You had plenty money 1922

Real names for UK holidays:

2014-04-15T14:46:26Z

Winter chocolate

Dress up in the name of some bloke.
Spring chocolate

Barbecue & festivals

Horror-themed sweets & partying

EXPLODEY & FIRE

Winterfest drink, week-long food & tv coma, relatives

DRINK

comments

au fic ideas. also a new fic.

2014-04-11T12:51:58Z

AUs we need more of:

Political. Presidential candidate Rogers, running mate Barnes. I am also in favour of one where Senator Rogers is the candidate and Barnes is husband or security. (aka Look, if Sebastian Stan will keep getting cast as the horrendously tortured gay addict son of the president/king, IT'S NOT OUR FAULT.) Bonus points for an appearance of Bucky's mum played by Sigourney Weaver.

Comic artist Steve. I'm happy with pre-war Steve doing mad pulp comics, or him becoming the artist for the Captain America comics (Simon and Kirby started it in December 1940 (cover March '41) even though they didn't enter the war until '42) you could even have him taking over from them when they moved to DC comics at the end of '41, Steve being an artist for Captain America until he meets up with Erskine, him making it home from the war and getting a job as the artist...

BNF Avengers. By which I am most in favour of still-being-Avengers and being BNFs in their spare time. Coulson is almost certainly a BNF of Captain America and Howling Commandos fandom in canon, at least pre-Avengers Assembled. C'mon, Tony started writing Cap fic as a rebellion against his dad. You know he did. Steve starts posting Captain America and Howling Commandos art and cartoons, encouraged by Coulson, and complimented for his classic style and clearly influenced by Steve Rogers' style. (added bonus for Tony finding out due to the raving about it and that )

And in the midst of this AU musing, I started another snippet-fic.

<a href=http://archiveofourown.org/works/1433743>Welcome to the Future, No Smoking Inside</a> - it's on part 2 right now. In which Steve wakes up from the freeze and and finds himself chatting to a SHIELD agent on a break between welcome to the future briefings. In which Bucky was born in the present day.

comments

stating the bleeding obvious

2014-03-18T12:20:14Z

watching one of those Stonehenge specials, hoping for a nugget of new info. (you watch enough of these, the programs are 3-5% interesting new angle/discovery, 40% dramatic reconstruction/bad graphics, 55-57% yawn) I did get it, but only right near the beginning, about the outer circle of bluestones that pre-date the sarsens that’re basically gravestones which very few of these ever touch on, and later insights into the analysing techniques they’re using. (always fascinating)

Apart from the giant ‘fuck you and your complete ignorance of a lot of army make-up throughout history’ when they said that ‘the presence of both sexes rules out the skeletons being warriors/army or a priesthood’, I spent a large amount of time rolling my eyes when it got onto the actual use of Stonehenge.

A few years back they started talking about the fact that the area around
Stonehenge for most of the year was tiny population and then became ground zero for the solstice festivals in these programs.

The analysis of pig teeth and human teeth showed how far people had come from and where. How many people. The short period of time the site was used for each year. The fact that so much food was being consumed and roasted up that loads was being thrown away. The rubbish. The sheer amount of preparation that went into this. Stonehenge being a destination for partying/observance. and that all this was AMAZING and UNIQUE.

To which I sit here and go ‘None of you fuckers excavating and analysing come from a festival town, do you?’

I come from Reading, in Berkshire. For the past several decades we’ve hosted a music festival on the last weekend of August and been doing it longer than most. Thousands of people descend from all over Britain and the world, party their heads off for a few days, then go home, a lot poorer, covered in paint, mud, clutching some utterly random souvenir and unbelievably hungover. The town has been doing this for so long that we have a system for doing this. The locals actually work on auto-pilot - the construction of the site starts in late spring/early summer, the supermarkets get stock in and re-arrange, the barriers and signs go up, etc. Locals not working the festival stay out of town for the weekend, the festival goers leave, the site gets cleaned up. This happens every year. Around the world and across the millennia of human civilisation, there have been festival towns where a big fuck-off festival happened once a year or every couple of years where people descend to party. San Diego for Comic-Con. Olympus. Mecca. Leeds. Glastonbury.

Seriously. I was ticking off every item they talked about and going 'Well, duh?'

'They travelled for a month with all these goods!'
'They do that.'
'The sheer amount of food consumed!'
'Happens.'
'Partied solid for three days!'
'…Yes?'
'It was a tiny village that somehow accommodated a population explosion!'
'You have the cash, we have the experience.'
'Clearly organised!'
'You want it disorganised?'
'AMAZING.'
'What part of festival town DO YOU NOT GET?'

comments

catching up on my comics after a few months of not reading them.

2014-01-21T13:19:49Z

So far, young Avengers - I spent so much time *smiling*. and then being a bit teary. *happy sigh*

Wonder Woman is GLORIOUS and horrific and family quabbles on an epic scale of beings that are *not like you* and the horror end of Greek mythology and I’m in love. Also, Diana, when not actively fighting or about to start one and is just hanging around or having a cuppa in a cafe, shoves her tiara up as a headband and wears a coat over the bathing suit. There are a few of these coats, but there is a distinct fondness for white, funnel necks and short burberry-style macs. verrrrry stylish, a distinct look and makes so much sense for someone who doesn’t have a secret identity and is always battle ready. *spoiler* the bracers she wears? Actually cage her power. Remove them and it, er, escalates a tad into the glowing eyes and crackling power around her, which fits for the whole god and demi gods only being human shaped thing the current run has.

Batwoman: oh, it was complex and interwoven and double-crossing and FAMILY and learning and limits and pushing through them and fucking up and learning and PTSD all round and broken and recovering and coming back harder and how being a military family fucks your reactions to normal life and paranoia levels and sneaking and creepy and spooky and haunted house and… then DC pissed off JH Williams and Blackman one time too many and they left, leaving the entire DEO storyline and Batman hunt dangling. And the issue after that is … generic Gotham tinged vigilante heist and washed out pale copies of our characters that are *nothing* like the ones we knew, don’t even speak or react like them. Kate and Bette are not Nightwing and Spoiler on a bouncy day, Andreyko. Sorry.

The thing about catching up in chunks is noticing all the ads. Aside from the really annoying new 52 newsreader update at the end of each issue - which is annoying, we’re not going to pick up stuff with a two second gossip-style newsbite on every character in the ‘verse but easy to skip. Preview short stories at the back, yes, not a 60 second news update. And there are a *lot* of adverts for crossover/theme months. …Villains month? seriously? How is that different from usual aside from the likelihood of random villain popping in and not having owt to do with the currently running storyline? and crossovers tend to be more annoying than anything, because you suddenly have this issue where nothing makes sense with story arcs beginning in a comic elsewhere that you don’t get. Which doesn’t smack of gimmick desperation at all, honest.

comments

Nanowrimo 2014

2014-01-01T17:49:14Z

No Seriously, Fuck TH White and Mallory

A tale of Arthur and Merlin on their latest reincarnation as avatars of Britain. Only they're not sure what they're supposed to be averting this lifetime given that they're running a café in a seaside town in Cornwall. Still, at least it can't be as weird as that time Arthur was a plumber.

The most that's happened to it is that it was spellchecked, and will probably contain my usual levels of getting sidetracked by utterly random things.

comments

Theatre list :

2014-01-01T16:46:11Z

(I think this is complete)

Sleeping Beauty, Sadlers (Bourne)

Kiss me Kate, Old Vic (Hannah Waddingham)

Macbeth, Trafalgar Studios (James McAvoy & Claire Foy)

Lift, Soho Theatre (Julie Atherton)

If You Don't Let Us Dream, Royal Court

Romeo & Juliet, Globe

Tempest, Globe (Colin Morgan & Roger Allam)

Midsummer Night's Dream, Globe

Othello, National Theatre (Rory Kinnear & Adrian Lester)

Indian Tempest, Globe

A Season in the Congo, Young Vic (Chiwetel Ejiofor)

The Pride, Trafalgar Studios (Hayley Atwell & Harry Hadden-Paton)

Zoo Nation Unplugged, Sadlers Wells

Macbeth, Globe

Blue Stockings, Globe

Scottsboro Boys, Young Vic

Mojo, Harold Pinter (Colin Morgan, Ben Whishaw, Rupert Grint)

Of these, highlights were... James Mcavoy in Macbeth, Sleeping Beauty, Midsummer Night's Dream, Othello, A Season in the Congo, Blue Stockings, Scottsboro Boys. Several made me cry, some made the audience yell, some left you with a gaping hole in your chest, and some left the audience going 'ow. ow. pulled something due to laughing too hard.'

Sexiest actor: John Light as Oberon

Hurt myself laughing: Midsummer Night's Dream

Best new play: Blue Stockings

Stole the show: Rory Kinnear, Othello

oh god oh no transformation: Daniel Kaluuya as Mobutu, Season in the Congo

Newbie: Jessie Buckley as Miranda, Tempest

New insight into old text: Halfway between Mcavoy and Foy having lost the baby and her nightmares being completely par for the course for post-apocalyptic setting, and Midsummer making explicit the defeat of the Amazons and forced marriage of Theseus and Hippolyta and her finding ways to undermine him.

comments

Things learned camping:

2013-08-28T08:18:03Z

All food (and crockery) is communal; stuff is cooked, the plate is then passed around the group or put in the centre. Plate is also re-used if stuff is done in portions (eg bacon sandwiches). Cook’s word is law. You also feel a bit like you’re yelling ‘come to the cookhouse door!’

Each night, when saying goodnight, especially if wending your way through the tents as everyone’s getting ready for bed, someone will start the ‘G’night John Boy.’ patter. Even if none of us have ever seen the original show.

Keeping stuff dry is actually *more* pressing than keeping stuff clean. You can clean something quickly, though that normally waits until the last minute - and is also communal. Drying takes *forever*.

The frying pan and grill were a major step in human evolution.

Wasp hunting and trapping is a way of life and a continual pasttime.

Books are nice but you’ll never manage to read more than a few pages at a time before someone’s interrupting you.

Gazebos/shelters you can stand up and congregate in (preferably with a table and seats) during rain: worth their weight in gold.

comments

today in cafe

2013-08-06T23:39:40Z

Me:'...I just write AUs, don't I? I never actually write canon. AUs with meticulously researched random tiny details.'
Jane: *patpat* 'But good AUs.'

(apparently I wrote canon in Torchwood and I used to write it in Angel. only the Torchwood would be case fic, so...)

comments

writing ponderings

2013-08-05T13:04:57Z

yes, I did just do a quick-n-dirty keyword search on ao3 to see if anyone else had done this...

had a drought since I completed Daughter of the Dragonlord, aside from not-really-going anywhere future bits which normally involve a lot of angsting and spinning wheels as expansion bits normally do for me. I know they're crap, it gets them out of my head. (these were mostly Mithian going 'I'm marrying Arthur and ohhh shit how's Merlin going to take this no matter how much she's avowed that she likes me and has no romantic interest in my husband-to-be she's had his firstborn'.) Then wrote a bit of angst about Ben and Keira from my Infernal Affairs-MI13 verse. In desperation and wanting to write something that wasn't wheel-spinning angst, flicked through notebooks to look for those one-line ideas I sometimes write at the top of pages. This morning one went 'so, if we take *this* and add that old fic idea...'

Yeah. So pondering Exploring Officer Charles and Raven. He's an adrenaline junkie telepath! She's a shapeshifter! Back home they're the oh-so-respectable brother-and-sister Xaviers, mostly concerned with parties! Together, they gather intelligence in the Peninsular Wars!

And yes, Erik and Charles totally had a torrid affair back in London, only Erik thought he was a complete fop who he really shouldn't have been that fond of, given how shallow and spoilt Charles was and Erik's permanent outsider status in society as Eastern European Jewish. Cue him coming across Charles and Raven in a foxhole.

:headdesk: oh dear lord, now I'm suddenly getting bits from that original regency fic I wrote where the couple couldn't stop arguing in public but had got engaged in secret ages ago...

comments

experiencing cognitive dissonance

2013-07-04T22:18:04Z

okay, that Merlin fic I've been writing? It's clocking up the hits and kudos gradually, but the comments are... interesting?

You know me, I occasionally try to go a bit historical and 'try-to-work-out-how-it-would-work'. Merlin fandom is a fun and interesting place. You often see fic that examines political stuff and the vague historical period that the show very rarely ever did. (well, Uther would occasionally do it - Queen Annis, plus regular bits of Uther - see the bit where he tells Arthur that a mistress is all very well, but don't think it's going any further than that.) Girl!Merlin fic often does it, because it's the nature of genderswap to examine the angles and changes and nuances. And with this one, I pondered what would happen if Merlin had grown up at court, thinking through and discussing it with mates. Originally I'd had Merlin and Arthur falling for each other in conventional fashion, only the way it gradually played out after I re-wrote the first concept it became more like intense friendship. With some other undercurrents.

And..um...several of the comments I've got are in the fluff and 'twoo wuv, they're totally getting married!' sector.

I am deeply confused. Does it seriously read like that?

comments

Fic: Daughter of the Dragonlord (Merlin)

2013-07-01T12:14:52Z

It's finished. Huzzah! With, er, a coda in the future...

Title: Daughter of the Dragonlord
Summary: Due to a really regrettable incident where she saved Arthur's life, Merlin is now the prat's bodyguard. She'd really like to go back to being Morgana's lady-in-waiting. If only because it might stop the overgrown lizard from going 'I told you so.'

(magic-never got banned, Merlin was born a girl, 'verse told in snippets)
Word count: 9581
http://archiveofourown.org/works/782441

comments

fic snippets ongoing

2013-06-27T13:13:09Z

Poking my Girl!Merlin bodyguard fic, which is being posted as snippets with only vague attempts at plot <a href=http://archiveofourown.org/works/782441>over on Ao3</a> (now with 90% less angst and head injuries to Arthur than the actual Merlin show due to magic being legal!). After having figured out how to get a very random idea I had for this back when it was completely different and I was wailing about trying to get a follow-through cohesive plot bolted onto the 'verse into a snippet, I... think I've only got three more snippets inside me, aside from a 'few years down the line' coda. Found it's a good way of coping with a verse and characters you have in your head but no cohesive plot. Which is a bit more like a sitcom than an ongoing drama.

comments

Globe-ity Globe

2013-06-14T11:38:54Z

Tempest 2/6/13

( Read more... )

Midsummer Night's Dream 8/6/13

(with added first timers Cathy and Gideon. Who did squee dutifully. I do like making converts to the cause. Only downside being that Gideon now keeps calling me 'Puppet' due to the plethora of short jokes. And it was full, and there were other tall people, so quite a bit of shifting in groundlings to see stuff)

Costuming - most everyone in Renaissance, the fairies in browns and greens and leather and furs and body paint, either stripped to the waist or minimalist bodices, lots of stag and horns and
skull headdresses. v. much Wild Hunt-ish.

Oh my Bard. This play. This fucking play. THIS WAS BRILLIANT.

( Read more... )

comments

in an effort to make myself get a start on this thing...

2013-05-03T12:42:03Z

You may recall the girl!Merlin thing I occasionally mutter about.

I decided to start posting the occasional snippet at AO3 - still *utterly* lacking a plot as it's more of a 'verse, which will be almost certainly be completely out of order but at least I'll have something there if I ever manage to get a plot. There will almost certainly be lots of snarking at each other dialogue.

Daughter of the Dragonlord snippets, starting off with a bit of establishing backstory.

comments

EXCALIBUR / MI-13 fancasting

2013-04-16T15:41:29Z

You may only use *current* actors. 'x would be nice if they were 10 years younger' holds no water - this is if we were making the film/tv show *now*.

Brian Braddock

Meggan

Kitty Pryde

Kurt Wagner

Pete Wisdom

Faiza Hussain

Rachel Summers

(other options)

Blade

Spitfire

Black Knight

John the Skrull

Captain Midlands

supporting cast: Betsy Braddock

Brian: Bradley James

Meggan: Georgia Moffett (I will also take Gemma Arterton)

Faiza : Amara Karan

Kurt : Colin Morgan (going on body type & bone structure)

Kitty : ...Natalie Portman? (maybe if Kitty was late 20s) argh, who else is a real shortarse but not busty?

Pete : drawing a blank. name me a late 20s-early 30s can-look exceedingly disreputable but not built as such actor with a nice line in a london and or essex accent.

Rachel : Karen Gillan? can she do an american accent?

Betsy : Gemma Arterton

John the Skrull : ...who most looks like John Lennon currently?

Spitfire : Emily Blunt

Captain Midlands : Lenny Henry

Black Knight: fuck it, I'm voting Rupert Young. he can at least convince as an ex-crusader.

comments

state of the national psyche

2013-04-05T13:47:03Z

I'm trying to decide whether it's faintly depressing or cheering after reading a theory that the reason the British army did better in the Falklands than the Argentinians was that we expect to make do with stuff held together by string and a prayer in so much of our life that we don't even think about panicking when supplies don't turn up and just get on with it. The soldiers didn't expect the stuff they'd been promised to turn up so had brought their own food and supplies.

'new and shiny and plentiful and efficient is very nice, but otherwise we can make do with pretty much anything as long as there's tea. And we brought our own kettles and tea bags to make sure there would be tea.'

Look, shiny and new and on time public services are all very well but they're bloody unnerving.

comments

Romeo & Juliet, Globe, 30/03/2013

2013-04-02T14:32:10Z

Part of the Education season pre-actual season starting. Won a buncha ticketses, so me, Ruthi, Orjan and Carmilla went along. (turns out it was Orjan's first theatre in 13 years and first Shakespeare in 15) Expecting it to be cold but not as bloody cold as it actually was. looked like a nice day. not necessarily sunny but no rain forecast, and as much as I love the globe, downpour is somewhat argh-some. The steward made a jibe about it having snowed on them last saturday. And laughed.

Music pre-start was brass ... and then we figured out what the tune they were playing was. Bloody 'Call me Maybe'. Which then segued into Jessie J's 'Price Tag'. (which actually works absolutely fine scored for trumpets) Started with a fight (including bmxs in the manner of city riots, incl the main stage prop, a burnt-out car.) Fight almost entirely feet and fists with requisite flailing and attempted martial arts moves because, hello, teenagers.

Costuming : hoodies and modern gear for teens (Tybalt is in full estate gangsta style parka), suits and formal for adults, Paris as young City type, with fortunately no colour coding that you often get. Unless you've very specifically set it up as gangs or military, this gets really tired. One suspects Jade Anouka* (Juliet) was very glad that current fashion for girls is hotpants and very thick tights. Nurse, in full chav mode was probs luckiest - velour tracksuit, padded gilet and uggs. Utter genius touch was Friar Lawrence and co, who were in full beige and other tans as happy clappy missionary types, complete with horrific glasses and sweater vests. And the ball - utterly hysterical - first Mercutio and Benvolio bounded onstage in full Only Fools and Horses mode as Batman & Robin, then we got Tybalt as Darth Vader (and flick-out lightsabre which he kept slashing about to make a point when he goes into his snit-fit), a Captain America, a Marge Simpson, a Scooby Doo, etc- all cheap store bought, and bestest, Capulet as Elvis. Complete with flames up the sides of his flares. Romeo and Juliet were in bits of standard Globe costume to make them stand out with neon accents for stuff like tights, but seeing the wondrous tackyness of everyone else, wondering what the hell they were supposed to be.

Good performances, convincing teenagers (sometimes they're so worthy/succumbing to the text that they just don't convince as teenagers - Juliet's supposed to be *13*, and if you're doing it in modern dress, you better play her as a modern day 13 year old, not how she'd have been expected to behave in the 17th century) and Romeo was a complete twerp. As is right and necessary. Best was Friar Lawrence and the Nurse, who were by turns well-meaning and meek with great 'oh shit' and 'give me strength' expressions and completely vulgar for the Nurse. Who believes in shopping expeditions. Most of the Nurse's dialogue works so bloody well in this setting. Actually, as does quite a bit for this play - slang and phrasing's made enough of a turn around in the last decade to not need translation as long as you act it right. Tybalt doubled up as an extremely down and out drug dealer :cough: apothecary. Definite tinge of the ex-Lahndan wideboy in Capulet.

Standout moments: IT FUCKING SNOWED. TWICE. (we declared that this counted as all the fresh air we required for the entire Easter weekend, *and* it was done in the name of culture, so counted double. fucking freezing) Didn't know going in that there wouldn't be an interval. They cut some of the second half's scenes to reflect this, including the killing of Paris (as seems to be really common these days, any idea why? doesn't add anything? makes Romeo less sympathetic?) and most of the tomb scenes - Friar Lawrence finds out from his

fellow happy-clappier that the letter didn't get delivered, Juliet gets put in the tomb, Romeo commits suicide, Juliet commits suicide. No interruptions by Friar. Wasn't bad, just made the suicides a bit rushed. Mercutio nearly skidded off the stage at one point when riding the bmx. Usual coming through the crowd entrances from the cast, including where Romeo grabbed a blanket off one groundling, then borrowed Orjan's strawberry beanie for a disguise. He did eventually give it back. All of Romeo's internal questions were directed at the crowd, and after the first time where he made a gesture for an answer, the crowd were very cheerfully yelling back yes or no. Yours truly

got asked a question by Juliet and I did answer 'fuck no.' May've got attention by our lot being the loudest gigglers at the funny moments. (pattern? what pattern?) The adults in the crowd are never going to forgive Romeo for walking in singing along to One Direction's 'You don't know you're Beautiful' and then getting the crowd to sing the last line. We know One Direction lyrics. Shut up. It was forced.

Post-play, retreat to Founders Arms for desperate warm-up of hot drinks...

*If you ever want someone to play Tara off've True Blood'scousin? grab Jade. Even has her wtf expressions.

comments

writers and long skirts: you're doing it wrong

2013-03-26T12:45:45Z

Or rather their propensity to have the heroine cut/tear them off whenever there's action required.

Excuse me while I groan because it's clear you've never actually seen material cut or torn. It's up there with the writers who tear a shirt off someone for the sex scene - do you know how difficult this actually is?

Anyway: Person is wearing a long skirt or dress and suddenly there's a fight scene requiring kicking, or they have to climb/run lots.

The writer thinks 'Oh noes! material in the way! I know, I shall get it out of the way quickly! Character undoubtedly has a knife/ can filch one off someone, cut and tear it off and Robert is indeed your mother's brother! She can get on with her fight/climb in all of ten seconds!'

Yeah. NO. Material and the construction of clothing doesn't work like that.

First, there's the material itself. Doesn't respond well to slashing with a knife - you might get a hole in it, but it'll take a good while to cut all the way through a piece. Several minutes. Faster with a good pair of sharp heavy-duty fabric scissors, but I somehow doubt your character has a pair of scissors on them, let alone a pair that would be any good for cloth cutting (have you seen fabric scissors, writer? They're bloody great heavy things, with *at least* 8-inch blades). If you must do this, make a small cut *at the edge*, grab the sides and pull. This will very noisily make a clean tear in the direction of the weave. And *only* in the direction of the weave. If the material was cut so the weave is on the diagonal - it'll tear in that direction. So you'll have a tear that... hasn't done all that much aside from split the skirt.

'But they make big slashing tears in curtains all the time on film!' I hear you say. Yeah. On film. Remember how that's not reality? Also, they have physics on their side. Curtain cloth has tension and weight due to the whole hanging from the ceiling factor, and isn't normally cut on the diagonal. And please note that they always cut *down*. no horizontal slashing here.

Second: 99% of clothing is not made of one piece of material, due to conservation of fabric, and that amazing thing known as design and getting it to hang right. Skirts are normally made of at least two panels sewn together. And the sewn part is normally reinforced with thread, and specifically made to be resistant to tugging and tearing. So even if you were lucky enough to make a horizontal cut/tear to the material, you'll run into a seam. And have to start cutting again, only this time it requires more strength and several goes.

So all this has taken a good ten minutes, and an awful lot of effort, which I doubt your character really has time for. Not to mention afterwards she'll be running around in a hacked off dress/skirt, which would a) look weird and b) be pretty much unusable afterwards. Clothing isn't cheap and the chances of spare stuff that'll fit hanging around is slim unless you're lucky enough to be in the middle of a residential area on laundry day.

'But how do I get the fabric out of the way so she can climb/fight?' I hear you wail.

(Never mind that it's actually quite possible to do this in a long skirt, women have been doing it for millennia, and yet there's a distinct lack of anecdotal evidence of them having to mend their skirts when they come back from doing this.)

Fear not, dear writer, I have a solution!

TUCK, KNOT OR ROLL THE MATERIAL UP.

It's that simple. Takes about 30 seconds at most, and that's if you're hell bent on keeping it securely in place for ages. And by 'ages' I mean an extremely vigorous evening of dancing or similar. Several hours' worth. If all you're wanting is to get enough material out of the way for activity, you only have to do this with one side. Which takes all of 10 seconds. Ever read anything set prior to the 20th century, and the female character says something about 'kirtling' her skirts? This is what she's doing. Hitching them up enough to do vigorous activity with her legs free and securing them in place.

Yeah. So, given the option of grabbing the front of her skirt and tucking it into her waistband/knickers or knotting it or spending several minutes hacking uselessly at fabric with a knife she won't necessarily have access to?

TUCK.

comments

new deities for winter

2013-03-22T13:28:47Z

Having thinky thoughts re: the extended winter we're having. (look, ongoing snow, cold rain and temperatures hovering around 0°C counts as *winter* in England. it's colder and snowier in Scotland.)

And the fact that these days, the automatic English response to winter and snow especially is 'it's like bloody Narnia out there' and 'Jesus fuck, who called Jadis?' and 'Just seen Jadis go past in her sleigh. Ignore all offers of turkish delight' and variations on that theme.

We don't talk about Jack Frost (very much an american thing anyway), we talk about narnia and Jadis, aka the White Witch.

Which makes me wonder: How much does an imaginary figure have to be cited in popular consciousness in relation to an activity before they become the deity of said activity? (see Hogfather and the sources Terry used)

CS Lewis, did you have any idea what you created?

comments

re-working stuff is problematic

2013-03-21T13:33:43Z

went looking for some supporting character backstory for a fic that ended up (after changing and re-doing and re-inventing) being my nano of Infernal Affairs and MI-13. (couple of years ago, it's on darkisrising). I allude to some of it in one chapter, but it's the later stages. The stuff I'd written was the saga of character and his boyfriend getting together.

Found it a night or so ago and thinking about re-working it for the world that I eventually settled on for nano. (previously I'd never got a satisfying storyline out of it) Problem: nationalities have changed, the outside world has changed, character x disappeared, character Y and Z changed jobs, trust issues changed (x is friends with Y but don't know if they'd ever go clubbing together). Originally this backstory was me doing Notting Hill with an american male film star and a scots werewolf secret agent. With gossip sites and headlines and gagging orders and 'which film star is considered a ladies man allergic to relationships in the US but has a very serious boyfriend in the UK?'. Now climate and gossip sites have changed, the werewolf is still an agent but as he's a bit more focussed on social work and coppers it's not so much 'secret' any more. And the film star is now British. Which definitely changes any 'technically in the closet' issues. And whether the film star is going to have the slightest chance of a regular bodyguard/handler-type.

I still want to re-work it, but cthulhu knows how I'm going to get it to.

comments

Things done:

2013-03-18T13:32:48Z

Kiss Me Kate @ Old Vic , 18/01. it was awesome, if not a little fucked up in relationships. interesting to see where the songs went, and everyone trying to steal the show from everyone else, which was actually completely in character. Only real problem was the actress playing Bianca was... not quite there with the rest. I dunno, just didn't fit. rather good stage design and costuming too - all black and white clever things with banners for the play.

Bro's wedding: family, food, *other* family, small children behaving themselves, the sheer speed Chelsea Old Town Hall puts through weddings, pretty dresses, and unbelievably hungover the next morning. Seriously. the waitresses were making sympathetic noises.

If You Don't Let Us Dream, We Won't Let You Sleep @ Royal Court 09/03 - play about debt. where society is going, companies trying to monetarise it whilst the entire audience sat there and winced because it's all too true. I'd call it a question raising play - it didn't try to provide the answers (it specifically stated it wasn't trying to, idiot critics who weren't listening) but it did show us all the questions we should be asking. Possibly yelling.

Stage door: I was first out, but as the crowds amassed, i turned and asked 'okay, who *isn't* here for Damien Moloney?' Lots of shuffling of feet and coughing. Anyway. Crowd all terribly patient and polite, Damien utterly lovely and answering questions and posing for pics for everyone. and yes he'd like to do a musical.

In other news: weather, can it be spring sometime soon? not suddenly taking a dip and snowing again?

comments

Fic: The Case of the Disappearing Dancer (Sherlock)

2013-03-07T23:12:09Z

Title : The Case of the Disappearing Dancer
Author : burntcopper
Fandom : Sherlock
Genre: Casefic
Characters: Sherlock, John, Lestrade, Mycroft, OCs
Rating : No sex and very little violence. :sigh:
Summary : Lestrade's snitch's girlfriend has gone missing. And of course there's issues that mean going to the police might be a little awkward.

Ao3 ( The door goes when John's making a cup of tea. )

comments

too close to home

2013-03-07T13:33:55Z

You may have heard me before make a comment or two about how I never get to see where I live on tv or film. (we do not *ever* talk about Crime Traveller, generally considered to be one of the worst sci-fi shows *ever*)

This week, I'm now discovering that curse. BBC released Mayday, a thriller/murder mystery of red-herringness with supposed spooky tones - young girl goes missing on May Day, lots of suspects/rotten core of community etc.

Set in a small town/large village in the Home Counties.

Aside from the sheer crappiness of the plotting (the 'spooky' shots that were supposed to make you uneasy look more like they've grabbed a bunch out of a how-to guide and completely failed) and the characterisation of heavy-handedness that makes so little bloody sense... (and apparently got even worse from reports of people watching it)

I turned off 20 mins into the first ep. It was that painful. Admittedly mostly because I couldn't take the dodgy sleazy single dad leering at the screen *again*. But there's nothing like screeching 'WRONG' and 'SERIOUSLY, WTF?' 'NEVER HAPPEN' at the screen every 30 seconds. There's a difference between american shows getting british stuff wrong and a native show getting it that badly wrong. Your tolerance goes downhill.

First: the pagan-roots ceremony. Uh-huh. NOPE. I have no idea what you're smoking, but nope.

Cute 14 year old on bicycle as may Queen.... AHAHAHAHA.

The giant airy houses everyone lives in. maybe on one bit of an estate tacked on, but not the supposed range of households you've got there. I want to know how much the single-income family with kids is earning to be able to afford *that*.

The spoilt rich woman with the fat dog? I nearly threw something at the screen because she was wearing the wrong shoes. It sounds silly, but the very idea that she would wear clogs any further out of the house than the end of her drive or to pop next door *very quickly* would be anathema to her.

Essentially, when the only thing that rings true is the kebab shop, you're doing something wrong.

The Vicar of Dibley is a better representation than Mayday.

comments

plot and film screenings

2013-03-06T11:40:40Z

writing bunnies doing that thing where they suddenly decide to get off their arse and interrogate a story I've had hanging around the notebooks. Just a short, and no idea if I've got the tone right as it's a fandom I haven't written in before, the characters are ...not ones I connect with easily, and oh christ, it's 90% plot. As Taz has been know to say, 'Heather doesn't *do* plot. Occasionally she starts with one but gets rid of it very quickly as it's a bit icky and her characters don't know what to do with one. Your plots quickly leave on the fastest planes to the nearest non-extradition country.' When I've got a plot I always feel like I've rushed it to make things happen, rather than my usual meandering from scene to scene via dialogue. Pete is advising me to practice writer despotism on the plot as it's fun .

In other news, Taz managed to get tickets to a press screening of Welcome to the Punch - crime thriller starring James McAvoy, Mark Strong, Andrea Riseborough, David Morrissey and many others. Set in and around the City and Canary Wharf (with one side trip to Iceland), done in glossy expensive action thriller Hong Kong/Tony Scott/Michael Mann style. With absolutely *no* geezers, cabs or red phoneboxes. And it is *fun*, and glossy, and well-acted, and all the plot makes sense (including the corrupt politician motivations and one of the ways they get clues - a really simple trick that means there's no chasing around for clues that makes utter sense in normal everyday life) and there are no holes and was done on a budget of £5m to look like a much more expensive film. Go see. A solid 4 stars.

And. Um. I shook Mark Strong's hand. :wibble: (and bounced across the crowd after the Q&A to interrogate a rather surprised Chris Hewitt (Empire writer, was doing the Q&A) to ask him what the t-shirt he was wearing was. (Jack Kirby Galactacus. we approve) Because that's what you really expect during a glossy press screening with the writer/director, several of the actors, etc. Someone to come up to the film reviewer specifically.)

comments

watching films and disconnection

2013-03-01T13:43:23Z

specifically, I'm going through the recorded tv on my dvr box to try and clear space, mostly going through the things I recorded because they looked interesting, or had an actor in I liked, etc. Some miniseries that got really good reviews I lasted one ep on. I could see that it was technically good, the acting was great... I just wasn't interested. 3 eps deleted in a swipe.

Last night I watched Street Kings. Which is a James Ellroy written LA cops thriller corruption undercover etc. you know the genre. I'd recorded it because Chris Evans was in it, and I'm making the effort to try and see his past work. (it's actually surprisingly difficult to find what he refers to as his dumb populist stuff on uk tv, unless it's Fantastic Four, whereas things like Sunshine are on regularly)

Anyway. Keanu Reeves as a permanently angry violent detective who gets caught up in corruption and finds out how far it goes and.... oh, what do you care, you know all the beats of the story anyway. You know the damn dialogue. You even know the camera angles and colour palette. Rest of the cast was actually quite good - Forest Whitaker, Naomi Harris as a murdered cop's wife, Chris Evans as the jaded-but-young homicide detective, half his dept made up the cast from The Wire, etc.

Except: it was incredibly weird, disconnected viewing. You couldn't quite look away because even though it was by-the-book of this genre, certain things kept throwing you out:

1) Keanu Reeves is essentially a likeable plank of wood.*
2) Nearly the whole cast were doing 'I will do my job and turn in a decent performance but we're not trying *that* hard' acting. Except Chris Evans and Naomi Harris, who were giving really good performances, which was kind of jarring any time they switched between the rest of them and these two. Second, they were normally just in a scene with Keanu, which ... actor who can't act vs. really good actor makes for very odd viewing.
3) Really quite lovely camerawork and editing.
4) You were constantly aware that on the one hand it could be a much better film if it wasn't Keanu and everyone else tried harder (when this genre is good and you have great cast, it's brilliant - see Out of Sight, Elmore Leonard penned Soderbergh directed, Clooney-Lopez starring, that's a masterpiece) - but OTOH, also intensely aware that it could be so much worse.
5) Any time a scene started and Keanu wasn't in shot but had started speaking, it sounded like it was being narrated. He's that deadpan.

*If you wonder why he's employed so much, even though everyone knows he can't really act? I heard this from... maybe Mark Sheppard? Keanu shows up on time, doesn't demand stupid paychecks, learns all his lines, makes an effort to be nice to the crew, goes home at the end of the day and isn't a nuisance. and the public know his name and're willing to watch something undemanding with him in as lead. Like any business, the people who keep getting employed are the people who're likable and do their job. They might not be the best in their field, but they turn up on time.

So yeah. not a recommended film (unlike, say, Shoot Em Up, which is a masterpiece of late night bonkersness or Smokin' Aces) but interesting for the incredibly dissonant experience of watching it.

comments