Despite major posting fail, it's not like I haven't been fannishly active the past few weeks -- it was just in the going-to-things type area and not spending time online (okay, that's not true of the last few days due to an HP fic that I can't stop reading, but still). I attempted to go to see Public Enemies and the 4th of July Fireworks with svmadelyn, kalpurna, talitha78, and norabombay plus Kalpurna's roommate. The movie happened, but due to some restaurant reservation shenangians, we saw the fireworks reflected through a window across the street. Oh well, there's always next year! Although they started early, which was totally cheating. I went to the Taste of Chicago with my sister rhiko and elizbot, ate ridiculous things, took even more ridiculous pictures, and called our mom from the top of the Hancock Tower to congratulate her on taking her RN boards (which she passed, hooray!). I also marathoned the rest of Kuroshitsuji over the holiday weekend, and ended up making emergency cookies because you can't watch this show and its endless parade of tea and pastries without wanting some yourself.

This past week, I attended a preview screening of the Leverage season opener, about which I will say nothing spoilery except AWESOMEAWESOMEFOREVER. Sometimes I forget that non-fangirl people watch these shows -- it was a pretty diverse crowd. Not diverse enough to hide the row of other fangirls in front of us, though. We were trying to figure out if they were actually fangirls, since we saw an LJ icon on someone's screen, but then we heard the phrase, "Jensen's ass" and that pretty much solved that debate.

This weekend was a dinner party at kalpurna's place -- dinner was awesome, and there were a lot of new-to-me bandom fangirls (including two delightful ladies from New Orleans who were sadly only visiting for the weekend). As usual, I think I got half real names, half LJ names attached to faces, which makes it kind of hard to write up about, but suffice it to say, it was fabulous and great to hang out with everyone.

And now I am SO EXCITED for the new Harry Potter movie -- I keep seeing the movie advertisements on the sides of buses and it fills me with glee. I'd say the last time I heavily read in HP was about five years ago, but I still read the odd fic now and then, and there's something comforting in returning to an old, familiar fandom.

Exile
Fandom: Star Trek: DS9
Pairing: Garak/Bashir
Rated: R
Timeline: Pre-series AU
Notes: Thanks to lynnmonster for the beta, and to kellyfaboo for audiencing, and to ontogenesis for letting me talk things through with her. Oddly enough, I was thinking about the new movie and alternate realities, and found myself writing DS9 instead.
Summary: Exile was certainly dark, but in Julian Bashir's case, it was warm and humid instead of numbingly cold.

( Exile )

Today:

1.) A small marsupial attempted to climb down my shirt;

2.) I ate a deep-fried snickers bar with istril and svmadelyn cheering me on and taking photographic evidence;

3.) We saw the Harry Potter exhibit and it was magical. Also, FYI - the dormitory beds seem a lot smaller in person than in the movies, which Madelyn and I agreed made some fanfic situations seem highly improbable;

4.) I watched the first three episodes of She-Ra with istril, and oh god, the eighties were so sparkly!

Dear Star Trek: you're eating my life. I'm serious. Although it's fortunate that there's all this fic being posted, especially as we're entering a slow season at work. And I'm writing again (please see: slow season at work), but even though I'm devouring new Trek fic, I appear to be writing DS9. How does that even happen in my brain, I ask you.

Life is still good, awesome new apartment is awesome, new roommates T and C are almost toxically adorable. Roommate T is home while I'm at work, and apparently my cats hang with him while I'm gone -- I came home the other night, and Miss Yukino, who is shy and freaks out about everything, just flopped over right in front of T so he could scratch under her chin. Also hilarious is when I hear Dorian making obnoxious meows in the kitchen while T is out there, too, and T responds to each disgruntled meow with a gentle little "Uh-huh" every time, like a man humoring a toddler. Also, T always puts down the toilet seat, which I appreciate greatly.

So in addition to a happy domestic life, I've also had a number of visitors, including moonythestrals and kellyfaboo. Kelly and I have explored two new brunch spots in my neighborhood (respectively, cheap and amazing and close, and pricey and amazing and a bit of a walk). It was great to meet moonythestrals, and always good to get together with fangirls!

So I guess I'm off to buy more Star Trek novels at used bookstores (boy, am I started to regret that book purge about five years ago) and reread DS9 zines and maybe watch some Star Trek of various flavors on the roommates' really fucking pretty flat screen. When I saw their set-up, it became instantly clear where all the money in the apartment had gone.

I, er, bought a TON of Gin/Kira doujinshi when I was in Japan, and I'm trying to clear some shelf space, reduce duplicates, etc, and I'd like these to go to a loving fangirl home:

( doujinshi for sale! )

The above was a text message from my sister rhiko early Saturday morning on her way to help me move to the new apartment. I did not properly appreciate it at the time because I was dying from plague and attempting to shut both my cats in the bathroom, but now I think it's hilarious. And true.

I am working today, for values of work that include, "sitting at my desk and trying not to cough on everyone or do anything requiring substantial mental effort." My entire weekend was a repeating pattern of unpack, nap, unpack, nap. And this cold is still kicking my ass, despite calling in sick on Friday and having Monday off. But the bonus is, I'm almost completely unpacked, and I rearranged all the furniture and hung up curtains. My two male roommates looked upon these precedings with befuddlement, although they conceded that it looked much nicer when I was finished. I waged war on the bathroom and the fridge as well -- really, let's just say that it involved some toxic mold killer, goggles, and a face mask. I'm not joking. Oh, boys. But the new place is huge, and it was all worth it the first time I saw the cats lope down the entire length of the house. They have a bajillion new windows with wide ledges to sit on, and once Roommate C's kitten gets spayed this week, they'll have the basement to explore and a kitten to play with.

I had some version of first-day jitters on the commute this morning, which is vaguely ridiculous because it's not like my commute is complicated or anything. And yet! Also, my new neighborhood is awesome and there's a panaderia across from my train station. I saw it this morning and I thought, "That's like a パン屋! But in Spanish." Have I mentioned how much cold medication I'm on?

This weekend, I pulled some of my old Trek novels off my bookshelf to flip through them, and my copy of Ice Trap had more Kirk/McCoy slash than I remembered. The truly hilarious part is that even my thirteen-year-old self recognized and approved of the gay -- there are paper slips marking all the slashy bits, as was my custom to save myself the trouble of finding the parts I wanted to reread (I also did this with Sherlock Holmes, and I remain totally amused that I was obviously slashing before I could even articulate it).

I don't think you need a lot of context for this next bit to make sense (except, maybe, that it's cold and they're on an actual ship on a planet's surface, but you probably could have guessed that from the title):

( Kirk/McCoy goodness )

When you watch something six times in a row and will probably watch it more in the next ten minutes, I think it's time to share.

Poker Face, by talitha78. Star Trek XI, Spock/Kirk, utterly freaking fabulous and almost unspeakably hot.

First! I am officially not homeless, and am in possession of a new apartment in an adorable neighborhood. The apartment is the basement and first floor of an old 20's three-flat, and my two roommates have the basement set up as their World of Warcraft haven. The main floor is allegedly mine to do with as I please, and believe me, I have plans (working title: Welcome to your late 20's, where you really should buy some actual curtains and furniture that is not quite so dilapidated). They are boys and thus appear to be somewhat mystified but content to let me continue on my interior decorating reign of terror. I'm moving in next weekend, so this weekend will be spent scrubbing the place down and maybe painting the bedroom if I get permission from the landlady.

Second: STARTREKSTARTREKSTARTREK. I've already seen it twice and I'm feeling the intense need to go see it at the IMAX as soon as possible even though I really should be starting to pack or something.

So, I've had a variety of adventures in trying to find a new domicile to move into at the end of this month. My plan of attack was two-pronged: 1.) find someone who needs a roommate, or 2.) find a roommate, then find a new place to move into together. To that end, I saw (among others) what I thought would be a totally cute place in the middle of Boystown, but was in fact a bit skanky. I saw a cute apartment where the tiny tiny bedroom which was not actually a bedroom (it had no closet -- look what House Hunters has taught me). I interviewed prospective roommates -- my favorite was the guy whom I had a great talk with until I mentioned my cats, and then he went pale and said, "I'm allergic." I just looked at him, and said, "It was in the ad." And then he turned a different color, and said, "I must not have read it all the way through." WHAT.

So, basically, I've been running around town like the proverbial decapitated chicken the last three weeks, but this saga hopefully has a happy ending: I found a nice place with amiable roommates, and have put in my application. Barring anything going horribly, unexpectedly awry (fingers majorly crossed here), hopefully I'll have a lease to sign in a few days. The lease starts the 11th, so then I can get down the very serious business of packing and actually moving and probably freaking out somewhere in there, too. Every time I move I always hit this point where I'm just like, why do I own anything, I should shave my head and renounce my worldly possessions except my doujinshi, I can't live without those.

Uh, so obviously this is responsible for eating up a lot of my spare time. But work should calm the hell down next week, so I hope to get back to some fannish productivity soon, even though I'm feeling a little overwhelmed by fannish sparkliness. A new Bruce/Dick fic? Dean/Castiel? (Warning: I really have to watch way more canon before I can do that.) Oh dear god, Hetalia? (Warning: It may actually kill my soul to even have to write the words "Germany/Italy" in any kind of serious capacity.) And who even knows what my brain might come up with after seeing the new Star Trek movie this Thursday.

Chicago fen:

Does anyone have need of a desktop computer? It's been in my apartment closet for a year, and I was keeping it around in case my laptop died, but -- clearly it's just taking up space and I don't even have a desk anymore, anyway. It's still a pretty decent computer -- kellyfaboo tricked it out for me with an extra hard drive and memory. I was thinking I would donate it, but I wanted to ask if anyone wanted it first.

Yorokobi
Fandom: Japanese baseball RPS
Pairing: Inaba/Morimoto
Rating: PG
Notes: Okay, I totally promised this a year ago when I saw my first Fighters game, when the Tokyo gang first beheld the glory of Inaba and Tightpants. And then cienna posted more pictures of the latest game and linked to this translation of Morimoto's wiki article, containing this quote:

On 10/12/2006, during the second game of the Pacific League Second Stage playoffs, in the 9th inning, he ran home from second base to score the deciding (and only) run of the game, which won the league championship for the Fighters. He said of that moment, "With all that happened, I best remember seeing Inaba's face, which was of such complete joy that I realized we were the champions."

( Yorokobi )

I know they're thin on the ground, but if anyone has an extra Dreamwidth code, I'd love to have one. I'm thehoyden on Dreamwidth - thanks, green_grrl!

Also, I find myself reading Dean/Castiel fic. You guys, I don't even watch Supernatural. I watched a collection of Castiel scenes on youtube, read cimness' Dean/Castiel primer, and then started digging through delicious. I'm actually very theoretically interested in watching Supernatural, but regrettably, I have absolutely zero tolerance for horror -- seriously, when I saw the Sixth Sense, I had nightmares for a month, and let us not discuss the time I saw The Shining. But now I find myself thinking, well, maybe you could watch some Castiel episodes if you just really spoiled yourself and had your finger ready to fast-forward through the bad parts -- but that does seem slightly ridiculous. It's sad but entirely predictable what the introduction of hot angels will make me contemplate.

I went and saw Fast and Furious tonight with celli and shrift, despite never having seen any of the other movies.

Dear fandom: please get on this. Please. I can convince you with one sentence, trust me.

( spoilers )

I am at work on a Saturday, guys. Okay, it only happens twice a year, so I shouldn't bitch too much, but seriously. I'm bored out of my freaking mind. So! I've never done this before, but what the hell, let's live dangerously -- I'll write a ficlet for the first ten people to comment with a pairing and a prompt. If I've written for the pairing before, it's fair game. ETA: All ten taken!

Finished snippets so far:

Yesterday's News, Merlin, Arthur/Merlin
Umbrella, Ookiku Furikabutte, Abe/Mihashi
The Next Feast of Fools, Merlin, Arthur/Merlin
Saturdays, Batman, Bruce/Dick
Ace of Spades, Naruto, Kakashi/Iruka
Mikan, Hikaru no Go, Isumi/Waya
Verisimilitude, NCIS, gen
Chicago Tradition, The Dresden Files, John Marcone/Harry Dresden

Holy crap, you guys. GO IOWA. As I just said to my coworker, "Iowa! Are you listening to me? Iowa."

Ties That Bind
Fandom: Batman (DCU)
Pairing: Bruce Wayne/Dick Grayson (background Tim/Kon)
Rating: NC-17
Notes: Thank you to lynnmonster and rageprufrock for audiencing, and bookshop for the beta!
Summary: The worst part is, it might not actually be the most embarrassing thing that's ever happened to him.

( Ties That Bind )

Chicago, I still love you, even when horrible things happen to me like when I parked across the street from Dunkin Donuts this weekend to get a cup of coffee and my car got towed to an uber-scary part of town.

thehoyden: at first i thought someone stole my car
thehoyden: and this guy was like, naw, honey, they just towed you because they're jerks
rageprufrock: what the FUCK.
rageprufrock: sldkjfdf
rageprufrock: omg emperor daley
rageprufrock: NOT ON
thehoyden: i kind of love him, even when he does horrible shit like this to me
thehoyden: he's like the ultimate bad mayor boyfriend
rageprufrock: god, seriously
rageprufrock: it's like
rageprufrock: he's the drunk asshole who like
rageprufrock: is always at your door
rageprufrock: being like
rageprufrock: baby why you gotta bring up old shit

I swear I'm giving my car to my mom as soon as I move.

So, bright and early on Saturday morning, I put on the only piece of green clothing I own (a Slytherin t-shirt that I bought from, er, Hot Topic about seven years ago?), and took the bus downtown. It was sunny and chilly but not nearly has cold as it has been. After I got a cup of coffee, I ended up on the Columbus bridge over the river (which is in the pictures below), but the cops kicked us off. So I ended up on the side of the riverbank with no guide rail, sitting on the cement breaker with my feet dangling over soon-to-be green water, when the police came and told us to keep off the cement. And then I waited about an hour and a half before the Plumbers Local 130 came and did their magic.

( when they said green, they weren't kidding around )