atmosphere of the entire community.

The ugliness took place in Coudersport, a small town nestled in the ruggedly-beautiful hills of north central Pennsylvania. Despite a series of harmonious and successful events in neighboring towns, the OITS Campaign was met in Coudersport by a barrage of Tea Party and fundamentalist activists who tried to shut the screening down and called for defunding the public library simply for being the site of an openly-LGBT event.

Fortunately, the library board was not to be intimidated, and the resulting publicity helped to create an extraordinarily well-attended, diverse and productive town-hall event that received national media attention: Potter County Library Faced Protests Over Gay Documentary (Harrisburg Patriot-News)

( Read more... POTENTIAL TRIGGERS: transphobia and threats of violence to trans women )

GO ARGENTINA!

And no, marriage is not actually necessary for the perpetuation of the species. Somebody didn't get The Talk.

Preview:


( Falling in love again... )

Last day to sign up for...



At the moment, we've actually got three four artists looking for writers with whom to collaborate. It's a pretty low pressure challenge - minimum 100 words for text, 1 min of audio for podfic, 30 seconds of video, 10-20 icons, or a final piece of art. Signups close at 11:59 EST tonight (but that's a soft deadline because we intend to get EVERYONE matched up.)

WE HAVE SNOWPOCALYPSE!

Flying home tomorrow! The great San Francisco adventure comes to an end.

Whoa, Tết falls on Valentine's Day this year. That's kinda neat. I'm feeling very New Year-oriented lately. How many times can you celebrate the New Year in one year?! Since I keep trying to start over and clear my slate, it feels appropriate.

My main New Year's resolution is to keep a journal (on paper.) But I'd also like to do some weight-training and try to gain muscle mass, continue exploring religious/spiritual avenues, help manach more with keeping the house clean, build something for the cats to climb, get chest surgery in May or June, keep in touch with friends, and fulfill some fannish and RL promises (ideally I'd like to get these done before Tết.)

Also, sleep more. Sleep = less acne, which would be of the good.