Wedding over.
Went really well.
Am exhausted.
More later, when have had more sleep.
Wedding over.
Went really well.
Am exhausted.
More later, when have had more sleep.
Comments OffTags: Life
So, I must resort to a bulleted list.
Comments OffTags: Life · School
A lot of my flist has been posting these, and since I’ve been having similar feelings myself, it seemed like a good idea to follow suit.
I started in fandom in what has been called “The Golden Age” between GoF and OotP– I started reading TLC and The Harry Potter Movie Site (later the Harry Potter Connection) and places like that around June of 2001, found a fanfiction I liked (Harry Potter and the Heir of Slytherin by Persephone aka Drummergirl) at the HPMS/HPC forums and followed it and its accompanying discussion as a lurker for several months, and finally got up the nerve to post right before September 11. I was aware of places like SQ (as a lot of the posters at the HPMS/HPC forums had their fics hosted there, and followed fics that were hosted there) and, shortly thereafter, Fiction Alley, but didn’t venture into the social aspect of the larger fandom for some time, choosing instead to stay in my little comfort zone. It wasn’t a bad place to be, actually. I met Melissa there, as well as Teri, Lou, Trisha, Rebecca, and many others (including Wolf550e, who is and probably always will be anti-LJ) :P. I was pointed to a lot of good fanfic, got my first lessons in fandom behavior and politics, and forged my first fandom friendships. I was inspired to write and post my first fanfic, and to start my first blog. I remember when we all told each other our real first names– some made people guess, even, and that was fun. Completely unaware of most of the rest of the fandom, especially its darker, nastier aspects, I stayed in my little bubble and loved life.
Of course, it didn’t last. Eventually HoS was finished, and the conversation died away. The original website with which the boards were affiliated up and disappeared, and we lost a lot of people who hadn’t had the boards bookmarked separately. Several subsequent affiliations died as well, and eventually posting all but died, and the boards have since been deleted. Melissa moved on to, well, TLC, many of us moved to blogs rather than message boards, and I. . . I registered at SQ when the new site went up, got involved in ship debates, and gradually–very gradually– became involved in the larger fandom. In March of 2004 I started my Live Journal, which opened up a whole new world of friends to me. I found I had more notoriety than I had any idea of– I still thought of myself, and still *do* think of myself, as relative nobody in the fandom, someone who may have famous friends but who is not famous herself. I spent anxious days waiting for new chapters of After the End and Rising from Ashes to be posted, made contact with Angua when I discovered we’d be debating at Nimbus together (and what a nerve-wracking experience THAT was, let me tell you– little old ME talking to the Great Angua?! :O), and met my first fandom friend IRL when Lilac brought her son to the same bookstore we attended for the midnight OotP party. I went to Nimbus, and met many more people IRL– people like Morgan Tuatha and Lou and Mellie who I’d known since my very first days in fandom, and other people like Angua, Sweeney and Catherine who were more recent friends, and people like Kirk and Julia who I’d never met even online before but who I instantly adored. Then came Wahleecon and late-night Y!M sessions and– so much. My fandom focus changed from reading fanfic to interacting with the people behind (and even around) the fic. And I can’t say that’s a bad thing, although I do miss the days of compulsively checking SQ or a Yahoo! Group hoping for a new chapter of some amazing fanfiction.
For a while, I kept up with my old friends just as much as my new friends, and I do still check the blogs of all those who aren’t on LJ almost every day. I remember those early days of confusion after HoS finished– where were we supposed to go now? What were we supposed to do? For a while we tried to continue the thread. But then Mellie got ever more busy, RJA stopped posting, Persephone herself dropped off the face of the earth– I last heard from her when OotP came out and she recognized me on the Today show. Those of us who had no larger fandom affiliation valiantly carried on the conversation, but felt rather left out. People had moved on, had forgotten us.
And now, when I hardly comment at all on *any* of my friends journals, don’t IM so much any more, and basically lurk in fandom except for scattered posts about why I’m not around much— I wonder if my first, my best friends are feeling the same sense of– I don’t know, abandonment that I felt when other members of our little clique began to move on. Do they look at me like a good friend from the past, but not involved in the present? Do they see me as an SQ mod, as someone who has people like Angua and Moey and Marta on her “friend-of” list, and doesn’t need the “little” people like Trisha and Katie anymore? Or worse, do those who don’t have LJs like Morgan and Wolf see me as abandoning them completely?
I hope not. I really, really, hope not. Because no matter how much I love all my new friends (and I DO!), I can never forget the first people who showed me kindness, who loved me and encouraged me and gave me memories that I can never erase. In some ways I wish we could all go back to that simpler time, that there was some place that we could all gather just like we used to and have fun just like we did then. But it’s not to be. Fandom has evolved, we have evolved, and this is our reality now. I just hope that all my old friends know that I’m not singling them out, or that I think that they’re beneath me because they aren’t as well-connected as I am now. I hope they know that I’m shamefully ignoring everyone equally. And that I will always think of myself as a little HPCer, posting about everything and nothing on the Heir of Slytherin thread.
I want to be the kind of person who finds time for everyone, who doesn’t let people down. I’m going to try a little harder to be a little better, to be the kind of friend that all of you are to me. Because in the end, that’s what fandom is really about– the people you meet, the people you care about, the people whose posts light up your friends page, whether they’re posting deep canon analysis or activities of their daily lives or silly things about nothing at all.
So, keep posting. I’m still here.
→ 1 CommentTags: Fandom · Harry Potter
I’ve been making excuses for my lack of posting in the last three months– I was busy! I had homework! Studying! And yet, I wasted quite a bit of time playing Minesweeper, etc. I simply got out of the habit, and so now– when I *have* had time to post (albiet not as much as I’d hoped)— I still haven’t done it. Bad me.
So here I am, trying to make up for all that. What’s been happening?
I had a lovely holiday. Got lots of of good presents, including a new watch and a wool pea coat. Good times with family, too. Christmas Eve was spent at my grandmother’s house, where a good time was had by all, despite the large hole left by the death of my grandfather and great grandmother. Usually the festivities at Grandma By’s encompass both Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, but in an effort to make things easier on grandma, we squeezed them all into Christmas Eve, which left us scratching our heads over what to do on Christmas itself. We’ve never spent a Christmas at home before, ever. But with my brother getting married, it was a good time for us to start new Christmas traditions. My brother’s fianc???e stayed the night on Christmas Eve (since she didn’t go home to Buffalo for Christmas), we slept in until 9:00 before we opened presents, had our traditional Christmas pancake breakfast, and then headed over to my Grandma & Grandpa Johnson’s for lunch. After a nice visit and some yummy food, we came back home, where Grandma By paid us a visit (she visited all the familes, starting down south in Mapleton and working her way up), and then spent the rest of the night playing board games (Ticket to Ride is *so* fun, and my team won at Cranium! TWICE! :O) and watching Christmas movies. Mom had bought a roast for Christmas dinner, but first we weren’t hungry enough and then we decided it just wasn’t Christmas-y enough, since we have roasts for Sunday dinner a lot. After throwing around a few possibilities, we ended up–get this– getting Chinese takeout. Fa ra ra ra ra.
Since then it’s been a whirl of wedding stuff. We hit after-Christmas sales to pick up snowflake-themed decorations on Monday, and to get Amanda’s wedding dress (which is GORGEOUS), and started printing out labels for the invitations, which were ready this morning. Ben and Amanda are at this moment sitting in the Cincinnati airport on a layover on their way to Buffalo for New Years, so Ben can meet his future in-laws once before the wedding. We’ve got a price list of the flowers (purple lisianthus will be available! YAY!) and things are starting to come together. But there is still so much to do, and school starts on Tuesday.
We did take time out yesterday to go see Finding Neverland, which I highly recommend. I admit to shedding a few tears at the end. It makes me even more excited about Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, not just because of Johnny Depp, but also because the young boy who played Peter is going to be playing Charlie. He was excellent.
I’d better get back to stuffing envelopes.
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resents under tree. Riddles. Greeting card.
HUGE ANNOUNCEMENT.
CAN’T TYPE.
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The semester is OVER!! I have officially finished my first semester of graduate school.
I SURVIVED.
Now, to survive next semester. . .
I wish I could skive off everything over break, but unfortunately, it’s not in the cards. I need to work as much as possible, because I need to pay for tuition and a heckuvalot of books next semester. Oh, and then there’s my credit card payment that’s due at the same time. And rent. I have enough in my bank account to pay for tuition itself, but just barely. Luckily, I’m getting a decent paycheck this week, and will be able to work 32 hours next week and at least a couple of days at least between Christmas and New Years, and my parents owe me $300, so I should be able to cover everything if I’m careful, and put all of Christmas on my credit card.
Oy. I wish money didn’t exist.
I between working, I also need to help as much as possbile with the wedding. It’s less than a month from now! o.O. I’m going with my future sister-in-law to help pick out the cake today, in fact. So that’ll be fun.
Tonight’s the Johnson family Christmas party, so I get presents! Presents are always good.
Oh, and today’s Dilbert? Priceless. And extremely appropriate, in my case.
Back to scratching out a meager living in a frustrating working environment. . .
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The Leaky Cauldron‘s reporting a small but significant change in the welcome note on JKR.com. Want to see?
Look at Google’s cache for the text-only of the welcome note.
Now look at the current page.
See the difference?
Stumped?
Old note:
This is where I can tell you the truth about rumours or news stories, where I can share the extra information I haven’t put in the books, where I can give you hints and clues about what’s going to happen to Harry next, and where I can announce I’ve finished book six… and no, that’s not going to happen very soon.
New note:
This is where I can tell you the truth about rumours or news stories, where I can share the extra information I haven’t put in the books, where I can give you hints and clues about what’s going to happen to Harry next, and where I can announce I’ve finished book seven… and no, that’s not going to happen very soon.
SQUEEE!!!!!!!!!
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Final of Doom: Finished.
Amazingly.
Yup, folks, I have just pulled my first official all-nighter. This is counting HP releases, incidentally, since after OotP I went to sleep at 7:30 and got up at 11:00, and the Midterm of Doom, because I got about 3 hours of sleep then. I’m quite proud of myself, as I did it on minimal caffeine (I had a small glass of Diet Pepsi round about 2:30 am). One small snafu, however. I had finally finished up and taken my shower. It was 6:50. I had to leave by 7:15 to make it to the final on time. Takes about 15 minutes to dry hair and get out door. So, I did what I’ve done almost every morning for the past 11 years– I went back to bed for a bit. Just to close my eyes for 5 minutes.
When I woke up, it was 7:30. (I do not count this short nap as negating my first all-nighter. If it was a 2-hour nap, maybe. But 35 minutes doesn’t count.)
So yeah, I ended up leaving here about the time I had planned on rolling into the (mostly empty!) graduate parking lot.
*headdesk*
Luckily, even though Professor Muhlestein gives Scary Exams of Doom, he is actually pretty fair, so when I walked in half an hour late looking absolutely panic-stricken, he asked the class if it was okay with them if I got a little bit of extra time to do my exam since I got there late (so I ended up with the same amount of time as they’d gotten, not that I got more than they did). Luckily, they all said “sure” (“You’d do the same for us,” was one of my classmates comments, and it’s true, I would), so I managed to finish the test relatively panic free (although my typo ratio was waaaay up the first few minutes as I tried to keep my hands from shaking :P). So I made it through feminist critiques on the literary canon, Chodorow’s theories of early childhood gender development, and Gilligan’s model for how women make moral choices pretty well, I think. Although that remains to be seen.
I’m back home now. Taking a nap would be useless, as naps always make me groggier. My original plan was to go into work after taking the test, on the assumption that I would have had a decent night’s sleep before and therefore could study for my other final after my work Christmas party tonight. Now, I’ve got a change of plans. I’m going to study *now*, so when I get home from said party I can go straight to bed and get a nice, at-least-12-hour sleep. When I feel I’ve crammed enough 18th-century literature into my head, I’ll stop and get something for the gift exchange (I’m thinking a pound of See’s chocolates would be good) and maybe some Vanilla Coke, go to work, and then go straight to the Christmas party *from* work. A good plan, I think.
So, studying. Bye.
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ext time I volunteer to put together a group project, shoot me, k?
It doesn’t end up working too well when people don’t send you the stuff in time to do a good job. I mean, I gave them the weekend. I figured I’d be nice, let them get it to me by Monday (since I was unlikely to do anything on it until then) and that would be enough. It’s an upper-division class, I figured people would be more responsible than they were last time I was in charge of editing together a paper (which was my Freshman year–I’ve put together other projects, but nothing that had to be cohesive).
RONG.
The first part came Monday night around 9:00. It was well written, but contained no source references and made no attempt to connect the information on slavery in the 18th century to the issue at hand (which is a novel called The History of the Life and Adventures of Mr. Anderson by Edward Kimber, which no one has ever heard of).
Next came information on Anglo-French relations in the first half of the 18th century, at about 10:30 Monday night. Except that the student, in his own words: “I basically just typed what was most relevent to the history on it and the time period we’re working with. They are basically verbatim out of the books, as to not distort what really happened (if I paraphrased, it would be a dissaster). So, feel free to put in your own words to flow with the rest of the group paper.” Ah. So, I’m supposed to take your research and paraphrase it myself. Uh-huh. I thought that was your job. So I get into it and discover: it’s all about the French and Indian War (Seven Years War) of 1754-1763. Except that the book was published in 1754, and is set in the early 18th century, between Queen Anne’s War (The War of the Spanish Succession) from 1702-1713 and King George’s War (The War of the Austrian Succession) from 1744-1748. Right. So now, I get to do the research he should have done, so that our paper actually covers something relevant. Also, the sources he quoted? He gave me titles, but nothing else. No author, no page numbers, nothing. Great. I basically ignored all his stuff.
Tuesday morning comes, and I get the third part of the project. This part is beautiful: proofread, correctly typeset, complete with Works Cited page and parenthetical references, and makes the effort to connect the information (on the ‘man of feeling’ character type in the mid-to-late 18th century) to the novel, everything. Yay.
But I still need one more piece.
And it doesn’t come.
So I send a reminder e-mail.
Nothing.
Then, at 6:30, I get an e-mail from the person who hasn’t sent me anything resending the slavery part for another student, saying that the other student wasn’t sure if it came through, and, oh, she’ll send her part as soon as possible.
Which turned out to be at 10:15 last night.
The paper was due at 12:00 today. And I had an 8:00 AM chiropractor’s appointment, and a 10:00 AM class.
GAH.
And when I opened it, it was good and well-written, but repeated a lot of stuff I’d already talked about (since I tried to get as much done as possible while waiting), so I had to basically re-write everything I’d done.
Never. Again.
At least it’s out of my hands now.
In other news, my back is much better, I have a total of ONE class left in the semester, I am going to VEG as much as possible tonight, and Jen and I have a bout of good, hard playing scheduled for Saturday. The semester is almost over
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My sister, , has had her fic uploaded to FictionAlley, and I think all of you should read it!
Now, considering that I am not really a gigantic Snape fan, and am definitely not a big Labryinth fan, but even I am enjoying this lovely HP/Labryinth crossover fic. As you can imagine, Snape and Jareth don’t exactly get along.
So. Go. Read. Review. She’ll appreciate it.
P.S.– Thanks for all the good wishes. I’ve taken it easy today, and kept it on ice and heat alternatively, and done some stretches, and it feels kinda better. My brother’s fiance is going to take a look at it soon– she’s a physical therapist. Nice to have one in the family.
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