A Study in Contradictions

It's always amusing to me how differently the world looks from where I'm sitting.

Me: OH GOD, now that I've spammed everyone with my The Social Network Big Bang by posting all the entries and posting to comms and talking about it on Twitter, they probably hate me.
A significant portion of my twitter/flist: WAIT YOU POSTED YOUR BIG BANG?

So, yes, yes I did post my conpeople AU, in which our hero learns the importance of love, time, using your damn words and proper lumbar support. And in case you missed me editing it in, novembersmith made the most amazing mix called Love Songs for the Criminally Unaware and I have been listening to it on repeat for days. Interspersed with this. Now that the serious side has been taken care of (SO PERFECTLY I CANNOT EVEN) I can get on with Earnest Mix of Seduction and Post Break Up Terrible Karaoke playlists *g*. Also I'm pretty sure I owe a fair few of you mixtapes; let me know?

Baby's first Big Bang! It was supreme amounts of fun, even if it did mean that I stayed up until past five three nights in a row, once for Moog's big bang, once for mine and once just because when given an IRL moogle62 I cannot stop talking. I loved getting art and being part of something and I think I'm proud of the story, I'm still too close to it right now, and all I can think about is all the things I didn't end up putting in it. But the whole BB has been of a sort of stunning quality. What are you, TSN fandom?

This is the first time in two years that I haven't had a deadline or an active WIP. I am confused by this state of affairs. Obviously all my brain can think of doing now is some sort of timestamp meme.

Out of fandom lifewise, well, hmm, things remain... stagnant. My boyfriend bought a new car which promptly broke down so that was. Yeah. Been better!

My family remain my family:

Me: Oh hey Dad, how are things in South Africa?
Dad: Your grandmother is mad at me because I set the lawn on fire while she was here.
Me: ... HOW?
Dad: I threw a firecracker at a monkey.
Me: Obviously.

And then we had a twenty minute conversation about the Italian national anthem. I swear I'm not making this up.

When I'm not talking Verdi, I mostly spend my days hanging out on tumblr and getting into email loops. Should you wish some quality correspondence, I can be found at muchadoaboutcogs on the gmail.

Aaaand finally, this meme went around a while ago but I never got round to posting it and I'm kind of intrigued. Like I said, I need to see the world from where I'm not sitting!

"If I made Cinderella, the audience would immediately be looking for a body in the coach." -- Alfred Hitchcock

If I wrote a story today, what would the readers immediately look for?

That was a pretty nice wrap up, there, don't you think? How are you, lovely flist?

It’s only been a month! I! No, I have no excuses, I am the failiest blogger ever to fail at blogging. Aaaand now the word blog has stopped sounding like a word to me.

On with the con report!

YOU GUYS I WENT TO A FANDOM CONVENTION AND IT WAS THE MOST AMAZING THING EVER.

I was staying with brimtoast in New York (you know, as you do) which will be part of another thing which I will totally get round to writing up and then novembersmith drove a Very Long Way and braved the wilds of New Jersey to come bop around NYC and the thriftstores therein with us for a few days, before driving the three of us to Boston for muskratjamboree 

Oh yes, fangirl roadtrip! During which we listened to the Libertines and decided they are the most perfect The Social Network soundtrack band ever and that someone should make a vid to Can't Stand Me Now immediately and also The Fantasticks cast recording, with brimtoast telling us the story in between the songs. novembersmith did an extremely heroic job because it was dark and snowing A LOT and it turns out that it’s quite a long way to Boston *hopelessly English*.

We were supposed to be meeting shiningartifact and swiiftly at the hotel where the con was happening and where the five of us had a room. Fangirl sleepover! But, heartbreakingly shiningartifact hurt her back just a few days before and couldn’t come. The pining, it was epic. But we found ourselves a lovely swiiftly lurking in the lobby and then proceeded to not sleep, as we had planned to, but to go through her welcome pack, eat chips and then I read out the opening page in French for reasons that made a lot of sense at the time...

Which may be part of the reason that we all got up blearily late and I was still in the shower and novembersmith only half dressed when it was time to go down for breakfast and the welcome and icebreaker thing. So we missed those :/. But on the plus side it meant that when we did wander down we migrated to the craft table, which turned out to be a brilliant plan! Now, I am not an artistic person, at least not with Visual Mediums, but it turns out that I cannot resist the lure of photos of people I fangirl. And glitter pens. We ended up hanging out for about an hour and making some very useful signs for future panels.

Also novembersmith helped make a Very Special Picture of Gerard Way and brimtoast put googly eyes on Lord Voldemort which turned out to be too terrifying to exist *shudders*

I made this!


The way MJ worked was that there were two panels every hour, so had you had to pick one that you were attending, which was sometimes nigh on impossible. Okay, so panel lists and reaction to follow. This might get long, kids.

( A Round Up Of The Panels I Attended Part 1 )


After the panels we piled into the lift to find the The Social Network watching party.
novembersmith : Did you check for the room number?
Me: I was just following this person with the glittery “Social Network Party!” sign
zeenell : Er, hello!

The viewing party was probably one of my highlights of the whole weekend. There were delicious mudslides, which as far as I could tell are wonderful but lethal cups of various spirits mixed with ice cream. It was just a room of happy people, all laughing and being delighted to meet each other and fangirling each other and piling onto beds to watch a brilliant movie with brilliantly slashy subtext.

The Social Network: *starts to get pretty sad*
novembersmith : Lal! This is the point where we hold hands.
Me: *strickenface* YES I AGREE *clutches*
swiiftly : *takes novembersmith 's other hand from over on the other bed*
elipie : I know we have just met, but I think I need to clutch your hand also.
Me: I think so too!

So then everyone held hands to get us through the tough times. We may also have yelled at the screen some. These things happen. Afterwards we had to watch happy vids. Essentially, you haven’t lived until you’ve heard a bunch of fangirls sing along to Bad Romance while slightly tipsy and falling off beds laughing and dancing.

Then we went to get ready for the vid party! And by get ready I mean drink candy coloured drinks straight from the bottle and wander around in various states of undress. Because we are the classiest.

While waiting for the show to start we - possibly in a horse, stable door situation - had something to eat. I remember gesticulating a lot with a stick of celery. We also alarmed the random other people sitting at our table.

Me: You and your dead boys.
novembersmith : I know, I know. I just like writing about them...
swiiftly : But it’s ok!
Me: Because there’s no necrophilia!
novembersmith: EXACTLY.
Me: And no-one has actual sex with a dragon.
(please note, these are things that novembersmith has put in fic summaries/disclaimers.)
Girl At Our Table: Ohhhhkaaaaay. *looks at life, looks at choices*

There were a few technical difficulties which brooklinegirl dealt with a good deal less panic than I would have, and there a mass sing-along of a song about pirates. I don’t even know. But it was awesome. The vidshow was epic, I LOVE FANVIDS SO MUCH YOU GUYS. Even the ones for fandoms that I didn’t know. Watching vids with fangirls is such a great experience, listening to everyone laugh and cheer their favourite characters and also be utterly destroyed by this Harry Potter video. Seriously, the lights came back up just afterwards and everyone was just clutching each other and sniffling.

Then it was time to dance! I very much enjoyed that my dancing parters were also of the DANCE IN THE MOST DRAMATIC AND INTERPRETIVE WAY EVER school of movement, which is the best way of dancing ever, okay. Highlights were definitely doing the most energetic point at everyone dance with brimtoast , swiiftly and mistresscurvy  to If I Had You, the whole room bouncing for the whole of Planetary Go! (with added fabulousness from K), brimtoast and I learning the dance routine to Guilty Pleasure in about 3 choruses and yelling bed based Panic! lyrics at swiiftly .

There was a slight room keycard incident after the show but we managed to use our problem solving skillz for the win, and also I found an ice machine and vending machine with ginger ale in a hidden area around the corner from our room. My very important priorities, let me show you them.

In a slight tangent, I’ve just noticed how much internet specific language I’m using here, and it was definitely one of the things I enjoyed about MJ, getting to use all of these words that are day-to-day to me, but never get to say out loud in social situations. I mean, sometimes people used terms that other people didn’t get but it was just so, idk, freeing and lovely and easy to say things like “jossed” and “flist” and “fridged” and “bulletproof kink” and so on and so forth. Also people weren’t surprised when I finished a sentence with “I can’t even...” which confuses my boyfriend on a regular basis.

Anyway! Saturday!

( A Round Up Of The Panels I Attended )

So, yeah, MJ. It was one of the best things I’ve ever done. So much love and kudos to brooklinegirl and mrsronweasley for organising it (while also moving house, wtaf, these women are superheroes). The level of planning and detail that went into it was incredible and it all went so smoothly.

I think the defining thing I will take away was how positive it was, in every possible way. You couldn’t move for people complimenting each other. Someone was always telling someone else that they just loved their cool geeky tee shirt or their hair or tattoo or their tights (:D). People saw usernames on name tags and ran up to say “I love your fic/art/post/general existance!” Seriously, someone hugged novembersmith for writing Anatomy of a Fall and me and brimtoast got all *proudtear* IT WAS AMAZING. And when someone said something funny, or clever or cool in a panel, and people were always saying funny, clever, cool things in panels, everyone was so appreciative. And it does bear repeating, the comments in the panels were of an incredibly high standard, I could hardly stand it. Fangirls are fucking hilarious, and they are damn smart and they are hella interesting.

And it was also positive because it really did feel like, I don’t know how to say this without sounding really cheesy, but it was just really open. Like, everyone got to talk about their kinks and their queerness and their stupid things that they just really, really love, they love them so much that it makes them make crazy hand gestures and squeaky noises and they can’t, they can’t even. And everyone else? Everyone else just said, HELL YES. ME TOO.

And on that note... <3

I went to South Africa and as promised, bring back tales of Adventure. And I even managed not to cause any kind of international crisis (aren't you proud of me mathsnerd ?), though not through lack of trying...

What you may or may not know about me is that I was actually born in South Africa, in the vibrant city of Johannesburg, to two half South African half British parents, and we left when I was three-ish. I have lots of family over there, now including my Dad who is currently on some sort of Gap Year slash extended jolly slash who knows. This meant that I got to go on a family visiting, cricket watching, showing the boyfriend the homeland and most importantly escape to the sunshine kind of a trip. And it was glorious.

( A summation, with added Pictoral Bonuses and conversations of a Lal-ish nature )
In short, South Africa I &hearts U




Anything else you would like to know, just ask! I have about a hundred more pictures than I put up here...