last night I talked with Shivani for about three hours straight to workshop the plot of The Devil's in the Details. I think we got some good subplots and motivations out of it, especially for Percy Weasley. I'm personally hoping for him to find his true calling as a noir detective under Mad-Eye Moody's monologuing tutelage, but it's all to the author's discretion.    

Not participating in NaNoRiMo this year (or any year, really) but I'm hoping to finish drafting and start posting my Good Omens/Tristan and Iseult short story by the end of the month. 

Of the six people in my Saturday D&D group, at least two of us are poly, at least three are not heterosexual, and at least one is nonbinary. I don't know how this happened, or what the chances of this are, but I guess it's cool it did.

I also let the DM know of the overall plot arc for my paladin, but why does it now feel like I've signed her death sentence? At least I get inspiration for next week, so I probably won't die immediately...

In other news, I'm DONE MY THIRD STORY (except for the author's notes, which shall come next week.) I like it... less... than my second. It has its good moments, but the third act is not earth-shatteringly amazing, there's a mildly contrived second-act plot device, and imo it's pretty clear I started running into mad writer's block and struggling with putting words on screen around Chapter 8. Shivani assures me it's good, at least because the writing is polished and stuff, but for such a wonderful person her taste tends alarmingly towards the fluffy and cute. 

And here are the classes we've determined for our favourite mythological characters: 

Odysseus: Mastermind Rogue
Gilgamesh: Paladin of Glory
Enkidu: Storm Herald Barbarian? 
Achilles: also a Paladin of Glory
Cu Chulainn: either the angriest Moon Druid or a Paladin of Conquest
Perseus: Champion Fighter

I've been online shopping a lot. Mostly for silk tops and dresses, for the day they let us back into the office lol (which isn't happening until at least next year). But silk is really beautiful and breathable and I kind of love it :/

One of them is a McQueen dragonfly dress. I don't have a problem. 



And a silk DVF wrap

I might have a problem. There's been this big honkin gold ring that I've wanted since last year. I told myself that I'd buy it once I passed my ethics exam. Which I did. And I bought it. It feels weird to be walking around with a hunk of metal on my finger that costs more than my PC. I'll get used to it. 

Last night there was a power outage. My Aquaclear 30 HOB filter drained out during the outage, and it's not self priming. So it burned itself out running dry. I replaced it with an Eheim 2211. It's called the "cadillac of filters." But cadillacs aren't german-engineered, with instructions that don't tell you how to place TWO CRUCIAL VALVES on the assembly! I spent three hours setting that puppy up. On the plus side the Eheim is self-priming so my aquarium should be OK during power surges now. 



In other news I have mad writer's block. It is real bad. 

I don't think I can write The Seven Temptations of Aziraphale to be better than Once More with Pharaohs. There's no way. Act 3 is half-baked at best right now. I shouldn't be running into plot holes this late on. I had a framework this time, dammit.  

This week, I've:
- completed a 25k word draft of The Story. Expecting to hit about 40k after I flesh out all the details and scenes. Once again, I have secured two betas. Isolation is treating all three of us well, for different reasons. Beta1 is appreciating shorter lawyer hours at home, Beta2 is catching up on vee dee oh games, and I'm catching up on sleep. 
- bought eighty dollars worth of red cherry shrimp on the internet
- ordered a bicycle 
- made jambalaya and the zestiest, spiciest quinoa salad
- not missed working at the office at all
- watched three episodes of the Witcher, a season of Key & Peele, and several episodes of Brooklyn Nine Nine
- beaten FTL on hard with the Zoltan A and the Rock B
- eaten at Spanky's sausage stall outside the Canadian Tire, which is, perplexingly, still the best damn sausage I've ever had. They carve their sausages with this neat criss-cross on top to better absorb toppings and smokiness. 

FINALLY. My 111k word ancient Egypt Good Omens time loop fic that hits half the tropes that I've ever loved and ever will love is DONE. Including the historical author's note at the end. Remember when I thought it was gonna be 40k words? AS IF. But this is, by far, the best thing I've made to date. 

But is it over???



I'm working on outlining the non-sequel now but I've also installed a hundred Skyrim mods so... chop chop, I guess.

*** 

Title: Once More, with Pharaohs
Rating: R
Fandom: Good Omens, by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman
Characters/Pairings: Aziraphale & Crowley
Warnings: Tiny bit of nonexplicit sex, swearing, minor violence, FRIENDSHIP.
Word Count: 111k
Summary: Egypt, 1337 B.C.: Aziraphale gets stuck reliving Tuesday afternoon over and over again. It wouldn't be so bad, if every afternoon didn't start mid-argument with a certain disagreeable demon. Or if cooperation with the aforementioned demon weren't Aziraphale's only chance at escaping the time loop...

Standalone, canon-compliant story featuring friendship and humour, with a side of angst, the smallest dash of romance, and a happy ending. Complete.

 - I passed the PEO ethics exam
- someone liked binge-reading my fic so much they skipped work to read it. So, :D but also :O 
- - All I've got to do now is finish the last two chapters and stick the landing... 

I dreamed that I was playing dominoes with Carrie, Gorick, Rosie, JLam, Mandy, and Kristie. I guess when you spend four years staring at the same people five days a week, ten months a year, you dream about them for ten years after. Anyways, it was drinking dominoes, and Mandy asked me why a someone had been crying on prom night. She was laughing when she asked, in a way I hadn't seen her laugh in years. Does she still laugh that way, or have I just been away for too long?

Anyways, I answered her question.

Who will I be dreaming about in ten years?

--

In other news, 

I have an idea for the sequel to OMwP, which hit 92k words last week. Tenochtitlan at its height of glory under Monctezuma I. Floating gardens. Con artists. Sort of a twist ending. Possibly multiple schemes going on to postpone the arrival of Cortes. Then after that... well, I really want to write something in Ancient Greece, because I've started playing Assassin's Creed Odyssey.

Also, wow, Halsey's new single ("You should be sad") really goes for the jugular, eh? It went straight into my Brutal Breakup Songs playlist. That pre-chorus --

No, you're not half the man you think that you are
And you can't fill the hole inside of you with money, girls, and cars
I'm so glad I never ever had a baby with you
'Cause you can't love nothing unless there's something in it for you

 Sooo I'm proactively beating jet lag to Japan by doing an all-nighter today, in theory so I can sleep half the way to Japan, wake up over the Pacific, and then be perfectly refreshed for dinner. I'd like to think that this is what I've been abstaining from coffee for - so that I can pound back mugs of yin yeung until 7AM while maximizing effect, and minimizing the bit where my heart has a pizza party. Once, I had an extra large coffee from Tim's and felt like I was gonna die for a whole lecture. Another time, I had coffee en route to Kingston, and where I got massage, and couldn't enjoy it properly because of the caffeine. 

Still working on writing chapters 8-9 for beta. This is the bit where I could write good sex scenes. Then I watched this video and realized that the choreography has to mean something in terms of character development. But now it's just... not as nice and fluffy as I thought it was gonna be. Which is fine I guess. But last chapter Shivani said that Az was being sort of harsh in one of his comments and I don't know if she'll like the new power dynamics. 

I had an idea for a gambling scene in Chapter 6 based on this comment (https://archiveofourown.org/comments/250112765) but then I spent a week trying to figure out who was gambling what, in what game, with what stakes... 

Chapters 5 and 6 are out for beta now, and the draft has officially hit the 40k mark.