*brushes off cobwebs*

[constance]

Many thanks to all of your sympathetic comments on my previous couple of posts. Someday soon I'll get around to answering them all, but for now, I'm going to move on to something a bit more upbeat.

I mean, sure, I could moan and whine about how this summer, like every summer in recent memory, is kicking my ass like Pai Mei and his crane, but why belabor the point when I could tell you instead about

ten things that are making me happy right now

1. My mother, who when confronted with a plate of delicious food wriggles in her seat in anticipation and bumps her hands together in a gesture reminiscent of Wallace, before she tucks in. I call this little tic her Dance of Good Food.

2. My car: it is going to be fixed, I have insurance money in hand, parts have been ordered, I am getting a rental car for the duration, and it is, as Kiki Kavanaugh says at her wedding, all so fucking grown-up that I am having trouble getting my head around it. My car! It will be fixed!

3. Harry Potter. Oh, my Harry Potter, my new-found-land. I would count the ways (not to mix allusions, but hey, I seem to be on an allusion-mixing roll, here, so why stick at mixing them within one paragraph?), but I'm sure the ways have all been discussed to death by now. I took a two-week break after my first reading, but over this past weekend, I read it twice more, and I'm listening to it on audio, and I am all anxious to get started on a project I've been contemplating for a few weeks now: a plan of Harry and Ginny's House of Dreams as requested by amelia_eve. Not to mention that I have an ongoing list of Fics I'd Like to See and/or Write, which I'm sure you've all shared yours as well, by now, but if you want to share them -- any of your thoughts, really -- again, I am all agog to hear.

4. George R.R. Martin, whose four-thousand-page saga A Song of Ice and Fire saw me through two of the worst weeks of my bad summer in high chivalraic semi-magical style. I will tell you a secret: I am currently designing the gown I will wear at my wedding to Tyrion Lannister, who has become one of my favorite characters of all time.

5. Marvin Gaye's "Got To Give It Up," Stevie Wonder's "I Wish," and Nina Simone's "My Baby Just Cares For Me," which played in high rotation over the weekend. I find it nearly impossible to be sad or mopey when any of these three songs are playing.

6. There is a new accessory rack in a little store near my house which consists entirely of dozens of headbands made of brightly-colored tie silk with long sashlike fluttery ends. I suspect that if any (or all, which is a minor dream of mine right now) were in my possession, I would treat them the same way I treat my hats, gloves, and scarves, of which I have plenty: I would eye them with reverence, stroke them tenderly, admire them without reservation, and never ever wear them because they made me feel conspicuous and self-conscious. I am working on overcoming this ridiculous attitude, because, I mean, why have thirty pairs of vintage gloves if you're not planning to wear them? Why lust after something you don't have the courage to don? Why grow out your hair if you're not willing to accessorize it as frivolously as possible?

7. Creme Brulee with fresh berries. Enough said.

8. Andre Benjamin. I like Outkast well enough, though they've never figured all that heavily in my musical pantheon; but the other day on a whim, I bought a used copy of Idlewild and brought it home, and as soon as the first scene started playing, I suddenly remembered how much I loved it when it came out last summer. It was a glorious extravaganza just suited to pulling me out of last year's ass-kicking, not a perfect film so much as a perfect frothy spicy late-summer confection, like the pecan-and-sweet-potato pie a la mode my mother had for dessert yesterday. But it wasn't until the very end, with Andre 3000's radiant ending-credit performance (can men be radiant? If any can be, he was), that I remembered how painfully much I loved him at the end of last summer. I want to marry him, too. I think Tyrion will understand, once I show him that performance. Tyrion is wise that way.

9. Fanfiction. I have all these fandoms and recs to get through, stories I've been waiting for, stuff I've been saving for the right moment, and I think, now that I've emerged blinking from DH and A Feast for Crows, that that moment is upon me. Just thinking about all the great stuff in store is sustaining me, and I haven't even started looking or clicking on those links yet.

10. You. I've missed you an awful lot. Hello. How are you doing?

Comments

[gmth.livejournal.com]

I am getting a rental car for the duration, and it is, as Kiki Kavanaugh says at her wedding, all so fucking grown-up...

Princess Daisy reference FTW!

Glad to see there's still some joy left in your life despite recent events. :-)

[tofty.livejournal.com]

There is. :) I'm kind of glad of it, too, for several different reasons, but that's an entry for another day.

Princess Daisy, though. That is another thing that pretty much never fails to make me happy. I have NO EXCUSE for its being one of my best-beloved books, but so it is.

[gmth.livejournal.com]

That is one of my all-time favorite comfort books. I have a copy at my elbow as we speak, and I pick it up and read a few pages at random whenever I need a quick break. A page finally fell out of it last night, and I was heartbroken.

Do Ram! ;-)

[tofty.livejournal.com]

No, Day, no! :D:D:D:D:D

[laurelwood.livejournal.com]

My copy is bleeding pages, too!

*sits back, wearing vintage Schiaparelli and fake emeralds*

[tofty.livejournal.com]

I recently ordered a copy off Paperback Swap (http://paperbackswap.com), so not only is mine in reasonably good shape, it is, against all odds given the name of the site, hardcover. I feel so deluxe!

*smug*

[ainsley.livejournal.com]

10. I am doing pretty well, after what amounts to a stay of execution today. A return of happy! And I? am a fan of happy, the kind of fan who refuses to let it out of her sight.

9. Oh, man, that's the one reason I'm sad about life returning--less time to read fic. At least I have a few hundred bookmarked to read so that I can instantly find something in my rare downtime. And I'm always discovering new fandoms (did you know the GRRM series is a Yuletide fandom? I shall be checking there after I finish the series.)

4. Yay books! I've been returning to the second book over a bumpy weekend just past, and it helps.

Mostly I'm glad you have things that are making you happy.

[tofty.livejournal.com]

10. I'm so glad. Was it your Thing that you mentioned that is making you happy now? I would have kept my fingers crossed for you if I'd read your entry when you wrote it, but my fingers are crossed now, anyway, in hopes that it keeps going for you.

9. I did not know that! I'll add the yuletide fics to my list, definitely -- and thanks for the heads up.

4. It does help, doesn't it? I've been feeling a little guilty, over the past few weeks, that I'm so shallow as to e distracted by fiction, but. Well, you know, whatever gets you through the night.

[ainsley.livejournal.com]

10. The fingers still need some crossing, thanks. I appreciate it!

4. Seriously, fic got me through the summer. I don't have my books here, and don't have money for more (or library fines oops). Escapism is brilliant, because it lets your subconscious process everything while you're elsewhere, someplace happy and safe.

[tofty.livejournal.com]

Yes, exactly. :*

[octoberstory.livejournal.com]

Hear, hear.

i want a man who loves my morning armpit.

[kickthebeat.livejournal.com]

i think all of these things sound absolutely delightful -- i still have not seen Idlewild, what is WRONG with me -- but you, you are the most delightful of all. although i have not been around either, i've still missed you dreadfully. i hope things are settling, love, and you are doing well.


on a completely retarded note, though, harry and ginny's dream house!!1! i am gibbering unintelligibly at the mere thought. xoxoxoxoxoxo

Re: i want a man who loves my morning armpit.

[tofty.livejournal.com]

one day when I am feeling coherent I will write you a thank you note to tell you exactly how beautiful your note was and how much it meant to me. xoxoxoxoxoxox right back at you, baby.

You must see Idlewild! It seems like exactly the sort of thing you would love. But maybe I'm wrong about that. :-?

Hahaha, I am just about finished, I think, with a rough draft of the house. I will post it tonight!

[laurelwood.livejournal.com]

It's so good to see you again! Congratulations on getting your car fixed soon. To me, the plumbing of one's own sink and the crawling around under the house looking for ducts seems even MORE fucking grown up even than the car stuff, but maybe that's because I've never had to do either of those two things.

And wow, the headbands sound gorgeous! Both girlies are growing out their bangs right now; perhaps it's good that we haven't seen ANY store that has anything like a tempting and beautiful display of headbands like the ones you describe. Oh, the wheedling that would ensue.

Do you make your own creme brulee, or do you indulge while out and about?

[tofty.livejournal.com]

I suppose the thing that feels so grown-up (grown-up in the boringest, least-fulfilling sense) to me about the car being fixed is shearing through the stupefying bureaucracy of it all. At least when I crawled around under the house, there was this feeling of adventure underlying all the anxiety, you know?

I usually tend to feel like a teenager playing at being all grown up, and the only things that change that particular dynamic are the little quotidian bureaucratic tangles that need to be sorted out.

I indulge in creme brulee when I'm out -- but I have always longed for one of those teeny blowtorches to make them. I guess it's a good thing I don't have one, because I might end up eating creme brulee for every meal for the sheer pleasure of using that little blowtorch, and as far as I know, one cannot live on creme brulee alone, even the kind that comes with berry medleys.

See what I mean about feeling like a teenager masquerading as an adult most of the time? :D

[octoberstory.livejournal.com]

How about I've never had creme brulee? I wish I'd thought of it when I was down there, we could have ordered some at Sonic! :O

Probably if you polled most nominal "adults", they would confess to feeling as you've described--like teenagers masquerading as adults most of the time. Or at least they still feel that way often enough to identify with you. I mostly feel like a junior high kid masquerading as my own babysitter.

Rehearsals are so excellent. Right now we're still doing tablework and research and I think of you often, wishing you were here so we could turn the whole production into some kind of Amadeus fandom. But I just settle for rereading your old Salieri/Mozart fic instead.

Glad you're back. I missed you. ♥

[tofty.livejournal.com]

I mostly feel like a junior high kid masquerading as my own babysitter.

ahahahahahahaaa

I will get that blowtorch and next you visit we can have homemade creme brulee. I have the ramekins and everything!

You are going to make a post of your rehearsals, aren't you? Or tell me all about them? I am dying to hear all those Viennese intrigues and schemings.

I missed you too, very much. I need to make me an Amy icon! :*

eat your heart out, bathilda bagshot.

[octoberstory.livejournal.com]

I will get that blowtorch and next you visit we can have homemade creme brulee

"...And that was the last correspondence the two women exchanged before the debacle referred to, forever after, as The Night Macon Burned: a sweeping inferno the scope of which had not been seen since General Sherman got a midnight craving for peaches."

Yep, lots to post about rehearsals. Have you read the play...? It's so excellent. Salieri tries to sexually blackmail Constanze then chickens out at the last moment, and she calls him a rotten shit and tries to scratch his eyes out.

YEAH YOU SHOULD MAKE AN AMY ICON! :D Because that would be THE GREATEST. EVER.

I didn't make this icon, but I did add the C just for you.

[tofty.livejournal.com]

Good point about the blowtorch, man. *regretful*

I have not read Amadeus, nor seen it performed. Because I am a philistine, I've only ever experienced the film, but I have at least seen that about 200 times. I wish I could be there to see you as Constanze! :(

[octoberstory.livejournal.com]

Yes, you are such a philistine, you fucking illiterate nincompoop. It's practically the Number One thing about you. 9_9

Ahahaha, I have also seen the movie that many times. Because it is the greatest ever. Never seen it produced, though. I read that Simon Callow was the original Mozart. Then Tim Curry reprised the role on Broadway, with Ian fucking McKellan as Salieri. *_* When the Ministry approves our application for a time-turner, remind me to pick us up a couple of tickets, mmkay?

I wish you could be here too, but I promise to post photos and reports. ♥

Your new LJ layout is pretty as I-don't-know-whatall.

[coco-palmolive.livejournal.com]

I hope Harry and Ginny's Dream House Plan answers my most pressing question, which is, do they keep Kreacher? I hope so, because although Harry is not the servant type, any happy ending for Kreacher probably includes a family who appreciates him. (Yes, I am a total sap re: Kreacher.)

[tofty.livejournal.com]

:O It totally does answer that pressing question! It's an important one for me too, for the same reasons that it is for you. I'll post it tonight.

:x

[resonant8.livejournal.com]

Let me ask you a question about A Song of Ice and Fire.

A while back, I had one of those collections of novellas that authors had written in their own universes, and there was a ASOIAF novella in there, and it whacked my torture squick on page one, so hard that I made no effort to read further.

(It was one of those things that was probably meant to signal in an offhand way the Medieval-ness of the place -- that this is not a universe in which people care about your human dignity or your achievement of your full potential, that life here is nasty, brutish and short, etc.)

Is there any point in my trying to read the books, or are they going to squick me like that too?

[tofty.livejournal.com]

Yes, I'm afraid it probably would. You put it very well when you say that this is not a universe in which people care about your human dignity or your achievement of your full potential, that life here is nasty, brutish and short, etc.). It is beautifully and painstakingly written, and there is much wisdom and pageantry and mindgaming taking place amidst the savagery, and I'd recommend it to anyone capable of committing to an epic of such scope; but knowing what I know about your preferences and squicks, I'd say that you'd very likely find it extremely hard to take, no matter how rewarding it is in the end, and it truly is rewarding.

Martin has no visible qualms about handing dire fates off to point-of-view characters (the entire series is written in a shifting third-person singular point of view) in whose happy endings we've become seriously invested. Frequently they are tortured during their own turns at POV, so that the reader is inside the head of the victim. I'm not easily squicked, but there are certain passages even I found difficult to read.

:/

[resonant8.livejournal.com]

Well, that's a shame, but it's good to know about it; so many people whose taste I respect have said they loved the books that I've been tempted to give them a try.

The problem with stuff like this is that it gets in my head and I can't get rid of it. Probably the only thing I have that's a genuine squick and not simply a strong negative reaction.

[tofty.livejournal.com]

The thing I find hardest to bear is not the violence per se, but the unforgiving, unrelenting barrage of it. No one is safe from it, it could strike at any time, it could continue against even Martin's clear affections for his own characters.

It is like crack, though. Once you've become invested, I defy you to put it down.

[octoberstory.livejournal.com]

Call me a knee-jerk Libertarian, but I am increasingly Pro-Targaryen.

[tofty.livejournal.com]

As long as Cersei lives to see Dany take the throne, I don't mind.

[octoberstory.livejournal.com]

For real.

[octoberstory.livejournal.com]

And where are you in the books...? Have you had much Jaime Lannister action yet? Because, man oh man.

I think we should absolutely set up camp in the SoIaF fandom.

[tofty.livejournal.com]

I finished them last week! Jaime is pretty awesome, man, and I'm glad he's starting to see sense about his sister -- I practically cheered when he burned her desperate note at the end of the book. I can't remember the last time I've hated a character as much as I've hated Cersei Lannister.

It kills me that we're going to have to wait for the sixth book to learn what happens next! :O WRITE FASTER GRRM.

Let's both write SoIaF fic!

[octoberstory.livejournal.com]

It's been so long since I finished AFFC, I must reread. :/ It could take a while, but, um...I think we have a while. GRRM takes such a notoriously long time. But hey, at least this is one series that won't be ending anytime soon!

After I reread I am all for full-on fan attack. I desperately want Kingslayer slash. Theon Greyjoy is also looking tense, and could benefit from a good pounding. >:D

[tofty.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I'm totally up for a little Bolton/Theon torture, sexual or otherwise. Mmmm, and such a cornucopia of possibilities for Jaime slash! Or het, for that matter -- a little Jaime/Cersei incest, yum.

In response to the canon, I think, my fic preferences for this fandom are almost all sordid, grim, and bloodthirsty. Darkfic ahoy! >:D

I've been reading that the fifth book has been delayed. COME ON, ARE WE MADE OF STONE, MAN?

:::

Also, to pass the time, I've been catching up on Deadwood and am done with S1. I have this to say about it: *_______* S2 and S3 are being downloaded as we speak! They cannot come fast enough!

[octoberstory.livejournal.com]

I think there's some stipulation in Martin's copyright info that any slashfic involving Theon must include torture. If there isn't, there should be.

Is it just my imagination, or do I remember a passage where one of the twins recalls sneaking out together as teenagers, with Cersei in MALE DRAG? Because OMGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGG. Possibilities=endless. There's that whole Tyrell clan, too! And I Wouldn't Say No To a Little Snow. :-*

DEADWOOD. YES. Al Swearengen is my personal fucking hero. (ANOTHER fandom begging for fic, yes indeed. I am alllllll about the Swearengen/Bullock.) And believe me, it just gets better. There are moments of brilliance in that show so acute that they have actually brought me to tears.

Speaking of v. good HBO shows, have we talked about Rome? It's done now, only two seasons long, and you must see it if you haven't yet.

[(Anonymous)]

Oh, there aren't many characters I wouldn't love to see more of, including Jon, whom I meant to mention in my top-tier list but forgot.

You know what I'm really craving right now, though? Skeevy, semi-noncon Littlefinger/Sansa, where of course he's not going to actually fuck her because he's totally going to sell her off where it best suits him and she needs her virginity for that, but everything else short of that.

I am going to hell.

Deadwood is da bomb, man. I love it all, from the gummy streets and bad teeth, to Bullock/Swearengen (I'm convinced that my father would number AS as one of his all-time heroes if I can ever convince him to watch the show). I can't wait to see what happens next.

I haven't seen Rome; for some reason the concept's never really grabbed me to the point where I start the laborious dl process. Maybe someday -- but so much else going on right now!

I have been waiting to start reading The Privilege of the Sword until I got a copy of Swordspoint to reread first -- and I finally got it this afternoon in the mail. So that's next on the list.

She's pretty heinous, but...

[octoberstory.livejournal.com]

I think her son made Cersei look like Mary effing Poppins.

Re: She's pretty heinous, but...

[tofty.livejournal.com]

Oh, agreed, but he had the good grace to die painfully and ignominiously, and so, you know, he's not so much a psychotic loose cannon these days as his dear mum.

Re: She's pretty heinous, but...

[octoberstory.livejournal.com]

When Joffrey snuffed it at that feast, I put the book down and did a Victory Dance. I am not even kidding. Ask Jim.

Come to that, there are lots of really gratifying murders in these books. Tyrion stabbing his old man on the privy has to be an all-time orgasmic literary moment. I hated that old bastard. Actually I hated him much more than I ever have Cersei. Who is, admittedly, one of the nuttier brands of fruitcake in the market.

Oh my god this is making me so excited to reread. But I think I have to wait til post-show to start anything seriously; because for the first time in years, I've got lines to memorize. Which, crap. O_o I have something like two weeks to get off book. SCARY.

Re: She's pretty heinous, but...

[tofty.livejournal.com]

Tyrion didn't stab his old man, he shot him. At point-blank range. With a crossbow. I get shivers of joy whenever I think about it! I hated Tywin too, and actively rooted for his displacement (never dreaming it would be as TOTALLY AWESOME as it was when it came), but not as much as I hated Cersei. He was the vilest of the vile, but at least he was smart, and not quite so busy orchestrating his own downfall. Cersei is conniving, but she's not an especially perceptive woman, and is so narcissistic and spoiled that those traits actively work against her most of the time.

My own victory dance came when Kevan Lannister told her that C. was the worst fucking mother in the world as he turned her down for the position of Hand.