girlofprey

The weather is suddenly bipolar, and I'm not sure I like it. Mostly I'm just hoping it will be okay on Friday, when I will travelling around. And Monday, when I'll be travelling around again. And next Friday, when I will be going out to volunteer all day.

In other news, I'm pretty sure I'm due a period, and if it starts the day I go away - again - I'm going to be incredibly annoyed.

I finished Bioshock! And got a new pairing. And it went slightly weird at the end, but it's still good. And I found out that the first page of the Bioshock kinkmeme was started before the second game (which doesn't have the same main characters) came out, haha, so I could read it. And there is plenty of fic on there. And plenty for my pairing. The only problem is that now I have caught up to when the second game was released, and I keep seeing sort of spoilers, but I am super used to getting fic for my pairing now, and I know there's more on there in amongst the second game spoilers. So. I should really stop. But I haven't yet. Or, I should start the new game. But I'm still kind of reeling from the first game, and I'm about to go away for the weekend, so it's probably not the best time to try to get into a new game. Hmm.

My other main fandom at the moment is ( Dallas! Mentions of rape and domestic abuse )

Also, I saw an episode of NCIS the other day. I still hate Gibbs and DiNozzo. Which makes it kind of hard to watch NCIS. It's like the Poltergeist: The Legacy of it's day.

Hello. I've been meaning to post for the past, um, few weeks. But I've been keeping myself on a pretty steady diet of Skyrim, Saints Row 2, rewatching about half of Season 2 of Oz for Peter Schibetta reasons (who I love MORE THAN EVER), and watching American Dad, for humour and intergenerational het incest reasons. THE BEST REASONS THERE ARE. Also, I managed to get onto the jewellery making course in Leeds for a second term, and I've been going to see my employment coach again. Christmas is truly over. Even if all the sales aren't. So I haven't really had a lot of time to do other things.

Some nice things that have happened to me lately:

• My new nephew came home from the hospital on Monday, yay!



• On Saturday in the post I got both a slightly gloomy, but lovely, card from jekesta containing beautiful stickers (thank you jekesta), AND a letter saying I'd won a premium bond, for the amount of £25, including a cheque for it. It was a good day for post.



• I got back on my jewellery making course. I was lucky to do so, really, in a slightly sad way, because I was only on the waiting list, and they didn't call me the morning of the first lesson like they did last term. But I called them and they said yeah, come in, so I went in and enrolled and went to the class. And then the tutor took the register and realised one person - who had also been on the course last term - wasn't on the register, and there were 13 people in the class when the maximum was usually 12. The woman who wasn't on the register said she hadn't signed any forms or spoken to the people running things upstairs, she'd just come back to the class. She and the tutor went upstairs to talk to the people in the office, and then the tutor came back down and said the woman had had to go home, because there wasn't a place for her. So assuming she wasn't on the waiting list like me, I probably ended up with her place. Which I did feel slightly bad about. But not entirely, because assuming I don't win my appeal - which I don't think I will - by the time the next term comes round, I might well have less money to spend on courses, and no concessions, so it would cost £50 instead of £5. So mostly I'm just relieved about it.



• My Oglaf book came in the post today, hurrah!

Some bad things that have happened to me lately:

• Yesterday at my jewellery course, I managed to cut my thumb with tin snips, which if you know anything about tin snips is pretty hard to do, but I managed it. I also burnt my fingers quite a lot while trying to polish things, scraped my elbow on part of my desk, and get hit by a tiny drop of boiling water while someone was quenching another piece. It really was not my day yesterday.



• I got a call from the Tribunals service today (and yesterday). It turned out it wasn't about anything much, though, but still. A reminder that it is coming :(

Hmm. In other news, Skyrim's wicked. The only problem I'm having with it is that there are so many quests, SO MANY quests, and you don't have to take them all, but I always worry that turning them down WILL mean you don't get to still do them, or that I'll forget that people are offering them and miss out on them. But now I have probably about fifty 'to do', and it's sort of stretching my own suspension of belief that people would not be upset that I took a few months to basically take something to another town for them. So I'm trying to work my way through them at the moment. And basically running into and getting more along the way. But still. It's pretty good.

Further adventures in gender included a quest where I had the choice between taking the side of a woman in hiding or the side of the men hunting her for supposed crimes, and taking her side led to the men accusing me of being fooled by a 'pretty face'. However, ( Minor spoilers for Skyrim, maybe ). So maybe Skyrim/Tamriel really IS meant to be a world where it's perfectly okay and accepted to be gay. In which case, well done, I guess, Bethesda.

Adventures with gender in Saints Row 2 have been slightly more confusing. By and large it's fairly straightforward or not mentioned. But there's an activity you can do in the game called "ho-ing". Which, as far as I can tell, is where you gain respect by going to strip clubs and "pleasing" - strippers, I guess - after which your sexual prowess is known throughout the land, or whatever. I went and did it as part of another job though, and you don't actually get to see any of the act, but you hear voices, and my character was definitely in there with a man. So. I don't really know whether I earned or spent money after that activity. Was it a male ho? Was it just some random guy and we were using a strip club as basically a motel, without paying any of the actual people who worked there? Which is kind of insulting if you think about it. Apparently you can earn money as a pimp by ho-ing, but I don't know how or if I did. But it sounded like a good time was had by all, at any rate. So fine.

Saints Row 2 is getting a bit tricky at the moment in that it's got to that sort of middling part of games, where you're quite good at it, but not super-good at it, so I'm feeling a bit cocky perhaps but the challenges are getting slightly harder and I can't just breeze through them like I could the earlier stuff. Which is a little bit aggravating. But I'm still really enjoying it. Especially now that I've figured out I can steal helicopters if I want to. Even if I can't quite fly them yet. Still.

I haven't really been watching any TV or anything lately. Although I did have dream the other night about hanging out with my awesome nana, before realising, in the dream, that she was actually Rita from Coronation Street. Which led to a weird dream about an alternative Coronation Street, where David Platt had a cat he walked on a leash, and Karen was still hanging around. Good times. Anyway, other than that, nothing really. Other than Oz and American Dad. YOU ARE FREE TO TALK TO ME ABOUT PETER SCHIBETTA OR HAYLEY SMITH IF YOU WISH. I love you guys. x

OH MY GOD I LOVE JACK DRSCOLL. OH MY GOD.

( Spoilers up to 2.06 of Single-Handed, and for the whole of the series )

( Tonight's Coronation Street )

Anyway. Other things I have been doing lately: I went to see the Horrid Henry film last week with my mum and nephew, and it turned out to be actually quite good. It started out seeming like it was going to be all about how school is rubbish and you should never do homework, kids, and really irritating, but it turned out not to be. And loads of the actors/characters were really good. Especially Anjelica Huston. And Dick and Dom were in it, wearing eyeliner. Which was kind of a suprise.

Single-Handed continues apace, although I loved Jack slightly less in last week's episode. ( Sort of spoilers )

Also, I have been catching up on Inspector George Gently. I got Series 1 last week, and I finally saw the pilot. ( Spoilers for the pilot )

And sort of because of that, I've ended up watching more of the second series of Luther today. I was watching it when it was on, but I think the second episode of it was on the week we went to Prague, and my parents watched it while I was doing something else, and then I never caught up with it. But I remembered after finishing Series 1 of George Gently that Lee Ingleby played the psychopath in the first two-parter. And in some ways I didn't want to watch it, because I thought the switch from lovely detective to crazy murderer and then back to lovely detective might be a bit jarring. But then I remembered that I've seen Series 3 of George Gently, so after I watch Series 2 I won't have any left, and if I watch Luther after that, the last thing I'll see of him will probably be the crazy murderer. And I'd rather not have that. So basically, I did watch it.

( Luther spoilers up to 2.03 )

Oh yes, and Sugartown finished last night. Sadly, without any slightly abusive incest, as I might have hoped. Or [incest spoilers], I guess. But quite lovely-ly all the same. And it seemed to me to be setting itself up for a possible second series, which the BBC might go for, although I can't imagine what the story would be in another series. We'll see. But I enjoyed it, anyway. Between Sugartown and Eastenders, I'm feeling slightly let down on the slightly abusive incest front. TV is such a tease, sometimes. Also, after three episodes and the full mini-series, I still don't really know if Max is meant to be the older brother or Jason. Which seems like a failing of the show's somehow. Maybe I just wasn't paying attention properly. I might try looking it up.

Anyway. So they're my TV adventures lately. Also, there's been Hollyoaks. Hurrah!

Yesterday I woke up to pretty massive period pains, and despite getting up pretty late (3-ish), I ended up going to lie down again for a while because curling up on the couch made stomach feel like it was stabbing me, and standing up made me feel hot and like I was going to throw up. Which I did not want to do, having just taken a painkiller.

But eventually I felt much better, and last night I was rewarded with Inspector George Gently, Sugartown, and new Dragon's Den. Inspector George Gently was supposed to be about the hippie movement in England in the 60s, and Gently and Bacchus finding themselves in the middle of a social and sexual revolution. I had high hopes for the episode, and it did not disappoint. I don't really understand the lack of fandom for George Gently. One of them's a Professional, and I've heard loads of people talk about how much they love Lee Ingleby. But anyway. Whatever. The episode also featured someone who is currently in Hollyoaks, which was quite pleasant as well. Hurrah.

They didn't really explain who the new person was on Dragon's Den. Only after rewatching it a couple of times did I hear that she got rich through the haulage industry. She has weird hair and weird make-up and weird clothes/shoulder pads. But sometimes she was really lovely, and sometimes she got really angry, and she has quite a lovely gravelly voice. So I quite like her. Also I LOVE DEBORAH MEADEN. That is all.

Today turned out to not be a very much better day. Our dog is quite old now and a bit less in control of himself than he used to be, and after spending a while downstairs having a sandwich and whatever, I went to go out and found that he'd pooed all over the garage. Including one bit right between a pair of my trainers, though not on them, so I guess I was lucky in a way. Then I went out to the shop, and I had some music in, and there were about three or four young women walking the opposite way to me across the street with their kids, and I heard one of them shouting, and I turned round to look, and she was shouting at one of her kids. Pretty nastily really. But I was obviously looking for a moment too long, because she noticed me, and started shouting something about how she was shouting at her kids, did I have something I wanted to say about it? I still had my music in, so I couldn't really hear her, so I just looked away and kept walking, and that was that really. But it wasn't very pleasant. Then I went home, messed about in my bedroom for a while, my dad came home and cleared up the garage (I would have liked to clear it up for him in some ways, but I really just wasn't touching that), and then later on was watching TV, and the dog started squeaking again, so I went to let him out, and found that in the garage once again our cat had left a dead animal for us. Except not so much the outside of that animal. My dad ended up clearing up that one too. Poor dad.

But after and in between all of that, I did get the usual Monday/Friday night soap marathon. Hollyoaks, Emmerdale, Coronation Street, Eastenders, Coronation Street. Phew.

Hollyoaks was quite good, plenty of Ste/Brendan, but I might well have enjoyed it more if I hadn't, just before watching it, read a Ste/Brendan fic that I thought was just a fic, but I eventually realised was the events of the episode from Ste's point of view, which the writer had obviously seen on E4 on Friday. And didn't warn for spoilers for it, or anything. It was still good though.

( Emmerdale )

Phew. And now ( Coronation Street )

And then there was Eastenders. The Michael/Anthony corruption storyline isn't being as brilliant as I'd hoped, but there's still a little bit every episode where Anthony will specifically say something either acknowledging Michael or trying to get Michael to agree with him, and Michael largely ignores him, but sometimes he'll stick up for Anthony or look over when something Anthony has done has gone right, and smile a little bit. So I'm still watching it. I get the feeling that it might become a bigger thing later on, when the storyline progresses a bit. I have to say though, Michael isn't doing too great at manipulative incest at the moment, but he is doing pretty well at being a nutcase. Honestly. He's like the Joker. He's not as good as the Joker. But you get the idea. For a soap. It's all little twitches and funny smiles. He's very good at it. Kind of a jerk, a lot of the time, but pretty good at it all the same.

Also, I found myself slightly shipping Masood/Yusuf. Now that Yusuf is all canonically acting a bit creepy, and their tension has become slightly less about being weird around Zainab, and more about shooting each other heated looks across tables and making catty remarks at each other. I'm not interested in them, but like I say, I like it better them just hating each other than being weird with Zainab. So hurrah. I guess.

And now it's really hot, so I'm going to go change, possibly.

I went to Wakefield and Leeds today, and I bought some earrings and some nail polish. And I tried on some perfume from Lush. It's very nice, but it turns out for a proper bottle of Lush perfume it costs about £32. And even the atomiser costs £15. Also, Jon Burgerman has designed a new tin for Lush which has bath bombs in it. This also costs about £30. Hhrrrghksjdfkdsj.

Anyway. Other things I have done as well as watch Harry Potter:

• Watched the last episodes of Case Histories. Sniff. ( Vague character spoilers that no-one will probably care about )



• Watched the first two episodes of Single-Handed. Sometimes when I am busy loving Jack Driscoll, I forget how genuinely really bleak Single-Handed is. It reminded me in these episodes. And now they have another evil ex-Garda come in to make the community more awful and make Jack Driscoll's life hell. And this one doesn't even love him, like his father. Jack's life is truly awful.

I've been thinking a bit about my fandoms lately. Especially with Connotations coming up and everything. At the moment, they mostly seem to be soaps, webcomics, and weird British/UK detective shows. And films, sometimes. I don't know what the detective shows thing is at the moment, possibly just the fact I've been watching a lot this spring. Most of them don't even have an obvious pairing. At the moment, my head is like a weird little detective agency. Filled with very competent people, who will get the job done, but might just fuck everything up and fuck their own lives up while doing it. Still, at least they have EACH OTHER. Which is often more than they have on their own shows.

Maybe I should focus on Danny Phantom, which has actual fic, and only has ghost, murder and underage issues.

Although I did watch Coronation Street tonight. They made Ken's gay grandson a calculating conman, and then GOT RID OF HIM. I know it's good to have positive gay portrayals on TV, but given that a lot of soaps now have gay and lesbian characters, I'm quite ready to see something outside the general gay and lesbian characters they have. Like villains. Hollyoaks has had a gay gangster for ages, and I know it's Hollyoaks, but they're doing quite well with it. Anyway. But no. He's gone now. Also, Gail got all jealous over people trying to date Nick again (I think they have to stop doing that, at some point. Or make it canon). And Gary is going crazy, and Izzy has to put up with it. Oh well.

Also, I watched a bit of Emmerdale last night and tonight, and I feel like I might be able to start watching it again. Except, as well as pairings which are just sort of starting out and then someone dies, one of the most annoying things for me is watching one half of one of my OTPs just be swanning around without the other one. I think that's half the reason I still go on about Toby De Silva and Toby/Jordan sometimes - because I watch Casualty sometimes nowadays, and Jordan is STILL THERE, being really clipped and brisk and slightly short with his colleagues, and then maybe finding out he was wrong and having to go apologise to them, and running the department on his own no matter what problems arise. And it's so easy to just imagine how much better things would be if he had Toby just quietly standing next to him, watching him, and when he'd had an argument with someone smoothing things over, even if just with his presence. And doing spare paperwork, and being lovely with the patients. And Jordan would have someone supporting him, and someone to take care of, and someone to shout at sometimes eventually leading to a heartfelt apology while Toby didn't look at him. And it just feels very much like it would improve his life. I once had a plotbunny, when all the actors and/or staff were leaving Casualty, about Toby coming back for some reason and finding Jordan running the department literally single-handed, except for maybe the paramedics bringing patients in, and helping to run it with him. That was a lovely plotbunny.

Anyway. My point is that it's weird watching Declan wander around and get on with his life when Nathan isn't there. And how much EASIER his life would be if he had Nathan to mock and argue with, and then jump in to help maybe when Nathan did something TRULY ridiculous. However, Declan's awful wife and not that brilliant daughter are apparently leaving soon. Maybe that will make things easier. Mostly I want Carl to have pushy, not-explaining-the-whole-truth arguments with Aaron about murder, and how at least Aaron had a good reason. But I don't think Emmerdale is going to give me that somehow. Hmph.

I'm sorry if any of this is coming out weird. I didn't get much sleep last night, and now my head and eyes hurt. I am TYPING THROUGH THE PAIN.

I really want to play more Heavy Rain, in an effort to try to get it finished, and finished quickly while still hopefully keeping everyone alive. But at the moment I'm so tired that turning my head slightly makes me feel a bit dizzy. Also I should probably try to get to bed tonight rather than stay up playing computer games, given that I want to get up at 10 to listen to Adam and Joe. So I probably won't play anymore tonight.

Is it wrong that when David Platt looks at Nick and says "discount", I hear "incest"? It's probably wrong.

Pairing Picspam!

C.R.A.Z.Y.: Zac/Raymond

I am unusually up before noon today. Which does mean that I have the time to make this post, but I may also lapse into incoherence at some point. I'm very sorry if that happens.

Anyway. I should say that this is an incest pairing, so if you don't like that kind of thing you probably won't be interested. I was going to say that it was probably my favourite brother/brother incest pairing, but that was mostly because I couldn't think of any others I had, and then I remember the King brothers on Emmerdale and things got complicated. But Zac/Raymond is definitely right up there near the top, at the very least.

C.R.A.Z.Y. is a Canadian film, and a Quebecois film, so it's all in French. It's a family drama about a boy who grows up in the 60s and 70s and is pretty clearly probably gay, and how his family cope or fail to cope with that. It's actually quite a sad film in a lot of ways, a lot of it is about how his dad hates him for being gay, or hates that part of him, and he hates himself because of it. But a lot of it's quite funny too, and a lot of it is pretty beautiful. And it's got this storyline about the boy and one of his brothers running through it, which I quite love.

( Zac/Raymond picspam. Big. Also MASSIVELY SPOILERY )

I'm slightly torn over which pairing to do next week. It's either going to be Daniel/Eli from There Will Be Blood or Louise/Jean from Female Agents. It sort of feels like I should get some women in at some point, but Louise/Jean is pretty much my main film femslash pairing, so it might be an idea not to get them out of the way too quickly. And Female Agents is the other main French-speaking film I love, and doing one after the other seems a bit odd. I don't know. I'll have to decide I guess.

I was also thinking about doing a pairing a week for three weeks, and then on each fourth week either just pimping a film I love with no real pairing in it, or without that being the main reason I love it, or posting about a non-film pairing I have. One has pictures, but the other has pairings. Decisions, decisions.

Not working at that place anymore does mean, though, that I can't live out my other fantasy of the other people who work there overthrowing the man who owns it and making me their queen. After which I would obviously have to abdicate, leaving it in the hands of a council of senior members of staff and the admin women, knowing that I had left it in good hands. But there you go. Jobs, eh?

And in other news, Emmerdale has unknowing half-brothers being a bit incestuous again. Hurrah!