The Kid called me last night at 12:50-something just to check on me, how I was prepared for the coming blizzard. Why did she call that late? "You don't work". *sigh* We had a nice talk though.

Woke up with the alarm at 10:00, dozed off and on til 11:30, finally got out of bed. Had breakfast and coffee, and went to the Starsky and Hutch Creative Work session.

I actually did some writing in something that I know more-or-less where it's going and therefore can actually finish. The Zoom worked perfectly, btw.

Anyway, we chatted til a little after 6:00. At 7:00 I Teamed the FWiB and that worked perfectly too, except that every now and then the video and audio would freeze up for a few seconds and he'd have to repeat something he said.

At 8:30 I called Middle Brother. He's fine, nothing new. We're starting to talk about his birthday.

The FWiB and I talked a few more minutes after I got off the phone with Middle Brother, then we got off and I had dinner.

After dinner I went to the bedroom and called mashfanficchick and we had talked for awhile. Then I got online on my phone and ordered two books for Middle Brother's birthday from Thriftbooks, one on New York City and one on weather, which is what he asked for, as well as Niagara Falls. He also want a cd named Low Riders, but there's to many things with that name. I'll have to try and get more info from him.

The snow was falling pretty hard the last time I looked, and the city has implemented a ban on driving except for emergencies.

That's pretty much all.

Gratitude List:

1. The FWiB.

2. I don't have to go out in the blizzard.

3. The Starsky and Hutch fandom.

4. Middle Brother is fine.

5. Thrift Books.

6. New story in the works,

Just a little though. It was the Flushing Lunar New Year Parade today, and I knew that would make getting to my meeting harder, so I got up 15 minutes early.

I had breakfast and coffee, showered and dressed, and went to look for where my 28 bus wuol be rerouted to. I went to the regular stop, even when it was obvious it wasn't there, in the hopes there would be a sign saying where it was. Ha!

No sign, but a police officer directing traffic who knew, so I was able to find it. I got the bus to my meeting and got there just on time.

The meeting was very good. Afterward as usual I went to the diner, driven by S. Today was a soup day, I just felt like a bowl of cream of turkey soup. I also got an order of onion rings, which I should not have done, but they were very good. And a cup of tea.

Then I took the bus home as usual. The 12 also was rerouted for the parade, but my stop was only a little bit moved. I got home and tried to get to the Starsky and Hutch chat.

I got in with the Zoom, but then I made the mistake of clicking on something in the chat, and it froze up. I had to restart the computer finally to get back in, and I used my phone for awhile while I was working on the computer. But after that it worked OK.

We ended a bit after 6:00 and at 7:00 I tried to team the FWiB.once again there were technical difficulties caused apparently by the app, as both of our computers had problems with it. He [honed and we talked while he worked on his computer. Eventually he Teamed on his iPad instead. Then, when we were saying goodbye, the teams just crashed for both of us.

After that i had dinner, and went to the bedroom to play solitaire.

The Kid FINALLY texted me to say she was alive, just busy. *sigh*

I fed the pets, and now am here.

Gratitude List:

1. The FWiB.

2. My meetings and the people there.

3. My pets.

4. Sunny weather before the blizzard expected this weekend.

5. Soup.

6. The Starsky and Hutch fandom.

What is my favorite place in the world?

God. Uh. Hmm.

I want to toss some far-flung locales on here, but I haven't been there in over twenty years and God only knows if they're still nice, so. I guess we'll go with the places I have known well and loved.

It's a toss-up between:

The Salt Lake City Public Library, at least as I remember it circa 2010 (which, God, was a long time ago...!) — I went to a bunch of poetry readings etc here and always loved it and felt very in my element whenever I was there, and the rooftop garden is super neat.

Cape Perpetua, because it's fucking beautiful.

Swan Lake, Montana, because I spent just about every childhood here from the time I was 4 to the time I was 14.

Mesa Verde, because it's just fucking cool.

SF MoMA, because I adore it and have a lot of great memories of visiting different exhibits there (for several years in a row I had business stuff that took me to San Francisco at least once if not twice a year, and I always hit up SF MoMA when I went).

Anyway yes, I am Indecisive, you are welcome :D

A favorite or hilarious story from the TTRPG table?

Oh, God, there are so many little moments that are burned into my brain, but I think the one I have to talk about is the Desk Goat.

( Beneath the jump. )

I will say that the other "favorite" moments I have are all ones that had pretty serious story consequences, etc, and so aren't particularly funny (or easy to explain). Think along the lines of deciding to redeem villains, challenging certain narrative assumptions about where stuff was going (and forcing me to pivot on a dime, ha), etc.

Technically, the players becoming attached to and deciding to redeem one specific villain is what led to the weird poly romance novel I (mostly) wrote last year, but...yeah.

(I say "mostly" because shadaras was there the entire time and most of the worldbuilding etc was stuff done in tandem as, wouldn't it be fun if..., so though the prose is like 95% mine, the story is definitely a collaborative effort.)

Which may have been because I slept til 2:00 pm, if you recall. But anyway, I slept badly in the night, woke up several times. was awake for a long time and as a result of all of this am now rather tired.

But mashfanficchick and I both got up around 1:00ish and puttered around, then had cereal for brunch somewhat after 2:00.

Then we watched another episode of MacGyver, which continues to be silly but fun. When that was over I went and showered and dressed, and by the time I finished it was almost 5:00 and time for me to go to the Bronx for my Al-anon meeting.

I took the subway to Flushing and the 50 bus from there and got to the Bronx by 6:15, so I had time to get my traditional pizza for dinner.

The meeting was small, just me and L, and we cancelled the second meeting so I got to the bus just before 8:00.

Got home before 9:00, and Teamed the FWiB. I had an awful lot of trouble getting Teams to log in on the computer, so we used the phone until I did and then we switched to that, and it worked OK.

That's about all, we talked til a bit after 10:00, and then I started catching up on the internet.

One thing I did was check my Funko order status. It now says the package was lost. Nothing about sending a new one. I will contact them tomorrow.

I also called the Kid, she didn't pick up of course so I texted. Hopefully she'll either call or text back.

I made Facebook contact with Liz M, the very old friend I sent a Christmas card to! She accepted my friend request, haven't heard anything from her yet though.

Gratitude List:

1. The FWiB.

2. Fun TV.

3. Found Liz M without even looking, she just popped up on my "you may know" thing.

4. My meetings and the people there.

5. Got back home and everything was OK.

6. Bed soon.

Was woken up early by the sound of the work they were doing on the building front entrance, but after they finished, went back to sleep for quite a few hours. Woke up again around 2:00.

Had breakfast, well, brunch really, with mashfanficchick. We had gluten free sourdough bread with cream cheese and lox. Very delicious.

mashfanficchick, having had melatonin the night before, which affected zer very strongly, went back to bed, but I stayed up and puttered on my phone and played solitaire and basically killed time til 7:00 when I Teamed the FWiB on my phone. Teams was working correctly today so that's good.

We talked til almost 8:30, when we got off, and I called Middle Brother, who is fine, but hasn't done anything of note recently.

Then mashfanficchick got up and we had some snacks, and watched this week's episode of Will Trent. That was highly enjoyable.

Then, after some thinking about what we should do next, mashfanficchick suggested we should watch something classic that I had never watched when it was on, that we had discussed some days ago... MacGyver. The original, from 1985, show.

So we watched the pilot episode on Tubi, and although it was sort of silly it was also fun. We had dinner after that, and discussed if we would watch more. I said sure.

So after dinner we watched the second episode on Tubi, which was even sillier than the first, but still a lot of fun.

And then ze decided to go to bed, and I'm borrowing the laptop to do this.

Gratitude List:

1. The FWiB.

2. Middle Brother is well.

3. Good TV.

4. TV that is more fun than good.

5. M&Ms, which I've been nibbling on.

6. Days away from home to relax.

Tabletop goals for the year?

In no particular order:

1). Finish the Bounty Hunter's Guild and give it a satisfying ending.
2). Run and wrap Goodbye My Darling.
3). Start the long-form Eberron campaign (name TBD).
4). Finish Space Heist and get it on itch.io, even if it's only as a public beta or something, because IT HAS BEEN LONG ENOUGH.

That's nice and concise, I think? :D

Will say that I do have a brief update re: sourdough — I made a successful starter and yesterday, I baked bread with it for the first time. Nothing fancy; I made two regular boules. The prove on it could probably have been a bit better, but dang, y'all, it tasted great. :D I ate sourdough toast this morning and it was everything I wanted. 10/10, would do again. ♥ So that's one thing crossed off my, "I want to try to do this" list, and now that I've done it the straight way, I can start playing with different flours and such (want to incorporate a bit of rye into it, for flavor), start thinking about inclusions, etc. I had this amazing fruit and nut bread at one point that I kinda want to try remaking...was like, walnut with dried cranberries? so, yeah.

We shall see!

When did you last . . .

1. Scrounge for change (couch, ashtray, etc.) to make a purchase?

2. Visit a dentist?

3. Make a needed change to your life?

4. Decide on a complete menu well in advance of the evening meal?

5. Spend part of the day (other than daily hygiene) totally/mostly naked?

Copy and paste to your own journal, then reply to this post with a link to your answers. If your journal is private or friends-only, you can post your full answers in the comments below.

If you'd like to suggest questions for a future Friday Five, then do so on DreamWidth or LiveJournal. Old sets that were used have been deleted, so we encourage you to suggest some more!

Got up this morning at 11:00 and had breakfast and coffee. Then I showered and dressed, and went into Flushing to get my three prescriptions filled. Nothing of particular interest happened on the trip, the rain had stopped and it was grey and damp.

I got back and put in a Shipt order. I got an Easter basket and some candy, and Easter grass for the basket for Middle Brother. Easter isn't until April though so I'll hold off on anything else til later.

I looked at HP's page but decided not to do anything at the moment. Yes I know I need to investigate the computer warranty but not yet.

mashfanficchick called me and told me about a situation with her building that lead us to the conclusion that it would be sensible for me to go over to zer place tonight after my D&D game and spend two nights until Friday rather than going over Thursday. So that's what we arranged.

At 7:00 I Teamed the FWiB and we had very serious technical issues, but, amazingly, caused by the Teams app, rather than my computer. We know this because the problems were on both our computers, and persisted even when I switched to my phone. Bah humbug. We never had these issues with Skype, why'd they have to go and eliminate it?

Anyway, at 8:00 I went to my D&D game, and, also amazingly, Discord worked fine, though I did keep my camera off so as to not put any more stress on it. We fought orcs and goblins, and got accused of passing counterfeit gold pieces.

Then I fed the pets and gave Oreo a day extra, and then Ubered here. We had dinner, and hung out for awhile and then I borrowed this laptop and started here.

Gratitude List:

1. The FWiB.

2. Got my meds.

3. Shipt.

4. My gaming group.

5. The computer worked for the game.

6. Visit with a friend.

Fiber arts project I've finished that I'm most proud of?

There's two that I'm really proud of, honestly — the rainbow afghan (pictures of which have been lost to time, alas), which was a queen-sized afghan I made from these blocks. It was, literally, red/orange/yellow/green/blue/indigo/violet flowers, yellow-centered with black edging about them to set it off (instead of white as in that pattern).

My ex pressed on me to give it to his mom, since she was going through a hard time, and so I parted with it and we shipped it to her. I have mixed feelings about that — on the one hand, it was so much work and it was really pretty (I made it all from thrifted yarn; it was jewel-toned and beautiful), but on the other hand, I don't tend to keep stuff I make, so who knows where it would have ended up otherwise? She was grateful to get it, so.

The other one that I'm very proud of is a cross-stitch project I did earlier this summer. It was the first time I'd actually cross-stitched anything in about five years, and I did it without a proper pattern (I did get instructions on how to do the worms and the dragon, but, you know). Pictures of it are up on Mastodon, so here. Perfect? Definitely not, but the person it was made for appreciated it, and I am still proud of it, so. ♥

I am writing this on the same computer so hopefully it'll keep working.

I got up at 9:30 this morning, after being woken up by Duane Reade calling to remind me I had prescriptions to pick up, my psychiatric meds. That was at a bit after 9 and I lay in bed awhile then decided to get up.

I had breakfast and coffee. Then I looked into why, when I requested a refill of my cholesterol med on the 10th, I hadn't heard anything about it. I called the office, the refill was still listed as pending and the woman I spoke to said she'd send a reminder to my doctor.

Then I took a shower and washed my hair, and then I called mashfanficchick about the Best Buy trip. We decided to meet at 2:30 so I puttered online an moved two more things to the external hard drive til 1:30 when I packed up the computer and left.

It's Lunar New Year (Happy New Year to anyone celebrating) so I was expecting it to be very busy and crowded in Flushing, but it wasn't actually. I took the 20 bus to the 48 and then met mashfanficchick at Dunkin' Donuts. While I was waiting I had a very interesting espresso drink, mocha and raspberry, and a Boston Cream donut. Very tasty.

So when mashfanficchick got there we did lunch at the Japanese place, their three roll sushi special as usual. Then we heaed to Best Buy by bus.

Got there pretty quick, but as I said, no joy. I didn't buy their protection plan, and I passed the return period in September. So I have to try with HP. I will start looking into that tomorrow.

So after that we went to Aldi, where I got a thing of port wine cheese spread, and then we got fancy tea at Gong Cha.

I had gotten a text from Duane Reade that my other prescription was no ready, and I was of two minds if I should stop on the way home and pick up everything. But it was late, so I just took the bus all the way home. I'm planning on going tomorrow morning. Or early afternoon.

I got home just in time to set up the computer and, with trepidation, try Teaming the FWiB. To our joy, it worked this time.

Then my Al-anon meeting by Zoom, I was very worried about, after the debacles on Saturday and Sunday, but that worked out fine too.

So after that i had a little of the port wine cheese, and went to the bedroom to play solitaire til pet feeding time.

So that was the day.

Gratitude List:

1. The FWiB.

2. The computer worked today.

3. Sushi.

4. mashfanficchick

5. Got the cholesterol med done.

6. Warmer weather.

(Day 16 was technically due YESTERDAY and I WILL DO IT, I just have a lot of thoughts on writing!)

1-5 novels/series I've read that I think other people should read so I can talk about them

Ha. Um. Hmmm.

This is always fun because it's like, "what DO I want other people to read, that isn't something they've already read?"

So!

A couple of pitches 'cos, you know, yeah.

1). Sunshine, by Robin McKinley. This is always one of those ones where it's like, "I feel like people were told to read it and bounced hard off the premise", because it came out when "vampires" was still "Anne Rice" and pre-Twilight. Post-Twilight (and I guess to some extent the Sookie Stackhouse books?), we're all kind of burnt out on 'em, and yet.

Sunshine — or Rae, to her friends — is a baker in the coffee house that's owned by her stepdad, Charlie. In a world where vampires, demons, and weres are common, she's about as normal as you can get. High school graduate by the "skin of her teeth", as she puts it, she's not exactly a deep thinker. A huge introvert with a desire for nothing more than to be left alone, the coffee house is her life, and she sees nothing wrong with that.

...until, you know, she's kidnapped by vampires to be used as an object of torment for a different vampire, and has to tap on the heritage granted to her by her extremely powerful sorcerer father to escape.

In other books I feel like this would turn into something where she learns to "embrace her dark self" or whatever, but no — she really does just want to go back to the coffee house and keep on Doing The Thing.

Alas, alack, the world has other opinions — and the vampires who nabbed her are very curious how the hell it is that she managed to escape...and why it is she took their other (vampire) prisoner with her.

2). Mudlark, by Lara Maiklem. Nonfiction. If you have no idea what mudlarking is, you need to read this. If you do know what it is, you should probably already have read it, and if you haven't, well, what are you waiting for?

(I know, I know, that's a hell of a review, and yet. I'm not wrong!)

3). Ombria in Shadow, Patricia McKillip. People who know me are probably going, "??" at the idea that I'm not recommending you read Riddle-Master; that's fine.

Ombria in Shadow opens with a death: the rule of Ombria, Royce Greve, has died, and a woman of unknown relation, Dominia Pearl, is taking over as regent for his heir. As her first act, she tosses Lydea, Royce's mistress, into the streets of Ombria.

This could be the beginning of some kind of weird revenge/redemption arc, but that's not where it goes.

Lydea is capable and clever, sure, and there is someone else who people want to see on the throne of Ombria, but there's multiple things at play, multiple factions at work, and much to consider going on beneath the surface. The politics are fun, the magic is wonderful, and the ending is entirely unexpected. It's lyrical and beautiful and I love it so. Finding a signed copy at a used bookstore was one of the best unexpected gifts I've ever gotten from the universe.

4). Strong Poison, Dorothy Sayers. It's in the public domain now! You really have no excuse not to read it. Er.

Warnings for the usual period-typical stuff to the side (and Sayers is not as bad as most), it's a book about a murder trial — specifically, murder by arsenic — that's laid out rather well and plotted in a way that's quite fun. It's dated as hell, of course, being as it came out in the 1930s, but it's fun, the characters are likable, and the plot itself is quite good.

Also I find that if people read it and like it, I can convince them to read Have His Carcasse and Gaudy Night, which are, I think, two of the best ones. :)


I think that's it, though of course I imagine shadaras will pop up and remind me about all the books I have been like, "?! you haven't read THAT?" at them about, so watch this space? :P

No one is quite sure what President's Day is for, but whatever, it was today. I went back to sleep after the alarm went off and slept til 11:30, but then I got up and had breakfast an coffee.

I called mashfanficchick to see if there was anything going on today, no, but we have decided, after the debacle yesterday trying to Zoom on this computer, we're going to Best Buy tomorrow and see what can be done. It's still under warranty, I have ha it less than a year, so...

There is some good news though, I hear from Funko, they are going to send me another Stephen Colbert Pop to replace the one that went missing.

I copied my Valentine's Starsky and Hutch story to the external drive, and a few other things, I don't think there's anything on the computer I can't stand to lose.

And the computer really has to go. I tried Teaming the FWiB tonight, and it was another debacle. We ended up Teaming on my phone, and that was running out of power. It was a mess.

mashfanficchick called me back before that. and we discussed various things.

The Bard Board of Trustees met today to discuss the Leon Botstein situation. The discussion on the Bard in the 80s Facebook group has been intense. It's all very distressing.

That's all. I just fed the pets.

Gratitude List:

1. The FWiB.

2. mashfanficchick

3. Funko is replacing my missing Pop.

4. The information about buying the computer is in my Best Buy account.

5. I can Team on my phone.

6. My days at Bard.

You know the drill, and you probably even know where you can ask questions if you have 'em :D

Favorite installment of a video game series or a favorite standalone video game?

Ha, I love being asked about favorites, because invariably my mind goes blank and all I can think is, "I have never enjoyed a videogame in my life..."

A handful, both standalone and not, in no particular order:

-The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion. Cyrodil is beautiful, alchemy is broken and fun, and the mages guild quest and the Dark Brotherhood quests in particular are very fun. Parts of it are extremely silly (the speechcraft minigame comes to mind), but on the whole the game is immersive in a way that I did not find Skyrim to be, and it's just...fun. It's fun to pop it open on a very gloomy day and bop around Cyrodil for a while, picking flowers, following whatever catches my fancy, and just generally dipping in and enjoying myself.

-Stardew Valley. I've achieved Perfection twice; I think that speaks for itself? Ha. I love the game — it has a nice rhythm to it that, once established, makes it very easy to sink into it and enjoy yourself. No matter what you do, it's almost impossible to fuck stuff up to the point where you break the game. (Not completely impossible, but very difficult!) Plus there's just something extremely satisfying about growing giant cauliflower. :D

-Slime Rancher. You ranch slimes and explore. The slimes are cute, the map is pretty, the puzzles are satisfying, and the overarching story (yes, there IS one) is queer-coded and very bittersweet.

-Strange Horticulture. You grow plants! You solve tiny puzzles to figure out what plants will solve different people's problems, and then you give them those plants! You have a cat! It's very fun, and the branching story is satisfying.

-Baldur's Gate III. The companions are good, the storyline is excellent, the mechanics are very fun...yeah. I mean, yeah. It deserves the praise it got, is that enough? :D

-Tiny Tina's Wonderlands. Okay, look, sometimes you just want a hot nonbinary paladin to name you their noble...squire? and send you out on a quest to save the land. Sometimes you want that to come in a setting where you have guns that shoot swords and the goal is simply, Numbers Go Up. Wonderlands does that, and it also manages to be this actually incredible emotional payoff about loss and grief, growing up and moving on.

Other stuff, hmm.

Honorable mention to Portal/Portal 2, perpetual favorites. NetHack also gets a shout-out, I'm awful at it but it is probably the game I've played the most (and I do love it, though I cannot possibly explain why). Gone Home and TACOMA also deserve mentions for being wonderful (though they're very much one-and-done), and, like, y'all, I love The Room I-IV. Fable! Super Mario World (and more importantly, Yoshi's Island, the first games I ever 100%ed, without the benefit of a game guide or the internet). Super Mario 64, which I still remember all the cheats and warp points for! I played and loved the Pokemon games (I've played almost every generation, oddly, despite not thinking of myself as a "Pokemaniac" in any sense of the word :D ), I loved Breath of the Wild, and I enjoyed ACNH.

But I didn't think of them until just now, so. :D

Got up at 10:00, had breakfast and coffee. Called mashfanficchick, ze said ze'd call back later. Ze texted later, we may do something tomorrow. I went to the Starsky and Hutch Creative Work session.

Or tried to. To make a long, long sad story short, my computer completely f-ed up. I could not get it to work in Zoom. It froze up and kicked me out, refused to load... you name it, it did it. I resorted to Zooming on my phone. Had to plug it in to the computer to keep the battery from dying.

I am worried now about Zooming for my Al-anon meeting on Tuesday. I may have to use my phone for that too. This is untenable. I am going to have to get a new computer, and this one is less than a year old.

The Kid called while I was restarting the computer at one point, so we talked a bit. I wished her hppy Valentine's Day.

The Zoom ended at 6:00ish, and I was worried about Teaming the FWiB at 7:00, but surprisingly the Team worked fine. We talked for nearly two hours, with a few minutes pause while I called Middle Brother at 8:30. He is fne, got my valentine, and had a party for Valentine's Day. And is excited that tomorrow is Presidents Day and there's no school.

After I got off with the FWiB I had dinner and went to the bedroom to play solitaire until pet feeding time. And that was the day.

Gratitude List:

1. The FWiB.

2. The Starsky and Hutch fandom.

3. The Kid called.

4. Middle Brother is well and happy.

5. I put a post on the Starsky and Hutch Facebook group asking about a vid and it was found!

6. The computer is working now.

(As per usual, if you want to ask, you can do so here!)

Romance! Tell us about your fav romance media (books, movies, TV, etc.)

Ha, I guess it is Valentine's Day? :) (Not that Maximo and I did much except watch The Boy and the Heron and eat pots de creme!)

I'm going to be very casual about this and divide it roughly between books and films.

Books

So — I've read a fuckload of romance novels. Like, more than is probably healthy? Anyway. There's a few book-romances (not necessarily romance books) that will always get a nod from me. In no particular order:

-War for the Oaks, the romance between Eddi and the Phouka. It has, hands-down, one of the best descriptions of romantic love I think I have ever seen in a book — specifically, an exchange where Our Brave Heroine asks the hero how he can be sure he loves her, and he lays out a very specific list of reasons that is just...yeah. That's what I think of when I think about love.

The quote is here.

Reluctantly, she remembered her suspicion, that he was playing at being in love. She didn't believe it anymore, not really. But she heard herself asking the hateful question anyway. "How do you know it's love? Maybe you haven't learned anything after all.

She expected a joke, an impassioned protest, an airy denial. Instead he looked gravely in her face and replied, "I've no surety that it is. I know only the parts of what I feel; I may be misnaming the whole. You dwell in my mind like a household spirit. All that I think is followed with, 'I shall tell that thought to Eddi.' Whatever I see or hear is colored by what I imagine you will say of it. What is amusing is twice so, if you have laughed at it. There is a way you have of turning your head, quickly and with a little tilt, that seems more wonderful to me than the practiced movements of dancers. All this, taken together, I've come to think of as love, but it may not be.

"It is not a comfortable feeling. But I find that, even so, I would wish the same feeling on you. The possibility that I suffer it alone — that frightens me more than all the host of the Unseelie Court."

-The Flatshare, Beth O'Leary. This was one that hit me at the right point in time, I think — I was roughly two years out of the relationship with my ex, finally beginning to acknowledge how fucked the whole thing had been from the beginning, and here was this really lovely novel that was about, well, realizing that you'd been in a horrible abusive relationship but that there was light and hope and laughter on the other side, that you could love someone wholeheartedly again and it would be okay. Plus the initial little setup for it — communicating solely through notes — was really lovely!

-Uprooted, Naomi Novik. The scene with the rose illusion...whew. If you know, you know. Also it's just a great book, hands down, so. Yeah.

Honorable mentions to: Beauty by Robin McKinley (twelve-year-old me was rather obsessed with it), Winter Rose by Patricia McKillip (tho I'm not sure I would term it a "romance", romantic attraction is rather at the center of it, ha), myriad other books that I'm trying to think of and just completely and utterly failing at right now? The problem with reading a lot and reading widely is that I can think of zillions of things and then the instant that I go to write something like this about them, my mind goes utterly and completely blank. Whoops.

Film

Again, in no particular order, and being sort of loose and easy with what we consider "romance", ha, I do not promise that I have good taste:

-"His Girl Friday". Hildy Johnson, intrepid girl reporter! She hides a murderer in a desk! Cary Grant romances her! It's a weird screwball comedy and it's one of my, "I don't feel well and I just want to watch something where everything turns out okay" movies. I watched it when I was recovering from surgery in 2021. V good, highly recommend. ♥

-"Three Thousand Years of Longing". It's Idris Elba as a djinn, with Tilda Swinton as a bookish scholar, with story and direction by George Miller, and if that's not enough for you, well — fine; it's a beautiful, strange fairy tale for adults.

-"Notting Hill". I have...such a soft spot for this movie, ha. Various people over time tried to ruin it for me by pointing out that the relationship at the heart of it would "never work out, long-term"; I know that, but that's not the point. For people who are not familiar: Will Thacker (Hugh Grant, this is literally the only role I like him in!) is the owner of a bookstore in the eponymous Notting Hill. Anna Scott (Julia Roberts) happens to come into his bookstore, sparks fly, it all sort of spirals out from there? The romance itself is fine, very 1990s in a lot of ways — I actually love it specifically for the deep and abiding love that exists between the friends that Will has in the film. The other romances that we see in the movie are very sweet and read as very genuine, and his friends are wonderful and support him when he needs support, and tell him he's been a twat when, well, he's being a twat. :D Who couldn't use a friend like that?

-"Moonstruck". Again, it's one of those movies where I have a huge soft spot for it. Cher stars alongside Nicholas Cage as a widowed woman who is trying to convince her fiance's brother (Cage) to come to their wedding. Of course, it's not that easy — Our Intrepid Heroine knows that her fiance is wrong for her in every conceivable way, but she's afraid of actually falling in love again, because her first husband died very young, in a horrible way. Enter her fiance's brother, who is a weird tortured artist of a baker (of all the things!), with whom she falls horribly, passionately in love with despite it being objectively the worst choice possible.

The thing is, they make it work. It's sort of funny, like — you don't want to root for them (she's blowing up her life!), but sometimes the right choice is the one that looks wrong on paper, and the two leads have great chemistry and really sell the whole idea of "right person, wrong time, fuck it, let's go for it anyway".

Also Olympia Dukakis is in it, and she's absolutely wonderful. Big ups to the granddad, too — he's amazing. :D

-"But I'm A Cheerleader". I cannot believe how many people I have had to introduce this movie to, good lord. Natasha Lyonne plays Megan, a high school senior and captain of the cheer squad who gets sent to a "pray the gay away" camp by her parents, who are convinced (as are her peers) that she is actually a lesbian. This despite her having done everything "right" — like, she's got a hunky boyfriend (quarterback on the football team), she participates in traditionally girly activities, etc, etc.

Enter camp, where at first she's fairly certain she doesn't belong, until a group therapy session goes awry and she realizes that she is, in fact, a gigantic lesbian. Whoops.

It is notable for being one of the first films I saw that had a lesbian couple as the focus where nothing horrible happened and they in fact got their happily-ever-after (implied). (The other was Better Than Chocolate, which I barely remember, so. :) ) Growing up in Utah, well — this movie was revolutionary, and seeing Clea Duvall as Graham was extremely helpful in some aspects. Is it a good movie? No, but I saw it at the right time and I think that while it's imperfect it holds up okay.


I'm sure there's other media, including podcasts, etc, but I genuinely cannot think of anything off the top of my head, whoops. :x Oh, well, maybe someday this post will get a sequel?

Got up this morning at 9:00 and had breakfast and coffee, showered and dressed, and went to my Al-anon meeting. Got lucky with the bus, there was a 28 that got there almost immediately after I got to the stop, so that was nice, but it's not as cold as it's been, so it wouldn't have been bad waiting anyway.

The meeting was very good. I went to the diner afterward, getting a ride with S as usual. Since it was Valentine's Day I treated myself to a toasted bagel with lox and cream cheese, which was yummy.

Then I took the bus home and went to the Starsky and Hutch chat. Or tried to. The computer was acting horribly with the Zoom, I had to restart the computer once, and got kicked out of the Zoom several times. Very very frustrating. Especially since we were watching vids, and I missed a bunch of them.

After that debacle, I am pleased to say that Teaming the FWiB went fairly well, though there were a few times he had to repeat things because the computer glitched. We talked for an hour and a half.

I called the Kid after that but she didn't pick up. I didn't expect her to really, I'm sure she's busy with her boyfriend. I left a text asking her to call so I can wish her Happy Valentine's Day. I hope she does.

Then I had dinner, and then went to the bedroom and called mashfanficchick to wish zer a Happy Valentine's Day and ask if there was anything going to tomorrow. Probably not but we'll see.

Last night after I poste here, I posted my Valentine's story on fanfiction.net, AO3, and the Starsky and Hutch archive. It's already getting good responses.

For those interested, it's here on ffnet: First Valentine's Day

and here of AO3: First Valentine's Day

Some sad news, I have become aware that someone on my Dreamwidth flist died on Feb 2nd. spikedluv. I enjoyed reading her posts and will miss her. Her obituary is in the comments to her last entry; it doesn't say what the cause of death was.

Anyway, aside from that, all is well here. Christie the Turtle is eating a little better than she was, so I feel better about that.

Gratitude List:

1. The FWiB.

2. My meetings and the people there.

3. The Starsky and Hutch fandom.

4. My story is doing well.

5. Christie is eating better.

6. Warmer weather.

(As per usual, if you have a burning question, you can ask here!)

A science fact everyone should know and/or that is cool.

Oh, gosh — the difficulty with being someone with expertise in chemistry is that I never know what people do/don't know, because stuff that I take for granted might be something that everyone does, or it might be something that makes everyone sit up and go, "what the fuck are you talking about?"

Suppose I can be a little self-indulgent, since it's my journal, and say —

The history of synthetic dyes is really interesting stuff. We'll settle on that, because it's weird and fun.

We're (probably) all familiar with the whole thing about how purple is the color of royalty because for centuries, purple/violet dyes were incredibly difficult to come by — think Tyrian purple, which was labor-intensive and required thousands of snails to create.

As alchemy became chemistry, with chemists moving more toward natural science and away from transmutation, part of the shift in approach was a desire to understand what gives rise to different natural products. How do we make them, what's their structure, etc. Not dyes so much as medicines and other valuable products that can be found in nature but that it might be nicer to be able to synthesize.

Starting in the early 1800s, we're getting a better grip on the periodic table, etc (though it isn't a table, yet) — we've been able to isolate some of the elements, we're beginning to have better understanding of different reactions, especially organic reactions, and what leads to the products that are desired. There's an interest in understanding how plants like indigo are able to work as dyes — can we isolate what molecule it is that gives rise to those dye colors. A lot of work is done to identify that molecule — one that gets called aniline — though the interest in it is less in using it as a dye (since it's not useful as one) and more in using it as a precursor for other chemicals (like eventually, polyurethane).

So.

Fast-forward to 1856. William Henry Perkin is a student at the Royal College of Chemistry. His PI, a guy named August Wilhelm von Hofmann, was an important organic chemist (he coined the term "synthesis" and if you have ever taken organic chemistry you are certainly familiar with his work) who had done a great deal of work on aniline and was hellbent on synthesizing quinine. He had a scheme that he thought would work to create it, and like all great PIs, he shoved it off on one of his students — in this case, Perkin. "Go do this and see if it works" — nice to know that some things never actually change, ha.

The synthetic scheme itself was unsuccessful — instead of making quinine, Perkin made what we would charitably call "black goop". Trying to clean it out of the flask he'd done the reaction in with alcohol, he was surprised to realize that the liquid was bright purple. Some initial tests showed that it could dye fabric, and so Perkin dropped out of college to patent it, selling it as "mauveine", and kicking off the synthetic dye frenzy. Mauveine was cheap and easy to make — after all, we'd figured out how to make aniline industrially — and so here was a color that had previously been unattainable, suddenly everywhere. People went a bit nuts for it, you had everyone running around wearing mauve, to the extent that different satirical publications wrote about the "mauve measles", and chemists everywhere sat up and went, "If that asshole can do it, I bet I can, too" — the real basis of scientific discovery. (TRULY.)

The craze for mauveine would eventually die down, as other aniline dyes (as they were called) were discovered, and other colors became available, but mauveine was the first. Despite its drawbacks (it's carcinogenic and prone to fading), it was the first commercially significant synthetic dye, and it really did kick off a huge line of work in organic chemistry.

It's sort of funny, actually, but the first line of synthetic dyes would also lead (indirectly) to the discovery of sulfa antibiotics. :)

So I will catch up now.

Yesterday I got up at 10:00 and after breakfast and coffee and showering and dressing and packing I went over to mashfanficchick's to watch our shows. Which we did, we watched the two episodes of Will Trent we were behind, and then I Teamed the FWiB from my phone.

Then we started watching Thr Lincoln Lawyer, and, well, we didn't stop. There were 10 episodes in the season, which all dropped together, and we watched them all. All night. We did stop for dinner (we had Indian food for lunch, earlier) but aside from that we watched straight through til the end. We finished around 8:00 am.

So then we ha breakfast, and went to bed. And slept all day. Literally. I got up at 5:00 and got showered and dressed, and went to my meeting, I was a little late of course, and I didn't eat.

The meeting was very good though small, and I only had to wait 15 minutes for the bus unlike last week.

Got home and Teamed the FWiB. Then I had dinner. And that was the last two days.

My Funko Pop has not shown up, though. I'm really annoyed.

Gratitude List:

1. The FWiB.

2. Good TV.

3. My meetings and the people there.

4. Didn't have to wait almost an hour for the bus.

5. Sleeping late.

6. Warm apartment.

(you know the drill, etc, etc. You can ask here! I will probably answer!)

Talk about fiber arts!

I'm skipping day 11 for now, since it turns out I have quite a lot to say :x but! We'll get to it later in the month, I promise.

Fiber arts!

My grandma was a quilter and did a lot of hand-sewing projects; my mom is also a quilter who does hand-sewing stuff.

My grandma taught me how to embroider, and from her and my mom I learned how to sew, which led to things like quilting and costuming as well as basic hand-sewing for clothing repair and alterations. (If you need a pair of pants hemmed, I'm here for you. :) )

In college, I learned how to knit, though as it turns out I'm absolutely terrible at it — tension is good and I don't drop stitches, but I'm just. Seemingly incapable of enjoying the process? Which is funny, really, because I also crochet, and I'm quite good at it and enjoy it a lot.

Not that I've crocheted anything noteworthy in the last couple of years, but, er.

I picked up cross-stitch during lockdowns because it was easy and didn't take a lot of brain. I've since gotten pretty good at it (the one in the background is also one I did).

The next cross-stitch thing I'm planning to do is this one. :)

I have some vague crochet plans for finishing an afghan I started literally years ago, but, well, we'll see?