michelel72 (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
michelel72) wrote2011-06-12 02:14 pm
michelel72) wrote2011-06-12 02:14 pm
Entry tags:
June 2011: State of the me
I haven't been around much; I haven't had time. Most of that is work; I adore my job, but it's exhausting, and nights/weekends really aren't enough for me even to keep up with the day-to-day, much less reading (I haven't read half the SGA Big Bang archive; I haven't read any of last year's Atlantis Big Bang; I have over 400 fics, fic indexes, and other works tagged as "to be read"; the ReverseBang just went live and the GenFicathon is about to), much much less writing. Which is frustrating. I simply need more time than that to switch from programmer-mindset to writing-mindset.
I did finally get a several-days-long vacation recently (which was a whole drama in itself, redacted for work-specific details); in the last three days of it, I was able to settle into writing and wrote 9k words. Of a brand-new fic, rather than any of my 17 existing uWIPs. Because my brain hates me. (It was, at least, one of the three one-line plotbunnies I had previously noted, rather than being entirely new.) And the structure is weird, because it decided it had to be from John's POV, when the key event happened twenty years earlier to different people entirely, so I'll have about 10k of an introductory scene, a few shorter time-passage scenes, and then a climactic sequence that effectively ends in narrated flashbacks. Which can work, but … yeah. And it doesn't help that the climactic plot element is missing, because the one I originally planned is kind of dumb for this setting and too closely echoes the plot of a one of those other uWIPs anyway. Even if I'd had the time to write one more word since I left off Tuesday evening, it's hard to move on when I know I'm heading for a chasm. Bleh. But this one has my momentum, so I'm going to keep whacking at it, at least until I get frustrated enough to get back into "Broken Mirror" or "Element Wheel".
With reading and writing fic, as well as keeping up with my rlist/flist, I spend a lot of time on my computer. My ISP is Comcast, who provides Symantec's Norton Security Suite free to its customers, and I have to wonder what the hell they're thinking. Norton was once the gold standard for computer utilities, if I recall correctly, but it's been worse than a joke for years. Why in the world would Comcast encourage its customers to use a product that makes Comcast's service seem unusably slow? I'm not exaggerating — when my browser takes 48 seconds to process a simple page-down command (yes, I timed it, twice; yes, the response time is unmeasurably quick with Norton uninstalled), I may be savvy enough to blame the add-on software, but not everyone will be, and they'll blame Comcast's speed. Inexplicably stupid marketing/support choice.
Not much else to report beyond that, so I'll close out with a huge batch of …
TV mini-reviews:
One of these days, I'll post about "Chuck". Really. (In the meantime, those of you who aren't watching: what are you thinking? The last half of the third season, and very nearly all of the fourth season, are brilliant! The characters, the way the humor is played, the successful conversion of a relationship from UST to RST (tm![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
ninjamonkey73), the team … love! Ask violetcheetah just how many shows I literally squee during, and she'll tell you that this is just about the only one! It only gets one more season! Get over here already!)
Another show worth mentioning is the comedy special "Wyatt Cenac, Comedy Person". As much as I like "The Daily Show", the humor veers into the crude and the stupid far more often than I care for, so while I like Cenac I wasn't expecting genius, and I was very pleasantly surprised. His stings often veer into the startlingly academic, which I'm a total sucker for. Recommended.
Finally caught up on "House" (meh, not entirely sure I'll bother with next season … but if you haven't seen the "Get Happy" sequence, track it down right now. Utter genius! I want those backup dancers in my real life!). Hopeful that "Criminal Minds" will right the ship next season, though the behind-the-scenes network maneuverings turn my stomach.
Enjoying "The Killing"; I'm too used to modern procedurals, which give you the villain's point of view, and this show is successfully surprising me with plot developments without making them look like cheats. (I don't feel a need for fic for this show, though, at least yet, and while I'm a ship-and-let-ship kind of person … Linden/Holder, person at fandomsecrets? Really? I just sincerely don't see it. I'm much more a sucker for complicated friendships or coworkerships than reading sexual tension in every interaction, though.)
I don't think I'll miss "V", but that was one hell of a finale. Any problems I had with Lisa were definitely with the character, not the actress. Lisa 2 and emo-boy … damn but that was an amazing finish. Hee. Been rewatching "Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles" so thatvioletcheetah can see it for the first time; I remembered being tepid about it, but the first season at least is everything "V" should have been. (If you've seen the whole series, go read Seven Sunday Mother-Daughter Mornings (gen, 3.8k) right now if you haven't already.)
"Men of a Certain Age" — it's weird, I always enjoy watching it, and I always have trouble wanting to start a new episode; with so much else queued, I've only seen the first episode of this season. (I miss "Terriers". Sniff.)
"Doctor Who" — meh. I don't really care anymore. It's there. It's a double handful of glitter thrown against a wall; it's a six-year-old's idea of glamorous makeup; it's the offspring of a Goa'uld's design aesthetic crossed with the speech rate of Rodney McKay on speed. (However, fic-wise, if explicitly sensual and briefly explicitly sexual is your thing — and it's not typically mine — Need to Know (Whoverse/Star Trek TOS, Jack Harkness/OMC, 10.5k) is charming and compelling.)
Following "Mark Watches Avatar" is reminding me how wonderful and special "Avatar: The Last Airbender" is.
I've seen all of five episodes of "Castle" due to lack-of-time problems, but it's cute, and I'm thinking of using the rewatch comm to give me a schedule to keep to.
And the Red Sox have gone from worst to first, quite literally. More importantly, Jerry Remy is back; the Don & Jerry byplay is why I bother to watch.
And that's that.
I did finally get a several-days-long vacation recently (which was a whole drama in itself, redacted for work-specific details); in the last three days of it, I was able to settle into writing and wrote 9k words. Of a brand-new fic, rather than any of my 17 existing uWIPs. Because my brain hates me. (It was, at least, one of the three one-line plotbunnies I had previously noted, rather than being entirely new.) And the structure is weird, because it decided it had to be from John's POV, when the key event happened twenty years earlier to different people entirely, so I'll have about 10k of an introductory scene, a few shorter time-passage scenes, and then a climactic sequence that effectively ends in narrated flashbacks. Which can work, but … yeah. And it doesn't help that the climactic plot element is missing, because the one I originally planned is kind of dumb for this setting and too closely echoes the plot of a one of those other uWIPs anyway. Even if I'd had the time to write one more word since I left off Tuesday evening, it's hard to move on when I know I'm heading for a chasm. Bleh. But this one has my momentum, so I'm going to keep whacking at it, at least until I get frustrated enough to get back into "Broken Mirror" or "Element Wheel".
With reading and writing fic, as well as keeping up with my rlist/flist, I spend a lot of time on my computer. My ISP is Comcast, who provides Symantec's Norton Security Suite free to its customers, and I have to wonder what the hell they're thinking. Norton was once the gold standard for computer utilities, if I recall correctly, but it's been worse than a joke for years. Why in the world would Comcast encourage its customers to use a product that makes Comcast's service seem unusably slow? I'm not exaggerating — when my browser takes 48 seconds to process a simple page-down command (yes, I timed it, twice; yes, the response time is unmeasurably quick with Norton uninstalled), I may be savvy enough to blame the add-on software, but not everyone will be, and they'll blame Comcast's speed. Inexplicably stupid marketing/support choice.
Not much else to report beyond that, so I'll close out with a huge batch of …
TV mini-reviews:
One of these days, I'll post about "Chuck". Really. (In the meantime, those of you who aren't watching: what are you thinking? The last half of the third season, and very nearly all of the fourth season, are brilliant! The characters, the way the humor is played, the successful conversion of a relationship from UST to RST (tm
ninjamonkey73), the team … love! Ask violetcheetah just how many shows I literally squee during, and she'll tell you that this is just about the only one! It only gets one more season! Get over here already!)Another show worth mentioning is the comedy special "Wyatt Cenac, Comedy Person". As much as I like "The Daily Show", the humor veers into the crude and the stupid far more often than I care for, so while I like Cenac I wasn't expecting genius, and I was very pleasantly surprised. His stings often veer into the startlingly academic, which I'm a total sucker for. Recommended.
Finally caught up on "House" (meh, not entirely sure I'll bother with next season … but if you haven't seen the "Get Happy" sequence, track it down right now. Utter genius! I want those backup dancers in my real life!). Hopeful that "Criminal Minds" will right the ship next season, though the behind-the-scenes network maneuverings turn my stomach.
Enjoying "The Killing"; I'm too used to modern procedurals, which give you the villain's point of view, and this show is successfully surprising me with plot developments without making them look like cheats. (I don't feel a need for fic for this show, though, at least yet, and while I'm a ship-and-let-ship kind of person … Linden/Holder, person at fandomsecrets? Really? I just sincerely don't see it. I'm much more a sucker for complicated friendships or coworkerships than reading sexual tension in every interaction, though.)
I don't think I'll miss "V", but that was one hell of a finale. Any problems I had with Lisa were definitely with the character, not the actress. Lisa 2 and emo-boy … damn but that was an amazing finish. Hee. Been rewatching "Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles" so that
violetcheetah can see it for the first time; I remembered being tepid about it, but the first season at least is everything "V" should have been. (If you've seen the whole series, go read Seven Sunday Mother-Daughter Mornings (gen, 3.8k) right now if you haven't already.)"Men of a Certain Age" — it's weird, I always enjoy watching it, and I always have trouble wanting to start a new episode; with so much else queued, I've only seen the first episode of this season. (I miss "Terriers". Sniff.)
"Doctor Who" — meh. I don't really care anymore. It's there. It's a double handful of glitter thrown against a wall; it's a six-year-old's idea of glamorous makeup; it's the offspring of a Goa'uld's design aesthetic crossed with the speech rate of Rodney McKay on speed. (However, fic-wise, if explicitly sensual and briefly explicitly sexual is your thing — and it's not typically mine — Need to Know (Whoverse/Star Trek TOS, Jack Harkness/OMC, 10.5k) is charming and compelling.)
Following "Mark Watches Avatar" is reminding me how wonderful and special "Avatar: The Last Airbender" is.
I've seen all of five episodes of "Castle" due to lack-of-time problems, but it's cute, and I'm thinking of using the rewatch comm to give me a schedule to keep to.
And the Red Sox have gone from worst to first, quite literally. More importantly, Jerry Remy is back; the Don & Jerry byplay is why I bother to watch.
And that's that.
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