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Useful Posts:
Intro Post
Glee Fic: My Recs & To-Read list
Wishlist
My Favorites
Comfort Books; Favorite Storytelling Devices.

I maintain a booklog at Goodreads as 'ribbonknight.'
I track the anime I watch here at MyAnimeList.net.

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Hello! It's been a while since I've hosted one of these.
Comment with any thoughts you have, however semi-formed. One thread per panel, please.

People can comment & try to come up with the best panels possible! Anyone can suggest panel ideas: People who run the convention, authors, attendees, or people who have never attended WisCon and never will. Please feel free to join in!

If the comments go in a direction you dislike, or you don't want to participate in a discussion, you can submit your own panel idea here on WisCon's website.

Things to know:

• Not every panel idea that gets suggested ends up on the schedule. Programming typically has to cut about 50% of the panels due to space/time constraints.
• People will be able to vote on WisCon's website for panels they'd like to attend, & also indicate their interest in being a panelist or a moderator. These votes matter.
• The programming team edits panel titles/descriptions after they've been submitted. Sometimes they combine multiple panels on the same theme into a single panel.
• This year, the submission deadline is January 21st.

Here are a few thoughts to maybe get you going:

• Our Guests of Honor are Charlie Jane Anders & G. Willow Wilson. Which of their works do you want to talk about, and what kinds of themes?
• Are there any sci-fi or fantasy TV shows, movies, or anime that you've enjoyed this year?
• What about books? Ongoing comics, or manga?
• Which online conversations have you found the most interesting in the past year that you wish to revisit, or expand upon?
• Can we talk about how to document and preserve our fannish history when we keep having to pull up stakes and move house every few years?

What else?!
Programming recently posted a great blog post with an explanation of how to propose a panel. They also recommend now as a good time for updating your profile and inputting your availability, and provide instructions on how to do so.

Disclaimer: I am not on WisCon's Programming team and have no influence over their decision-making process. This is just a friendly place to generate some ideas and get them submitted!

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In your own space, share a favorite piece of original canon (a TV episode, a song, a favorite interview, a book, a scene from a movie, etc) and explain why you love it so much.

1) The OP for Samurai Champloo. This was the first anime for which I downloaded fansubs, because at college I finally had an internet connection fast enough to do so :*) The OP is stylistically perfect, imo. It perfectly sets the tone for an irreverent show about samurais set to hip-hop music, by the creator of Cowboy Bebop. I still know all the words ;) This show introduced me to MINMI, still one of my favorite artists to listen to. She did the ED, though, not this song!





2) Glee performance of a mashup of Rihanna's Umbrella with Singin' in the Rain, performed on the high school stage full of water. The umbrellas make great props both as canes and for twirling while open, and splashing the water with hands and feet is pretty cool. Everyone looks smart in their suit outfits, it's the end of a guest appearance by Gwyneth Paltrow, where she was pretty great with the kids. It's a great deployment of Matthew Morrison, letting him sing a Broadway tune, and a good use of the kids to keep the beat seamless between the two songs. And any time you get to watch Harry Shum Jr. having the time of his life = good.
I still have a hard time watching a lot of Glee footage that includes Cory Monteith and Mark Salling.





3) The Nibelheim flashback from Final Fantasy VII.

At this point in the game, all you knew about Sephiroth is that he just murdered everyone in the Shinra Building - including President Shinra, previously the biggest villain of the game. You followed a trail of blood throughout the building, having woken in the morning to find your characters' prison cells mysteriously unlocked, and everyone free to go, despite having spent hours breaking into their tough security.

The framing of Cloud's narration - telling the story to the rest of the party members - is the first time this band of randos has been able to talk after a fast-paced introductory section. Seeing Sephiroth's strength during the single battle you enter with him was chilling as a player.

It deepened the story, it introduced Nibelheim and its creepy music, and LATER ON the player's interpretation of reality as based on this flashback gets upended. This is why Tifa has a lot of, "..." going on even though she was present for this event that happened "5" years ago.

The mood, the creepy music, the haunted Shinra building, the human experimentation subplot, all of it was candy. Still my favorite part of the game, I think.



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Rec at least three fanworks that you didn’t create.

These are recent-ish fics in my current fandom. To find out the fandom and the relationships, you'll have to follow the links, and also be logged into your AO3 account.* This is because the fandom is an RPF one, and we do not want these things to be searchable.

Between the Thought and the Action by littlemousling and moogle62
28k, sudden joint telepathy

if everything happens that can't be undone by longnationalnightmare and oops_ohdear
45k, regency au

But if I know you, I know what you'll do by hopefor46
9.7k, fairy tale au that's a remix of a fic that I wrote!


*If you don't have an AO3 account and would like one, let me know. I have some extra invites. Even if you don't write or post fic, accounts are helpful for bookmarking your faves and marking fics to read later. And, in cases like this one, reading fic that has been locked to the archive.

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Day 1: In your own space, talk about your Happy Place—the things that give you joy, calms you or keeps you sane

I'm not quite sure I'm fulfilling the prompt correctly, but I am going with digital "spaces," which are either fandom-centric or fandom-adjacent.

The first is Tumblr - my account is ribbonknight, although my understanding is that my content is "dash-locked," meaning you need to be logged into your own account in order to see it. I do this because my current fandom is an RPF one, and we make every effort to keep our weirdo stuff AWAY from the people in question!!
Maybe it's because of the visual nature of the site, but I always find something to make me happy on tumblr. There are fandom-specific people and accounts that I follow, but I also enjoy the serendipitous nature of tumblr, where you get people talking about seasons or just funny comebacks, etc.

Another happy place is the Discord channel associated with my current RPF fandom. There had been a Slack, which then shuttered under semi-lolarious circumstances, and the Slack may or may not have secretly been replaced, idk! The Discord channel is populated by people who'd found each other through Tumblr, and it just facilitates a different way for us to talk to one another.
I'm technically also a member of the "oldschool fandom" one that had been linked around Dreamwidth, but it ultimately had too much activity for me to be able to keep up with it.

Lately, playing Animal Crossing: Wild World on my DS has been a happy place for me. The dreamy low-stakes nature of it reminds me of Glitch. I can also see that in addition to Stardew Valley having lifted a lot of its infrastructure from Harvest Moon games, it clearly took some things from Animal Crossing, too.
I'd played Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp in an app on my phone before coming to WW. I really liked the social nature of Pocket Camp, and being able to see how my friends decorated their spaces, etc. I honestly don't remember why I deleted the app - maybe just got too bored by the daily happenings? I'm not sure.
In WW, there are a few things I do every day - search for the rock that will dispense free coins, buy coffee from the pigeon named Brewster in the basement of the museum, search for fossils, collect and sell fruit, check the recycling bin in City Hall for cool shit, etc. The other townspeople and mail I receive provide some surrealist humor, and it's great all around.
Before starting Wild World, I had been playing Harvest Moon: The Tale of Two Towns on my DS. I liked that game, but it did move SO SLOWLY that I semi-abandoned it in favor of starting a Persona 5 game on my PS4.
Anyway! This game, & this genre, is my go-to "I just got home from work and need to forcibly chill the fuck out after a miserable bus ride" evening activity ;)

I love logging my reading on Goodreads, as well as tracking "books I want to read in the future." I also love looking at other people's updates to see what they're reading. I am ribbonknight over there; my profile is here.

Lately I have been watching Veep, and am in the middle of season 5. Every episode makes me laugh, it pulls me out of every bad mood; I love it so much. ty to brdgt for having suggested it.
Young Pope ended up being too dark for me at the moment. This has happened to me a lot in the past few years with live-action TV.

Physically, my "happy place" is when I go Up North to where my family has a trailer on a lake, or when I go horseback riding on Chief. Fresh air, trees, open sky, a lack of buildings. So nice. If I had my way, I'd live in the middle of nowhere.

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As I work on figuring out my gift list for Christmas, I come to Dreamwidth with what is basically the perfect question for this crowd:

Please rec me LGBT books for a 15-year-old girl. She's not super into ~discussing~ things with me, a family member [she has basically acted like a 15yo for the past decade], but this is my attempt at a show of solidarity.

---

SPECIFICS:

• Not super into comics but did read & like Ms Marvel a few years back


• Okay with fantasy & SF but not REALLY their thing [despite my best efforts lol]


• Overall preference for fiction, but she does get super interested in really interesting or WTF historical figures


• Likes: 13 Reasons Why, Pretty Little Liars, Grey's Anatomy, Full House [idk why this show made a comeback on DVDs but here we are], v. into makeup

Have been thinking of Malinda Lo's Ash altho I can't remember for the life of me whether I've already gifted it to this household; were_duck thought When the Moon Was Ours. I'll likely be getting two books.

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The current week-long Black Friday sale that Sentai is holding is BANANAS, like so bananas that I am making a Dreamwidth post to alert random people to the fact that SO MANY SERIES are available for like literally $4.99 and EVERYONE NEEDS TO KNOW ABOUT IT. Here is a link to the first page of the sale; series are in alphabetical order.

Yes, so many things are streaming & digital now, but having just watch a significant portion of my Crunchyroll queue get wiped out when Funimation broke off, I have more faith in discs that I can hold in my hand than subscriptions. (To be clear, I do still have and use subscriptions! But consider them ephemeral.)


Stuff I'm buying or already own & recommend:
Chihayafuru ($4.99 per 2-cour set)
CLAMP School Detectives ($4.99 for 2 cour)
K-On! & K-On!! ($4.99 per cour)
Magical Shopping Arcade Abenobashi - ($4.99 for 1 cour)
Penguindrum - ($4.99 each for 2 cour)
Princess Tutu ($3.99!!!, 2 cour)
Shirobako (EVERYONE SHOULD WATCH SHIROBAKO IMO!!!) ($4.99 per cour, 2 cours)
Tari Tari ($4.99, 1 cour)
Yozakura Quartet ($4.99, 1 cour)

Stuff I'm considering buying based on what I've heard/am curious enough & it's cheap enough - lmk if you like it?!
AKB0048
Coffee Samurai / Hoshizora Kiseki [double feature] ($1.99) [Getting]
Flying Witch ($4.99, 1 cour) [Getting]
The Garden of Words ($3.99, movie) [Getting]
Glassslip ($4.99, 1 cour)
Hakukoi - various seasons & movies ($2.99-$4.99 ea) [Not getting! Watched first two eps; kind of thing I'd watch once but never again]
Maria Holic
Non Non Biyori ($4.00 per cour, 2 cour) [Getting]
Patlabor ($2.99 per movie; $10.99 for 7-ep OVA; $4.99 per cour for 4 cour, + 1 cour of 'New Files')
Sakura Wars ($2.99, 2 cour) [Getting]
Stella Women's Academy High School Division Class C3 ($4.99, 1 cour) [Getting]

---

Did anyone else see the Hibike!/Sound! Euphonium movie, "Liz and the Blue Bird," in theaters? IT WAS SO BEAUTIFUL AND GOOD, I cried and it was so great to emote in a room full of people about a show I'd only watched by myself. I miss that part of Anime Club, and it was a great way to spend a week night.

I do wish that these special anime events, where Crunchyroll/whomever the fuck teams up with a theater chain to show something niche on 1-3 specific dates around the country, would be held in normal theater seating instead of the more expensive recliner seating, BUT. If it's all that's available, I have no choice but to luxuriate, right?

Series that I wish were on sale: Sound! Euphonium; Hanasaku Iroha

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I now have at least a month of HBO NOW, so that I can watch the Pod Save America midterm election specials.

I am wondering whether people have recommendations for other HBO TV shows. nicasiosilang has already demanded that I watch Young Pope, in which the Pope is 1) American, and 2) played by Jude Law. SOOOOOO THAT'S HAPPENING. But I will entertain more suggestions to make the most of this month.

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So, after my anxious Thursday night, once I left my apartment and actually settled into the hotel room I shared with littlebutfierce, my anxiety levels went down quite a bit. I guess this is something to know for future WisCons. I feel grateful to have been able to spend so much time with littlebutfierce while they were here.

Thanks very much to those of you who asked how I was doing, even if in passing. It felt nice to be surrounded by all of you.

I feel kind of guilty about how few people I saw, although I did make it to a handful of panels this year.
More than a few hours of my time were eaten up by Safety issues, some of which are public, and some of which are not.
Very cool of X's partner to point-blank refuse to help us contact X before blogging after asking whether it was for a Safety issue, and then saying, "No," and then, "I know what this is about. This is ridiculous, you people are ridiculous. I'm not helping you reach her." Which, fine. But nobody should claim that we didn't try. (Other methods were also tried.)

I feel satisfied and comfortable with the decisions made by the co-chairs and Safety leads.
At any rate, what I wanted to say is that I am available for people venting or etc. I have a position within the leadership structure, but I am not on the Anti-Abuse Team, and I (rightfully) do not have access to the totality of information that they have.
During the actual con, I weigh in and support Safety decisions as requested. Depending on the circumstance, I may be involved in relaying information as well, although generally my presence is saved as a last resort, :)

My own panel about the 2018 Midterms went well. I was able to share some information about Pod Save America/Crooked Media's plan to flip 8 House seats in California, the Crooked 8, with a guy looking for a way to help in a relatively blue city/state. I still feel very conflicted and weird about my own political activism, or lack thereof, which is balanced between a fulltime job and mental illness, as well as familial things like aging parents who live half a state away, horseback riding preferably twice a week, and this volunteer gig with SF3. I haven't gone door-to-door or made calls or etc. Maybe that will change once we get past Wisconsin's late gubernatorial/senatorial primaries before the election in November, but in the end I try not to feel guilty about what I can do. What I can do ultimately ends up being mostly online activism, but unexpectedly being able to weigh in, for example with a cousin who had some expected influence in a Q&A with a congressional candidate in a rural western state, connecting people with information, giving advice to people who might have some influence working on campaigns, and my usual hyper-active political tweets. I think we are all doing our best.

Per usual, I feel filled up with enough community and hope and inspiration to go on for another year.

Between my birthday and WisCon, I've spent a lot of the past two weeks in conversation with friends, and I feel lucky and grateful to know so many kind and intelligent people. I am grateful also for being able to converse with you all online for all the times we cannot hang out together in person.

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Have had littlebutfierce here the past few days, and was able to drop them off at the Concourse and get four hours of work in today.

I'd planned to go to the Guest of Honor readings at A Room of One's Own, but then was too anxious to do so.

After the time had passed by which I could reasonably make it, I then cried in bed for a while. Unclear why I am anxious in the first place, but have decided I'm not leaving the apartment for tonight.

I think I wish I had gone Up North instead, where at least I could somewhat function.

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