just a drive-by random update

[rusty_halo]

I worked today from 9:15am – 10pm. I miss you guys so much. :( :( :(

On the plus side, a new person joined our team today, so maybe I’ll have more free time in the future? *hopes* Now I’m on two nightly calls (8pm Mondays at 9pm Thursdays) and early morning calls keep popping up too. :(

I miss fandom. And I miss my fandom friends.

You know, what’s amazing is that even though I hardly post here anymore and haven’t been fannishly active in ages, my fannish friends are still the best friends ever. Just in the past month I’ve:

* Hung out with the lovely 10zlaine and attempted to introduce her to the vegan wonders of NYC (she’s a new vegan!). She’s been coming for plays at BAM–we saw John Gabriel Borkman earlier in the year (complete with scary Snape fangirls in the actor Q&A) and Diary of a Madman recently. And then she so generously stayed over at my place for 6 extra days and catsat while I was out of town. (10zlaine, in case I didn’t tell you yet, THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU. The place was perfect and the kitties were so well-cared for and happy.)

* Went to Puerto Rico with jaydk for her birthday. (I’ve never needed a vacation more in my life.) We spent 3 days at El Conquistador (this crazy resort with a water park, a private island, a bunch of pools, and an amazing spa) and then 3 days at La Concha in San Juan. The best part was the rainforest, though–I went in the waterfall again! I could totally live in that place and as long as I had internet I’d never leave.

* Visited with chenanceou, who was in town briefly, although sadly I barely got to see her because I had to leave unexpectedly. But it was so good to catch up and hopefully she’ll be here this summer so we can spend more time together. :)

* Visited with the fantabulous soundingsea a couple weekends ago. She came over to my place for a day of fangirling (although sadly she’s not so into SPN anymore, but we still had plenty to talk about). And the night before, we hung out with deepad, who is lovely and always a pleasure to hang with.

Who all is going to Wincon? I think a lot of Writercon people will be there. I’m going and rooming with soundingsea and 10zlaine. I want to spend some time actually in New Orleans too, at a downtown hotel–wish I had time to actually make plans! But the Wincon tickets are purchased and hotel booked, so it’s definitely happening. :)

Hmm, what else? I saw Book of Mormon on Broadway (thanks Chen for forwarding me the sale!). It was very good, like Orgazmo merged with that South Park episode about the boy from Africa, set to music. It’s interesting to see how Trey Parker revisits the same themes throughout his life but in all these different forms. And very odd to see a fairly typical Broadway crowd coming out of such an obscenity-filled show! But the performances, music, and choreography really were fantastic. I’d actually like to see it again, from a closer seat.

In terms of fandom, I have so little time I didn't even realize SPN was going on hiatus! And was very sad to get back from vacation to find there was no new episode. And the one before hiatus was pretty awful (and offensive, OMFG) although I'm too busy to be very mad at TV shows and it did have some things I liked:

* showing rather than telling that Dean is a guy who spent time in hell and is more comfortable than anyone should be with both 1) experiencing pain and 2) committing torture
* and then also showing his incredibly forgiving and loving side, yay complex multidimensional characterization! And both the flaws and virtues are organic to the character as established from the beginning.

And I liked the theme that Chosen Families are more important than Blood Families.

But:

1) the episode completely failed at its primary goal of being ~scary~ and
2) WTF was the point of the Campbells then??? and
3) GODDAMMIT, GWEN AND RUFUS, ARE YOU SERIOUS? Someone needs to make a chart showing:

	narrative importance (minor, medium, major)	alive or dead?
All recurring white male characters
All recurring female characters
All recurring characters of color

Because I count 0 recurring characters of color still alive, 2 recurring female characters still alive (one minor, one medium) and 4 recurring white male characters still alive (all of major importance). So when the creators go "We kill everyone equally!" I can wave the chart in their faces and show that they may kill a lot of characters, but they sure as hell don't do it equally.

Also I liked Gwen. :( :( :( And they did absolutely nothing with her. :(

Oh and White Collar. I just caught up. It's a silly show but I enjoyed it and will probably start reading fic again once my SPN obsession exhausts itself. The Peter/Neal relationship is interesting and still the heart of the show, and the conflict introduced by the finale was, although ridiculously sudden, a good starting point for the next season. (As they were losing tension with all the "Neal is good and would never betray Peter" affirmations.) Unfortunately I don't think the show is ever going to be very well-written, but I like the performances and the sense of humor a lot, so I'll keep watching. But it'll never draw me in the way SPN did.

Oh yeah! And Game of Thrones. I can't even tell you how happy I am to see posters of Sean Bean on the Iron Throne all over the subway! It's like fandom is taking over the real world! I watched some of the previews from the HBO site and I'm amazed how faithful to the books they're being. I'm looking forward to seeing if the actual show lives up to my hopes.

Everything else I'd talk about is related to work, which--the security at my job is crazy, I feel like Big Brother is always watching, plus this is the first Real Grown Up Corporate Job I've had, so I don't feel comfortable talking about it much. Alas.

Miss you all. (And I'm still reading! Just sporadically and not having as much time to comment, but I really do care about keeping up with everyone on my flist/circle.)

PS: Can you tell almost all the writing I've done recently has had to be either in list form or in Excel spreadsheets?

Originally published at rusty-halo.com. You can comment here or there.

Comments

[kalliel]

Ugh, 9:15a-10p? DDDDDD; That sucks; I'm sorry, bb! It's nice to know that in the midst of that you still got to have some fun, as evinced by the bits below. Puerto Rico sounds amaaaazing~!

And yes, fandom friends are a special breed. It's still my life goal to meet a fandom friend in person. One of these days, I swear to god. As for WinCon, I'm still trying to decide whether I can afford it. Airfare blows. XD So I'd still need to figure that part out. BUT OMG, NEW ORLEANS. DO WANT.

6x16 was pretty silly, in most respects, but I guess I can appreciate them trying. Ish. XD There were bits in it I liked but I can't remember them specifically. I'm gonna miss Gwen and Rufus. ); Though I thought it was pretty amusing that they at least expressed vague shock over Gwen (which I guess for people used to death, about a person they don't know that well is the most you can expect), and sadness re: Rufus, but for Samuel it was more like... No one gave a shit and no one felt entirely at ease not giving a shit, but they weren't going to sweat it, or something. That Sam (with soul) was the one who did the shooting probably didn't help Dean and Bobby, either.

I'm really looking forward to Game of Thrones. Though I'm curious about whether/how they plan to incorporate the multiple viewpoints? There's POV to some degree in TV (like how SPN is almost perpetually Dean POV ahahaha) but...not like that. And there's so many characters/so many POV switches! Color me curious.

That and I want to know what all they plan to cut--they can't possible include everything from one novel in one season.

[rusty_halo]

New Orleans is a fabulous place for a con. I hope you can make it!

I did appreciate SPN trying in 6x16 (I really liked some of the Dean characterization!) but it was overall a letdown. :(

I'm a little worried that Game of Thrones will lose a *lot* with the inability to really show POV shifts, but I do think that with (*gigantic spoiler from the end of the first book*) looming, they've still got a built in opportunity to really challenge the audience's understanding of whose POV we're seeing. ;)

I'm really pleased that GRRM is involved--hopefully his approval means that they're not messing anything up too badly. Plus apparently they're adding more Jaime Lannister--I certainly can't complain about that!

[soundingsea]

Yeah, SPN just fails with its women and characters of color. That's where fanfic can make a difference. :)

I can't even tell you how happy I am to see posters of Sean Bean on the Iron Throne all over the subway! It's like fandom is taking over the real world!

I was so excited seeing that all over NYC. Totally awesome.

It was so great seeing you! And downtown hotel, eh? Before? After the con? If the con isn't downtown I guess I'd like seeing the actual city. Not that I have time to plan either.

[rusty_halo]

Yeah, the con is outside of downtown, not sure how far. I definitely want to spend a few days actually downtown, either before or after. :) You're welcome to join me (and maybe Tammy will too).

Argh, need to research!