The Ink-Pot and the Palette

I thought I was done with fandom. I hadn't read any fic in ages, and the last couple of fandoms I put a toe into--Teen Wolf, maybe? and, IDK, Sherlock, a little?--never fully grabbed me. My fannish life seemed to be over.

Then a month or so ago, Twitter lured me to the edge of The Untamed and I fell off that cliff backwards*.



( All the way to the bottom. )

Chapter 42 of Restraint is almost ready for beta. It took me weeks to find a hand-hold in what seemed like a sheer cliff face of storytelling, but I think I've found it, the segue to the already-written ending. I hope to have the remainder of the novel posted by Sunday night, depending on kis' availability to look it over with her usual eagle eye.

(If you're one of the people still following the story, I've got one word for you: Kleenex.)

I feel so strange contemplating the End of the Story. I don't know when another story will come. Restraint is one of the biggest things I've ever undertaken, and it's going to leave a huge hole in my life when it's done.

At the same time, I'm ready to move on. I'm pretty completely engaged in this weight-losing project, which I think will occupy most of 2011. There's not that much to it--eating less isn't very complicated--but I'm operating at such a different level than I have in any previous attempt, with information that's new to me, and tools that didn't exist even five years ago, that it's taking up a lot of mental real-estate at the moment.

( Enjoyable things )

Kowalski is Bleeding, by Speranza
Fandom: Due South
Pairing: Fraser/RayK, Vecchio/Stella
Rating: Adult
Read by darkemeralds, with Spanish language sections by vampirefan
For ratherastory, Podbang 2010
Running time: Just under 7 hours

MP3 here
M4b podbook here

This is one of my favorite stories in fandom. It has a beautiful woven structure, a terrific plot, and Speranza's usual great characterizations. I hope I've done it justice.

Thank you to the wonderful mods at amplificathon for running this show and zipping up the files to the archive, and to general_jinjur for providing the archive space.

Despite having had to work for a couple of hours yesterday, I've had a lovely weekend, with lots of checkmarks in my "Time With People" goal-box on Joe's Goals. It's practically a social whirl for me: I had a mojito with my buddy Darrell from work on Friday night, then dinner last night with the ever-gracious serenity_valley and sr8tontilmornin (conversation compelling, house delightful, food excellent, as always); then coffee with my mother this morning.

I've lost just under 20 lbs--that was a nice Sunday morning treat. It's weird how avid I am to weigh myself each day, after having spent 30 years avoiding knowing that number.

Bike errands today included buying a 2.5 quart Crock-Pot (influenced by the aforementioned excellent food chez sr8tontilmornin), in which a shoulder of pork is currently slow-cooking in a Chinese style char siu sauce--whisky, honey, star anise, fennel, Sichuan pepper, cassia bark, cloves, garlic...The house smells wonderful. I've never had a Crock-Pot before. I think I'll get good use out of it.

Just finished re-recording the first three chapters of lovesrain44's Blue Skies From Rain because Audacity swallowed up some bits and I thought I could improve a lot on others. I've got chapters 1 through 10 done now, and I think I'm pleased with it. Only 19 more to go! :D

And speaking of chapters, I finally broke through the Chapter 42 barrier of Restraint. It's not done yet but it's well underway, and everything after it--the Epilogue and the Afterword--is pretty much complete. I plan to post all three pieces at once, the grand finale of a project that has occupied me for well over two years. It will be both wonderful and sad to be done with it.

And, in conclusion, chart!


(Detail from my tracking spreadsheet. It all means something--mostly "Yay!"--but I like the look of it as a design.)

( What a splendid birthday! )

Not exactly a party animal, I know (well, I never was), but I had a lovely, lovely day from start to finish, and I hope everybody else's birthdays will always be as nice as mine was yesterday.

The barometer is, evidently, skyrocketing and the shower scene music from Psycho is a fairly apt representation of the way my inner ears feel right now.

And speaking of the shower scene music from Psycho, is anyone else loving Scott Caan in Hawaii 5-0? He's just such a banty rooster. I like the show way better than I thought I would, mostly because of him. Which is strange because little stocky blond cock-of-the-walk attitude guys usually aren't at all to my taste.

And speaking of taste, I made a gluten-free lime pound cake yesterday, mostly while listening (again) to pandarus' fabulous The Student Prince. (Really, some of the most stand-up-and-cheer fiction I've ever read, fan- or otherwise! Highly, highly recommended.) The cake came out yum, and now the limey deliciousness reminds me of the terrific payoff scene where Arthur grants the interview, which I was listening to while applying lime glaze.

And speaking of payoffs: I just watched episode 12 of Rubicon. Wow. Just, wow. That show! I've never encountered that kind of slow-building, totally controlled long-arc story on television before, and holy crap, did it ever pay off in this latest ep! It was a brilliant, dark climax to the arc, and will be the starting point for a scary and exciting new arc. Amazing writing and acting.

And speaking of writing, Restraint chapter 39 is almost done at last.

I just recorded the first section of my Podbang entry. Can't say too much about it, since it's secret and stuff, but here are some things I've worked to improve on from last time. I've already said a lot of this to pandarus, from whom I learned it, so thank you Fayjay!

Notes to Self:

• A simpler recording set up means a vastly greater likelihood that you will actually do some recording
• Slow the heck down
• Slow down some more
• Now take your time...
• ...and relax! Breathe!
• Use more of your vocal range
• No, you're not an actor, but what the hey, act a little--go on, you know you want to
• A nuanced reading is more important than a perfect recording--way more important
• Practice first

There are probably some more things, too, but it's really cool what a vast difference slowing down makes. There's more room to glance ahead and micro-plan the next line, more room to breathe and relax. I made far fewer mistakes than ever before, just by that one trick, and the mistakes I do make are MUCH easier to edit out because there will tend to be some space around them.

So, the plan for now is to record half an hour per evening, then practice-read the next half hour.

Then work on the next chapter of Restraint. It's just fic all the way down around here!

pandarus/Fayjay's podfic of Restraint, Part III, is up on the archive!

Oh, and I'm hard at work on Chapter 36. I thought it was done, but my wise beta hinted that I might want to rethink that position a bit, and she was right. So a bit of a remodel is taking place (seems to be the theme of my life), and it will be a few more days.

So meanwhile, I wholeheartedly and with tremendous squeeing recommend everyone to go listen to Fayjay's fabulous podfic of Part III.

It's a story about transportation. A story about service. A story of the limits of technology and the boundless nature of kindness, and it is the story of the thing that rarely happens happening at just the wrong time. It is a tale of podfic, and a Dutch German woman, and and a boy called Jeremy.

It is the story of my Saturday, and it goes like this:

( Read more... )

Now it's 1:30. I have my wallet. My devices are charging. I'm getting on a bus in a few minutes and going to get Clyde, who will carry me in a lovely, newly-gear-adjusted, impact-free manner back to Clever Cycles, where I will purchase my accessory items before they close, and then...

Then I think I'm gonna stop at an all-day breakfast place and treat myself to some bacon. Because I totally deserve bacon.

It's been a mad four-day weekend, mostly involving writing. I think I burned out a few brain cells on Restraint, because pandarus recced it the other day and suddenly the hit count at AO3 started soaring.

What's even cooler is that pandarus wants to podfic it.

She podfics as Fayjay and if you like podfic and have even a glancing familiarity with any of the fandoms she records in, I cannot recommend her work highly enough. One day, a couple of months ago, I was listening to her recording of "Old Country," the you-can't-believe-it-will-work-but-it-does Harry Potter/Supernatural crossover by Astolat, and I thought, "It would be so cool if that reader could podfic Restraint, because she has exactly the right British accent for it and she's fabulous and would be my second choice after, like, Stephen Fry. Or Alan Rickman."

But then I thought, "Naah--she's a BNF and I could never ask her."

It will come as no surprise to the reader to learn, therefore, that when she emailed me and volunteered to record my story on the strength of the first four chapters, well, a) I said yes about twenty seven times, and b) the pressure to push ahead and keep writing was suddenly on! (And I've ended up having a lovely email conversation with her, so that was a huge plus.)

So I poured on the steam and got a hell of a lot written by my glacial standards, with kis betaing the same chapter at least three times, bless her patient spirit, but now my brain is fried. I was up till 3:30 a.m. last night, and dreamed of the story all night long when I finally did get to sleep: spinny dreams, thoughts chasing each other around. And kittens.

Not that restful.

I took my nephew out this evening for fish and chips and a beer (well, he had root beer--he's only 13) to fill the protein gap left by four days of insane writing-based malnourishment. Came home and watched "Harold and Kumar Go To White Castle" and laughed my ass off. I needed the break.

And now I must sleep. Gah! Look at the time. It's an hour later than it is.