bironic

Life Things are Happening that I will talk about soon, and that has made things busy. As usual. What is the pathology for inability to chill out?

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Anyway, the second basement-cleaning trip went well enough aside from the grime. My dad handled everything well -- I underestimated his desire and ability to get rid of a lot of the stuff down there -- and the two of us made another big dent in the clutter. Let's see if I can remember some gems. On the Why? side: five or six boxes of hanging file folders, 19 rolls of packing tape, and several pounds of paper clips. On the sentimental side: early childhood Apple II floppy disks and keyboard covers for things like Stickybear, Facemaker, Iggy's Gnees, Grandma's House, Dinosaur Dig and Muppet Learning Keys. And of course EZ Logo and, later, Print Shop. Also some more adorable schoolwork. ♥ On the What the heck do we do with all this? side: a dozen boxes of computer software and piles and piles of computer hardware going back to at least 1980.

I didn't find the piece of kinky noncon "art" drawn on the back of some elementary school homework that got me into trouble with the school psychologist, but I did find a similar one from what must have been the same era:

( cut for sensitivity )

Also, baby's first vampire creations:

*shakes head fondly*

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Vidding quandary. I want so badly to include scenes from The Green Table ballet in my next vid, but the quality of the YouTube file that I snagged a couple of years ago (before it disappeared, whew) sucks compared to the rest of the sources going into the project. Yet it is the only footage of these scenes from the ballet that I can find anywhere. (There are some decent clips available of the politicians arguing around the green table, but that's not what I need.) Scrunchy face.

Speaking of vidding, Vividcon is this weekend. I'm not able to go, but people's vids will happen! Including

jetpack_monkey's Starships remix! Excited.

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There was all this other stuff I wanted to tell you... Oh, good movies: Fish Tank, about a troubled teenage girl who seems to have an opportunity to turn her life around when she falls for her mother's new boyfriend (a young Michael Fassbender); Bliss (Mutluluk), about a young Turkish rape survivor who wins over her would-be executioner as well as everyone else she meets while on the run; and Daydream Nation, a weird/quirky heavily stylized Canadian indie film about some outcast teens and their parents and teachers during a pivotal few months of school, which I kept thinking about for days (and which contained a joke about Atom Egoyan, helping win my heart) even though it wasn't really about the student/teacher relationship that drew me to it in the first place. Saw The Queen of Versailles, too, and was interested in that dual fascination/repulsion way, but didn't think it was as spectacular or revealing as reviews suggested.

ETA: Oh, duh.

cincodemaygirl,

alpheratz and

corbae threw a hipster-themed party (ironically, of course) the other weekend and it was much fun. In addition to the silly theme, the snacks and the opportunity to see some local fans who've been scarce of late, like

v_greyson,

roga was in town (well, in country) and managed to make it down for a few hours. That was great, though short.

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*cough* So, you know, hi. Thinking of you and reading your posts even if I don't comment a lot.

Thank you, everyone who took a minute to offer advice for the Great Basement/Attic Cleanout. Your voices were in my head as we worked last week. ("Resist the urge to move piles around!" "Only keep items for people if you have someone specific in mind." "Take this chance to model letting-go for your father." "Don't just throw everything away.") After six 12- to 14-hour days in NY, a day at the office, a holiday, another day at the office, and a day to recover, I'm feeling together enough to tell you that it went well and to share some pictures.

( Before and afters )

It was tough in several ways. It was exhausting and filthy, and decision fatigue set in each day before I was done. There are some things I'm remorseful about, including the way I treated my dad a few times.* Bringing my notebook was an excellent idea, although I didn't leave much time for thinking; it's a defense mechanism, keeping busy. I was also reminded in more than one way why I don't live there anymore. And there is so much more to be done. But I'm glad we tackled our portion, I'm glad my sister was there most days to join me—we hadn't spent that much time together at once in years—and I think we accomplished what we set out to.

*He was up and down in his handling of the mess, the dust, the hubbub, the idea of letting us let things go. Sometimes he'd hover or pick through our piles, then sometimes he'd volunteer to shed some of his own stuff. Sometimes I'd ask him a question about what to do with a particular item and he'd freeze up. E. had to take him out of the house at least once.

I enjoyed two breaks: dinner Saturday night with my dad and E., and brunch Sunday with

ignazwisdom, who braved two trains to come visit from Brooklyn. Hadn't seen Iggy in ages and that was great. As was brunch, mm. We are going to try to re-watch some TOS eps long distance, so don't be surprised if you start seeing posts about them around here.

( Some fun stuff we uncovered, incl. fannish and baby items )

Thanks for reading. ♥

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Did manage to sign up for a Kink Bingo card, which I started brainstorming for when I had a chance to breathe on Thursday. There should be a picspam soon. Watch this space.

Yesterday was synn's birthday \o/ and we had a good time of it. In the afternoon, we made some Christmas ornaments by decorating salt dough shapes she'd prepared the day before. They turned out cute! Wanted to share some snapshots with you:

( Full size and a few close-ups behind the cut )

A fun project. Can't remember the last time we did rainy day arts & crafts.

Now home, and almost time for lunch with deelaundry and then Batman with some work friends.

This month's

kink_bingo challenge is "new horizons"—trying something you haven't tried before. Like many people who participate, I am always trying to try (heh) new things—for instance, before the last round I hadn't pieced together a found poem, or made a vid constructed entirely of intercuts, or vidded DS9 or cartoons, or done themed recs sets, or explored several of the kinks in the squares I filled—so this challenge didn't motivate me in and of itself. But lo, the very next day

kickair8p announced over at

tentacle_fest that some powerful 3-D graphics software s/he uses to make tentacle art is available for free through the end of March. Cue

synn and I spending a day downloading the stuff and figuring out whether we could make it work.

I'd never tried anything like 3-D rendering before, but with some quick tutorials, hair-pulling, and a troubleshooting tip from

kickair8p, I learned how to pose pre-made human figures and configure $10 worth of props around them such as (*cough*) tentacles and torn clothes. Because what is the purpose of 3-D software for someone whose drawing ability has barely evolved beyond stick figures if not to make dirty pictures? Whee.

And so with no further fanfare, I present to you my first, wobbly creations. Warning that some can be interpreted as noncon.

( Girl in green tentacle attack pose from various angles. Not explicit, but still probably NSFW. )

( Girl in squiddy tentacle attack pose from various angles. Ditto the above. )

( Girl and guy in aggressive, dom/sub or nonconsensual pose, as you prefer to read it. Again, not explicit, but NSFW. )

On the occasion of

deelaundry's birthday yesterday and also the

kink_bingo January remix mini-challenge, may I present with Dee's permission some cover art for her story Kennel Club.

Fandom: House M.D.
Pairings: Wilson/everyone (House, Cameron, Foreman, Chase)
Rating: PG-13ish for non-explicit nudity and insinuations
Kinks: Confined/caged, collars, subspace/headspace, shaving, obedience, a hint of in-public/voyeurism and animal play, although n.b. not all of those are in the original story.

( Full size behind the cut )

Wrote 3,600 words or so this weekend. \o/ Will write some more tonight, if all goes well—John/Radek for Kink Bingo.

Took a long weekend in Florida to visit my grandparents, coinciding with my father and his fiancée's visit. Was… interesting. The daily thunderstorms were most exciting. One blew in while we were visiting the Miami Seaquarium; the wind started to gust, the parrots and macaws started squawking like nobody's business, and the whole thing felt like an avian version of Jurassic Park as the hurricane rolled in. The next day, a mid-morning storm hit while we were trying to sneak in some beach time. It was fine at first (there were these cute little swimmy ankle-kissy fish in the water, for one thing, and it was sunny and the water was warm), with most of the looming clouds and curtains of rain off to the south or out at sea, but then the wind blew—these storms seem to come in fast and hard—all the beach umbrellas uprooted themselves and went flying, kids screamed, shins and ankles got sandblasted, the palm trees whistled, the gaps between the rain bands closed, and when the lightning started flashing a few miles out the lifeguards called everyone in. Then it rained for hours. Oh, well.

( a few pix: storm, friendly lobster, bendy skyscraper )

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I found these Harry Potter doodles in my photo folder and felt like sharing, now that the movies are done and all. I dashed them off with a mechanical pencil one night in… 2004, must be, the summer of Convention Alley and The Shoebox Project. My sketching skills haven't advanced beyond, oh, third or fourth grade, but I think these turned out really cute.

( 3 more doodles )

So, let's see: That'd be Dumbledore with McGonagall and Hagrid; Harry, Ron and Hermione with their pets; a Marauders scene; and Snape brewing wolfsbane for Lupin. ♥

Those were the days.

I hereby declare that the end of the year will not occur until the end of the weekend. That way I can use the days off to finish this vid and maybe a story, and still have them count in the year they were started.

Anyway, here's the year's fannish productivity in review.

Since I mostly wrote for Porn Battle and SGA Kink Meme prompts, there was one burst of stories in January/early February and another in July. In addition to the usual suspects, I tried writing in some different fandoms. I made some covers for two people's House Big Bang stories. On the vidding side, my computer went all kablooey, twice, so I lost several months of vidding time and then had to rebuild three vids-in-progress; but I did get the machine temporarily patched up and then this month got a shiny new one. In the end, I didn't produce an astounding amount... but there was also the maid of honor thing and the freelancing after work thing and the family health thing ~~and the WTF is wrong with me thing~~.

2009 | 2008 | 2007 | 2006

( Fic in 2010: SGA, SGA/House, SGA/DS9, True Blood/X-Men, SGA/American Idol, SGA/Inception )

( Vids )

( Art )

( Podfic )

Total:

Fics: 10
Words (not counting Amnesty): 18,874 (half as much as last year)
WsIP word count: 4,500

Full vids: 4
Minutes: 13.5 (5 more than last year)
VsIP minutes: ~13

Graphics: 3 covers, 1 icon collection, 1 manip

Podfics: 3
Minutes: ~24

Het: 9
Slash: 2
Femslash: 2
Multi: 3
Gen: 6
Other: 1

Goals for 2011:

Figure out what the hell happened to my ability to produce creative work
Finish Lightfoot, Dylan, Oliver and femdom vids
Finish dance WIP
Have a vid shown at a con

The end.

Looking forward to other people's roundups; have already bookmarked a few. I missed a lot of stories this year.

I don't think I'm even doing this row on my

kink_bingo card, but that apparently didn't deter me. Behind the cuts are 83 multifandom and original art (though not original by me) icons for my tentacles square. Includes f/f, m/m, f/m, f, m, and, of course, tentacles.

Please note that a lot of these images came without artist or source attribution. I've credited sources where I could. If you know any others, I will gladly credit them.

The first section is rated G to PG-13. The rest are rated B for breasts (no genitalia) and are NSFW.

( Cute tentacles! )

( Consensual tentacles! )

( Body Parts & Tentacles! )

( NONCON & Ambiguous Tentacles! )

( RL/Erotica Tentacles! )

Icons are of course available to all, to use or modify as you please. I only ask that you don't hotlink them.

Please share this post around with anyone who might be interested in using these!

Well, that's interesting. It's not a big leap to restricting access to sites that offer fan-produced work.

In less worrisome news, turns out my weekend was spent in gorgeous fog on the bay in southern Jersey instead of nowheresville northern Jersey:

There's a bridge back there, lost in the mist. (click for bigger)

Alas that now I'm back in D.C., it's 90 degrees. And barely April. It is -- *checks* -- 79 degrees in my apartment. Time to get out of this town.

You may have seen that House Big Bang went live. I made some art for it: two covers and a pinch hit. The first one is what I worked on the most, and turned out, I think, the best.

Misc.: Saw and greatly enjoyed Naissance des Pieuvres (Water Lilies). The comment thread by Ediane at AfterEllen's review is the closest I've found to my own thoughts. Bizarrely, neither NY Times nor Variety discussed queerness in their reviews, when the movie is about a girl who falls in love/obsession with another girl, who may or may not be attracted to her in return.

Lastly, have a rec: spike21 and harriet_spy's From the entrance to the exit, it's farther than it looks -- SGA, post-series, very NC-17, and hit so many of my soul-deep kinks in the first half to two-thirds that there was this thrill running through me I haven't felt in a long time, reading. It's John/Todd/Teyla, too, and has pretty much everything you could hope for in that grouping. IMO. I'm not sure what to make of the ending yet, and there's an iffy bit in the beginning equating alienness with monstrousness, but the story is absolutely worth checking out.

p.s. Even in the company of 7 non-fannish people and making no attempt to turn conversation or channels in that direction, some subjects and programs are apparently unavoidable, such as SGU, the Merlin episode with the slash dragon, Top Gear, and my friend's brother's discussion of the attractiveness and sexual preferences of Anderson Cooper.

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bironic

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Style: Simplicity for Compartmentalize by timeasmymeasure

Entries tagged with art by meee

Taking a breather

Basement: It is done. Sort of.

Fannish arts & crafts; rainy weekend

3D tentacle art! Well, "art."

Cover art!

Life, illustrated (early August)

2010 fic/vid/art year in review

Tentacle Icons

One day I'll say something meaningful again.

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