You Can Call Me

Life updates!

2014-09-02T22:20:07Z

Sup friends!

It's been so long since I updated here D= So rather than actually update, here are a few links to things about me~

So I recently discovered I was asexual. So that's a thing!

Eastercon con report!

Nine Worlds con report!

Worldcon/LonCon3 con report!

Did I mention on here that I don't work for Screwfix anymore? Because I don't! I am now revelling in that bastion of the middle classes, The National Trust (still a retail monkey though!)

How're you all doing?

Posted over at dreamwidth, comment here or there, or everywhere!

World Fantasy Con 2013

2013-11-11T02:05:27Z

(crossposting from my blog! hence the kind of 101 feel to it all)

Hey everyone! I know it's been a little while since I've posted here, but I've been on holiday! It was very much a holiday of two halves - the first was spent at World Fantasy Con in Brighton, the latter spent parading around the South East of England visiting friends and relations.

Today I'm going to post my thoughts and experiences of WFC - partly this is intended for me personally, but I will be making some points that I hope everyone finds interesting! Normally when I do a con report, I go through each panel I attended and add some thoughts, or at least pick out highlights from each day. Not this time! I'm simply going to go through the good and the bad.

Firstly - what is WFC? It's a convention for writers and professionals in the field of written fantasy and horror to meet up, participate in panels (a group of 4 - 6 people talk about an issue), give readings and socialise. It is not meant for fans (which I didn't know when our memberships were bought, it may come as no surprise that I'm neither a writer or professional anything), but supposedly we either pant around after our favourite authors and tremble in their presence or enjoy what programming our feeble, non-pro minds can handle. (Am I bitter about the "We're so PRO!" attitude of WFC communications? Nooooo, of course not!) It also has a (juried) art show and a dealers room.

The con was held in the Brighton Hilton Metropole website and went from 2pm on Thursday 31st October to 1pm on Sunday 3rd November (unless you include the awards banquet, in which case it ended at 5pm on Sunday). The website is here.

Spoilers: The people were lovely, the con was a disappointment.

Good things:

There were plenty of people in attendance, from a variety of different industry professionals, to authors, to fans. This meant that if you wanted to meet people you only know from Twitter, it was likely you'd find them in the crowd. This would have been wonderful for me (a chance to meet Rochita Loenen-Ruiz! Emma Newman! Anne Lyle! and I only managed to pluck up the courage to say hi to Rochita! And that was after I made sure to attend a panel she was on) except I lost ALL CONTROL of my social skills and was ENTIRELY AWKWARD to everyone except my family members. STILL, the con had lots of wonderful people there and I got to see some old friends.

The con had a few problems with GOH dying or being unable to attend - so they went ahead and got Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett to come along! The quality of the guests was very high, and even though I know too many authors to be impressed just because someone is an author, I still ended up pinching myself because Terry Pratchett, Neil Gaiman, Susan Cooper, Holly Black and Joanne Harris were within touching distance. Not to mention seeing people like Joe Abercrombie (the king of grimdark fiction!) or Scott Lynch (the most luscious hair I've seen in a while!) or Joe Hill (astoundingly funny!) on panels and hanging around.

I imagine if you were the kind of person looking to network with industry types, this was exactly the kind of con to go to - although I don't know how easy it would be.

Most of the programming was pretty bad, but the panel on comics and how they're doing, where they're going was really good! I mean, come on, it had Maura McHugh, Mike Carey, Mike Chinn, Christopher Golden, Joe Hill and Neil Gaiman on it - how bad could it have been? It was certainly a good panel - a good spread of involvement within the industry and different perspectives from each panellist meant that the discussion rolled along well and the points we heard were relevant.

The dealers' room was large and had a fairly wide variety of books available. It also included one t-shirt table, one jewellery table, one memorabilia table and I think a LARPing table? It was a great place to find books by authors you'd just heard speak on panels or in readings, so that was neat! I bought rather a lot of books (expect some reviews to come!), oops?

Tessa Farmer's art installation in the art show was just incredible. It was so creepy, detailed and otherworldly - the kind of quality you expect to find in a gallery, not a convention! Her website is here - although do note that if you don't like bugs, bones, decomposed animal bodies or parasitic creaturses , her art may not be for you, and when I say scary I really mean it!

The readings track (there were two rooms, each author had half an hour to read an excerpt of their work) was good and was a great way to sample authors and find new ones! I wish I'd gone to more than I had - but I had a chance to see Mary Robinette Kowal's reading with bonus puppet show, and it was fantastic! There was also a one hour slot where I think 8 or so authors read smaller pieces from their children's fiction, all of them were great!

The amount of books given away when you registered was very generous! I didn't pick up any (gasp! I didn't even pick up a programme!), because I figured with three other members of my family also attending, it would be pointless lugging around too many books - especially if we ended up doubling up some titles! Two book bags were provided for each person by Jo Fletcher Books.

I have to end on the volunteers for the convention - those people who organised WFC, and especially the redcoats - the people standing around directing people, helping them, taking the flack (I saw one woman quite angrily point out to one volunteer that her colleague had been completely wrong and there WAS a way for her to get somewhere, harrumph. Er, lady, these people volunteer? Don't speak to them like that! However the volunteer acted with far more aplomb than I'd have managed!). They were all of them pleasant, friendly and eager to help. Nothing but high praise for them!

Bad things:

Firstly and most importantly - if you MUST have your convention in a hotel that is not entirely accessible for those with mobility issues, then don't have registration in an area which is not wheelchair accessible??? Like, is that not obvious?? It's incredibly ill thought out, and incredibly insulting! People pay a lot of money to attend WFC and are then casually informed that they can't register with everyone else and if they need to use an elevator, they have to use the staff one (due to the layout of the hotel). I am still flabbergasted that in this day and age, people choose to hold cons in places they KNOW to be problematic, access-wise. Ugh.

The con did not have a panel parity policy (basically, that there should be roughly an equal representation of genders on panels, e.g. 3 men, 3 women, or 2 men, 3 women, 1 woman and 2 men, etc. or if that's not possible, a broadly equal representation over the whole of the programming). This wouldn't have been a problem, except that it ended up with around only 30% of panellists being women, the rest men. And POC representation was even worse - WFC is a really white con, but still, only 11 POC on programme? Yikes. Tom Pollock did a great pre-con post on this issue here. Personally, I felt that having mostly male voices didn't really help the quality of the panels!

Speaking of the quality of the panels - well. I am absolutely not trying to suggest that the people on the panels don't have interesting, exciting, relevant or novel thoughts to share. In fact, as I am familiar with many of them through their work or from seeing them at places like Eastercon, I am very well aware that many of the people on the panels can engage in and create fascinating talks that are insightful, exciting and up-to-date. But no one managed much of that at WFC. I really don't want to come off as too harsh (I may have already failed!), because I'm aware that no one intends to go on a panel and not give their best, but the level of discussion was pretty basic and rarely managed to produce anything I hadn't heard before (it was often as if the con had travelled back in time by at least five years). In many cases, the programming felt sluggish and uninspired, like the people on the panels weren't sure what to say, how far to go or what the panel was aiming to achieve. A real shame for a con which had so proudly declared it was sourcing the best panellists, all of whom are professionals!!!!!one!.

It turns out WFC didn't have a green room (an area where panellists can meet up before their panel to have a bit of a chat and not have to start a panel with no idea where everyone else is coming from). I suspect had there been a chance for most panellists to have met and had a discussion PRIOR to the panel, the quality would have improved - a little thought about what people want to discuss, what initial views people hold, which way the moderator wants to take the topic and I'm sure the panels would have turned out better.

Again an issue with the programming - I don't know who wrote or titled the panels and descriptions, but oh my god, could you be any more condescending?? Paranormal romance, young adult fiction, blogging, eBooks - you could practically see the twisted, unimpressed expression of whoever was tasked with writing the programme. I will not belabour this point, but to me it seemed as if the things which caught the most flack were the places you are most likely to come across views other than cis-het-white-dude - not a comment on the attitude of the people running WFC (although seriously, you guys might be sexist if you legitimately think 'broads with swords' is an appropriate panel title and discussion), but it certainly rankled that anything not "traditional" (male) fantasy was looked down upon in official communication.

WFC also has a really strict no costumes policy (it was relaxed on Halloween), which is really odd for a modern convention. Seriously, even if you don't encourage it, what kind of con actively bans it??? I'd say that's a totally old-fashioned view, bearing in mind the popularity of cosplay, but actually costuming is a strong part of fannish history and it makes no sense to me that a con would be so po-faced as to actually ban it?? Incomprehensible!

This is a really specific issue but - why the hell isn't the con hotel's post code on the website? Do WFC members not use sat nav? Even my glowing fairy wand needs a post code to give me accurate directions.

These last two points are entirely personal, so feel free to skip: I don't know what happened over the weekend, but my social skills seemed to evaporate?? Normally I'm good at small talk, if nothing else, but when trying to talk to people at the con I just fumbled around and was really awkward, which was embarrassing as fuck and a shame as well - so many people I wanted to talk to, so little ability to do it with!

Oh, er, also, I made a bit of a tit out of myself by losing my purse in the dealers room (and having so filled my massive handbag with books, notebooks and illicit non-hotel drinks, I didn't even notice). Luckily, the inimitable James Bacon came to my rescue and walked me all the way to the dealers room to get it back again! In one way - lovely to catch up with James, in another, what kind of adult needs to be led back to her purse? On a positive note, my wonderful spiky shoulders (in black) did at least make me an easy purse-loser to find.

Overall, my expectations of World Fantasy Con were pretty low, prior to the con I felt their communications were quite hostile, their attitude didn't make me feel welcome, they seemed to view a difficult-to-access hotel as something to take note of rather than apologise for and they made some decisions I found baffling. As far as programming went, it lived down to those expectations. As a place to meet people and buy books, it worked pretty well. I know many people found the con enjoyable - certainly my family did, I think perhaps part of the problem is I've been to some very good cons in the past so I may need to stop holding every con to those high standards.

Rather than end this on a depressing note, I will instead link you to three enjoyable things related to WFC!

Runemarks by Joanne Harris (who was one of the GOH) - This is a book I bought at the con and one that I enjoyed reading a great deal! It's a really cool story set 500 years after Ragnarok, centring around a girl called Maddy Smith, who has a few unusual powers. If you like strong characters, intriguing plots and Norse mythology, I think you'll love this book!

Chie and Weng Read Books - a blog by Rochita Loenen-Ruiz and her sister, Weng (Rochita attended AND was on a panel discussing how blogging has affected the art of criticism. Or at least, it was meant to. It didn't.) If you want to talk about blogging opening up criticism to include voices from the under-represented (which of course you do), you could do worse than listen to two Filipino ladies talking about SFF - and SFF from a diverse variety of sources. It's a lovely blog filled with good reviews and author-interviews, I highly recommend it!

Loncon 3, the 2014 Worldcon - Worldcon is similar to WFC in that it is a globe-trotting convention dealing with genre stuff. It is different in that it is definitely meant for fans, it's HUGE, it covers a massive range of topics (science! sci-fi! fantasy! steampunk! comics! anime! free wifi!) and there really will be something for everyone. The last Worldcon I attended was in Glasgow, it was my second convention and it set the bar incredibly high - it was interesting, thought-provoking, fun, inclusive and remains the best con I've been to. If you've never been to a con before, then Worldcon would be a brilliant start! I urge you to check it out!

Did you go? What did you think? Have you been to any other cons recently?

Posted over at dreamwidth, comment here or there, or everywhere!

Three things make a post!

2013-08-31T23:01:31Z

1) Recently, I got out my sewing machine and modded a t-shirt I own into something that looks cooler and fits better! Details under the

This t-shirt from Unicorn Empire

Into this!

So all of the gold fabric is added in - so you can see I changed the neckline, the shoulders, and the sides! I'm soooo pleased with how it came out - there are tons of mistakes, but it's a lot better looking on me now than it used to be, haha.

2) I got my financial aid through for my next Open University courses!! That means in October I'll be studing Exploring the Classical World and Reading Classical Latin. Once those two are finished with, I have two more courses to do to complete my degree! Only two years to go~~ Who'd have thought I'd have made it this far?

Oh, and speaking of education, I got my NCFE Level 2 in Supporting Teaching and Learning in Schools! So that's pretty good too. And I got a Grade 2 pass in my Ancient Greek course :D

3) Today Mum and I booked our tickets and some of our hotels for cons next year! So my con schedule now looks like this:

World Fantasy Con - Brighton, Oct 31 - Nov 3 (not looking forward to this a great deal, tbh, doesn't seem like there'll be much for me to do? but we shall see!)

Eastercon - Glasgow - April 18-21 - I volunteered! And I always enjoy Eastercons, but I'm especially excited for another one in Glasgow :) We booked the Travelodge for this already, and it came out to £86 for three nights, which is really not too bad!

Nine Worlds Geekfest - London - August 8-10 - tickets are bought, I do intend to volunteer for this one! I think it's in the same hotel and location as this years, so that's convenient! I'm definitely looking forward to this one a lot! And if you're in London or nearby, you should deffo consider it! There's plenty to do!

Worldcon - London - August 14-18 - I'm so excited for this! I loved the Worldcon I went to in Glasgow, and I cannot wait to go to this one! And I volunteered for the fan stream, I think (waiting for the fan stream organiser to email me back...)

Posted over at dreamwidth, comment here or there, or everywhere!

Nine Worlds Geek Fest 2013

2013-08-14T18:33:38Z

I know I literally only just put up my Eastercon report (so late, I am sobbing), but now I’m posting another con report! This time in a reasonable time frame!

So, Nine Worlds Geek Fest, it was a bit of alright.

This was a multimedia, multi-track convention that went on down in Heathrow in the Radisson and Renaissance hotels. It was its first year, so before I went I was pretty unsure of how it would work out and how having SO MUCH going on would work with however many attendees it attracted.

The short answer – it all worked out really well!

The longer answer, is under the cut!

I went with Mum this time (which is nice since she missed Eastercon!), and we travelled down on the Thursday. We had no trouble getting there, or to our Travelodge (which has improved on previous Eastercons by HAVING FREE WIFI!). I promptly (hAha) wrote an essay for my current OU course and we got ready for the con the next day.

And by promptly, I’m sure you all know I mean I was still writing that fucking thing by the time the con itself started – so unfortunately I missed the beginning of the con! I’m still bummed about that, but Mum and I eventually arrived at the Renaissance and checked in. It was super fantastically easy! A case of walking up to the desk, giving our names and then walking away with a badge and a goodie bag!

Unlike other cons I’ve been to, Nine Worlds marked off the day(s) you were there for, and then let you loose with sharpies to write your own name. I actually think this is a really good idea, because it lets you put down what you want people to call you rather than just whatever name you pay/register with. Also y’know, you can add your Twitter or Tumblr or whatever as well, and that’s neat! I imagine if you wanted, you could put down preferred pronouns? But it would involve people squinting at your badge, so maybe not.

Programme and badge looked like this:

And no, unfortunately, they didn’t have glitter pens. That was me adding glitter eyeliner (which was a theme for this con! ALL THE GLITTER).

After having a brief look around the Vendors’ Room, it was time for a programme stuff!

Legal Regulation of Robots - a talk by Lillian Edwards on the complications of classifying and writing laws for more robots. Very interesting! I think it’ll be very interesting to watch how the next 5 or 10 years work out in terms of robots and how the law views them.

Fictional Vampires, Real World Problems - this was more of a seminar, I guess? Ollie (who is so super cute, gosh) introduced the topic, threw out a couple of questions, and then Hell erupted and vociferous fans all told each other exactly how they thought vampires live. It was kind of amazing, and we managed to cover a lot of topics, highlights including:

Would a vampire feed a human a specific diet if it affected the taste of the blood? (Like a foie-gras farm but with humans)

If vampires were part of the mainstream world, how would employment work? Would we quickly end up with a society where vampires were CEOs and shit because they have ALL THE EXPERIENCE? Would we have to change our employment model? Is it fair to only give vampires night shifts and unsocial hours?

If they do hate the Sun, do they all live in places where you get a constant night? (A la 30 Days of Night)

No, seriously, do they slosh if they drink too much?

What are they drinking? Blood or life force?
And we didn’t include this but maybe we should have…

Just why ARE they so dreamy? *siiigh*

Writing Fantastic London - a creative writing workshop by Tony Keen, around the topic of London as a fantastical setting. It was a really neat talk, mostly running through the books on his list (which I would type up, if anyone wants? I assume someone’s already posted it somewhere though). There was then some time to think up, discuss and write ideas around the topic. Mum busied herself writing Bedlam (see last entry!), whereas I wrote like, 5 lines inspired by a Welcome to Night Vale esque London. It was gonna involve blood fountains. Uh, let’s move on…

ETA here are links to Tony Keen's reading list for this panel, with fantastic recs and rousources and also a link to the story that Mum wrote. :)

After that panel, we went back to the Travelodge (via Dominoes! Mmmm, over priced pizzaaaa).

The morning of Saturday, we had intended to get up nice and early, which we sort of managed? I decided to spend the day in an Angel from Night Vale closet cosplay:

HA I look kinda dumb in that photo, but I think I looked pretty cool! It was a subtle look, at least compared to my original make up: Sooooo many eyes. 7 eyes was too much to get on a bus with, I decided, so I went with the three on my forehead!

Anyway, we actually decided to drive along to the con, and got there in time for:
Aliens, Mummies, Monsters and Mermaids - a talk by Paolo Viscardi on the various aliens, mummies, monsters and mermaids that have turned up around the world, and how NONE OF THEM are aliens, mummies, monsters or mermaids. I really enjoyed it! Paolo is a very good speaker, and it was fascinating to see some of the things that have turned up and the hype and buzz that can surround things.

It’s Not Just Pretty White Boys: Problematic Issues in Fanfic - I think this was actually the first panel I went to! A group were meant to be talking about issues in fanfic, but it started with a lack of representation in canon? I don’t really know why, but it was kind of interesting. This is about the only thing I remember over the whole weekend as having been problematic for me – in discussing the lack of POC in fanfic, some of the panel managed to be pretty othering. I think it was a case of meaning well, but still, white privilege needs to be checked a little harder next time, and if there is going to be discussion about the sea of beige which makes up most fanwork, perhaps white people shouldn’t preach. Still, the discussion about the fetishizing of gay sex was interesting as well the talk around the heterosexist nature of a lot of fic.

Owning the Servers: AO3 and OTW in a post-‘50 Shades’ world - a talk by Lucy Pearson about the beginnings of, the aim and current running of the Organisation of Transformative Works. I hadn’t really known the proper beginnings of the OTW, despite being on LJ during Stikethrough ’07, and seeing the purges of FF.net. It was really fascinating to see what the organisation does, its aims and how AO3 began and now works. I really appreciate AO3, and knowing more about the OTW now, I am incredibly glad that they exist!

At this point, Mum and I left the con to go for a very nice dinner with my big brother, in a Richmond pup. Guuuys, I’ve never seen Richmond park before! It’s so pretty!
Anyway, here's me and Matthew at the pub:

As it happened, we didn’t spend too long together, so we managed to get back to the con for more programme stuff! I’d wiped off my angel makeup to go out for dinner, so I redid it, but slightly different:

Neat, huh?

Unfortunately the door to the fanfic room was locked when I tried to sneak in to the fanon panel, so I missed that )= For a while, Mum and I hung out in the singalong, and sang… along…

After that I intended to go to Wonder Women! A docu about the untold story of American superheroines, but there more cool people were going to a fanfic panel, so I went to that too!

The Joy of Writing Sex - yes, FList, I was wondering what I was doing there as well, since I don’t actually write? But, lmao, if I ever do, I shall feel more confident about it! This panel was pretty cool and filled with useful advice about how to write sex scenes. Maybe one day I’ll use that advice in more than just a commenting-on-fic way!

After that, I headed down to the Queer Disco and boogie’d down very hard. So hard, you guys, you’ve never seen so much boogie.

And so, Sunday! This was the day I subtly dressed like a space explorer from the 60’s or something (you know, silver dress, holographic leggings, silver boots, that’s 60’s, right?). It was unfortunately the last day of the con! )=

Putting The Fem in Slash: Queer Female Visibility in Fanfic - Another panel talk on favourite fem pairings, who should be slashed, crossovers, etc. It was kind of early in the morning, so I confess I was still a little out of it, haha. It was really good though! Lots of recs!

Infrared Astronomy, and the Herschel Space Observatory - a talk by Dave Clements. It was set up as two separate talks which linked together. I’m not so sure I understood a huge deal about the infrared astronomy – except that we have CIB (Cosmic Infrared Background?) and that by looking at that, we can see many things which are invisible to an optical telescope – for example we can look through dust clouds! So that’s really cool. The HSO talk was more on the results from Herschel, and that was also fascinating. Overall I really enjoyed the talk, and the chance to grab 10,000 Herschel pens, haha.

It’s Not Fanfic, It’s Literature - a panel discussing the perception of fanfic and whether it is or is not literature following in the tradition of rewriting older stories/myths. Interesting! There wasn’t a great deal skewed towards the kind of fanfic I would write – that is, short pieces of fluff with no authorial intent for them to stand as literature. Personally, I think self-definition is an important aspect of this, although it’s often seen that publication lends credence to what would otherwise be called fanfic and not literature. Very interesting!

Pair of Fangs: age and family within the vampire mythos - two talks given by Ollie, one about family links – both to birth family and to blood family, and children vampires. I think they were both pretty light – that is, not an in depth academic discussion of the theories and ideas behind the concepts, rather examples of each and what the general tendency is within literature. Personally, I enjoyed them both a great deal, and I felt that at the end of the con, they both struck the right tone. I also enjoyed the discussion afterwards! And Ollie was a super sweetheart who gave me a True Blood bottle! Squee.

Alternative Media: Non-Text Fanworks - another sort of mini-talk thing, by four different fans. We had some talk on podfics, photo-manips, needlework, interactive story telling and amigurumi. It was really interesting to hear how other people engage with fandom, and oh my god, you guys, the needlework! So talented and beautiful!

And that was my last programme item of the day, really.

Mum and I dipped into the singalong, and took part in an impromptu Dr Horrible re-enactment (with TWO Dr Horribles! That was fun. We left pretty soon after.

I had a really fun time at the con, and I can’t wait to go back next year. I have some last bullet points, which I guess can be seen as feedback?

Positive things:

The determined inclusivity – Nine Worlds didn’t shy away from shouting about the fact that the con is for everyone, and harassment wouldn’t be tolerated.

Longer panel times – so often an hour can feel rushed and you get the impression there is much more to be said, so 75 minutes did work well.

The variety of topics covered! It reminded me of Worldcon in its scope, and I was pleased there was so much to choose from! Especially as some of it wasn’t particularly sci-fi/geek oriented.

Each stream had its own room, which I thought was a fantastic idea.

The friendly and welcoming atmosphere – everyone seemed so happy to be there, and it was a very positive atmosphere!

Negative things:

This may just be me, but omg I couldn’t figure out where the elevators were in the Ren?? Like, I missed a couple of panels until I found them. Maybe if the Renaissance is used again, could there be a sign? For those of us who are super incompetent?

I know people work Fridays, so maybe the con couldn’t have begun before it did, but I do feel like Saturday was PACKED with content, and then it petered out on Sunday. I don’t know if there’s a way to try and spread things more evenly, but it wouldn’t have been a bad idea, especially considering it’s quite expensive (or I think so? I don’t have a lot of money), it was a shame it fizzled out so much of Sunday evening.

I don’t feel like there was a proper beginning or end to the con, which is a shame. I’m not saying we need a super long opening and closing ceremony, but perhaps an official SOMETHING might be a good way to go? I think a last feedback and official closing thing might not be a bad thing to consider.

I seriously hate how far the con hotels are from reasonable food options (and from home, haha, it's like 6 or 7 hour drive) – by the Travelodge is a small community so you can get food there, but it’s either a £2.40 bus ride or 30/40 minute walk away, and if you don’t want to subsist on McDonalds or Co-Op food, that is an issue. There is no easy fix, and I’ve been moaning about it since the first Heathrow Eastercon, so I in no way blame Nine Worlds for this, but it’s still irritating!

Finally, check out my swag:

Posted over at dreamwidth, comment here or there, or everywhere!

Bedlam, a story by Catherine Taylor

2013-08-13T23:49:36Z

At Nine Worlds Geek Fest last weekend, there was a panel called 'Fantastic London' run as part of the creative writing track. I'm really proud to say my Mum wrote a short, but incredibly awesome, piece of fiction! In just 15 minutes! I asked her to do a quick recording, just because, and both are under the cut:

Bedlam - Catherine Taylor

Bedlam was a terrifying place. A place of no hope and the only escape was death. It was also a dumping ground for every weirdo and druggie who ever ran out of money and friends.

When Benedict ran out of friends, he only had himself to blame, since he had eaten them. Feeling morose, he resorted to lurking around the opium dens. Too much narcotic eventually skewed even his metabolic processes and, luckily for him, he was found crawling and screaming through the gutter's filth in the wee hours before dawn, by the local watch.

In a choice between letting Bedlam have him (he'd make good entertainment) and the excruciating, boring paperwork and court appearances of charging him - Bedlam won hands down.

Poor Benedict, he was protected from Sun, but kept in solitary confinement in view of his disastrous eating habits.

After a year of starvation in which every second was a torture, once the narcotics had left his system, Benedict hatched his escape plan. He faked his own death.

He was buried in the mass grave and then found he had swapped Bedlam for Hell as he was too weak to scrabble his way out.

The years passed in a haze of self-loathing and boredom interspersed with violent fantasises of what he would do if he ever got free. But how?

Two and a half centuries later, the world crashed into Benedict's world in the shape of Phyllis, the giant screw. The Crossrail tunnelling project burst in upon Bedlam's graveyard. In the confusion that followed, nobody noticed the missing labourer... They'll start noticing missing people soon... Quatermass? You wish.

Hopefully that embed works, but if it doesn't, here is a link to Soundcloud.

I hope you all enjoyed it! I'm so proud of my Mum, I think it's a really cool story for something created in such a short time!

Posted over at dreamwidth, comment here or there, or everywhere!

Eastercon 2013

2013-08-13T23:14:47Z

(Wow, FList, I'm sorry I haven't updated since December! I promise to do a post soon about what I've been up to! [spoilers: one other convention, one new OU course, work])

So this past weekend I have been in Bradford attending EightSquaredCon, the 2013 Eastercon. In short, I have had great fun, I've learnt a little bit and managed to sustain myself on a diet that only included one piece of fruit over four days.

On Friday, Dad, Aaron and I travelled down to Bradford, found the Travelodge, registered at the con and attended a couple of panels! As we only got to the con hotel just before 6pm, there wasn't a chance to go to many, but the ones I did go to were:

The Magical British Countryside: This was an interesting panel, with lots of discussion around how certain people connect to certain places. Some did so on a personal level, which created meaning in the place for them and in so doing made it a spiritual/magical place. Some felt that there is an innate magic in the landscape, and that is what they try to capture in the various forms of art. Obviously connecting on an emotional level and believing the land to have an innate magical spirit of its own go hand in hand, so in many cases the feelings lap over each other. As an American on the panel pointed out, for white Americans there aren't really aspects of the landscape which are embedded into their cultural history and seen as magical (fr ex, the Grand Canyon is spectacular, but Stonehenge is magical/spiritual and holds a different significance to an awe-inspiring piece of the land) so coming to somewhere like Britain, or Europe, offers them that historic connection. As Mike Shevdon pointed out, cities often inspire emotional/spiritual connections, but is that because the land draws people to it with its own innate magic or is it because humans inhabit it and so build and grow the spirit of a place by their interaction with it (fr ex, London, the Underground)? This was all, obviously, fascinating to someone who has trouble believing a place to be innately magical, and which only gains values that we ascribe to it - not lessening the place's significance, but suggesting it is mostly human influence and our desire to connect to one another by connecting to a place we all view as special. Very interesting!

Crossover Fanfic: This was pretty much a fun and light-hearted discussion about crossovers - what were the weirdest ones you've written, weirdest you've read, what works particularly well and a little bit of discussion on what actually counts as a crossover and what is an AU? Is it enough to have characters from two canons meeting, somehow (what I would call a crossover)? Can characters from one canon be placed in the setting of another and is that an AU or a crossover (I would call it an AU, myself)? What about crossing over more than two sets of canon? I suppose the conclusions drawn in this panel were: so long as you can think it, you can write it, and if you're a good writer, you'll make almost anything you create worth reading.

As an aside to that panel, I know they were discussing fanfic, but it would have been interesting to hear a little bit about the Tumblr habit of making crossover graphics/gifs and putting a tiny drabble/fic underneath, buuuut there is only ever so much time for a panel to talk about something!

Graphic Novel Selections: This was a good panel, with lots of recs given out by members of the panel and audience, and since I wrote them down, here they all are (just as much for my personal use as anyone else reading this!):
Sam & Max (complete) - by Steve Purcell - Apparently out of print, wiki here and webcomic starts here
Multiple Warheads (on going) - from Oni Press
Sweet Tooth (complete) - by Jeff Lemire - from Vertigo, wiki here
Nocturnals (complete) - by Dan Bereton - seemingly out of print, wiki here
Sleeper (complete) - by Sean Phillips and Ed Brubaker - out of print, I think? available on Amazon, wiki here
Courtney Crumrin (on going) - by Ted Naifeh - from Oni Press
Lenore (on going) - by Roman Dirge - from ~~Slave Labor Graphics~~ Titan Comics, wiki here and I add a personal recommendation to this - I used to LOVE Lenore. Also it seems appropriate to point out, Roman Dirge was in a car accident, and his family are asking for donations
The Amazing Screw-On Head (complete) - by Mike Mignola - from Dark Horse Maverick, available in a collected edition with other stories, the panellist rec'ing this hadn't actually read the comic, but seen the short animation based on it. As I have read it, I can thoroughly rec it, it's zany but wonderful!
Chew (on going) - by Jon Layman and Rob Guillory - from Image Comics (Read some of it, and fuck yeah it’s awesome!)
Digger (complete) - Ursula Vernon - from Seawolf Press, official website here
Rachel Rising (on going) - Terry Moore - published by the creator
Thieves and Kings (on going, I think?) - Mark Oakley - website here
And I think that was everything! Or at least, everything I wrote down! I think maybe someone mentioned Bryan Talbot and Grandville, and if they did, good, because that shit's awesome.
There was also a bit of talk about how one gets into comics - from the sounds of it, luck.

My Friday evening ended up with throwing up, so that wasn't so great =/ But all was well by Saturday! No more stomach bug!

And so, on to Saturday!

The Stories in Games: I found this a really interesting panel, especially as I am not, myself, a gamer, but I do watch quite a few of the games my brother plays, so I am interested in the stories involved in them. Anyway, the panel touched on many interesting subjects, such as when did a story aspect actually enter games? How does the setting of a game influence the plot? Is it any fun when a games company/GM railroads you into the story THEY want to tell rather than the one you want to play? Are all players actually interested in the story aspect of a game? And how do multi-strand plots such as Mass Effect influence the plot and outcome, and is it worth doing a multi-strand plot when the climax is the same no matter what you do?
As a note on the lack of choice in the plot you undertake, it was interesting to hear games described in that case as an interactive film, which I'd agree with.

On Twitter, Everyone Can Hear You Scream: I had gone into this panel expecting something a little light and fun, touching on the very public nature of Twitter and the fact that it can be archived, unlike a face-to-face conversation. HA. No, this was a very in-depth discussion on the nature of data-gathering by companies/governments, the area specific censorship enacted by Twitter, the fact that people on Twitter forget they aren't just speaking to their mates and so say really awful things that they wouldn't have otherwise.
I think it was Daisee Chain who pointed out that Twitter can have a very lynch-mob like feel if someone popular gets a bee in their bonnet and sets off their friends, although another panellist said they experienced that more on LJ than on Twitter. I actually agree with Daisee on this, not least because LJ is frequently like a ghost ship and you couldn't get together a good lynch mob without months of advance notice. Twitter has a lot of immediacy about it which encourages the group-mentality but does NOT leave you much time to investigate and think about who you're attacking lest the issue be done and over with by the time you've read the relevant blog posts.
So yes, not what I expected, a lot more technical and in-depth, but nonetheless a very good panel.

Motherhood in SF and Fantasy: Or, as it could have been called, where have all the mothers gone? This panel touched upon the fact that in Western SF, mothers and mother-child relationships rarely figure largely in plots. There are exceptions, like Boneshaker by Cherie Priest, but for the most part, mothers are absent. It could be because SF/F stories are at heart, adventure stories, which relates back to a person's need to break away from family, etc etc. It could be because a whole swathe of writers have bad relationships with their mothers and don't want to write about it. It could be because motherhood isn't sexy (although presumably a mother had to at some point have been sexy enough to sleep with someone so they could reproduce??). It could be because we're all giant children and Mummy has never been and never will be ANYONE BUT MUMMY and all Mummy does is look after ME and absolutely NOT steal starships and fight genocidal robots, GOSH.
Also, apparently a lot of non-Western SF includes mothers in their stories, so perhaps a Western attitude to the family/mothers, influences whether or not they appear in prominent roles in our fiction.
An interesting point was briefly made, that in the case of romance (a genre more aimed at women and mothers), mothers are frequently the protagonists of their stories, so perhaps it's also an issue of marketing and what editors/publishers/writers see as their intended audience?
I think this panel did have an issue though, and that is that one of the panellists has never written a mother character, is not a parent, and didn't really have much to contribute to the discussion? I'm not really sure why he was chosen or why he accepted, although he did bring up the interesting question of, are there many stories of mothers who kill their children? I wanted to jump up and yell MEDEA but I restrained myself. She did kill her kids though. And not even because they're evil! She just REALLY HATED her husband and the situation her life had ended up in. I will say it's super interesting that rather than being punished for murdering her husband's new wife, killing his sons and ending his family line, she just flew off in a chariot. Like a boss.

The Best Books of 2012 (Not the Not-The-Clarke-Awards): My notes for this panel literally just say: "Recs galore, wrote some, not all, down" And yes, I wrote a few down on my tablet, but aside from Boneland by Alan Garner and Blue Remembered Earth by Alistair Reynolds, it's mostly xxxx ?????! Because I didn't catch the title or author, hahaha. I'm sure someone will provide the list somewhere!

After that, I took Dad and Aaron back to the Travelodge and intended to go back.

I went to sleep instead... v..v;;;

And so! Sunday came along, and dougs had asked me to do a reading at the Easter service, so, naturally, I did.

Easter Worship: This is always one of my favourite things about Eastercon, partly because I love how weird it is! There's lots of science talk, lots of good and rational thinking going on at a sci-fi convention, and then there's a room full of people singing and chanting their thanks to an invisible being who sent his son down to die because that makes all the believers not spend an eternity in agony and torture because they were a bit bad for their comparatively short life! I love that contrast.
Anyway, the service itself was absolutely lovely, I realised I had no idea how one introduces or ends a reading, and the entire room were very helpful in letting me know I could pretty much do what I liked! I think the reading went well (I chose 1 Corinthians 15:12-26 over the other option because it includes some amusingly circular logic and all the talk of the dead rising makes me think of zombies, which is neat), and the singing this year seemed particularly loud, and there was a person really hitting the descant hard, which was awesome!
Doug also gave a very nice sermon, pointing out that actually, the way that God, and indeed Christians, act can be perceived as being fannish (TOTALLY LOVING what you've created, totally loving what someone else created and talking about it and telling others about it and being totally amazed that we have this wonderful thing!). Doug also pointed out that the very best way we can be Christians in a wider community is to try our best to spread love, joy and justice! (like a religious mix of chocolate and Batman!), which is, after all, what Jesus has done for us.
Deborah is our usual organist and was on top form this year! I'm so glad we're all lucky enough to have an organist now, especially such a lovely one ♥!!

Alan Garner: Although this was a panel item, it ended up mostly being Sue Mason (frostfox) expounding on the subject of Alan Garner, upon which she is something of an expert. It was a very interesting panel, and I did learn a lot about Alan Garner - mostly that his books are difficult, occasionally distressing but ultimately very satisfying. Alan Garner sounds like a very interesting man.

New Classics for Old Fans: Essentially a wonderful panel that did exactly what it said on the tin - a group of young fans rec'd things that they enjoyed, mostly YA titles. Look how many there are!

(I know that it's blurry! But you can see how much I wrote down!)
Anthony Horowitz – Power of Five
Maureen Johnson – Name of the Star
Phillip Reeve – Larklight and Mortal Engines series
John Green – The Fault in Our Stars
Gemma Malley – The Declaration
Susanne Collins – The Hunger Games series
Scott Westerfield – Uglies
Peter F. Hamilton – Void trilogy
Jan Mark – Plague 1999
Michael Grant – Gone
Meg Rosoff – How I Live Now
Rick Riordan – Percy Jackson series and Heroes of Olympus series
Seanan Mcguire
Kate Thompson – The New Policeman
Mira Grant – Newsflesh
Sally Garnder – I, Coriander
Sophie McKenzie – The Medusa Project series
Robert Muchamore - Cherub series
Gail Carriger – The Parasol Protectorate series (personal rec added here, these books are great!)
George Orwell – Animal Farm
Stephen Chbosky – The Perks of Being a Wallflower
Tamara Pierce – Song of the Lioness quartet
S. F. Said – Varjak Paw
Neal Shusterman – Unwind
Daniel Marks – Velveteen
And one from me: Holly Black – Valiant (second in a trilogy, but stands alone very well)
This was a great panel, and lovely to see younger fans getting a chance to be on the program! They were great panellists :D

Superpowers Sold Cheap!: An interactive panel thing, basically someone stood up and the panel gave them superpowers, a name and a costume. I ended up being Wrench Wench, who wore skintight overalls and steel-toe cap boots, and had screwdriver fingers... Er. Well. I think this panel was ok, but also at times really cringeworthy? I think better organisation and a more decisive panel would have worked better. In fact, this is a panel I'd like to do again at next year’s Eastercon! Anyone else interested in doing it with me? Or I can have a dictatorship going on, just me yelling things at the audience. It could work!

The Red Queen's Race: Big Business In Superhero Comics: Firstly, ok, this is a really misleading title. I thought we were going to be talking about things like Wayne Corp and actual big business in comics, not the big business behind publishing comics, hahaha. Thankfully, it WAS about publishing comics! The panel were all very intelligent and had a lot of good things to say about things like endless events, crossovers and shock tactics as sale mechanisms not allowing for good stories or working as long term solutions to sales-dips. For example, the New 52 with DC happened 18 or so months ago, but we've had Death of the Family with the Bat line, the Superman crossovers happening now, Swamp Thing and Animal Man crossing over, Grifter and Stormwatch crossing over a bit, and now the Throne of Atlantis storyline with the JLA and Aquaman, and those are the things I know of. That is a lot of crossing over and inter-title character sharing, mostly done, I think, as a means of grabbing more money even AFTER the massive reboot.
They also brought up the point that character development – true character development – has become quite rare, because a creator may have spent years building a character into a mature, rounded adult, and then suddenly! Through a means of deus ex machina, the character is back to some previous point, and the whole rigmarole starts again. This can be very frustrating, especially when it leads to things like the break-up of Peter Parker and Mary Jane’s marriage, or the total lack of Lois and Superman, or even things like Apollo and Midnighter in Stormwatch, because a solid relationship ages the character too much and a single person, or people working towards a relationship are more saleable??
Interestingly on that, comics like Animal Man and Aquaman both include steady relationships, which I think adds a unique and welcome angle to the plots of both comics. Without Ellen and his children being major players in the comic, Animal Man would have totally lost the emotional urgency and horror that really made the comic work so well.
I think this panel was one of my highlights from the weekend, even though I don’t feel stunning new realisations were reached, it was just nice to hear well-informed discussion on comics.

It was also the last panel I attended on Sunday.

So we come to Monday, unfortunately the last day of the con! =(

And so my last day started with:

Selling Space:

Oh my god you guys I am writing this in fucking AUGUST because I SUCK SO BAD and forgot to finish this. It was a very good panel, interesting discussion of science in schools, funding ACSHUAL SCIENCE and the inability of the press to do responsible science reporting (see: reporting results that don’t exist, giving definites when there are only strong probabilities).

AS FAR AS I RECALL I only did one other panel

What’s On Webcomics:
I don’t even know. I remember interesting discussion and NONE OF THE RECS because I’m awful and don’t even know which notebook I used. /o\

AUGH JEEZ THIS IS SO LATE. I don’t even know if I did anything on the trip back. =/

Posted over at dreamwidth, comment here or there, or everywhere!

lullula @ 2012-12-24T19:38:00

2012-12-24T20:18:44Z

I know, I know, I'm just too damn loquacious up in here. I need to post less, right?

...

Ha.

Anyway! Hello LJ! How are we all? Good? Good.

Since my last update I have:

Been to Novacon! It was ok! We only really went for one day of the con, and I think it's probably better if you know more people there? It was interesting though, and I'm glad we went! I got to see johncoxon's movember stache, which was impressive! (And gave me to opportunity to say 'stachetastic' which is sadly not an opportunity oft afforded to me)

Turned 24! That's right, on the 25th of November, I officially became a year older. I still live at home, haven't got my degree yet and have yet to find another human being to connect with on a romantic level, but that's ok. I'm doing pretty good, I think.

Gotten a job! That's right, on the 26th of November, I officially became employed! (Third time this year, here's hoping it's the charm!) So I now work at Screwfix, which is a bit like Argos for Trade/DIY, if you don't know it. It's actually a really good job so far, the first two weeks were training/store filling. Store filling is basically labelling shelves/drawers, filling said shelves/drawers and then counting the things in the shelves/drawers. A bit tedious, but I think everyone takes care of the shop better because we all put the work into getting it set up.

The shop opened a couple of weeks ago, and I've been enjoying it! The customers are mostly friendly (although what is up with people walking in with a single, tiny screw and asking for one exactly the same [or the same but in metric]?? I'm not a fucking... manufacturer of screws? How should I know what size it is on sight?? I know we're called Screwfix, but jeeeez) and the whole team seems to get on really well. OTOH I do now say things like, "The team" which makes me feel like a blue-sky thinking middle-manager BUT I DON'T CARE. They pay me and I don't hate them, I'll sound like a corporate spiel spouting shmuck if they keep that up, haha.

Started a new course on the OU - I completed my first course (intro to Arts and Humanities, got a 67 overall, I think), and now I'm working through Ancient Greek Lit and Lang. I'm going to be taking the Language pathway, and I'm enjoying it! I've sent in two assignments and got a 98% and a 72%. Preeeeetty damn proud of myself, NGL.

Started a new night course - Supporting and Teaching Learning in Schools. This is basically teacher assistant training, and I'm doing it with a friend. We both seem to be enjoying it a lot, but neither of us have had much luck finding a placement yet... That kind of sucks, but I'm sure I'll get something in the new year!

Saw The Hobbit! OH MY GOSH, YOU GUYS, IT'S AWESOME! I know some people are underwhelmed? BUT I AM NOT ONE OF THOSE PEOPLE. TOTALLY IN LOOOOOOVE! I did enjoy LotR? But I SUPER hate Frodo, so having a Tolkien film without him in is kind of wonderful. Obviously I love Gandalf, because who doesn't, right? And Bilbo is great (despite Martin Freeman playing him - as a person, he's such a dick, but he is also a really great actor ;a;). BUT the dwarves were a revelation, ok? I didn't really rate them in the book, but just. Give me all dwarves. All the time. They are the beeeeest ;3;! And yes, I know they were positioning Aiden Turner as Kili as the hot one? WELL they succeeded. I would also like to swoon over Fili and Thorin just turned me into a puddle of goo. HE IS SO MAJESTIC. *_*

I guess firstly, I changed my hair~ I went from this:

toooo this:

because apparently green hair is inappropriate for work, but purple with a green fringe is fine? lol

An accurate depiction of my essay writing approach:

I drew this at the start-ish of Autumn? I still think it's pretty cute:

And then a little while ago bienenwolf was doing frienddraws so I did them:

as an android bee-like space sentinel. AS YOU DO.

And then I guess there are the last few demon people that I did before I gave up on that challenge:

Dragon - I was trying for a Greek vase kinda feel, which didn't really work... hah.

Ghost - another idea that I wasn't proficient enough to actually dooooo.

A REALLY lazy zombie.

A Queen bee for the insect.

And a boggart instead of a dullahan, since I couldn't get a good idea for a headless harbinger of deeeeath.

So that's you up to date on me, Flist. Was it worth the wait? lol.

Anyway, MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE~~

Have a seasonally appropriate Spidey (who also happens to be my new icon!)

Posted over at dreamwidth, comment here or there, or everywhere!

MCR - Conventional Weapons

2012-10-26T18:37:34Z

I'll be honest with you guys, ever since Danger Days came out, I've lost a lot of interest in MCR (WHAT CAN I SAY, I'M FICKLE).

It maaay come right back if the rest of Conventional Weapons sounds like these two songs:

Tomorrows Money

Boy Division

They sound really good, right?

Posted over at dreamwidth, comment here or there, or everywhere!

lullula @ 2012-08-31T01:47:00

2012-08-31T00:47:31Z

Ah my gosh you guys, typing is too hard, so here is a video where I talk about my life recently:

And how is everyone? Are we well? Anything new and interesting happening?

30 Days of Monsters art dump

2012-07-25T01:34:54Z

So on Tumblr, chairman_wow reblogged a 30 days of monster people art challenge, and I've been doing it \o/ It's quite fun :D

1. Harpy

2. Centaur

I actually don't like this one much, haha, I'm not good at horses v..v;; She's meant to be a fire warrior or smth because in the zodiac, Sagittarius is a centaur and a fire sign. AHA.

3. Slime

One of my favourites :D Based on the idea of living moss graffiti, only she has slime and spores or smth?

4. Naga

I worked so haaard on this one, I really like it :)

5. Mermaid

I copped out on this one, tbh, I couldn't be bothered so I just did a deep sea bioluminesent jelly-fish thang, ahaha.

6. Spider girl

"So he said it wasn't the spider monster thing, but because I didn't shave my legs!
So I said, fuck you AND fuck the patriarchy!"

Another one that I'm proud of! Even though I may have overdone it with the space brushes on the wallpaper, haha.

7. Plant girl

I just had no ideas for this one, she looks like broccoli v..v;;;

8. Octomaid

I COMPLETELY gave up on the tentacles - I could just not get them right, ugh.

9. Demon

Gave up on the background here too, haha. She's meant to be a sweet girl who accidentally keeps tempting people.

And that's it for now! This is quite a fun challenge, even if I don't manage to do it daily like you're meant to.

Oh - is anyone else watching Teen Wolf? I need someone else to sob with ;a; (Oh Derek, your life! And Mama Argent, noooo!)

Posted over at dreamwidth, comment here or there, or everywhere!

Life, who needs it?

2012-06-21T23:02:04Z

So! It's uh... been a long damn while since I updated? Oops?

My life, post Easter-Con:

Mum and I went to Derby and Chatsworth the weekend after, whilst Dad attended Alt.Fiction, a writers con. We stayed in a Hilton, which was pretty swish! We also went to Broadsworth Hall on the way back up.

I had a visit to Middlesbrough & Whitby with Mum. We went into the Magpie and ... eh? They still use lard for cooking chips so I couldn't have any, but the vegetarian shepherds pie was ok.

Mum and I went to Bradford and then Harrogate. Both were nice - we met up with my god-mother and her husband at RHC Harlow Carr.

Mum and I have just got back from Manchester and Wales! Manchester (well, Wilmslow and Didsbury) were much more interesting than I thought they'd be, and Wales was gorgeous as normal!

I have also gotten a job! I'm a Room Attendant (...I clean rooms and change beds) at a country house hotel near to me. It's hard work, and the pay is weird - You don't get paid for the hours you work, you get paid at a rate of 2.5 rooms per hour. So I might work from 9am until 2pm, but if I only have 8 rooms, I will get paid until 12pm (they don't pay half hours, apparently). Conversely, if you work 16, you only get paid for 5 hours (or up until 2pm). EMPLOYMENT, EVERYONe.

So, that's my life right now! I might post pictures later :)

Posted over at dreamwidth, comment here or there, or everywhere!

Meme~

2012-05-07T01:49:26Z

Rule 1- Post the rules.
Rule 2- Answer the questions the tagger set for you in their post and then make 11 new ones.
Rule 3- Tag 11 people and link them to your post.
Rule 4- Let them know you’ve tagged them!

Tagged by xrysomou

1. If you had the chance to rule over any country, which would it be?

Ooh, hmm, I'd like somewhere small, but with a good climate and good arable lands, preferably with a coast and favourable trade routes either by land or sea. To be honest, I actually wouldn't mind the UK - it's a little big, but the climate isn't too changeable and there are plenty of resources to take advantage of. OTOH, I could have a nice island somewhere warm, and just let people serve me as I lazed around in my house by the sea... Oh, so difficult... Maybe Tenerife, since I've been there on holiday a lot, and it IS pretty lovely.

2. If you could pick any weapon in the fight against invading aliens, what would it be? (no magic guns that can kill everything) DIPLOMACY~ Hahah, man, it really depends on the aliens! Are they on a bacterial level? Are they poodle sized? Us sized? I'm gonna assume they're similar in size to us and can be taken down by conventional weapons... You can run out of bullets way too quickly to make a gun useful in the long term, but something like a crossbow could be pretty neat. If I want to pretend I'm a badass, then I guess a sturdy bat with nails in >D

3. What creative work has made the biggest impression on you? This can a book, a film, a painting, music...

Oh, wow, I am a massive consumer of all media and have been since I was little, so I don't know if anything's ever had too massive of an impression on me... Maybe Howl's Moving Castle by Diana Wynne Jones? Not because it taught me anything or because it's an ~*important*~ book, but when I read it, it was just perfect. I just felt good reading it, and I have every time I've re-read it since.

4. Any guilty pleasures?

Really terrible porn, NGL.

5. Favourite dish from your childhood?

Dropped scones? Jacket potatoes with butter and cheese? My family has never really had traditional mealtimes or anything, so there's no signature dish from my childhood, haha.

6. What's your biggest strength?

Over investing in really trivial things? Reading a lot of slash? Er... Well I guess I'm pretty good at looking on the positive side of things, and I can analyse things pretty well.

7. And your biggest weakness?

Procrastination and self-sabotage.

8. Pepsi, Coke or neither?

Diet Coke! Alllll the way.

9. If you could take a snapshot of a moment in your life so far, what would it be?

Er, well, there haven't been many moments lately where something in my life hasn't been really bothering me... Not having a job, failing academically, being a really ugly person doomed to die alone showered with the revulsion of her peers (why are all these things still true, JFC)...

I guess any of the times where me and the family and the dog have gone to Belsay Castle, or any other historical building... I'm always pretty happy there.

10. Were you ever in the Brownies or Girl Scouts or other such organisation?

I was briefly in the Girl's Brigade, before joining the Brownies and moving on the the Girl Guides :D I got a confectioners badge!

11. Rec me one book to read over the summer, and tell me why.

Er... Oh! The Clockwork Century books by Cherie Priest, specifically Boneshaker and Dreadnought, which are the first two. I have Ganymede somewhere, but I got halfway through and a little disinterested... Uh! Anyway, the reasons I like these books are that they're really clever, really well-written steampunk, but they're also zombie books! That's like, two of my favourite genres cuddled together to produce some truly fabulous books. I also think that the gruesome aspects of the book are handled with a light enough touch that they have an impact, but don't leave me so revolted that I take to Twitter in a moralistic rage. Another major plus point is that the female characters are all really strong and well written! Dreadnought especially is fantastic for this, as it's told entirely from a female perspective and she's a nurse! That's not someone you normally see represented in fiction, y'know?

I tag... anyone that sees this and wants to do it! Ahaha, *copping out*

11 questions:

1) What's your plan of action for a zombie apocalypse?
2) Do you believe in the supernatural?
3) What was your favourite book/film/tv show etc as a child?
4) Which film have you anticipated the most?
5) If you could give any film a sequel, which film, why and what would be your ideal plot?
6) Quick! Find your nearest book! Turn to page 7, write down the seventh sentence.
7) In 20 years from now, what's your dream life like?
8) Favourite item of clothing in your wardrobe?
9) What's your go-to feel good film?
10) What does everyone else love that you can't abide?
11) Say something nice about someone you know!

Posted over at dreamwidth, comment here or there, or everywhere!

Eastercon! Part 3! The bit that's actually about the con!

2012-04-13T04:42:52Z

This Eastercon was an interesting experience for me, I spent a lot more time socialising than going to panels this year, which is pretty opposite to what I normally do. I also did my very first panel \o/ That was pretty exciting, if also slightly terrifying. As with all things, it wasn't quite perfect, and I'm gonna speak a little bit about that later on.

I unfortunately had to start Friday by doing an essay, but I got it completed! It was probably one of my better ones, in fact.

Only uh, the deadline for it was the day before. Thank god my tutor is the sweetest person in the world and accepted it anyway (I didn't find this out till Tuesday though)!

Once the blind despair of wrecking yet another academic career had passed, I meandered my way to Radisson Non-Euclidean. After searching out my parents, I attended a few things.

The highlights:

Talk On Cassini and Saturn: this was a really fun talk, I understood a lot of it! Which is really unusual when it comes to talks on anything. It was interesting to hear all that's been found out (there's geysers on Saturn's moon Enceladus! Titan's been probed!), and the person speaking made it a very fun presentation.

Archery in fantasy TV and film: I reeeally like archery anyway (arrows! they're really cool!) but it was great to hear the differences between bows, and that catastrophic de-laminating of bows due to non-waterproof glue could kill your friends. And arrows shattering could kill your friends. And standing where the elves were standing in the siege of wherever could ~~kill your friends~~ kill you and your friends. And you didn't say fire in arrow-y times, since that's an instruction for fire-arms (genuinely filled with glee at that bit, because I am really simple to please), but maybe loose, or something. I was very entertained during this talk, perhaps you could tell.

I then spent a moment talking to two very well dressed persons who assured me that my super amazing silver DMs will break in soon! (6 weeks is apparently soon, apparently. I weep as I contemplate that length of agony)

There's a hole in my plot!: This was one I didn't expect to enjoy as it was billed as recognising and correcting plot holes in your writing (I don't write, haha), but the panellists were all really entertaining, so it was fun just to listen to them banter. The room was also exceedingly full, so me and chairman_wow sat on the floor.

Tales from the typographical ocean: this panel was looking at various fanzines from different decades, and seeing how they'd changed. It was really quite interesting, I enjoyed learning how things change and how they've remained the same.

After those, I went to the pub quiz and another panel, but neither were particularly spectacular (but we did get more than half points on the pub quiz!). I also got to spend a nice amount of time just chatting, which is always fun. I managed to miss the late night film, Jesus Christ Vampire Hunter, which I regret, even now! Alas.

I'm not sure what I did for much of Saturday morning - I think it involved a lot of sleeping and a visit to Tescos. Natch.

I really didn't do a great deal on Saturday, aside from a couple of panels and a visit around the dealers room.

Still, there were highlights:

Who likes reboots?: Any panel that spawns the line, "I really like Star Wars, so I'd like to see it done well." has to go on a highlight list, haha. There was a lot of fun discussion around what actually makes a reboot, what were good ones, what were bad ones, and overall it was a fun panel to listen to.

My brother and sister-in-law came! I won't mention the ridiculousness that happened trying to get my sister-in-law in, despite how frustrating it was.

A really fun talk about comics with Matthew and mokatiki. I love talking about comics anyway, but especially with people who enjoy them as much as I do.

We went to The Pheasant, a pub/restaurant near the hotel, for dinner. It was good food with great service, but the portions were so ridiculously huge we couldn't manage dessert. It was still a lovely meal though, and if ever Eastercon is back at the Radisson, I think we'll end up going back. Afterwards, I insisted on going back in to the con, because I really wanted to go to...

No country for old men: this panel was discussing some of the experiences of female fans and how safe they feel in fandom. It was very interesting, especially some of the ideas raised about the ways in which fandom can be made a safer space, for everyone but especially for women. I do hope some of the ideas - especially, a code of conduct and someone available 24 hours should you need help or to report an incident, will be enacted at later Eastercons.

Whilst I was in that panel, Mum was in the disco, dancing with a Klingon. That picture is probably the highlight of the night, if not the whole con and possibly also my life.

I also really liked getting to tell Tartovski that my Mum likes his tweets, especially the one about him walking into a party and recognising a girl he'd slept with on a first date. It helps that he's a really nice person and finds it as funny as I do.

And with a brief and manic dash to find Mum's bus pass, we finished Saturday!

So, as you might suspect, Sunday swiftly followed Saturday and with it came the excitement of being on a panel! For the very first time! In front of actual people! Gad.

Instead of sleeping in till noon, Sunday began nice and early, so that Mum, Dad and I could attend dougs's Sunday service! It was great! The only not great thing was how little sleep I had, since I was up late on Saturday being social. Ugh. Talking. With friends. How terrible.

Sunday's highlights:

Sunday morning service: if only all services were as lovely as this, I might end up in church more often! dougs always manages to create a wonderfully friendly atmosphere, and even if I only ever see these people once a year, in the service we always feel like a proper community. dougs's sermon this year (handily split up into three mini-sermons for easy digestion!) felt very apt, defining the three ways in which Christian communities should interact - with God, with each other and with the wider community. I really felt the message this year was an important one. Oh, and we also had a real organist! She was fabulous, and it was fun singing to actual music and not a .midi file!

The fantasy of William Shakespeare: this is another panel I attended not expecting to be particularly interested in, as I am not a Shakespeare scholar and I'm only familiar with The Tempest and Romeo and Juliet. But! It was filled with really interesting facts, like a lot of the Church's income came from brothels! And people used to bring pigs to the theatre! And actors didn't stand still to declaim and then have a swordfight, oh no, they fought and spoke at the same time! And a ghost (I don't remember which one) might have been perceived as a demon! It was all really, really neat, and I came away feeling like I've really got to get to a theatre sometime soon.

Comics outside the mainstream: Man, I really love non-mainstream comics but I am super bad at finding them, and this was filled with a bunch of recs, so that was great.

The New 52: The panel I was on! \o/ OMG though, you guys, I was so nervous. I had a really fun talk with mokatiki about DC and the reboot, so I knew we would have stuff to talk about, but I was still soooo afraid of being in front of real! live! actual! people. But I think it went pretty well! The moderator, Saxon is a really nice guy, and led the discussion well. mokatiki is also really excellent, and there are many things about the reboot which we agree upon, so that made talking about it easier. And jamesb is someone who I know and who I've also seen on plenty of comic panels, so having him on the panel as well was comforting since if I'd forgotten every single thing I knew about the reboot (not, alas, unlikely), I still knew there'd be someone else with intelligent comments to make! As it was, I felt like me and Anna gave a lot of opinions, and James brought all the facts, which struck a pretty cool balance. So I think my first panel went pretty well~ Or at least there weren't too many disasters (except for one person who wanted me to explain why I still buy Red Hood, to which I could only bleat "Because I love Jason" and not give the 30 minute actual answer).

Minority representation in fandom: this was a panel which spoke about experiences of non-white fans and the ways in which Eastercon could reach out to a more diverse audience. There was yet more wonderful discussion, it was pointed out that Eastercon can be pretty insular and seem quite exclusive, and also that it involves a pretty big chunk of change - there is no way to do it on the cheap. I also pointed out that it's pretty poorly advertised - how would anyone who doesn't know about it, find out about it? Overall, I feel like there were a lot of points to take away from this panel and I wish it had been better attended.

And again, after more socialising, Sunday drew to an end!

Clearly, Monday happened.

Apparently I didn't do anything but visit the dealer's room and chat until 1pm on Monday. That seems unlikely, but according to my notebook (yes I make notes about what I do at cons. I have a terrible memory), that's what happened!

So, highlights!

Dystopian YA: yet again, not something I was sure I'd love a lot, since I really like my YA happy and hopeful. And yet! It was really interesting, and everyone on the panel had a lot of recs and good insight. One panellist commented that some of the appeal in dystopia might be to do with the experience of being a teen - every choice you make seems to determine your entire life and if you make the wrong one you're doomed and you will be unhappy, and probably stupid and underpaid and stuck wondering where the hell all that potential your teachers insisted you had went. I uh, might be able to relate. Just a little. (See: constant breakdowns over the total wreck that is my life because I made ALL the mistakes at school). At any rate, I really enjoyed it, especially the point about there not really being 'girl' books and 'boy' books, but just poor marketing (because boys fall in love too! and might like to read about it! and girls like guns too! and are actually expected to read about it anyway, since a man's interests are totally valid whereas a girl's are totally shameful so she should probably be glad she gets the opportunity to educate herself on what she should be interested in, not those icky things like feelings and lipstick and such, and wow, another point with which I might over-relate!).

Social media in SF: I love social media! So hearing a discussion about how current SF represents it (generally poorly!), how past SF represented it (how can you imagine a totally alien planet but not imagine communication evolved past a call box!) and how it might be represented in future was of course really interesting to me. I tweeted that this was probably my favourite panel of the con, and this is due to a combination of interesting subject, engaging panellists and lots of super interesting points raised. In retrospect, it's hard to say whether this actually was my favourite panel, but it was certainly a brilliant one to end the con on!

And then, after more time spent chatting in the bar (this time to strangers! who weren't so strange after we'd spoken for a bit!), it was finally the end, and we all left the Radisson for the last time. It might have been a more poignant moment had the rain not been utterly pissing it down.

So that was pretty much my highlights! Now for some general observations, I guess.

To me, this con was certainly fun, but a surprising amount of the programme items didn't interest me. Luckily, there are more than enough fabulous people there to talk to in the bar that this didn't feel like a genuine problem. Additionally, plenty of con reports and tweets assert that people had a wonderful time and found the programme items a lot more engaging than I did, so I think it's fair to say that this Eastercon really did have something for nearly everyone!

Apparently, I've gained enough social skills in the past year to actually manage to chat and talk to people! I was pretty surprised by this, since most of the time I spend a lot of con time trying to figure out how the hell to even say hello to someone interesting, even if I've met that person before (does anyone else feel like they're instantly forgettable? I know my hair is a bright colour, but other than that I'm pretty sure I don't leave much of an impression because I'm really boring). So it was really neat that time not spent in panels could be spent talking to aforementioned interesting people.

There was a lot of talk about panel parity this year. Partly this is great - because yes, we do need to have fewer male voices and more non-male voices heard. Partly this was a little disturbing - it's so binarist, and I don't know if anyone's addressed this? I'm pretty sure I don't need to go over how exclusionary a policy of equal male to female participants inherently is, and I hope this is something that's considered in the future. Also, there are some cases where one gender's voice should be heard without giving equal weight to another's - if I want to hear about how female writers feel in a male dominated field, I actually don't want to hear a male's opinions, because it wouldn't be about them. In general though, I am in favour of it, and overall I feel Eastercon did well in trying to ensure non-male voices were on panels.

Eastercon is still a really white, mostly middle-class or above space. This is not necessarily a criticism - it's not anyone's fault that lots of white people turn up, but it would be nice to see future Eastercons with more diversity - perhaps by reaching out to Uni's and widening their advertising pool (I don't know if that could be reasonable considering the cost of advertising though).

God damn but there are a shit ton of iPads in the hands of Eastercon goers.

I feel like this post was really text heavy, so here's a picture of Mum and me taken over the weekend:

In summary: Good Eastercon! I'm really looking forward to next year's!

_{It is actually nearly 6am and I think I've been writing this since 6pm, so I am going to stop here, even though I can think of about a thousand more things to say.}

*Is Jesus actually a zombie if we eat His flesh and he doesn't crave ours?

Posted over at dreamwidth, comment here or there, or everywhere!

Eastercon! Part 2! The tweets

2012-04-11T16:46:55Z

A lot of my Eastercon experience was through Twitter, I said things, read things, retweeted things... It's really easy to lose track of everything, so I used storify to group everything together :)

Just click and read~ [View the story "Eastercon" on Storify]

Posted over at dreamwidth, comment here or there, or everywhere!

Eastercon! Part 1! The part that involves no actual con going!

2012-04-11T15:27:27Z

So from Thursday to Tuesday I was down in London attending Eastercon! \o/ I think this was actually my 7th Eastercon (depending on whether Worldcon '05 was mixed up with Eastercon '05). Damn, that is a lot of cons.

I'm gonna put it all under a cut, as I have a few pictures/tweets and this is probably going to get looooong, and this post is all about travel and shit and so is not even about the thing which is in the subject bar... Naturally.

To get down to Eastercon this year, we decided that since there might be a fuel strike, to take public transport! Unfortunately, we decided this the week before and that really fucked with the prices. Dad, Aaron and I got a train (thanks to my knowledge of discount train sites, it was ~£60 for all three of us) and Mum was going to get a plane after her last day of work.

The train was fine! We dutifully piled on at 5.25am (I tweeted! And took a photo!) and arrived in London around 8.30am. We did a zombie shuffle to Kings Cross' left luggage facility and then sat about in a daze till the British Library opened. I did research/essay writing (Tweet + photo!), Daddy and Aaron went to the café and then ambled about in a beffudled fashion. Eventually I dozed off one time too many, had a glance at the Illuminated Manuscripts (Illuminated Manuscripts!!!! \o/!) before we decamped to the nearest Pizza Express and ate ourselves into (even more of) a stupor. We then had the utter joy of getting to Heathrow Travelodge via tube and bus. We did it! It was, as much as public transport can be, an actual utter joy. I'm as surprised as you, but then again, London's public transport is one of the very few things to recommend it.

So that was us.

Mum, on the other hand, found herself in a certain amount of difficulty.

We had booked her ticket (all told, £90) through the website Fly.co.uk, and they had sent us a booking confirmation. We assumed, as presumably anyone would, that this meant Mum had a ticket. So imagine Mum's shock to turn up at NCL only to be told, "No, they haven't bought you a ticket. You need to get into contact with them so that they can buy you a ticket or you need to buy a new one."

What. The. Fuck.

At this point, I was happily ensconced in the Travelodge having a kip. (Seriously, traveling to London on maybe 2 hours sleep is not fun at all)

And then I got a phone call... Mum, very upset, explaining that I needed to get into contact with Fly.co.uk and get them to buy her the ticket.

Fine, I went on their website, looked at their FAQ, found fuck all of any actual use, so I emailed the address they gave if your questions aren't answered.

A few minutes later, I get a response! Sweet, possibly good service!

Only it's just an auto email, giving a direct links to all the FAQ answers. I WENT THROUGH THOSE. I had to go through them to get to the fucking email address!

So I phoned Mum back, explained the situation, and gave her the REALLY EXPENSIVE help line number to ring. Knowing what help lines are like, I rang it too.

Mum gave up after 8 minutes.

I gave up after 15.

JFC guys, can you imagine this situation? My Mum has just finished an incredibly stressful day at work (in case you didn't know, she works in a hospice with people who are really close to the end which is stressful in and of itself!), only to be told she can't get on the plane because the company we used is a fuck up. That kind of stress is just... God.

So to cut a long story short, I had to buy Mum a new ticket! On a dinky netbook with ropy 3G internet. Luckily, BA actually has a halfway utile website, so it took me all of two minutes and Mum wound up with the last ticket available for the 20.15 flight to Heathrow. The kicker of this is, it only cost £76. Less than the original! But it was done! Mum got herself a coffee and calmed down, I went to bed, and a few magical hours later, Mum was with us in Heathrow.

The entire situation may have inspired a few somewhat angry and irate tweets.

And that was Thursday!

I am now skipping to the end of our trip, since the actual con report is going in another post, and this is just the personal travel post. (The reason I'm doing this is the con report is gonna get linked to [by me, on Twitter, not by my adoring audience, as I don't have one of those], this is not :D)

As Tuesday was the day we were leaving, the morning was spent shoving things into bags and figuring out exactly where to put the sudden abundance of books. Luckily, everything went smoothly and we left the Travelodge on time. We'd booked a taxi to take us to a tube station, but upon discovering the cost of getting to Kings Cross, Mum made an executive decision, we skipped the tube and taxi'd all the way in (tweet!). I know right? Damn if that wasn't excessive of us. Another brief stop at the left luggage, and a brief bit of lunch on the station, Mum and I left Aaron and Dad to meet up with Matthew and do their thang while we did ours.

Our thing happened to be us going to Hyde Park, with the idea of enjoying the sun and eventually ending up at Harrods for afternoon tea. I rather liked this idea, as wandering around a park always makes me feel a little like a Regency lady, out and about - seeing and being seen. :D

We started at Hyde Park Corner and meandered our way around the park, stopping to admire all the beautiful things:

(tweet!)

:) My Mum would be one of those beautiful things.

We stopped in the Serpentine café for hot chocolate and biscuits (and reading Charlie Stross's Halting State which is really good btw), before carrying on. Although it was frequently sunny, it was just as frequently showering, which led to me looking very fetching, in an older lady kind of way:

(Tweet!)

We actually made our way around from Hyde Park into Kensington Gardens, and I finally saw the Peter Pan statue!

(Tweet!)

At this point we realised we probably weren't going to make it to Harrods. Since it was such a lovely evening (and I think I saw a juvenile cormorant! that was exciting for me), we decided to stay in the park.

From there we carried on, until suddenly a really massive shower dropped out of the sky and we took refuge in some kind of tennis club's tiny café. There was some poor kid in there who not only has a tennis coach, he also has a mother who goes on for AGES about how he hasn't done his Latin memorisation.

What I want to know is, what kind of school makes you memorise passages of Latin? I mean, I've had to learn vocab and shit like that, but never actually a whole passage... Maybe the mother was wrong. Or I misheard, IDK. It was still funny sitting next to them and watching the perfect manner in which he blanked her. It was kind of enlightening.

Once the rain and hail had finaaaally stopped, we carried on:

(Tweet!)

Around 7.30pm we headed towards the buses and got to Kings Cross just in time for dinner (er, at Pizza Express, again) with Matthew and Lise. A great time was had by all, and it was very sad when we had to go the train station, grab our bags and get on the train (~£100 for the 3 of us). We waved at them all, until Kings Cross was left behind us. Aaron had stayed back with Lise and Matthew as he was getting a bus up.

The train ride itself was fine - Halting State kept me occupied until about Gateshead, and getting a taxi from the train station to the hospice (where Mum had left the car) was easy enough.

On getting home, I had to grab the z-bed from the shed and put the mattress on the floor of the living room, as my room is currently uninhabitable.

And then the dog came in and was very affectionate (tweet!), and I guess that was the end of my Eastercon.

So that's that, basically, I'm home and I've had a great time!

Next up - the actual con report :D

Posted over at dreamwidth, comment here or there, or everywhere!

lullula @ 2012-02-21T07:19:00

2012-02-21T07:19:55Z

Guuuuuysssss what is uuuuuup?

I'm actually only on here because I am in dire need of you, pleeeeease oh please, send me good vibes today! I have a group assessment/job interview at 9.30 and I would super-duper like to be employed!

Are all fingers crossed? Excellent.

I leave you all with this.

lullula @ 2012-02-14T23:45:00

2012-02-14T23:44:19Z

Help me, o FListies! I can't stop buying comics (I spent like maybe, £50 on them today? FIFTY WHOLE POUNDS, MY GOD). I just... I try to stop and then I don't and I DON'T EVEN FEEL BAD.

I've kind of had to stop buying so much in the way of coke and chocolate and crisps, so I guess technically I'm being healthier? That's good?

UM.

Anyway I had a telephone interview today! I passed it! So that means I get to go to a group assessment! And then maybe I'll get a job, and if you need to phone a helpline about Student Loans, you'll be hearing my dulcet tones over the phone. Who knows? Fingers crossed though!

Er, what else... Oh, I volunteered to be on a panel at Eastercon! I'M REALLY KIND OF NERVOUS but also excited. It's about the New DC 52, which is something I'm really interested in! (I would say, see previous FIFTY WHOLE POUNDS spent on comics, but I wasn't even buying DC stuff today! AK:SDJFL:ASF) I'm kind of hoping it's going to be ok? I mean, in general the people who talk about comics at Eastercon are neat people, so I don't think they're going to make fun of me and make me cry, BUT I MAY DO THAT TO MYSELF. I will just sit there blubbing into my free drink, and every time someone asks me if I have an opinion, I will tearfully reply, "I'm not even here, you're drunk and imagining me! WHY won't you stop imagining me so I can crawl out of here like a wounded kitten."

I um. Probably won't do that though.

In other news, I cut my hair and dyed it green! Because I make excellent life choices.

And finally, on Twitter, I followed Liam Sharp and he followed me back! Which is excellent news for me, since I've had a crush on him since I asked for him to sign something for me at Worldcon.

Posted over at dreamwidth, comment here or there, or everywhere!

lullula @ 2012-01-12T16:27:00

2012-01-12T16:41:29Z

So er, ashling_lily posted some of her art, and I thought that since part of my new years resolution is to draw more, I might share some of mine? :D? It's not great, but I like most of what I've done!

Chronological order, go!

IDK, I was sketching this out, but apparently now I can't leave anything until I've slapped on at least SOME colour? I do love how her eyes came out though!

This one was an experiment on creating lines by erasing from a coloured canvas. I'm pretty happy with it, but I could just be lusting after the pink and ignoring all the flaws, hahaha.

I commissioned a drawing of this kid from someone on Tumblr (who has, er, disappeared? But I don't mind, the money was a donation to their stressful housing situation), and looking over a past commission made me want to draw him! And name him. So now he's C, a really tired zombie apocalypse survivor! Whilst everyone else is busy wearing neutral colours to blend in with buildings, C figures if he's going to die, he is going to die wearing something OTHER than beige and taupe.

I guess I just like girls and really bright colours, hahaha. This is Adora Fixalot, who is an excellent mechanic, with a strong chin.

This is a fanart of Abe Sapien (awesome blue fish dude from B.P.R.D/Hellboy comics) meeting a friendly, bioluminescent mermaid. It was (obviously) a birthday gift for a friend ♥

The lineart on this one is actually a few months old, but I cleaned it up and popped some colour on it. She's meant to be a museum tour guide...

And finally today!

So uh… space pirates! Or, one very accomplished Space Pirate Captain (currently a little worried and confused), and one very enthusiastic shop girl who is seizing her chance to be a Space Pirate! (And if not a Space Pirate, another notch on the Captain’s bedpost, because gosh darn).

Hahahaha, I know this isn’t excellent or anything, but I was experimenting with trying not to use black lines! I think it’s come out ok though! I also figured out how to install brushes in Photoshop, so I'm pretty pleased with myself!

Annnnd that's it! I may do a few more art posts in future, if anyone's interested?

Also I'm going down to London tonight! I'm going to have a champagne afternoon tea in Bloomsbury, and visit the da Vinci exhibit annnnd do some IRL drawing with chairman_wow! I think it shall be excellent!

Posted over at dreamwidth, comment here or there, or everywhere!

One of the great unwashed! And also a really crap person D=

2012-01-06T16:18:55Z

Ok, so uh , there is someone out there who is still waiting on their aar_capslock Secret Santa... Um. I uh... am still... working on it v..v;;;;; I am so ashamed, you have no idea.

In other, somewhat less shameful news, I'm unemployed! The temporary contract I had with Sainsbury's ran out, and they decided not to give me a permanent contract. It's a shame, but my health is so bad anyway, night shift probably wasn't the most ideal working hours for me... I had a nice time working there though, every single person I met was really friendly and helpful. I did walk past a couple of people walking about me (didn't hear what they said, but you know when someone's talking about you), and rather than feeling a sudden rush of embarrassment, I pretty much smiled and carried on. After all, what're they gonna say? I'm slow? I'm fat? I'm single? All true things, and none of them bothered me.

but yeah, that's over, unfortunately.

Still, that leaves me with more time to make use of my subscription to Marvel's back catalogue of digital comics. I have a whole year to basically read everything I can get my hands on, hahaha. It's fun, and I've been reading Avengers, Amazing Spider-Man and Invincible Iron Man. Sometimes the art has made me want to claw my own face off, but it's mainly been fun! I don't know if I've mentioned on here that I've been steadily getting into comics, but I have! It's a pretty even split between Marvel and DC, and I've been trying to read more indie titles, but I haven't found many good recs for them, yet, so my collection of those is still pretty small.

Annnnnd finally, the OU is going ok? I just submitted my third assignment (4 hours late! THE SHAME). I really need to just dedicate a couple of days to sitting down and working through some of it, since I'm really far behind. Once I start reading it's fine? But getting the motivation together to actually sit down and make my way through is difficult. Still, I'm determined! I will finish this, and hopefully with marks over 60. My last two assignments were marked at 73 and 79 respectively, which I'm really pleased with, but I think if I don't start getting more prepared and start managing my time better, I'm going to end up getting lower and lower marks )=

Right then, belated Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you all! ♥

Posted over at dreamwidth, comment here or there, or everywhere!

lullula @ 2011-12-18T19:41:00

2011-12-18T20:10:04Z

Ugh, my new job is kinda killing me *_* I have no energy the day after each shift, haha, but then again I'm working 10 hours doing heavy lifting and shit, so I guess that's normal. The aching feet are not welcome though ;a;
I went to Edinburgh this weekend! My little brother and his girlfriend had been meant to go, but they seem to have split up, so me and Mum went instead, haha. The first day we did some shopping (comics! aaah!) and visited the National Museum of Scotland, which was fun. We also saw Sherlock Holmes: The Reeeeally Gay Sequel. It was good! Second day was spent wandering around the Botanical Gardens, and we went to see Hugo. Oh my gosh, that was so sweet! Annnnd then today, we went to the zoo!
WE SAW PANDAS! THEY ARE SO CUUUUTE! I have a video:

Posted over at dreamwidth, comment here or there, or everywhere!

Meme + New Job!

2011-12-04T21:40:52Z

Ganked from !

RELATE ME! When you think of me, what is the first thing that pops into your mind related to me in the following 10 categories:

TV Show:
Actor/Actress:
Catchphrase/word:
Colour:
Food:
Drink:
Icon:
Website/community:
Other LJ user:
The first word you think of when you think of me:

Alsooo~~ I have a new job! I'm gonna be a General Assistant at Sainsbury's! It's only a temporary job, but they said if I work hard, I could end up with a permanent contract. I really hope so! It seems pretty perfect pay/hours wise. Cross your fingers~

A-AR Fic: Mike/Chris, the Werewolf AU

2011-12-01T01:31:32Z

I wrote something! And I like it! \o/? This is hopefully the first part in a series :)

Title: Howling At The Moon, Or, How Mike Wasn't A Total Cliché, Thank You Very Much Tyson
Author: Lullula
Rating: PG-13
Pairing: Mike/Chris
Warnings: Mention of intense pain off-screen, RPF
Summary: Mike's a werewolf. Mostly that involves snuggle piles in the back lounge and occasionally handing out advice to techs on Warped tour.
Notes: Very kindly beta'd by xaritomene, cheerleading by xrysomou

Mike breathed in deep, filling his lungs with woodland air.

It was beautiful.

The clean fresh air was undercut with the sweet scent of decaying plants and the sharp green smell of pine. If he concentrated, he could pick the smell of animal trails through the forest, a couple of rabbits, a herd of deer. On the trees closest he could pick out the weaving paths that the squirrels had taken.

After too long spent cooped up on a tour bus and in crowded cities, it was like heaven to his enhanced senses and the urge to run was almost overwhelming. He couldn’t, they had a photo shoot to do, but if it had been a full moon, nothing would have kept him from taking off and letting the miles disappear under his feet.

He glanced around once more, letting the stillness of his surroundings seep in. He might not be able to run off his pent up energy, but he would remember this place the next time the bus started to feel too close, too claustrophobic.

He took one last deep breath and fixed the scents in his mind before making his way back to the rest of the band. Time to be human for the camera.

*~*

The photo shoot was easy, they just had to sit around a camp-fire looking ‘natural’. Mike spent most of his time leaned up against Chris’ shoulder, listening to the crackle and pop of branches burning happily. It could have almost been perfect, if there hadn’t been a photographer poking his camera over their shoulders or directing them into different positions. There was also a distinct lack of marshmallows.

The light started to fade quickly and after a few shots of them lit up by the fire and with the darkening forest looming behind them, the photographer wrapped up the shoot.

Chris remained next to him as the others packed up around them, Mike heard him tell Tyson that they’d follow them back to the van soon. It wasn’t hard to ignore them though, and keep his eyes focussed on the fire before him. The patterns that flared up were hypnotic and soothing, it wouldn’t be hard to sit here all night and just watch.

“Come on, nature boy, you’ve gotta get your ass kicked on Mortal Kombat again.” Chris stood up and winced at the unfortunate cracking noises emanating from his knees. He was getting too old to be sat in the cold for long periods of time, and wasn’t that depressing?

“You ever want to play a man’s game, and not one where you button mash like a jittery pensioner, we can talk about ass kicking.” Mike grinned at him, more a show of teeth than a friendly smile. “I see the way your lip quivers when Ty pulls out Fallout 3, you giant baby.”

Chris rolled his eyes and pulled Mike up to stand next to him. “Reel in those fangs, wolf boy, I submit to your alpha status. You are the best, and I’m sure you’ll wipe away my tears when I cry about how inferior I am.”

Mike thought about plastering himself against Chris, breathing in the scent at his nape, leaving bruises decorating his neck, pushing him back down, showing exactly how alpha he was. He thought about it, but said, “Sorry dude. Moon’s coming closer, y’know?”

Chris shrugged and nudged Mike in the direction of the van, “Yeah, but you’re being good. We get back to the van and I’ll give you a Scooby snack.”

“If that doesn’t mean blow job, I’ll tell you now, I ain’t interested. How about I show you exactly how good I am at Halo?”

“Why, Mr Kennerty,” drawled Chris in a truly atrocious Southern accent, “you do know how to charm a dame! Show me your prowess sir, and I’ll show you mine.”

There was a moment of silence as they regarded each other, before they both broke into raucous laughter and made their way back to the rest of the group.

*~*

The tour was going well, the support group were a bunch of really sweet, eager to please dudes, they hadn’t encountered any crazy stalker fans, and best of all, they’d managed to keep the back lounge nice and empty. Nights spent as a large wolf went much more pleasantly if he wasn’t trying to avoid guitar cases, amps, the odd snare drum and once, memorably, a battalion of blow-up dolls in period accurate uniform.

The extra space also made it easy for Chris to pull down all the cushions and blankets they owned into a nest on the floor. Mike had once said that the best part of coming from a family of werewolves was the family snuggling on full moons. Since then, Chris had occasionally invaded Mike’s space under the pretence of “bein’ too lazy to get a blanket” whilst they watched a film.

It was kind of sweet, in a gruff, manlier-than-thou fashion. Eventually, Chris had given up pretending he was doing anything other than snuggling, and then they had started to build blanket nests.

Mike thought it was the best decision ever, especially when Nick and Ty joined in. Partly it was just great to be surrounded by pack on a full moon, but mainly, it was touching to realise that they trusted him so much.

Despite the fact that Mike had never so much as snapped at a bunny, it was still an undeniable fact that he was a predator. It would be no effort at all to use his powerful jaws to rip apart his band mates, and one accidental swipe of a paw could leave someone needing stitches. They’d have all been well within their rights to lock him away, covered with silver restraints.

Instead, they piled in the back lounge and had movie marathons, eating popcorn and chips until they all eventually fell asleep, in a heap of warmth and fur.

So yeah, this was turning out to be a great tour.

*~*

The tech inclined his neck, a subtle but clear message – no contest, no challenges, not looking for any trouble. Mike smiled, open and easy. He didn’t need anyone showing him subservience, but it was cool when they did.

After looking around Warped’s coach park quickly, the tech jogged over to Mike.

“Hey man, my name’s Conner, can I uh, can I ask you some questions?” He smiled hopefully, but looked ready to back off if Mike wasn’t interested in talking.

“Mike, and I guess you can, but I gotta tell you, I don’t really have the time to hand hold you through everything. I can smell you’re new n’ all, but…” Mike paused, feeling uncomfortable. He didn’t want to have to turn anyone down, but explaining werewolf lore would take a lot of time, and he just didn’t have it to give, especially not to someone he’d just met.

“Oh no! Nah dude, no, it’s just the one thing. It’s probably real dumb, but I uh, I was turned and dumped, y’know? There’s a vampire in the band I’m with, and he can tell me most stuff, but there’s some things he don’t know.” There was a blush spreading across Conner’s cheeks, and as he lifted a hand to scratch self-consciously at his neck, Mike saw the beginnings of a large scar peeking out of his sleeve. It looked pretty rough, like there’d been a lot of damage to cover.

“Yeah? Who’re you with? Maybe I know him. There ain’t so many vampires on the circuit, but they’re all pretty decent dudes. You’re probably in good hands, and vampires know a whole lot about the history and lore and shit.” Gerard Way, for example, knew so much about vampire lore that he was making a killing under a pseudonym, writing trashy vampire romance novels. “Fire away with your question.”

There was a moment where Conner honest to God shuffled his feet, and he looked almost painfully embarrassed as he asked, “So the uh, the transformations? Are they gonna stop, like, being so damn painful?” He glanced quickly at Mike’s face, before hurrying to add, “I mean, I know my whole body’s changing and bones are snapping and shit, but I don’t know how much more I can cope with.”

Instinctively, Mike winced in sympathy. He’d been born a werewolf, but that didn’t make the first changes any easier. They’d kicked in when he’d hit puberty, and he could vividly remember the agony of the first few years.

He laid a hand on Conner’s shoulder and smiled wanly, “It does dude. But I’ll be honest, it’s gonna take a while. It’s maybe a couple of years of complete suffering, and then your body gets used to it, I think. The pain doesn’t really stop or anything, but it becomes a lot more manageable. You just have to grit your teeth and get through it. If you can get some, there’s a wolfsbane tincture that helps a lot. I won’t lie and say it stops the pain, but it gets you high enough you don’t mind so much.”

Conner didn’t look so much relieved, as less desperate. It was about what Mike could hope for, it definitely wasn’t an easy fact to deal with, the thought of regular bouts of excruciating pain for the next couple of years. In all honesty, it would have been fair for Conner to start crying. Mike was glad he hadn’t though, that would have been awkward.

“Ok, well, that’s not great, but it’s not as bad as it could be, right? And I think Sashi knows some dudes that could get me some wolfsbane. He’s mad connected, but I guess he would be. He’s pretty old.” Conner took in a deep breath and shook himself a little, before he looked Mike straight in the eyes and smiled. “I’m seriously grateful dude, thank you for explaining that to me. I know it’s not cool to have a stranger come asking questions, and you didn’t have to answer me at all. If there’s ever anything I can do for you, you just gotta ask.”

Conner had really striking green eyes, and a really pretty mouth. Mike could feel some baser instincts calling out, telling him to take Conner and make him part of his pack. It’d be real easy, and real nice, to have a sweet pup hanging around.

“Well you got an attractive smile, so I didn’t mind.” Mike grinned and ignored his base instincts. His pack was perfectly formed, and there was no need to add to it. Plus, dealing with an angry Disashi was not his idea of fun, and it was clear to him that the vampire had claimed Conner as his own. The two tiny holes at the base of his neck were a clear warning to anyone who knew how to look. “It’s pretty hard dealing without anyone who’s been where you have, so if you end up with any more questions, you can just text me, ok? There’s a lot of time on bus rides where I don’t have shit to do, and I don’t mind answering.”

They swapped numbers and Conner grabbed Mike in a quick hug, before jogging back over to his bus. Mike saw Disashi raise an eyebrow at him through a window, and gave a grin and a wave in return. He hadn’t realised that Disashi had been watching them, but it was good to know Conner had someone looking out for him. Newly turned werewolves without supervision didn’t tend to last long.

But that wasn’t Mike’s problem, he didn’t have anything to worry about, other than the distressing new tendency Tyson had of locking him and Chris into small rooms.

*~*

Mike followed Nick off the stage and handed his guitar off to a waiting tech. His cheeks were starting to ache from smiling too hard, but this was their last show and it had been great. Nothing had gone wrong, the crowd had been amazingly into it – his ears were ringing, their screams were still echoing – and during Mona Lisa, Chris had been staring at him just as much as he’d been looking at Chris.

They’d always been close friends, and of course there’d been the odd drunken make-out session (and maybe Mike remembered those when he was alone in his bunk, but no one else knew that) and Mike never failed to notice Chris was a good looking guy, but they’d never really taken their relationship any further.

But when you both looked at each other when asked if you loved anyone? There was a pretty clear message, right there.

So maybe it wasn’t a candle-lit declaration of forever and there hadn’t been any intense pining against rain-lashed gothic windows. As far as he knew, Chris hadn’t been writing tear-drenched entries in his diary, lamenting the lack of his true love and Mike had never felt a need to get all wistful about what-might-be. That wasn’t what they were about anyway, and even if Mike turned large and hairy once a month, they weren’t dramatic dudes. Tyson could have all the expansive gestures he liked, Mike and Chris were quieter.

And ok, maybe Ty hadn’t been completely insane to start locking them into small rooms together.

Chris came up behind him and Mike felt his smile stretch impossibly wider as he turned to face him.

“So, uh.” Mike said eloquently.

“Uh indeed.” Chris rolled his eyes fondly at Mike, before leaning in and kissing him.

And oh, that was excellent. Adrenaline was still rushing through his veins from the gig, and all of his senses were heightened. He could smell the sweat cooling on Chris’ skin, feel every inch of skin that was plastered against him. Warmth seemed to spark between them like fire, curling around them and binding them together. Even behind closed eyes, Mike could see the tendrils of light pulsing around them, following the path of the heat.

Chris gasped and pulled away, “That some crazy wolf shit going down? Because that doesn’t normally happen when I kiss someone.”

“That’s uh, magic dude. Just means we’re in this for the long haul.” Mike kissed Chris again, quickly. “Kind of what you get for being with a werewolf.”

“Y’know, I feel like maybe I shouldn’t be cool with our relationship being pre-determined? But I wasn’t goin’ anywhere anyway.”

Mike probably wasn’t ever going to stop beaming, but that was ok. He had a real good reason to keep on smiling.

Posted over at dreamwidth, comment here or there, or everywhere!

lullula @ 2011-11-25T19:16:00

2011-11-25T19:16:35Z

Happy birthday to meeee~

I'm 23 now! It's kind of hard to believe, haha.

lullula @ 2011-11-17T18:53:00

2011-11-17T18:54:19Z

Ganked from whocares19_05

1. Five ways to my heart.
2. Something I feel strongly about.
3. A book I love.
4. Things I want to say to an ex.
5. Five pet peeves.
6. What I ate today.
7. How important I think education is.
8. I'll put my music player on shuffle and write the first ten songs that play. (I shall pass on that one as there is hardly any music on this laptop and it'd get boring really fast... ;))
9. Five people I find attractive.
10. My opinion about my body and how comfortable I am with it.
11. What I wore today.
12. My zodiac/horoscope and if I think it fits my personality.
13. Something I always think "what if..." about.
14. Something that I'm proud of.
15. A problem I have had.
16. Five items I lust after.
17. My fears.
18. How I hope my future will be like.
19. Something that I miss.
20. Five words/phrases that make me laugh.
21. Something I'm currently worrying about.
22. Things I like and dislike about myself.
23. A quote I try to live by.
24. Somewhere I'd like to move to or visit.
25. Five weird things that I like.
26. One thing I'm excited for.
27. Responders choice. (i.e. something not already on this list.)

Posted over at dreamwidth, comment here or there, or everywhere!

This is not the Melissa you are searching for.

2011-11-12T05:32:52Z

So, lately, I have been getting emails from a music studio on Roseville, CA. At first they were from Living Social and then from the studio itself. I thought they were spam and ignored them, until they started talking about invoices. I emailed back and told them they had the wrong person, but it seems the Melissa of America has a very similar email address to mine...

Hello Melissa,

We hope your day is going great!

Attached is an Invoice3656 in the amount of $45.00. As a reminder, tuition is due on the first lesson of the month. We accept online payments, check, cash, and charter school voucher/purchase order.

To make payment online, click on the following link - Make Payment. If you wish to make a payment in person, you may drop it our payment box located in the studio waiting area.

Please keep your account in good standing by making your tuition payment promptly!

If you have questions regarding this invoice, feel free to email or call us.

My reply (which in my head was quite sarcastic, since I thought it was just spam):

I'm sorry, I think you have the wrong email account. I have not used the site Living Social nor have I ever purchased music lessons from you. Partly as I have no intent to learn music and partly because you are an American company and I do not live in America.

Perhaps you should check your records and find the correct Melissa to invoice.

Best regards.

I got a reply from them, and assumed that would be the end of it...

Ooops... I am so sorry. Thanks for your graciousness.

Chuck

Ok, how cute is it that his name is Chuck? Do you think he's a super spy?

So the next day I get a repeat of the first email, and replied with this:

Dear Chuck,

I'm still the wrong Melissa. If you have a phone number for the Melissa you are looking for, perhaps you should ring that instead?

Good luck with getting your invoice!

Sincerely,

The Melissa from England who has never bought music lessons from you

And once again, I'd assumed that would be the end of it!

Oh no.

Hello Melissa,

I wanted to know if you will be continuing and if I should save that Monday night slot for you. Thanks.

Not from Chuck this time, but an Alan.

My reply:

Hi Alan,

I'm very sorry but there seems to have been a mix up - I'm not the Melissa you're looking for. I emailed someone called Chuck and told him that he was sending mail to the wrong address, but I don't think he's found the correct email to send things to. I actually live in England, so even if I were interested in having a music lesson, I'm afraid I couldn't make one on Monday evening ;)

Perhaps you'd have better luck getting a response if you rang the Melissa in question?

Best regards

Once again, I thought this was probably the end of things. No one is going to keep sending things to an address that doesn't get a reply, right?

Nope:

Hi Melissa,

I was wondering if you have an alternate email address that we can contact you at. Our billing system has been sending emails to a Melissa Taylor in England. For some reason it is converting your email address of m.t [not her email, obvs] to mt [nor is this mine, obvs].

Thanks for your help.

Chuck

Hooray! I got Chuck again!

And after writing a long email to the m.t address, it, surely enough, bounced into my inbox and presumably not hers. So of course, I replied to Chuck:

Hello Chuck,

Once again I'm sorry to report that it's still the wrong Melissa here. I tried to email the All-American Melissa using an alternate account, but that bounced into this inbox. Perhaps you could try emailing Melissa Taylors 70-79, to see if any of them are the Melissa of your invoice dreams. If not, it's possible one could know the whereabouts of the ever elusive Melissa Taylor of Roseville, CA, although I doubt it... If I'm anything to go by, we only emerge from our secretive burrows underground in the pursuit of chocolate, comics and apparently music lessons.

As I understand from a previous email, Musically Minded Melissa has a no-doubt melodious moment of Monday music mentoring. Perhaps you could catch her then? And then through the esoteric teachings bestowed upon all Studio Administrators extract from her a workable email address...

I have to admit, this saga of Which Melissa Is The Melissa We Can Get Money From is becoming quite entertaining ;-)

Best of luck in your intrepid quest for the Mythical 'Merican Melissa.

I admit it, now I'm just having fun.

Posted over at dreamwidth, comment here or there, or everywhere!