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ladiesbigbang: queen latifah.

hi!

I'm still alive! And actually doing pretty well. Sooo much better than the last entries I wrote here. :)

What I wanted to share today was that my brother is working on a project and he could use some help! He's trying to launch a product called the Velocity Clip. I'm really proud of him -- he's worked really hard on it, and it's been cool to watch how this started out as a mere brainstorm between him and his friend and has grown into this.

Velocity Clip

Yay family! \o/ Signal boosting would be absolutely appreciated :DDDD

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ladiesbigbang: queen latifah.

ladiesbigbang

...I do, in fact, still exist! I've just been mostly playing over on DW. Case in point:

ladiesbigbang: a female-centric panfanwork big bang challenge
[community profile] ladiesbigbang: a female-centric panfanwork big bang challenge. [LJ feed: ladiesbigbang]
Optional sign-ups open June 1-30th, final drafts due October 1st.
sign-ups: creators | cheerleaders | betas
info: minimums | rules & guidelines | pinch hitting


:DDD
ladiesbigbang: queen latifah.

The Women of Psych, Leverage and White Collar Commentathon: Prompts Collection

:DDDD

The Women of Psych, Leverage and White Collar Commentathon: Prompts Collection.

Oh, and I'll probably be over at DW for the duration of the three weeks. Not that I'm foreseeing that I'll be posting a lot, because I'm perpetually behind and can't seem to catch up, but I doubt I'll post pointers for every post.
ladiesbigbang: queen latifah.

mostly 'cause I need someone to write me some parker/maggie.

So, this is kind of a last-minute question, but would anyone be interested in participating (by contributing, linking, submitting prompts, etc.) in a "Women of Psych, Leverage and White Collar" commentathon for the three weeks for Dreamwidth 'fest?

I think it would go something like: 3-4 days of prompt collecting, and then the commentathon itself would be open until the end date of the three weeks. It'd be open to all media, so art/fic/recs/vids/podfic/icons/graphics/manifestos/meta/etc. I could probably also use a helper or two if anyone's interested, primarily for organizing a round-up post and possibly for writing some White Collar prompts (I always like to make sure that every available character on a show has at least one prompt, if I can, and White Collar I'm not super familiar with).

Ideas, suggestions, "make sure to do [x]" input all welcome, though no guarantees I can accommodate it.

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ladiesbigbang: queen latifah.

Alice in Wonderland: Said She (Alice, G, 860w)

Alice (light Alice/Red Queen), G, 860w.
The place you leave isn't always the place you come back to. "It will only be a matter of time until you remember how to forget," said She, her fingers spider-walking downwards to tighten the laces.

Said SheCollapse )

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ladiesbigbang: queen latifah.

Psych: Tradition (Gus, Shawn; G; 210w)

This is just pure, unadulterated sweetness.

*

Gus, Shawn; G; 210w.
Gus' face scrunched in revulsion at the sheer principle of the thing. "It's like he doesn't know us at all."

TraditionCollapse )

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ladiesbigbang: queen latifah.

Leverage: Phases (Parker/Sophie, G, 1,570w)

Thanks so much to [personal profile] fizzyblogic for the beta! ♥

*

Parker/Sophie, G, 1,570w.
Sophie, as ever, has a plan. She is a planter of seeds, a nourisher of ideas; she simply takes what is already there and brings it out into the light and waits for it to grow.

PhasesCollapse )

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ladiesbigbang: queen latifah.

♥ tinheart

I feel like I've been gone for ages! [profile] tineart was visiting for a week and a half and it was so much fun omg, and now my room is so much emptier without her in it.

In case I forgot to write a more detailed log of our adventures later, we:
  • worked on a project that's been making me want to die for years (dear missing container store receipt: where are yoooou?)
  • went to Chinatown for the day with my mom, where we had dim sum (mmmmm), bought trinkets and gifts, and also scooped up a ton of CDs and DVDs (including some Chinese opera, which I'm apparently interested in now, to my surprise, and [personal profile] tinheart got some cool instrumental stuff as well as an obscure band whose name I've forgotten)
  • drove down Lombard, my first time at the wheel! I maintain that going down is the easy part; it's getting up to the curvy part of Lombard that's scarymaking
  • got boba and dim sum on Irving
  • saw Alice and Sherlock Holmes
  • watched some of the best Gus/Shawn Psych episodes, aka almost all the episodes that feature pining!Shawn because I'm a total sucker for that; also watched a bunch of Leverage and Legend of the Seeker
  • got into a drumming groove on a pair of congas that someone's letting me hold onto until he wants them back, then did some drumming on my djembe and ashiko, and also did some swing dancing in my living room
  • went on a hike out to a waterfall
  • saw a giant male turkey in the road, who then proceeded to do a mating dance for a nearby female
  • braved a rather treacherous rope swing
  • took pictures out at the Golden Gate vista point
  • had amazing matter paneer and navratan korma after work one night (and some iffy cupcake Chardonnay wine, though, really, that name should have tipped me off)
  • went out for falafels and shopping at the giant flagship Goodwill on S. Van Ness, and then had cheesecake and wine with my friend M
  • discussed our bucket lists and a whole lot of questions along the lines of "if you could only have one hairstyle for the rest of your life, what would it be?" (my answer: some perfect combination of braiding/loose hair that would keep it out of my face but leave me enough at the back to play with occasionally)
  • renegade origami and $3 wine from a carafe also happened
  • [personal profile] tinheart made us all knishes and they were so nummy! Mine had portabellas and potatoes in them, mmmm
  • profit?
And now I'm off to contemplate my remix assignment, because I ended up signing up even though I was waffling. Remixing: I wish I knew how to quit you.

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ladiesbigbang: queen latifah.

Thank you tearful_eye and lyrstzha for the v-gifts! ♥
ladiesbigbang: queen latifah.

Lots o' stuff that was just rotting away in private entries.

My luke_noah award banenr.Collapse )

Perusing the results page led to me spending a couple hours re-living my fannish love for this show at the following places: the epic Luke/Noah picspam and the epic Jake/Van picspam. Ugh, THEY ARE SUCH GOOFBALLS I CAN'T TAKE IT, and also: this, so very married. And this .gif posted by oktoberskies reminded me that I never really got over my crush on that dude, because, hoshit, his smile.

*

I got podficced! rhea314 recorded "Jesus Complex," which can be found over here. rhea314 did such a great Jaye voice; it was so cool to hear my fic read out loud for the first time.

*

That fandom questions meme sophinisba tagged me for awhile back: Heroes, Noah's Arc, Psych.Collapse )

*

Completely against my will, I seem to have become fannish about Legend of the Seeker. D:

*

Other privatized posts I need to clean up and get out of my hair: that long-simmering why-is-Gus-ever-joked-about-as-a-sidekick rant, some multiracialbabble, some half-written "30 days of sexcetera" stuff I just didn't get around to posting (yeah, I didn't actually forget about that), and a WIP amnesty because my writing mojo ain't mojoing lately and I'm hoping clearing out the half-developed bunnies will help.

*

I suppose I'll end this with another meme, for the heck of it: Pick a paragraph (or any passage less than 700 words) from any fanfic I've written, and comment to this post with that selection. I will then give you a DVD commentary on that snippet: what I was thinking when I wrote it, why I wrote it in the first place, what's going on in the character's heads, why I chose certain words, what this moment means in the context of the rest of the fic (fic series, fic universe), lots of awful puns, and anything else that you'd expect to find on a DVD commentary track.

Fic can be found my LJ tags and [archiveofourown.org profile] trascendenza (though not all of it, yet).

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ladiesbigbang: queen latifah.

The car full of awesome women, that is.

Jesus Christ it's a woman-centric big bang GET IN THE CAR
aka: LADIES' BIGBANG SIGN-UPS ARE OPEN, Y'ALL. \o/

[community profile] ladiesbigbang
[[ Sign-ups for Betas | Sign-ups for Cheerleaders | Sign-ups for Creators ]]


At the moment we're getting a lot more creator sign-ups than beta or cheerleading sign-ups, so if there are any betas or cheerleaders out there, we could use you!

If you're like "buh, what is this?" check out the challenge overview, and the rules & guidelines for creators have more specific information.

Even if you're not going to play, maybe consider giving podficcers permission to record your fic or leaving some woman-centric prompts.

AND NOW YOU'LL HAVE TO EXCUSE ME WHILE I GO CONTINUALLY FLAIL ABOUT THIS.

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ladiesbigbang: queen latifah.

Beta?

Is there someone who could do Britpicking (and a general typo check would be great, as well) on a 1,500w Sophie/Parker Leverage fic?

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ladiesbigbang: queen latifah.

The Middleman: In a Different Soil (Roxy, T, ~1,900w.)

Roxy (light Roxy/MM), T, ~1,900w.
The choices she makes. If she had to live with mortals every second of every day there's no telling what she'd do.

In a Different SoilCollapse )

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ladiesbigbang: queen latifah.

I have no title for this.

CIRCLE OF MINE, ALLOW ME TO INTRODUCE YOU TO MY NEWEST LADYLOVE.

This is Emma Feigenbaum. ♥_♥


She's a cohost on Everyday Food. The show's pretty hit and miss for me since I'm only interested in the vegetarian or easily vegetarianized dishes, but OMG I COULD LISTEN TO THIS WOMAN READ THE DICTIONARY ALL DAY LONG. Everything about her voice is so melodic and soothing, and the way she moves, so gracefully and smoothly, I can't even.

Have I mentioned that seafood is my least favorite thing, oh, ever? But:


SIGH.

In other news, trying to rewrite the [community profile] ladiesbigbang FAQs so they aren't convoluted and confusing is a lot harder than it sounds :( But the amount that I'm excited about this challenge is EPIC.Collapse )

On that note, have two quotes I enjoyed (enjoyed with caveats, anyway) from a book by a woman about a woman that I recently enjoyed, "K" is for Killer by Sue Grafton:

I scooped up the mail that had been shoved through the slot, flipped a light on, set my bad down, and locked the front door behind me. I started peeling off my clothes as I climbed the spiral stairs, littering the floor with discarded articles of clothing like those scenes in romantic comedies where the lovers can hardly wait. I felt that way about sleep. -p224

"Everybody comes here. This is hot." She was glancing around as she spoke, snapping her fingers while she did some kind of chin thrust in time to the music. I wondered if this was mating behavior. -p245

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ladiesbigbang: queen latifah.

Legend of the Seeker: Precautions (Kahlan/Richard, T, ~1,530w.)

Kahlan/Richard, T, ~1,530w.
"But you agreed that the mission was too important to risk it," she said, sounding confused.

PrecautionsCollapse )

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ladiesbigbang: queen latifah.

Legend of the Seeker: When the Work is Done (Kahlan/Richard, K, ~250w.)

SIGH. Spoilers for end of S1.

*

Kahlan/Richard, K, ~250w.
"Oh, really?" he said, raising an eyebrow. "Come on, I wasn't that bad."

When the Work is DoneCollapse )

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ladiesbigbang: queen latifah.

This wide range of topics brought to you by my attempt not to spam with 23829384 different entries.

I've been reading a lot about asexuality lately, so have some links:

glad_to_be_a has a lot of interesting posts, and I in particular found the aromantic tag really informative. (I'm actually questioning my own relationship with romanticism right now and reading those posts was very eye-opening for me.)

The Asexy Beast. Of course, there's always something to fall in love with: asexual perspectives on pop culture and much more. -- This blog has a lot of fun and funny stuff, right alongside thoughtful and thought-provoking stuff. I find the book reviews in particular really interesting.

What Do You Mean By Sex? For brevity's sake, a very rough approximation of my "orientation" would be "polyaffectionate pansensual asexual". That means: I don't know what it feels like to need sexual release. I'm not sure I've ever been "sexually" attracted. When I really like someone, I have urges to become good friends with them. I don't understand attraction to a class of people on the basis of their gender. I don't know why people want to form exclusive monogamous units of two. I don't understand why sex is so important in building relationships. I do appreciate sensuality, and enjoy being physically affectionate with people I love and feel close to.

Also, very cool: lgbtfest is now allowing prompts for asexual characters.

*

Other links:

Interesting discussion about woobies over at sophinisba's journal.

The Girls' School Picspam, Part 1 and Part 2 by [personal profile] cimorene are EPIC and wonderful.

The Good Wife: An Alicia/Kalinda picspam by freya86 really makes me wish I were watching this show!

*

And now some totally random babble:

My new favorite invented term: ridicfic.Collapse )
And I don't know why I'm on such a het kick, lately.Collapse )

*

I've been "officially" celibate for about three and a half months (I can't remember when I unofficially started). Thus far, it's been about what I was expecting -- it's pretty much effortless, and the biggest shift is in the way that I feel in certain situations.

I was really surprised when I was discussing this plan with people and some of them would react with shock or complete disbelief, unable to fathom how I was going to go an entire year, how I would exert that sort of willpower. And I was just like o_O What? Because, for me, it's always been more effort to seek out sex. Sex, except for a few rare exceptions here and there, is not something that generally just falls into my lap. I'm not a person who's fending off constant amorous advances. That's not to say that there aren't any, but, hmm. Allow me to give some context.Collapse )

*

Also:


dslfhdf;djfldsfkhsdl;lhs;dlfhs;ldfh; CAN'T DEAL

Legend of the Seeker babble, spoilers up through end of S1.Collapse )

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ladiesbigbang: queen latifah.

Ten things that are good to know about me.

I've never done one of these before, but the time feels ripe, so:

1. I'm 24, a woman, queer, poly, mixed race first-generation Chinese and German born and raised in the Bay Area, California. I'm single and currently doing a year of celibacy. I'm not interested in marriage; I am interested in having and/or adopting children someday.

2. I speak a little bit of a lot of languages. The closest I come to actually speaking another one is Spanish, though I occasionally sing in Cantonese in public, just to keep things interesting.

3. I work with fire sprinkler systems. I am the only woman technician I know and I'm kinda impressed with myself in that regard while simultaneously being scared shitless of the awe-inspiring power of water under high pressures. I am not planning on this field as a career, but that won't stop me from lecturing you if you write a fic where someone hovering a lighter under one sprinkler head sets the entire system off.

4. I'm multifannish and multishippy and I adore polyships. I write too much fic and can't seem to crack 10,000 words to save my life. I'm passionate about canon: witness my love for creating/consuming picspams and transcripts. I love AUs and crossovers of all stripes. Crack, in particular, holds a really special place in my heart -- it's one of the few genres I'll read in any fandom, regardless of my familiarity with it. I JUST REALLY WANT TO READ MORE STORIES ABOUT MY FAVORITE CHARACTERS AS INVERTEBRATES/PLANTS/ROBOTS AND/OR ALIENS, OKAY?

5. I am way more likely to be in a small fandom (or many of them) at any given time than a large one. I have a tendency to love prematurely canceled shows like BURNING. I also really wish a fandom existed around Julie E. Czerneda's writing, because I ♥ her stuff.

6. I talk about my emotions a lot because I spent a huge chunk of my life disconnected from them and I'm learning to renavigate the territory. I don't expect hugs or advice unless I ask, and I cut generously precisely because I know this stuff isn't for everyone (I know I can't always handle reading about other people's emotional processes). You are always welcome to share your own experiences if reading about my stuff brings something up for you. I've done holistic-style therapy on and off for the past couple of years and I like it a lot.

7. I'm spiritual and mostly confused about it; I was raised without religion. I want to believe more than I'm actually able to believe.

8. I have no internet at home at the moment, which leads me to lurking on my phone a lot and results in me being kinda commentspammy when I do find time in front of a computer.

9. Things that are welcome here: lurking; random drive-by comments; talking amongst yourselves in the comments; subscribing/unsubscribing at will (I turned off notifs awhile ago and me checking my profile is a completely sporadic exercise). I grant blanket-access unless you're an icon-only journal and might still even accidentally grant access then. Not much is locked.

10. Some things I love, in no particular order: organization (particularly centralization, tags and indices, oh, indices ♥); fruit; cooking veggie food; sewing with tiny, precise stitches; doppelcest (biggest surefire kink everrr, closed followed by cybernetic lifeforms, alien porn and bff ships); sleeping outside; the sun and nude sunbathing in it; the macro feature on cameras; dancing; second person and lyrical prose; hiking and running; my family; my friends; squee; marathoning; cheesecake and white chocolate; etc. etc. etc.

And if you feel like sharing some things good to know about you/completely random things, be my guest. :)

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ladiesbigbang: queen latifah.

Follow Friday: the communities edition

[community profile] smallfandomfics
[community profile] crossovers
[community profile] bigbangindex for finding big bang challenges.
[community profile] multibeautiful originally POC daily.
[community profile] factfinding isn't quite going yet, but I anticipate once it does it will be fantastic.
[community profile] deliciouslymad also not quite going yet, but it's a comm all about being wacky over delicious.com, what's not to love?
[community profile] shareandsharealike "...a community for those of us who like our ships...a little crowded. Whether it's three or sixteen people, shameless one-time orgies or long-term poly relationships, it's all welcome here."

Aaaaand I may have gone ahead and created this community because I felt like it should exist:

[community profile] ladiesbigbang: "Ladies' BigBang is a woman-centric multimedia big bang challenge that welcomes artists, fiction/meta writers, vidders, podficcers, fanmixers, picspammers, reccers and graphics folks."

Willpower, pfff. Totally overrated. I really need to get on finding some co-mods/making some pretty graphics for this thing, though.

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ladiesbigbang: queen latifah.

Link roundup, part 2

seperis talks about the sketchy stuff Apple's up to. I don't like thinking that the natural evolution of advertising is for it to get MORE annoying :(

[personal profile] effex wrote great posts called So You Want to Ship Some Women?: Part 1 and Part 2.

[personal profile] katta had a great guessing game going on (part 2, part 3) where she took names of TV shows that had been translated into Swedish and then literally translated them back to English, leaving people to guess what the original title was. I think "Murder and no songs" is my favorite.

[personal profile] alessandriana recs a an interesting blog here that could be a good reference resource for writers.

[personal profile] elke_tanzer made an incredibly epic and really comprehensive Follow Friday that covers a ton of comms.

[personal profile] damned_colonial's three part Age of Sail Fandom guide is truly a feat of organizational beauty. *_*

There's a table read of the last and unfilmed episode of Middleman at YouTube. I have yet to watch this, alas, though I'm also kinda hoping a transcript will pop up somewhere.

Is it a Fuck Yeah?: Have you ever wondered if that thing you love the most already has a "fuck yeah" account on Tumblr? Search to find out!

Find your LJ friends on DW.

I don't know what this is, but I LOVE it.

*

Some fic people wrote me:

mithen wrote me a gorgeous Rachel Dawes drabble called Autumn Leaves. So delicate and yes. Rachel. ♥

rhea_carlysse wrote me a whole bunch of delicious Rhodey/Tony snippets, nom nom nom.

For the Threshold ficathon: [personal profile] havocthecat wrote me Foothold, a Threshold/Stargate crossover that features lots of awesome women and a great fusion of the two universes, and Evolution, a lovely Rachel drabble that captures so much of what I love about her.

For [community profile] purimgifts: Courtesy Call, Obvious Suspect, and Five Weeks by jain. They're all really lovely and have the wonderful mix of banter and silliness that I love from the show, and I have to rec the last fic in particular, because it has Abigail/Juliet that is SO SPOT ON (I could hear their voices so well), and features Juliet beating up a punching bag, unf.

For help_haiti: exoticrooftile wrote me two great Primeval ficlets and chanter_greenie wrote me an gorgeous, thoughtful character study of Ziyal from Deep Space Nine.

*

In other news, cripes, it is hot today. Spring, I see your rearing your warm little head over there, and I am certainly glad for it. Though not so glad I wore the heavy corduroy today. (Aside: is that really how corduroy's spelled? It looks so strange; it took me four tries to get my spellchecker to stop doing the little red line underneath.)

And off to American Canyon. Oh, job, you always send me to cities I would never otherwise visit.

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ladiesbigbang: queen latifah.

Default filter

Is there a way to create a Default reading filter and then have another filter that automatically catches everything that isn't added to/isn't on the Default?

This question brought to you by my paranoia that in creating two mutually exclusive filters I missed a name or two which, in effect, is like accidentally unsubscribing from someone without meaning to! But I really need smaller reading filters for reading on my phone, because my thumb gets sore from click-click-click scrolling.

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ladiesbigbang: queen latifah.

Link roundup

Two posts about being mixed race that I liked:

So here's the thing: I'm totally more Chinese when you're around by stephiepenguin:
1. some white person who's only just met you looks at you and says, "you're not Chinese"
[...]
6. someone goes on a rant about Asians, or Chinese people, and I have to decide whether I can smack them down;

we're all in this together by [personal profile] iambickilometer:
So when I found out that one of my favourite characters is also mixed race? And that he has similarly vague features? I wasn't angry that people were doing it wrong, I was so happy to see myself in him.

That first one was part of the asian women blog carnival #5: who i am when i'm (not) with you, by the by, which has lots of great reading.

And the [community profile] you_know_thats_right 'fest has a masterlist and prompts now available for writing. I received Friends Help You Move, which is an awesome established relationship Gus/Shawn fic that made me flail my arms with GLEE, because it involves sneaky-Shawn and infuriated-Gus and is so THEM.

I know nothing about Leverage, but the The Ultimate Sophie Devereaux Meta and Canon Guide - Season One by [personal profile] havocthecat is a thing of beauty. I want one of these for all my favorite characters!

Aaand I actually have tons more stuff to link, but now I need to drive down to Los Gatos and drop off some plans, swing by and do a survey for a wet standpipe system on the way back up, and then additionally pick up some parts while I'm in the neighborhood. I love busy days at work. Less time to goof on the internet, but a much warmer feeling or productivity. Plus, I'm in a good mood and it's sunny and a perfect day to be running around.

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ladiesbigbang: queen latifah.

Eastwick/Psych: Strong Brew (Roxie/Shawn, T, ~730w.)

I can't believe I inadvertently wrote a fic where Shawn's mother's doppelganger sex pollinates him. Dear brain: what up with that?

*

Roxie/Shawn, T, ~730w.
"I'll eat you for lunch, little boy," Roxie said, running a fingertip down the side of Shawn's face.

Strong BrewCollapse )

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ladiesbigbang: queen latifah.

blah.

I am in a really weird mood. I feel very restless, like I can't really focus on anything and I keep darting between activities, unable to settle on one. I'm feeling very emotionally overloaded, like there's so much going on I don't know how to let it out. I find engaging with people hard when I'm in this headspace.

Had an intense conversation with my mom yesterday. The past couple years I've learned a lot more about our family history -- immediate and extended -- and I've been going through waves of processing this information, slowly having my understanding of my family members shift as it integrates, and honestly, the whole process is very difficult. I understand why parents protect us when we're young, but it doesn't necessarily mean it's easy when you grow up and find out a whole host of stuff that you didn't even have the slightest inkling about when you were a kid. I have a counseling appointment in a few hours; hoping that'll help me ground a bit.

I have money in the bank. *savors the feeling*

Browsed [community profile] icons today. Not as many icons as I'd expect, woe. Found lots of nice stock ones but not a lot of fannish ones. I'm seriously in need of some Juliet icons. Ruby and Mira icons wouldn't go awry, either.

Half the problem is I'm too picky when it comes to icons. I like a) close-ups, b) high saturation, contrast, and sharpness, c) faces/profiles. I'm also way into soft glows when they enhance the lighting on the face. I haven't really made many icons since switching over to GIMP. I just can't seem to adjust to it; I do miss the PhotoImpact tools and layout.

Writing = blah.

I can't think of a good conclusionary note to end this on.

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ladiesbigbang: queen latifah.

This post brought to you by trying to learn the pronunciation difference between "choi" and "chói."

(I feel like I should write a disclaimer somewhere on this journal about how anytime I romanize Cantonese I'm just making it up as I go along, not adhering to any particular system. The one class I took used Yale, and I like it well enough, but I didn't manage to internalize it and, meh, I'm just not friends with romanization in general.)

Stumbled across this article ("How two gwailos learned to speak perfect Cantonese"), which is encouraging to read because usually when I hear about English-speakers trying to learn Cantonese it's always about how hard it is.

This led me to reading this blog entry discussing the "Cantonese is dead" meme, prompted by "In Chinatown, Sound of the Future Is Mandarin" article in the NY Times. I don't really have enough context to gauge a lot of the accuracy of the stuff discussed in the blog, but like the author, I'm getting kind of tired of the meme, as well. I'm particularly tired of people telling me that it would be a "waste" of my time to try and learn more Cantonese. I'm sorry, but since when is a language's only value its international currency as a business tool? Because that's what I keep hearing, over and over again, how Cantonese is dying down to a regional language and Mandarin is becoming an international one, so why would anyone want to waste their time learning Cantonese when they could learn Mandarin?

Gee, I don't know: culture, history, personal enrichment, downright enjoyment, heritage. I mean, shit, when has learning more about another language ever hurt anyone? I just find the approach of evaluating language learning only in terms of the language's inherent "productiveness" to be a turn-off.

Which leads me to "Why is Cantonese unpopular to foreign ears?", a phenomenon that totally baffles me, because I think it's a gorgeous language. I mean, yeah, like they discuss on that thread, Cantonese speakers can be pretty loud, but that's one of the things I love listening to, the vigorous up and down. Like one of the posters over at that thread, the second I hear Cantonese my ears perk up and fixate on it, just because I love listening even if I only understand the odd word here and there.

Of course, I also think German sounds lovely -- the "r"s, people, those beautiful, rich "r"s, as well as Russian -- the "l"s, ugh, I can't get over them, even though my tongue valiantly resisted when I tried to make those sounds. I honestly can't think of any language I've ever heard that I thought sounded ugly. I just love all the uniquenesses of sound out there, the incredible amount of variations in how we can use our tongues and teeth and lips to create meaning.

So I'll keep mulling over how to ply my mouth around the differences between "choi" and "chói," thank you very much, regardless of whether it'll ever "amount" to anything other than my mom being able to congratulate me on finally mastering it.

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ladiesbigbang: queen latifah.

Psych: Getaway (Gus/Shawn, PG, ~920w.)

Written for [personal profile] templemarker for the [community profile] you_know_thats_right winter fest.

*

Gus/Shawn, PG, ~920w.
Gus and Shawn unwind. "God, if you weren't so hot right now I'd totally hate you," Shawn grumbled, getting up and grabbing the fanny pack that Gus kept their funds in.

GetawayCollapse )

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ladiesbigbang: queen latifah.

Psych: Serenade (Gus/Shawn, PG, ~3,500w.)

Written for veronicaluv for the [community profile] you_know_thats_right winter fest.

*

Gus/Shawn, PG, ~3,500w.
Gus is having some communication issues. "Oh, really?" He could hear Joy rolling her eyes right back at him. "And what's that? Pretend he's your boyfriend until he figures it out on his own?"

SerenadeCollapse )

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ladiesbigbang: queen latifah.

Yeah, I'm still on Threshold.

My productivity, let me show you it:

[ Threshold Ficathon Masterlist ]
[ Threshold Fandom Masterlist - Updated ]


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ladiesbigbang: queen latifah.

Threshold/Star Trek: The Next Generation: paradox-a-day 'verse

For reference's sake. Roughly in order of timeline/time written.

A Paradox a Day Keeps the Doctor Away by [personal profile] trascendenza [ Nigel, Data, Geordi | G | 732w ]
"Doctor," the voice went on. "It appears he is awake."

Untitled by lastwordslinger [ Beverly/Nigel, Ensemble | UR | 1,341w ]
"I mean, I'm a doctor, not a quantum physicist."

Reasoning by lastwordslinger [ Beverly/Nigel | PG-13 | 722w ]
Nigel and Beverly have a strange encounter.

Across the Divide by [personal profile] trascendenza [ Beverly/Nigel | G | 683w ]
Nigel's at the end of his rope.

Dreamscape by [personal profile] trascendenza [ Beverly/Nigel | G | 187w ]
"I should be worried that this is an alien dream."

A Stitch in Time by [personal profile] tinheart [ Beverly/Nigel, Data | PG | 1,695w ]
They had to stop meeting like this.

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ladiesbigbang: queen latifah.

Thoughts, thoughts, thoughts.

Various topics I got wordy about a few days back. Writing all this out did help clear my head, though it felt like I was barely scratching the surface. Sometimes I just feel like I get so dammed up, like there's all this stuff inside me wanting to get out, and I have a hard time pushing through that (but once I do, boy, does it spill).

i. hypocrisy.Collapse )
ii. & iii. sexcetera.Collapse )
iv. leaving behind a record.Collapse )

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ladiesbigbang: queen latifah.

If I had to describe Being Erica in one loooong run-on sentence:

Being Erica has:

  • the discovering-of-self qualities of Joan of Arcadia, with bonus mentor figure who often appears in random and amusing costumes, a la God always appearing in different bodies, and a lot of the same panspirituality discussion;

  • the same time traveling framing as Quantum Leap (complete with similar sibling regrets), in which our intrepid protagonist goes back to the past to "right something that once went wrong," though it's never quite so neat as that (also: popping into the past at super-awkward times ftw \o/);

  • all the family wackiness and femmeslash potential of Wonderfalls (see also: protagonist is "overeducated and underemployed" premise), and, for ease of viewing, the guy who played Eric in Wonderfalls plays almost EXACTLY THE SAME ROLE in Being Erica;

  • and did I mention that it's all about a woman and she has friendships with other women and the show manages to split its focus between her family, her job, and her romantic stuff? Plus this?


In other words, I AM IN LOVE.

Not to say the show doesn't have its issues, but omg, right now it's just making me so happy. ♥_♥

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ladiesbigbang: queen latifah.

(no subject)

WHAT UP, INTERNET. I am drunk in a Thai food restaurant bathroom in the city. I think I'm going dancing later. WHEEEE.

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ladiesbigbang: queen latifah.

Excuse the spammage.

But my library time is once again running out and I wanted to take a minute to wish y'all an early happy Chinese New Year. Woe, my year is coming to an end! Oxen represent.

The family and I are having a party tomorrow which has entailed lots of fun preparation, including but not limited to polishing of tables and grapes made of stone, buying of a large ham-type thing from Lucky's (with a detour to Goodwill, because all the clothes were $2 and that kind of sale is just too good to pass up), and tomorrow I'll be assembling a pyramid made out of oranges and hopefully stuffing my face with jin deui and bao, because I'm nothing if not all about desserts that have red bean paste in them. (You are my favorite, red bean paste, never leave me.)

So, back to Goodwill, I got a bundle of clothes for $18 bucks. \o/ And I liked the way they shut down the fitting rooms because it forced me to make quick decisions about whether or not a piece of clothing was worth my $2 gamble. The cute orange pants = yes, the weird purple velvet shirt that had a cut I sort of simultaneously loved and hated = no. I also enjoy the way Goodwill gets crowded during these sales; the energy is so manic, with all of us rifling through the clothes as fast as we possibly can. And yet people still be polite and say excuse me and thank you as we try to move through the crowded stores.

*

My brother has been visiting and regaling me with tales of how he now likes to drink raw organic eggs. Um. Even though I'm no longer a strict veggie, HOLY CRAP THAT IMAGE DISTURBS ME.

*

I had a few more things I was hoping to post for halfamoon but I may or may not finish those in time, hmmm. I seem to be writing all the time lately which has been fun, but I can feel my mojo slowly running out.

Note to self: I don't want to create a Ladies' BigBang community. Because surely one exists already, right? Riiiight, internet, you've already taken care of this, haven't you?

Also, I have a couple of fics for upcoming exchanges that I could really use betas on. Mostly I just need technical stuff like catching typos. *makes puppy eyes* Betas, pretty please?

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ladiesbigbang: queen latifah.

Heroes/Threshold: Choices (Molly, Claire; T; ~2,300w.)

Notes: 2007-11-30 and 2010-02-13. Originally for a request by [personal profile] mylia.

*

Molly, Claire; T; ~2,300w.
A report of a corpse walking out of a morgue leads them to Texas. "Claire Bennet," J.T. said, clicking the slide onto the big screen.

ChoicesCollapse )

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ladiesbigbang: queen latifah.

The Big Bang Theory: The Sociosexual Interaction Model (Leslie/Penny, T, ~1,200w.)

Leslie/Penny, T, ~1,200w.
A not-romance in three parts. "I must warn you, though, that they may be eradicated."

The Sociosexual Interaction ModelCollapse )

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ladiesbigbang: queen latifah.

Brokeback Mountain: Spitfire (Lureen, T, ~670w.)

Lureen, T, ~670w.
Lureen, gender, and fresh starts. Back then she'd been a hellion.

SpitfireCollapse )

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ladiesbigbang: queen latifah.

Women's Murder Club: Picspam

This picspam contains themes of meaningful femmeslashy gazes, friendship, and an all-around awesome woman team. ♥

Pics inside.Collapse )

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ladiesbigbang: queen latifah.

Media roundup

The livebloggy edition.

The Big Bang Theory, S3Collapse )
Women's Murder Club, entire seriesCollapse )
Being Human, 2x04 - 2x08.Collapse )

And then I did some Psych re-watching:

2x03 - Psy vs. Psy.Collapse )
3x02, Murder, Anyone?Collapse )

And then the newer Psych eps:

Psych, 4x11.Collapse )
Psych, 4x12.Collapse )
Psych, 4x13.Collapse )
Psych, 4x14Collapse )
Psych, 4x15.Collapse )
Psych, 4x16.Collapse )

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ladiesbigbang: queen latifah.

The Big Bang Theory: Stacked Odds (Leslie, Sheldon; G; ~270w)

Leslie, Sheldon; G; ~270w.
"I see your Cylon toast and raise you a Dalek cookie," Leslie said, tossing it into the center of the table.

Stacked OddsCollapse )

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ladiesbigbang: queen latifah.

Stargate Atlantis: Party Time (Dusty, Alison; G; ~630w)

Dusty, Alison; G; ~630w.
Of cookies and promotions. "My glamorous life as an integalactic medical professional," Alison said, spreading her arms and leaning back in her chair.

Party TimeCollapse )

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