bironic

Hello! I’ve been here, keeping up with people’s posts; I just haven’t been posting myself. Let’s fix that.

Travels

I went on vacation last month for the first time in 5 years, to visit my friend A. and her husband V. and two kids for a few days in Finland, where they’re from, and another few days in Stockholm, where they live now, finished off with a few days on my own on the Swedish island of Gotland. I’d never been to either country, and it was so nice to see new landscapes and architecture and wildlife and try new foods. The weather offered welcome relief: around 21C/70F and breezy compared to this summer’s record-breaking number of humid 90F+ days at home. Two weeks after midsummer, it never got fully dark.

( deets )

Next time maybe there will be a chance to visit

isagel and/or

naye. I’d also love to see Lapland in wintertime and the northern lights.

COVID

I’d put off traveling anywhere besides visiting family since 2020 because I knew as well as anyone that it raises risk of contracting COVID, and I’d avoided COVID so far. But fumbled policies have left us with COVID being basically endemic, and I wanted to go abroad, so I took extra precautions before and during, bought travel insurance, and crossed my fingers.

Friends, I came down with COVID less than 24 hours into the trip. Which, if the CDC’s statistics on incubation period remain reliable, means I 100% caught it before departing. Sigh. One of many no-longer-"novid" victims of the summer surge. ( deets )

I got home and slept a lot for a couple of weeks. Would say it took one month from first to last symptoms. TBD on any lingering effects.

Health

Like, for example, how my current period has lasted three weeks and counting? More likely it’s perimenopause and/or the fibroids or endometrial hyperplasia an ultrasound found last week, after more than a year of increasingly disagreeable symptoms. The medical investigation is only just getting underway. "Hooray."

Family

My little sister is getting married this fall! Guess it’s time to accept that she’s 40 and not 12. Her boyf is a good guy. Our parents are over the moon that one of their offspring has at last found a life partner, even if there are no grandchildren on the horizon. Insert complicated feelings here about suspecting I am ace and aro + wanting parents to feel like the family line isn’t dying out + general mortality anxiety. The wedding will be fun and the right amount of quirky. It’s at the science museum on the grounds of the 1964 World’s Fair, where our families used to visit when we were kids and my dad took slides and reel-to-reel tape when he was young. I’m dress shopping. Some relatives I haven’t seen in a while will be there.

My grandfather turned 103 in June. He’s as cognitively sharp as you could hope. A lady with a therapy cat comes to visit him in the assisted living facility every other weekend. Amazing. I wish I could look forward to same, but since he’s my dad’s stepfather, the genes don’t belong to us. Best hope comes from my grandma (dad’s mom), who made it to a week short of 99. The rest died young or youngish, alas.

Pets

Pepper is still here, still cute, still feisty. She’s my condo companion and stress reliever and provider of amusement and affection. If rescue records are to be believed, she turns 5 this month. The average guinea pig lifespan is 6, but there’s a pretty big spread around that number. We’ll see. My sister’s guinea pig—adopted to be a friend for Pepper but whom Pepper categorically rejected—lived until almost 5. If memory serves, our childhood guinea pig made it to something like 8.

View from above of a gray and white guinea pig with making a puppy-dog-eyes expression

Guinea pig looks up from drinking while a hand pets her

Guinea pig lying on her side inside a white quilted pillowcase, leg out, with one poop visible

A guinea pig sits in the arched doorway of a small wooden house, paws in front, looking into the distance

Work

I accepted another promotion. Been having mixed feelings about it. Good: money, learning useful new skills, a change after 10 years in the same office. Ambivalent: little time for creative work. What does it mean to focus on management and strategy after 25 years of identifying as a writer and video editor? Am I drifting further away from the ideal artist life I dreamed of, or making a smart/pragmatic decision since various factors have made writing harder as the years pass? Am I gravitating toward something I’m actually better at? What’s the plan? What’s the meaning of life?

THE END

Hello to you all. Please don’t feel like you need to respond to everything if there is one part you’d like to engage with. <3

(as Stephen Colbert said until recently)

Doing: Move-related stuff.

thedeadparrot helped me haul the world's greatest secondhand bed frame across town. My dad and sister came up for a few days for an initial round of painting. We did a nice gray in the main area that doesn't turn blue in the northwestern light, unlike in my current living room; an awesome purple-gray in the bathroom; and a bright yellow-green in the kitchen, something I'd wanted for ages.

Then we experimented with doing an ombre accent wall. The mid- and dark grays I picked are not quite in the right family, but the final product is growing on me. It looks like storm clouds or a misty forest canopy. Some pix.

stultiloquentia borrowed me to go strawberry picking. Yum! The farm had seven varieties. The one called Cleary was far and away my favorite. Sweet and bright, with a little white crown at the stem. Another called Cavendish came in second. I ate some fresh. The rest await the right recipes in the freezer. We had lunch under a tree.

(Did I mention the condo has a real fridge/freezer? The apartment freezer can't be more than 2 cubic feet and goes through unpredictable temperature cycles so everything ends up thawed and refrozen and speared through with ice crystals.)

This weekend I will be attending a small BBQ for the first time in two years. Inside? With multiple people? Honestly, I'm not sure I'm ready.

Going: The day science deemed me fully vaccinated against COVID, I drove to NY to see my family, who'd been ahead of us on the vaccination front. My sister and I then flew to Florida to visit our grandfather in anticipation of his 100th birthday! So I went from staying in the house except for bike riding and occasional double-masked grocery runs to sitting in a packed airport and visiting an elder care facility. Then spent time at both parents' houses unmasked. Zero to 60. What felt weirdest was how weird it didn't feel. Neither terrifying nor joyful. Like the pandemic had created a buffer between me and reality without my noticing, tamping down reentry emotions.

Fortunately, everything turned out fine. He was so happy to see us. The cold my sister came down with on the second day proved by virtue of both rapid and PCR testing to be indeed just a cold, and no one else caught it. His actual birthday went swimmingly last week, he reports. And now I'm back to staying mostly at home while getting more comfortable visiting with one or two friends at a time in their homes or in a car.

I also "went" to

con_txt this past weekend. A lovely time, as usual, and extra sweet after having missed

vidukon and

wiscon. So proud of my friends for putting it together in its second virtual incarnation. Need to catch up on the vid shows.

Watching: A reality show called Secrets of the Zoo on Disney+, which follows veterinarians at the Columbus Zoo in Ohio. It's great for animal cuteness and education, but not great whenever they lose a patient.

Then I finished the first season of Star Trek: Lower Decks, inspired by

cinco and

celli at their panel on new Trek incarnations at con.txt. It did grow on me. As they promised, it talked back to TOS and TNG while showing a deep knowledge of and fondness for the franchise. The episode inspired by "Space Seed" and The Wrath of Khan did what JJ Abrams' Star Trek and Star Wars reboots should have done: taken a beloved original and told a new story while still paying homage to it visually/linguistically/thematically.

Next up, Discovery season three while I have this oops-I-forgot-to-cancel-after-the-free-trial month of Paramount+? Seasons one and two left me cold, but the panel did make a case for giving the show another try.

Reading: Sort of nothing? It's taking me ages to finish How to Be an Anti-Racist, which has nothing to do with the book and everything to do with my pandemic brain and lack of commute. I would like to read the Golem & the Jinni sequel that just came out. I'm in the queue at the library.

Vidding: On hiatus. It'll be interesting to see which idea breaks the dam.

How are you?

I was not doing well in the beginning.

( Mentions death and death fixation, babies, mental health, pandemic )

I am doing better now.

( Mentions mental health, weight; contains pictures of a guinea pig )

I dunno, what else. I haven't posted at all this year except for 2019 roundups and some Festivids recs. I need to tell you about the vid

sisabet made me for a charity commission and post the fics and vids I managed to make. Writing fiction and editing video with less anxiety is fascinating.

As for the world…. My immediate family is still healthy. My mom retired. My stepmom still has to go to work. My sister took a temp gig and quarantined with me for two weeks before returning home. She climbed out of the worst of her depression after she fell in love with and adopted the second guinea pig I took home and failed to bond with Pepper. My grandfather, now 99, survived the initial wave(s) in Florida and a bout of shingles and is now in the queue for the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine. My job is fairly secure; we've only had to deal with a pay freeze so far. I have trouble retrieving words in conversation and my media consumption has plummeted and my long-distance vision is shot and my heating bill is outrageous, but I somehow adapted to ~these unprecedented times~. Being an introverted homebody helps, although backyard gatherings and nature walks and online socializing have been invaluable after I lost my baseline of human interaction at the office. I just can't think too hard about failures of leadership and bureaucracy and capitalism and common sense or else all is fury and despair.

Happy new year, friends. Are you all right?

Going

[TW: alcohol/verbal abuse?]

I got home yesterday from a week in Tennessee with my mom and her bf at the bf's new-ish anticipating-retirement house, same as last winter break. Also the same, I returned ambivalent about the experience: refreshed from the change of scenery and outdoor time in the warmer weather and lack of TV/internet and glad to have spent time with my mom, yet somewhat the worse for wear physically and emotionally, although I'll take this year's hot tub-related rash over last year's wood stove-related itchy eyes and sore throat. I don't like being around fighting family members, especially when there's nowhere else to go, and it continues to disturb me how he talks to her when he's frustrated or drinking; and I missed doing Hanukkah traditions more than I expected to.

Highlights: digging up our own pair of Christmas trees from the woods behind the house, one "real" one and one Charlie Brown-style wimpy one; eating fresh grilled beef and venison; sitting on the porch in short-sleeved shirts playing Scrabble and listening to the neighbor's roosters. We reviewed footage from their motion-activated camera and saw a bear and cub, a coyote and lots of deer; when we played one night with the bf's Xmas present, a pair of infrared binoculars, we saw a skunk on the front lawn. I wrote 400 words or so of miscellaneous fic. I'm trying not to fixate on the bad stuff.

Doing

After putting it off as long as I could, I ordered a new laptop. This post comes to you from it. Reason #1: It will run Windows 10 instead of the Windows 7 that will no longer be supported in about a month, even though I dislike Windows 10. Reason #2: With souped-up components, it's supposed to be able to handle Premiere and After Effects, which would allow me to replace my current, eight- or nine-year-old everyday laptop and vidding desktop with a single, portable machine. I need to see how well it runs within the 30-day return window. It would be nice if everything worked properly, not least because a replacement wouldn't come with a significant holiday discount. $$$

I do have half a Festivids draft. We'll be finishing that on the current/old computer, because we all know it's a bad idea to change programs etc. mid-vid.

Watching

What I actually wanted to tell you about is this Israeli/German movie I watched on Netflix last night while too travel-tired to do anything else, The Cakemaker/Der Kuchenmacher/האופה מברלין [The Baker from Berlin], because it could have been GREAT and instead a single story decision made it THE WORST.

Setup: A man from Israel, Oren, who comes to Berlin regularly on business, starts sleeping with a young bakery owner there, Thomas, whose cakes and cookies he has fallen for. ( Spoilers and infidelity )

Crossposts: https://bironic.livejournal.com/424185.html

Two months since last update, oops.

For a while there, writing in any form felt onerous. It took longer than expected to recover from the summer. I kept thinking the move shouldn't have rattled me as much as it did, but emotions are emotions, and life needed time to return to normal, aided by a meds switch. And then things got busy. And now it is now.

Let's catch up in increments.

Thanksgiving

For the first time in my nearly 40 years, I did not spend the holiday with family. I was worried I'd regret it, but forgoing travel proved the correct choice. I was able to visit friends for the holiday proper, host friends the day after and see my dad and stepmom this past weekend instead; soon I'll be spending winter break with my mom and her bf.

Our first snow came early and deep this year, starting at the tail end of Thanksgiving weekend. I used the quiet time to cook ahead, read a book and experiment with making caramels. The first batch of Smitten Kitchen's apple cider ones came out all right, so I tried the more time-consuming recipe from King Arthur Flour, which proved outstanding. I am so pleased. Making both of those taught me enough to do a better job when I made the second batch of the ciders. Now the fridge is packed with almost 400 caramels wrapped in cute polka-dot waxed paper and ready to be gifted.

New York

Two days after the storm, I drove to NY. I helped my dad around the house, including shoring up his ridiculous chipmunk-proof PVC pipe and chicken wire garden enclosure for the winter with a series of two-by-fours. He helped me with a couple of tricky tasks for my apartment: building aluminum air vent deflectors to stop the heat from blowing directly on the bed and living room chair, and cobbling together a weatherstripping getup to prevent said heat from being sucked straight out the gaps between the front door and the door jamb/door stop, since those gaps have been making an impressive vacuum sound as they pull my utility bill payments into the stairwell. I also cleaned out a bunch of books and paperwork that still remained in my old room. Best find: late '80s/early '90s sticker collection. Fuzzies! Oilies! Holograms! Neons! No scratch-and-sniffs, alas.

The highlight, though, was meeting my college friend S. in the city to see the Philip Glass opera Akhnaten at the Met, about the mysterious-bodied ancient Egyptian pharaoh, husband of Nefertiti and father of Tutankhamun, who upheaved hundreds—thousands?—of years of artistic and religious tradition only to have his changes and his legacy buried along with him. I like a subset of Philip Glass, and I'd loved learning about Akhenaten in school and on those early Discovery/History Channel shows because he was so distinctive, so I was really looking forward to this production.

It was as weird and beautiful as hoped! I loved it! ( Spectacle, gender ambiguity, Victorian necromancers, juggling. )

To top it all off, Philip Glass appeared onstage at curtain call. He looked frail but happy as he gazed out at the standing ovation for the penultimate performance of the sold-out run.

R.I.P. Odo

That night I was sad to hear of Rene Auberjonois' death. He was such a sweet guy to his fans. I still belong(ed) to his official fan club. It's been both wonderful and difficult to read all the tributes from other Trek actors. When I got home, I watched a bunch of Odo episodes in memoriam.

This is why it takes me forever to post. More to come.

Crossposts: https://bironic.livejournal.com/420787.html

I have a new place to live! An extra relief after seeing so many places that were either dirty/cramped/outdated/inconvenient or off the market by the time I arranged to see them. It is bigger than my current apartment and on the top floor of a standard Boston-area triple-decker house, which hopefully means it will be quiet, though costlier to heat and cool. It's got light and trees and a tiny study off the living room that has a built-in bookcase and will fit my vidding computer desk. It also ought to make my commute more straightforward; TBD. Of course, it is substantially more expensive, in part because it's been six years since I rented at market rate and in part because of the square footage and location.

I've been having more feelings about it than expected. Excitement, curiosity, regret, fear (money, the unknown), pride, guilt, etc. There are so many things to second-guess. I want to move already and tackle what needs to be tackled instead of worrying about what might need tackling. Then settle in and, please please please, be content. Fall is coming, and rumor has it the new street is a trick-or-treating hot spot, which would be amazing.

The whole unplanned and rapid process was stressful and lonely; would not recommend. I will miss my current apartment, imperfect as it is. However, friends are wonderful, offering sympathy and advice and boxes as well as couch space if things had come to that. My mom made me cry a few days ago when she called to say she was sending a check to cover the movers' fee, unasked-for. I've worked hard in the 15+ years since college to be independent and not ask anything of my parents—would not have rented this apartment and hired movers if I couldn't make the budget work—and this moment of being taken care of just sort of broke me, in the good way.

Another delicate moment on Friday, my birthday, when, at the office party we hold for every such occasion, my editor chose to cater with an ice cream treat I'd once told her my sister and I used to get when we were kids: Baskin Robbins clown cones. She drove several towns out of her way that day to the store that makes them. :,)

Now it is time to take a breath. Having booked it months and months ago, I have joined a handful of local friends in a rental house on Cape Cod; first time visiting there after almost 11 years (noncontinuous) of living in Boston. Nothing on the to-do list besides read, write, cook, sit by the shore. I went to a vidder friend's wedding on Saturday a few towns over from the rental, which was a backyard affair and really lovely. When we return, a week and a half of regular life. Then

fanworks. Then move-in.

If you have my old/current address and I haven't sent you the new one yet, feel free to ping me.

Travel

I just returned from a week in rural Tennessee, where my mom's boyfriend bought a house for them to retire to in a few years. It's perched on the side of a mountain abutting Cherokee National Forest. It felt like vacation as soon as I heard running water and smelled wood smoke. Beautiful land,* spacious home, largely off the grid, although the steep slope made me nervous. We saw turkeys and Carolina chickadees along with many neighbors' pets and livestock. Went for easy hikes, ate venison steaks, played games, sang along with my mom's guitar on Christmas Eve—she has adopted the bf's Italian-American Catholic traditions—and discussed the ups and downs of their relationship. I fired a gun for the first time; took out some bottles with buckshot. When in Rome...

*stolen, sigh

Festivids

Hauling my desktop (vidding) computer 800 miles proved worthwhile, as I squeezed in two productive editing sessions. The draft is nearly complete. I'd like to send that out for beta soon and try for a treat. It would be sad to break the streak of making at least two Festivids per round.

Vidding anniversary

May will mark the tenth anniversary of posting my first vid. I'm planning some short write-ups for the occasion that can be spaced throughout 2019, like "favorite opening credits" and "vids that never made it." Is there anything you'd like to know?

In memoriam

I was saddened to hear about the recent passing of

stardreamer. I had only just begun to get to know her here on Dreamwidth, where she was an engaged, insightful, compassionate commenter. It took longer than it should have for me to subscribe to her journal, which is when I learned that she had been struggling with pancreatic cancer for a while. It finally got the better of her in November. A real loss. Among other things, I'm sad I didn't finish the Midnight, Texas fic in time for her to read it; it's a tiny fandom and she'd said she was looking forward to it.

May her memory be a blessing.

Crossposts: https://bironic.livejournal.com/406040.html

Doing

I spent May working 24/7 on the vid; did little but watch TV in June; then spent three-quarters of July working 24/7 on an article for my job. Now it's back to chillin' out, by which I mean doing the minimum at work while visiting friends and family, consuming media, daydreaming and going for the occasional swim. Things will achieve balance again at some point.

Oh, and my birthday happened last week. 'Twas a pleasant one. Some friends made me dinner ♥, and some other friends and I went for fancy Italian over the weekend.

marginaliana made a beautiful Star Trek and blood moon-themed card and

thingswithwings wrote an Odo/Quark flashfic. Other surprise gifts included a quart of farm-fresh blueberries, a book on Hollywood Gothic and a Ravenclaw button. Happy double chai to me. The Hebrew kind, not the tea.

Going

I popped down to NYC for 24 hours to catch my beloved friend A., her husband V. and their five-year-old while they swept through three states on a business trip from Munich. The timing was terrible, but it was a joy to see them; I hadn't seen A. in three years. That kid was born a few months before we all left DC. Time flies.

My mom came to MA for a class mid-month, so I hung out with her for a few days. That was nice, although it would've been nicer if I hadn't had to work. We played mini golf, went to an art museum, walked around a lake and watched bits of the Harry Potter marathon on TV. Food highlights: lamb burger with goat cheese, sunflower seed risotto, cocktail made with local blueberries.

Next weekend is

vividcon, the last before it metamorphoses into

fanworkscon in 2019. It already sounds like people's emotions will be running high. I'm aiming to remain calm, set simple goals—i.e. "meet

sol_se"—and not have too-high expectations for hanging out with people who will all be trying to do and feel A Lot. My perspective: It is just another Vividcon, this is not the last opportunity to see vidders, not everything has to be 'a moment.' It helps that I'm not showing any new vids amidst the glut of premieres. So far the worst I have to deal with is performance anxiety over co-modding a panel. (If you have requests for multifandom vidding topics, drop a line here!)

Watching

The movie adaptation of a play I'd wanted to see but missed, Marjorie Prime, which, like Robot and Frank, and like Westworld only less irritating, uses AI as a lens to explore age-related memory loss, how memories help construct a person, how they can be manipulated, and what happens to memories themselves and echoes of people as time passes and stories get conveyed second- and third-hand. The movie dipped in the… third quarter? But the beginning and end were wonderful.

Other than that, a string of movies and shows featuring Zahn McClarnon.

I watched six seasons of Longmire in about a month, whoops. It's a present-day sheriffing show set in rural Wyoming. Came for Zahn as the police chief of the neighboring Cheyenne reservation; stayed for him and Lou Diamond Phillips, Katee Sackhoff and some heartfelt seeking of justice. Post pending when writing about it feels less intimidating.

Writing

Fic!! Although I've been playing with Mary Sues on my hard drive here and there, it's been two years since I posted a story to the AO3 (Here rest, interred without a stone) and three years since an actor or source inspired a cluster of fics (the Inkheart trio, plus two WsIP I swear I'll finish one day). In the last month, I've started no fewer than three stories, thanks to Zahn McClarnon characters.

So far:

- 1,400 words of an indulgent Mathias/OFC dubcon aphrodisiacs story for Longmire

- 670 words of the vampire threesome flashbacks no one else has written despite the clear subtext in this one episode of Midnight, Texas

- 2,000 words of noncon inspired by a scene in the premiere of The Red Road that I watched on Sunday. I should have known noncon would overcome the writer’s block.

- Well, and 6 lines of Mathias/Cady (Longmire), but I'm not sure there's enough to hang a story on

It's both motivating and refreshingly low-pressure to observe how few AO3 fics there are for some of these characters. ( Quick examples: )

I need all the momentum I can get, being so rusty at this point and easily defeated by self-recrimination and any narrative problems that arise.

disgruntled_owl and other local fic-writing friends have been great help on both fronts, offering solutions and encouragement.

Vidding

I've recovered enough from "The Greatest" to plan vids again. I'd like to make one for Longmire; given that I've been humming a particular song candidate for about six weeks, chances are it'll be set to that.

Also on the docket is the second

FandomTrumpsHate vid, for

deelaundry. We've narrowed it down to two options: either the opening credits to a TV show she has been imagining for a while or a remix of her "all you can kink" Tango & Cash vid.

Reading

Can wait for another post.

Crossposts: https://bironic.livejournal.com/393846.html

Hi, friends. Thanks for voting in the poll! Indecisiveness combined with a general suspicion that everything I say and write these days is ~~stupid~~ banal can lead to extra-long periods of not posting.

I have been all right. Going to the gym 4+ days a week is not my natural inclination, and I still hurt in many places, but it is clear the activity is keeping my mood afloat, helping me sleep better and, yes, building strength and stamina. I took tonight off to browse the local library book sale -- $2 for Neil Clarke's Best Science Fiction of the Year vol. 1 and Whale Rider on DVD, yay -- and write a post.

My sister came to visit over Columbus Day/Indigenous Peoples Day weekend. (Wow, it looks even worse to put those side by side than to use one alone. Wish we could just say Indigenous Peoples Day now, but it hasn't permeated the culture yet.) We went to a book event featuring chef Jacques Pépin, daughter Claudine and granddaughter Shorey. Having grown up watching Pépin, Julia Child and the Frugal Gourmet on PBS, it was a real treat -- especially since he came out twenty minutes early, plastic cup of wine in hand, to do photo ops with anyone who wanted.

The discussion itself was quite funny. Claudine, the moderator, got teased by her dad, but she dished it right back. "Never work with family," she quipped at one point. They told stories about things like how PBS timed its filmings so if Claudine wasn't a fast enough learner at rolling out dough or whatever, Jacques would elbow her out of the way and do it himself. Whereas when he partnered with Julia Child, she just told the film crew, "We're going to make this dish and we'll tell you when we're done," meaning some poor editor had to trim 110 minutes down to 20-something. Nor did they work from recipes, so airings were delayed because the producers had to reverse engineer them.

We also went to the county fair in the rain, figuring the crowds would thin out. Incorrect! Nonetheless, we enjoyed many animals, vegetables and ~~minerals~~ crafts. A pair of goats tried to eat our plastic ponchos, and once again the rabbit and cavy tent drove me to look into how feasible it would be to get a couple of guinea pigs to cuddle at home. (Space, climate control and frequency of cage cleaning & feeding are the main concerns, i.e. I could not be away for more than about a day without arranging for care. And I don't know if I trust my ability to maintain the energy levels to do what's needed. This was easier growing up when we had four family members to share tasks.) LOOK AT ITS LITTLE TRIBBLE TUFTS.

Work has been work-y. We were urged to apply for some awards in our field, which took up most of the last three days. I've won a few in this job, so I'm a bit hopeful. Otherwise just trying to keep my head down and enjoy the aspects of this career that I enjoy while our office's overall stress rises and morale dips. Pretty sure [coworker] is about to quit.

Good news is we still get financial support for professional development. Next week I'm flying to San Francisco for a conference. If any of you have food recommendations in the Union Square/SoMa area, especially for breakfast and lunch, share away. I'm already set on returning to a couple of takeout places in Chinatown for tasty tasty dim sum. Still dreaming of the shrimp and leek dumplings from my first visit there a year and a half ago.

Crossposts: http://bironic.livejournal.com/383812.html

I.

Quick reminder that bidding for the vid I'm offering for charity ends at midnight tonight, if you would like to make a pledge. Sorry/happy to report that the current bid is $110, in case that saves you a click.

I put in one bid, for a Remus/Sirius/someone fic from

setissma, but

thedeadparrot outbid me. :) That's only fair, since she'd been bidding before I stuck my nose in.

II.

I'm at my mom's for the week and she's doing well. Big relief. Last week was tough, being in another state and waiting for updates while trying to work. Now we are just lying around the house listening to music, watching TV and old movies, occasionally playing Scrabble* or this Star Trek trivia game** or yelling at a Banff National Park jigsaw puzzle whose pieces all look the same.

*Geekiest hand of the game

**We shuffled the trivia cards so the movies and series would all be mixed together, but then we realized we didn't know Voyager or Enterprise and by the end we just shamelessly cherry-picked TOS for her and DS9 for me, with occasional Wrath of Khan and The Voyage Home thrown in.

III.

Persuant to the above:

TV: My mom and her bf are into reality TV, so I've been introduced to shows like Wicked Tuna, Living Alaska, and Alaskan Bush People, plus many reruns of Property Brothers, House Hunters, etc., and the usual Jeopardy! and Wheel of Fortune. Let's not talk about the news.

Movies: I brought down one of the DVDs from a grab bag

jetpack_monkey put together, and we are two for two so far: Attack of the Crab Monsters, which featured the immortal line, "Once they were men. Now they are land crabs," and Not of This Earth, featuring space vampires and questionable transfusion practices. YouTube trailer for the double feature. Tonight we'll try the third, War of the Satellites. Maybe we'll even get to the .avi file of The Frozen Dead that's been on my computer for about three years since my coworker tried to get me to watch it.

Books: Binti was great. I haven't gotten more than a third into Akata Witch because of all the TV, but I look forward to finishing it. Then The Unbeatable Squirrel Girl vols. 1-2, which was supposed to be for book club but just got outvoted by Paper Girls vols. 1-2, which I guess is next-next.

IV.

The neighbors' college-age son has gotten into Game of Thrones, grew his hair into several inches of curl, got himself a sword at a garage sale, and now does cosplay of Jon Snow in a fur-shouldered Night's Watch cloak. It's impressive!

V.

Okay, she's out of the shower, so that's all for now. Hope you're all hanging in there.

Crossposts: http://bironic.livejournal.com/379705.html

Exemplary Bus Dad appeared again tonight. What a spirit-lifter. This time they talked about duplexes and possibly Jesus; she tried to eat his fingers; and when, a few times, she stood up on the seat, grabbed the rail and leaned back, he placed an unobtrusive hand or leg beneath her in case she fell, then snatched her knit hat and batted her face with it while she laughed. They say the Grinch's heart grew three sizes that day.

Oh, and he had a safety pin on his lapel. First safety pin wearer I've crossed paths with whose pin hasn't struck me as emptily and/or obnoxiously performative. ETA: But that probably says more about me and my projecting than it does about the pin wearers.

Thank you for your kind comments after our family's unexpected holiday loss. If you're interested, here are some of the pictures we put out when visitors came.

( baby pix, ca. 1918; also 1950s )

Short work week, after all that. TGIF tomorrow. Gonna watch a movie at

disgruntledowl's house and hope to work on a vid this weekend. Probably should prioritize the Elf one since Xmas is coming up before the Festivids deadline. Also need to work on an essay for a thing.

Not much notable to report, activism- or media-wise. Caught up on Westworld and The Daily Show, rented the first season of Grantchester and read a book for work.

no_detective et al screened the Eyewitness pilot at fangirl Thanksgiving, which was entertaining in a group but I'm not sure I'll pursue it.

How are you doing?

Crossposts: http://bironic.livejournal.com/379500.html

( Thanksgiving and bereavement. )

Uh, so other than that, Thanksgiving was actually pretty good. The flight down was short, uneventful and scenic; my dad's fiancée made a sweet potato pie with marshmallows on top that we blowtorched and later had to scrape off because they melted into a charred, lumpy glaze; there were about nine hundred people at the stepfamily's annual Thanksgiving dinner, but my worst worries weren't realized: (1) no one talked politics* and (2) despite the absence of my sister, who usually serves as a conduit, I talked with many attendees and didn't need to hide in a quiet corner. Some of the older kids (high school and college-ish) even came up and started conversations.

*In fact, the total lack of politics talk slowly swung me from "whew" to contemplating the extended family's privilege and/or willful ignorance at not seeming worried by current events. It's possible they've been talking about it a lot not-at-Thanksgiving and took a break for the holiday?

In other news, that orig. fic vignette made it to 4,800 words before I left MA, I've been alternating between reading a dull book for work and acquaintances' shifter romance novels, and I still hope to see some fangirls on Saturday.

Crossposts: http://bironic.livejournal.com/369572.html

VIDDING

I keep thinking I've updated recently but it's just placeholder vid posts for Vividcon. I ended up making a third vid at the last minute for Premieres. It is a simple little thing for the animated movie Ferngully: The Last Rainforest. Anyone else of a certain age remember Chrysta and Batty Koda and Tim Curry as the smog monster? I got the song idea when someone nominated the source for Festivids, but then no one requested it, so here we are.

DOING

Got back last evening from 5 days on Long Island -- well, 3 1/2 plus driving -- where to my disappointment there wasn't time to connect with my city fan friends nor a contingent of Brit fanquaintances on account of I spent most of the weekend with my childhood friend A. (who now lives two time zones away) & her family, who were in town for a wedding, plus dinner with my also-in-town-from-out-of-state cousin, boat ride with my mom and her bf, combo high school graduation/birthday party for various stepfamily members, visit with my remarkably old yet mostly lucid grandparents, visit with my dad & his fiancée, etc.

The beginning of the trip involved too much driving around and socializing, but by the end I had relaxed. It was a relief to eat meals prepared by someone else, and tasty meals at that, like Dad & E.'s grilled skirt steak with summer corn and bruschetta. My mom and I came across reruns of some TV shows we hadn't seen since my childhood (Night Court) or hers (George Reeves Superman). Dad & E. & I settled in for some of the Olympic trials in swimming, diving and gymnastics. I swam a little. Helped my dad organize some bookshelves that had been disturbed after a burst pipe, and then we squared up a six-foot-tall PVC cage around his pea patch that is the latest escalation in his battle against vegetable-swiping chipmunks.

I slept well the last two nights. I never seem to sleep as well anywhere else as I do when I'm in that bedroom where I lived from age 9 to 18 and college summers and a few years after that.

Packed a few more boxes of books and my old stereo to bring up to Boston. Sat for a while after I had gotten back and unpacked, looking at the new-old books on the shelves and thinking about who I was when I collected and read them and who I am now and strengthening the connections between the two. I've been slowly shedding books that I will never read or that I read and didn't like. These aren't going anywhere.

Crossposts: http://bironic.livejournal.com/356460.html

(It is raining.)

Doing: Just returned from a five-day trip to my grandparents' in Florida, with my dad. Some ups, some downs, as happens when one's family is dealing with age-related health issues and dwindling ability to remain independent. Or codependent, as the case may be. In any event, it was good to see them, they appreciated the visit, and my dad and I did make it to the beach one beautiful morning. Two hours of swimming and of resting in the shade of an umbrella: divine.

Watching: A collection of Turner Classic Movies with the grandparents: Bringing Up Baby, With Six You Get Eggroll, Anna and the King of Siam (with Rex Harrison, not Yul Brynner), and 15 minutes of The Man Who Would Be King before I quit in distaste. Oh, and we caught the last 20 minutes or so of Transcendence, because apparently Paul Bettany movies now follow me wherever I go.

On my own, beginning of season three of Gilmore Girls, with the occasional ep thrown in of season three of Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries. Haven't yet started the new series of Doctor Who.

Have also been getting together once every couple of weeks with

thedeadparrot to alternately heckle and admire Project Runway, which is great fun.

Reading: Re-read of Ancillary Justice complete; Ancillary Sword half complete. Still wonderful. The series works for me on every level: concept behind the main character, basic plot, worldbuilding, personally and societally relevant themes (schisms in identity, class conflict, racism, suppression/absorption of minorities, social justice, police brutality, white male privilege, love and grief and revenge), favorite sci fi tropes (artificial intelligences, alien contact, awakening after centuries in cryo freeze), subtle and indirect emotions that sneak up on you, use of "she" as gender-neutral pronoun so that the universe feels filled with women. Not least, I relate to and envy the main character in numerous ways. Today's delight: remembering how Translator Dlique sounded a touch like Luna Lovegood as well as Delirium of the Endless. Can't wait for Ancillary Mercy next week.

Ummmm also I mentioned this on Twitter but I discovered last week that Ann Leckie recced Starships! in August and I retweeted her and then she replied to me and I may have died a little.

Before that, read Saga vol 5--excellent--then finished The Book of Three and barely started The Black Cauldron by Lloyd Alexander, in the Chronicles of Prydain series, for book club. Eh. So far it is template fantasy; I found myself playing Spot the Comparison to things like Lord of the Rings, The Once & Future King, Earthsea and the Fionavar Tapestry. Young Eilonwy is a hoot and the prince whose name I've forgotten is written to be nice and sexy in a kids' book sort of way--in fact, young male protagonist Taran reads as though he's in love with him without really realizing it--but the books have not grabbed me so far. Gwydion. Will try a little more and see how it goes. Favorite line so far: "She is the only oracular pig in Prydain."

Vidding: Submitted my most favorite source ideas to

festivids (who will make me a book trailer for Ancillary Justice???) and am trying to think of whether there are any more. Glanced really quickly through the list of nominations and spotted something that soon after generated an idea, woo.

Also we will see if a vid gets generated for Halloween, my most successful vidding holiday to date. Have a bunch of source already ripped for one potential project. Unfortunately, have a bunch of RL stuff in October, too.

Writing: Not a lot outside of work. Adding some words here and there to that Marius/Mary Sue story. Speaking of posts that met with crickets.

Meeting: Got to hang for a couple of hours with

such_heights and

happydork last weekend when they stopped by Boston Fannish Brunch on their way across the country for their honeymoon; that was a treat.

Eating: Culinary highlights of September included a lobster roll from James Hook & Co., which lived up to its reputation of understanding that mayo and bun should take a backseat to the lobster meat, and a scoop of Noodle Kugel ice cream from JP Licks, which was cinnamon-spiked vanilla ice cream studded with cooked-then-frozen egg noodles. Because how can you pass up a specialty Rosh Hashanah ice cream flavor?

ETA: Wait, I forgot the other two excellent foods. First, following some nutrition advice, I tried broiled mackerel from the local Japanese restaurant and it was fantastic. Savory and salty and firm with a crisp skin. Will attempt to make something like it at home one of these days and see if the resulting oily-fish smell is worth the meals it produces. Second, I discovered the cayenne-mango flavored almonds from Q's Nuts in Somerville and cannot get over the perfect blend of spicy and sweet. Nom nom afternoon snacks.

Dreaming: of autumn. It's still 80+ degrees out, and nearly October. Come on.

Also I had a dream the first night in Florida that Chief O'Brien showed up to try to save me at the end of a godawful tennis match and I was disappointed (but also relieved) that Bashir wasn't there. And then that I had to explain to Tony Stark how I was feeling after a traumatic event, so I phrased it in relation to his life: "imagine if the Iron Man suits were all destroyed, and Pepper was hurt, and Rhodey'd been killed..."

Whew. Okay, let's return after this to normal-sized, focused posts.

Winter break: the joy of working for an academic institution. Chilled out at my dad's for a few days for the end of Hanukkah, which was nice. Survived a 30-person Hanukkah party with extended family. Then he and I made a beautiful wooden cutting board.

<-- partway through the process

Currently chilling out at my mom's for Christmas, which she apparently now celebrates. There were more family dinner parties. Now, Star Wars jigsaw puzzle complete, a cranberry-orange-cinnamon-cloves mix is simmering on the stove, filling the house with a wonderful spicy cider scent, and we are watching TV.

(Me: So you're finally able to watch Mythbusters again, after we showed you James Bondage?
Mom: Ehhhhhhhh. It's... definitely different.)

Later, flying down to see

synn, whee. It's been almost a year and a half.

And on the plane, I expect to finish Ancillary Justice and perhaps start Ancillary Sword. Ohmigosh, Ancillary Justice is so great. It is just as Pop Culture Happy Hour and a couple of friends promised. Such an interesting concept for universe and protagonist. It took a couple of chapters to get into, but then she won my heart on, what was it, page 26? -- singing with three mouths -- and there was that one chapter in the middle where everything happened, and I honest to goodness made noises at the book, I was so invested in the character. Couldn't tell you the last time that happened.

Giving gifts has been satisfying. And receiving some! My sister gave me music files on a flash drive and my mom found a Deep Space Nine clock for me on Etsy that is fantastic. Also a teacup that says "Potions Master."

Have bookmarked a handful of Yuletide stories to try. We'll see if there's any intersection among canons I know, canons I like, canons I'm interested in reading fic for, and good stories. Definitely want to try the Imperial Radch ones after I've finished the books.

Hope those of you who are observing winter holidays have had a good week, and hope those of you for whom the holidays are difficult have made it through all right. ♥

Just back from 10 days in NY with family. Tired. Glad to be home.

The first weekend was fun. ( Caught up with my dad, took a fantastic boat ride alongside Manhattan with my mom )

( pix )

( Surgery went well )

I brought podcasts and stuff to read out loud, but she couldn't concentrate on them. We watched/listened to/napped through a lot of TV. Mostly unengaging cooking and real estate shows, unless you count HGTV Bingo (stainless steel appliances! granite countertops! open concept kitchen! I can't buy this house, I don't like the interior paint color!) but by the end we did manage some good stuff IMO. Like Galaxy Quest, which we'd all seen enough times to know everything that was going on without needing to actually see it, and the second half of Jurassic Park and the first half of The Lost World. They hadn't seen The Lost World. I reminisced about reading the book back when I was a teenager mooning over Ian Malcolm and delighting in the suspense of the trailer scene in particular. I remember re-reading it on a day trip tour bus while on a family vacation in England. My dad probably kept elbowing me to put the book down and look out the window like he'd been doing on trips for years.

Also caught part of a Jesse Stone movie marathon. My mom liked ~~Magnum PI~~ Tom Selleck. My sister liked the golden retriever. My ears pricked up when commercials promised a new one at 9 p.m., but it turned out to be the "cable premiere" and I'd already seen it on Netflix. Alas.

And a Harry Potter DVD marathon from Prisoner of Azkaban to Deathly Hallows Part One. That was great. My mom got really into Deathly Hallows. I… thought I would have more to say here about HP, particularly regarding the experience of rewatching after so long away, and also about the Marauders generation on film, and also also how nifty it was to see the films for the first time since going to visit the sets in Watford, but either that was wrong or it's too close to collapsing-into-bed time to collect ruminations right now. TBD.

At some point I'll catch up on Doctor Who etc. Just have to get through four workdays, a networking event and an Atul Gawande book reading/signing first. Then a holiday weekend and a Vin Diesel movie night at

thedeadparrot's. Woo.

- Working on festivid. Nothing fancy (yet?) (or am I lying to throw you off the scent?), but I think I like it.

- Chicken stock cooling on the counter. Smells lovely.

- My mom came to visit this weekend. On Saturday I took her to Nordstrom for a lingerie fitting; she hasn't had an easy time finding things she likes since her lumpectomy left her a bit mushed a couple of years ago. After a rocky start (our fitter was 45 minutes late because of traffic) it went really well and she has gone home with three bras that made her smile, no insert required.

- We saw Ender's Game. Even though it rushed a few important developments and turned the only two female characters besides Valentine into emotion-soaked stereotypes who get pushed around in a man's logical world, given that it kept the themes that really mattered at the end, I'll call it a decent adaptation.

- Before the movie, the I, Frankenstein trailer showed. Oh, dear God. I'd already resigned myself to seeing the movie in January because a) Frankenstein and b) Aaron Eckhart, but seriously, could they have made a more ludicrous contemporary Hollywood version? I don't think so. It looked like a parody. I wish it were a parody. I will enjoy it as though it were a parody. Frankenstein's creature punches a gargoyle monster mid-air while drums crash and orange bursts against teal. Nothing more needs to be said.

- Who knows how these things happen? I've been getting into these Jesse Stone TV movies, with Tom Selleck. Anyone else tried them? He plays a police detective in a small town who solves A- and B-plot crimes each episode. Sometimes it's just nice to watch stories about decent people trying to do decent things. I mean, aside from the mobsters and murderers and domestic abusers and stuff. The piano music is lovely. Viola Davis, also coincidentally in Ender's Game, should get more lines. Stone's sidekick Suitcase, who looks like Alexander Skarsgard with his guileless face on, makes me smile. "You're on to something, Jesse. I feel it in my cells."

- It gets dark so early these days. Tomorrow they're saying it may snow in the morning. Let the Game of Thrones quotes commence.

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. ♥

.

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.

My dad is what you could affectionately call a pack rat. Or non-affectionately call a high-functioning hoarder as you side-eye the stuff crammed into the attic, crawl spaces, rafters, basement, garage and shed of the otherwise lovely house he's lived in for more than 20 years and now shares with his (understandably distressed) fiancée, E. ( More on that. ) So it is more or less a miracle that E. has convinced him that something needs to be done before the place spontaneously combusts. And it was with a sense of relief that I accepted his request to spend some time up in NY and start clearing out the basement as a Father's Day gift. I'd always figured it wouldn't happen until he'd passed away.

The catch, if you can call it that, is that he wants me (and my sister) to tackle "our things" first—the 30 or so years of stuff stored in boxes and bins about which he's always said, "You'll want it when you're older." Well, we're older, we still don't want most of it, and finally he is ready to hear it. And if he isn't ready, then he is going to be banned from the room while we sift through everything and decide what to do with it all. What you don't see can't hurt you.

As the date draws near, however—am taking the train on Wednesday—I'm fretting more about how I will react to digging up the past. ( Because it's always easier to toss someone else's stuff, and I don't know what we'll find. )

In a way it would be easier to toss everything without looking at it. It would have been easier if we'd made these decisions back when we or he packed up another batch of who-knows-what and stuck it in the crawl space to begin with. But a trip down memory lane also sounds like fun. Nostalgic, possibly teary, alternately joyful and depressing, fun.

So, friends. I come to you to share a plan of attack and to ask if any of you have dealt with similar situations and might have advice. ( Questions and tactics )
All that being said... the whole thing might be fine. It might be fun and done quickly, with the bulk of work falling on the donation/sale side.

We'll see.

Happy post-Thanksgiving/post-weekend. Long time no entry. (Again.) I spent a week or two finishing an extracurricular job and generally being too busy, and then one week in New York visiting family and remembering how to slow down.

The Thanksgiving trip turned out to be really nice. It provided an opportunity to reconnect with my mom, dad and sister as well as a chance to get to know better the people who are basically stepfamily now: dad's fiancée and her extended family, mom's boyfriend's son who is living at home for a while. Sometimes it involved troubling late-night conversations—more common as I grow up—but for the most part things were lovely. There was a day trip on a boat, some shopping, bonding time in the kitchen, ceiling painting, box packing and old stuff chucking, some couch lounging...

I also got to show my friends A. and Mr. A. around Long Island for a day, attended my other friend A.'s baby shower and spent a long afternoon at the company that used to employ me/destroy my will to live. You may recall stories if you read this LJ up until 2008. I hadn't been back since I quit to go to grad school five years ago. The visit was actually great. About a dozen people I'd worked with were still there, somehow, and there may be contract work in my future. The worst (aside from the fact that the office relocated from 25 miles/60 minutes away from my old house to less than three miles) was that one of my favorite former coworkers, who'd also left and for whom I'd done some freelance jobs, died of a freak intestinal issue over the summer. He was only 28 and had a brand-new daughter.

After driving back to D.C. with Pop Culture Happy Hour podcasts for company, I unpacked a bunch of boxes of books and CDs and assorted other things I'd never moved down here. The Vampire Chronicles! Sandman graphic novels! Poetry! School yearbooks! Old writing now on a Flash drive! Seder plate! Wine glasses! &c. &c. It's nice to have the books in particular. *hugs them* Three and a half years later, my little studio apartment starts to look well-furnished.

.

What else. I told you about the Dracula ballet.

synn and I went to the annual Crafty Bastards fair a few weeks ago and played Hipster Meme Bingo with the merchandise, keeping an eye out for moustaches, zombies, bacon, robots, T-rexes, tentacles, owls/cute baby animals, cupcakes and narwhals and stuff, with bonus points for combinations of the above (t-shirt with UFOs abducting dinosaurs! prints of UFOs abducting penguins! tote bag with Obama punching out a zombie!). So that was amusing. Not that I am immune to all of those tropes. No cephalopods this time, but I did get a greeting card with a tiny penguin.

'Tis the season for gift shopping/making/giving. And Festividding. (Half a draft done.) And snow. And sweaters and blankets. And maybe finally acquiring a TV stand that will hold my hundred-pound CRT as well as a shelf of DVDs. Dear vendors: giving load capabilities in flatscreen inches is not universally helpful.

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Quarantinewhile:

2020

Back in internet-land

Fall into winter, part one

A room of one's own, for a price

1st of the year

What I've been up to, midsummer edition

Current poll leader: What I have been up to

Postcard from the mid-Atlantic

Ushering in December

Thanks, 2016.

New York, part one

Apres moi, le deluge

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Where I've been

Of the good: Veterans Day edition

Basement: It is done. Sort of.

Feelings, upon preparing to sort through a lifetime of stuff

Home for the holiday

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