Lots of people on my friends list are unhappy about Torchwood. At first glance, there seems to be a lot of different complaints, but as far as I can tell the common thread behind all of them is, people asking why?

( It gets spoilery from here. )

That was the best bit of television I've ever seen.

( Which, I imagine, will do for an unpopular fannish opinion. )

This bit goes outside the cut, because I think everyone should read it: My favorite moment of the episode was ( I'll cut this half of the sentence ) And it made me think of this post by rm, which I read before I saw the episode, which said:

To me this episode (and to a given degree the whole series) has [...] been all about how you should fear the people you were raised to believe were powerless -- they're not -- not the PAs or the women or the folks living on council estates or the fucking queers.

Which is why, despite the brutality, there was still transcendence, and love, and hope.

I took advantage of my afternoon off to snap picturs of my new dolls and update doll_shop with shots of Persephone and Arachne. :D :D :D

Mom brought me home. ~*thank God*~ They've replaced the fuel filter, so it's running alright, but for good measure, they're also fixing the odometer and gas gauge, which is what caused the clogged filter to begin with. And my parents are paying, and letting me pay them back in installments. Nonetheless, I think it's time to start laying by a monthly sum to bribe worthless young men into marrying my daughters replace Luna eventually. Poor girl, I should have named her after a harridan---my old cars, Rochester and Mr Rayne, did very well all the time I had them. Well, I did smash Rochester's nose in, but that was mere carelessness.

Anyway, this is a bit of a godsend in disguise because I was dying for a little time off and now I have today and tomorrow. I have to work like gangbusters next week, but it might even be worth it.

Thanks for the sympathies and commiserations, flist!

This month I've joined Swap-Bot, in the hopes that it would induce me to stretch my crafting boundaries, and so far it's been brilliant. I just mailed off my packages for the Tea, bookmark, something to read swap, pictured above. I made a quilted cover for the book, a fabric bookmark, and a little felt purse shaped like a teacup with the various teas wrapped in squares of muslin with handwritten tags and stuffed inside.

You might look at all that and think I just had too much time on my hands, but the truth is I'm stalled on my novel, and I can't play Plants vs. Zombies all the time.

I've also returned to my dollmaking with a (carefully measured) vengeance. As soon as I get a little time and some good light, I'll be photographing the mythology and folklore dolls I've made already. So far it's Arachne, Persephone, and a deep-sea mermaid that I promised to jonquil yonks ago. Not quite sure what it's going to be next, although more of rjanderson's faeries are definitely in order, and I should be making an Athena doll, if your poll response is any indication.

Tomorrow's foods are prepared:

1 turkey, cheese and mustard sandwich on brioche roll
1 spinach, cucumber, apple and green onion salad with poppy seed dressing
1 cup baby carrots with hummus
1 parfait of plain Greek yogurt, fresh peach, blackberries, honey, granola

And tonight I am drinking stinky cat piss tea in the hopes that I will be asleep before 4 am. I really, really need two days off in a row. Or possibly several.

TORCHWOOD

WAS BRILLIANT





I'm sorry if that's a spoiler, but no lj-cut could contain my shock and delight.

When's part two coming on?

The best hangover cure is still sleeping till noon then drinking a pot of sweet black tea.

Very little sleep this morning. Woke up, showered, wondering if I could charitably call in to work. Got called and cancelled on by work instead, but rather than just giving me the news and letting me go she kept me on the phone for half an hour and by the time she shut up again I was too fed up and anxious to go back to sleep. So I'm having an actual cooked breakfast for the first time in months and listening to Neil Gaiman read The Graveyard Book, while my eyes burn. He's an excellent reader. I enjoyed the book when I first read it, but it's often the case that I don't realize quite how good a book I've zipped through is until I hear it read aloud. My enjoyment is hampered by the fact that that every time I hear or read a good book, I want to put it down and start writing.

Not just now, though. Now I want to put it down and start sleeping.

This week I made a new doll pattern. My first doll from it was Persephone. Now I want to make another doll in the same line. Advise me!

Poll #1419096 Doll
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All

What doll should I make next?

Suggest a mythical or faerie tale character (female) for my next doll.

THIS RIGHT HERE. It's "Buffy vs Edward" the video, and possibly the funniest thing I've ever seen. Basically, it's this icon, only more than 12 frames.

So I've spent practically the whole day tweeting for Iran, and I've got nothing to say about it now, except that I'm pretty sick and tired of how in the American media it's bigger news when white people give a shit than when brown people are getting killed, beaten, and oppressed. But that's nothing new. Instead, I leave you with a conversation that just occurred in AIM, not entirely unrelated.

cesario (11:50:04 PM): Something incredibly disturbing just happened to my brain.
lizbee (11:50:09 PM): Yes, what?
cesario (11:50:51 PM): I discovered that the word "Ahmedinejad" fits neatly into the opening strains of the song "Happy Holidays".
cesario (11:50:57 PM): Now I can't stop singing it over and over.
lizbee (11:51:31 PM): OH LORD
lizbee (11:51:40 PM): THANK GOD I DON'T KNOW THE TUNE OF "HAPPY HOLIDAYS"
lizbee (11:51:45 PM): OR YOU WOULD BE IN SO MUCH TROUBLE RIGHT NOW
cesario (11:55:38 PM): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CA1REZdiSQM&feature=related
lizbee (11:56:02 PM): *opens link* *sees what link is* *closees window*
cesario (11:56:10 PM): noooooo you must share my pain
lizbee (11:56:55 PM): There is a world of bad pop music out there. Do you really want to start something you can't finish?
lizbee (11:57:25 PM): I JUST REALISED THAT I HAVE HEARD THE SONG, AND NOW IT IS IN MY HEAD!
cesario (11:57:35 PM): AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
lizbee (11:57:37 PM): I'LL GET YOU, CHRISTMASES IN RETAIL!

ETA:
lizbee (11:58:27 PM): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G8zDCU-0PPc
cesario (12:01:38 AM): Yeah right. *is never opening a YT link from you ever again*

doll_shop doll_shop doll_shop doll_shop
doll_shop doll_shop doll_shop doll_shop

:-)

The problem with LiveJournal is that we think we're close, but really, we know nothing about each other.

So I want you to ask me something you think you should know about me, something that should be obvious, but you have no idea about, or something you've always been curious about but have never asked, or something completely silly that you'd like me to answer for kicks. No limits on the range of questions, either: ask me anything you want to know about, whether it's a fannish opinion or a question about a fic of mine or trivia about my real life or my thoughts on events in the offline world.

IDK, I've seen this meme on my flist on average once a week for the last three years but I've never done it before just because I figured no one would ask anything and then I'd feel bad but then I went and discovered mental health, so LOL to that.

Also, if anyone has any tips for regulating a fiercely irregular sleep cycle (like, habitually irregular) please share them.

A Spark in Drought
by Branwyn

fandom: Mary Russell
pairing: Russell/Mahmoud
setting: Justice Hall
notes: Sequel to my other R/M story, "A Thousand Times"

*

...I wanted only to die, moon-dark, blessed,

Poised beneath the driest arrows of my suffering,
Far from the flocks of burning, singing gulls,
Face to face with the God of my childhood.

Noelle Kocot

( here )

So I sort of stopped writing fic like a year ago, but a few weeks ago The Language of Bees came out and jump started my old passion for the Russell/Holmes books by Laurie R. King, and the next thing you know lizbee wanted a story, and I wrote it.


A Thousand Times
by Branwyn

fandom: Mary Russell
pairing: Russell/Mahmoud
spoilers: BEEK and OJER. AU that takes place in the Palestine adventure in 1919.
warnings: character death and torture
notes: lizbee made me do it.


Come, come, whoever you are.
Wonderer, worshipper, lover of leaving.
It doesn't matter.
Ours is not a caravan of despair.
Come, even if you have broken your vow
a thousand times
Come, yet again, come, come.

Rumi


*
( They bury Holmes at night. )

I'm listening to "When the Music Stops" by Eminem, which ends on this lyric:

"I'm reaching for the Glock but the music stops" *gunshot*

It was immediately followed by:

"Now, Wakko Warner with the fifty U.S. states and their capitals! Baton Rouge, Louisiana..."