wiseheart | So, it is party time again, folks!

...push us over the top!

Edited 2014-10-07 02:11 (UTC)

Page 5! HURRAH!!!!

Yeah page 5!

You officially rock!

Well done! Does the dance of the new page!

I'm on the US West Coast - so not quite bedtime for me, this should make it 753 comments! Impressive!

I knew we would make it to page 5 when last I looked! Two more days to go!

Yay! Page 5 \o/

So, new page, new topic: list your top favourite fandoms - let's say, we should limit to 10 tv and 10 book fandoms. You can list less in each category but no more.

It will be interesting to see how many we share. :)

Here are mine

Top 10 TV fandoms:
1) Battlestar Galactica (the original)
2) Star Trek (classic, the original)
3) Babylon 5
4) Kindred: The Embraced
5) Tour of Duty
6) Merlin
7) Sherlock BBC ( the first 2 seasons - I despise S3)
8) Stargate: Atlantis
9) Star Trek: DS9
10) Torchwood

Top 6 book fandoms:
1) Tolkien's universe
2) The Cadfael Chronicles by Ellis Peters
3) Taran books by Larry Alexander
4) Miss Marple novels by Agatha Christie
5) Poirot novels by Agatha Christie
6) Earthsea by Ursula K Le Guin

There are lots of other books I love, but they can't be considered fandoms, so this is what I could think of off the top of my head.

Hmm, this was surprisingly difficult, both to find anywhere near 10 television fandoms and to limit myself to anything like 10 book fandoms! I ended up cheating with the books and listing some authors.

Television
1. Twin Peaks
2. ST:DS9
3. Angel
4. Yes, Minister
5. Blackadder
6. Blake's 7 -- this was my entry fandom at least in terms of online interactions but I'm pretty much out of it now
and way below...
7. Forbrydelsen S1
8. The Hour

Books
1. Jane Austen
2. Earthsea
3. JRR Tolkien
4. Diana Wynne Jones
5. Jane Eyre
6. Eagle of the Ninth series & other Sutcliff
7. Norse mythology
8. Sherlock Holmes
9. Good Omens & other Gaiman
10. LM Bujold Vorkosigan/Chalion series
and many, many more...

Yeah, I know, I condensed Tolkien, Larry Alexander and Agatha Christie, too.
Is there a meaning behind which ones are in italics on your list?

Supposedly titles should be italicised, while universes/characters are usually not; so Earthsea series vs Earthsea the universe. But mostly I was being lazy/inconsistent with everything except the obvious titles!

I don't really have fandoms in TV, but 10 favorite shows in my past (haven't had a TV for years now)
1) Anything Jacques Cousteau
2) Sealab 2020, a cartoon about an underwater colony of scientists -- that's what I wanted to be as a little geek girl
3) Star Trek -- most of the iterations, except Janeway never did it for me
4) Tour of Duty -- Thanks for the reminder, wiseheart. That was a special show, and for America, I think it was culturally an important marker: we could actually have a show on commercial TV about Vietnam that showed a lot of the ambiguities
5) Stargate - original -- don't think I've seen more than an episode or two of the later ones
6) Cadfael series (seen on public television in the US)
7) Arthur of the Britons -- saw it as a kid in NZ. As I've described it elsewhere, a young, grubby Arthur and his grubby companions -- Saxon Kai and his adoptive Welsh father, Llud -- all riding around a grubby, not-at-all-great Britain
8) Early St. Elsewhere which, I discovered when I moved here, was modeled on the medical facility that houses my current academic employer

Haven't read for fun enough to have favorites in books, but I have enjoyed the odd Cadfael novel and remember being enchanted by the ecology of the magic system in the Earthsea trilogy. I also must have bought and read just about every paperback spinoff from the Space: 1999 series in my teens. No accounting for my "tastes"!

Edited 2014-10-08 01:50 (UTC)

A fellow Earthsea fan! The magical system is so much more intuitive than many more popular series. Have you read the later books? If so, what do you think?

I love Cadfael too, though I felt the television adaptations did a relatively poor job, despite Jacobi. It didn't help that they kept recasting Beringar; I preferred the first one, despite his acanonical blond hair.

The episode I found most horrible was "The Pilgrim of Hate". That is my all-time favourite among the novels, and the character rape they did in that one was outrageous.

In general, it was very cheaply made (filmed in Hungary, no less), practically everything took place in the same cottage with slightly different decoration. And I didn't find Jacobi a good choice. I used to know an old Benedictine brother who was just like Cadfael, but Jacobi was too aristocratic-looking for the part.

I preferred the first Beringar (Sean Pertwee), too. That was another character turned inside out; and I missed the Cadfael-Beringar friendship. It is such an important element of the books, and it was completely omitted from the series.

At least Jacobi can act, which is more than could be said for most of the others.

Beringar I was occasionally ok, though they did play down the central friendship. Beringar II might as well have been an OC.

I don't remember the television version of The Pilgrim of Hate; possibly I've mercifully blanked it; possibly I've just never watched it.

I have never read the books, and only saw the series after I read your Torchwood/Cadfael cross-over. I have been meaning to get a one of the books - just haven't gotten around to it.

Trying to list fandoms is hard, especially if I think about fandom interaction vs caring about the canon.

TV
Babylon 5/Crusade
Doctor Who
Stargate
Firefly
West Wing

Books:
Tolkien
Swallows and Amazons series - Arthur Ransome
Bujold
Sucliff - various of the historical ones
Paksenarion series - Elizabeth Moon
Sherwood Smith
Far Distant Oxus - Katherine Hull and Pamela Whitlock
Noel Streatfield

And I should stop trying to make the lists now, I know I'm forgetting this and it is hard to pick.

Edited 2014-10-07 20:35 (UTC)

Yeah, it isn't easy, is it? You think findin ten would be hard, but once you start thinking about your favourites, fandom or not, you realize how little ten choices are.

I tend to find picking favourites hard - so many different things to try and rank on.

Which Bujold series do you like?

All of them! I think the world building (so much detail and interesting hints) is wonderful in both Sharing Knife and Chalion - and so want to know more about either world. Vorkosigan series is great too, but the books are so varied in strength, but the characters are great and it is very interesting to see the bio-tech and the way it feeds into all the world building.

I first got into Vorkosigan, though I really like only some of the books -- Memory is my favourite, but I like most of the ones with a detective flavour, and Shards for Aral & Cordelia, still one of my favourite fictional couples. I've found the later books a bit weak; I read Captain Vorpatril's Alliance a couple of nights ago, and thought it read like fanfiction.

I started Chalion only last year, and only read the last two books immediately before the Bujold conference this August. I need to read them again, but I think it's a much stronger series than Vorkosigan. The invented religion in particular is really interesting, and not something I've seen done so successfully elsewhere.

Sharing Knife I'm still reading. Plotwise it's a bit slow not to say corny, but I find the worldbuilding hints simply fascinating and I'm loving the parallels with LotR.

Captain Vorpatril's Alliance felt to me like she was trying to answer all the questions and tie up the series. It certainly didn't read as good as soon of the others.Memory is definitely the best, although also so hard to read at the start.

The religion in Chalion is great - I love the fact that the gods do want to intervene, but have rules (and that the rules aren't really understood by anyone).

The plot picks up more in the 3rd and 4th books ofSharing Knife. I love the totally different basic setup and the whole Lakewalker culture and life. It is really interesting to speculate on what might have happened before or how things will change.

One needs to be invested in Miles & Simon (& Alys, & Gregor) for Memory to have its impact, I think. I agree wrt CVA; also, I didn't like the heterosexualising of Byerley, who I'd read as queer.

I must try to finish Sharing Knife -- before YT sign ups if possible, though I'm going to be frantically busy &/or away from home for much of that time.

One needs to be invested in Miles & Simon (& Alys, & Gregor) for Memory to have its impact, I think.
Yes. It really builds on everything.

also, I didn't like the heterosexualising of Byerley, who I'd read as queer.
I'll probably have to reread at some point, because I still saw him as queer through it - just in a relationship of some sort with Rish. I may have been reading what I want into it, I know reading something for the first time I often miss things (one of the things that make rereading so much fun).

I must try to finish Sharing Knife -- before YT sign ups if possible, though I'm going to be frantically busy &/or away from home for much of that time.
*nods* Where are you at?
I should not say much about it, because spoilers, but the fourth book is very much my favourite.

I wish Rish had been male; I don't think it would have affected the story too much. It's certainly possible to continue to read By as bi, which I can tolerate.

There was a lot of talk at the conference in August abut how all of Bujold's homosexual/bisexual characters do one of die horribly; be Eeeevil; or Turn Heterosexual for Love.

With SK, I'm somewhere in the middle of book 2; I keep picking it up & putting it down again. Altariel, my Bujold-peddler, likes the last two books, as I recall.

I wish Rish had been male; I don't think it would have affected the story too much.
It would have changed the first parts a bit - Ivan's not seeing her as a threat etc, but I think it could have worked.

all of Bujold's homosexual/bisexual characters do one of die horribly; be Eeeevil; or Turn Heterosexual for Love
there are a few that don't, but oddly it seems to be more in the fantasy series that Vorkosigan: Umegat (in Curse of Chalion, and some in Sharing Knife (but spoilers)

Book 2 is slow paced for a lot, but the pace of the books picks up from there.

LJ ate my comment. Sigh. I think I said something like...

A slight & androgenous Rish that big military Ivan took for female could have been made to work, I think.

I'd forgotten Umegat. He doesn't get to die, but he does suffer terribly.

Looks like I need to plod through book 2 in anticipation of jam tomorrow...

/o\ for the comment eating.

A slight & androgenous Rish that big military Ivan took for female could have been made to work, I think.
yes

I'd forgotten Umegat. He doesn't get to die, but he does suffer terribly.
*nods*

I suppose Rish could be genitally male, or hermaphrodite, or agendered. A culture that can make kittens literally grow on trees wouldn't be tied to normative gender presentations.

That would certainly work, and count make for an interesting fic idea.

I really need to get into writing Vorkosigan; I read it a lot, but I've never quite dared to try my hand at so much as a drabble (and still haven't read Cryoburn, cos I don't want to read the end).

I've written it a couple of times, but not very successfully (and got burned by picking the wrong betareader for one of them).

I read Cryoburn without knowing the end, but I can see why you'd not want to read it. It is an interesting mystery before that, but the end is very sad.

I've pretty much given up using betas; almost all the ones I trust have essentially left fandom or have zero time/energy these days, and I find I disagree with readers I don't know as well more often than not. Also I tend to finish pieces of exchanges on (or after! -- you didn't hear that with your mod hat on) the deadline. I'd definitely need a canon picker for Vorkosigan (or Chalion).

I got spoiled for Cryoburn by clicking on a piece of fanfiction immediately after the book came out without reading the spoiler line (if there was one), and it so upset me I've steered clear of the book. I gather one can avoid the event by stopping a few pages off the end, but I don't know whether I've got that sort of discipline.

For some reason I find it really hard to mentally resurrect characters when canon kills them off, which it seems to do with my favourites with monotonous regularity. (Thank you JKR, Joss!)

I tend to try and use betas because I know they generally improve my stories - just I really didn't like a comment about how mathematicians/scientists didn't think a particular way.... which given that I have a maths degree I found rather annoying and inaccurate (given how many people I've known who would identify as one of these I don't think there is an overall different way of thinking when applied to life).

It is the very end of the book and afterward bit, but I think it would be hard to stop. I know I couldn't!

For me it really depends, some deaths I have no trouble ignoring by writing earlier or AUs, others throw me out of the fandom hard. It partly depends how much it works emotionally in the canon (ie most of the HP deaths seem far too formulaic and not dealt with well...)

I knew a lot of people who read maths & they're a diverse bunch, though they did tend to share a certain pedantry of speech.

I was very upset by the end of HP; it didn't completely throw me out of the fandom, but it stopped me rereading canon.

*nods*

I struggled with the whole of the 7th book - it just made so little sense (especially I just couldn't believe all the fuss about finding food in a summer/autumn countryside....) but the end really didn't work - so many random, oh this person died, but everything goes on exactly as if nothing had changed from the first book.

I quite liked HBP, especially once I'd been persuaded of the truth of Snape's sympathies, and then to find there was yet another mystical gizmo ... and, as you say, the epilogue was simply absurd.

*nods* Sudden new magical thing to look for with no warning was rather too much.

And tying it in to the cloak felt a stretch, as if JKR had looked around for objects introduced in book ?1 and tried to make them count in the climax.

Actually the cloak made the most sense to me - it was the randomly appearing without any mention other bits (eg if she'd included the tale in the first or second book, it would have made more sense.... but still been rather odd)

I get the impression the tale grew in the telling. I suppose JRRT simply revised The Hobbit to fit the new narrative weight the Ring needed to take.

I don't know Bujold at all - never seen any books over here. Apparently, I've missed something really interesting.

They are very good books, but not often in bookshops even here.

I got my copies secondhand via Amazon marketplace -- I've never seen them in a bookshop here.

I think you might particularly like Chalion -- the worldbuilding is excellent and it's set in a fantasy medieval Spain.

And here is another topic for you: are you currently working in the job you always wanted? If not, what did you originally want to do? Do you intend to try pursuing it still or have you settled for your current life?

Currently self employed web developer/unpaid carer. Neither of which I ever imagined being, but I never really came across a dream job. Maybe a some point in the future my health will be good enough to think about it and try to find something.

When I was a kid I wanted to grow up to be a farmer, and take over my parents dairy farm. I think I got over that 'dream' before hitting my teens though, and now I definitely would not want that job! It is a lot of very hard work, for very little pay, and often even less appreciation. It was a good life as a kid though, always having my parents at home even when they were at work...

I should perhaps have added: My current job is university lecturer in physics; it isn't what I planned to do even when I started university, partly because my first two years at university I did history and German. After changing to an engineering degree, I still wasn't planning on staying in academia; indeed one of my main reasons for going down the engineering route (apart from really enjoying it) was the prospect of a 'real' job at the end of it. On the other hand, I did always say I wanted to work in the research and development department of whatever industry hired me, and being a physics lecturer is partly a research post, so in some way I suppose I have ended up where I planned to. I am very happy where I am, both with the job itself and with my colleagues. For example, this afternoon I was working on setting an assignment for the module I gave the lecture in this morning. The director of my research centre, one of the senior professors, will teach on this module after my three weeks are up, and I asked him to look over my ideas for the assignment. He not only took time to read it through and give a few quick comments, he actually went and got his laptop and showed me the assignments he set for his part of the module last year and then talked about the pros and cons of different types of questions for quite some time. For someone new to the lecturing gig, like me, that sort of thing is fantastically helpful!

Sounds like a great job for you! :)

I feel very lucky!

My dream is still to write & publish a mainstream novel. Unfortunately I'm no further along than I was nearly a decade ago; it's been a bad decade for creativity!

I hear you! I always wanted to be a professional sci-fi and fantasy writer, perhaps historic novels, too. But I had to realise early on that in our system I won't have a rat's chance, and so I became a teacher. Which I would like very much, if they would let me do my job and not make my life hell with idiot restrictions and nepotism.

Oh, and I wanted to be a nun, too, for almost 20 years! I even spent nearly 3 years in a convent in Germany, before finally giving up on the idea.

I don't think it's easy in the UK to make a living out of being a novelist/poet.

I don't have any urge in modern society to become a nun, though I can see the attraction in medieval England.

I loved the way of life we led in the convent. It was just the German mindset that was incompatible with mine.

There are some lovely Germans, but I've met a few who lived up to all the stereotypes.

At heart I'm an anarchist, which doesn't help!

My Tio (uncle) almost became a priest - that is until he met my Tia (Aunt). Joining a religious order is an amazing commitment, and not everyone has the calling. I couldn't imaging ever doing it, but I do admire those who do.

When I was quite a little girl, I decided I wanted to work on Jacques Cousteau's ship, Calypso. I also imagined myself as the navigator of both ocean-going and space-faring vessels for years. But somewhere amongst our moving internationally, my maths fell apart, and a neither oceanographer nor ship's pilot (sea- or space-faring) was a viable choice by the time I was choosing a college major, so it was political science.

Since early in this century, I've been a qualitative researcher in public health at a university, but another shift is due. I'm trying to get into work around local/regional resilience and readiness in response to the impacts of climate change. I live in a harbor city, and the storm surge map projections show me living on waterfront property, at least temporarily, within the next 10 years. Sobering... I have research background in climate change work (back when people still said "possible" or "hypothetical" in front of "climate change"), and I can get almost anybody to talk to me, and I feel like this is the area where I can be useful. I have a few contacts, and now my health is settling down, it's time to get off my butt and start actively networking, etc.

Feel free not to answer, but I'm curious how you got from political science to public health research?

Working in the field of climate change impact sounds both interesting and essential.

Good luck!

I admire you for daring to start something completely new.

In fact, I am - I was good at translating while still at school, and everyone told me to pick it for a job. It seemed a good idea, so I did. What I didn't know is that translating doesn't pay very well... So I'm doing work I'm good at and which I like, sometimes even a lot, but at a price, so to speak.

*nods* It is good that you are enjoying it.

When I was trying to decide what to do for my A'levels my French teacher took me aside & told me not to do languages because nearly everyone ended up in translation, & there was no pay to be had. From other translators I know, it does sound an interesting, relatively low stress job that can be done from home.

Yes, it's relatively low stress, even with deadlines, if you are able to work according to schedule. That the schedule is your own, is an added benefit.

I'm quite bad at working out how long it will take me to do something -- when I freelanced, I had to get my project manager husband to help in estimating.

Well, you know how many days you have and how many pages your text has. That makes the calculation relatively easy. The last week is for making corrections. And I always add some extra pages every week in case something unforeseen happens.

I suppose the difficulty level is likely to be relatively constant throughout; whereas writing nonficion one has to allocate enough time for the literature survey, and some parts are a lot less formulaic than others.

Generally speaking, that's true.

It is very nice to enjoy your work, isn't it? It sounds a very interesting job. It is a pity it isn't better paid, but I hope you at least make enough to live comfortably!

Don't worry, I do, especially now that one of my daughters can look after herself.

I am pleased to hear it! I sometimes feel a bit guilty about how very comfortably I am able to live on my salary, doing a job I really love with supportive, friendly and helpful colleagues, especially when I know that there are people who struggle with making ends meet doing jobs they don't like.

Why feel guilty? You didn't steal anyone else's job, I assume?

No, I don't thing I stole anyone else's job! Though listening to some of the discussions on immigration here in the UK, sometimes I wonder if the politicians might not think I did...

I suppose my guilt has to do with the fact that if they paid me less they could pay people having thankless/boring/what-have-you jobs more. On the other hand, knowing employers, I think they would just pay me less, and the other people less as well, so I usually don't let it get to me (too much).

I think your analysis is spot on.

I can't say I have ever had any particular career in mind - I just kind of fell my job, it's not terrible interesting, but I am good at it.

800 comments! Go us!

Go us indeed! Have some chocolate to celebrate!

Yay, chocolate. :)

Yes, please! I'm assuming virtual chocolate won't keep me awake at night.

It is even completely calorie free! ;-)

We're being so chatty I'm getting left bahind!

I know the feeling. Getting home late today, I was positively overwhelmed.

Don't feel you have to respond to everything! It's supposed to be fun!

Oh, I know. That is why I kept out of the gardening discussion - i've got the dead thumb an am happy if I can see the difference between spinach and an apple tree. ;)

I'm pretty dead-thumbed too, whch is one reason all this gardening is so hard!

I feel like that too, but so many interesting discussions. :)

I feel like I've got a 10-day-party hangover...

Time for bed for me now; I have another lecture tomorrow morning, but this time at the much more civilised hour of 11am. There are plenty of other things I need to do at work this week, though, so must get some sleep so that I can do them...

Good night all, and thanks for fun discussions! Looking forward to seeing threads collapsing on this fifth page tomorrow!

They have already started collapsing - go us!

Fantastic indeed! You really do throw the best birthday parties; always so much fun and interesting discussions, and that lovely cooperative spirit of everyone cheering everyone else on!

I talked for a bit on the phone night before last with the guy who mentored me on my fieldwork up in Canada. He's a wonderful person, and the conversation and revisiting my thesis fieldwork reminded me of strengths I forget because I've used them so little in my current job.

Isn't it funny how things come to remind us when we forget something important about our lives?

I've not said anything about our new home, which we moved into in February. We're still getting settled -- 10 years in the last place was the longest I'd lived anywhere in my life, so moving, particularly in between snowstorms, was a challenge at many levels. But it's beginning to have that feel of "home" for me as I nudge myself to go sit in the front room to drink my tea and read, rather than hunkering here at my work table in the bedroom in the back.

The 2 bedroom flat itself is a bit rough in spots, and we're still finding places to put things away, but it's getting to be cozy. I like the relative quiet of our one-block, one-way street, compared to the busy two-way street we lived on before. The back porch is a generous size, and our dog, Mac, is very fond of it. He goes up to the back door, sits, and makes the most pitiful sounds until he is let out. Even in rain or cold, he needs at least a brief visit to survey his domain!

Sounds nice, good to know you are settling in well.

Quiet & cosy are definitely good! And it's nice that your dog is adjusting happily.

We're moving sometime between end of November and early next year after ~15 years in one place, my longest ever. Hopefully no snowstorms to contend with though!

Good luck with the move!

Thank you! I think we're going to need it!

Wishing you an easy move and no snow!

Thank you! The new house is on the coast, so I'm hoping snow will be confined to the nearby hills.

Sounds lovely. Why do you have to live on the other side of the planet? I'll never get the chance to visit you, especially with my flying fobia.

Its great that your settling in - animals love their routines and they definitely love to survey their domain!

Fandoms: I'm not really into them anymore, but what I still watch on TV occasionally is Star Trek, Battlestar Galactica, Sherlock Holmes (new version), Doctor Who, Game of Thrones, Scandinavian thrillers and The Borgia's. Oh yes, and Isabel, a Spanish series about Isabella of Castile and Ferdinand of Aragon.

Isabel, a Spanish series about Isabella of Castile and Ferdinand of Aragon.
Oooh - that sounds interesting!

I was going to say the same!

It *is* interesting. The series is in its third and probably last season now. I'm watching it on the only Spanish channel we can receive in the Netherlands, but I need the subtitles to be able to follow it.

*nods* My Spanish is fairly basic now (I was never fluent). However, I'll have to look it up, although I doubt it would even be on tv here.

Maybe they put it in chunks on YouTube.

I'm quite fond of Nordic noir, but my husband hates much of it -- finds it too dark & 'nasty', as he puts it -- so I don't get to watch it all that often.

Not all of it is noir, but the best series usually are.

Nordic noir? Do tell! What are the features of a typical Nordic noir film?

Now there's a question! Hmm. I've mainly seen television & novels, not film, which might be different.

I think they gather their power from the dissonance between the dark subject matter and the clean bright liberal socialist ideals that at least Brits tend to associate with Scandinavia, as well as the beautiful landscapes/cityscapes. So they often deal with themes of racism, homelessness, political, police or military corruption, terrorism &c. The pacing is often languid, particularly compared with other modern crime dramas. There's an emphasis on the victim's family's grief. They're usually of the police procedural type, and the investigating officer is often a strong & unusual woman, who isn't interested in family or clothes/appearance -- the last alone is a huge & to me welcome difference from all US crime drama I've ever seen.

The genre reminds me of Edge of Darkness, an iconic British drama, if you happened to have seen that.

Sorry for not being around earlier - it has just been one of those days, one thing after another.

It looks like we are over half way to p6 and a great comment total \o/

I think we have a chance of breaking a thousand before the end. What was the previous record, Soledad?

Certainly feels like 1000 is possibly.

If we keep on chattering like starlings...

Maybe I'll even get back to the conversations on the previous page at some point. (I feel like I've been dropping things at random)

I'm tending to respond to things that end up in my inbox, and neglect all the interesting conversations going on not in response to my comments.

Sounds like an easier way - I seem to be wandering round in circles a bit at the moment, and staring at comments, trying to think of replies - rather out of brain at the moment, I think.

Sounds like you need a coffee -- I certainly do!

I've got myself more tea - lots of honey and lemon. I really want to zap this cold and cough soon.

Good luck with the zapping -- I hate colds. They're surprisingly debilitating, I find, especially as I grow older.

I'm currently at a week and a half on this one, and so really want to be better soon.

The idea that colds only last ~5 days is definitely wrong -- I had one earlier in the year that lasted three weeks, and my muscles didn't recover for a few weeks after that. Sigh.

Hoping you feel better soon!

Thanks.

They usually last a fair while for me - probably interacting with everything else.

Oh dear! Wishing you well Real Soon(tm)!

Thank you!

I hope you feel better soon - I hate being sick.

Thank you! I do too.

That would have been two years ago, when LJ ate the party. We were up around 1600 or so, I think, but there were a lot more people participating.

However, I find I don't really care about breaking any records. I'm having such a nice time with you lovely ladies, such interesting conversations, that the rest doesn't count.

Ah, I don't think we're going to beat that! A thousand is a good round number to aim for, though.

And already over 900 :)

Indeed! We are made of awesome!

Indeed, we are awesomeful!

It is a great party - so much fun :)

And in the interests of boosting our progress on the page count, a new question -- how did you first encounter our gracious host?

I'm not sure I know the precise answer to my own question! I know we met in Tolkien fandom. I recall I'd read and enjoyed her stories in that fandom. I think

altariel must have introduced us? She kindly invited me to LJ back when codes were necessary, and I did pick up quite a few of her f'list when I joined.

Ah, I think I've tracked it down -- it was your 50th birthday party, when Altariel & others on my f'list sent everyone over here to get your threads collapsing.

Yes, she used to send guests to my parties. :)
Of course, that was before the arrival of the little princess.

Indeed, she's not been on LJ much since V day.

And who could blame her? Seeing how adorable the little one is? Probably a lot of work, too. Small children usually are.

Having met her, briefly, she's a huge amount of work -- tho' extremely charming -- I must admit it didn't make me feel broody.

I love having nieces and nephews -- it is the best of both worlds to me: I get to spend time with charming little children, but I don't have to take care of them (at least not full time)! It also means I get to buy all sorts of fun -- and educational -- toys and generally get invited to play with them, too! The one sad thing about my current job, is how long it takes me to get from here to Uppsala, where the nieces and nephews are, but so far I have still managed to get back there twice a year, so I shouldn't complain.

Educational toy buying is great fun. And there's books... Sadly neither I nor my husband has siblings with children, and my husband's god children are all well over 18 now.

Oh yes, buying books is fantastic! Luckily all my nieces and nephews are book lovers. My oldest nephew famously asked his second or third Christmas "When are we going to open the books?" meaning the presents under the tree. :-)

Books were always my favourite presents, particularly when my pocket money was so small it took me weeks to save up for a single paperback.

When I was a kid, my Mum gave my two brothers, my sister and I books from two different series: the first one we would get another book from for our own birthday; the second one we would get another book from on our own birthday and everybody else's as well! On top of that, books were definitely to be shared, so that I got to five new books to read for every birthday. :-)

The nearest book shop was 100 kilometers away, so buying books ourselves wasn't really something we could do very often. On the other hand we did get taken to the library by the school once a week for half of each semester; that was where most of my reading material came from!

Unfortunately my late brother never liked books -- we realised much later he had dyslexia but it was before the days in which that was diagnosed & treated, so he never learned to enjoy curling up with a book.

The nearby library was a bit useless; at one point I started madly reading ballet books -- my mother asked me whether I wanted to learn, and I pointed out I'd read the entire children's section from end to end, apart from the ballet books. So the librarian was persuaded to give me an adult ticket, aged about 10. My mother also had an extensive book collection (she used to teach English & history) and she only banned Enid Blyton, so I read Solzhenitsyn & Lolita instead. (She put the less suitable books on the top shelf, but I was wise to that!)

We didn't seem to have different library cards for children and adults, when I was a kid. There was certainly a children's section of the library, but I was allowed to borrow books from other parts of it as well, such as Dorothy Sayer's Lord Peter Wimsey stories.

My parents had an extensive book collection, too, but not that much in the way of fiction actually. Dad had a couple of Enid Blyton books in Swedish from when he was a kid, which we did all read several times over.

Being a bit of a rebel even then I think I must have read some Blyton, but I don't recall liking it. I suppose Blyton must have been my era's Rowling.

My two sisters and I all chose not to have children, but my husband is the only one of the four boys who did not have children, so I have six nieces and one nephew, all by marriage. And of course, there's the Elfling whom I caught as he came into the world some years ago... and who was doing a good job of beating me at a game at his family's new home last weekend now he is a young lad.

I have to agree having Nieces and nephews is great! Although most of mine are adults now - on the bright side, they are starting to have children, so I get another generation to spoil and send back to their parents :)

She emailed my about one of my stories (back in the days when you could just get someone's email address from ffnet), and then followed emails and comments both way, and so on. (Tolkien fandom ~2003)

Ah, so you too were in Tolkien fandom back in the day!

Yes - it was where I started out in fandom - wanting people to complain to about the movies.

Tolkien was probably my first offline fandom, way back in the 1980s, but I got online & into fanfiction with Blake's 7 in the 1990s. Most of the Tolkien fans I knew loved the films a whole lot more than I did, so I didn't get to complain very loudly.

*nods*
I quite liked the first one, rolled eyes at some of the changes (especially Arwen) and things being missed out - liked the extended version more. Then had real problems with the second, especially the character assassination of Faramir, and all the excessive battle scenes. And the third was still a disappointment from there (evil Denethor, all the fighting, no scouring of the Shire, etc).

Indeed, the first one was on the whole positive. I particularly enjoyed the Shire & Rivendell settings. Most of the changes (Glorfindel-Arwen; Bombadil; moving Boromir's death) made at least some sense.

But the cinema version of TTT was simply awful. Faramir was one of my favourites and I couldn't forgive that. And the warg fight/horse kissing -- don't get me onto that.

And, oh god, RotK -- suffice to say, Denethor was another of my favourites.

and Arwen being randomly dieing...

Denethor is such a great and under appreciated character - just because he went wrong at the end - he managed to lead Gondor and hold Mordor at bay for so long. It is one of the things that makes me so sad that there is not more interesting Denethor stories in fandom.

I absolutely, positively agree with both of you. And I was so disappointed that so very few people were of the same opinion!

The Hobbit movies are evey bit as blasphemic. Interestingly enough, there, too, the second one is magnitudes worse than the first. I am already afraid of the third part.

Generally, the artwork is splendid, the writing is rubbish (save for the lines stolen from Tolkien), the canon rape is painful, and with the exception of Sean Bean and Martin Freeman, none of the actors really managed to convince me.

Generally, the artwork is splendid, the writing is rubbish
Yes. Although even the artwork fails at some points.

It does, but it is easier to overlook, due to the hectic filming and the rubbish 3D stuff. It annoys me to no end.

The bit that really disappointed me was Laketown - it just didn't look right to me -- too close to the water (I always imagined the buildings being on higher stilts with room for the boats beneath), too shoddy looking.

You are right, Laketown was rubbish... and Beorn's house wasn't anything like on Tolkien's pictures, either.

Yes!

Indeed! It was hard, back in the day, biting my tongue every time one of my friends raved.

I am definitely NOT going to watch the other Hobbit films -- the first one was bad enough...

Bean made Boromir into a tragic figure, in a way that didn't come over quite so well in the book. I found the settings got worse as time went on; the Shire & Rivendell were good; Moria a little disappointing; Lothlorien & Rohan completely wrong; Minas Tirith just rubbish.

Personally, I liked Rohan and loathed Rivendell - too decadent-looking for my taste, and the idea of everything, even the library (!) being open to the elements was just stupid, IMO.

The Shire ws beautiful indeed, Moria boring, and Minas Tirith, aside from the outside view where it indeed looked like a ship, could have been just any other city in Southern Europe.

What was your problem with Rohan? I mean, the buildings, not the Rohirrim, who were terrible.

Rivendell seemed to imply a lot of the use of the ring to make it safe and comfortable to live in....

The Rivendell Elves were terrible. I suspect Elven magic kept the books dry... I did like the valley a lot, though, and some of the Art Nouveau-influenced interiors.

Rohan was meant to be a plain with long grass, as I've seen in Mongolia. The NZ landscape was too rocky with too short-cropped grass, and not at all horse (as opposed to pony) country.

The buildings of Edoras were ok, but the hill fort had far too small a hill. (We have a set of hill forts locally, and they're nothing like that.)

Boromir was good. Lothorien - yup, looked far too normal. Rohan seemed a mixture to me - I loved the horse heads on the end of the beams.
Minas Tirith seemed out of proportion, but some of the details were good - but the climbable rocks were wrong. Although I did enjoy seeming all the trebuchets.

I'm probably going to see the other Hobbit movie, just from curiosity.

Lothlorien seemed to exist in perpetual gloom, when the original is sunny.

Edoras wasn't too bad; some of the detailing was excellent -- it was the Rohan plains I really didn't like -- they should have been plains of long grass with no rocks, as I've seen in Mongolia. The rocky heath was terrible horse country.

And those spiral staircases around the trees! Lórien was populated by Silvan folk - would they really hammer nails in the trees, so that Galadriel wouldn't have to climb a ladder? Oh, please!

And just didn't look very blended into the forest at all.

Yup. Though Galadriel is Noldor, perhaps she couldn't climb ;)

hehehe - or thought it below her dignity? ;)

Below her dignity to do in public perhaps :)

I'd forgotten all the rocks! Yes, totally not good horse country.

I had this beautiful internal vision of the Rohan plains from the books, backed up by Mongolia, where we saw Rohirric-style horse games in Rohan-like countryside, if a bit dry. You'd have wanted a sturdy shaggy pony in the NZ version of Rohan.

That sounds very cool!

Like a train crash you can't help watching with morbid fascination.
I'll watch it for Martin Freeman, though. He's an excellent Bilbo, IMO.

Indeed; far too few decent Denethor stories. One of my all-time favourites was Dwim's 'Star & Stone' (Denethor/Thorongil) but I don't think she ever finished it.

Ohh, I'll have to see if I've read that one - if I did it was years ago. I've read a lot of her stories and it will certainly be interesting to see her take on that time (and characters).

I think it was called 'Star & Stone' -- it was my favourite of her stories, but I had to give up checking for updates because I was so upset at her abandoning it.

*nods* It is so sad to see good stories abandoned.

I had very similar feelings about the first film, which I went to see with my brothers and sister and Mum at Christmas. Then we went to see the second one the next year, and when we got out my sister and I were both boiling with anger over what they did to Faramir. As it happend we saw it shortly after with my aunt, her husband and son; having warned them that there were things we strongly disapproved of, it was quite heartening to have our aunt come out of the cinema and her first words being "They wrecked Faramir!". :-)

Everyone here seems to agree!

I first met our lovely host at one of her exciting birthday parties, having been invited by

altariel; then later on I had the great good fortune of meeting her in person when she and her Mum visited London, while I was living there. That was a fantastic day!

Altariel really is the great facilitator!

She is indeed! :-)

I didn't realise you knew her!

I think I may have met her through spotting that she had a "Lilla My" icon, who is a character out of Tove Janson's Moomin books, which I think you call "Little Mymble" in English. I wasn't very fond of the character when I read the books as a kid, but now I love her tough attitude!

Then I was fortunate enough to meet

altariel in the non-virtual world, when

wiseheart and her Mum visited London.

I first met her at a Blake's 7 meet-up in Manchester, which must have been in 1999; I had relatively recently moved up here from Cambridge, and was feeling homesick, so I think I gabbled about Cambridge a lot...

I have to admit, the Moomin books drove me wild as a child, and I've never tried them as an adult. They were read to us in primary school, and I did hate being read aloud to, which didn't help.

I've never met Soledad's mum, but Mr EA and I were lucky enough to spend some time with S in her home city, when she was gracious enough to show us round -- and feed us espresso/cakes!

I think the Moomin books are much more adult fiction, though they are usually marketed as for children. It is my theory that this is because they are illustrated, which would be rather silly, but we humans do have a tendency to stereotype things. As I said, I wasn't very fond of the books as a child, but find them really deep and beautiful when I read them as an adult.

Getting shown around any city by a native is usually the best way to see it, I think! That you also got to meet

wiseheart makes it sound like an even better experience!

Perhps I should give them another try, but my to-read pile (of books I own) is already teetering well over a hundred...

It is a lovely city, and I wish I could visit again -- unfortunately we're on zero holidays till we've settled down a bit financially, which might be several years.

I think I read on or Soledad's lovely stories and sent an email complimenting it. However, I lost some years of email in a computer failure, so I can't be sure anymore. However long it's been, I remain delighted by her company!

Was this in Tolkien fandom? we mostly seem to hail from there.

Yes, it was my Boromir/Elladan series that, in the end, fell victim to another author's greater popularity.

Boromir/Elladan -- now that's a pairing I hadn't thought of. I must admit I don't find the twins all that exciting -- there's so little about them in canon they might as well be OCs.

I ran across some of her Torchwood stories, I was a bad girl at first and didn't comment - although I loved them. I started following her and started commenting, and that was about 3 years ago.

And in the meantime you've earned the Most Supportive Reviewer Award, together with

jenn_calaelen. Without the two of you I think I'd have given up writing out of sheer frustration, *hugs*

*hugs* :)

And the rest is history!

espresso_addict asked about the previous record: it was in 2012, with 1328 comments, on 6 pages. Then LJ decided to crash our party, and we tried to reconstruct it, reposting the comments still in our inboxes. The reconstructed party then had two separate entries, one with 765 comments on 7 pages and one with 617 comments on 3 pages. But that was partly a forced thing, to show that we can boast the numbers. I much prefer this year's party with the lively discussions.

In 2011, we had 943 comments on 7 pages. In 2010, it was 742 comments, on 6 pages. In the earlier years, it was even less, despite that we had twice as many party guests. This year's party is fantastic!

This year just seems to be zooming along in conversations :)

Either Soledad or I has just posted the 900th comment! I definitely think we can make a thousand!

Yay! \o/

This should be 912 - and

solanpolarn isn't even here yet!

She might have another 9am lecture to contend with.

True. Work has the annoying tendency of clashing with fun.

Have you tried backing up the comments recently -- it's starting to load ominously slowly for me.

Did it yesterday. Will do in a moment again and pray that they'll import.

Good luck!

Praying with you... At least my icon problem seems to have fixed itself.

It does indeed! but I don't have anything fixed timewise at work tomorrow until after lunch, so I was planning on getting caught up on comments before bed this evening. The rate at which you ladies have been amassing comments in my absence makes that rather a daunting task... I think I will just dip in, and out, of threads that look particularly interesting.

No lecture tomorrow, but labs in the afternoon; I was at work late preparing for the lectures next week. I am trying to get ahead on the physical lectures I have to give, so that I can also write up the notes for week after next for the on-line course, since I am hoping to be away in Dublin for experiments that week...

At least you don't have to get up early -- we could be heading for a thousand comments very shortly, says she temptingly...

We have now passed it! Does the 1000-comments dance.

We are awesome! And we managed it just before midnight European time, too!

At the rate we are going we may break 1100 comments before the party finishes tomorrow night!

And the rest, I think!

Yes, rest is very likely to be in order after this wonderful and very intense party!

We'll sleep for a week! Except I've got to be in Scotland in less than a week, and my sister-in-law is up for the weekend to help with all the house jobs...

And I have to give another three lectures next week, as well as writing notes for my on-line course and monitoring/partaking in the on-line discussions for that...

Best of luck with the move! It sounds like a great adventure.

It is terrifying! But it means the fulfilment of a more than decade long aim, and how often is one lucky enough to get to do that?

What takes you to Scotland, if I may ask?

It's Scotland that we are moving to, and we've been invited by the current owners to stay (they run a B&B) and meet the neighbours, learn how to deal with the private water supply (aka stream) &c.

She is now! :-) *brings out the chocolate*

10 more top level comments to get to Page 6. I think we'll manage so much in 26 hours, even without boaster one-liners, what do you think?

Seems likely :)

Latest comments don't seem to have come through to DW. It still stands at 780 over there. I'll give it another try tomorrow. sigh.

Fingers crossed!

*crosses fingers this doesn't crash then*

950 if no one has beat me to it \o/

We need someone else to wake up to propel us to a thousand.

*nods*
or more topics, but I'm failing to think of any at the moment.

We still have a whole day. Just take it easy - perhaps

sammydragoncat or

lhun_dweller will pick up the tomahawk on the other side of the globe.

:)

This one is for the fanfic (or original) writers among us: are you currently working on anything?

I've mostly been stuck recently, but been trying to get back into working on my various ongoing projects:

Firiel - I've been trying to split this into separate stories to try and make myself finish a bit

Project currently called Firiel's heirs, which is AU from the main story line where she has more children in Gondor after the fall of Athedain, and Denethor discovers their descendants while trying to work out who Thorongil is.

Swallows and Amazons/Narnia crossover featuring Lucy and Bridget ending up at the same school and talking, not realising that the other's adventures are different for a long time, and bonding over being treated like their official age.

The think the rest of everything is very stuck at the moment, of course, whether I make any progress depends on what my Yuletide assignment ends up as.

I'm in a unique situation - never before have I worked singularly on one story for such a long time. That one would be Kansas 2 - The Yellow Brick Road.

Yes, I am updating Adventures weekly, but those are all pre-written chapters that have been waiting for their turn in FF.Net's Document Manager for a long time. And Prophecy Change is practically a repost of Flarn Manages, the Minbari Sue I was writing with

eye_of_a_cat - all I'm doing is removing the gratutious Minbari phrases and chunks of purple prose.

Impressive to be ahead in things! Hopefully it keeps on flowing nicely for you.

God, I hope so! Kansas 2 is supposed to last 54 chapters, and I've just finished Ch 14!

Still even if some of it has been pre-written - that is an impressive amount of work.

So you have a Denethor & Thorongil story! [Is intrigued]

Are you planning to participate in the Autumn (in the northern hemisphere) Pico this year? I seem to recall you were working on Firiel ?last year.

There is very little of it so far, it keeps getting stuck.

It depends on how the Yuletide work is looking by that point - hopefully assignments and the first rush of questions will be over by then, and everything settling down (plus sharing out more work to volunteers). I've started Autumn Pico several times, but not done so well on finishing. I'd like to participant as it has been very good in getting me making progress on things in the past.

Delegate, delegate, delegate!

I'm not sure how many times I've finished (if at all) -- I tend to get distracted, either by lack of progress in writing or RL events.

Delegate, delegate, delegate!
Yes - trying to work towards it being far more of a general team effort, and working out which bits really need to be done by mods (which I suspect is very much a minority of the work, but lots of the decisions), and how it can be spread out without causing problems and stress.

Good idea! I'm so hopeful that YT will continue for years without causing another generation of mods to burn out. It really is by far the best part of Christmas for me, and has been for years (not that that is saying much, given some of the past events).

*nods* Part of the planning is to have it so that it can be handed on in a other people (when either hh or I or both of us decide to stop modding) in a controlled and documented way, as it would be very sad to see it die. It would be good for it not to be so stressful, but I'm not sure how easy it will be to control it - but it is the plan.

That sounds very sensible. It's a pity so much of AO3 makes the task harder, but at least you don't have to create the AO3 infrastructure from scratch. The admin side of the Mithrils was so painful that I don't think I'd ever volunteer to do anything remotely similar again.

*nods* At least AO3 is mostly stable or quickly fixed when it goes down - I remember the old site and signups not going through due to load, and having to be done again from scratch (and no editing them, just replacing). I think there are definite improvements - just a pity that some of the rest of the problems can't be solved.

The year the old site got hacked & everyone had to reload their stories was a memorable one.

I hadn't realised that the mods couldn't see the nominators -- I did wonder why the series of LJ queries when it seemed quicker to e-mail!

Yes - it would be much simpler that way! It is rather sad when people don't reply to queries, especially as we do try to get everyone to follow the lj/dw announcements; but every year it seems that people don't.

I think so many people have migrated from LJ that they simply don't log in more than once in a blue moon to see announcements. I noticed some people on Tumblr complaining that that hadn't been updated recently -- I didn't even realise Yuletide had an official Tumblr.

Well, semi-official. One of the tagmods started it and links to the announcements... but there is sometimes a delay, as she is in another different timezone...

Ah -- I wonder if she forgot to link the nominations opening? That was the complaint I caught. (Not that I generally use Tumblr at all, someone from Fanlore kept sending people there...)

I can see it there (no idea how to link to a specific post) - I wonder if it was delay or just something people missed, I have no idea how people find stuff on tumblr (it is far too confusing for me)

Tumblr always makes me feel 100 years old. Give me bulletin boards...

I am writing lecture notes, but I don't think that quite counts...

Why shouldn't it?

I thought you might be asking about fiction, and my lecture notes aren't supposed to be that!

I was hoping to make more progress on my Earthsea novel Jade Dragon, but the only thing I managed to do was to relocate some of my paper notes after the builders made my bedroom into a waste ground. After the [expletive deleted] Windows XP computer debacle, I still don't have a computer connected to both the internet & my printer, nor any likelihood of one in future. Though we have purchased an uninterruptable power supply to stop lightning storms from deleting my files while I'm working on them remotely.

Given how busy I am between now and the end of the year, I probably need to restrict my energies to Yuletide, and even that is beginning to feel a bit goey, what with the moving 'n all...

Good luck getting the notes and files sorted out!

Thanks! I really must work out a way of writing that works with the new Windows 7 laptop that won't allow me to print. I suspect half-moving to Scotland in the next few months isn't going to make life any simpler on that front!

I'm still playing with "Awful Mary Sue" in my head. I should dig out the Litmus Test and see what I still need to cover. I'm afraid this inconvenient business of finding a new job cuts into my free time. However, my thyroid problem seems to be settling down (radioactive iodine: just say yes, please!), so I'm sleeping through the night again and, in turn, getting my brain back. I was afraid the fuzzy thinking and bad memory was going to be my permanent, post-menopause condition, but things are improving as the blood test numbers improve, so here's hoping....

Good to hear things are improving for you! It would be fun to see more of the story.

I go away for a day, and come back to find you have managed to rack up over 950 comments! This is a fantastic party; my only complaint is that there is too much fun so that I can't keep up with it!

No-one of us can, not really. But that's all right, I think.

It is certainly a much more enjoyable 'problem' than not having enough fun!

Very hard to keep up - but a good party :)

A very good party, indeed! And I see we have now passed 1000 comments: Go us!

Sixteen minutes to midnight on my clock - almost birthday time!

Are you and Soledad in the same timezone?

Yep, we are.

To my best knowledge, we are.

995 comments -- can we get it to four figures before Soledad's midnight?

Looks like yes \o/

We are awesome!

It's saying a thousand now, nd it's still a few minutes to the hour! Go us!

Amazing!

Amazing progress!

YAY!!!!

1009 (including this one) - and HAPPY REAL BIRTHDAY, SOLEDAD!!

Thank you!

So, it is party time again, folks!

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