Ice Crystals

quick hit fic post!

Wed, 22 Feb 2012 03:40:23 GMT

Ahem, owlmoose? This is your fault.

"Given the Terms," Final Fantasy XII. Al-Cid/Ashe/Balthier, established relationship. Balthier and Al-Cid make a bet regarding Ashe and something about which she says she has never had quite enough; she is likely to find that it is best to be wise with one's wishes, for they might be granted.

NC-17/NSFW, contains explicit sex, bondage, tag-teaming. 5500 words (yes, really, in 24 hours, even.)

Dreamwidth | AO3

(many thanks due to seventhe for encouragement and beta, and to who_shot_kr for making happy noises at me while I was copy-pasting giant chunks into the IM window.)

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Meta: Games, Roleplaying, and Choices

Wed, 08 Feb 2012 03:45:42 GMT

So, I have a thing with (computer) RPGs.

I find it pretty much impossible to not play a paladin. Not in terms of class, but always Good-aligned, and usually....well okay usually Chaotic Good, but yeah. I always have to do the Right Thing and help people and do all the good quests and save people.

I don't have the same impulse in tabletop or LARP games; in fact my current LARP character is by any objective measure an absolutely terrible person who should not be allowed to run free. My longest-running Exalted character does horrible things while in Limit Break and sometimes when she's not in Limit Break. I've played many terrible awful horrible no-good characters around the gaming table and in the LARP group.

But when it comes time to deal with pixel people, I always take the heroic route.

My Warden in DAO was a female Cousland rogue, and although she did harden some of her companions, (insert excellent puns here about hardening Alistair and inserting things, yup, I'm still 12) she always took what I perceived to be the "good" choice. When I played Dragon Age 2, I was diplomatic Hawke all the way. In Mass Effect, which my paladin plays and I get to kvetch on, I feel much, much more in tune with our pure-Paragon fem!Shep, and our hard-Renegade m!Shep really just doesn't interest me much. In Strange Journey, I went Law hard first (and I was so horrified at how that turned out. It was as horrifying as when I played through on Chaos later.)

I don't know why this is, but in my current DAO playthrough (f!Tabris) I'm trying really, really hard to think about what the character would do, and it's hard. I don't want to disappoint the pixel people. I don't want to do mean things. I can't imagine what would drive my character to take some of the, um, less friendly options but I think that's because I let *me* drive the mouse too much.

In LARP or in tabletop, when my character does something objectively bad (like, say, leave an entire settlement's worth of people to be killed by the erupting volcano because it is not expedient to rescue them and they have no intrinsic value to the party at present--Somber Orchid in Limit Break is the best thing ever, clearly) then I acknowledge it's objectively bad and that I would never do it, but the person-that-is-my-character is distinct and separate from me. In video games, I hate doing objectively bad things. I don't want people to die. I don't want people to be upset with me.

Maybe it's because in tabletop/LARP I can say to the other players, hey, we're cool, right? You know this is just a game and I don't actually want to [whatever horrible thing my character just did]? I wonder if it's that the game worlds are so immersive I can't break myself out of them long enough to think that way, or if it's that I feel oddly not-okay about not being able to clear my actions OOC with the other PCs (yes, I know, there are no other PCs in Dragon Age/Mass Effect. Try telling my lizard brain that.)

Anyway. Do any of you have this issue? Or do you have thoughts? Inquiring minds want to know!

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bring to me your sugestions!

Tue, 07 Feb 2012 01:36:35 GMT

Hello, DW. I come to you in search of advice! For you see, I will soon have a shiny and pretty brand new iPhone (for those of you who love specs: 4S/64GB/black on Verizon). I require your app recs!

Things I had on my Droidphone that have iOS versions:
Google Authenticator
Mail/Calendar/Contacts
Maps, etc.

Things I had on my Droidphone that, to my knowledge, do not have explicit iOS equivalents and for which I really want a replacement:
Plurka (for Plurk)
TweetDeck (Yes, technically TweetDeck has an iOS version, but I hate TweetDeck on my iPad so I am declaring shenanigans/GTFO, and I want something that works like TweetDeck does on my Droid.)

So! Give me your recs for:

*Plurk apps
*Twitter and FB apps
*Anything else you think I would like!

Caveats:
*I am neurotic and paranoid and hate turning on location-based services unless I'm explicitly using something that requires it at present (i.e. Maps). Ergo, I really don't want things that are going to stand up and do a little awkward dance when I arrive somewhere, or that are reliant on location data to function. Geotagging turned the F off.
*Not super interested in streaming media. My music collection is ridiculous enough.
*For social media apps, I would prefer things that do not auto-load images/video; placeholders by default or an option to set them preferred.
*Again for social media apps, if they have desktop equivalents that will know which Tweets/etc. I have read and can sync, that's cool!

I'm totally willing to pay for good apps, or to pay for an app in order to avoid advertising.

I also own an iPad and an iPod, and games are more likely to get installed on those because I won't require their battery power to last all day. ( Games I own already )

(FWIW, when considering my phone habits: the apps I use daily or better on my Droid are my finance app (which does have an iOS version), Chrome/browser, Gmail, Calendar, Contacts, TweetDeck, and Plurka. Intermittently I use: NoteEverything, News/Weather, and the camera. I do not use my phone for much beyond email right now.)

If you, too, possess an iDevice and wish to add me for messaging, let me know--my iPhone is going to be set up with my legal name, but if you already have my phone number and/or legal name (address, have stayed with me at a con, etc.), it is fairly safe to assume I am willing to add you to iMessage.

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January Goals Roundup/February Goals

Sun, 05 Feb 2012 07:22:42 GMT

hi, DW. I have been very very busy this week. In fact I have still not started Final Fantasy XIII-2. That is how busy I have been. It mocks me.

This is also why my goals round up is so late. Well, here goes nothing!

Writing
In January, I was going to write:
* 2K on the NaNo adventure
* Finish chapter five of A Summoner's Faith
* Write one prompt or kink meme fill, any fandom, of 500+ words.
* 1K on Every Light.
* Promptmas fics (which do not count toward goal #3).

lolololololol. Um. Well. I did 500 words on the NaNo adventure, and I did write a 2600+ word kink meme fill. I didn't do any of the others. I did, however, finally get started posting my fic to AO3. Did you know I had totally forgotten I wrote a whole bunch of stuff that never got posted anywhere? I will have links later.

In February, I will write:
* Yuri Challenge (1000 words)
* dragonagewomen fic (Leliana/Cassandra, 0/??? words; my outline is looking sorta terrifying right now.)
* 1k on NaNo
* 1K on Every Light
* At least one Promptmas fic

Video Games
In January, I planned to:
* Start Dragon Age: Awakenings
* Make measurable progress in Infinite Undiscovery and Legend of Heroes: Trails in the Sky.

I did not start Awakenings because I started a female City Elf in Dragon Age: Origins instead. I am presently in the final section of Legend of Heroes, and I am about to hit a big old plot fuck-you in Infinite Undiscovery. I also played Super Mario 3D Land start to finish during January, so I'm declaring net victory in games. (I also start-to-finish beat 3 little PC games: one hidden object and two puzzle.)

In February, I will:
* Finish Legend of Heroes
* Start (and make progress in) FFXIII-2

Mind/Body/Spirit
In January, I planned to:
* Once per week, spend ten minutes meditating.
* When we go skiing, take it on with confidence. I'm not as good at this as I used to be and that's okay, but I would like to work up to skiing one of the darker blues by the end of the trip.
* Continue taking my vitamins daily.
* Make that damn dentist appointment for the fillings.
* For the weeks I am home, yoga once per week.

....I managed vitamins. And I did try a blue, but that ended poorly. Failboat capsized.

In February, I will:
* Take my vitamins daily
* Attend my annual checkup appointment :|
* Make the dentist appointment
* Focus on getting my knee healed so I can go back to (pretending I'm going to be) working out.

Money/Career
In January, I planned to:
* Have $150 saved at the end of the month for adding to the car payment.
* Limit lunches eaten out/purchased downtown to no more than once per week.
* Read three chapters of the Ruby on Rails HeadFirst book I bought.

I did save $150. Lunches I did not succeed at. Nor the Rails book.

In February, I will:
* Pay minimum $1200 on the car loan at the end of the month (thank you extra paycheck)
* Avoid going shopping--no new games, clothes, etc.
* Seriously start with Rails.

for now, though, I think it is time to make a goal of sleep.

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that fucking figures.

Fri, 27 Jan 2012 23:52:44 GMT

So I fell yesterday.

I was going down Vagabond, which is a very nice blue run, and I hit a patch of ice. I started going straight downhill (very uncool), attempted to turn, skidded, and somehow wound up on my back going down the hill headfirst. Nothing hurt, but when I got up, my right knee felt a little wobbly.

I made it the rest of the way down (bailed onto a green at the first opportunity), and continued to feel a little wobbly. We had lunch and I returned to the condo, and then eventually betook myself to the local medical center.

$242 later, I have been seen by a medical professional and acquired a knee brace. The doctor said not to ski unless my knee feels "great," but said I probably didn't do serious damage--a minor tear to the meniscus or minor cartilage damage. Fuck my life, y'all, I had two days left to ski. :| And we're probably not coming back next year.

So I spent all day today on my ass updating AO3 and my ficjournal (have gotten through a lot of fandoms; I have six or seven trivial-sized fandom collections to do, and then FF6 and FF12, which basically are huge and I hate myself).

It doesn't hurt most of the time (and hurts in a "this is stiff and sore" sort of way when it does, which is when I straighten my leg all the way out), which makes it more obnoxious. Not that I actually want to be in pain, but it's fucking annoying to be plonked on my ass when I don't even feel like it's necessary 99.95% of the time.

Yes, I realize this is a case of serious first world problems, but I was just getting up to skiing blues and feeling good about it, so I am going to pout. Like a pouting thing.

Dammit.

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The best thing about vacation is the food.

Mon, 23 Jan 2012 03:52:20 GMT

So we are on vacation! We are in Steamboat Springs, again, for a week. We are here with my parents. We got in yesterday--it was a horrifically bumpy landing and I was making alarmed squeaky noises the entire time. (I hate flying. I hate it. I hate it so much. Paladin was trying to calm me down and I was having none of it.)

We got here in one piece and checked in, and then did the early errands--acquiring skis, doing the grocery shopping, etc. We ended up ordering pizza for dinner--with elk sausage, boar sausage, red onion, and mushrooms, and it was amazingly delicious.

Today we got skis for my parents and paladin went off to do his own thing, while I skied with my parents. We did the same little green run six or seven times, getting used to skiing again and getting our boots adjusted to be tight enough. We came back to watch the AFC Championship (I was good no matter who won; pretty happy with the Patriots, especially since I think they'll do a better job of wrecking the razzafrazzing Giants dlskfjlkasjdfkljasldfj raaaaage.) We went out for Italian for dinner--I had duck confit canneloni in a Chianti reduction with dried cherries and cheese of some kind. oh. my. God. It was amazing.

(I have also had several excellent amaretto sours and a thing called a Hot Apple Pie, which consists of hot apple cider with Tuaca. Mmmmmmmmm.)

Tomorrow we're planning on taking on some longer greens, maybe one of the easy blues if we're feeling up for it. So far things are going pretty well; apart from my horrific anxiety during the landing of the plane--dear God let it not be that way going back--I've been pretty okay. We took it pretty easy today, and probably will tomorrow as well.

And now I am going to go try to convince myself to write, instead of flopping on Plurk and Tumblr.

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Shopping Adventures!

Mon, 16 Jan 2012 20:54:52 GMT

I swear I do not know where this week went. (I actually do--multiple days of playing Exalted plus classes plus freelance work, but still.) But it has been a very productive weekend! I saved all the erranding for today, which was possibly a poor decision in terms of having to deal with far too many idiots at the mall, but oh well.

( Spoils, and minor retail rants )

Finally swung by Chipotle for lunch, and now I am home and full of tasty foods, and I can has video games for the rest of the day :D

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I wrote a thing.

Sat, 07 Jan 2012 06:22:47 GMT

For the Oh My God We Need Some Porn In Here Stat Porn Meme.

"Cool and Smooth", Celes/Locke, NC-17, explicit sex with pegging. 2100 words. One night after perhaps more wine than was wise, Locke finally manages to ask Celes for something he's been wanting for a while. She is happy to oblige.
Dreamwidth | AO3

I am sort of amused and rather pleased at how much this fic is (apart from fandom/pairing) very much not my usual fare. Writing new things! oh help this is terrifying.

(in other news now is not really the time to have decided I want to rename every single pairing and threesome tag in my ficjournal to "relationship" instead. I'm going to assume I'm being weird because I'm very tired and just. Let that sit until tomorrow.)

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so tired.

Thu, 05 Jan 2012 04:13:30 GMT

I'm heading to bed soon, but I wanted to record a milestone: I hit one of my writing goals within 3 days of the start of the month. :D Last night, I finished a 2100-word kinkmeme prompt. And it is so way ridiculously far outside my comfort zone I have literally no idea how this even happened. Jeez. As of yesterday I had already written almost 3K for 2012.

Of course, I have so far spent tonight's newly acquired writing time (because Exalted was cancelled) doing the following: playing Dragon Age, cooking dinner, finally fixing the thing in iTunes that was making the FF8 soundtrack playlist sort wrong aaaaaaagh, shopping for new music (Daughtry and Adam Lambert, because why not), and dabbling in playlists. I have 26 words to show for it. Oh, and adding a bunch of emotes to my Plurk.

Okay, self, come on. You can get 375 words tonight in the next 20 minutes, easy.

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Fannish Year In Review/Fic Round-Up Post

Sun, 01 Jan 2012 21:16:46 GMT

I had a surprisingly productive year, even though it doesn't really feel like I did. (Isn't that always the way!)

So, first the fic list, and then the obligatory meme. For the fic list, note that drabbles are posted only to Dreamwidth; longer fics are Dreamwidth and AO3. I've generally marked things safe for work or not safe for work, rather than more specific ratings, with notes on content.

Fandom List: Assassin's Creed series, Digital Devil Saga, Dissidia Final Fantasy, Dragon Age, Final Fantasy VI, Final Fantasy VII, Final Fantasy VIII, Final Fantasy IX, Final Fantasy X, Final Fantasy XII, Final Fantasy XIII, Last Remnant, Lost Odyssey, Magna Carta 2, Persona 3, Radiant Historia

( 26 fics )

Whew! That was a lot of fic. A lot more than I thought I had done!

And now for the traditional end-of-year fic meme!

( right this way please... )

All of that being done--last night was pretty awesome. We had lots of people over, there was much chatter and enthusiasm and laughter. We watched Mulan after we rang in the new year, and sang along (sorry, people upstairs.) intorporeal made us a ton of amazing food, and (parts of) the apartment are now shiny sparkling clean in preparation for the new year!

And now, I am going to go play more of my replay of Dragon Age: Origins.

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2011 Year in Review/December Goals

Sat, 31 Dec 2011 01:32:56 GMT

It has been a long, rough year, my friends. I was looking back through my assorted posts for this year's resolutions and wow. Just. Wow.

I think a lot of that had to do with the struggles I had with my brain-meats, but I am determined that 2012 is going to be way more awesome.

December Goals Round-Up

( So How Did I Do In December? )

Goals for 2012

I liked having things in "themed" goals last year--it gave me some flexibility to adjust each month, and it really helped to not set myself goals that required a specific numeric achievement (other than writing, where if I don't have a specific numeric goal, all bets are off.)

( To the Future, And Beyond! )

I think those seem like reasonable and attainable goals.

Right at this second, as I type this on the plane, I really wish I could add "stop being so nervous when I fly" to this list, but baby steps, self. We will get there. Baby steps make it possible.

And now I am finally home and posting!

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wow.

Fri, 30 Dec 2011 06:29:01 GMT

I have no idea how it happened, but I am within 2K of hitting my getyourwordsout goal for the year (150K total).

Relatedly, I am still working on things for Promptmas. One of them exploded into (currently) 1600 words and may be still going, if I decide I hate it tomorrow morning when I look at it again. So much for posting stuff every day. (I should've known better than to make promises like that.)

Oh well. For now, I am over 148K on the year and going to sleep.

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End of Year Meme/Fannish Year in Review

Thu, 29 Dec 2011 21:17:57 GMT

End Of Year Comment Love Meme!

My comment is here.

Year in Review: Fandom Edition

I swiped this from owlmoose. As per usual, the master post of all fics written this year will come up on January 1 or thereabouts, once the Yuletide reveals are in, because it bothers me to list this year's Yuletide on next year's list. ...Don't look at me like that.

Your main fandom of the year?
In terms of wordcount alone, Final Fantasy XII and Persona 3 battled it out for dominance. I spent a lot of time reading in Dragon Age fandom after I finished DA2 in September, but haven't written much for it.

Your favorite film watched this year?
I don't watch very many movies; in fact I can only specifically remember three (Thor, Immortals, and The Muppets.) Of those three, I think I liked Thor the best--there was some bit of magic missing somewhere in the Muppets movie for me, I'm not sure where (and to be fair to it, the anxiety attack I was having throughout the movie is not helping my perception.) But I am weak vs. pretty fight scenes and ridiculously well-built guys, I guess.

Your favorite book read this year?
Amanda Downum's The Drowning City and The Bone Palace. I also really enjoyed The Hunger Games and sequels, but the Necromancer Chronicles are what stood out in my mind.

Your favorite album or song to listen to this year?
That's a tricky question. I bought a lot of music and put individual songs on repeat fairly often, but nothing is standing out as my #1 choice.

Your favorite TV show of the year?
The Good Wife, hands-down. The show is incredibly smartly written, features lots of awesome ladies being totally awesome, and has an underlying theme of "everyone has a price" that is pretty much bulletproof for me. Also, hot.

Your favorite LJ/DW community of the year?
I probably participated the most in newgameplus, I think, or ff_exchange. I'm trying to branch out and get into more comms this year.

Your best new fandom discovery of the year?
I think I'm with owlmoose here: Dragon Age. It's horribly intimidating to me as a fandom, but so delicious. (See me hide in a corner the way I do with every fandom that's not Final Fantasy....)

Your biggest fandom disappointment of the year?
I would have to say probably my own failure to get more writing done. I keep trying, and some days the words are just there, but my habit of fits-and-starts makes this really difficult.

Your fandom boyfriend of the year?
Gosh, this one's a toss-up. The main competitors are Shinjiro from Persona 3 and Fenris from Dragon Age 2, but honorable mention to Balthier (Final Fantasy XII,), Kain Highwind (Final Fantasy IV), and Alistair (Dragon Age: Origins et al.)

Your fandom girlfriend of the year?
Vivian Hawke, my diplo!mage from DA2, and Mitsuru Kirijo, from Persona 3. Honorable mention to Celes Chere (Final Fantasy VI), my perennial favourite, and Oerba Yun Fang (Final Fantasy XIII.)

Your biggest squee moment of the year?
This one is tough! Nothing's really leaping out at me as the thing I loved the most.

The most missed of your old fandoms?
Final Fantasy IV and Final Fantasy VI, hands down. I've written a bit for both, but not much.

The fandom you haven't tried yet, but want to?
I've written a small handful of things for Dragon Age, but I want to try more. (By my standards, what I've written for DA is nonexistent. *eyes giant pile of FF4*) I'd also like to maybe dip my toes into Suikoden. But that's an even more terrifying notion than DA.

Your biggest fan anticipations for the New Year?
Mass Effect 3. FFXIII-2 (yes, I know it's going to crush my dreams underfoot, but until then I make the hopeful face.) Finding new fandoms and new awesome people. Introducing tuberose to more of my fandoms and squealing about it. Lots.

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Yuletide Recommendations, Part 2: Fandoms G-Z

Wed, 28 Dec 2011 01:53:23 GMT

And the next round! This one covers the rest of the alphabet.

( Gentleman Bastard Sequence )

( Greek Myth )

( Kushiel's Legacy )

( Last Remnant )

( Mass Effect )

( Octopus Steals My Video Camera and Swims Off WIth it While It's Recording )

( Radiant Historia )

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Yuletide Recommendations, Part 1: Fandoms A-F

Tue, 27 Dec 2011 03:32:38 GMT

Fandoms A-F! I am having a surprising amount of patience for combing the archive this year! (My making a recs post at all has a lot to do with that magical "Share" button on AO3, not going to lie.)

( Assassin's Creed: Revelations )

( Arthurian Myth )

( Black Jewels Trilogy )

( Changeling: The Dreaming )

( Echo Bazaar )

( Fairy Tales )

( Final Fantasy IV )

( Final Fantasy VI )

There are more recs to come; I saved out one of the longest ones to read later, and I'm only up to F, but this is what I've got so far. :D

In totally unrelated news, folks, if you have a Mac, I have just discovered something totally amazing in the process of compiling this post: TextWrangler, which is the text editor I use, lets me collapse cut-tags while I'm working so I can make sure all my cuts are properly closed and my entry does not get ridiculously huge! I am ridiculously pleased by this and it may create Moar Recs Posts in the future.

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Yuri Challenge Dear Valentine

Mon, 26 Dec 2011 21:27:23 GMT

This is a placeholder post! I will have details here no later than 2nd January 2012.

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eeeeee lookit my Yuletide shiny!

Mon, 26 Dec 2011 03:57:29 GMT

Diamond Dust (5660 words) by Anonymous
Fandom: Final Fantasy VI
Rating: General Audiences
Warning: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Celes Chere/Locke Cole
Characters: Celes Chere, Locke Cole
Summary:

Celes understands Locke more easily when he's not trying to speak to her.

(man, this "Share" button is going to cause me to write all kinds of recs entries, y'all.)

This is awesome. It has beautiful bits of meta about Espers and Magicite; it's a whole lot of Celes and Locke failing to talk to each other (usually a bulletproof way to win my heart), and interwoven scenes as the game progresses. I love it. Go read, and leave some love for my Yuletide Santa!

(further recs as reading warrants. *side-eyes the size of the Yuletide collection, takes a deep breath and dives in*)

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That went better than expected.

Mon, 26 Dec 2011 01:47:36 GMT

Did not get into screaming fights with any of my relatives! Awesome!

Yesterday was a little rough--Mom was very frustrated because the sink broke and cooking became very difficult, but eventually Dad fixed it with a new faucet and we had a delicious prime rib dinner and watched The Sound of Music, like you do, and then benjamindunbar gave me all the hugs while I was trying not to panic.

This morning I woke up at around 10 after a looooot of sleep, which probably has to do with why I feel better, and we made breakfast and then exchanged presents.

( Loot! )

The family came and we had a huge dinner--glazed ham, homemade scalloped potatoes, candied sweet potatoes, mac and cheese from scratch, and fresh rolls. It was so delicious. I got to see my cousins, which was awesome, and my godfather. For the most part dinner conversation was hilarious and not obnoxious, which is always a win. And now I am watching the Packers, who I fully anticipate are going to crush the Bears.

Dear DW (and LJ) family: I love y'all and am so glad to have you in my life. Thanks for being here, for commenting or lurking or reading or sharing. ILU. ♥

and now I finally get to read my Yuletide fic!

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Where to find a Rina around the Internet; and Twelve Days of Promptmas!

Fri, 23 Dec 2011 19:47:07 GMT

So since I see that there's an influx of people on Dreamwidth now, this seems like as good a time as any to share some communities and Other Places to Find Me, and also, it's time for Promptmas!

Comms I Mod Or Enjoy on Dreamwidth
final_fantasy_archive - bring your FF fanworks! Bring your recs! Bring your announcements of related things! Share them! We want to have you. :)
sidequest - Prompting memes for multiple (video-game specific) fandoms. If your fandom isn't there, submit a post for it. Prompt! Write! Everything is delicious!
yuri_challenge - There's a new round happening for Valentine's. Come play with us!

I'm sure there are more; this is me distractedly trying to organize while on airport Wi-Fi.

Where to Find A Rina On the Internet
lassarina
rose_in_winter - fic archive, including drabbles
Lassarina - incomplete fic archive, does not include drabbles and is missing a lot. I hope to remedy this.
LassarinaAthyn
lassarinarose
lassarina

N.B. I do still have accounts at InsaneJournal (completely defunct), delicious (mostly unused), and LiveJournal. I will probably continue to cross-post to LJ because it takes me no effort, but I prefer to read and interact on Dreamwidth. My fic is no longer directly posted to my LJ ficjournal. I've not been happy with LJ for at least four years and I am pretty much done. (If certain fandoms move at least in part, I will be utterly done.)

Twelve Days of Promptmas!
So. I had a bad day yesterday. I found out some things I'd much rather not have known. My reaction to this is WRITE ALL THE THINGS and turn it into something positive! The rules are simple:

1) One prompt per person; once I've written your prompt you can ask again.
2) I make no guarantees of length. You might get a drabble. You might get 5K. Who knows.
3) Play nice. Please don't ask me for things you know I'm not comfortable with. If you're not sure, I'd prefer you check first.
4) I will post at least one thing per day.

(there might be more than 12 days. Duration of this meme is flexible and subject to change at my whimsy.)

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Mon, 12 Dec 2011 03:37:30 GMT

Hello, DW. It's been a sort of slow week--I haven't accomplished much of note or worth writing about. Except that I finished my final achievement run in Strange Journey. Do ALL the things! aaaah Neutral ending. Wow. Just wow.

Paladin and I have been playing Assassin's Creed: Revelations (and by that I mean he plays and I watch.) Some thoughts, behind the cut for spoilers:

( Ezio Auditore, Still A Badass )

I'm still not done my Yuletide fic, though at least I know what the outline is. And I'm hoping to get it done this week which should be far less busy than most weeks. Maybe.

In football news, it was half a good day, half a bad day; the Pack and the Jags put on excellent shows (take that, Haynesworth, you useless lump) and the Redskins were at least in it until the end, but true to form, they blew it at the last minute. Sigh. And as for Carolina....well. Yeah. But hey, the Ravens humiliated the Colts in their return to B'more, so that's always nice. (And I don't really mind when the Patriots win. I would've preferred it not be against the Redskins, but.)

mmmf. It is hard to think of things to say when you're in a food coma. We had a wonderful steak dinner, and all the food is smacking me upside the head with le tired.

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really, weather? really?

Mon, 05 Dec 2011 03:15:13 GMT

I really do need to remember to do something about these fucking sinus headaches. Given how often the weather changes in Chicago, this is just untenable.

The paladin has been playing his (early) Christmas present--Assassin's Creed: Revelations. So far I'm thoroughly entranced by Sofia and extremely meh about everyone else. Except Prince Suleiman. He's pretty awesome. Ezio seems...I don't know. Maybe it's just that the NPCs aren't as interesting, but Ezio seems less funny now. Except for the minstrel bit, which made both of us choke laughing a few times.

I had a pretty good day on Friday, insofar as my entire brain got taken over by crossover ideas that ate my head completely. It's been a while since I had a rush of ideas like that, so I'm pretty excited about having all these shiny new ideas. (Also, I need more words this month.)

Football's been a mixed bag; the Redskins utterly fell apart at the end, but the Packers just pulled it out (12-0, fuck yeah!), and Carolina embarrassed Tampa. I have hopes for Jacksonville tomorrow, but fffff. Also I laugh at Dallas, NYG, and Philly, and Indy is showing rather distressing signs of life. Come on, guys, are you really going to let Detroit have the only 0-16 season? It's really just the right thing to do, to give them some company!

I also started a new Exalted character yesterday, an Abyssal formerly named Rue and now called Lily of the Valley. She delights me utterly, but much like Somber Orchid, she is definitely packing the wrong Exaltation. (Orchid should've been a Moonshadow or maybe a Daybreak; Lily is a Day caste who definitely should have Exalted Night. As the GM put it halfway through the prelude, "Come on, Unconquered Sun! Help a sister out!" Literally, since Rue/Lily was indeed trying really fucking hard to save her sister from the god of slaves. But she will be a delightful little Day Caste darling assassin. I adore her already.)

And yeah, I have a penchant for flower names in Exalted. Black Lotus was the first one, followed by Somber Orchid and now Lily of the Valley. In my defense the latter two were explicitly chosen to match character archetypes and practices. Black Lotus was me name-generating until something looked cool because I was desperate.

In video game news, I'm working on finishing up my last playthrough of Strange Journey (I have hit Sector Grus, so it's not that far off!) and still patiently tromping through Infinite Undiscovery, where I am about to go into Fayel.

Oddly enough, December looks to be a quiet month for me, not very busy, mostly because all Exalted games are on hiatus due to assorted student obligations and holiday-related obligations. I'm pretty okay with this, because I need the downtime after November. (My brain hit 50K and then gave up the ghost for a while. I'm starting to be able to think again, which is really nice, and also really necessary.)

Now, do I want to write the FF4/FF6 crossover first, or the FF4/FF8 massive clusterfuck of "lol timelines what are you" and sorceress meta....? Or maybe it should be that one about how Balthier got back to his Ivalice after the detour to FFT: War of the Lions timeline...?

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hey hey hey!

Thu, 01 Dec 2011 03:02:27 GMT

look!

Yuri Challenge @ Dreamwidth! Celebrating f/f pairings in East Asian fandoms!

Yuri Challenge! Come play! Bring your East Asian fandoms! join usssssss.

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November Goals, and NaNoWriMo

Thu, 01 Dec 2011 02:21:53 GMT

The goals rundown (quickly):

Video Games: To complete at least one more game by the end of the year. I'm in sector Fornax (so 6 of 8) in my Strange Journey final run, and I've been progressing slowly in Infinite Undiscovery, which is fine, because NaNo.

In December: Complete one game!

Writing: NaNoFuckingWriMo. And I did it! And I only have 12K to go for GYWO. Speaking of...

In December: 12K total, including Yuletide. And finish the draft of the NaNo novel so celeloriel can rampage through it like unto a starving and very finicky T-Rex.

Fitness, Body, Health: Yoga once a week. pffffft hahahahaha well. No. ON THE OTHER HAND I did identify the source of the anxiety attacks so.

In December: Take my vitamins every day and keep track of how changing meds etc. is affecting me.

Money: Pay for any Christmas shopping in cash (credit allowed if money is available to pay off immediately. Done and DONE. And bonus: I PAID OFF THE LOWEST CREDIT CARD AGAIN. (i.e. I paid for the car repairs I had done in October, FUCK YEAH.)

December: Pay for next term's French tuition in cash and don't resort to credit.

In other news, I have some Thoughts on NaNoWriMo.

1) Outline saved my life, again. I think 5 repetitions is enough to prove that yes, Virginia, outlines make me win NaNoWriMo. (Because when I go "zero fucks to give for this scene" I can skip ahead to the next interesting bit!)
2) ....I think this thing might have worth buried somewhere inside it. Maybe.
3) I think, all things considered, I do like Scrivener better than Liquid Story Binder. LSB was fine when I was stuck on Windows, but I much prefer Scrivener's interface. One thing I would like is a slightly better way to keep some QuickRef windows perpetual (since I have one for variable names, see below.)
4) Variables are the greatest thing that has ever happened to me in a long project, for srs. Names might slow me down for 20 minutes, but instead I can say $some_clever_name waterfall and MOVE ALONG. and it is a thing that can be dealt with later.
5) I really do much better at NaNo, and it stresses me a lot less, when I can carry my laptop with me to work; I can generally get all 1700-2000 words before I even get home. 15 minutes at Starbucks pre-work; 45 minutes at lunch; 30 minutes on the train home.
5a) This really only works if I do not eat somewhere that has WiFi.
6) Having my paladin to take care of me makes NaNo less difficult on me physically; he is very good about making me eat real food (and arranging things like cooking giant batches of beef burgundy so that the food is just There and I don't have to deal with it.)
7) Productivity Parties are the best.

I think that's about all I've got. Yeah.

Random thoughtlet: I fucking love Neil Diamond's first Christmas album and I hate the second one like burning.

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oh yeah so

Wed, 30 Nov 2011 02:32:23 GMT

Validated and won NaNoWriMo! I hit 50K (plus my known required padding since Scrivener counts "word--word" as two words and NaNo's validator doesn't, and I am unholy fond of em-dashes--seriously, I lost like 400 words to that, no lie) as they were calling my boarding group Sunday night.

I have some things to say about the NaNo experience and also some general realizations about LIFE ETC. but I am all out of spoons and have spent all my GP (Grownup Points) for the day, so fuck it, VIDEO GAMES FOREVER.

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NaNoWriMo, Day 26

Sun, 27 Nov 2011 05:27:07 GMT

All right, there we go. Now I'm making progress. 48,155 per the site (48,375ish per Scrivener), and I can probably finish the rest tomorrow on the plane or in the airport.

I'm writing the climactic scene and it's turning out....more of a philosophical discussion than I thought it was going to, which fits the general theme of what it's going to do, but I'm not sure if it's climactic enough. I don't feel like there's enough danger. And I'm trying to avoid Evil Overlord Declares His Evil Plan! speechifying.

pleh, whatever, that's for edits. Dialogue! I can write it!

and now....I dunno. maybe I'll read something.

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