Spinning on that dizzy edge

My husband has given up being surprised when I know all about a movie or TV show despite having never seen it, because being fandom adjacent is a sort of omniscience.

However, I feel compelled to confess the gaps in my fannish experience, ie the things I haven't finished or never got around to seeing that it seems EVERYONE else has:

Leverage
Due South
Fringe (though this one is less my fault, as I was specifically asked to not watch it so my TV killing curse would spare it, and then never got back to it)
Orphan Black, season 3ish and onward
The Librarians, season 2 and onward
Avatar: TLA, season 1sh and onward
Legend of Korra
The Clone Wars
Star Wars Rebels
Slings and Arrows
Person of Interest
Supernatural
Parks & Rec
Community


At some point, I would love to get around to working my way through this list. It'll probably mean watching less HGTV, for starters.

So which do you think I should start with? And what fannishly popular media have you missed yourselves?

I made two vids for Festivids!

Creator (Eureka, Jo Lupo)

What's Your Naked (What's Your Number, Ally/Colin)

They were both really well received, especially by the intended recipients, so I'm happy about that. gwyn guessed correctly that I had made the WYN vid for her, so I owe her a prize. You want icons with that? ;)

I still want to go back and respond to all the comments, which sets up a weird pressure in my head to find umpteen different ways of saying "thank you". Oh, fangirl problems...

I finally got a new laptop to replace my current workhouse with the broken hinge. The new one has Windows 8.1, UGH. I forget each time how much I hate setting up machines to have all the correct bells and whistles, and deleting all the unwanted crap. (McAfee can go suck it with their horrible protection and whiny "don't remove meeeeeee!" warnings.) Having this new awful OS on top of that just feels me with dread. Once I'm done, though, it will be zippy fast, and I can gift the Emperor with my old one (set up in the basement with a monitor, so he won't destroy it with the wonky hinge).

January blurred into February, and now February is almost done, too. As much as I love snow, I'm good now, so spring can arrive any time. Plus, March means my birthday and a visit to kass! Note to self: start planning media to bring for the trip for potential recruitment.

Speaking of new fandoms, I have fallen hard for "Arrow". I blazed through most of seasons 1 and 2 last weekend. I knew it was full of fabulous ladies, but no one told me just HOW full it was! Ladies everywhere! Duplicitous DAs and CIAs and CEOs, a whole rainbow of HBsIC. I was spoiled for a lot of it, thanks to Tumblr GIFs and such, but I'm still enjoying small unforeseen twists. However, I am getting tired of the Identity Angst and SECRETS EVERYWHERE. Hasn't that shit bitten them in the ass enough already?

Speaking of fabulous ladies, "Agent Carter" has ended, alas; I'm trying to manage my expectations so I won't be utterly crushed if it doesn't get renewed. We had a sublime run of it, and the DVDs can't come soon enough. I'm really hoping that "Agents of SHIELD" can build on some of that energy and keep me excited for Marvel on TV.

In other news, "Glee"'s final season is filling me with complicated (and CAPSLOCKy) feelings. What a long, strange trip it's been.

What all are you watching?

One of my worst habits is staying up super late on the weekends, because that's when I can have gloriously long stretches of time to watch whatever I want on TV, once the Emperor has gone to bed (and I can take shameless advantage of his ability to amuse himself in the morning while I sleep in). Tonight I got an even later start than usual, as this afternoon we were over at the in-laws' farm to hang out with the family and particularly the husband's oldest sister before she jets back to the West Coast.

We got home at 10:30 and poured the Emperor into bed, then I settled down to polish off the last few episodes of the first season of "Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries" on Netflix. Alas that they don't have season 2, so I will have to go *ahem*ing to procure them, along with the newest Doctor Who.

Two more days of vacation, wahoooo!

After I finished watching the HIMYM finale last night, I went to my husband and informed him, "I has a sad."

I watched the first several seasons of HIMYM with great glee and appreciation; I will forever have a girl-crush on Alyson Hannigan from her days as Willow on "Buffy", and the whole cast from the very beginning had amazing chemistry and sparkling dialogue. But gradually the bloom wore off and I just bought the DVDs when I found them for super cheap, intending to catch up at some magical point in the future when I was backstroking in all my free time (author's note: still waiting!).

But then I heard this season was going to be the last, so I figured I'd watch a few episodes, and it was like the start of the series all over again. The central conceit grabbed me: the whole season would happen over the weekend of Robin and Barney's wedding, with flashbacks and forwards and all the wandering asides that I loved. I didn't catch all the recurring gags, but enough that I felt included in the gang's antics and callbacks. The cast energy and chemistry were amazing; the introduction of the Mother was lovely and paid off the wait. I reveled in each week's new shenanigans.

Then last night's episode happened, and I felt sucker-punched by most of the developments. I don't want to spoil what happens for those of you that might actually care, but...Let's just say that I'm a grown-up, and I know that real life, with all its good, bad, and WTF news, happens to everyone. But HIMYM was a sitcom, a happier place where the rules didn't always apply, and I was not expecting the way the storyline shook out. I chalked it up to my immature desire for escapist happy endings and thought I'd probably be alone in being upset.

Then I wandered onto a bunch of similar reactions this morning, and now I don't feel so alone in wanting to pretend that the finale was simply some bitter AU.

Oh, 'Mother': An Awful End To A Long Love Story
How I Met Your Mother Watch: Mate and Switch
Series finale review: 'How I Met Your Mother' - 'Last Forever': How they conned us all
How I Met Your Mother Series Finale Recap: Not-So-Happy Endings
The How I Met Your Mother Finale Bailed on the Entire Show

Anyone else feeling my pain?

Geesh. I was doing so well there for a while, posting most days, and then whoops! Here's what's been on my mind lately...

My husband is loving his job. This makes me so happy; he hasn't enjoyed his paying work like this since before the Emperor was born, which is coming up on nine years now (!).

( Imminent Imperial birthday )

( translating fannish brain )

( Agents of SHIELD )

( George Wendt and beans - no, Kraft and DOMA )

( When local politicians attack (my outrage, let me share it) )

I know I'm really lucky, living in a mostly blue state, holding down a non-governmental job. My heart goes out to all you sequestered and furloughed folks.

I'm so glad tomorrow is Friday Friday Friday! Oh, weekends, I love you so.

With a hat tip to marthawells' earlier post:

A Reminder That Reality TV is Staged a post from one of the cosplayers who got depicted as a "villain" on Heroes of Cosplay.

That post, and one that it links to, Tonight, I make my TV debut, represent the viewpoints of some members of a group of amateur cosplayers who gathered as the 11 incarnations of Doctor Who at Planet Comicon in Kansas City, whose appearance was completely edited to serve SyFy's dramatic purposes, twisting what actually happened to make the main cast of HoC appear in a, well, heroic light.

I don't watch a lot of reality shows. My TV at home pretty much stays tuned to HGTV (when the Emperor isn't hijacking it for the Wii or On Demand replays), so I can indulge my interest in house porn and travel. Even that channel, though, is filling up fast with competitions and staged drama, and I hate it. I hate being sucked into thinking how shallow a woman is for harping after granite counter tops and stainless appliances, because that's all the dialogue of hers that's shown. I hate how long the camera lingers on a disappointed couple's faces just after they're told that due to unforeseen problems, their dreams of a new kitchen are going up in smoke in favor of fixing their rotting roof and antiquated plumbing, and how the audience is turned into creepy voyeurs as they stumble away to recover while the camera pans back with the sound fully intact so we can "overhear" their emotional response.

I'm there to see the before and after renovations, the potential unleashed in a remodel, or what houses and apartments look like in far-off places, not some edited piece of footage turning normal humans into caricatures of themselves in the race for ratings. It's gotten to the point that I'll record them on the DVR and then watch only the last ten minutes of the show.

So to bring this back around: it's not like I ever trusted SyFy to be pillars of humanity. I mean, I was there when they canceled "Farscape" (and I'm never forgiving them for that). But when I saw the promos for "Heroes of Cosplay", starring a cast of almost entirely women talking about, manufacturing, and performing cosplay, they got my attention. I've watched each episode and been lulled into a sense of actually knowing these people, feeling a connection to some and eye-rolling at the antics of others.

But after watching the final episode, which actually cast them as outright heroes prevailing against difficulties both internal and external, and then reading those accounts from the other side, I feel like a total rube. I should have known better than to believe that the competitions they entered were completely free of SyFy's influence, or that the big, happy family of cosplayers across the country, audiences and entrants alike, were as cohesive and positive as presented. I feel horrible for all the amateur cosplayers who had their entries effectively stomped on by bigger budgets and manipulated screen time.

At least there were some positive notes presented over the course of the series, like when one young cosplayer in the group was rather snotty about turning down another's offer and got called out for it, or when the fact of body size and appearance in cosplay was discussed with multiple viewpoints presented. But I can't even trust that those were honest moments, or someone simply throwing the audience a bone.

Thanks, SyFy. Way to mangle this opportunity, too.

Wheeee, I'm going to Vancouver! The problem with being unable to commit until the last minute, though, means that now I have to race around getting all the details locked down. Having the teller at my bank fuck up a certified check has not helped my calm at all.

I interviewed with my boss today about joining the web design and support division that is being moved to our location from the main office. It seems big and scary, which means my complacent, slacker self should totally do it in the name of self-improvement and job training. The meeting, plus a desultory poke at my current project that should have been wrapped up weeks ago, has constituted all the actual work I've done today. Oops.

All Hail the Emperor! Oh, bless my little man for finding new and exciting ways to be awesome while I've been wallowing. He's met his goals at school for three weeks in a row, so his social skills teacher is allowing him to self-monitor. I'm not quite sure of the details, but I think it means he signs his own sheet at the end of the day. He is so proud of himself, I could just burst. He was amazing, too, at his IEP meeting a couple of weeks ago; he gave the introduction of his goals, challenges, and accomplishments, and was so smooth about it. I wish I'd taped it.

Plus, I finally went looking and discovered that "Avatar: the Last Airbender" is on Netflix. I sneakily put it on this past weekend while he was playing on his DS. He was hooked almost instantly. We're almost at the end of season 2 now, with the constant refrain of "Mom, put on Avatar please!". Thank God - if I had to endure any more "Pokemon" or "Johnny Test", even as background noise, I think I might have gouged out my ears. I wish I had tuned in earlier! I suppose now is a great time to play catch-up, so we can launch right into "Korra" when we're done. \o/

Tomorrow at this time I will be heading for the airport, on my way to Seattle. With all the packing, planning, and preparation I have left to do, sleeping tonight may be optional.

The Emperor's glasses were lost last Friday at day camp and recovered Monday. I'm glad we had the spare pair to tide us over, and even gladder that the new ones were found. It would have run us at least $350 to replace them. *phew*

We're losing "Chuck", which makes me sad, but I can understand it - they've had a good run, they weren't canceled in the middle of a storyline, and I still love what they're doing. But honestly, I'm fonder of the show than anything more passionate at this point, and there doesn't seem to be much more for them to cover.

However, I am seething FURIOUS at SyFy for canceling "Eureka". It's all my fault, again, some more, because the Fates heard me exclaim out loud how much I love this show, and sought to punish my hubris. I loved what Wil Wheaton posted on his blog, and further on his G+: "ICYMI, here's Amy Berg on Eureka's cancellation: "Everyone is asking why. It's simple, really. We are the network's golden child in every way, except profit margins. Fact is, Eureka is an expensive show to make. And we could not maintain the quality of our show with the cuts it would take to make us profitable for Syfy's new parent company. Our creative execs at Syfy fought hard to keep us. Trust me, they LOVE us. We just couldn't make the numbers work."" Also this cartoon, because really, SyFy, when you let your cast find out about a cancellation from a new release and don't tell them yourself, it's a totally jerkwad move. Not that I'd expect anything else from them. Throw another goddamned wrestling show or Ghosthunters clone on the barbie and pony up for what keeps actual Sci-Fi fans coming back for more.

But enough whining - tomorrow I'm off to Vividcon, and the anticipation is making me giddy. I'll get to meet so many people that have just been names on my screen until now. Woo-hoo!

OMG, guys, my Farscape vid won an online award! Granted, it's only a round 1 win, and the other vid I'm up against for round 2 will blow me out of the water, but still!



I submitted it on a lark, and it wasn't until sabaceanbabe posted about the voting that I remembered. Even though round 1 is done, you can still vote for Viewer's Choice and such, so go vote for me and sabaceanbabe and all the other righteous vidders on that list!

In other news, I totally failed as a parent this week. The Emperor has been watching Futurama again, and we blazed through to Jurassic Bark. We got to the end of the episode, and I went upstairs to get dressed. The next thing I knew, a sobbing Emperor threw himself at me; he was upset for the next half hour, all the way though being dropped off at daycare. (I don't think the teacher approved of us letting him watch an adult show like that.) I should have just skipped it. Man, I felt like crap after that, on top of being sad myself at the ending. :(

The Emperor is shaping up to be quite the philosopher. Today he informed me that we're all a part of "God's big dream", and unlike all the other garbled religious stories he tells us about, this one came entirely out of his own head. Now if only I could break him of his distressing insistence that he wishes that everything was dead, because sometimes he hates being alive.

Right now, I've got Muse's concert video on in the background. I have to laugh at myself; I keep hearing songs and thinking "I love that song! I didn't know they did that one!" You'd think I'd have clued into their distinctive sound by now...

Happy weekend, everyone!

I think my body is getting sneaky on me. I've been bumping along with a 28-29 day cycle for years now, with a day or two deviation. Now, according to the lovely chart at MonthlyInfo (I can't recommend that site enough for simple tracking), I seem to be settling at a 31-32 day cycle. Guess I'll have to start up charting again to pin down the magic week.

The vid is coming along quite nicely - I've got about 10 seconds to nail down at the end for the first draft will be ready for a discerning eye or two. kazbaby, you still willing to take a look?

COOOOOOOOOOOON! I'm not sure how I'm going to make it through tomorrow, with everything I want to get done before I leave Saturday morning. Maps, tickets, questions, schedules...Packing! I still have to pack! I hate packing so much, you wouldn't believe it - I have nightmares about vacations where I arrive and I've forgotten all the vital stuff. At least it's a short weekend. *deep breath* All else pales, though, against the prospect of Hanging with Hewlett.

I was looking at TV Guide's Fall TV scorecard (which only mentions the main five channels and not any cable ones - click here for the schedule), and my curse wasn't terrible this year. The Big Bang Theory, Castle, Chuck, Glee, NCIS, Parenthood, and V all are returning. That includes three shows that I've been watching for two years or more! \o/ Gossip Girl and HIMYM are still hanging on, waiting for my interest level to catch up again. I am sad, though, at what I lost: Dollhouse, Eastwick, FlashForward, and Heroes. OK, no, I'm not actually sad about Heroes; I totally choose Chuck over Heroes any day. But I wish I could have gotten FlashForward instead of V, and more of the lovely ladies of Eastwick, and definitely more of the finally-hitting-its-stride Dollhouse. Ah well. I haven't read any reviews of the new shows other than Hellcats, and they lost me when Ben Browder left. *sniff*

Now it's time for the summer TV series. When is Eureka coming back, anyway? Or White Collar, My Boys, or Warehouse 13? A girl has needs, you know.