impala_chick | Reading

We've just had the time change, putting the clocks ahead an hour, and I'm doing better than I usually am with time changes, largely because I took a melatonin and made myself go to sleep on time. I woke up with some anxiety this morning, just a vague and general sense of unease, and I'm pretty sure it was caused by how dark it was thanks to the time change. I'm fine now.

All of this is to say that it's difficult enough for us to adhere to our routines without arbitrary policies adding further stressors.

Anyway, how has your week gone? Please do share your ups (yay!) and downs (boo!), if you're so inclined.

( My Week in Review )

We'll all get through this together, friends. That's the thought I'm leaving you with this week.

aurumcalendula

I'm a bit sad VidUKon no longer doing DVDs/USBs of premieres (I totally get their decision), but it did get me thinking about trying to make DVDs (or possible Blu-Rays) of my vids so I have them on physical media.

Any recs for software for Windows? (something that creates basic menus would be nice)

profiterole_reads

Here's the new Korean practice post! As usual now, it's an open chat.

You can write about whatever you want. If you're uninspired, tell us the story of what you're currently watching/reading/playing...
You can talk to one another.
You can also correct one another. Or just indicate "No corrections, please" in your comment if you prefer.

화이팅! <3

aurumcalendula

I think all of these were created around 2001 (possibly earlier) - the earliest references I can find for some them are around May 1st 2001, August 4th 2001, and November 22nd, 2001.

(based on some of the footage included, I think #10 and #13 were made sometime between May 7th 2001 and August 4th 2001 and #6 and #12 were made somewhere between June 18th 2001 and August 4th 2001)

A digitized version in mkv format with chapters marked for the vids is available here (password = fanvids).

imho the horizontal lines are less noticeable in the digitized version then they were on my TV when I was playing the VHS. There is some flashing (usually pink) between some vids. Also heads up that vid #4 is kinda NSFW because of the fanart included.

( list of vids with vidders and possible dates )

autobotscoutriella

I finally painted the wooden wiggle shark that's been sitting on my coffee table for ~4 months :D

yaaurens

Escapade was a blast! Me and Airawyn convinced someone new to attend this year, and she fit in superbly. I imagine she'll be back next year. It's always a bit of a gamble, y'know? Want to make sure friend has fun, but also don't want to be tied to friend the whole time. It was great though, the second batch of friends I introduced her to, she went, wait, are you ___? And it was! So they had a grand time chatting about people they both knew. And then later on we were doing something in the con suite and she met Nev and was like, wait, did you write ___? And Nev was like, OMG WHAT I have been recognized by name alone?!?

And seeing pals and hanging out and talking fandom was fun as always. I miss everyone already!

I am also older! (not a surprise, cuz everyone is, but y'know) We went to the Skirball museum to catch the Jack Kirby exhibit right before it closed, and boy am I glad we did. It was delightful. I loved getting to see original art, and sketches, and learn things about the man that I never knew before (like he moved it here near me and is actually buried out here? I need to make a pilgrimage!). The 'rents went along and I think they actually enjoyed it too - we got there just in time to join a docent tour, and that was extremely helpful for them. And me too, but more for them since they had zero background info. Ash cam along too, and that was so much fun getting to see her and spend time with her just doing something fun without work or munchkin involved. (I like munchkin, but I miss just having Ash.) And then we went through the rest of the museum, which was much more mom's speed, as it's a Jewish American museum so it's all kinds of Judaica info that she's super into.

Got a bunch of books for birthday, including the translations of Mo Du and Sha Po Lang, which I haven't started yet. Did finish the last of the Lychford books that I hadn't read yet, and now feel like I want to go back and read all six of them again, in a row, in the correct order. I just really love those novellas.

Work continues, except for my Methodist job, which officially ended today. I imagine it's not a common experience, witnessing the closing of a church. I've certainly not done it before; we've always left instead. So that was sad and hard. Hopefully will be able to keep in touch with people.

I got my first fraud return, and my first IP PIN reject, so those feel like mini milestones, lol. And more military returns, and some pretty wild life stories. Kinda fun, really. Tomorrow I plan on taking my next level-up test, which will get me to three, and then I'll probably start working on the next set of classes because I still have a lot of long, empty days at work.

Didn't go see the Z1L movie for a couple of reasons - time, and Sam mentioned some directorial choices that were visually difficult, so I just said fuck it, I'll wait and small screen it, and spend time with my friends instead. I think that was a good decision.

Dad and I have been working our way through Arsenal Military Academy, which hasn't been too bad, really. This is the most tolerable I've ever found Xu Kai to be, and Zhu Hong's actress is in there too. It's still a stretching disbelief cross-dressing show, but at least a couple of characters have at least acted suspicious about it, lol. It's also made me look up some historical references, and I always enjoy learning new things, so that's fun too, even though what I'm learning is definitely Not Fun.

Tuesday is my cardiology appointment, which I am both looking forward to and dreading. It's one of those, please let them find something, but an easily fixable something, kind of situations. I would like to not have a constantly elevated heart rate any more, thanks, it's been like three years, I'm over it.

Hand specialist appointment, however, is not until JUNE. I need to contact my PCP and be like, please, do you have a second option, because I don't have physio now, and my left arm is getting worse, and waiting another 2.5 months is not gonna be helpful. Or get me back in physio, something.

Goals for the Week: pass the level-up exam. cross the 25 returns mark. start reading sha po lang.

Good Things: friend time! books and having time to read them. dark chocolate peanut butter cups.

flareonfury

xmen100

mcu100
Submissions for the Bi-Weekly Prompt will be accepted until March 21, 11:59PM EST.

@ xmen100

@ mcu100
Submissions for the Monthly Challenges will be accepted until March 31, 11:59PM EST.

Honestly the "Drink" prompt did not come to me because of St. Patrick's day but in the fact that I really wanted a female character as the prompt image in honor of Women's month/day, but then it kinda just felt right using the prompt with both communities especially when I saw that image of Emma. I didn't think through the Monthly Character prompts, otherwise I'd have done female characters there as well.

In other news,

galorechallenge Round 14 is now open! Officially finished uploading all the old prompts. I still need to add new prompts/crossovers since nothing new has appeared, feel free to suggest prompts/crossovers HERE. Still need to make a new promo banner & header but meh, I haven't felt like it honestly.

So it's been awhile since I posted anything directly to here, I apologize for that, but February has oddly been busy? Mostly with work but I also wrote a lot more last month (8 fics/drabbles) which I'm so proud of. I also did something to my right foot (not quite sure if it's my ankle, it feels more like the top of my foot) so I've been dealing with that pain off and on since mid-February. Most of the time I forget about it because my full-time job is mostly a sit down job (and it only vaguely hurt while sitting), and I haven't had a lot of scheduled retail shifts last couple weeks (thankfully for my mental health, horrible for my bank account), but I do have to get up and move around at my full-time job - sometimes a lot so that's when it mostly hits me. I did rest it a lot when I got home from work as well and I rested a lot this weekend (although I did get some cleaning done), so I didn't spend a lot of time online thus my oblivious to the world becoming on fire (I listen to audiobooks at work, and usually on the way to & from work, rarely do I put on the radio and when I did nothing mentioned anything at all - all I noticed was the gas prices shot the fuck up and I'm like why? Found out last night. Yeah. Fuck. The world is on fire. Again/Still depending on your viewpoint.)

ANYWAY due to my offline time, my newest obsession:

the Monsterverse (aka Godzilla 2014 & Kong: Skull Island shared universe along with the TV series Monarch: Legacy of Monsters). Caught the trailer for Monarch on Prime and I was like sign me the fuck up. I enjoyed every second of it.

Look I've loved Godzilla since I watched Godzilla (1998) and the animated series based on the film - I know most people shit on that movie but I enjoy it. And it satisfied the need for more dinosaur-type stuff I wanted back when I was a kid and in love with the Jurassic Park trilogy (haha, still am). I think the animated series of Godzilla also kind of synched it for me (I have the DVD set for it) and it's still pretty good - I want to rewatch again thanks to Monarch (they share some similarities that probably only I can see and enjoy but I'll take it). I also really enjoyed Godzilla (2014) film, which people also kinda dislike? I think or at least have mixed feelings about? I enjoyed all the sequels as well, and I appreciated what they were as monster movies, but I think Monarch show really kinda synched my love for the universe. I kinda wish I could have showed the show and the other newer movies to my Nana, she loved the original Godzilla stuff and would watch those, I'd love to know what she'd think of the show. I haven't seen those since I was a little kid and I don't remember actually enjoying them? Maybe it was the graphics, maybe it just didn't hold my attention - not quite sure (might try again). Anyway, as much as I loved Aaron Taylor-Johnson & Elizabeth Olsen in Godzilla (2014), I didn't really go looking for fanfiction or other fanworks (maybe gifs on Tumblr) until Monarch. The cast is just so good, and the characters! Ugh, I love all of them and I ship like everyone (as you can see what I've iconed so far). And the fact that they have Kurt & Wyatt Russell playing the same characters but at different points of time - BRILLIANT. I think my favorite characters are probably the "core" main characters: Cate Randa, Corah "May Olowe-Hewitt" Mateo, Kentaro Randa, Keiko Miura, Bill Randa (did not expect to like that character after Kong: Skull Island!) and obviously Lee Shaw.

Also I obviously noticed back when they did Kong: Skull Island, but a lot of Marvel/MCU actors/actresses appeared in the Monsterverse and all it does is making me want them to do a Godzilla/Marvel crossover movie. They won't do it, but there is at least I think a Godzilla/Marvel comics series I think.

It's a small fandom, so there's that... but at least it exists. Anyway, let me know if you like any of the movies or like Monarch! I'd love to hear what you think or who you ship :)

profiterole_reads

Zero Happily Ever Afters by MN Bennet was amazing. It's Book 4 of Branches of Past and Future, a magic school adult book series, focused on a telepathic teacher. And there are still two books to come, so I don't know what's going to happen with the numbers in the titles.

In terms of plot, the stakes have increased a lot in this tome. I prefer less over-the-top storylines, but so far, the author has managed to keep them sufficiently grounded.

There's major m/m, which used to be m/m/m (Finn died a few years before Book 1, but we have all the flashbacks, so maybe that still counts as polyamory). The students include an m/m couple, a sapphic, an ace girl, a trans boy, an enby... And there's a trans woman among the new superheroes!

For more HP-like LGBT Books, check out my rec list.

aurumcalendula

After *mumble* hours on the WaybackMachine last night, I think I've determined the vidders for all except the Parody Intro.

They seems to be by vidders involved with the CreatiVentures, CreatiVideos, and T 4 Productions digital vidding collectives - specifically Theresa (aka T), Todd Allen, Jamester, and Angie.

(Lunacy Reviews lists Matt Savelkoul as one of the vidders for vid number 18, but I'm a bit dubious of that since the website also lists him for certain vids when the vidder's collective websites for those vids do not.)

As far as I can tell from their archived websites:

CreatiVentures = Angie, Jamester, T, and Todd Allen
CreatiVideos = Jamester & Todd Allen
T 4 Productions = Angie, Cat, Elena, and T (and later Dave)

argentum_ls

More than a year after writing it, we've finally reached the point in our schedule where I can start posting my next Matthew story, Fish or Cut Bait.

Title: Fish or Cut Bait
Summary: A new case with a personal connection to Diana Chase takes the team to a town Matthew called home a century ago. There, with Diana closely involved in the investigation, he must also determine how Talbot's newfound knowledge of his Immortality will affect their partnership and his position within the FBI.
Rating: G for now. Probably up to a T later.
Word Count: ~43,000 (when complete)
Tags: Casefic, Canon Typical Violence, Other Additional Tags to be Added

I'm ridiculously excited about this story, in part because of how long it's been waiting. I hope you all enjoy it too.

queer_scribbling

I don't want to lose this reply from the tv_talk community, but I also never tried to do episode by episode recaps because I didn't feel like I was engaging with the shows in question enough to warrant that. I have run into some people who bounced off 'Bookish' when they found out Mark Gatiss is the main lead, Mr Book. 'The Gold' ran on PBS Masterpiece in my viewing area in October and November 2025; 'Bookish' ran in January and February 2026.

"Also tried out Bookish on PBS. Not sure I'll stick with it. It seemed to have all the elements of a good story but was just dull somehow, despite its cast."

My family likes the intro, but we were kinda Eh on the season.

Contains spoilers.

On the one hand, it fits with other PBS murder solving shows in that each case only took up two episodes at a time [while watching live; streaming might combine them], so it's not like we felt it got too convoluted by juggling too many cases that were all solved in the end. On the other hand, the interaction between Mr Book, Mrs Book, and Jack between the cases was more okay than actively drawing us into the 'what is The Secret here' plotline. (Mr Book is written as a bit of an eccentric secondhand book seller, so we were expecting a certain amount of 'Mr Book will dramatically reveal his niche knowledge to solve the case at the end'.) Mr Book and Mrs Book are in an open lavender marriage, and I feel like I ought to like the element of what we see with companionship (Mr Book reading to Mrs Book in bed) and the separate bedrooms as a queerplatonic element.

However, the reveal was personally underwhelming. Jack seemed to have really grown attached to his assumption that Mrs Book might have been his mother awfully quickly, but also, he seemed to be written as the weird one who showed a glimmer of 1940s era homophobia that Mr Book and Jack's biological father were lovers. I know Jack wasn't getting the same info as the audience, but it just seemed like a moment where the Books had a 'what a shame that some people are so small-minded' reaction as an appeal to modern viewers instead of carefully broaching the subject before the big reveal so they wouldn't have been so shocked at how Jack reacted. Was Mr Book worried that Jack might tell someone? Eh, not the point, we jumped forward a few weeks, and Jack never said anything while stuck in the 'I just don't understand' stage.

"Also tried out The Gold [...]. It seems promising."

My family gave it a try because The Gold was on after something else we were already watching on PBS that night. Some of my family was technically alive for the initial Brink's-Mat robbery and ensuing trials (without paying much attention to it), but we were all mostly entertained without knowing much about the actual trials to lead us in certain directions. In some ways, it felt like a large neon sign called 1980s UK Classism 😬.

Current Mood: tired
Current Music: MyNoise - Irish Coast (Default Audio)

autobotscoutriella

Made blackberry and apple cake and mint tea tonight, for an end-of-week treat. I forgot how nice it is sometimes to feel like a little Redwall mouse after a long tiring day.

(I'd post pictures, but the lighting in my kitchen is terrible, so you'll just have to trust me when I say I burned the cake a little bit but it was still delicious.)

aurumcalendula

The Xena fanvid VHS arrived safely!

There's 30 fanvids on it (~2 hours of time in total)

Most don't have vidders listed.

I think it might be a mix of VCR and digital vids (there's some with effects and/or fanart included) and I think the tape is from sometime after 2001 (since there's footage of the finale in some vids).

Some (not all) have significant horizontal pink and green lines - I'm wondering if that's from the VHS or the footage in those vids (and/or a result of me initially having the VCR set on LP instead of SP).

I have a DVD-R of it recorded in LP quality and I'm recording one in SP quality.

( list of vids )

muccamukk

Watch on YouTube

I guess the joint tour is going well. This is the most wholesome fucking shit I've ever seen.

aurumcalendula

I was watching

killabeez's awesome Special Ops: Lioness fanvid the other day, and now I have a bit of a vidbunny for a different fandom.

Any idea if there's a cover of Can't Help Falling in Love with a similar vibe, but with a male vocalist? (there's a ton of covers of it, but I haven't found one that fits what I'm looking for yet)

autobotscoutriella

It's too early to get excited about spring...but it's warm enough I didn't need more than a raincoat this morning, and there was fog on the river, and it's going to be nice enough this afternoon that I can open up the apartment windows and air things out a little. Maybe I'll actually cook something nice tonight and sit out on the porch with dinner.

(I've seen enough from the kittens that I do NOT trust them on the porch [balcony, fenced off] without me right there to grab them. I think they can come sit out there with me if they want, though.)

mx_morden

I've had a couple of pretty busy days, but I think (I *THINK*) I can chill now. I have some more bureaucratic stuff to take care of, but it's gonna have to wait until next week (pretty sure that the office I need is open like three hours a single day each week lmao).

Now that the health stuff is on its way to being taken care of and that I finally got my new ID, all I have to do is sit my ass down and study. That's gonna take a massive amount of effort, depressingly, because my brain is fucking fried :°

Anyway, it's almost the weekend, so I can allow myself to listen to some music!

The new ERRA album, "silence outlives the earth", out today! I really enjoyed "gore of being", "further eden", and "echo sonata" when they first came out, and I'd been looking forward to this album a lot! I'm maybe halfway through my first listen and it's definitely not disappointing so far :)
(By the way, I found out ERRA did a cover of "Stockholm Syndrome" by Muse and it actually kinda slaps!)

Also, I was fucking around the list of new releases on r/metalcore and bumped into a band called "The Gloom in the Corner" and their new album "Royal Discordance", and... holy shit. I'm such a sucker for music that blends genres, and these guys mix metalcore with a kind of theatricality that in certain points reminded me of My Chemical Romance (and whoever knows anything about me at all, knows that that's the highest of praises I can give anybody lol). I need to listen to the whole album again, but man, I really, really liked it!

A bunch of random songs that are going straight into my March playlist:

ALSO!!!
Did y'all hear about the Fall Out Boy demos thing? Apparently some people are being sent CDs in the mail with a bunch of previously unreleased old FOB demos. The person from the reddit post I liked uploaded them on the Internet Archive :O
What are those dudes even up to, this time??? >_>

I'm gonna listen to some music for a bit, and then either watch the latest JJK episode or start the new documentary miniseries The Dinosaurs, because fuuuuck yeah, it's finally here! \o/

Current Music: cicada siren - ERRA

mx_morden

I'm always the last one to jump on the bandwagon and everybody probably knows this already, but I just found out about Every Noise at Once and my mind is blown. There is SO MUCH STUFF to discover on there! And it's so neatly categorized! There are previews! And lists of bands for each genre! And massive playlists! I think I'm in love ;^;

maevedarcy

( You're about to view content that the journal owner has marked as possibly inappropriate for anyone under the age of 18. )

immortalje

Ao3 had really crappy timing with their outages this week. It first went out when I wanted to read for an before heading to bed, came back online while I was asleep only to go out again right before I got up for work - and I like to read on my phone on the way to work. And then it repeated again.

Oh well, I ended up filling I don't know how many pages starting a variety of Heated Rivalry stories. Some that did blend together a bit too much to the extend I wasn't sure any more which one I was writing. Oops. I still haven't watched the show and only got at most two chapters into the first book and I'm not sure how far I want to go with only knowing canon through fics, a mix of clips, analysis videos and fan edits on youtube and absolutely no hockey knowledge whatsoever. Well, I did watch a couple of videos on Youtube explaining things and I did look up how trading works. I've expanded the narrow section of tropes I've been looking at slowly.

I'm also more than half-way through a Heated Rivalry claim on

dailyicons that I might as well have limited to Shane/Ilya. There's two icons of Svetlana that are basically the same - one with and one without text. And every now and then I curse the screencaps I downloaded because I'm scrolling up and down and not seeing the exact image I have in mind from any of the youtube videos I've seen.

Deep Conversations

at the waffle house.

Reading

Fitness Fellowship 2026: Check-in 10

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Korean practice

More Xena VHS stuff

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Not Even Close to Weekly Update, 3/8/26

Crossover Galore Challenge is now open!!

Zero Happily Ever Afters by MN Bennet

More Xena updates!

Fic: Fish or Cut Bait (Highlander: the Agent)

PBS Shows - 'Bookish' & 'The Gold'

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Xena Fanvids VHS Update!

Music Friday

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Make him submit: A sub!Derek Hale Fest

Heated Rivalry

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