(This was a placeholder post for twitter, but keeping it up for now so it's obvious to anyone who knows me from kpop fandom that it's me.)
TBZ Kiss Ficlets
2013 in Fic
Jan. 4th, 2014 01:03 pmLove Song No. 31 (Homestuck, Rose & Karkat, Rose/Kanaya, 4.4k, pesterlog quadrant meta)
30 Sentences (Various, 600 words, fills for the 3-sentence ficathon)
Something Real (One Direction, Harry/Louis, 6.5k, sixth form AU)
Morning Light (Hikaru no Go, Shindou/Touya, 1.4k, woke up together trope with no actual night-before-the-morning-after)
First Pass (Hikaru no Go, Waya/Isumi, 1.1k, outsider POV bodyswap trope)
Night Visits (Adventure Time, Marceline/Bubblegum, 2.6k, ridiculous gothic horror AU)
Knew You When (Chihayafuru, Chihaya/Shinobu, 3.9k, canon-divergence AU in which Shinobu is the one to introduce Chihaya to karuta in elementary school)
Touch Shy (Ookiku Furikabutte, Abe/Mihashi, 1.7k, near-canon future fic with ... idk tropeyness and Abe's v. earnest and methodical determination to think things through till he gets them right)
Encore (No. 6, Shion/Nezumi, 1.5k, tropey tropey reunion fic)
+ 1 fanvid: The Crow (Avengers, Clint & Natasha, brainwashing/rescue/partnership vid)
____
( Meme questions )
30 Sentences (Various, 600 words, fills for the 3-sentence ficathon)
Something Real (One Direction, Harry/Louis, 6.5k, sixth form AU)
Morning Light (Hikaru no Go, Shindou/Touya, 1.4k, woke up together trope with no actual night-before-the-morning-after)
First Pass (Hikaru no Go, Waya/Isumi, 1.1k, outsider POV bodyswap trope)
Night Visits (Adventure Time, Marceline/Bubblegum, 2.6k, ridiculous gothic horror AU)
Knew You When (Chihayafuru, Chihaya/Shinobu, 3.9k, canon-divergence AU in which Shinobu is the one to introduce Chihaya to karuta in elementary school)
Touch Shy (Ookiku Furikabutte, Abe/Mihashi, 1.7k, near-canon future fic with ... idk tropeyness and Abe's v. earnest and methodical determination to think things through till he gets them right)
Encore (No. 6, Shion/Nezumi, 1.5k, tropey tropey reunion fic)
+ 1 fanvid: The Crow (Avengers, Clint & Natasha, brainwashing/rescue/partnership vid)
____
( Meme questions )
Yuletide Reveals
Jan. 2nd, 2014 11:04 amUgh why does January 1st have to be followed by January 2nd. January 1st was really nice, I read fic and watched Camp and hung out with ![[tumblr.com profile]](https://www.tumblr.com/favicon.ico)
toujoursgai singing bits of the Sound of Music and eating ciabatta and feta and stealing all her movies. I'm the only member of my team in the office other than my manager, this sucks. ALSO one of the other editors sent round an email while I was away to say she'd just quit because she was moving to Europe for a year. MY LIFE IS SO POINTLESS.
*coughcough* anyway, so Yuletide author reveals happened. I really wanted to do treats this year, I guess, since even though I didn't get my assignment done till right before I had to go away, I then spent the next day at work plotting out two different treat ficlets, and wrote them both that night instead of packing.
Knew You When for![[archiveofourown.org profile]](https://p.dreamwidth.org/b164c54b26e4/-/archiveofourown.org/favicon.ico)
vtn
Chihayafuru | Shinobu/Chihaya | 3900 words | teen
Summary: In the last year of elementary school, one of the most promising young karuta prodigies of the decade transferred to a new school in Tokyo. From Kyoto. (Canon Divergence AU.)
Notes: Actually really hard! I find it so difficult to get a hold of Chihaya's motivations, especially. I think because she's a really internal character, but in a really non-verbal way? Maybe it would have been easier to write her from her own POV, I don't know. A Chihaya-POV would have been the more natural choice for this conceit - swapping out Arata for Shinobu as the one to teach Chihaya karuta - but Shinobu was my recipient's favourite character, so I wanted to make it her story.
Probably it just needed to be longer; canon-divergence AUs do, really. Still, I'm quite pleased with it.
Touch Shy forsoftintelligence
Ookiku Furikabutte | Abe/Mihashi | 1700 words | teen
Summary: It took Abe longer than it should have to realise that when he touched Mihashi now, Mihashi shivered and stuttered and just about fell apart.
Notes: Lol this is so shamelessly not!ficcy. I actually had a bunch of notes already, for the beginning part of it, but they were all character motivation, not story, and when I wrote the fic I essentially just threw the notes at the page and scribbled around them.
Encore for![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
eglantiere
No. 6 | Shion/Nezumi | 1500 words | teen
Summary: Shion wasn't prepared for it to be such a replica of the first time.
Notes: So zero thought and insight and originality went into this one, it was late and I was just kind of typing FEELINGS ABOUT SHION AND NEZUMI AND REUNION YES, but I think it's actually the best-formed of the three, structurally. Or at least it's my favourite, maybe. It was also fun to write for someone I know, I haven't done that in a while :)
*coughcough* anyway, so Yuletide author reveals happened. I really wanted to do treats this year, I guess, since even though I didn't get my assignment done till right before I had to go away, I then spent the next day at work plotting out two different treat ficlets, and wrote them both that night instead of packing.
Knew You When for
Chihayafuru | Shinobu/Chihaya | 3900 words | teen
Summary: In the last year of elementary school, one of the most promising young karuta prodigies of the decade transferred to a new school in Tokyo. From Kyoto. (Canon Divergence AU.)
Notes: Actually really hard! I find it so difficult to get a hold of Chihaya's motivations, especially. I think because she's a really internal character, but in a really non-verbal way? Maybe it would have been easier to write her from her own POV, I don't know. A Chihaya-POV would have been the more natural choice for this conceit - swapping out Arata for Shinobu as the one to teach Chihaya karuta - but Shinobu was my recipient's favourite character, so I wanted to make it her story.
Probably it just needed to be longer; canon-divergence AUs do, really. Still, I'm quite pleased with it.
Touch Shy for
Ookiku Furikabutte | Abe/Mihashi | 1700 words | teen
Summary: It took Abe longer than it should have to realise that when he touched Mihashi now, Mihashi shivered and stuttered and just about fell apart.
Notes: Lol this is so shamelessly not!ficcy. I actually had a bunch of notes already, for the beginning part of it, but they were all character motivation, not story, and when I wrote the fic I essentially just threw the notes at the page and scribbled around them.
Encore for
eglantiereNo. 6 | Shion/Nezumi | 1500 words | teen
Summary: Shion wasn't prepared for it to be such a replica of the first time.
Notes: So zero thought and insight and originality went into this one, it was late and I was just kind of typing FEELINGS ABOUT SHION AND NEZUMI AND REUNION YES, but I think it's actually the best-formed of the three, structurally. Or at least it's my favourite, maybe. It was also fun to write for someone I know, I haven't done that in a while :)
Yuletide Recs
Dec. 31st, 2013 11:18 amI'm probably not going to get any further through the archive before author reveals, so here are all the recs I've posted to pinboard so far.
7 slash, 6 femslash, 1 het, 1 f/m/m, 8 gen:
( Black Books, Brooklyn Nine-Nine, Calvin & Hobbes, Chihayafuru, The Church Mice, The Demon's Lexicon, Despicable Me/Hobbes & Bacon, The Lost Prince, Disney's Mulan, No. 6, Ookiku Furikabutte, Orange Is the New Black, Pacific Rim/Cloud Atlas, Slow Starter, Swallows & Amazons, Temeraire, Villette, Windows 95 Tips )
7 slash, 6 femslash, 1 het, 1 f/m/m, 8 gen:
( Black Books, Brooklyn Nine-Nine, Calvin & Hobbes, Chihayafuru, The Church Mice, The Demon's Lexicon, Despicable Me/Hobbes & Bacon, The Lost Prince, Disney's Mulan, No. 6, Ookiku Furikabutte, Orange Is the New Black, Pacific Rim/Cloud Atlas, Slow Starter, Swallows & Amazons, Temeraire, Villette, Windows 95 Tips )
yuletide yuletide yullllletideeee
Dec. 14th, 2013 08:08 pmAhaha so today is essentially the last day I had to finish my Yuletide fic, since Christmas shopping tomorrow and then flying home mid-week. I have essentially spent the last eleven hours chipping away at it, because oh my fuck what is consistent motivation and why are these characters so determined not to have any.
Anyway it is doneeeeee I have unlocked achievement: not a total car crash at yuletide for another year. I would like streamers and a small certificate with glitter on it.
I'm not currently capable of telling if it's any good, and also see previous concern re: character motivation, but I feel pretty good about it all the same. I was getting really concerned about falling down on this one.
Anyway it is doneeeeee I have unlocked achievement: not a total car crash at yuletide for another year. I would like streamers and a small certificate with glitter on it.
I'm not currently capable of telling if it's any good, and also see previous concern re: character motivation, but I feel pretty good about it all the same. I was getting really concerned about falling down on this one.
Yuletide progress
Dec. 8th, 2013 10:38 amWriting my Yuletide basically follows the same set of steps each time:
1) I'm going to do Yuletide so well this year! I think I'll write longfic. Or maybe I'll finish my assignment really early and then write treats for all the other fandoms I offered! I'm so pysched damn.
2) Look it's just 1000 words. I can do that. I can pull off something really effective in 1000 words.
3) Oh god this canon is impossible to write why didn't I realise that before I offered it.
4) That is a terrible clumsy ficlet and I am embarrassed but it's done. I should probably not add an apologetic author note. Even though I want to.
5) Ooh, positive response. Maybe it isn't irredeemably bad. It could be ... a little bit charming?
6) Why is my amazing fic not on the first page of results when you sort by kudos.
I'm in between 3 and 4 at the moment. I finally managed to get together an outline and start writing this morning, and by that I mean I have 71 words, but the psychological difference between 0 words and 71 words is pretty immense to be honest.
My deadline is 18 December, because that's when I leave the land of reliable internet, and I have to do all my xmas shopping before then, so this is honestly ... getting kind of tight. But not at total panic stations.
1) I'm going to do Yuletide so well this year! I think I'll write longfic. Or maybe I'll finish my assignment really early and then write treats for all the other fandoms I offered! I'm so pysched damn.
2) Look it's just 1000 words. I can do that. I can pull off something really effective in 1000 words.
3) Oh god this canon is impossible to write why didn't I realise that before I offered it.
4) That is a terrible clumsy ficlet and I am embarrassed but it's done. I should probably not add an apologetic author note. Even though I want to.
5) Ooh, positive response. Maybe it isn't irredeemably bad. It could be ... a little bit charming?
6) Why is my amazing fic not on the first page of results when you sort by kudos.
I'm in between 3 and 4 at the moment. I finally managed to get together an outline and start writing this morning, and by that I mean I have 71 words, but the psychological difference between 0 words and 71 words is pretty immense to be honest.
My deadline is 18 December, because that's when I leave the land of reliable internet, and I have to do all my xmas shopping before then, so this is honestly ... getting kind of tight. But not at total panic stations.
Femslashex
Nov. 14th, 2013 07:48 pmHeyyy, so ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
femslashex is open. I received:
Shinoburedo (Though I would hide it…) by Isabear (Chihayafuru | Chihaya/Shinobu | G | 4200 words)
Which is a lovely fic about meetings and half-meetings and searching for someone you don’t know.
I wrote:
Night Visits (Adventure Time | Bubblegum/Marceline | Teen | 2600 words)
Which is a ridiculous gothic horror AU. Barely an AU. Bubblegum and Marceline are so gothic horror tropey, I didn't even realise how much till I started writing this.
femslashex is open. I received:Shinoburedo (Though I would hide it…) by Isabear (Chihayafuru | Chihaya/Shinobu | G | 4200 words)
Which is a lovely fic about meetings and half-meetings and searching for someone you don’t know.
I wrote:
Night Visits (Adventure Time | Bubblegum/Marceline | Teen | 2600 words)
Which is a ridiculous gothic horror AU. Barely an AU. Bubblegum and Marceline are so gothic horror tropey, I didn't even realise how much till I started writing this.
(no subject)
Nov. 2nd, 2013 06:24 pmI finished my femslashex fic today! Thirty seconds ago, actually. It's been mostly finished for hours, but the last couple of hundred words have been all inching-forward-a-sentence-at-a-time, trying to find a wrap point. The ending is still a little abrupt and needs some finessing, probably, but it is an ending. I could post the fic right now if I had to.
That probably means I should start the canon review for my Yuletide.Or do the adapted Nano thing that I'm not going to talk about because it's already the 2nd and I might not do it.
Maybe I'll just bask in completion glory for a bit instead.
__________________
Favourite fanwork from the past week:
The Pontic Rapport: or The Curious Cousins by russian_blue (Sorcery and Cecelia | 4300 words | G)
This is a freaking jaeger pilots AU for Sorcery and Cecelia. I came out of Pacific Rim absolutely positive that there were going to be a million PR AUs for fandoms like Teen Wolf and Supernatural and Avengers before I even got home, but I didn't think anyone would do something as cool as this. The style is excellent - epistolary like the books - and the worldbuilding is wonderful. Steampunk magical fusion jaegers and a kaiju war in the age of limited information and highly patriotic and filtered media coverage, damn yes.
femslashex fic today! Thirty seconds ago, actually. It's been mostly finished for hours, but the last couple of hundred words have been all inching-forward-a-sentence-at-a-time, trying to find a wrap point. The ending is still a little abrupt and needs some finessing, probably, but it is an ending. I could post the fic right now if I had to.That probably means I should start the canon review for my Yuletide.
Maybe I'll just bask in completion glory for a bit instead.
__________________
Favourite fanwork from the past week:
The Pontic Rapport: or The Curious Cousins by russian_blue (Sorcery and Cecelia | 4300 words | G)
This is a freaking jaeger pilots AU for Sorcery and Cecelia. I came out of Pacific Rim absolutely positive that there were going to be a million PR AUs for fandoms like Teen Wolf and Supernatural and Avengers before I even got home, but I didn't think anyone would do something as cool as this. The style is excellent - epistolary like the books - and the worldbuilding is wonderful. Steampunk magical fusion jaegers and a kaiju war in the age of limited information and highly patriotic and filtered media coverage, damn yes.
The thing about Person of Interest is that I really, really like almost every single thing about it, except the main character.
Which is a problem. And the reason it's taken me so long to finish watching season 1. (I currently have the finale paused, because attention spans are for people without laptops.)
And it's not even Reese's fault, really. As representations of his trope go, he's a good one. It's just that his trope - the insanely competent, unassailably confident white male superman - has been shoved down my throat as an admirable hero in too much media over the course of my life for me to have any patience for it at all.
( More )
Whoops, apparently this is a "shows fandom loves that I have issues with" series. Next up: Night Vale! (Not really, I love Night Vale.)
_________________
Favourite fanwork from this week:
I'm already on the topic, so this piece of Night Vale as a dating sim fanart byajmartinsson, which is freaking adorable in an appropriately creepy way. I don't dating sim but I'm kind of fascinated by the idea, and I would definitely play this one if it existed.
Which is a problem. And the reason it's taken me so long to finish watching season 1. (I currently have the finale paused, because attention spans are for people without laptops.)
And it's not even Reese's fault, really. As representations of his trope go, he's a good one. It's just that his trope - the insanely competent, unassailably confident white male superman - has been shoved down my throat as an admirable hero in too much media over the course of my life for me to have any patience for it at all.
( More )
Whoops, apparently this is a "shows fandom loves that I have issues with" series. Next up: Night Vale! (Not really, I love Night Vale.)
_________________
Favourite fanwork from this week:
I'm already on the topic, so this piece of Night Vale as a dating sim fanart by
(no subject)
Oct. 19th, 2013 04:27 pmYuletide assignment! My recipient has asked for pretty much exactly the kind of fic I was hoping for when I offered the fandom we matched on. I will probably still have trouble with it, because writing for a new canon is always difficult, but right now I'm so pleased. I'm really glad this is the story I'll be doing.
I've also got the canon for one of my recipient's other requests open in a tab, because it sounds cool. I'm not at all likely to switch, because I'm excited to write the fandom we matched on, but I love finding new things through DYT letters.
I've also got the canon for one of my recipient's other requests open in a tab, because it sounds cool. I'm not at all likely to switch, because I'm excited to write the fandom we matched on, but I love finding new things through DYT letters.
(no subject)
Oct. 18th, 2013 07:29 pmDamn, is it time to get Yuletide assignments yet? I'll just sit here and fidget, then.
I made a resolution that I was at least going to get myfemslashex fic started before I got my YT assignment, so I wrote 750 words last weekend. Then I triumphantly stopped working on it entirely, whoops.
Favourite fanwork from this week:
The Not Remotely Secret Memoirs of Alexander the Great, Aged 13¾ byarysteia (Classical History RPF | Alexander/Hephaistion | 3300 words | teen)
I'm trying to read the last of last year's Yuletide fics that I have bookmarked, and this one turned out to be a delight. I don't know a lot about Alexander the Great, except that apparently he used to earnestly debate whether Achilles or Patroklos topped? And I could believe that of this Alexander.
I made a resolution that I was at least going to get my
femslashex fic started before I got my YT assignment, so I wrote 750 words last weekend. Then I triumphantly stopped working on it entirely, whoops.Favourite fanwork from this week:
The Not Remotely Secret Memoirs of Alexander the Great, Aged 13¾ by
I'm trying to read the last of last year's Yuletide fics that I have bookmarked, and this one turned out to be a delight. I don't know a lot about Alexander the Great, except that apparently he used to earnestly debate whether Achilles or Patroklos topped? And I could believe that of this Alexander.
2 Hikago Ficlets
Oct. 17th, 2013 09:25 pmSo a million years ago I asked for prompts to write ficlets! And then I got stalled on an unwritable prompt, so I only ended up writing two, both Hikaru no Go.
Tonight I finally got around to uploading the second one to AO3, so:
Morning Light
Shindou/Touya, 1400 words, PG
Akira has never woken up with no knowledge of how he got to bed before. (Woke up together prompt!)
First Pass
Isumi/Waya, 1100 words, G
Isumi comes home to find Shindou sitting on his front steps, scowling in a weirdly un-Shindou-ish way. (Bodyswap prompt!)
It is retrospectively a little hilarious how diligently I avoided the actual point of both of these tropes.
Tonight I finally got around to uploading the second one to AO3, so:
Morning Light
Shindou/Touya, 1400 words, PG
Akira has never woken up with no knowledge of how he got to bed before. (Woke up together prompt!)
First Pass
Isumi/Waya, 1100 words, G
Isumi comes home to find Shindou sitting on his front steps, scowling in a weirdly un-Shindou-ish way. (Bodyswap prompt!)
It is retrospectively a little hilarious how diligently I avoided the actual point of both of these tropes.
Dear Yuletider
Oct. 9th, 2013 06:43 pmHi, thank you for writing a story for me!
( Generally )
The rest of the letter is identical to the optional details in my sign-up, except for an extra paragraph for Disney Princesses.
( Chihayafuru, Church Mice, Disney Princesses, Gate 7, Gunnerkrigg Court, No. 6 )
( Generally )
The rest of the letter is identical to the optional details in my sign-up, except for an extra paragraph for Disney Princesses.
( Chihayafuru, Church Mice, Disney Princesses, Gate 7, Gunnerkrigg Court, No. 6 )
(no subject)
Oct. 8th, 2013 08:09 pmWhoa, how on earth did the swimming anime make it into Yuletide? There are over nine hundred fics at AO3, and about a dozen new stories uploaded every day.
I mean, I'm ... pleased? The world can go ahead and give me extra Free! fic any day it likes. But baffled. Maybe it got more leniency than most because it's the first year of eligibility.
Back to agonising over my sign-up, I guess.
I mean, I'm ... pleased? The world can go ahead and give me extra Free! fic any day it likes. But baffled. Maybe it got more leniency than most because it's the first year of eligibility.
Back to agonising over my sign-up, I guess.
I have five and a half thousand words of Shingeki no Kyojin space AU now, which hasn't even so much been a WIP as I thing I pick up and use to scribble about impossible space monsters every now and then. But I've written pretty much everything I had in my head now, and it's really just missing an ending, which ... I can almost feel what it should be? So I should work it out soon. It's all feelings now, though, and no monster battles or world building, so it takes actual concentration. And I'm not even sure it's worth it, because ... gosh, this fic is so 'splainey.
I think this kind of excessive worldbuilding could actually be id-fic for me. There's something that's satisfying on kind of a soul-deep level about writing internal monologuey world exposition, even when I know it's bad for the story. Anyway, maybe I'll just call this a fic for me, and let other people make of it what they like. If I ever write that ending.
( Hey, excerpt )
*
I got myfemslashex assignment, and at first glance it's really doable. I got matched on two of my fandoms, plus a third that I didn't offer but could easily write. Then I spent a week casting about wanly for any ideas at all.
I think maybe I have an idea I like now, I don't know, I'm a bit nervous about the pairing I've chosen. I think they might be one of those superficially easy but actually fiendishly difficult pairs full of deceptively enticing wrong turnings, like Rose/Kanaya. Possibly I'll still switch fandoms and try something else. Since options.
*
I've been learning Japanese - with assorted books and internet resources and Anki flashcards which, wow, Anki, I adore - for the last month or so, and I'm enjoying it so much, it's ridiculous. I guess I'd forgotten how satisfying it is to learn things, and a language is so brilliantly, I don't know, enclosed, as an area of study. Like, it's a huge amount to learn, but you can feel its edges, too, and you can really track your progress through it, it feels so objectively measurable.
I have a vocabulary of about 250 words, now, and a handful of polite verb tenses and particle usages, and I'm hoping next chapter will give me either adjective conjugations or plain-form verbs, because those are super mysterious at the moment. Like I think you use both polite and plain forms in the same sentence, maybe? Things I will probably find out soon! Excite.
I also have over a hundred kanji now, which, I'm finally getting to the stage where I look at new characters I want to learn and I already know parts of them, a lot of the time, which is so exciting for me. They just feel like gifts, like getting kanji for free.
I obviously can't really read actual things, yet, but it is making the pecularities of manga scanlations a lot more understandable. The other day I came across the ridiculous exchange "Thank you." "No, no need to apologise" in a scanlation, and I was so pleased to remember that sumimasen can mean either thanks or sorry. I mean who knows, maybe that wasn't even the translation, but that kind of thing still feels like suddenly getting to see a little further in than before. Like a language is a huge green valley obscured by a thick white mist you get occasional glimpses through.
Basically my goal, in so far as I'm letting myself have a goal, is to get as competent as I am in Spanish. So not at all a fluent speaker, but able to read, if I don't mind taking my time, and able to get by in a simple conversation if the person I'm speaking to is patient. Spanish took three years of university, but I think I'm a lot better at basic language acquisition skills than I was then, so even without the formal structure I think I can move more quickly than that. We'll see, there's no practical necessity behind it, so if I lose momentum that will be OK too.
*
Favourite fanwork from this week:
Down to You bylongleggedgit (Free! | Nagisa/Rei | 4800 words | teen)
It's the first actually good Nagisa/Rei fic I've come across, and damn I hope it's the first of many, because they're such a great ship. I'm still waiting on a fic that really uses the way Nagisa teases Rei in canon, but this is a terribly appealing picture of them all the same. I really like how warm it feels, how warm Nagisa's voice is, even though the irrepressibility is the more obvious characteristic.
I think this kind of excessive worldbuilding could actually be id-fic for me. There's something that's satisfying on kind of a soul-deep level about writing internal monologuey world exposition, even when I know it's bad for the story. Anyway, maybe I'll just call this a fic for me, and let other people make of it what they like. If I ever write that ending.
( Hey, excerpt )
*
I got my
femslashex assignment, and at first glance it's really doable. I got matched on two of my fandoms, plus a third that I didn't offer but could easily write. Then I spent a week casting about wanly for any ideas at all. I think maybe I have an idea I like now, I don't know, I'm a bit nervous about the pairing I've chosen. I think they might be one of those superficially easy but actually fiendishly difficult pairs full of deceptively enticing wrong turnings, like Rose/Kanaya. Possibly I'll still switch fandoms and try something else. Since options.
*
I've been learning Japanese - with assorted books and internet resources and Anki flashcards which, wow, Anki, I adore - for the last month or so, and I'm enjoying it so much, it's ridiculous. I guess I'd forgotten how satisfying it is to learn things, and a language is so brilliantly, I don't know, enclosed, as an area of study. Like, it's a huge amount to learn, but you can feel its edges, too, and you can really track your progress through it, it feels so objectively measurable.
I have a vocabulary of about 250 words, now, and a handful of polite verb tenses and particle usages, and I'm hoping next chapter will give me either adjective conjugations or plain-form verbs, because those are super mysterious at the moment. Like I think you use both polite and plain forms in the same sentence, maybe? Things I will probably find out soon! Excite.
I also have over a hundred kanji now, which, I'm finally getting to the stage where I look at new characters I want to learn and I already know parts of them, a lot of the time, which is so exciting for me. They just feel like gifts, like getting kanji for free.
I obviously can't really read actual things, yet, but it is making the pecularities of manga scanlations a lot more understandable. The other day I came across the ridiculous exchange "Thank you." "No, no need to apologise" in a scanlation, and I was so pleased to remember that sumimasen can mean either thanks or sorry. I mean who knows, maybe that wasn't even the translation, but that kind of thing still feels like suddenly getting to see a little further in than before. Like a language is a huge green valley obscured by a thick white mist you get occasional glimpses through.
Basically my goal, in so far as I'm letting myself have a goal, is to get as competent as I am in Spanish. So not at all a fluent speaker, but able to read, if I don't mind taking my time, and able to get by in a simple conversation if the person I'm speaking to is patient. Spanish took three years of university, but I think I'm a lot better at basic language acquisition skills than I was then, so even without the formal structure I think I can move more quickly than that. We'll see, there's no practical necessity behind it, so if I lose momentum that will be OK too.
*
Favourite fanwork from this week:
Down to You by
It's the first actually good Nagisa/Rei fic I've come across, and damn I hope it's the first of many, because they're such a great ship. I'm still waiting on a fic that really uses the way Nagisa teases Rei in canon, but this is a terribly appealing picture of them all the same. I really like how warm it feels, how warm Nagisa's voice is, even though the irrepressibility is the more obvious characteristic.
kudostest things
Sep. 27th, 2013 03:53 pmSo I've been updating the ![[pinboard.in profile]](https://p.dreamwidth.org/c3508662f31c/-/pinboard.in/favicon.ico)
kudostest pinboard eight months now (bookmarking all new AO3 femslash with a 10%+ kudos/hitcount ratio). Here are some things that I've learned:
1) Dangan Ronpa has an f/f ship that the fandom refers to as Despaircest. I don't know what to do with how weirdly appealing that sounds to me. Although I haven't reached the tipping point and actually checked out the visual novel yet.
2) Teen Wolf and Avengers are pretty much the only femslash-friendly fandoms that pinboard is into. Those fics are the only ones that will already have notes when I save them.
3) Once Upon a Time is a fucking monster of a femslash fandom, and I have no idea where the fandom even lives. I only ever see OUaT mentioned in passing in my corners of DW and Tumblr, by people who like it but don't fic, but somewhere there is a community of people churning out 100k Regina/Emma epics every day and twice on Sundays. Despite the fact that the ship is built on hate UST, and Regina's canonical character tag includes the words "Evil Queen", they are almost all about Regina being brave and misunderstood while everybody except Emma is mean to her.
4) OUaT is also super into ship portmanteaus, but they're all kind of charmingly evocative and none of them are smushnames, so on the whole I tentatively approve. Snow Queen (Emma Snow/Evil Queen Regina) is the most common, but I've also seen Sleeping Warrior for Aurora/Mulan, and a bunch of Ruby ships along the lines of Red Queen, Red Snow etc.
5) Despite all the attention they've gotten, there's still very little fic for Orphan Black and Orange Is the New Black.
6) There is a person who has been writing a Judi Dench/Fandom Insert Character series for five months now.
7) I have no idea how the Marvel and DC universes work or how to tag them. I sort of thought I would start to get a sense for the interconnecting sub-canons, but noooooo.
8) Fic summaries make RWBY sound so exactly like my kind of thing. I wish I liked the animation style enough to watch more than an episode.
9) There is apparently no better character name for the playable video game characters where you can choose their gender than e.g. 'Female Hawke'. It took me ages to work out whether this was a name or a Rule 63 tag.
10) If I've never heard of a fandom, it is almost definitely a video game. If I've seen something mentioned on tumblr that I assumed was an anime, that's also a video game.
11) There are kind of a lot of video game fandoms.
____
So I missed last week because I wrote a Dear Femslashex Letter instead (apparently ... two posts a week is not possible for me?), but here's my favourite fanwork encountered this week:
Home by Harukami
It's No. 6 again, and Nezumi/Shion again, and it's what I basically want 90% of all No. 6 fic to be: a complicated but happy reunion preceded by thousands of words of being lonely, and painfully, epically missing each other. Thank you I will take twelve hundred.
Also Shion talks to mice.
1) Dangan Ronpa has an f/f ship that the fandom refers to as Despaircest. I don't know what to do with how weirdly appealing that sounds to me. Although I haven't reached the tipping point and actually checked out the visual novel yet.
2) Teen Wolf and Avengers are pretty much the only femslash-friendly fandoms that pinboard is into. Those fics are the only ones that will already have notes when I save them.
3) Once Upon a Time is a fucking monster of a femslash fandom, and I have no idea where the fandom even lives. I only ever see OUaT mentioned in passing in my corners of DW and Tumblr, by people who like it but don't fic, but somewhere there is a community of people churning out 100k Regina/Emma epics every day and twice on Sundays. Despite the fact that the ship is built on hate UST, and Regina's canonical character tag includes the words "Evil Queen", they are almost all about Regina being brave and misunderstood while everybody except Emma is mean to her.
4) OUaT is also super into ship portmanteaus, but they're all kind of charmingly evocative and none of them are smushnames, so on the whole I tentatively approve. Snow Queen (Emma Snow/Evil Queen Regina) is the most common, but I've also seen Sleeping Warrior for Aurora/Mulan, and a bunch of Ruby ships along the lines of Red Queen, Red Snow etc.
5) Despite all the attention they've gotten, there's still very little fic for Orphan Black and Orange Is the New Black.
6) There is a person who has been writing a Judi Dench/Fandom Insert Character series for five months now.
7) I have no idea how the Marvel and DC universes work or how to tag them. I sort of thought I would start to get a sense for the interconnecting sub-canons, but noooooo.
8) Fic summaries make RWBY sound so exactly like my kind of thing. I wish I liked the animation style enough to watch more than an episode.
9) There is apparently no better character name for the playable video game characters where you can choose their gender than e.g. 'Female Hawke'. It took me ages to work out whether this was a name or a Rule 63 tag.
10) If I've never heard of a fandom, it is almost definitely a video game. If I've seen something mentioned on tumblr that I assumed was an anime, that's also a video game.
11) There are kind of a lot of video game fandoms.
____
So I missed last week because I wrote a Dear Femslashex Letter instead (apparently ... two posts a week is not possible for me?), but here's my favourite fanwork encountered this week:
Home by Harukami
It's No. 6 again, and Nezumi/Shion again, and it's what I basically want 90% of all No. 6 fic to be: a complicated but happy reunion preceded by thousands of words of being lonely, and painfully, epically missing each other. Thank you I will take twelve hundred.
Also Shion talks to mice.
