Spinning on that dizzy edge

I've reached critical mass on links I feel need to be shared. (Hat tip to karmageddon, siria, and umadoshi, and anyone else I've filched these from.)

Remember that massive Metafilter thread on emotional labor? Olivia K. Lima posted a PDF putting it all together. (Very long - it will eat lots of time reading through it.)

Did you know that HP laptops may be logging every keystroke? Yikes!

It's a little bit woo, but also great food for thought: 5 Self-Care Strategies That Aren’t Fucking Mani-Pedis

It's probably not news that conservative voters have an irrational attachment to the just world hypothesis. I wish this article had actual advice to counteract it, but just calling it out is a step in the right direction: The 'pro-life' party has become the party of death: New research on why Republicans hate poor and sick people

"The Snarling Girl" By Elisa Albert, Notes on—and against—ambition. I feel like I could spend hours trying to unravel all the emotions and realizations that this essay prompted in me. I am not ambitious at all, but I have a dim recollection of maybe feeling that way when I was younger. Where did it go? Do I miss that feeling? So much to chew on.

For a palate cleanser, have a goofy animation of the history of the world.

Similarly, Chris Evans reads a kids' book about superheroes. Bless that soft bro loaf.

Are the flying pigs having snowball fights in hell? Because I seem to have made it through an entire regular TV season without a single one of my shows being canceled. That hasn't happened since...EVER. I even watched multiple new shows this year, and they all made it through. I don't think it's my tastes that are changing; either the networks are relaxing their standards for demographics and audience size required to renew, or *GASP* the masses are coming around to my way of thinking.

This includes: Castle, Grimm, iZombie, The Flash, Arrow, Agent Carter (:D :D :D), Agents of SHIELD, and Once Upon a Time. I'm not counting Glee because its end has been planned for a while.

Spoilers ahoy!

( Once Upon a Time )

I am loving everyone's delight in Mad Max: Fury Road, both fannishly and critically. ( Links and fannish adjacent thoughts )

In flashback news, I've been watching Alias. Bless that zany early 00s show; I have to shake my head every time Sydney skulks through her missions in her all black spy gear...with a belly shirt, so her abdomen flashes through like a beacon whenever she moves. So stealthy!

Confession time: I loathed Kennedy in Buffy season 7. Her storyline, her designs on Willow, the lackluster performance by the actor...everything. So I take a certain amount of catty glee (I will admit to being an awful person sometimes) to seeing Iyari Limon in an irritable bowel medicine commercial. Heh heh heh.

Speaking of commercials, have you seen Kristen Bell and her husband Dax Shepard hawking Samsung appliances? They legitimately made me laugh; I watched the whole behind-the-scenes thing, because I love watching KBell in action, being loose and comfortable with herself, and HAPPY.

I saw Avengers: Age of Ultron, because it was necessary as a MCU fangirl. I'm still deciding if it's too late to post a reaction piece about it, because about 2300 words poured out of me when I sat down to watch an AHEM copy.

I've got a business trip next week to visit the main office. Airfare was ridiculous for traveling that week, so my coworker and I will have to drive 1.5 hours to a podunk airport, take a hop to Chicago, then over to the Twin Cities, meaning a day wasted in travel each way. But I'll get to have dinner with heresluck, which I am very happy about, and lots of down time to catch up on shows. I'll be packing Lost Girl, Miss Fisher Murder Mysteries, Doctor Who, Orphan Black, plus some movies for my Big Idea VVC vid...and going into the office at some point. :)

I hope you all have a lovely weekend!

I tried my best with the post-a-day thing, but various things ate my brain over the past couple of weeks.

For example, I've been on Tumblr a lot lately. I blame work and the web development that I'm doing, as the pages I'm coding take forever to load. I managed to collect from here and there various sources about writing, and thought I'd link them here in the interests of closing some tabs.

7 Questions to Make Sure Your Plot Has Believable Consequences
"A great plot in your fiction novel must have believable consequences in the world you create there. Otherwise, your story falls off the deep end."

Beth Bernobich: Writing Advice, the Meta Post
"Think of this as meta advice: how to approach the advice you come across. Here goes…"

How to Battle Writer's Block
"First of all: you need to make sure that you’re really having a writer’s block. I get a sense that a lot of cases of “block” are misdiagnosed right out of the gate."

Writing Wednesday – Epithets
"It’s a short-hand. It’s also irritating as hell to read. I don’t need the overly flowery “chocolate-orbed boy” descriptor when his name, Jack, would suffice. "

5 Moral Dilemmas That Make Characters (& Stories) Better
"Readers can’t resist turning pages when characters are facing tough choices. Use these 5 keys to weave moral dilemmas into your stories—and watch your fiction climb to new heights."

Today is going so slow, and honestly, I am fine with that. I am catching up on my email and infinity tabs (when so many links are open they spill off the top of the browser).

So have some interesting flotsam!

JK Rowlings is writing Quidditch World Cup updates on Pottermore? Man, I am out of the loop.

Colorado, hotbed of healthy economic and civic progress, all thanks to pot. Can we pleeeease legalize weed already? This is getting embarrassing.

The A.V. Club is doing a Farscape watch. They're up to halfway through season 3. Me, I can never get enough of people gushing on how amazing My Show is.

See Every Major Marvel Character’s Hometown In One Map. Marvel + maps? YES PLEASE.

There are several aspects of Robin Thicke's "Blurred Lines" that I actually enjoy, like the thumping base line and the funky beat. His performance and lyrics, though, leave me wanting to bathe in hand sanitizer. Thanks to a link by cereta, I now have not one but two delightful options done by women! BRB, watching those again.

What are you all up to today?

I've been trying to pay more attention to my Facebook feed, as that's the way I find out most of the news about non-fandom friends.

So it was that I found out about Joseph Gordon-Levitt producing an upcoming film adaptation of Sandman. I have no idea what to think about that; if I remember correctly, they've been trying to adapt that beast for years and years in one way or another. I'd love to see it as an HBO mini- or full series, honestly, if it's going to be made at all, but I suppose that I trust JGL as enough of a fandom-friendly guy that he might actually get it right. It doesn't hurt that Neil Gaiman is also on board, and he's probably less likely to have a hissy fit and stomp away than Alan Moore was with his various projects.

I also loved this fangirl version of Jingle Bells. Let's see if I can imbed this:

My fabulous fangirl friend cee_m and her peeps editorzon and sabrinagb are working to put together an amazing bandom shindig in LA:

It's going to combine the awesome of going to conventions with the awesome of attending concerts. This first year we are looking to have a 100 - 200 person con in Los Angeles. We are looking for your input about how things should roll, what/who you want to see, etc. If you could fill out this short 14 question survey that would be AMAZING!

Their survey is here: https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/5DDC8BH.

Any and all feedback you can provide would be greatly appreciated. Thank you!

Ever since seeing "The Avengers" (twice!) during opening weekend, my brain has been All Avengers, All the Time. Half my open tabs are Avengers-related.

Like, the latest Avengers party note on ONTD. Many, many hours were lost today to refreshing and saving off a crapton of GIFs. (It makes my heart twinge nostalgically for the crazy days of ONTD Star Trek, which was the last movie I fell this hard far. *sniff*)

There's this great analysis of screen time per Avengers character. How rocking is it that Black Widow is a close third behind the near-tie of Captain America and Iron Man?

Speaking of Black Widow, I must shamefully confess that I have never been up on Avengers canon (I was mainly an X-Men fan, and that was years ago), so with everyone dropping oblique references to the Red Room and Winter Soldier, I really appreciated this brief history on the subject.

Avengers icons, anyone? Lovely pieces there, but my stubborn "My way!" impulse means I'll probably wind up trolling through my *mumblety-hundred* MB of Avengers images and make some myself. Does that happen to anyone else?

I'm following multiple Avengers WIPs, guys. I never do WIPs. Except now. *sigh*

At least it keeps me distracted from the TV shows I killed off with my curse this year - Chuck (in denial - still haven't watched the finale), The Secret Circle, and Ringers. None of them were heartbreaking, but I did want to know what would happen next.

How about you all? Hooked by Avengers yet? Shipping anyone? Excited or crushed by the fates of your favorite TV shows? Inquiring minds want to know!

I would usually celebrate by taking the day off work, but I'm already burning through my vacation days with the Vancouver trip. Instead, I bought my general admission and Dog's Breakfast tickets for the con, plus I finally got the confirmation letter that they received my vid entry. \o/ There's still the niggling detail, though, where I'll be staying. Anyone have space for me in their hotel room? Please?

In other linky news:

sabaceanbabe posted a delightful, sensual, and porny Veronica Mars fic for me, because she is awesome both at remembering and basically as a person. *GRIN* It's definitely tipping me towards working on a VM vid for Club Vivid.

I can't tell if the creators of this Can I Get a Hell Yeah! T-shirt are Farscape fans, or if it's just that common a saying. I'd totally get it, if I thought the Emperor would refrain from yelling that every time I wore it.

Cate Blanchett is beautiful, full-stop. But it's so refreshing to see a gorgeous woman who has bags under her eyes. We age and we get tired. No amount of expensive creams and lotions are going to fix that. (Note to self: you should still get more sleep.)

The Scale of the Universe 2 is a nifty toy to zoom in and out of. Start at the smallest point of the scale and pretend you're on a massive Katamari roll!

I am having a mellow birthday; it's been really nice. I've gotten a bunch of greetings on Facebook, been useful several times at work, the Emperor called me from school on his teacher's phone to let me know he had an awesome day, and I may even indulge in some greasy carry-out for dinner. But really, I'm pushing forward to the end of the day tomorrow, when I'll be past my annual review (*fingers crossed* for a raise) and some other news.

Have a great Wednesday, all!

If cleanliness is next to Godliness, and Zenliness is next to mindfulness, then I am spiritually bankrupt. *sigh*

I finally got the last of the Christmas crap packed up and put away this past weekend, way past overdue. I never got holiday cards sent out, I baked zero cookies, and I got all of two ornaments hung on the Space Battle tree, so why it took me so long to undo it all, I have no idea. It feels so good to have it done; every time I walk by the living room, I breathe a sigh of relief. The rest of the house is still drowning in clutter, though, try as I might to dig our way out.

I have been distracted at work for months. Depression, sleep debts, SAD, family issues, health issues - all I've wanted to do at work is surf the AO3 for fic and nurse my new crush on Chris Evans. (I blame his role as Jensen in "The Losers", because I am an absolute sucker for smartasses in glasses.) Seriously, if you ever want to pimp me into a fandom, tell me there's a tall guy who has short mousy brown hair, maybe a little bit of facial scruff, blue or green eyes, and is fucking brilliant on or offscreen, glasses a bonus, and I will curse you even as I download that shit as fast as I can. (David Hewlett, Tahmoh Penikett, Sean Murray, Chris Pine, Ben Browder...damn your stupid faces.)

At least I got my Festivids entry done (a Jake 2.0 vid! Go watch it, eh?) to the happiness of the recipient. I also wrote a last-minute entry in the Losers fic Scramble (created for kate in a feverish 3-hour binge two Fridays ago). It's my first A03 offering; now I really should post the rest of my stuff, I suppose.

Tomorrow's Friday, right? Weekends are where I'm a Viking. In my sleep, doncha know.

No, I'm not at all avoiding working on this intensely boring test plan. Why do you ask?

I have no idea who decided that non-fuzzy bear versions (Bearbrick? Sounds like a cutesy version of bareback to me.) of Kirk and Uhura were necessary, but here they are:

( Can't spell bears without ears )

If you can explain this to me, please do.


This planned version of a vinyl figurine of David Tennant's Doctor Who seems to place great emphasis on his, ah, groinal region:

( It's the pelvic thrust that really drives them insane )

Between the framing of the area with his unbuttoned suit jacket, and the dark lining of the coat pointing like an up arrow and the bottom triangle of the bright red tie pointing right down, the figure would seem to be smirking "The sonic screwdriver is my penis." Big Chief's conditional warning that Note: actual product may vary from shown. Pending licensor approval. means it's not final, of course, but I'm actually kind of fascinated with the product as it is.


In other news, who knew Almanzo Wilder was such a hottie? Good going, Laura!

( A little bit Hemsworth of a Farmer Boy, maybe? )


*sigh* Damn. That test plan didn't magically finish itself. Guess I should actually do some work.