kangeiko

Well, looks like we survived another year. Last night was fun, at queenspanky for the festivities. This morning I managed breakfast - and not a hangover in sight! - and DW then followed. Um, more on that later, once I haven't figured out WTF it was about...

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So, the year in fic. First, the yuletide reveal -

Yuletide 2009 Fics:

Goma, La Belle for Scylla
[Sahara, Rated R, 26k, Gen]

After a routine mission goes awry, Al and Dirk have to race against time to stop a deadly diamond-smuggling ring -- that harbours even deadlier secrets...

This was my major writing project of the year, and grew out of me not being able to write for my actual assigned fandom. I thought, "well, I've seen the film - why not give it a go?" and then realised I could use all the source material from my recent Congo trip to fuel it. Hence the word count. I tried to make it reasonably accessible, even for people who haven't seen the film. I have to say, this was rather difficult to write, primarily because I didn't have much time to write it - work was being demanding at the same time, so I had very few evenings in which to get the bulk of it down. But I got it done on time, for which I am grateful.

*

do zla boga pinch-hit for Minnow
[Neil Gaiman - American Gods, Rated R, 2.3k, Gen]

Czernobog and the Zoryas arrive in the New World.

This was a last-minute pinch-hit. I only went for it because I'd recently read American Gods, and I had experienced hitherto unforeseen levels of frustration that we didn't get to see Czernobog's arrival story. Plus, I wanted to work something festive into it.

*

the old things fade Yuletide treat for jengrrl
[Låt den rätte komma in | Let the Right One In (2008), Rated PG, <1k, Gen]

Eli and Oskar, post-film.

Something that bugged me about the end of the film was, weirdly, the hopefulness of it all. My first thought was that those small moments of bliss wouldn't last, that change would slowly creep in and make the happiness fade away. And I saw this little treat as a chance to have a first go at that. I still think there's more to be said here, and reading the wiki info on the book and how it differs from the film was intriguing. Once I've had a chance to compare and contrast for myself, I think I might revisit this topic again, in more depth.

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Non-Yuletide 2009:

March
- History, in parts: [B5] John and Delenn and editing.
- Winter: [Alias] Irina bides her time.

April
- the root of all things: [Carnivale] She's not a mother to him; it's never been as simple as that.
- Pay no attention to the masked man: [Transmetropolitan/Watchmen] Someone familiar shows up in the City.
- Ambition: [Deadwood] Silas and Dan have a little talk.
- Method Acting: [Alias RPF] Victor likes Ron just fine. Sloane's another matter entirely.

June
- Three Fates, Waiting: [ST:TOS/Blake's 7] When Jim Kirk is six years old, his parents make a deal on his behalf.

July
- Zero Sum: [Watchmen/The West Wing] darlas_mom requested Adrian Veidt (Watchmen) & Jed Bartlet (The West Wing). Some strange sort of fusion then occurred.
- the universal wolf: [Sweeney Todd RPF] Yuletide NYR. Maybe it's just him getting older. Maybe man wasn't meant to film musicals at this age.

August
- Delenn's 3 bits of sexual trivia [B5] meme response.
- G'Kar's 3 bits of sexual trivia [B5] meme response.
- Untitled snippet: [Harry Potter] Marauders-era genderswap crack.

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You will notice that fic-producing dropped off dramatically after August (i.e. disappeared entirely until yuletide). This is partly due to the second half of 2009 being really quite shit. Nevertheless, I must also point out that the first half of 2009 was rather wonderful. So, instead of doing a balanced "what was good and what was bad" sort of post that will depress me, I'm going to list 10 things (in no particular order) that were really good about 2009:

1. My job was made permanent!
2. I travelled! To many places! One of which was on my list of 'places to go before I die'!
3. I saw friends I haven't seen in years and made new ones!
4. On a material note, I have a new mattress! (This results in me getting a good night's sleep!)
5. My brother has a job! OK, it's a stop-gap job until he's actually doing a job, but he's in employment!
6. I've joined a gym! And am still attending! This means I can run for the bus without having a heart attack!
7. My parents are healthy! And the bits that aren't are not too bad and scheduled for fixing!
8. I'm still studying Arabic! And some of it is finally sinking in!
9. I qualified! And joined the Institute! And have letters after my name!
10. It snowed on New Year's!!

So, what will 2010 look like? My 2009 NYR are here. I can say that I probably didn't leave work at work - it has a tendency to follow me home and I feed it and then it never leaves - but I did go out, and I did read, and I did have fun. Less so in the last few months, but more than 2008. So.

NYR 2010:
1. It has become an old stand-by: read 50 books.
2. Stand up for myself at work, and not let it eat up my life by having it take up every spare moment.
3. Make the most of travelling, and add in a little extra when I am out there.
4. Carry on with Arabic.
5. Go out more. Do more things. Don't let work take over. (I think it bears saying twice.)

I read 52 books for 2008 [see the list here], which were a good mix of fiction and non-fiction. 50 of those I had not read before (and the two re-reads were Kim Stanley Robinson, so it's not like they were light reading!).

As usual, one of my New Year's Resolutions will be to read 50 books in 2009. And - crucially - review them. My reviews petered off quite quickly in 2008.

I even have a good idea of what will be on my reading list for 2009, and people are welcome to comment and recommend stuff to me. In non-fiction, I like hard science, early American history, pre-Civil War British and Victorian British history, genetics, environmentalism, global warming and climate change, African history and politics (usually left-leaning, although I like to read some good dissenting views as well).

Fiction-wise, I like pulpy, trashy sci-fi, grand world-building narratives, gloriously detailed historical fiction, and pretty much anything by J Winterson, M Atwood or AS Byatt.

My reading list - already purchased and sitting on my bookshelf - is thus far:

- The Scar, China Mieville
- Iron Council, China Mieville
- The Years of Rice and Salt, Kim Stanley Robinson
- Foucault's Pendulum, Umberto Eco
- Jonathan Strange and Mr Norell, Susanna Clarke
- Minority Report, Philip K Dick
- Carter Beats the Devil, Glen David Gould
- The Earthsea Quartet, Ursula Le Guin
- The Dispossessed, Ursula Le Guin
- Evolution, Stephen Baxter
- The Fabric of the Cosmos, Brian Greene
- Critical Mass: how one thing leads to another, Philip Ball
- Chaos, James Gleick
- The Secret History, Donna Tartt
- As Used on the Famous Nelson Mandela, Mark Thomas
- Oryx and Crake, Margaret Atwood
- Identity and Violence, Amartya Sen
- Brick Lane, Monica Ali

Any others I should add to the above?

Instead of writing a list of fics that I wrote this year, I updated my List of Fics. Because I hadn't actually done that since May. So, woo, yay, an update. You may catch up with all fics you may have missed, broken down by fandom, here: kangeiko's fic.

The mythical Actual Website (tm) still continues to be mythical. *sigh* At the moment, I can't get my ftp client to talk to the website. This is a source of great woe, as I can't be bothered to try particularly hard. Woe some more.

Today, I watched most of Life on Mars S1 (ZOMG awesome!!) and ate yummy things, and slept a lot, and unsubbed from otw_news.

Now, this last also caused great consternation, as I'd been suspiciously circling the community for a while. I liked it back when it was fanacrhive, and was all for it, but after it underwent The Change (tm), my ehtusiasm took a nosedive. Simply put, all the fun things didn't seem fun anymore when presented with a schedule and rota and cleaning list, and bunk beds in dormitories. I think I'm a little too old to have other people arbitrarily appoint themselves in authority over me, particularly when I don't actually see a reason for that.

So, that was troubling me. And given that the organisation had become formal, I no longer felt comfortable lurking on the sidelines, when merely being a member of the community was, to my mind, membership of the organisation itself - an organisation I'd already decided I was somewhat uncomfortable with. So, off it went. I'll have to keep abreast of current developments via metafandom, I suppose.

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I've nearly completed my '50 books' NYR for 2007. I'm giving myself a couple of extra days because I'm in the middle of a couple of books... "I'll start, so I'll finish," as it were!

My resolutions for 2008 have been drawn up, though, so let's have a go at them as well:

1. Read 50 books during 2008. Nice and easy, given that I've more or less managed it in 2007, and that was an exam-heavy year.
2. Start going to a class regularly. This can be pilates or yoga or dancing, but I need to start attending some sort of class, more as stress relief than actual exercise. Shaddup, it's important.
3. The law school thing. Figure out what I want to do & do it.
4. Cook something healthy & wonderful at least twice a week. This will become imperative once athena25 moves in with wingsmith and I lose my source of freshly-cooked food.
5. Try not to knacker myself with work. It's only work, after all, and there are ways to make it bearable.
6. Finish the 100fandoms challenge. There are only 30 or so fics needed for that, and I'm all ready to launch into a few new fandoms, so this shouldn't be impossible.
7. Do not sign up to any more ficathons, excepting yuletide, of course, which has never been a source of stress for me but is instead immense fun with no bad side effects (as I invariably end up writing over the Xmas break). I keep wanting to include other ficathons in there, but I suspect that work will be ridiculously busy this year, and I really don't want to end up defaulting on anything!
8. Stop promising people more fic until I finish the fic I already owe people. There is a folder in my inbox called 'FIC TO WRITE': empty it.
9. Make time to see that lovely boy that I am almost sort of possibly seeing. Because he's not, in fact, an axe murderer, or weird in any way. If things stop working there, start saying 'yes' to invites & dates & things. Have already established that boys are not icky.
10. Make time to see my friends a lot more. I currently only really see athena25, wingsmith and queenspanky with any regularity, and one of those lives with me! Must do better.

I think that's a good number, don't you?

Book list for 2008:

1) Herland (Charlotte Perkins Gilman) : (review)
2) Woman, Child For Sale (Gilbert King) : (review)
3)The Black Swan: the impact of the highly improbable (Nassim Nicholas Taleb)
4)Happiness (tm) (Will Ferguson)
5) The Leto Bundle (Marina Warner)
6) Elisabeth (David Starkey)
7) Idoru (William Gibson)
8) Blood River (Tim Butcher)
9) Peony in Love (Lisa Lee)
10) Genome (Matt Ridley)
11) The left hand of darkness (Ursula le Guin)
12) Sixty Days & Counting (Kim Stanley Robinson)
13) Shooting War (Anthony Lappe and Dan Goldman)
14) Ring (Stephen baxter)
15) The Matisse Stories (AS Byatt)
16) Little Altars Everywhere (Rebecca Wells)
17) Seventh Heaven (Alice Hoffman)
18) Perdido Street Station (China Mieville)
19) Watching the English (Kate Fox)
20) Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy (John le Carre)
21) Hopscotch and Handbags (Lucy Mangan)
22) Speak for England (James Hawkes)
23) Nectar (Lily Prior)
24) The Abortionist's Daughter (Elisabeth Hyde)
25) Ya-Yas in Bloom (Rebecca Wells)
26) American Psycho (Bret Easton Ellis)
27) The Devil Wears Prada (Lauren Weisenberg)
28) The Secrets of Jin-Shei (Alma Alexander)
29) The Golden Notebook (Doris Lessing)
30) The Siege of Krishnapur (J.G. Farrell)
31) the Lovely Bones (Alice Sebold)
32) The Empire of the Sun (J.G. Ballard)
33) Making Money (Terry Pratchett)
34) The Shock Doctrine (Naomi Klein)
35) Notes on a Scandal (Zoe Heller)
36) Field Notes From a Catastrophe: a Front-line Report on Climate Change (Elizabeth Kolbert)
37) The meaning of the twenty-first century: a vital blueprint for ensuring our future (James Martin)
38) The Black Dahlia (James Ellroy)
39) Doctor Salt (Gerard Donovan)
40) I Capture the Castle (Dodie Smith)
41) On Immigration + Refugees (Michael Dummett)
42) Desertion (Abdulrazak Gurnah)
43) The Eyre Affair (Jasper Fforde)
44) The Book of Loss (Julith Jedamus)
45) Devil in a Blue Dress (Walter Mosley)
46) Japan: Through the Looking Glass (Alan Macfarlane)
47) The Devil in Amber (Mark Gatiss)
48) Crooked Little Vein (Warren Ellis)
49) Antarctica (Kim Stanley Robinson)
50) Escape from Kathmandu (Kim Stanley Robinson)
51) Forty Signs of Rain (KS Robinson) (re-read)
52) Fifty Degrees Below (KS Robinson) (re-read)

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