Yeah, yeah, linkspaming. I don't care.

First, I'm sort of a fan of Dune. I don't think that hardcore fans would think I count because I got into it through the Sci-Fi Channel's miniseries. I eventually managed to read most of the series. (I've been in the middle of Chapterhouse for... er... a few months now...) Anyway. I've heard stories of the WTF Dune coloring book that was released to promote David Lynch's movie. And now Coilhouse has scans. Wow. Just... it is more cractacular than I imagined. (Although I do sort of want to make those Spice Cookies...)

Second, The Yuri Challenge prompts are up~. There are Covenant of the Plume prompts. There are Taisho Yakyuu Musmume prompts. The Any/Any prompts also look promising. I am excite. So very excite. Also, I'm not the only one who wants Agrias/Ovelia. YES!

Okay, so I've heard about the Mark Reads... site from his reviews of the Harry Potter and Twilight series (Mainly from TVTropes and Fandom_Secrets). Thanks to cleolinda, I got the news that he is starting up on The Hunger Games. Fuck. Yeah. Seaking. He's going into it blind. In the parlance of the site, SO NOT PREPARED.

Oh, and I'll also take the time to rec "The Panem Victors Breakfast Club" by electrumqueen. You should be fine if you've finished Catching Fire, but I guess that you can take it as spec fic with a bunch of OC's if you've only just started on the series.

In the 74th year of the Games, The Watch is held at Haymitch's Capitol residence (where it often is, for ease of access to alcohol: even amongst those-who-survived, Haymitch is The Alcoholic); they are playing a drinking game, while watching the interviews. You take a sip every time someone looks like they're about to throw up, and when they actually do (there's always one), you down the whole thing. Haymitch is a cheat; he never sips, only sculls.

In other news, hadesphoenix linked me to stuff by The VLog Brothers. Pretty nerdy and cool, and one of them is doing an LP of Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood. (Speaking of Brotherhood: OMG K-MART HAS IT ON SALE ON THURSDAY OMG.) I didn't expect to like the two much, because my previous experience with John Green was when reading An Abundance of Katherines, which I really didn't like.

OMG chofi HOW COULD YOU NOT LIKE AN ABUNDANCE OF KATHERINES IT IS UTTERLY BRILLIANT AND I BET YOU WERE JUST TOO STUPID TO GET ALL THE MATH. I CANNOT BIDE ANYONE STUPID ON MY READING LIST, SO I AM GOING TO STOP FOLLOWING YOU NOW. RIGHT NOW.

Anyway. I'm down with the mission of the Nerdfighters and it seems really cool. (Since it's basically the mission I have for Fandom in... only in vlog form.) It's on Ning, however, and I'm scared that the IRL identity and this one will be linked up. I'm seeing some noms de internets on there, so I guess I'll have to get chofi/chofitia for use on there, too.

Triple word post score!

So I've decided to actually, you know, use the DW, but it's probably going to have a similar fate to the IJ: a mirror journal. At least this time I uploaded my ElJay entries so that I don't get stuck in an archiving mire like I am at IJ. (Uh, yeah... about posting what I've got of Benefit-verse using in-fic chronological order...)

Hrm... now to have a point to use the Ashe icon... Well, first is Yahtzee's fail of a review for The Sims 3. The whole "Dude, not funny" feel of the review was of course magnified in the forums. Conversations about the fail here and here. This business hits close to home because I used to be (and have my moments of being) one of those types that derided the "casual gamer" in order to bolster my own old school cred. (Of course, being a [female] fan of the Final Fantasy series means that I'm about half a step above the casual gamer in the hierarchy. Is there a gamer hierarchy? You know, like The Geek Hierarchy the Brunching Shuttlecocks made. Whoo, tangent.) This also sort of stinks of "I am better than other girls, because I can do this guy thing!" which is not cool. Remedial feminism is remedial.

In actual gaming news, I finished Tierkreis and have started Final Fantasy. Thanks to canis_m whenever I see Atrie I start thinking "Taiki~" and wonder how everyone's favorite black kirin would look in Atrie's gear. (Answer: adorable, but of course) To remain vauge, yet ranty: it's really great that you've finally decided to have a female Tenkai, Konami. Next time, how about we make her something more than an NPC? Also, I want a Nimni plushie. His armor would be insane, though. I still have a lot of white fleece, so maybe a Neira is in the future?

Now, for Final Fantasy. It's going a lot faster than I thought it would, mostly because I got my plot background from 8-Bit Theater and it took a while for the strip to do the first five minutes of the game. (I still think "stabbity" whenever my black mage has a knife/dagger.) Names: Namae, Nom, Elia, and Nombre. One of these names is not like the others...

Live, from the work desk...

more of Kushiel-verse?

I think I might pick this up as a brain-fluff read. It... actually sounds kind of fun. Extra bonus that it takes place in the same 'verse and doesn't deal with the same characters. I kind of got thrown out of Kushiel's Dart when I realized that Joscelin was basically bizarro fanon!Suikoden III!Yuber. (I guess this makes Phèdre bizarro!fanon!Albert. And Delalunay bizarro!Leon. And I should stop this madness now.)

Actually, now that I think about it, the threshold started looking appealing with "bistre."

Yeah, I finished it, because that's how I roll. I stuck with it for the pr0n, because that's also how I roll.

Then again, I have a hella lot of stuff to read, as it is. Maybe I should invest in more paid accounts for my journals, just so that I can have polls where my lists tell me what bits of my queues to work on next.

So the U.S. is going to get a PSN available version of FFVII

It's sort of sad that I started thinking about the incoming wank (Aerith vs. Aeris, part quatre!) and Fandom!Secrets, rather than the influx of new fan work (as was my reaction for each release in the Compilation). Jaded fan is jaded.

Hell, I want to see if the spelling and grammar mistakes were corrected. I'm sure that I'll catch wind of the fallout should any mention of the Comp make it into this version of the script.

Remember when I was kind of WTF over the casting of The Last Airbender? The folks over at Racebending.com have decided to petition Paramount over the WTFery. This is me getting of my lazy ass to get you off your lazy ass and sign the petition. Here is a lovely image link to tell you the same:

So sign the petition, please.

Despite having a media intake queue, I went and bought more books to read. I managed to finish them off, so at least I've kept myself neutral. And then this post on Jezebel reminded me that I'd like to get a Game Rectangular Prism and Ikaruga. Damn it.

So. The New York Times did an article on whether reading on the 'tubes counts as "actual" reading. Cue references to MySpace, Wiki, and Google. Surprisingly (at least to me, since I'm not very used to meat-world media talking about fandom), there were also references to Gaia, the Pit, and fanfic writing, in general.

I'd like to rant about how the representation of fanfic is more skewed towards the "Lol, I wrote this on a suga high! R/R!" types. Or on how you could totally call the Comments section being "I have [condition]! Reading on the 'tubes helps me!" vs. "STFU and read a real world book!" vs. "At least they're reading!" vs. "Um... I like to do both?" However, my eyes are shot, so I'll just leave you with a constant:

Anyone who thinks that reading teen gossip or making up fantasy characters that change plot to satisfy the adolescent mind is remotely similar to reading a great book must be suffering from the same malaise that the Internet is purported to create. So at least their reading, huh? Even if the grammar and syntex, well, again, forgive me, SUCKS!

Note to self: Temeraire icons. NAO.

Well, Victory of Eagles preview up, and of course I read... Temeraire-voice helps to remind me that he's still going through the adolescent sulk period. Dueling Math Nerds for the win (I had to work out what they were talking about. I really need formulae.), though I'm holding out on my squee opinion of Perscitia until I read more about her.

Also: NOVIK AT THE GREENWICH VILLAGE B&N!1!!! July 9. It's a Wednesday, so I'll have to take off from work for it. This also gives me about a day and a half in which to finish Victory of Eagles (It comes out on July 8), because I'm sure there will be spoilery conversations. 384 pages in about 36 hours is totally doable.

Reviews for VoE~

For most of its length, Novik keeps the focus of the plot squarely on Laurence and Temeraire — the former weighing his feelings of guilt against his implacable notions of honor and duty, and the latter's own regret once he learns just what Laurence has lost, and his dismay at being unable to break through the defensive line of Laurence's sullen and grave demeanor. The bond between captain and dragon can never be broken. But there are some crises that Laurence has to work through himself, where Temeraire simply cannot help.

Oh, God, I can't wait until July.

Well, I'm something of a fan of the The Alkazar. I rather like the subset of the Alkazar where the actor plays up some sort of characteristic of his or her character in real life, probably just to pander to the fans or a specific subset of fans. Examples include Ruben Langdon acting like a total dork., Steve Burton acting unsure but determined, and Gideon Emery admitting to developing a small crush on Fran.

So, in the mornings I listen to the Z100 Morning Zoo (Guys, you've seen my deriviative, unoriginal fic; my derivative, unoriginal icons; my derivative, unoriginal layouts; and my overall devivative, unoriginal thoughts. Is it that much of a surprise that I don't listen to more enlightened stations?), and this morning they interviewed Jesse McCartney. So, along with the creepy Shota Cat-like perving from the hosts and from callers, Jesse also mentioned that he's more attracted to the lower half of the body. Alas, he didn't mention whether he preferred blondes, bruinettes, or red heads.

Dear any and all Rutgers HP fen:

Based on this video, I feel that Rutgers should have a team and compete in the cup next fall. 139 Year rivalries don't just go on by themselves, you know.

X's and O's,
Me.

So, the recent Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix Wright debacle and a discussion on FFVII old meme inspired me to Google my fan-self.

I expected some ancient fanart from the epic Mary Sue fic I did during high school. (I've done this before, yeah.) Instead, I found this ancient character generator quiz I made for the same Mary Sue fic. I mean, holy shit. I forgot I ever made it.

We have Crisis Core FMV's in English. Highlights include Genesis's English voice (just emo enough, I think) and the Three-way Fight of Awesomeness, in which Sephiroth is Awesome. There's also the Ending FMV, with the secret ending. I didn't notice that one little thing that Cloud does with the Buster right before the end of the secret bit, when I saw this in Japanese. Now that I have, I'm eat up with the squee.

In other news, I saw Persepolis, finally. I misted up. Had a bit of "I would have translated that like that" with the French. (sigh)

I think I'm going to start creating a series of entries filled with educator-type wank, and the brain-comes-to-a-screeching-halt responses that I encounter. This one comes courtesy of a New York Times article on a survey given to teens about history and literature.

Teenagers???? I asked a couple of my colleagues to name the second president of the U.S. and neither could answer me. I gave them a hint and told them that he's on the nickel and they still couldn't name him without reaching into their pockets. ...and neither of them appeared the least bit embarrassed.

Poster, you're doing it wrong.

So, MSN had this article on the declining numbers of male teachers. There's a feedback button linking to a message board, and so, people will share their thoughts on yaoi education. Cue wank over pay, loss of control, accountability, NCLB, harassment accusations used as payback for discipline, and those damn spoiled hoodlum kids and their crazy rock-and-roll music electronics.

Then, this:

As a male college student looking to become a high school social studies teacher, I find these comments interesting. I think it's unfortunate that there are so few male teachers. I can see how children coming from broken homes, especially boys, would look up to a strong example of male leadership and concern. Sadly, feminism has weakened the role men are able to play in our culture to exert a strong impact among youth. Men are sometimes seen as being unable to relate well with kids, perceived as a threat to them, or viewed as relegated to specific jobs while women take on the teaching roles.

...

...

Finally, a Feminism 101 Blog is there for a reason.

Poster, you are making my intended profession look bad.

Violets are #0000FF.

Happy Valentine's, and all that.

So, I've outed myself as a fangirl in my Literature of Adolescents class, and have told the class that I have an ElJay. I haven't given anyone a user name, of course, but really, it's only a matter of time before someone finds me. Sigh. [/ogiue]

Second, awesometacular crib-notes are awesometacular.

Vegeta! What does the scanner say about the Anonymous count for Project Chanology's February tenth worldwide protests?

IT'S OVER NINE THOUSAND!

Round Ups:

• @ Encyclopedia Dramatica (Image and Video Heavy, page Not Totally Work-Safe.)
• cleolinda's round up post. It provided a link to the best macro ever.

There's noise on the Tubes talking about an Ides of March protest.

You can't spell "ignorance"...

Bullet time points time:

• Seph's laugh is nice. It's a very nice "God damn it, I am eat up with the TMI, aren't I?" laugh.


• Lazard sounds absolutely nothing like I had imagined him. It fits, but it'll take getting used to.


• Angeal sounds just about spot-on from what I had in my head. He was a little gruffer, in my mind, but it goes well, and it won't take getting used to.


• THEY KEPT IT AS "I LOVE YOU." MY LIFE IS COMPLETE.

ETA Feb. 09, 2008, 8:41 am: And the objections have begun! Oh, FFVII fandom, never change.

I know I shouldn't talk, because when I read fic, the voices I hear in my head (Oh, yeah, that sounds good...) will be the voices the characters have had in my head before the release of respective parts of the Compilation. Ah, well, I have unwashed plebe status from even acknowledging the Comp, so what do I know?