Patrick Stewart is going to be knighted! And high time, too.

Is there a Patrick Stewart/Ian McKellen fandom? There is, right? Has anyone written fic yet about how they're going to be Sir Patrick and Sir Ian now? Because someone should get on that.

Hello again, Internet! I had a lovely train ride, but I missed you during it.

However: I am now in Bethlehem, with a job for the next week or so, and a Yuletide draft my beta likes plus a pretty solid idea for a treat! Plus I got my mom to watch Kiss Kiss Bang Bang and she ships Harry/Perry/Harmony with me now, so life is generally pretty great.

Today is work and then tree-trimming; tomorrow is church and then work; day after that is dentist and Photoshop and work and Yuletide deadline. Tuesday or Wednesday my mom and I are going to New York City, but boy, it pleases me so much to be working six days out of the next nine. BOOKSHOP DELI HERE I COME

PS is it true that ( Potential Doctor Who casting spoiler ) Because if so FUCK YEAH. If not, the person who told me is going to be sorry. >:|

HAHA CHECK ME OUT I HAVE MY FINAL PROJECT DONE. Two whole hours early, even! I rock. The art doesn't, but I do. And things are all downhill from here, thank God.

If anyone cares, my work from the semester is here. It's not all that great, but I take great comfort in the thought that at least I'm not Rob Liefeld.

This seems to work for ganymi: to-do list!

By Tuesday night I need to do nine 9x12 drawings (three each pencil, ink, and charcoal) and three 18x24 drawings (ink and charcoal combined) photograph all my work from the semester, and upload it to an online portfolio. Also, I need to order a sub platter from Jimmy John's and remember to pick it up on the way to class.

By Wednesday morning I need to actually remember something about sewing even though I haven't been to costuming class since Monday-- this is a good thing! I finished my final project a week and a half early, but I still need to get through the exam.

By Thursday afternoon I need to have my room cleaned up, my clothes and linens clean, fresh sheets on the bed, and be packed and on my way to Union Station. I really ought to be finished reviewing my Yuletide canon by now, too.

By Friday evening I will be in Pennsylvania, and intend to have a Yuletide fic written and off to beta. I also have some prompts I'd like to write treats for, but I have no idea whether anything will come of those or not. Deadlines :(

So mostly I need to scrape together a hell of a work ethic until Tuesday, and then write my Yuletide, and after that I can go back to worrying about Sayers fic! And my parents, and working retail over Christmas without spending all my money at the bookshop deli, but!

I had a nicely artsy day today! Went to Borders, had coffee, drew a complicated chart to help me sort out the billions of OCs casefic seems to require, and ended up doodling little people all over instead. And had a lovely conversation with the woman sharing my table, to boot. Wandered along to the Art Institute, looked through the Arts+Crafts exhibition they have going-- which is really great-- finished my holiday shopping in the gift shop, and then went to the music rooms at the library, where I completely failed to learn how to play "Take Me Out to the Ballgame."

I also discovered today that I own a Campion novel I've never read, and brought it along for bus-ride reading. And discovered that not only is Amanda in it, it is a novel in which Albert and Amanda pretend to be engaged to fight crime, and got so excited over this that I completely forgot to get off at my own bus stop. radioreverie is fired for not informing me that this existed. >:(

It's kind of odd, going to the Art Institute of Chicago to look at an exhibition about a movement in which so many prominent artists were themselves involved with the Institute. It gave me the same weird self-referential feeling I got last week, when I went to backread the 1930s tag on little_details for help writing Dorothy Sayers fanfic and every other post was recommending Dorothy Sayers as a primary source. I ought to say something coherent and thoughtful here about how there's a grey area sometimes between primary and secondary sources, but newredshoes could probably say it better, or already has.

(Speaking of newredshoes, I know it's December now, but I am probably going to be at Borders again tomorrow night, if you still want a writing companion. :D?)

HEY HEY HEY GUESS WHAT.

I got into college! The college I already go to, but still, I'm an actual degree student as of January! And I might not even fail out this time! :DDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDD

I'm celebrating this with gingerbread (from a box mix, but shhhh) and hot chocolate spiked with Kahlua. It's all very cozy and cheerful, and TCM has been showing Humphrey Bogart movies all day, and I'm trying very very hard not to replace this in my mental Lord Peter canon with Band of Brothers crossover fic. Life: tough all over.

Happy Advent, friendslist! I finally dragged myself back to church this morning for the first time since Easter. The sermon was about not being afraid of change and the chaos it brings and used Harry Potter as an example, the recessional music was therefore "It's The End of the World As We Know It," the rector actually remembered who I am, the coffee was horrible, and Formation was a discussion of Matthew that actually treated the Bible as a secondary text written by a bunch of fallible people with agendas in mind.

I know I was supposed to be thankful for things three days ago, but I am so so thankful for sane Christians and the opportunity to be part of not one but two communities thereof.

In completely unrelated news, every trailer I see for Despicable Me just makes me happier and happier.

In case you were wondering, Internet, I am in fact alive! I have had ridiculous quantities of stuff to draw and 'shoop for the last couple of weeks, and I have not been sleeping quite as much as I should, but I am over that hump now. I am certainly not going to make 50K for NaNo at this point, but I was originally aiming for 30K and I should beat that pretty easily, so generally I am pretty pleased with myself and my drawing and sewing and writing.

Also I have been watching a lot of Doctor Who (in no particular order) and Life lately, and occasionally Farscape. People should talk to me about these things. Especially people who have Who audioplays sitting around, because they are really excellent for listening to while drawing. I'm particularly partial to Five, Eight, and Nine :D?

Ahahahaaaaa. I woke up at midnight this morning to pull an all-nighter and catch up on a ton of work, which usually ends in me going back to bed and failing miserably and hating myself. But today! Today I was actually at my desk by one and I got it all not only done but done earlier than expected. Way earlier. So not only am I one week closer to being caught up on the drawing work I fell behind on, I am dressed and ready to leave an hour and a half before I have to go. So I'm having oatmeal and cider for breakfast and watching Life and poking at my NaNo a bit.

Of course, I have school till ten tonight, but I am unfazed. I am rocking the adulthood thing today, Internet, just watch me.

Okay, Internet, I will make a deal with you. Someone get Clyde Langer and Fitz Kreiner into a fic together, and I might get around to writing that Sally Sparrow/Wendy Watson fic I promised radioreverie last year.

:D?

In related news, newredshoes will be pleased to know that neigedens and I got around the other day to watching Hickory Dickory Dock, and I loved it hugely. Not just because om nom nom Damian Lewis sprawling all over furniture, but because Captain Hastings was gone and Miss Lemon got to be Poirot's sidekick instead, and IMO she was actually a much smarter and more useful sidekick than Hastings ever was. I could do with more of that.

The main thing to remember in autobiography, I have always thought, is not to let any damned modesty creep in to spoil the story. This adventure is mine, Albert Campion's, and I am fairly certain that I was pretty nearly brilliant in it in spite of the fact that I so nearly got myself and old Lugg killed that I hear a harp quintet whenever I consider it.

It began with me eating in bed.



If there is a better opening to any book anywhere, I don't think I want to know about it.

Ahahaha it is really funny to log on this particular morning and see the rest of my age group going HAY CHECK IT OUT LAST SEMESTER OF COLLEGE while I have been running around all day trying to get into a college I am already going to.

;___________;

For those of you just tuning in: I have the most ambiguous academic status ever. I went to one school for two years, hated it, flunked out, and then registered here as a student-at-large and have been doing that for a couple of semesters. And now I'm applying to be a BA student. So I'm in this bizarre sort of academic limbo where I'm technically a student at two different universities, and even though I'm probably going to be a degree-seeking student next semester I'm not allowed to register for classes until January 18 (no srsly what the actual fuck) and on top of everything else I've been panicking about my BA application because my boss, who promised to write me a letter of recommendation two months ago . . . didn't.

The upside to this situation, however, is that I was able to run off to a professor I had over the summer, who is not technically my advisor but will be one of them soon, and get her to write me a letter of recommendation to her own institution and then run up to Admissions to turn it in. Admissions was, of course, closed today for no discernible reason, and now I have to wait until tomorrow with that letter burning a hole in my purse and I'm irrationally terrified that it will just up and vanish.

And next semester I will be a BA in Theater Design student and have to start filling out paperwork all over again so I can turn that into an interdisciplinary degree with Illustration! But I'm not even worrying about that yet. All that takes is a proposal with an essay and a list of courses. That will be cake compared to this shit.

TL;DR if all this stuff falls out right, I will be taking Art History I, Figure Drawing I, and either Drafting for Theatre or Costume Construction II next semester. HOORAY.

There is an upside to not actually going to any Halloween parties, and that is that I can dress up as however many people I like! In this case, three.

The theme for the evening is "clothing I own and love but rarely have any use for."

( Photos under the cut )

I should probably stop procrastinating and start writing things now.

IMPORTANT ETA: when Geocities went down it took my Peter/Harriet mood theme with it, so they have now been replaced with the Farnon brothers. Best mood theme ever, y/y/mfy?

Have I mentioned lately how happy Sarah Jane Adventures makes me? Hint: really really really really happy.

But I want Eve/Sam fic and there is never going to be any :( Everything I could ever want out of a canon pairing and naturally it all happens offscreen.

You know what's great about lunchtime on Monday? Nobody wants to use the practice rooms at the library. Should you be so inclined, you can go and sit and play "Scarborough Fair" over and over again for two hours, until you almost don't suck at it and your wrists and the small of your back are miserable knots of pain, and it is awesome.

I'm just saying, my kindergarten piano teacher-- who used to tie himself into knots trying to get me to sit still for five minutes at a time-- would be pretty pleased right now. I know I am.

In less impressive news, I have been listening to the same three musicals over and over again so much that I wasted like five minutes this morning trying to find the song "Confrontation" in the Funny Girl soundtrack. While there is probably an awesome crossover idea in there somewhere, I think I may be suffering from too much of a good thing.

I have no particular opinion one way or another on the existence of Disney's A Christmas Carol, but I wish it wasn't coming out now. I was very carefully brought up to believe that the Christmas season doesn't come until after Thanksgiving, and I firmly believe it should stay there. Christmas movies have no business coming out at the beginning of November.

Also, the commercials are making me homesick, which is equally premature and Generally Not On.

As a general rule, though, I am quite fond of November and December, despite encroaching schoolwork and costuming work and miserable weather. December means a train trip and Bethlehem and the Moravian Bookshop and Hannukah and Christmas; and November means just enough snow to be pretty, and buying a hot drink and curling up in an armchair somewhere and writing a lot. Because, yup, November is Get Your Shit Written Month.

I hesitate to call it National Novel Writing Month, because I'm not writing a novel this year; I was going to, and then I was going to finish last year's (which could take up another 40K easily). And then it got to be mid-October and I have three fics in progress that could easily be 30K+ each, and . . . yeah, I'd like to get these done someday. So my actual goal for November is a thousand words of either Zac/Vanessa/Ashley or Hilary/St. George a day, plus a second draft of the Link/Violet by the end of the month. I think this is doable; a mess, and probably not ~in the spirit of NaNo~, but hopefully productive.

And newredshoes, or any other Chicago folks, if you would like to have writing parties again this year I am all for it. :D?

Ahaha so this thing where you write fic with three- or four-digit word counts? Completely awesome. Why did no one tell me?

Of course, now I've gotten started on this pairing I will never ever finish and it will probably end up being a longfic anyway, but, uh, here, have a bit more St. George/Hilary. It is the_antichris's fault, which is excellent; I rather missed having things be her fault. They always turn out so nicely.

( just a tiny thing, 305 words )

So it turns out that drafting body blocks is the most relaxing thing ever. It involves exactly enough math not to be boring, but not enough to require actual effort, and I want to do it all the time.

In not-precisely-related news: I'm fond of Newsies and Hairspray and all, and Singin' in the Rain and Jekyll and Hyde are pretty great, but Funny Girl is the best of all possible musicals, and if you disagree something is clearly fundamentally wrong inside you and I should probably come find you and put you out of your misery.

How are all your days going! :D

Today I discovered that my NYR recipient loved my fic! And then I went to "class," which was actually sitting by myself drawing a hallway in a Victorian office building for three hours while I listened to musicals and strangers sometimes wandered by and told me I was doing a good job. (And when my professor came to check on me, I mentioned this and he said "I can see why! :D") And when I got home I discovered that someone had recced The Fraser Record (Excerpts) and there is HSM superhero fic.

It's like yesterday got two days' worth of suck and today got two days' worth of awesome. I am confused.