Falmouth report

Being a report into being back in Cornwall for a week of vegging...

Broadband be here, so that's good, at least. Mine is a family that canot exist sans net.

Meandered up and down main street yesterday, having forgotten the absolute convenience of living about two hops and a jump from bakers, tescos, etc, etc. Being able to meander out of the flat and go straight to shops is *bliss*. *scary* amounts of flats and things been built since I was last here, which appear to be catering to the moneyed set - ie, people who don't live here. Not so good.

Bought tfishnet. It's not very close-weave, but was the closest-weave I could get. Apparently for anymore choice you have to go to a specialist up near Penzance, also known as *how* far away?

Investigated fanfiction.net during an idle moment whilst going through copperbadge's Discworld fic. Meandered into Robin Hood sector in 'Books'. Downed tools and ran for cover at the sheer amount of Mary Sues that you could see just in the header lines.

Augh! No bloody talking about feelings, we're manly tv characters, please

Okay, slightly inspired by the horrors of fanfiction.net paddling.

Is there any way to convince a large amount of writers that canon observation is a good thing?

That the majority of books and tv shows and films do not feature characters who feel the need to discuss their feelings? In fact, most of them are pretty much allergic to it. So discussion of feelings happens practically never. Especially if they're male. Going double if they're British. The most you tend to get is 'Can you please not do that, it disturbs me.' Blair Sandburg doesn't spill his heart out in diatribes. Sodding Six Feet Under characters do not spill their heart out in diatribes the way that fic has them doing.

So what the hell is with the plethora of fics that have Robin of frickin' Sherwood characters doing it? Or 'Much was tormented by the demons of his past'. *What* bloody demons of his past? He doesn't have any. He was a serf. He became an outlaw. His parents got killed, which is not something we've ever seen him angst about. Do these writers even watch the bloody shows they're writing about?

Maritime Museum

Went Maritime Museum. Basically, it's about small boats, and in places, more specifically, small boats in Cornwall and Falmouth. Falmouth being one of the major stop-offs on the route for the Packet ships (news, passengers in small amounts, sugar, rum, goods, etc - yes, a lot of the boats that Caribbean and Atlantic location-pirates attacked. So there's a decent plot point for all you PoTC writers.), refuelling for any major ones due to it being one of the western-most points as well as the one with the deepest harbour and ship-repairing and building resources.

Not usually my cup of tea, and the big hall with all the examples of boats across the world had me going 'meh' when looking at the modern ones, though things like Dragon Boats and strange Vietnamese ones were cool. I still can't believe how big the Eton ten-man rowing boat is.

On the other hand, lots of history, cool multimedia toys that showed you how to find your way using depth measurement through a harbour and how the weather pressure systems worked, things about oyster fishers and the different methods of building small boats. Plus the look-out tower that went from three floors up to look over the whole of Falmouth Harbour and across the bay to right down to low tide point. It was high tide when I went, so the water was right up to the top of the windows, and you were looking out into the murky green water and at the occasional small fishes and a boat that was sunk and no-one retrieved it when it *was* low tide, a couple of years ago, judging by the crusting and seaweed on it. Nice couple of hours.

In other news, got the first lines of a Gosford Park fic out, but I've no idea when or how I'll actually get to the porn in this segment. maybe write little conversations and snippets like the film did. :pokes fic: We need Ivor Novello/Parks fic. Because it would just be too pretty to *not* exist.