Shiny stars at the edge of the Universe

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

avrelia — Tue, 30 Dec 2025 02:43:29 GMT

Just a bit of hello to my friends! Hope you are ok

Let's celebrate! My blog is 20 years old

avrelia — Thu, 26 Oct 2023 19:12:25 GMT

More Joy Day

avrelia — Sat, 15 Jan 2022 01:04:22 GMT

for this year More Joy day, I shall post my answer to eglantiere's prompt:

can you write, on any day, of things that bring you uncomplicated, sensory pleasure? tactile, or visual, or audial, or some sense of 'oh, nice' -things, or activities, or anything like that.

Air, warm and sweet, just after the sunset; lilac bushes; the smell of freshly-mowed grass; when my bunny jumps in my lap and lets me pet her; the sound of a passing train far away beyond the forest; hugging people I love; drinking coffee with milk and eating a pastry in just the right moment; when I finished hiking a mountainous trail or completed some other heavy physical exercise and can go home and rest; sunset sky, forests that remind me my home forests of Northwestern Russia, ocean on Hawaii, walking alone in Rome (any other city is fine, too, Rome was just the last time it happened like that), eating ice cream while walking in the cold weather, seeing a beautiful bird in the wild, picking up horse chestnut fruit, and holding in my palm smooth auburn spheres. Putting them in a pocket and then forgetting about their existence for a year and finding them again and stroking their dry, ridged shells.

Ok, I’ll stop for now. It already looks like a mix of the
Pillow Book and
Денискины Рассказы, and I am pretty sure I am forgetting something really important. But I want to post it today! heh.

Russia-based spin-off of Buffy the Vampire Slayer

avrelia — Mon, 03 Jan 2022 17:42:22 GMT

in my "give me something to talk about" post selenak asked me:

You're in a charge of a Russia-based spin-off of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Could be present day, or any time in history (including of course the 20th century). Which setting do you choose? What's the Watcher's cover story/civilian job, and what the Slayer's? Does she face Baba Yaga or another Russian myth?

One of my first attempts at fanfiction, not successful, but the one I returned several times until leaving it to rest, was the story of the Agrafena the Vampire Slayer in 1777, in St. Petersburg. It was not connected to Baba Yaga or any traditional Russian spirits, but let me play with many St.Petersburg’s dark legends and actual history, full of floods that were decidedly apocalyptic (also, see Pushkin’s The Bronze Horseman, which dealt with the subject first and best). I mean, I timed this story specifically during one of such horrible floods, in September 1777.

While I am unlikely to go and finish this story (it’s here), I do think it is a cool concept and setting Slayers’ stories during 18th century in Russia can lead to many delicious possibilities.

Another time that can lead to fascinating stories would be somewhere between 1961-1968. The future had never seemed brighter – the wars are won, the scientific progress does miracles, the first man was in space already. Vampires are just so inappropriate in that setting. Not no mention – how can you explain to an atheist, sincerely believing in bright communist future girl who is planning to be a nuclear physicist in space that actually she has to fight vampires with a stick? It’s perfect.

And still, I wouldn’t use Baba yaga here, but instead turned to darker urban legends and regular demonfolk like domovoys, kikimoras, etc. I love Baba Yaga, and she has her place in modern stories, but she is a bit overdone.

ETA because I realized I only answered half of the question. more ideas for 60s Soviet Vampire Slayer.

Given the age range of the beginning of the Slayer calling - around 15, it would still be appropriate for a high school setting. And then the Watcher can be a teacher or a head of an after class hobby circle, or both. I am thinking something like photography – which was pretty popular at the time for boys and girls and could be a fine cover for a number of weird activities. If our Slayer is still alive upon school graduation, she could try to pass entrance exams for a college or start working, and the Watcher could find her a job close enough for him to continue watching her.

Geographically – we would be talking about the borders of USSR as they were in the 1960s, not specifically Russia.
If in 18th century young St. Petersburg is the best choice, for 20th century I wouldn’t choose either Moscow to St. Petersburg/Leningrad, but instead looked for other possibilities.
- Black Sea cities or small towns. Small town for the vacation resort atmosphere or a large seaport for the constant mix of random people and influences.
- medium size provincial town where nothing happens
- secret scientific research town
- large industrial city
- small town in Carpathian mountains. Castle, tourists, lots of vampires, ghosts, local legends.

Please ask more! https://avrelia.dreamwidth.org/283337.html

Hello, 2022!

avrelia — Mon, 03 Jan 2022 02:41:19 GMT

I can't bring myself to list the results of year 2021.

I mean - we are fine, in good health, and so are our extended families.
getting US visas for them though, is way more complicated, which sucks.
we now have a bunny
kids are going to school, which is so much better. I am so not a homeschooling parent, and I've known it all my life, before I was even thinking of being a parent.
D. is a highschooler. Mind boggles.
G. is a second grader. Mind boggles some more, since in my mind he is a baby
I know, I know,
I am deadly tired, and always feel that I am failing at parenting and life in general.
and in writing, too.
though I wrote some fanfiction, and I keep writing, and I have ideas...
so... a bunny!

also, please tell me what to write about in January (see the previous post)
I did watched some tv, so I need to do a round up of it

December 2021

avrelia — Thu, 02 Dec 2021 03:35:38 GMT

Time to use my New year icon, and wow. How come it's December already?

Everything is the same. I don't do anything, and I don't even have an excuse of kids at home. Time just flies away. It still leaves me tired and exhausted, but without any meaningful result.

I think a year ago I had more hopes for the world.

Anyway, I am fine, my family is fine, and I have no idea what to do next.

Well, except for day to day stuff.

Decided to do the Holiday love meme:

✨ holiday love meme 2021 ✨
my thread here

the Moonlighting series

avrelia — Wed, 06 Oct 2021 17:52:50 GMT

https://www.hallowedgroundmedia.org/hallowed-ground-storycast/moonlighting

I listened to this podcast, where Lani Diane Rich was talking about the Moonlighting series, and I was happy to discover that she had all the same frustrations about it as I did, but is so much better at talking about them.

I watched Moonlighting when it was airing in Russia, in the 90s. I was a teenager, and I was sucked in in all the mad energy of Maddie and Dave, their chemistry and unbelievable UST. Reader, of course I shipped them.

I loved the crazy antics, the fourth wall breaking, the experiments, I loved Allyce Beasley Curtis Armstrong’s characters.

But mostly, yes, I was there for Maddie and Dave.

But will they won’t they was becoming boring and sour, and when they got together it was horrible, and then everything just got worse and sadder. I couldn’t understand what was happening.

And then much later I learned of the so called “moonlighting curse”. That supposedly falls upon any consummated relationship in tv series and turns everything into crap. And which totally doesn’t not exist, because it was obvious even to me when I was watching, that the problem was with bad writing that seemed not to know what to do with the characters. I mean, there is plenty of conflict and interesting stories could be told about people in relationship – just not if their only goal in live was to kiss each other. And honestly, not knowing what to do with the characters was just one of the problem. It was what they did with the characters that seemed to be the problem.

When the series started, Maddie was someone we cared about, a person who lost her money, and has to adjust to a new life, a new job, new people around her. She tried to be serious and careful, and economical. Cybil Sheppard, as her heroine, was, I think a half-forgotten star of several movies (I haven’t seen any of them), and this series was supposed to be her comeback. But was Bruce Willis who became a breakout star instead. And well, his David was electrifying, fun, engaging and irresistible. It was fair. But as the series progressed Maddie is shown as a caricature – boring, nagging, killjoy of a person who never has fun herself and never lets anyone have fun. She is having random womanly emotions, and she is wrong most of the time. David, on the other hand, becomes more and more adorable: he likes fun! He solves crimes while having fun! He has real deep feelings! Everyone loves him!

It is no wonder that the relationship between actors were sour as well. But seriously, the show became unwatchable in its later episodes.

Still, when I think of Moonlighting now, I think of the amazing first seasons, of Atomic Shakespeare, of Agnes DiPesto rhyming on the phone, of all the fun, and of the valuable lesson that the chemistry between characters is not enough for the story to work. And that there is no moonlighting curse.

on recent Marvel tv shows

avrelia — Thu, 10 Jun 2021 18:00:36 GMT

I have enjoyed “The Falcon and the Winter Soldier.” I loved seeing the world after The Blip and the problems it faces. It even added the necessary perspective to WandaVision – the people in West View are the people in this post-Blip world, faced with the same problems – lost and found families, people who grieved for five years only to have their loved ones back, unchanged. Parents who reappeared and found their kids aged five years in a blink. Or are nowhere to be found since they have new families..

I loved watching Bucky and Sam struggling with their choices. Bucky having to come to terms with his past, surrounded by the reminders of his crimes, unwilling, but horrible. I liked Sam’s reluctance to pick up Captain America’s shield and the title and the associated visibility and scrutiny. I loved Sam’s family.

But a month has passed and I realize that nothing much of that series in left in me. Where WandaVision cut deep and stayed there, in the wound.

The quiet despair is so much more effective.

I made a Joke on Tumblr about new sitcom “These Wacky Sokovians”, featuring Wanda and Zemo. And I keep thinking about it – not the sitcom, but generally how the meeting between them would go. I mean, Zemo would definitely blame Wanda for the Ultron and her role in Sokovia’s fate, but I think Wanda has a lot of grievances against baron Zemo as well. I mean – how it all started? Why Stark weapons were there in the first place? Sokovia for Zemo was a different place than for Wanda. He was royalty, he was in the military, he was fine. Was he one fighting for political control with the little help of US weapons? Seems likely to me.
https://avrelia.tumblr.com/post/653352447595692032/i-am-still-thinking-about-it-not-maximoff-zemo
There is a fascinating article in Rolling Stone about WandaVision. Lots of delicious tidbits about creative process and behind the scenes stuff and what future brings for Wanda Maximoff. (spoilers for WandaVision)
https://www.rollingstone.com/tv/tv-features/oral-history-wandavision-olsen-bettany-hahn-feige-1155120/
my favorite quotes:
Schaeffer: [] We knew it was going to be resolved with a logic battle, and we put a pin in that. And then as we moved on, it was like, “Anyone have any ideas about what the heck this logic battle could be? How the hell do you write for an omniscient synthezoid?” It was Meghan McDonnell, who is the writer on Captain Marvel 2 [since announced as The Marvels], who stumbled upon this Ship of Theseus thing. And then Matt came up with the idea of putting it in the library, a palace of knowledge, which was genius, and having them spin and having the papers flutter. I was always afraid it would be the thing that would be kicked to the curb, but I do think it’s a lovely moment of rest and thought inside of the finale.
Bettany: My favorite meme so far has been “what is the Ship of Theseus, besides the Ship of Theseus persevering?“
Schaeffer: []I did want it to feel hopeful, because as a fan I want to have my heart wrenched, but I don’t want to be dropped into the pit of an abyss.[]
Feige: Some people might say, “It would’ve been so cool to see Dr. Strange,” but it would have taken away from Wanda, which is what we didn’t want to do. We didn’t want the end of the show to be commoditized to go to the next movie, or, “Here’s the white guy, ‘let me show you how power works.'” That wasn’t what we wanted to say.
So that meant we had to reconceive how they meet in that movie. And now we have a better ending on WandaVision than we initially thought of, and a better storyline in Dr. Strange. And that’s usually how it works, which is to lay the chess pieces the way you want them to go in a general fashion, but always be willing and open to shifting them around to better serve each individual one.
Olsen: What we filmed was that she had to get away before the people who would hold her accountable got there. And where she went is a place that no one could find her. I know that for sure. Because she knows that she is going to be held accountable, I think, and I think she has a tremendous amount of guilt, and a new amount of loss.

Oh, and of course, the first episode of Loki is a lot of fun, just as we all expected. Nothing much to say about it yet, except that I am in love with the crazy retro-futuristic, kind of reminding of Soviet Science Fiction, grand and weirdly optimistic aesthetic of the TVA

Fandom as Alchemy

avrelia — Mon, 07 Jun 2021 18:03:36 GMT

Sometimes fandom discourse reminds me of alchemy. There is a beautiful unifying theory, an idea of a perfect story existing in a perfect world, where characters come together in a perfect union and live in perfection, if we only uncover the symbolism and unlock the sacred mystery.
And there are a lot of deep and interesting meta, and commentaries and essays explaining in beautiful details the inevitability of that perfect story.
And there are lot of amazing discoveries and invention and work made along the way, the work that will help the humanity to progress… New elements and laws of nature are discovered, the distillation processes are perfected, new alloys are invented…
But led still doesn’t turn into gold, and philosopher's stone doesn’t grant eternal life to anyone. And the root of mandrake is only useful to scare away the onlookers...

Buffy Summers is 40

avrelia — Wed, 20 Jan 2021 02:42:11 GMT

I am a bit in a weird non-writing head space right now, but I can't miss today.

Today Buffy Summers is 40!

Happy birthday, Buffy, please don't celebrate it! We love you.

SMG on instagram and FB has a lovely post about it, too.

avrelia — Wed, 30 Dec 2020 23:19:50 GMT

I am so damn slow both in my reading and in my writing. I have no idea, whether it’s new, or old and noticeable… I mean, I have time, but focusing on a book or on writing takes so much energy, that even such a simple thing as a post here requires a lot of planning…

Anyway. The year is gone. It started badly, with a death of a close friend of my mother – whom I also knew and loved. And it continued, well, we all know how it continued. There was a lot of canceled plans and broken hopes, and worries, and I am deadly tired. My mom had Covid, lots of people I know in Russia had covid (strangely, none of the people I actually know in USA or Canada had covid, which probably says something interesting, but not sure what.)

We bought a house. And moved, again. My kids had to adjust to another school, full online learning and having no friends. But in February we spent a great week on Hawaii with them! And memory of that visit warms me even now. Generally, my family is fine, both here and back in Russia nad Ukraine, and I am very grateful for that.

I actually wrote a lot, fanfiction-wise. I even participated in my first holiday fic exchange (I am a chicken to try Yuletide, so it was a tiny, Avatar tLA-related, exchange.) I got a nice fic, but the fic I wrote was apparently so horrible, that the person I wrote it for, didn’t react to it in any way. Oh, well. It is upsetting, but I have to cut my losses and move on. I can’t be loved by everyone.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/28093746 Here is it, if anyone is curious.
I actually have ideas to write in other fandoms, but never seem to have time.

My movie of the year: The Old Guard. Charlise Theron’s performance is a lot how I felt this year.
My tv series of the year. I am not sure. It started with the Witcher, which I loved a lot, then during summer I enjoyed the final season of Marvel’s Agents of SHIELD, and now I am watching season 5 of the Expanse. Everything else kind of left little memory. Oh! I also evnjoyed weird and silly Colombian series Always a Witch/Siempre Bruja.
Not very highbrow.

The book of the year… I don’t know. My reading was a mess. The most memorable book, I think was Olga Tokarcsuk Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead that I wrote before about.

And here is my favorite place to buy face masks! Very 2020.
https://lolomercadito.com/ I bought several as gifts and two for myself. The beauty of embroidery is stunning.

December posting meme

avrelia — Wed, 02 Dec 2020 19:18:12 GMT

I have forgotten that it is a thing, but please ask me about stuff and tell the date when to talk about it!

I'll update the post with dates.

Help me to stop foundering and post already!

Happy Thanksgiving

avrelia — Thu, 26 Nov 2020 22:04:40 GMT

Thankful for all the things that going well. For all the people that are alive and well. FOr all the good news

Some pictures from the last week

hills in the twilight

hills in the early morning fog

RIP Rachel Caine

avrelia — Mon, 02 Nov 2020 03:21:25 GMT

Rachel Caine died today. She was a wonderful writer (thought I only read her Great library series, it is awesome), and a Buffy fan. She was a guest at Writercon 2006, in Atlanta, and while I only kind of vaguely remember her there, I always felt a certain kinship (Buffy fans, unite!). I followed her on Twitter, and in the past year it was heartbreaking to follow through her losing another battle with cancer. Still, her books, and our memories will live on. Thank you for being a fan with us, Rachel Caine.

https://preview.mailerlite.com/x6r7e1

Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D and the joy of filler episodes

avrelia — Mon, 10 Aug 2020 23:58:16 GMT

I am waiting for the series finale of the Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. I’ve watched it since the beginning, and I enjoyed most of the ride very much, and I love the characters and cheer for them and worry about them… But here is the thing, as they moved to tighter storylines, where bad things kept happening to my favorite agents all the time, and as soon as they were out of one horrible danger they would get into even more strange danger. And eventually… it got hard to care. I knew no one was safe – but to sit and wait whom of my favorite characters (all of them) they are going to kill now slowly seeped a lot of pleasure. I mean, there are high stakes, but how many times can we kill Coulson? I miss filler episodes. They have such a bad reputation, but they allow viewers to take a breath between all those stakes that keep being high and higher, and they allow characters to be themselves, to interact, and to expand the world beyond narrow limits of mortal danger. The remedy to pacing problems is not to get rid of all the fillers, but to pace it, I guess… As a writer, I have no idea how to do it – I am painfully bad at plotting my stories, but as a viewer – I know that I am tired. And I try to calculate whom they can kill for impact, but I cannot find anyone on eth show whose death would mean anything at this point. I mean, Coulson is patently unkillable. Everyone else – either died (in any of the realities or time streams) or suffered so much the death would be…. Whatever. And “whatever” is not an emotion anyone wants to have about their creation, right?

avrelia — Mon, 22 Jun 2020 03:09:32 GMT

I feel like I have to update with something meaningful, but there is not much happening in my life, and too much is happening outside of my life that I am trying to process.

I miss all the stuff we planned for this summer. School time is over, but obviously nothing much changed.

Looking for new dwelling again - to quarantine comfortably.

Reading about racism is one thing. Explaining racism to kids - now, that's difficult. I am not sure I managed to do it right. And, yeah, I am very privileged that explaining racism to my kids is still a choice for us.

The whole JKR debacle made me read more about trans issues. Because for me, naive, as I was it seemed simple: if I always knew I am girl even when I disagreed with definition (no, girls don't have to be neat), and it was only marginally connected to my body, why can't other people feel the same? Well. I am still reading. And TERF always position seemed unnecessary cruel to me.

Still trying to write ATLA fanfiction, still enjoying it. ATLA is on Netflix now, and my stories got much more attention, but unfortunately not many comments...

Nicole Beharie on her work at Sleepy Hollow and life after

avrelia — Sat, 20 Jun 2020 22:11:52 GMT

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/19/movies/nicole-beharie-miss-juneteenth-sleepy-hollow.html

“For me, six years ago I was on a TV show. My co-star and I both got sick at the same time with the same illness and had different treatments. He was allowed to go on leave for a month and I had to continue working. There was a smokescreen of me getting my own episode titled “Mama.” By the end of that episode, I started to fall apart.

They shut down production for two weeks because I got sick. They sent in lots of doctors, and I had daily checkups to make sure I was actually sick because they had to get the production going. Every doctor said I wasn’t doing well and that I needed to rest. That is not what they wanted to hear.

What happened after that?

“It took five years to undo those three years. I’ve been putting pieces of myself back together and healing from all the antibiotics and the antiviral steroids as well as the things that happened in that environment. I never wanted to think about this until the resentment and bitterness was out of my system.

A lot of corporations are saying lovely things right now, but it doesn’t always go well when black people speak up and ask questions. We can face weaponized denial and obliviousness.

Sometimes I think that some people I was working with didn’t like that I was unwell but loved by the audience. I would think they’d support that. But everyone of color on that show was seen as expendable and eventually let go.

I tried to get work afterwards and people were like, “We heard you were difficult.” But no one can say I was late or unprofessional or negative.”

If you’re black, speaking on your own behalf is considered a problem. But suppressing your feelings isn’t good for your health.

“We honor the rebellion as the American Revolution, but rebels of any other hue will not do. One of the things it affected was my thyroid. I couldn’t talk last month. That part of my body shut down. I refuse to let the system continue to stop me from breathing and speaking. But a lot of people of color struggle with that.

I’m very well and wiser now. Sometimes things would happen on set or in the story line and there was the whole “Abbie deserves better” insurrection that happened online. I was like, “How do people know? I haven’t said anything.” I’ve always felt the love.

That’s what I love about social media. You have all kinds of people speaking the truth. And we all know it.”

You took some time after “Sleepy Hollow” to rebuild. Many black women don’t feel they can.

“I recognize how fortunate I am. So much that happens in our communities can make us ill, angry, depressed. Maybe this pandemic gave us time to ask ourselves: “Where am I? Who am I?” That’s why these uprisings are happening.

When I was on that show, I was working so hard to please people and be accepted. I had to be exceptional. I worked myself to the bone 16 to 18 hours a day thinking that it was going to make a difference on my body. We shouldn’t have to die in the process of having a decent life.”

What brings you joy these days?

“Fresh air, grass, walking barefoot outside and healthy food. Being in Georgia near family and seeing the resilience and what’s emerging.

It’s nice to know that everyone’s doing what they can to push the needle. I looked up what turquoise means, and it enhances courage, love and expression of will. I hope we all start communicating without fear until that is typical reality.”

Nicole Beharie, via Candice Frederick for The New York Times

avrelia — Sat, 30 May 2020 23:16:45 GMT

I am torn between hopes and horrors at the world being what it is now. Thinking back to February – how normal everything seemed, it is almost like spring of 1913… All the plans we had for the spring and summer are gone, and it’s sad, but not much, we are used to the new circumstances. But the idea that the world has changed irreversibly is truly terrifying.
The thought that we, as people has lost valuable time, that we could have imposed stricter quarantine in the beginning and it could have helped not to let the pandemic out… But maybe it wouldn’t, maybe nothing would have.
I love that we had a week in Hawaii with kids in mid February.
I love that a year ago I visited Moscow.
The idea that the air travel won’t be possible for years terrifies me – I am used to idea that we are not cut off from the world, that we can visit our friends, our parents, to travel for fun… I mean, I haven’t even traveled that much, compared to many, and it wasn’t really frivolous, to be able to invite my mother (sorry, I read an article that basically calls all travels a frivolous expense for rich and carefree and got upset). I don’t know how the life will go on with the people cut off from each other again.
The coronavirus we are dealing with proves to be a fascinating thing – every day we learn something new about it, but we learn at the cost of lives lost. I mean, this century has already seen several new and terrifying diseases, but only this one proved to be truly threatening.
There are jokes, and there are all our human tiredness, and the feeling that we are in for the long night is not fun.
And then the riots. I don’t know what to say about that one.

Mid May

avrelia — Sat, 30 May 2020 23:16:28 GMT

My mood is up and down. Mostly I have to remind myself that things are good. In my life, because it just doesn't feel like it.

And the slow re-opening of places doesn't cheer up, because nothing really changed for the better - we only slowed down the worst.

It does seem we are in for another year of staying home, and it depressed me a lot. I am not exactly a social butterfly, but I did had plans - for summer, for life, for schools, for travels. No video conference or virtual travel makes it all better.

Anyway.

She-ra season 5 is here, and we've just started watching it.

Re-watching Russian doll - and it's one of the shows where re-watching really pays off: I notice how well it is constructed, how the world changes, and enjoy the soundtrek immensely.

Avatar the Last Airbender is on Netflix now, and I tell everyone to watch it. One of the best shows ever.

And I wrote another fanfic on Atla. it's AU though:
https://archiveofourown.org/works/24208009/chapters/58315912

Part Jane Austen's Persuasion, part murder mystery, part everything else that was happening in my head.

Remembering Sleepy Hollow

avrelia — Fri, 24 Apr 2020 21:32:49 GMT

Recently I’ve been thinking about the Sleepy Hollow. The tv series one. As a tragic example of the creators being totally blind about the thing they created and destroying everything that was good about it in the process. There is no question that the creators should be able to tell the story they want to tell. The problem was, the story they wanted to tell – the one of Rip Van Winkle, a man out of his time, wasn’t the one anyone wanted to watch. They actually pitched it initially as the updated Rip Van Winkle, weren’t approved and moved on to updated Sleepy Hollow idea. (I read it somewhere and cannot find the source right now). Anyway. Judging by the way it went for four seasons they still wanted their story to be about a lonely white man from 18th century finding himself in 21st one.
Fair enough. The problem was it was not the story we wanted to watch, and it was not the story we initially saw – in season one. And we, the viewers, loved that story! It was a story of two sisters, two Black girls, Abbie and Jenny Mills who were both close and the opposite to each other. Sudden appearance of the inexplicable and terrifying Headless Horseman made Abbie, a policewoman in a small town in Upstate New York to re-think a lot of what she was convinced she knew about life and to battle apocalyptic forces with a weird man out of time, Ichabod Crane. It was crazy, it was glorious, it was delightful. The relationship between Ichabod Crane and the present, 21st century were a lot of fun, and his bouncing of Abbie Mills no-nonsense attitude had a lot of sparks. The supporting cast was amazing, and they all seemed to be fully alive characters, even the ones that were actually dead. And were played by the people of color (many of them, that is). The only problem seemed to be Katrina, the wife of Crane, stuck in the purgatory. The only thing we knew about that she is a powerful witch. Which is not really a character by itself.
Many hate her, but I can’t – I can’t hate an empty space. It was not her fault the was nothing else to do. Maybe another actress could have invented a personality for the heroine by herself, but it was really the writers’ job. And the only thing writers could come up with for the second season was the love triangle. I still has no idea about her. Why was she a witch? Why she married Ichabod? What she loved? Whereas the characters played by Nichole Beharie and Lindsay Greenwood, Orlando Jones, John Cho, Clancy Brown, Nicholas Gonzales, etc were memorable and understandable.
Anyway, the creators seemed to be really in love with Ichabod Crane, and they believed the fans, too. So they got rid of all the interesting characters beside him and turned it all into a family melodrama. Abbie Mills got relegated to the sidekick until the opportunity arose for her to sacrifice herself for the pretty white man. And they got surprised when everyone hated it.
I still have my dvds of season one, full of delight and hope. But every time I think about the Sleepy Hollow, I feel regret – the show wasted great actors and great possibilities and the goodwill of the viewers so thoroughly by not seeing what they created and why it worked at the beginning. Alas. But we’ll always have the beautiful scenes when Abbie Mills and Frank Irving were mocking Ichabod Crane.

Good things for free

avrelia — Mon, 20 Apr 2020 20:38:47 GMT

Tor.com offers all four Murderbot books for free this week:
https://www.tor.com/2020/04/20/download-all-4-murderbot-books-for-free-before-network-effect-arrives/

Bolshoy theater steams stuff (as I understand, the performances are available for 24 hours after scheduled streaming)
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCUimBc08CcsoCvP_WlYJl0Q

Treasure Island by National Theater (until Wednesday)
https://youtu.be/QwNvC8sFTEU

And Twelfth Night on 4/23/20 and for a week after that!

Spring Break

avrelia — Wed, 08 Apr 2020 00:47:02 GMT

Things get into routine, weird and crazy routine. I keep thinking how lucky we are comparing to many others.

Kids have a spring break this week, but I feel it’s me who’s on a spring break, because I don’t have to structure their time and make sure that they do their school work and other work, and go for a walk in a tiny local park with them and play with them and read with them, and cook and clean several times over.

Now I am working on ways to relax by myself – before I could always send everyone away and be alone and do whatever to recharge. These last three weeks I felt “always on”, and it was horrible.

The stress comes out of uncertainty, and all the bad news everywhere, and waiting for more bad news. Despite the whole isolation thing, I am communicating with people more than ever – and it’s exhausting, even if necessary. I call my parents, I call my friends, I arrange video calls for George with his friends… I even have my book club meetings through video conferences.

When do people have all that time and strength to learn all the new languages and skills, read books, watch streaming lectures and operas?

I am only watching nature documentaries with kids, like Planet Earth. They are relaxing.

In funny news: I dropped into a discussion for recommendations for Spuffy fanfiction. I tried to be helpful and remember some stuff I liked:

- wow, it’s been a long time ago
- wow, a lot has disappeared forever, partly because I don’t remember names or titles
- wow, a lot is still out there, and it feels like a time travel
- wow, I really forgot a lot.
- wow, I really don’t want to read it all again, no matter how I loved it.

Still, now I think about making a post with some links, just for historical purposes.

avrelia — Thu, 02 Apr 2020 02:06:25 GMT

On the positive side of things, I am trying to write a crazy AU story. It's a lot of fun, turned out.(it's Avatar the last Airbender, Mai/Zuko, as most things I write these days)

The weather is nice.

https://www.themarysue.com/march-meme/

avrelia — Tue, 17 Mar 2020 02:16:53 GMT

Silicon Valley is basically on lock-down starting tomorrow. No non-essential travel, no meeting people outside your household... Just yesterday I was talking to a friend in Vienna and wonder about severity of measures there, and now we have the same.

At least I can take my kids and go to a park. I hope. Being stuck in an apartment with a Working From Home husband and two kids whom I basically have to homeschool now is not as much fun. If I cannot get out, I'll go crazy.

I hate homeschooling. I mean, I still did a fair amount of it with Russian language, but now it's everything and for the foreseeable future...

And dentists are closed. Damn.

At least I managed to get a haircut last week.

Everything feels crazy.

I really want to curl up with a book and forget about everything

Pandemic and TV

avrelia — Sat, 14 Mar 2020 23:59:04 GMT

Well, the schools are closed. as of March 16th. It's probably the right decision, but it still freaks me out. Self-isolating while being alone is one thing, self-isolating with husband and kids is totally different. I don’t anticipate a load of free time – just more cooking, cleaning, teaching kids myself and playing with them and stuff.. and all the while being stressed about uncertainty. Fun times!

Won't be able to take kids to playdates, playgrounds, libraries, anywhere. Sitting together in a small apartment for the foreseeable future is not going to be fun. I mean, there are still parks and mountains, and we are fine, and have internet and food and whatnot.

I don't want the panic to eat me up, but it really is affecting. One moment I think we are overdoing it, the next moment I am sure we are not doing enough. I read the new info, but it doesn't help. bouncing back on my fatalism. I didn’t buy toilet paper, and feel rather smug about it. Until our usual stock runs out, I guess.

And it’s raining. Thanks, California. Just in time for crappy mood.

Meanwhile, in Stuff I Watched news.

Altered Carbon, season 2

Altered Carbon is sci-fi series that are well-made, visually gorgeous, and have some ideas, and I have next to nothing to say about them. Everyone says how the first season (that closely follows the book by Richard Morgan) is much better, and I disagree. I found that I mostly forgot about it. It’s another bleak and dreadful future full of horrible violence against women and not only women, of course, but young beautiful women look much cuter dead and broken. I liked it, I liked the characters, and was happy to see faces new to me and familiar – as Dichen Lachman as the sister of main character, or Adam Busch in a small role. And I wanted more – so I was looking forward to the next season, and here it is, and I liked quite a lot. And the lack of graphic sexual violence didn’t make it boring or tame, it made it better, allowing to focus not on naked bodies, but on ways we still can be horrible to each other.

On to the plot (with minor spoilers)

The main feature of the series universe is that human conscience can be recorded on a special device (stalk) and backed up on remote servers, and uploaded into a different body (sleeve), etc. And it resulted in many ways the rich can control the world, and the poor can get screwed. Our Main character is Takeshi Kovacs. In the first season he was in the body of Joel Kinnaman, in the second one he looks like Antony Mackie, but the original – Will Yun Lee is the best.

In the second season Tak is looking for the woman he loved and long thought to be dead – Quellcrist Falconer. He is being helped by his friend AI who looks like Edgar Allan Poe and runs a virtual hotel. And occasionally by Trepp, the bounty hunter, played by Simone Missick. Quellcrist was that ideal person living in flashbacks and memories during the first season, but now she is out of the fridge (literally) and has her own agenda. And not quite her own, too. So, that got so much more interesting.

Ragnarok (Netflix)

6-episode long Norwegian series about a small town in Norway, secretly rules by a family of ice giants. And then a woman with two teenage sons returns to this town (which she left after the death of her husband) and her eldest son Magne becomes Thor, with all associated superpowers. Her youngest, Laurets, is Loki, but doesn’t know it yet. But one simply cannot be more Loki than he is. There are also a large assortment of teenagers who don’t (yet?) associate with any Norse gods, parents of those teenagers, strange chain-smoking old lady who utters cryptic stuff, one-eyed old man who does nothing, ravens flying everywhere, and the problems with ecology due to a plant owned by the family of ice giants. The whole story is not very deep, but entertaining. So far, anyway. Made me to want to read again on actual Norse Mythology, because I realized how skewered I am by MCU canon.