imhilien

July is winter here in New Zealand and it's windy and cold right now. I have an old, hand-me-down black faux fur coat that comes down just past my waist that I wear indoors over clothes. The fact that it is lined keeps me warm.

What I've Seen

I went to 'Indiana Jones & the Dial of Destiny' the other day. I wasn't sure whether to go or not, but when I heard it featured a fantasy version of the Antikythera device (a 2,000 year old machine made by Archimedes for moon calculations, found in an early 20th century shipwreck), my history nerd side lifted its head and said 'let's go!'. The film was better than I thought it would be and featured Mads Mikkelson (sp?) as the baddie. I saw the trailer for the new Mission Impossible movie but it left me cold, unfortunately.

We recently had the French Film festival at some local theatres and I saw the docu drama 'Notre Dame on Fire'. It's from the POV of the fire department who had to deal with the fire there a few years ago. Carrying all their heavy fire fighting equipment up narrow, medieval staircases would have been a nightmare. Then there was the melting lead roof that was literally coming down the gutters and had to be avoided too.

What I've Read

At a recent book club meeting a lot of people were recommending fantasy book 'The Fourth Wing' by Rebecca Yarros. I heard it featured dragons (hmm) so I read it and it was a page turner for me. A disabled, bookish woman from a military family is forced to train as a dragon rider. If she survives that, she must try and bond with a dragon. Simone St James writes paranormal thrillers with just the rightest amount of spookiness and her latest one is 'Silence for the Dead'. Set post-WW1, a woman on the run fakes her CV so she can work as a nurse in the countryside. She ends up at a place for soldiers with shell-shock but there's something creepy about the place. Also, all of the patients seem to be having the same nightmare. The book also looks at how shell-shock was seen as something shameful by society at the time, who didn't know better.

My city is under a State of Emergency (again) because of constant, heavy rain today. A lot of businesses sent people home at midday-ish so the roads and motorways will be clogged with people and also floodwaters possibly.

Sadly, someone has been lost - a group of school children had gone caving(!) today up north and it sounds like one of them got swept away. But seriously, what teacher thought it was ok to go caving of all things when heavy rain was forecast in advance.

I'm ok where I am at the moment; the rain is steady and I can't see any obvious flooding out in the street.

Challenge #14

In your own space, do the Fandom Wrap Challenge.


What were your top 5 fandoms for 2022 based on the amount of time you interacted with them?
1. Lucifer (TV)
2. Exiles Saga / Galactic Milieu
3. Babylon 5
4. Star Wars
5. Phantom of the Opera

What were your top 5 fandom spaces (Discord, Twitter, etc.) you experienced fandom in terms of time spent?
1. A03
2. Tumblr
3. Dreamwidth
4. Reddit
5. Instagram

What are the top 5 things you did to contribute to fandom in terms of time? Did you write? Comment? Send positive energy into the universe? Create art?
1. Write
2. Comment
3. Kudos
4. Bookmark
5. Art

What were your top 5 most appreciated fandom contributions? (i.e. in terms of likes, kudos, reblogs, comments, etc.)

Stories on A03

1. A Choice of Roads
2. Winter Heart
3. Descent
4. The Right Thing To Do
5. Fallen Feathers

Have a Top 5 List you'd like to share?? By all means!

Top 5 Cool Evil Guys / Anti-Heroes

1. Jareth, The Goblin King
2. Marc Remillard
3. The Darkling
4. Phantom of the Opera
5. Darth Vader

Challenge #13

In your own space, rec three fanworks that you did not create.


AU story recs for Dragonriders of Pern, Shadow & Bone and Lucifer (TV)

( Read more... )

#11 Talk about your favorite trope, cliché, kink, motif, or theme

I have a few favourite tropes, actually.

'Rag tag bag of misfits save the world' - A world is in danger, but there's only a group of misfits who can actually do something about it. But none of them are actual heroes. Never mind, they'll come up with unorthodox ways to save the day that a hero might have overlooked.

'Middle Aged Chosen One' - You're treated as a Chosen One, but surely you're the wrong age? Maybe you're dealing with trauma too, if you have day to day struggles, how can you save the world?

'Enemies to Lovers' - If only they can save the world, but they barely trust each other. What do they have to go through to get to that point

Challenge #7

In your own space, interact with a community or a fic.

Well, I belong to the DW writing group fandomweekly that posts weekly challenges that you can write fanfiction (or original) for.

A recent challenge was 'Hero' and I wrote a short 'Phantom of the Opera' story called 'I Can Be Your Hero'  for it. :)

https://fandomweekly.dreamwidth.org/593358.html 

In your own space, Scream Into the Void. Get it all out. Leave a comment in this post saying you did it.

Ok. Well, I have a chronic illness and I'm trying to find a part time job in a pandemic.

Due to bureaucracy / pandemic / other issues, it might be a while before there's another sci-fi convention in my neck of the woods. Due to my health issues, taking a trip to another city having a convention is near impossible (also expensive). So I'm sad about that.

I write fanfic for a small fandom on A03 (Exiles / Galactic Milieu book series by Julian May). It can be tough thinking, 'Is there anyone else writing for this fandom right now? No, it's just me...'

It's a new year, how did that happen? In 2022, New Zealand came out of another lockdown and I was glad to get back to my art group. I didn't get Covid or colds so that was a relief. Although we now have a new wave of Covid so I'm always careful when going out. Christmas and New Year was just a quiet one with my folks.

I recently went to the quirky English film 'The Lost King' about the woman who went hunting for the lost remains of King Richard III (is it a spoiler to say she succeeded?). She deals with skeptical people who think it can't be done and are reluctant to fund a search. Complicating matters is that after she goes to see a performance of the Shakespeare play about him, an imaginary (or is it?), gloomy version of him then starts following her around! But there is some humour with this at times.

I wouldn't mind seeing the new Avatar movie but at 3 hours, 13 mins I don't think my chronic fatigue brain would like that, ouch. Instant headache. I'll have to wait until the DVD comes out and watch it in stages.

Resolutions for 2023; my art group often has exhibitions so I want to put one of my paintings in the next one. I've only done this once before but it was one of my tiny paintings and that was nerve-racking enough! But I can offer a bigger one this time. Keep writing.  Try and find a part-time job.

I recently finished a painting of Rangitoto Island (or 'what's in the harbour') and it's available in my Redbubble store as a greeting card, tote bag and other stuffs.

NicciArt.redbubble.com

Passing on information from ruuger that it sounds like the people running fanfiction.net (ahem) may have actually run away a while ago. I can't log in any more so this may be part and parcel of what is going on.

Try and save copies of your stuff before the site vanishes some day soon. :(