IN WHAT has become something of a theme, here I am running in a horrifyingly long time after I posted my last entry in order to shout, "NOT DEAD AND ALSO I MISS YOU." I appreciate that gets hollower each time! (Particularly since all the lovely comments on my last entry, a good, ooooh, eleven months ago, languished unanswered. I am contemplating whether to answer them or not. I think I might. In which case, brace yourselves for some REALLY belated responses to comments you'd forgotten you left. :)?)

NOT DEAD AND ALSO I MISS YOU.

Teaching continues apace. This year I am writing a dissertation for my Masters, as well. Combining an MA with a full-time teaching job, while an excellent decision in many ways, was in many other ways a TERRIBLE decision. Including the ways where I have given myself FAR TOO MUCH TO DO.

On the plus side, it's now half-term. <3 Lie-ins a-go-go!

Also posted on Dreamwidth at http://surexit.dreamwidth.org/93415.html with comments. Comment wherever you like.

I miss you guys. ♥

I miss making stuff and talking about stuff and sharing pretty pictures and pretty words. I miss being someone who writes things, even though I was only someone who writes things for about a year. I miss capslock. I miss caring very intensely about really minor details of things. I miss being a fan.

I'm still a fan in my head, but it's not the same! Fandom, I will never really leave you, but ugh this job is fucking up my ability to properly engage with you.

How are you all? Still out there? Or has everyone gone to Tumblr?

Also posted on Dreamwidth at http://surexit.dreamwidth.org/93027.html with comments. Comment wherever you like.

I potentially need to see Winter Solder with someone who will understand my FFELS, because I predict they will be manifold. I am hideously busy and this may not pan out, but anyone based in London who wants to see it in the week after it comes out?

Other than that, keep on keeping on, my lovelies, and I will rejoin you someday. ♥ I am doing exciting things (including a specific literacy intervention with one boy that I have high hopes about, if he can stop being a dick and pretending that he doesn't give a shit about whether he can read and write or not) and boring things and tiring things and nerve-wracking things and I am not so far away from a goddamn six week holiday (by not so far I mean, end of July) when I might be able to effect my glorious and triumphant return.

Also posted on Dreamwidth at http://surexit.dreamwidth.org/91944.html with comments. Comment wherever you like.

Because you've been waiting with bated breath to hear.

The Musketeers, which is awful and adorable. It has a wide range of beautiful men in it (including Santiago Cabrera OMG ♥___♥), and the BBC has helpfully prepared this trailer to give you a true sense of its priorities.



It is the dumbest thing, with the worst dialogue, and I fucking love it.

Call the Midwife, cry cry cry all the bloody time. So feel-good I can barely stand it. (I am getting sick of Shelagh and Patrick, though, they're so bloody simpering and nice and ugh. Next week looks like it might fix that?)

Bluestone 42, and I am dreaming of a crossover between this and Gen Kill, oh my God.


Mac and Rocket would get on with Ray, y/y?

Death Comes to Pemberley, which was exactly the right kind of fluff. ♥

Atlantis, oh my God this is the worst, and I have residual Merlin bitterness for it, but. But. It's charming and I don't have to think.

Basically, as you can see from the above, I am DROWNING in silly BBC shows (the only one of these that I will make a claim for legit being good is Bluestone 42). (Actually, just realised I've sort of run out of stuff - any recs? Not too dark, full of pretty people, preferably ridiculous either on purpose or not, and UK-based?)

And with that scintillating update, I will go and plan lessons. ♥ Not reading my dwircle or flist at the moment, jsyk. Email in.ois.oisou at gmail as always, but I'm not replying very promptly. Basically I remain shit and you guys remain lovely.

Also posted on Dreamwidth at http://surexit.dreamwidth.org/91827.html with comments. Comment wherever you like.

I'm back from the Hebrides! I went to the Hebrides, I know I didn't say, but now you know. It was grey and stormy and the cottage was freezing (our cottage doesn't have central heating), but then sometimes the sun shone, sideways and slanting, for a few hours, and it was beautiful. Not the kind of beautiful it is in the summer, full on and sparkling, but an odd wet beauty. ♥ We had a neighbour round for a wee dram, only we'd run out of whisky (OH MY GOD HOW EMBARRASSING). No worries! The neighbour had a spare bottle in his car. :D

Low point was the fact that I have Issues coming out of my ears about New Year's Eve, so I only stuck it out at the community ceilidh for about forty-five minutes before nopeing out. :( Any other night it would have been a really good dance (Scottish dancing is one of my many favourite things, and the band were very good), buuuut not NYE. :( Resolutions for the year: don't die or have a nervous breakdown.

On the topic of nervous breakdowns, I have a shitload of stuff to do in the next two days before term starts, and it's not all going to get done. In the interests of accountability, I'm going to talk through my Plan for the next forty-eight hours:

Before I go to bed tonight, I'm tidying my room and setting out the work that I need to do tomorrow.

Tomorrow, I'm waking up at 8.30, eating cereal, and doing a few hours of getting the Powerpoints, resources, and extended lesson plans for the coming week sorted. I'm not getting distracted by doing more planning for the weeks beyond that - planning is a very tempting way to procrastinate because it's quite fun and it's also actually work, so all the shit work ends up not getting done.

Also tomorrow, I need to mark the last couple of coursework pieces for my year tens, and get to the Post office before it closes at midday in order to sort out sending the letters my year nines wrote to Rick Riordan over to his publisher in the States. Then I need to photocopy those year nine letters and mark the photocopies. In the same trip I'm going to the High Road to pick up the parcel that the postie apparently couldn't fit through the letterbox (bastard), because I suspect it is something that needs to be sent to Sudan and I'm meeting the guy who's going to Sudan on Sunday. Other things that need to be bought: anything I realise I need while I'm planning, prizes for year 10s for their Of Mice and Men Mr Men books.

If planning, year ten and year nine marking are done, then there is also finishing off collating year 10 S+L data, year 7 marking, and then year 8 marking, but if they don't get done they don't get done. Also, dinner with Granny at 7. Also also, make shopping list for Sunday.

On Sunday, get up at 9 and read for essay. Read read read read, make notes while reading, read. Meet Sudan guy at 5-ish, do shopping in the same trip. Come back, make lunch for Monday, get clothes laid out, pack bag. Then do some more reading.

Throughout the week: read for essay, mark all books. Finish any marking that didn't get done over the holiday. Write essay. Write lesson plans for essay. Do planning for next week. Try to do lesson objectives to cover the whole term, it's a pain but it would be good to get them done next week.

Somewhere in there, also teach.

Ugh, right, that's enough staring at that list and thinking, I'm starting to get panicky. :( Instead, I will think about Psmith slavefic, because eglantiere put the idea into my head and it is intriguing.

[ETA: I forgot to say! I am hideously, guiltily aware of how bad I've become at answering comments. I am not that person! I hate being that person! I always answer comments on entries! Only, at the moment, I don't, and I am that person, and I am endlessly sorry and love you all and treasure your comments and will answer them if I have the brainspace/time/energy/whatever weird alignment of the planets sometimes allows me to lift the overwhelming fog of 'HOLY SHIT TEACHINGTEACHINGTEACHING'. ♥]

Also posted on Dreamwidth at http://surexit.dreamwidth.org/91548.html with comments. Comment wherever you like.

I'm back from the Hebrides! I went to the Hebrides, I know I didn't say, but now you know. It was grey and stormy and the cottage was freezing (our cottage doesn't have central heating), but then sometimes the sun shone, sideways and slanting, for a few hours, and it was beautiful. Not the kind of beautiful it is in the summer, full on and sparkling, but an odd wet beauty. ♥ We had a neighbour round for a wee dram, only we'd run out of whisky (OH MY GOD HOW EMBARRASSING). No worries! The neighbour had a spare bottle in his car. :D

Low point was the fact that I have Issues coming out of my ears about New Year's Eve, so I only stuck it out at the community ceilidh for about forty-five minutes before nopeing out. :( Any other night it would have been a really good dance (Scottish dancing is one of my many favourite things, and the band were very good), buuuut not NYE. :( Resolutions for the year: don't die or have a nervous breakdown.

On the topic of nervous breakdowns, I have a shitload of stuff to do in the next two days before term starts, and it's not all going to get done. In the interests of accountability, I'm going to talk through my Plan for the next forty-eight hours:

Before I go to bed tonight, I'm tidying my room and setting out the work that I need to do tomorrow.

Tomorrow, I'm waking up at 8.30, eating cereal, and doing a few hours of getting the Powerpoints, resources, and extended lesson plans for the coming week sorted. I'm not getting distracted by doing more planning for the weeks beyond that - planning is a very tempting way to procrastinate because it's quite fun and it's also actually work, so all the shit work ends up not getting done.

Also tomorrow, I need to mark the last couple of coursework pieces for my year tens, and get to the Post office before it closes at midday in order to sort out sending the letters my year nines wrote to Rick Riordan over to his publisher in the States. Then I need to photocopy those year nine letters and mark the photocopies. In the same trip I'm going to the High Road to pick up the parcel that the postie apparently couldn't fit through the letterbox (bastard), because I suspect it is something that needs to be sent to Sudan and I'm meeting the guy who's going to Sudan on Sunday. Other things that need to be bought: anything I realise I need while I'm planning, prizes for year 10s for their Of Mice and Men Mr Men books.

If planning, year ten and year nine marking are done, then there is also finishing off collating year 10 S+L data, year 7 marking, and then year 8 marking, but if they don't get done they don't get done. Also, dinner with Granny at 7. Also also, make shopping list for Sunday.

On Sunday, get up at 9 and read for essay. Read read read read, make notes while reading, read. Meet Sudan guy at 5-ish, do shopping in the same trip. Come back, make lunch for Monday, get clothes laid out, pack bag. Then do some more reading.

Throughout the week: read for essay, mark all books. Finish any marking that didn't get done over the holiday. Write essay. Write lesson plans for essay. Do planning for next week. Try to do lesson objectives to cover the whole term, it's a pain but it would be good to get them done next week.

Somewhere in there, also teach.

Ugh, right, that's enough staring at that list and thinking, I'm starting to get panicky. :( Instead, I will think about Psmith slavefic, because eglantiere put the idea into my head and it is intriguing.

Also posted on Dreamwidth at http://surexit.dreamwidth.org/91548.html with comments. Comment wherever you like.

Only the trope_bingo card, the first card, is current, and I'm going for a blackout with that one, argh. The other two are from last year, and I have self-imposed the challenge of one line of each by the end of the year.

( Tropes, AUs and fluffCollapse )

Also posted on Dreamwidth at http://surexit.dreamwidth.org/61101.html with comments. Comment wherever you like.

I have a small problem, guys.

I've been watching Garrow's Law recently, to fill the 'mindless relaxation' space in my life. It is a very charming and ridiculous BBC drama about William Garrow, who was a pretty cool lawyer in the 18th century who I had very vaguely heard of before watching this drama. I have now been educated to realise that he was probably the only truly good man operating in the entire legal system at that time. Thrill as he clenches his square jaw in pain as the defendant he was trying desperately to save is dragged away to the gallows. Admire as he speaks truth to power on the subject of slavery. Swoon as he espouses his rigorous and deeply wonderful notions of justice, and frankly makes you proud to be British, dammit.

Here you go, the BBC trailer:

Honourable, radical, revolutionary... everyone meet possibly the world's greatest man. He is ridiculous and it is terrible how in love with him the narrative is, even when he's acting like a child, but I do still thrill, admire, and swoon, even while choking with laughter.

Okay, so this is not my problem. My problem is, I just watched Season 2, Episode 2, in which the main case that Garrow defends is an army captain who's been accused by a cobbler of sodomy, and their storyline has mashed AAAAAAALLLLL the buttons in my brain. Forbidden love! Grand public gestures! Nobility! Clinging to each other in a crazy world! The army captain is played by Andrew Scott, and he does a fucking stellar job, oh my God. I can tell you this because I have now rewatched the episode three times (fast-forwarding through the boring bits where Garrow and his own forbidden lover angst, because as much as I enjoy his love interest by herself, Garrow-in-love is kind of cardboard), each time focusing with razor-sharp intensity on every minute twitch of Scott's face.


Here he is, keeping himself together with desperate dignity as the charges are read out. ♥____♥ OH GOD HE IS SO WONDERFUL. I think he hits the same faithful-stoic-complicated-angry buttons that Captain Wentworth does, actually.

He is the main masher of buttons, tbh: the cobbler is very sweet and lovely, but I am mainly interested in him in the context of whether he makes Captain Robert Jones happy.


Probably he does. ♥____♥

So now I want to write thousands of words of fic about two characters who appear in one episode of a show that basically no one else in fic writing or reading fandom has watched. (Except osprey_archer.) I mean, I won't, we all know that, I am too flat-out to write anything, but just... ugh, guys, my brain has been invaded by men in stockings and silly curled hair. :(

(I would also like to make very sure that everyone knows that the entirety of Garrow's Law is available on Youtube, and especially this episode. Just so you know. No particular reason.)

Also posted on Dreamwidth at http://surexit.dreamwidth.org/91249.html with comments. Comment wherever you like.

God, I'm almost halfway through the school year (one week to go before Christmas holidays, but I'm four months out of 10 and a half in, and if we forget the half (let's forget the half) then there's only six to go), which is insane. My rlist is full of such incredibly articulate people, and so many of you make these posts which make me feel like I have such a fascinating window on your lives, and show me how important and significant the things you're doing are, and I keep wishing I could make a post like that. Teaching is... it could begin, and I would somehow manage to just pick my whole current life up and put it straight into your brain, no miscommunications and screens between us, and you would understand the whole tangled mess of stuff that's going on.

I can't do that, I can't even come close to it, because it's a tangled mess of stuff, and, ngl, I'm only good at putting deep feelings into fic.

There is basically no point whatsoever to this entry! Hmmmmmmm. Let me add some UK rap!


I just really love Genesis Elijah, tbh.


I really like the measured heaviness of this, and also the bit where the police officer is grinning as they all sing at him.


Okay, I like this because it is a) a fucking hilariously bad video and I am a connoisseur of bad rap videos shot on someone's phone and b) I like it. Interestingly, it comes across as skating close to BNP territory, which is because of the way that white skinheads rapping about how English they are reads. Given that there are several non-white friends in the video, I am pretty sure that English Frank and Dru Blu did not even consider this reading. There are several things that someone not me could tease out of this, including the historical origins of skinheads being strongly associated with black music and the way that the white working-class of many areas of London now operates in a world where they are the minority - non-white people are still a minority in London, and a huge minority in the UK, but because of the way race and class intersect the working-class of London (and maybe other cities? idk) is extremely multicultural, in a way that the middle-class is not yet. Aaaaaanyway, I like the fact that two white men have chosen to express their pride in their Englishness in rap, an artform strongly associated with black culture, and speaking (probably authentically) in a dialect which is strongly influenced by Caribbean English.

To be fair to English Frank, have a better video with less dodgy visual overtones:


And finally, a woman, HOORAY. I love my UK women. (And a bit of Nottingham, as well, not London.)


I WILL STOP NOW. Ugh, rap is the best. ♥ (Also, Lowkey has retired, apparently. *mourns* Let's all watch Terrorist? in remembrance and admire both his lyrics, his politics, and his looks. *is shallow* Well done, that interrogator, for bringing a dictionary to an interrogation! Indispensable. And actually, on the shallow front, let's also rewatch Hand On Your Gun, because I really like that coat.) (Both of those videos have nasty surprises at the end - not hideously shocking but I always switch off once the track stops.)

Also posted on Dreamwidth at http://surexit.dreamwidth.org/91106.html with comments. Comment wherever you like.