duinemerwen: (Default)
2023-04-01 02:00 pm
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Books I read on vacation (March 2023)

The Witchwood Crown 2/5
Empire of Grass 3/5
Into the Underdark 4/5

I'm not convinced these books need to be so long. My favourite plotlines included Unver's ascension to Shah, Tzoja's multiple career changes, and Morgan's treetop adventures with Reeree. And not having read the original trilogy I can totally believe Simon and Miriamele as former swashbucklers. However I did not sign up for the Nezeru/Morgan hookup, the fake deaths in books 2 and 3 happened too closely together (and to the same two characters), and the plot, though interesting, takes altogether too long to emerge. Now that it has, I'll definitely read the fourth book, because it's guaranteed to get to the point and be good. I'm a sucker for things entitled The Last X, and I'm deeply, deeply worried for the survival of the royal family. So thanks, Tad Williams, for stoking that anxiety and also for including a synopsis of the story thus far at the beginning of each book. 

Old Man's War 5/5
The Ghost Brigades 2/5
The Last Colony 3/5

John Scalzi is an incredibly expedient writer, which is generally a good thing, except when the genre works against him. The first book was fantastic: Starship Troopers, but what if they're all retirees, and the protagonist names his brain implant/personal assistant "Asshole?" I never thought I'd ever read the phrase "Activate Asshole" and am grateful to Old Man's War for bestowing that gift upon me. The second gave me a bit of whiplash, because I really missed John Perry's viewpoint and Jane Sagan was only a minor presence. The Last Colony reunites the two, but with an entirely different genre. And that's where I think he could've slowed down a little. I like a complicated political gambit as much as anyone else, but I think he could've dwelled a little bit more on the colonists in between moves. 

The Collapsing Empire 5/5
The Consuming Fire 4/5
The Last Emperox 2/5

Ditto here. I thought the Collapsing Empire did a great job laying out the premise, and coming fresh (ish) off the Expanse, I could immediately grasp the stakes at hand. Scalzi's gambits work better on a smaller scale when dealing with a prison escape, a kidnap attempt, or a bomb threat. But everything falls apart in Book 3. Did the Flow Theories end up right? Did the empire collapse neatly? And how, how, could anyone think that the emperox turning into a supercomputer is a good plot ending? It's a literal deus IN machina and feels like it undermines the entire point of the first and second books. The Expanse did this better in its last half-dozen chapters. 

Blackout 3/5
All Clear 4/5


All Clear is brilliant but I don't think the entirety of Blackout was necessary to set it up, since the first of this duology involves a lot of people trying to blend in, not disrupt the pillars of causality, and make their very important appointments. Even though, the atmosphere of WW2-era Britain was THICK. I loved seeing people from all walks of life in the war. Sir Godfrey's last conversation with Polly was the best thing I read on vacation. I didn't even mind all the fake deaths. 

Palimpsest 1/5

What the hell? 

Alright. It wasn't bad. It's poetry, good poetry. I just was not in the mood to read poetry where people fuck to enter a city of dreams. It was beautiful but also self indulgent, filled with cool stuff for the sake of being cool. And succeeding consistently, but to what end? I don't think I'm ever in the mood for that kind of book.

Uprooted 2/5

The antagonist, an entire forest, was compelling, creepy, and consistently several steps ahead of the protagonists. So I liked that. But I didn't like the main character, or the unexplained magic system, or the romance that robs the mentor character of all the mystique he had at the beginning of the book. Also, ew, the romance. Spinning Silver was ten times better than Uprooted. 
duinemerwen: (Default)
2023-02-23 08:05 pm
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muna - winterbreak

MUNA - winterbreak




This song, like my ex's best friend, conjures for me similar feelings of making the wrong decisions. The hazy texture of the guitars and vocoders evokes frost upon a windowpane in December, as you trudge home in the slush briefly transformed from brown to orange in the sodium street lamps.  Yet for all the open-endedness and uncertainty of the verses, there's something cyclical about the percussion and structure of the chorus. This is a conversation you've had before. You already know how it ends because you've seen it end before, in the melting snowbanks of March that reveal all the ugliness and cowardice inherent in your blood, sure as morning. 

But - it's not March, is it? It's still December. Maybe this will be the time you get it right. Maybe in this liminal period between Christmas and New Years, where in the song's bridge the percussion barely dares to breathe and the guitars disappear into the background of the shitty house party and you can barely breathe in the air suspended between you, maybe this is the time it'll work. In this moment the weight of failure is a thousand years away, you can no longer feel your own pulse or your skin or the chill of the basement apartment, and there is nothing left to do but to kiss her. 

It doesn't end well. It'll end as it's ended every time. But you don't know that in this winterbreak, this beautiful sliver in time with no past and no future. 

 
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2023-02-23 12:52 am
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machine gun kelly - my ex's best friend



As per prompt 30 of the 30-day music meme (more like the 300-day music meme...) this is another song that reminds me of myself for two reasons. The first of which because MGK is a total forking mess in the song.  He knows he's making the wrong decision, that nothing good is going to happen. There's a little gasp in the instrumental right at the 0:30 mark in the prechorus when he realizes, oh shit, they're going home. And then by the time they hit the elevator at 0:38, it's too late, it's inevitable that something is going to happen, and that moment is just so delicious that the drums kick in to mark the beat of his stupid traitorous heart, and then there's nothing to be done but to ride that the momentum headlong into the chorus. 

The chorus is almost perfunctory compared to the prechorus - but I think that's about right too, isn't it? Sometimes the buildup, the knowledge that you are making the bad decision is sweeter than the reward itself. This leads into blackbear's verse, which is the spare and measured justification to MGK's ex that she has no fuckin business getting mad at MGK. Yet despite the yowl blackbear is able to summon up, it's ultimately uncathartic and barely casts a pall over the second iteration of the chorus. 

But here's the thing. You can only do a bad thing so many time before it stops feeling sweet. And that's why I think the outro is perfect. It's a hollow, distorted version of the first verse. It's like a hangover. All the mystery and the excitement is gone and dead in the cold light of day. 

This song is perfect. 

Oh, and the second reason it also reminds me of myself? He's oversharing. SO MUCH. What is even the meaning of dignity?? I have a whole playlist on spotify about bad decisions and this one is right at the top. 

 

duinemerwen: (Default)
2023-02-18 03:42 am
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Games I've finished in the last few months

Disco Elysium
The controls are kind of wonky and I am not convinced that "failing upwards" is a good way to do detectivework, but I have never, ever played a game with writing like this. It spoke to my soul on a disturbing, primal level, even correctly pinpointing my my political orientation as a ludicrous hodgepodge of communism, fascism, and stock tips. But despite the overwhelming despair inherent in the game's world, there is always a slim shining sliver of hope: for in the dark times, should the stars also go out? Absolutely brilliant, must-play. 

Stray
Something about this game gave me an incredible headache. Was it the camera angles? The lighting? Stray's appeal is easy to understand. You play as a cat, doing cat things. You destroy furniture, knock things off shelves, and flop over when wearing a backpack. Good thing Stray is also short, as it hasn't got enough complexity to merit more than a few hours of play. The ending is well-deserved and sweet.

Hades
I played this game very intensely for several weeks, completed a 32-heat run and all the prophecies, and gave myself thumb pain. That has never happened to me before. 
duinemerwen: (Default)
2022-11-07 11:31 pm
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fic

So the fic I'm writing, it's a Good Omens fic for Nanorimo, and heaven wins, the apocalypse comes to pass, it's not a great time (until it gets better). 

Jesus is a minor character.

And I'm just trying to characterize this guy, and I can't figure out if I'm supposed to be writing him from the Jewish perspective (because Neil Gaiman is Jewish and Terry Pratchett was an atheist) or the Christian one (because this is very Book of Revelation heavy), and also I know that whichever one I choose, I'm gonna be executing it wrong.  

Well, I've got about a chapter of buffer before I need to figure this out. 
duinemerwen: (Default)
2022-11-06 12:22 am
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Long haul

1) I participated in Inktober. I half-assed it on some of the days (particularly when I was on vacation), but here are some from last month that I was proud of. Mostly portraits, because you can't hide bad proportions when doing a portrait. 



more pics under cut )
I'm still keeping to at least one drawing per day (even if it's a doodle) but now I'm also working on my Nanorimo project. It's a Good Omens fic where Upstairs wins (not currently pursuing either of the Tristan/Iseult crossover or Sixth Crusade ideas). I don't think it's worth 50k words, but I'll be happy to get 20k out of it. Currently, I'm about 9k words in and I have most of the plot ideas (finally) in place. 

Other Books I've Read

The Fifth Season
The Obelisk Gate
The Stone Sky


The Fifth Season was brilliant. There's an event in the middle that happens where I think, damn, I should've seen that coming. Then something similar happens AGAIN and I'd never been so happy to be blindsided. The Obelisk Gate and The Stone Sky didn't have that WOMP factor, the same sense of newness and progression and volatility, to carve out a trilogy-shaped niche in my heart where this story could live rent-free. Don't get me wrong, I think the story is really well executed: there are characters that objectively should be loathed, but are written tenderly all the same. The world is full of bitterness and hate and vengefulness, but also incredible resilience and love. The trilogy as a whole is worth a read and easy to respect, but difficult to love unconditionally. 4/5

Ducks
I have friends that worked in Fort Mac, though I never did myself. This is a memoir of the author's time in Fort Mac between 2005 and 2008. She does a brilliant job showing the inhumanity born of isolation, the pervasive sexism, and the brutal casualness of violence and assault. I would consider this essential reading for anyone of any gender in a male-dominated industry. The only reason that this is not a 5/5 because it's so harrowing I do not want to read it again.  4/5

duinemerwen: (Default)
2022-10-29 12:02 pm
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Vacation reading (DR #3)

The Lies of Locke Lamora
Red Seas Under Red Skies
The Republic of Thieves

 
By the end of page one, I knew I was in for a treat. By the end of the first chapter, I was completely in love. I shotgunned all three books in two days and they never stopped being propulsively fun. Characters occasionally juggle the idiot ball but I don't care. Locke is fundamentally incapable of being anything but a flashy mad genius. Everyone should have a friend like Jean Tannen. I think I'm going to buy the paperbacks, and I can't believe that it's been ten years since book 3. 5/5

Space Opera
This would've been funny if it was half as long as it actually was. I got pretty sick of the music genres that seemed to have been generated by an AI pretty quick, but I guess I was invested enough to finish. 2/5. 

Spinning Silver
There were a few POV characters with only a few chapters apiece, which I'm not sure was necessary. Executing a key midbook climax from the perspective of the youngest of these POV characters was also not a good choice. Otherwise, I was hooked from the opening chapter. I've never read a book with a moneylender as the protagonist, and her schemes are clever, and despite familiarity with all the fairy tales inspiring this story, I could not guess how it was going to end. 4/5. 

A Memory Called Empire
The protagonist's perspective as a person who wholly loves a neighbouring culture but will never be considered anything but a barbarian was a great choice, as was the Mayan-inspired worldbuilding. I wasn't moved to tears or anything by this book, but it was skillfully and carefully written platonic ideal of space mesoamerican murder mystery with memory-lineages. 4/5. 

A Desolation Called Peace. 
The highs were higher than in A Memory Called Empire. Namely Eight Antidote's tutelage, Three Seagrass's slow realization that she was being kind of racist, and Twenty Cicada's kitten. Yet I had both too much and too little of the translation process - Ted Chiang's "Story of Your Life" is the gold standard of this, and I think it was a disservice to give the "transformation" to a secondary character very abruptly and offscreen. 3/5.  




Started, couldn't keep going. 
Fonda Lee - Jade City (just kind of grim, but not in a fun way) 
The City We Became - N.K. Jemisin (I just don't care about New York City) 
Saladin Ahmed - Throne of the Crescent Moon (I got a fifth of the way in, but the plot is leaving me cold)
Steven Erikson - Gardens of the Moon (What is even going on, just give me a bit of handholding or at least make it fun

duinemerwen: (Default)
2022-10-14 02:30 am
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Book recs

Kieran Gillen - Die
Kieran Gillen - The Wicked + The Divine
Kieran Gillen - Once & Future

It's hard to end a series satisfactorily, and I can't say I'm 100% happy with how any of these ended. All three of these comics are stories about stories, the danger of labels and mantles, and the temptation to define yourself by a role. If I had to rank em I'd put Once & Future up top, because I love the grail mythos, because Bridgette is a badass, and because Duncan and Rose are real snacks. I found the ending a little rushed, and one character's background and evolution could've been more heavily foreshadowed. Also, I did like the comic better when it was just dipping its toes into the Otherworld, rather than being fully submerged in supernatural nonsense. Still, the good bits outweigh the mediocre so impressively that this ranks as a 4/5. 

Die probably goes in second. Stephanie Hans' art is fantastic, possibly the most beautiful I've ever seen in a comic. The ending is extremely satisfying. The issue pacing is great. I love the stable time-loop embedded in the world, and touches on TTRPG history from Kriegsspiel to Angria. But... I don't really love the characters, they're pretty fucked up and cynical, even if the story isn't. So is the world. Made it hard to get attached and keep reading at points.  3/5 

Finally, the Wicked + The Divine -  There are amazing moments, like Morrigan/Baphomet's backstory and conclusion, and Dionysius's fate. But the plot twists are ridiculous. I point to one particular prophecy which is presented in one issue, but immediately handwaved as "but it's not what you think" in the subsequent one. W+D is also not particularly thematically consistent. During the middle couple dozen issues, I lost track of the plot - like, so Persephone is a god now, so nobody is around to keep all the other gods on rails, so what is anybody going to do about it? Mope, sing, and wait for the situation to get really critical, it seems. The story gets back on track for the last dozen issues or so, but at that point the middle third had already muddled me up too much. And despite the ending being thematically appropriate, I did not enjoy the timeskip at the end, including the romance switcheroo and the auto-eulogy. 2/5
 
Cassandra Khaw - Nothing But Blackened Teeth
This was a terrible book too weighed down by the bickering of the supporting cast and shitty word choices to achieve any proper atmosphere. "Smartphones strobed to life?" - "full of absolvement for my outburst, chin tipped to a modest angle" - "made him look like a goldfish drowning on dry air." To say nothing of the ending ritual, which starts too late and ends too soon.  1/5

Kirsten Chen - Counterfeit
I was only interested in the subject matter because I'd previously enjoyed repladies drama and have missed it sorely since it went private. This story's structure is interesting and effective, as is its use (and disuse) of stereotypes, but I could've used more of the book's second POV character, and less of the first.  2/5

Martha Wells - All Systems Red
 This was fun! But of course any book where the protagonist is called "Murderbot" would be fun. I enjoyed the social awkwardness between Murderbot and their "colleagues," Murderbot's general apathy, and determination to do the bare minimum require of their job. However, the various factions and supporting characters are not so well developed. There are some sequels, which I guess I'll read too.  3/5

Tamsyn Muir - Nona the Ninth 
This book only makes sense as part of an incomplete hole. The highs are so high, notably, everything the Sixth House is involved in, Corona's plea, Crux's reappearance, Kiriona's transformation, and the Epilogue. But. There are so many questionable choices in this. Why does so little happen of long-lasting consequence happen in the first half? Why does it take an entire space ship of plot threads to land midway through to kick everything off? And why, for the love of the Emperor, was PAUL picked as a suitable name??? 4/5. 
duinemerwen: (Default)
2022-10-09 10:57 pm
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Ronon vs Teal'c

As inspired by the Ronon vs Teal'c episode of Stargate Atlantis, I've developed a rough list of fighters across various skillsets and franchises that I would like to see beat each other up. Assume that these combatants are each armed for CQC with a ten-inch bowie knife, and their natural weapons. 

APEX PREDATORS

By dint of experience, rage, or plain ol' biology, these fighters occupy the top of their respective food chains, and are pretty much unbeatable by anybody in the other categories. 
- Xenomorph (Alien) 
- Predator (predator) 
- Wrex (Mass Effect) - remember, Wrex is not just a giant turtle. He has over a thousand years of fighting experience, a biotic barrier, and multiple redundant organ systems. 
- Any Xeleyan in body armour (The Orville) - though they may not have anything particularly flashy, these guys can rip open blast doors without too much effort. I don't remembering anyone else on this list who did that. 
- Doomslayer (DOOM)

Assassins

These guys aren't much stronger than the average human, but are very well prepared. If starting from stealth, they might have a fighting chance against the Apex Predators above. 
- Thane (Mass Effect) - He knows how to take down a Krogan. But he'd really, really, rather not. 
- John Wick (John Wick)
- Batman 


Proud Warrior Race Guys

These are the guys who can run a marathon and then kick your ass, but otherwise aren't too far above a human in terms of raw strength and ability. I consider everyone on this list to be roughly equal in prowess. 
- Worf (Star Trek) 
- Spock (Star Trek) 
- Ronon Dex (Stargate)
- Teal'c (Stargate) 
- Data (Star Trek) 
- Bobby, in power armour (The Expanse)

Space Magic

- River Tam (Firefly) - ? - has less combat experience than most of the others on this list, but is capable of hiding herself on a ceiling, and single-handedly taking down hundreds of Reavers. It's not really clear how her empathic abilities work, but I think she'd be able to use it defensively against opponents who project their emotions heavily (Wrex, Worf, etc.) But it would be less useful against those relying on animal instinct (Xenomorph), or simply don't project. 
- Aria T'Loak (Mass Effect) - Aria canonically crushed the heart of at least one Krogan warlord (Patriarch). But in a fight requiring more tactical prowess (Predator), Endurance (again, Predator), or against an enemy immune to intimidation (Xenmorph), it's unsure how well she'd do. 

Everyone Else

Non Combat Dudes

My personal thoughts on who would win a Baltar vs McKay battle is that, McKay could drop Baltar, but that Head-Six would just force Baltar to stand up again and again, and that McKay would end up running for the hills. 
- Gaius Baltar (BSG) 
- Rodney Meredith McKay (Stargate) 
- Quark (Star Trek) - Nog is not on this list because Nog is actually a combat vet. 
- Joker (Mass Effect) - "What does the Alliance hire pilots with brittle bone disease?" "So their Marines have someone they can beat during hand-to-hand drills." 
- McLovin (Superbad)

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2022-07-10 08:48 pm
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Charly Burke

I'm actually really enjoying her character on The Orville... 

On one hand, they didn't need a new ensign, or to write in all sorts of four-dimensional mcguffin problems that only she could solve. And it's weird that her actress is dating Seth McFarlane whilst being twenty years younger than he is. 

However, I respect the way the show is handling Charly's hostility at Isaac following Amanda's death. It's a bitter, necessary pill to swallow. Not everyone is on board with Isaac's presence on the ship. The Kaylon attack was three years ago for the viewers, but for the crew only a few months have passed. It's not pretty, and the ensign occasionally comes off as surly and unlikeable - at one point, Ed accuses her of acting like she has a "monopoly on grief." Those jagged edges are necessary for Charly's character. 

I hope the ensign sticks around.

duinemerwen: (Default)
2022-06-25 11:14 pm
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2 quick d&d tarot readings

Reading 1

Past: Five of swords
Present: Nine of swords, reversed
Future: Five of wands, reversed
Influences: Knight of coins, reversed
Potential: Six of cups

This relationship has never gone smoothly. Any victory achieved has been hollow (five of swords) and ultimately unsatisfying. The situation persists to present day, but now fraught with a certain degree of self-loathing (nine of swords, reversed). The situation will bring out the worst in everyone but is likely to just go out with a fizzle because everyone is sick of it (five of wands reversed). 

Influencing the sitch is a miasma of stagnation and dissatisfaction (knight of coins). I sure don't know how to address that in order to reconnect with old friends (six of cups). Except an incredibly powerful common enemy. 

Reading 2 
Past: page of wands, reversed
Present: nine of swords, for fuck's sake
Future: four of wands
Influences: ace of cups
Potential: judgement

I have a lot of ideas that I'm struggling to realize (page of wands, reversed). The story is full of dread, ticking timelines, and prophecy (nine of swords). Especially prophecy, because the nine of swords in this deck I'm using portrays the Oracle of Delphi telling Laius that his son is going to kill him. 

The future of this is... well, the four of wands is normally one of the happiest cards you can pull. Reversed... well, it usually symbolizes a private journey, but in this particular case I interpret it as the situation getting FUBAR'd. 

The situation is influenced by, like, spiritual rebirth, unconditional love, and stuff (ace of cups)? I mean the party is currently in the land of the dead, if they survive that could count as a rebirth. I was tempted to interpret this as a literal looming campaign reboot but this is the ace of cups, not Death or the Tower, dammit. 

The potential of the situation is represented by the card of judgement, which in my deck is portrayed by the Monkey King leaping between the Buddha's fingers. In this position of the spread I'm not sure how to interpret Judgement, except as an indicator that it's time to shit or get off the pot. 

Reading comics
Garth Ennis's Rover Red Charlie is one of the happiest things I've seen Garth Ennis write. I guess narrating a transcontinental journey from the perspective of three dogs will do that to you. However it is a postapocalyptic transcontinental journey, and still has got some brutal violence, rotting corpses, and radiation sickness. Dogs are not immune to the horrors of the end times, but on the plus side, the main trio of dogs do not die and they get a happy ending. Way happier than Pride of Baghdad, anyways. 3/5, recommended to anyone with a decent tolerance for comic book violence. 


duinemerwen: (Default)
2022-05-01 01:23 pm
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Apple Cart

Apollo: This, the rest of your life, Kara. Is this how you want to spend it? Who you want to spend it with?
Starbuck: You got someone in mind, Lee?
Apollo: Tell me you're not afraid that I'm not gonna come along and upset your neat little apple-cart.
Starbuck: Maybe I want it upset.
What I'd give to write something that good... 
duinemerwen: (Default)
2021-10-05 12:22 am
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I'm no longer on vacation

Ya boy is back 

It was sort of a mini vacation. I wore smashing dresses, ate omakase sushi (my favourite was the sea urchin/tuna tartare, the monkfish liver, and the bonito), and got new earrings. 

I'm now on Ghost Story in the Dresden Files.

I've begun writing That Interquel (which will not exceed 20k words).



Tonight, I watched Lasting Impressions in Season 2 of the Orville. It's another episode where not much happens (much like the season opener Ja'loja, which I loved). I'm aware that it's real similar to several episodes of Star Trek. Still found it very touching, at least partially because I've felt similar infatuations. Not with holodeck ladies environmental simulations, but they honestly might as well have been.   

Also it had this scene: 


duinemerwen: (Default)
2021-08-26 03:49 pm
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The Poppy War Trilogy

Reading the Poppy War trilogy felt like reading morbid wikipedia articles when I was a kid. I don't mean it in a bad way, but after a certain point you just sort of detach yourself a bit from the subject matter. That's not to say the books weren't good. They were. The prose got the job done without belabouring the point or being too brief. The ending was properly cathartic. I don't think I'd read it again. Reading Rin's arc was like compulsively poking at an old hurt, over and over, getting it good and inflamed again, because she just keeps getting angrier and angrier.

That was part of what made the Poppy War so readable, actually - I wanted to see the lengths to which Rin would go to accomplish her goals, i.e. what her wheel-o-war-crimes would stop on next, which of her friends she might steamroll over next.  

I would have liked to see more of the consequences to her conquest in The Burning God. The novel gets into it a bit, with regards to the famine, the fractured geopolitics, and how the cleanup never ends. But I found those chapters to be perhaps too subdued in comparison to the batshit insanity that precedes and follows it. 

On the other hand, my favourite sequence in the entire book takes place during that cleanup period. There's a bit in Chapter 32 where Rin and her friends fantasize about all the things that they can do now that they've dismantled the feudal aristocracy in the midst of a famine. Their reforms range from practical to completely frivolous, and it's one of the only points in the entire book where their relative youth and pre-war identifies are visible, and where they're actually happy - and then they wake up in the morning, having to face the food shortages and assassins and arsonists anew. 

3/5. 

duinemerwen: (Default)
2021-08-17 08:42 pm
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The Green Knight

 I liked it, and there's value in sharing Gawain's uncertainty at what happens next with the audience by ways of leaving the ending ambiguous, BUT. I still wanted a greater sense of finality in the ending. The ambiguous ending was absolutely the correct choice, but I don't have to be happy about it. 4/5 

Also I forgot to tuck my shirt in when I was cycling to Palmerston last weekend (nice, easy 90km. Except for the headwind) and I sunburned my lower back, which hadn't seen sunlight in two years, so that got sunburned, and it sucks. This weekend looks like it'll be humid, so I'll probably stay in town and clean up some of the local caches on my map. 

Ah. And Brooklyn Nine-Nine came back when I wasn't looking, so that's nice. And my fish have had babies again! 
duinemerwen: (guh)
2021-04-19 03:53 pm
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Autoexcommunicate

So the Lee/Kara post-canon fic is officially a go now. 

But also, what would be the best command to give to a Kuo-toa fish pope to prevent a TPK on Saturday? 

Blasphemize's a good, safe option. Autoexcommunicate gets the point across, but it's got too many syllables. Baptism would work for regular pope, but this one's a fish... And if it's too tricksy the DM probably won't bite. 


duinemerwen: (is a tool)
2021-04-09 10:26 am
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Frakkkkkkk

Okay so I had a dream about this girl I'm acquainted with. But it was exactly that kind of dream. We were working in this post-apocalyptic factory, made out on a grotty futon, and then she told me that she loved me, and I just totally froze up. Didn't know what to do. Just kissed her and skedaddled. 

After that I dreamed I was rampaging through a haunted gift shop in Skyrim. Shot some flaming arrows at a frost troll. Glitched through a wall (read: found the maintenance access) and then bought a small daisy-embroidered handkerchief and a square blue ornamental glass dish. 

AND THEN. Admiral Cain from Battlestar Galactica was organizing war games in what looked like a Megabuilding from Dredd, and we all know that Admiral Cain doesn't like to lose. Things got all intense until it wasn't a game anymore. Admiral Cain started sending teams of marines through the door and threatening us over the intercom. 

My squad - composed of Colonel Osama bin Tigh (who should be good at this small force vs bigger force stuff!) and Roomba (of all people!!!) began to mount a defense, but just when things were getting interesting, and we'd planted all the explosives and ransacked an armoury, I woke up. 

So just FML.

duinemerwen: (guh)
2021-04-08 11:14 pm
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I got promoted!

Yay! And, just a few weeks til my designation finishes processing... 

 I have some new creative pursuits on the horizon.

First of all, the BSG finale WRECKED ME BIGTIME. I started crying when the opera house dreams started aligning with the present, except that everyone was wearing TACTICAL VESTS and I couldn't handle the CONTRAST and the SOUNDTRACK and then ughhhh

AND THEN THEY FOUND EARTH, and a bunch of main characters died, another main character clearly hasn't got much time left! And then the characters I was rooting for this entire time got such a MESSY ending, and I guess toilet paper isn't even going to be invented for another hundred thousand years??

So I sobbed messily for half an hour after the end credits rolled while Krogoth ordered sushi. Which is EXACTLY the sort of reaction that four seasons of TV should wring out! So don't misread me here - I don't care that the last season veered from SPACE SURVIVALISTS to RELIGIOUS ROBOTS and then ROBOT MARITAL COUNSELLING, because when the finale hits like a frakking truck I WILL FORGIVE ALL THOSE SINS but also I will cry about it.

AND THEN, because I can't find that angsty post-canon Lee/Kara fic, I guess I'm gonna have to write it myself

Second order of business is to get my act together and really get the 5e space campaign rolling.

But, story first. Really. 

duinemerwen: (Default)
2021-04-03 12:47 pm
Entry tags:

Commode

Why is it whenever I dream of public toilets, they're either out of service, dirty, or don't have working doors?? 

Must I live in terror that Gaius Baltar is going to jump out from behind the sink? Or that the opposing stall door will slowly swing open, revealing Starbuck as she peruses a magazine? 

Please, say it ain't so.  
duinemerwen: (Default)
2021-03-10 02:05 pm
Entry tags:

check out time

I dreamed that I'd booked a hotel room in the midwest for a conference. My friend had joined me for the last night - they were passing through on a trip of their own, after their reservation fell through. Nothing untoward happened that night, because they're a chivalrous type. In the morning, I made hotel room coffee and we drank it on the balcony. Check out time came and went. And I couldn't stop thinking - why did I wait? Why didn't I do anything?

--

Lee Adama walked in a fatsuit so that Thor could run in a fatsuit.

--

(23:38:44) its like in 50 years
(23:38:52) THIS convo will still exist
(23:38:55) sigh


--

I planned a last-minute mental health vacay a week and a half from now but my plans are already fracturing cos my boss really wants me to call in for a 3-hour meeting on monday and wednesday afternoon.

I am become Atlas, holding the weight of this doomed-ass witness statement upon my shoulders.