elizalavelle | Reading

I ended up getting to work about an hour later than expected because my niece's school thing ran over and traffic was weird. It was alright, though. We didn't have much left over, so my office mate had no trouble getting it finished before the first drop. Said first drop wasn't too bad either but there was still plenty to do by the time I got there. We ended up having to leave a few trays from the second drop until Monday, which isn't great but would've happened regardless due to when we got those cases.

All in all, not a bad day. The kids had slept well and so were pretty well-behaved for me. We played, we ate, I let them watch a couple episodes of a cartoon and they each did a sticker picture. The four-year-old did fall off my bed at one point and there was some rather pointed disobedience of my instruction to not touch each other but other than that, it was smooth sailing.

There were a few highlights. First of all, I'm not sure the four-year-old quite understands what a tornado is. One of the first games they played involved my Optimus and Megatron plushes working together to save the day from one. How, you may ask? Megatron distracted it while Optimus sneaked up and defeated it from behind. Yeah, Idk. Second, when I let the kids know that lunch would be arriving soon, she told me that she was really glad because she was "hungrier than [I could] imagine." Or any of her siblings could imagine. Or her mom or dad. She was awfully rambunctious for a kid that hungry, imo, but maybe that's the limit of my imagination talking. Lastly, while working on his sticker picture, the two-year-old too to exclaiming, "Oh, dear!" whenever even slightly inconvenienced. Idk if I missed the one of the cartoon characters saying it or where else he might've gotten it from but it was both cute and confusing to listen to the constant, "Oh, dear! My sticker!" "Oh, dear! My paper!" "Oh, dear! The eyeball!"

anais_pf posting in

thefridayfive

1. How often do you hear live music?

2. What was your favorite live musical performance ever?

3. Do you play an instrument, or sing?

4. Have you ever performed music onstage?

5. Who is your favorite musician?

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!

dustbunny105

My sister's oldest has a luncheon at school tomorrow and parents have been asked to not bring younger siblings along. She couldn't find anyone else to look after the littles, so I got the go-ahead to be a couple hours late for work. Not the best timing since this is the end of the pay period and I won't be able to make up those hours but I'm fortunate enough to not be counting on those hours' pay.

I'm hoping I can set them to playing and I can take some time to continue working on my reorganization. If not, well, it's not like I'd have been able to use that time for that task on a normal day anyhow.

dustbunny105

Wip Wednesday! I was prompted "jar" last week and not only have I apparently never used that word, I had a heck of a time figuring out how I could. Once again got saved by how vague some of my wips are at the moment, lol. Didn't come up with anything all that interesting but at least I came up with something:

( Read more... )

silversea posting in

booknook

Happy Wednesday! Are you keeping up with your reading? Falling behind?

dustbunny105

Lately, I've developed a particular fascination with the old Transformers picture and prose books, which all seem to take place in their own little continuities. Heck, there's even one stand-alone where Windcharger kills Starscream! Windcharger didn't get to do squat in the cartoon, mind you, and didn't do much more than that in the comic. And only then in the UK version, I think. So, to have him (pretty brutally) take out the Decepticon SIC before the movie came along and normalized character death is pretty wild.

They are, as a general rule, even more obviously kid stuff than the cartoon and comic but I just love how lawless they come across as being, largely unencumbered by the more mainstream media. And it's also interesting to see how toyetic the illustrations are, since of course they weren't beholden to the same expectations as animated or even static but sequential storytelling. It's a bit uncanny at time but, I mean, they are alien robots. Ngl, I'm also intrigued by how many of them are written or co-written by women, who are pretty under-represented in the rest of the brand's writing force.

There are quite a few books, scattered across different licensees, and they're not the most straightforwardly archived on the wiki. So far, I've got three: One (of six) Big Looker storybook, The Great Car Rally, and two (of nine) Find Your Fate ("choose your own adventure") books. I want to eventually get all of them (plus the coloring and sticker books but that's a whole other thing). I need to go ahead and make a spreadsheet or something, I think. Been planning to do that for some of the toylines anyway, so I might as well. Some of these aren't that hard to find but a few get pretty expensive in even questionable condition. I expect it'll take me a bit to get all of them but that's part of what'll make it fun :)

rocky41_7 posting in

booknook

Title: How to Love Your Daughter
Author: Hila Blum
Translator: Daniella Zamir
Genre: Fiction, family drama

The other book I finished during my voyage through the southwest was How to Love Your Daughter by Hila Blum, translated from Hebrew by Daniella Zamir. This was book [checks notes] #17 from the “Women in Translation” rec list. It’s about an estranged mother and daughter; as the mother peers through the windows of her adult daughter’s house from across the street, she ponders what went wrong in their formerly loving relationship.

How to Love Your Daughter is a cerebral kind of novel that swims back and forth between Yoella’s present, desperately reaching after the daughter who’s walked out of her life, and Yoella’s recollections of raising Leah.

The twists and turns of their relationship are subtle, almost too subtle. Both characters come off slightly neurotic, fussing about every minor interaction and seeming, to me, to invent problems where none really existed. In the end, it’s not so much a long-deteriorating relationship, which is what I expected, as it is Yoella making one decision that forever alters Leah’s perception of her.

“No one warned me my love could destroy her,” Yoella says about Leah at one point and that’s the core of it. Yoella adores her daughter, almost beyond reason. And it’s that very willingness to put Leah above everyone and everything else that eventually pushes Leah away from her, which is such a perfect tragedy.

I saw another review that said this book was both too long and too short, and I think there’s some truth to that. There are drawn out middle sections which don’t necessarily add much, but the ultimate break and subsequent efforts at reconciliation by Yoella don’t get as much room to breathe as might have benefitted them.

However, the ending is an exquisite microcosm of the tension of the whole novel, leaving you wondering about unreliable narrators and perceptions. Some people felt that Yoella gets off too easy—I would recommend rereading the section where Leah talks to Yoella about her reality/fantasy of Dennis writing her a letter.

I don’t know that either Yoella or Leah comes off as really sympathetic here, but they do come off very human, full of flaws and self-justifications and irrational reactions. And maybe sometimes it’s just human nature to create a tragedy where there didn’t have to be one.

rocky41_7 posting in

booknook

Title: Ninefox Gambit (Machineries of Empire #1)
Author: Yoon Ha Lee
Genre: Fantasy

I went out of town for my little sister’s graduation this weekend and finished two books on the trip! The first was Ninefox Gambit by Yoon Ha Lee, a fantasy-in-space story about a young infantry captain who has the soul of a famous traitor embedded into her mind to assist with a tricky military campaign.

I nearly had to eat crow on this book because I’ve said so many times I prefer when SFF books just dump you into their world rather than giving you an expositional primer, but Ninefox Gambit really tested my commitment to that. The first third of this book is a whirlwind of terms, practices, and concepts that not only are never explained, but for which the context is nearly nonexistent. I think you simply have to accept being confused to enjoy this one, which is why many reviews did not.

Semi-related, this may dress itself up as sci-fi, but it is fantasy. This is a magic system. A magic system that makes use of mathematics, but a magic system nonetheless. Accepting that going in will make dealing with the practical jargon much easier.

All that said, I ended up really enjoying this one, and I do plan to read the next two in the series. There’s just oodles of machinations and scheming and recontextualizations that I think are great fun and the end payoff was worth sticking with it.

As is the case with any story of this nature, our resident omnicidal traitor, Jedao, eclipses the book’s actual protagonist, Cheris. It’s just hard for our young, inexperienced infantryman to be as engaging as someone with as much history and baggage as Jedao. But I do think Cheris holds her own and doesn’t become just Jedao’s shadow. Additionally, Jedao, who is the most tactically brilliant mind the empire ever produced, gets plenty of opportunity to shine without making Cheris look like an idiot in comparison, which is a difficult needle to thread as the author. Furthermore, Cheris comes into her own more over the course of the book, which makes sense for her rapidly expanding level of experience.

Jedao is great fun to poke at and learn about, though I won’t say too much here to avoid spoilers. I hope we get to hear more from him in the next books.

Lee tees up the next book perfectly here without ending on a total cliffhanger. Nevertheless, I’ll be getting my hands on book 2: Raven Stratagem as soon as I can.

dustbunny105

The full promo image for Missing Link Ironhide is out and... I'm not mad but I am disappointed.

He can pull off a mode that looks similar to the original toy but it's only about halfway there. Most significantly, his roof does not detach to form his battle sled. You can't even finagle a more toy-accurate fanmode out of it because of how it's engineered, though I suppose someone might be able to figure out an upgrade kit. Hard to say from what we've seen but I'm leaning towards nah.

Still a neat what-if design in concept but it suffers from some overly modern design cues that make it look like it will, ironically, share the original toy's misfortune of standing out like a sore thumb from the rest of the line. The Arcee mold has some not-quite-vintage touches, too, but benefits in this case from not having an original toy to compare it to.

I think I like him regardless of his flaws but there was never really a question of me getting him. The real pickle for me is the inevitable Ratchet retool. I was excited for Ratchet when Ironhide was still just a silhouette and part of me still is. But I keep going back to that lack of a sled. Unlike Ironhide, Ratchet's sled was part of his animation character model and it came up in Marvel too. It's never been made all that much of but it's a lot more integral to the platonic ideal of a G1 Ratchet than it is to G1 Ironhide. I'll probably get him anyway, I expect he'll still be fun, but I'm not anticipating him nearly as much.

dustbunny105

Well, today's mission was partly accomplished.

I slept a little longer than I meant to but still got started at about the time I wanted to. Which is not to say I had quite the energy going in that I hoped I would. There was a lot of little stuff that needed moved before I could get to the furniture and I got struck with analysis paralysis a few times. Using the fifteen minute method/clockwise method combo helped but I had sort of thought I could be quicker about it. Ah, well. It got done.

When I had the room mostly empty, I remembered that I don't have carpet cleaner or even baking soda. Which was a bit of a problem since I wanted to have a go at the carpet between vacuuming. So, I decided to take a break and go to the dollar store. Aaand they didn't have any baking soda. Naturally. I tried the slightly further away dollar store and they had some, though, so that was cool.

Unfortunately, I had misremembered when my mom was coming home and therefore how long I had the house to myself. See, the thing about taking everything out of a room is that stuff still has to go somewhere. And since I thought I'd be alone for a few more hours, I wasn't being especially mindful of how I was placing it. Oops. The upshot of it was that my trip to procure baking soda ended up being moot, because I couldn't take the expected time on the carpet. Such is life!

Anyway, I realize as I'm writing this out that I don't have anything of any real interest to say, lol, so long story short: I vacuumed and got the furniture where I want it. That took longer than expected because I wore myself out with my ultimately pointless walk through the heat to the store and so the room is still not totally put back together. Bed isn't made, toy shelves aren't set, books are stacked in front of the bookcase and I didn't even bring everything back into the room yet. I'm going to bed soon in hopes of waking up early to get some more done but I'll have to work on this as the week goes along. As usual, I underestimated how many little things there are to do to put the place back together and of course those all add up.

Still, I'm pleased by what I got done. It'll take some getting used to, as I expected, but I really like it already. The enhanced under-bed access is especially nice, considered how much of it I utilize. For a long time I thought the room would look smaller if I pulled the bed out but it actually kinda looks bigger, funny enough, and not in a way I think bringing everything else back in will diminish. I came up with ideas for more changes as I went along but nothing I'm interested in implementing right away. Main goal right now is to put everything to rights. With it all being arranged into a roughly organized mess, that should be fairly easy. I guess we'll see!

dustbunny105

Found most of what I needed at the farmers market but no one had bell peppers yet. I'll have to adjust my plans. We also came across some new-to-us vendors and got some chocolate cherry loaf and some vanilla pudding with mixed berries. Good stuff! Well, the pudding is good stuff. Haven't tried the loaf yet. It smells good, though, so I have set my expectations accordingly.

I was a little worried the mall food wouldn't live up to my cravings but it diiid. I wish they had a non-mall location around here but alas. We took the niblings to the arcade after and it went well until time to leave. They got put to bed late last night and the two-year-old had been getting just a little moodier through the afternoon. That came to a head when we said it was time to go and we ended up not even being able to take a quick walk through the game store like the older two wanted. Then the poor little guy conked out almost as soon as we started driving.

My day went off-track right about the time we got back to my place. I'd sort of expected that everyone would come in to sample the goodies from the market and the older two were obviously looking forward to that. We weren't going to risk waking the grumpy one just for that, though, so I offered to let them come hang out for a bit. And, y'know, there was no point doing that for just a short visit. Plus, I also went to bed kinda late last night and it was catching up with me, too, so time kinda just disappeared between games. They ended up staying until almost five, which was later than I expected to start working on my room. I was going to take a quick nap and get to it right after they got picked up but I was worried about oversleeping and decided to get right to it. Only it turns out I really needed that nap, lol.

Long story short, I've not even got everything out of the room yet. But! I have started getting stuff out of the room. And I did some measuring, so I'm pretty sure I know how I want everything arranged now. Still subject to change, of course, but I like having a more solid plan. I'll have most of tomorrow to work on it, so I'm not worried.

tellshannon815

1. What do you consider your current main fandom? (This can include hobbies and collecting. Anything you feel fannish about!)

My three favourites of all time are Lost, Dark and From, so I'd say these are my main fandoms right now. Also School Spirits, Fringe, Yellowjackets, The Way Home, Doctor Who, Supernatural, Hunger Games

2. What was your first fandom?

While I first became aware of the concept of fandom through my now-ex boyfriend from university having some friends who were active in Harry Potter, the first one I was truly active in was Lost.

3. Do you have any favorite headcanons or fan theories?

I have a lot of headcanons for Dark around the Nielsen family:

Right before Mads went missing, he and Ulrich had one of their typical spats which ended in Ulrich telling him to "get lost". It was something that would normally have blown over, but because Mads did disappear so soon after, Ulrich never entirely forgave himself. Since Regina knew about the incident, she also blamed Ulrich at first; while they never really became friends, they did come to an understanding over the matter.

The night before Katharina and Ulrich's wedding, Hannah decided to try and put a stop to the wedding and see if she could persuade Ulrich to leave Katharina for her. She got as far as turning up to his stag night, but got there just as Ulrich had left for fresh air, upset as it had just suddenly hit him that Mads wouldn't see him get married. Realising it wasn't the right time for that conversation, she didn't say anything in the moment and just let him talk. Ulrich ended the conversation by repeating a rumour that Michael intended to propose to Hannah, and Hannah realised he seemed happy about the possibility, that he felt nothing for her at that time.

What really prompted Michael to turn his back on his old life as Mikkel was not anything Ines ever did, but reading an article in the local paper about the death of "the lunatic on the ward". Realising his old life was now lost to him, he threw himself into the new. The only time he ever let the mask slip was in response to a remark in school assembly that the Berlin Wall was unlikely to come down in the principal's lifetime, to which he had shouted "Bet you're wrong". Michael had a cover story that usually explained it away if the subject ever came up again.

And one for From:

Colony House was one of many just like it at one time, but the others were all destroyed. During the American Civil War, the incarnation of Jade that existed at the time was part of an attempt by his regiment to escape by burning the town to the ground (the idea being that they couldn't be trapped there if there was no town to be trapped in). However, some of the more sober members of the regiment stepped in, saving Colony House. Town as it is now stands on the site of the old houses.

One for Lost:

Jacob also met the deceased characters off island. At this time of night I can't be bothered to type it all out, but here's the story of that: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16228004

4. Have you ever created fanworks?

Dude, have you ever met me?

5. Are you still active in any old fandoms?

I'm still active in Lost and Fringe but will dabble in others. How are we defining an old fandom here - as in one I was active in ages ago? One that's been around for ages and canon finished for a while but was new-ish to me?

dustbunny105

And just like that, the weekend is upon me!

I'm aiming to get up early tomorrow for the farmer's market. I make my mom breakfast for Mother's Day every year and I'm hoping to find what I need there before resorting to a grocery store. If nothing else, it'd be nice to get tomatoes that have a real flavor.

Afterwards, my sister and I are planning to go to the mall. Not for shopping but for the food court. Turns out we've both been craving one of the Chinese restaurants in there. Since we're dragging the kids along, we may stop in at the arcade as well. We'll see.

Can't stay out too long in any case because I'm gonna be rearranging my room this weekend. The plan is to completely empty it of furniture, vacuum it, then put everything back in the new configuration. Kinda wish I'd borrowed my brother's oldest for this task but such is the benefit of hindsight. They might all still be down with colds anyway.

Lots to do this weekend but I'm looking forward to it!

anais_pf posting in

thefridayfive

These questions were written by

pebbleinalake.

1. What do you consider your current main fandom? (This can include hobbies and collecting. Anything you feel fannish about!)

2. What was your first fandom?

3. Do you have any favorite headcanons or fan theories?

4. Have you ever created fanworks?

5. Are you still active in any old fandoms?

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!

dustbunny105

It's been one of those Thursdays that I keep forgetting isn't Friday. Work wasn't even that bad today so maybe it's just that the weather was sort of gloomy but it very much felt like I should've been able to come home to the weekend, lol.

Ah, well. Just one more day now!

dustbunny105

I saw Fred TwT

Anyhow, Wip Wednesday! I got a couple of tough prompts last week in "bohemian" and "tattoo". No hits, unsurprisingly, and I had a heck of a time figuring out where either would fit with any significance into any of my current wips. Could only come up with something small for either prompt but they made me work on stuff I've been neglecting, so I can't really be mad:

( bohemian )

( tattoo )

silversea posting in

booknook

First Wednesday of May! How are everyone's reading going?

dustbunny105

The first color image for the Missing Link Ironhide has been revealed and he's looking nice~ Like, nice enough that I had to remind myself he's not actually the one I'm excited for, lol. Bring on Ratchet!

I'm even more eager now to see the full set of stock images, because I still can't quite make out how the mold works. It seems now like the toon-inspired head is connected to the battle sled rather than the torso, so you give it to him by clipping it on as a backpack. That much, I get. But I'm having a hard time visualizing how the head would be hidden for sled/battle station mode. There's something off about the way the arms sit, too, but I imagine they'll have more room to maneuver without the backpack.

Alternatively, maybe he really is their first speculative reimagining of a figure.

We'll probably get more images and potentially design notes by the end of the week, so not long to wait!

dustbunny105

Idk if it's just the fact that I'm recovering well but I'm full of restless energy all of a sudden. I hope this hangs on for the furniture rearrange I'm planning this weekend, lol.

This'll be a bigger change than I've done for a hot minute. I mean, heck, I specifically cut down from a queen bed to a full because of how I wanted it placed and now it's not gonna be there anymore. Feels weird. I know there's nothing actually weird about it but it feels weird. I think it's going to be an improvement, though. It'll take some getting used to, probably, but I think it's going to be an improvement. I guess we'll see!

rogueslayer452

As many are celebrating Star Wars on this day, I wanted to give attention to something that I hadn't seen much acknowledgement on in terms of this franchise.

An Ewok Adventure (a.k.a. Caravan of Courage: An Ewok Adventure) (1984) and its sequel Ewoks: The Battle for Endor (1985). Both were live-action made-for-television movies set in the world of Star Wars focusing on the Ewoks and their human companions, mainly the little girl, and other creatures and antagonists.

Although I grew up on the original trilogy, I have always been a casual fan of Star Wars. I liked the story, but that was about it, I didn't dig deeper into anything else beyond some of the following movies (and later with The Mandalorian) nor have I been part of its fandom. With that being said, I do remember these two Ewok movies. I recall seeing commercials for them on television, especially on The Disney Channel in the 90s, and we must've recorded them on video during that time too because this was very memorable to me, especially the little girl and her friendship with an Ewok. And truthfully, I didn't even know these were two separate movies because I just kind of lumped them together, which is why my memory is kinda fuzzy on the plot itself although I do recall certain moments here and there. I just find it interesting that every single time people talk about Star Wars media, from the movies to shows or even that infamous Christmas special, I rarely see anyone reference these two Ewok movies. It's become kind of obscure and forgotten, which is a shame, because this kind of gives us a look into Star Wars media before the prequel trilogy and definitely before Disney bought it.

Current Mood: thoughtful
Current Music: Sleep Token - Dangerous

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Elizabeth Jamieson

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