In case this hasn't been brought to anyone's attention:

TRIGGERING MATERIAL FOR SEXUAL ASSAULT BELOW.

The Steubenville Rape Case Getting National Attention

Rape Case Unfolds on Web and Splits City

( more links below cut - triggering material )

ETA: LJ side of this post has a highly triggering comment that includes rape denial and victim blaming. User is now banned, but it's unscreened because hell if I'm covering up that kind of attitude. It's the second comment in that post.

Because sometimes, people are fucking sociopaths.

Westboro Baptist Church Wants to Picket Connecticut School Shooting

Because sometimes, it gets much more interesting.

Time Magazine: Anonymous Targets Westboro Baptist Over Newton Picket Plans

Forbes: Anonymous Targets Westboro Baptist (Again) Over Threat To Picket Newtown - UPDATED

Anonymous: YourAnonNews Twitterfeed for all your Anonymous needs.

So far:
1.) Twitter feed of Shirley Phelps hacked (currently showing as suspended!)
2.) Current down status of their website
3.) Doxing of all Westboro members (this link is to anonpaste where the information is currently stored, link retrieved from The Wired article).
4.) cosmothegod seems have been inspired to break probation and join in the fight and claims responsibility for the twitterfeed hack.

(Note: All links taken directly from articles and SFW and my work's system is not blocking any of them.)

I have to say, the designers of Anonymous's messages knows how to make an impression.



Because sometimes, numbers matter.

Petition White House to have Westboro declared a hate group here. Currently at 183,347. When I signed an hour ago, it was at 179K. They have already been so identified by Southern Poverty Law Center and anyone sane with a working understanding of not being a sociopathic, greedy, depraved dick who commits crimes against humanity. Emotional torture is still torture. Doing it for the lawsuit and money potential means you're just a sick fuck.

Google Now

Multiple answer questions, choose one:

1.) One day, say in the morning, it suddenly comes on to tell you that your commute to work is only 14 minutes with a three minute delay on Rundberg, you:
a.) appreciate the terrifying precision of Google's traffic stalking
b.) wonder when on earth you got that program.
c.) Google, how do you know where I work?????

2.) You're driving home and stop at the pharmacy, where you are helpfully told you are three miles from home and the next bus is at 4:52 along with a complete bus schedule of the bus stop that when you turn in your seat is, indeed, right behind you, you:
a.) appreciate that google has done the impossible and actually figured out Austin's actual, as opposed to theoretical, bus schedule.
b.) wonder if that stop was always there.
c.) ....Google, are you watching me?

3.) You're at a red light and across the street is the local grocery store HEB. When you look at Google now---you are stupid like that--you notice HEB is a place of interest for you and offers links. You:
a.) appreciate the existence of links because insanity while driving is a bad idea.
b.) seriously, what the fuck.
c.) wonder if you banged Google that night you got drunk and are now in a LTR with it.

Other Sources of Dissonance

Apart from my apparent relationship with google, all the pharmacies--ALL THE PHARMACIES--thta are named walgreens in my city are out of methylphenidate. Among the ritalin family, it's the only one I can tolerate and also, I like what I know (this is why if I ever get married, it's gonna be a fangirl most likely, and current running are svmadelyn, amireal, or taraljc, as I have known them the longest; I like what I know and the longer I know, the better I like, and I found a nice condo and will marry for a shared mortgage), but today, today was different. I was at CVS, in a strange pharmacy and my prescirption is indeed correct but the pills are not pink and round and saucery but yellow and shaped not unlike round Pez--sharp edged, I mean. I looked it up in the pill identifier, then called my mother to do the same, and all say this is but another variation, but it is not pink and it's very weird and the yellow is not unlike that of very pale pus.

Other News

High-stress work week is over, mostly. As Christmas is coming up, we can downgrade to Yellow-Red alert, which I can deal with, and I have a nice weekend to go with it. This is making me happy.

SPN novel of never-finished actually did sort of finish; at the request--seriously, request--of my beta, it's been split into parts due to it being at this point 277,000 words, or roughly 600 pages. So technically speaking, Part I, of 126,000 words, is now complete and final draft.

( this is possibly the most interesting thing i have written from a procedural point of view )

( wip: working title: apocalypse not now )

Because reasons: io9 breakdown of trailer

Okay, Ami hit me with this in chat and if this happens? I will send JJ fruit baskets forever, okay. FOREVER.

( amireal's theory of in darkness from io9 speculation )

Hall of Fame by The Script with will.i.am - my new favorite song, and strangely enough, a music vid not by fandom that brings something to the table in interpretation and meaning all on it's own. I expected something a lot more GLAMOUR SUPERSTAR whatever; I got something far, far better.

Special note: I dare you not to get tears in your eyes when she stops, closes her eyes, and touches the speaker so she can feel the rhythm with her body. Just. Awesome.

Its' also, in itself, a fantastic song, in the family of You Gotta Be by Des'ree where they just make you feel like you could save the world before breakfast. I am actually making a playlist for this; sometimes, you just need to hear a lot of songs about how you are awesome.

IF ANYONE VIDS THIS SONG, IN ANY FANDOM, EMAIL ME. I would love to see this one go into common use. Well, and some Des'ree wouldn't hurt either.

I am exhausted from life, hence music to sooth the savage beast. So listening to now.

Let Her Go by passEnger - this didn't work for me until third listen when I got hard hooked by the lyrics. Give it three listens and if you aren't singing along the refrain, I will be very surprised.

Will Someday Change by Our Lady Peace - this is a drink alone in the dark in the rain after your dog got run over kind of song. No, really. I love it, but keep in mind I have a playlist called "cut your wrists". I collect songs like this. Very low key, very gorgeous, and very melancholy.

Be Somebody by Thousand Foot Krutch - I'd almost set this in bookends to Hall of Fame; different genre, different style, relationship-oriented rather than life-oriented, but despite the feel of it at the beginning, this is actually pretty positive. Definitely writing music.

Give Your Heart a Break by Demi Lovato - if the radio hasn't brainwashed you yet, I'd love to know how you escaped. It's freakishly bouncy and lyric automemorization means some people may be singing along in their office or bouncing down along the cubicle to the beat. Not that I know anything about that.

Cumbersome by Seven Mary Three - I originally listened to this and would have sworn it was Collective Soul. It's not, but if you like them, this will really, really work for you.

Hard to Love by Lee Brice - to round this out, country genre, and so freaking addictive I was muttering the chorus in one listen. It's just like that.

Breathe by Angel and Airways - also responsible for the song for the HP Neville video of awesome. Honestly, first listen it was okay but nothing to write home about; second, it worked much better.

Glitch players:

Would anyone be interested in doing a DW/LJ-Glitch group snap in Glitch of all of our avatars?

If yes, tentative date 11/24/2012, with a time between say 8AM CST to 2 AM CST (which would technically be 11/25/2012) translate to your time zone - Time Zone Converter. If interested, please reply so we can set up a time period for everyone--well, and a place as well.

*hopeful*

ETA: If enough people are interested but can't make the 24th, a second date will be added here.

Also, added time zone converter link above for those in different time zones.

For reasons this year, for the Thanksgiving luncheon I'm contributing actual food and not just money toward supplies, and I wanted to make something either vegetarian or vegan for dessert, since we have a lot of Indian contractors and employees in our unit. Years ago at Vividcon, someone brought pumpkin chocolate loaf that I was kind of willing to kill everyone at the con for, but after extensive googling, while there aren't that many recipes for it--though I heartily approve of the addition of chocolate chips to the mix--I wasn't sure if this was the right one. Or a right one, in any case. To clarify, I'm not even vegan or vegetarian by implication, so I don't know by looking if this one is a good one to use. My memories of the VVC one are pretty much magical.

Chocolate Pumpkin loaf. Recipe is pasted below cut as well. Is this one good?

( delicious )

So radio silence is lifting briefly due to the realization of how long it's been since I chatted or posted, and also because my life sucks immensely at this point, and work is only like, a tenth of it, but honestly, without the other ninety, that would still be enough.

Due to reasons (the legislature), our first two weeks of testing were thrown out and we have to start from scratch at the very beginning. There is a very mild upside in why this happened--now our test period is much longer--but its' also being combined with another test period. Also, I have to rewrite about a quarter of my tests, which is not an upside, just a bitter reality.

I am not dealing with anything well right now, tbh, and I'm very, very tired. I honestly do not know if I've ever been quite this tired in my life.

In the event that someone finally notices that my current email threads at work aren't me being charmingly naive but painfully sarcastic (my boss visibly restrained herself from hitting her head on her desk when she caught up with it, but if she isn't complaining, I feel I'm still okay writing short, moving essays on why I think something is wrong so very wrong are you drunk right now wrong but not using those words), I have decided that my life's goal will be to watch and document every vid ever made to This Is War. I mean, why not. Some people collect stamps. Stamps do not have a lot of swordfighting and explosions. You see where I'm going with this.

This is, in effect, my bulletproof song. Let me show you.

This Is War - Harry Potter, All - this has some timing failures, but seriously, I want like ten of these for this fandom.

This Is War - Harry Potter, All - utterly gorgeous.

This IS War - Merlin, All - I'm guessing how little I specifically know of the canon post season two is what makes me take the entire thing as EPIC and AWESOME and WHY AM I NOT WATCHING THIS, and them I remember, not until Arthur knows the goddamn truth already.

I'm going to specifically warn here for some serious, serious fast cutting. I mean, I love fast cutting, but there was definitely a moment or several that dramamine would not have been amiss.

This Is War - Supernatural, All - a couple of unusual choices in cutting, but the more I watch it, the more I like it.

This Is War - Supernatural, All - I love this one like air.

I have a four hour headache that won't go away and is just low grade enough to mostly ignore but distracting enough that sleep and functional concentration are out of the question. This is the kind of night where I read up on the history of Dadism versus Surrealism because why not?

Brief Diegression

This has to do with something I read that threw out Dadism as a movement that encompasses the idea that the world doesn't deserve art. Or maybe just western civilization, because nothing like exoticism of the east to really round that out.

(Note: I'm saying that was the impression I got from what I read first. I'm still processing what I've read since then.)

And because the connection between art and social movements fascinates me. Not so much each of them in themselves, but because of the arguments that pit art-for-art's-sake against art-for-politics and art-for-social-movement and art-for-propoganda and the idea of dishonest art. Or for that matter, to jump mediums dramatically, poetry versus prose. I think I fundamentally lose the argument since I wasn't socialized well as a child when it comes to the fine arts and creative process and art to me was always filed away under communication of an idea; you can do it badly in a variety of ways, granted, but you can't do it wrong. I sometimes come out of intensive reading feeling this is the equivalent of someone saying French is better than Greek and everyone should speak French; that's as close as I've ever come to getting a handle on the idea; it always comes across as depersonalization and homogeneity of something that should be intensely personal and idiosyncratic at its most ideal.

( sketching )

the dangers of headache-induced night surfing

I don't have any idea how I ended up reading about the etymology of y'all on wikipedia. I can't even blame wikisurfing; I was nowhere near wikipedia last time I looked. Yet.

Souther American English/Grammar

Y'all

Specifically, Y'all all which finally nailed down something I'd tried to explain about when you throw in that extra all because usage is contextual in the extreme.

A very specific example from experience that isn't covered in the wikipedia article:

To my aunt, referring to her family that was there with us: Are y'all going to the thing?

To my aunt, referring to her entire family both present and not: All y'all are going to the thing?

I feel validated by wikipedia, yes, so am sharing my feeling of triumph.

Cracked is cracky

If Classic Holiday Movies Got Gritty Reboots - for the record, most were awesome, but number three both fascinates me and freaks me out in equal measure. Instantly, I can see the trailer for it: the childish sing-song voice chanting Frosty's "I'll be back again someday" while in the snow-distorted distance, we see the vague shape of a snowman dragging a hammer behind him slowly approaching the oblivious group of children who watched the agony of him slowly melting and did nothing. Oh, they should have known, known the warning when they heard it: I'll be back again someday to destroy you all!

So I'm never sleeping again. Well done, me.

The 7 Most Elaborate Dick Moves in Online Gaming History and The 7 Biggest Dick Moves in the History of Online Gaming - the runescape massacre in the first one just kills me, but in the second link, number 5.

It forced the three top guilds to co-operate, which makes herding cats look easier than getting Bollywood extras to move in step. It was Sesame Street by way of Lord of the Rings, specifically the end of the third movie, since for over three hours, 180 players turned themselves into a Sisyphean Zerg horde. Resurrecting each other faster than the monster could kill them, they put in Herculean feats of teamwork that cruelly mocked the concept of "fun." They fought like warrior poets, they fought like Scotsmen and eventually ground the boss down to 22 percent health -- at which point Sony turned the whole thing off and acted like it was the players' fault.

Fun is for those who have not been playing the stupidest bubble app in history that you have spent three days on the same ridic level. This is war. Not that I'm talking about myself here or anything.

Thanks to ff_a, I have been--I have no idea what this is.

Check out the cover for Flowers in the Attic

The book that launched a million incest kinks and probably contributed heavily to fandom's having a genre for it. With a cover out of a wholesome YA romance. They--at least look alike? Truth in advertising in the purely visual spectrum? My childhood has been de-sullied. Goddammit.

Honest to God, Lucy Liu is freaking amazing and she and Johnnie Miller are magic together.

( spoilers, very disorganized as I just finished watching )

One of the sadder realizations I came to recently is how much one's app choices (when not bought in hysterical sale mode) tell you about them as a person. What you put on your homescreen, for example: my laptop's desktop has two files on it, one a cheat sheet for my server, while my phone has seven screens that I'm slowly but surely organizing in a kind of desperate hope that I can follow two conflicting impulses and fail. I want each screen to be thematic, but I also wnat the stuff I use most to be within a click, which is painful as my three most used items other than email and messaging and mp3 player are a Office Suite 8, Math Pro, and Sudoku, and Office 8 needs to be on the Office Things page and math pro and sudoku need to be with the games, because as a human being, I find doing simple arithmetic and gazing in satisfaction at my high scores more rewarding than pretty much anything short of breathing.

This is a lesson in what putting vulnerable children into math competitions from an early age does to them.

It also showed me my arithmetic is not nearly as fast as my simple multiplication, since from an early age we were not taught arithmetic tables, due to reasons with it being plus and minus I suppose, but we were multiplication tables, and that sticks. Arithmetic, even simple arithmetic, i stop to count. With multiplication, I honestly don't even remember tapping in the number sometimes, it's that automatic. I remember arithmetic drills from an early age mocking us about using our fingers--dear teachers K-6, screw you, it works--but multiplication had a soundtrack, sometimes with rhythmic dancing, and for the life of me, I resent that this was not a feature during those miserable third grade tests where Travis, wherever he may be, beat me by a second every goddamn time (and used his fingers, I saw him). And at the end of the year he got to drink a Coke in class (I remember this like it was yesterday) while I sat there in seething resentment and plotted a course of life that would one day lead me to Calculus AP and differentiation.

How to get girls into math; see above. It works.

I wonder if I just wrote all that to explain that in case anyone should ever see my phone and wonder why math pro is on screen two (to the right) in a prime position outranking Pandora, they will know the reason why is logical.

Work on Call

Being on call for sudden, inexplicable testing (I literally do not know why they want me on call or what it is that might be tested. That could be a problem should they text me. Strangely, they didn't seem to think so) is possibly second in boredom levels only to those days we have REALLY IMPORTANT TEST TO RUN AT NOON and you're still waiting, breath bated, at two wondering if you can dial it down to defcon three now because that level of alertness is both exhausting and weirdly frustrating. This happens a lot with REALLY IMPORTANT TESTS, you see. And you can't move an inch from your computer because inevitably, once it starts you have a narrow window to finish the test due to reasons and life as we know it will end if you fuck up, so no pressure or anything.

I don't object to testing on weekends. Much. I object to being at defcon three for twenty four hours because REALLY IMPORTANT TEST NARROW WINDOW FUCK UP END WORLD and I still don't even know what it is we are testing. It involves, I understand, mass update triggers and batching. And possibly skynet and Romulans destroying Vulcan and soylent green.

I have a feeling this is a preview for what the Oracle update is going to be like. Oracle updates require teh equivalent of simple regression testing, ie we just do a lot of tests we always do to make sure nothing is legitimately broken, you might say, because there are not just levels of broken, there are shades within those levels. One of the most important is how long will the goddamn tester argue this is a problem?

( because I can )

News

Being bored.

Students, experts recoil at alcohol enema case - the only reason I'm even mentioning the weirdness of this was that for the life of me, I knew I'd heard of something like this before. I realized just a few minutes ago it was Law and Order: Criminal Intent, specifically about a woman who organized hen parties (bachelorette parties, I think?) and she'd been using cocaine vaginally, which killed her, but at least did not involve an enema.

( mild tmi anecdata )

Also, Bullied Teen Gets Last Laugh - if you need something heartwarming, read this.

ETA - thanks to green_grrl for the link:
Sikh Woman Teaches Reddit a Lesson in Tolerance - I can't think of what to say to this but amazing. She's amazing.

“When I die, no one is going to remember what I looked like, heck, my kids will forget my voice, and slowly, all physical memory will fade away. However, my impact and legacy will remain: and, by not focusing on the physical beauty, I have time to cultivate those inner virtues and hopefully, focus my life on creating change and progress for this world in any way I can. So, to me, my face isn’t important but the smile and the happiness that lie behind the face are.” - Balpreet Kaur

Last Notes

Oh look, still not called. This is going to be a long night.

Elementary pilot was, in a word, really goddamn awesome.

( okay, I had more to say than I thought )

This is a little late, so I think the list is accurate until this afternoon. Cross-reference google play and amazon by availability with links.

25 Cent Apps at Google Play

( list twenty five cent apps at GP and Amazon )

( also on sale at google play )

Banned Books Week: Banned Books That Shaped America which lists off some banned books and where and sometimes why they were banned. I'd like to thank Texas for the following, because God knows, this makes us seem sane:

Moby-Dick; or The Whale, Herman Melville,1851

In a real head-scratcher of a case, a Texas school district banned the book from its Advanced English class lists because it “conflicted with their community values” in 1996. Community values are frequently cited in discussions over challenged books by those who wish to censor them.

...yeah, I got nothing.

(Note: If by community values they meant "our community does not value this level of epic boredom at this length", okay, maybe I can see it. I have a feeling that is not the case.)

Stranger in a Strange Land, Robert A. Heinlein, 1961

The book was actually retained after a 2003 challenge in Mercedes, TX to the book’s adult themes. However, parents were subsequently given more control over what their child was assigned to read in class, a common school board response to a challenge.

I'm trying here, so hard. I'm failing. I--what?

Not Texas (I hope, please), but huh?

Where the Wild Things Are, Maurice Sendak, 1963

Sendak’s work is beloved by children in the generations since its publication and has captured the collective imagination. Many parents and librarians, however, did much hand-wringing over the dark and disturbing nature of the story. They also wrung their hands over the baby’s penis drawn in In the Night Kitchen.

...I have never seen this penis. Jesus, I need to find that book and where's waldo this like, soon.

The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne, 1850

According to many critics, Hawthorne should have been less friendly toward his main character, Hester Prynne (in fairness, so should have minister Arthur Dimmesdale). One isn’t surprised by the moralist outrage the book caused in 1852. But when, one hundred and forty years later, the book is still being banned because it is sinful and conflicts with community values, you have to raise your eyebrows. Parents in one school district called the book “pornographic and obscene” in 1977. Clearly this was before the days of the World Wide Web.

...where the hell is the porn in here? Did I miss this chapter? What porn?

(Note: Again, boring, and also, the Adultery Baby is freaky like hell; that kid alone might justify banning just to have less hideously precocious babies wandering around. Then again, that was the most interesting part of the book, even if it was born of fear.)

The Words of Cesar Chavez, Cesar Chavez, 2002

The works of Chavez were among the many books banned in the dissolution of the Mexican-American Studies Program in Tucson, Arizona. The Tucson Unified School District disbanded the program so as to accord with a piece of legislation which outlawed Ethnic Studies classes in the state. To read more about this egregious case of censorship, click here.

More details on that here. I mean, it kind of mocks itself just reading the justification, to be honest.

For more adventures in limiting the vastness of the human experience as expressed in literature due to reasons, Banned Books Week website and ALA's Banned Books section.

Thanks to cracked.com, I have learned the following:
1.) Assassination by furry has actually happened.
2.) DYI Home Nation Building, also see Wikipedia on Micronations (and current list). This has got to come in handy one day. Is there a manual?
3.) Here Comes Honey Boo Boo has social value. No, really.
4.) I could be crushing cars beneath my motherfucking tank right now. Why the hell am I not doing that? Currently trying to convince norabombay that volcano bungie jumping would be a great way to relieve stress.

So Honey Boo Boo is real. I honestly thought it was a very elaborate joke. I could have lived with that quite happily.

Probably this is old news or there are workarounds for this somewhere already, but if you own a Kindle Fire or an Android Tablet and like to download fic directly onto your Kindle/Android device from the website, this might help.

Currently, mobi files from AO3 download into the Download folder and from there you have to move them to the correct folder manually. Or you can try this. If done successfully, your downloaded mobi files from AO3 will immediately go into the correct folder for insta!reading.

Tested with the following devices successfully:

Tablet/E-Reader: Kindle Fire
System Version: 6.3.1_user_4107720

Tablet: Asus Transformer
Model: TF101
Android: 4.0.3

Phone: Samsung Galaxy S III
Model: SGH-T999
Android: 4.0.4

( this isn't hard, just steps )

( instructions for Android Tablets and Phones )

( instructions for Kindle Fire )

I probably need to check this for numbers. Also, the paucity of screenshots for Kindle is because the Galaxy S III has screenshot capability by swiping the screen, which Kindle does not. Which okay, Galaxy, how are you so awesome?

Title: Babel
Author: Seperis
Codes: James Kirk/Spock, Nyota Uhura, Leonard McCoy
Rating: NC-17
Summary: Starfleet hasn't forgiven him for how he became captain.
Author Notes: This was written for the KisCon 2011 zine. It also has the unique distinction of being the only fic I have ever written while in full writer's block and that is a hell I never want to experience again. Until today, I hadn't actually re-read it after I submitted it, so I was pleasantly surprised today reading it.
Archive: Archive of Our Own

( babel )

Work hates me. I'd actually go into detail on this, but the detail is boring. However, I can detail that the build after the one I'm currently testing I was (ridiculously) worried that all five of my assignments seemed smaller than I'd been given recently and my lead had taken teh two biggest. Please shut up; I know what you're thinking. Anyway, I worried I hadn't done a good job with the last huge build etc adn faith had been tested in my work, because when I'm not overworked this is the shit I think up, and then realized one of them was testing the Oracle update.

I have never, I think, actually talked about the last Oracle update. I wasn't directly responsible for planning the testing, as I wasn't in this section of testing. I also possibly blocked it out in horror. People talk of it in whispers. Loud ones.

I can't tell if this is proof that there is faith in my work or a hope I'll finally snap.

( also, people ask me things )

( also, work is moving us )

I'm hoping to get Monday off for reasons and this week so far is not shaping up to go well at all. Also, I'm reading during breaks the most horrible Pride and Prejudice spin-off series I have ever had the misfortune to see, and yet I keep going. I can't explain it except okay, one scene: a Transylvanian princess and a Japanese samauri whose boyfriend committed seppaku with her husband's help during her and her husband's run from her murderous father and end up in Japan after fleeing through St. Petersburg and spending time with a famous Jewish philosopher in possibly Siberia have a swordfight in the middle of the road in Derbyshire on a theoretical point of honor. Also, the husband's brother is married to Caroline Bingley and they sekritly adopt the illegitimate son of the Regent (her husband's boss) and a dying prostitute. And a Scotsman swung from the ceiling of Pemberley in a kilt to rescue Darcy from the Scotsman's murderous younger brother and later ended up marrying Georgiana. I cannot make this up. And this is like, not even the least believable.

Honest to God, these are not well written (at all, even by accident) and kind of hideously anachronistic in various ways, but I read this just to wonder what is going to happen next.

Having been paid, I started my monthly expenditures with my new favorite hobby: music replacement.

Years ago, when I was unemployed, a student, and then very low-paid, I used to download (at freaking dial-up speeds) tons of music from napster and limewire, as back then, downloading was such a commitment and effort it felt to me like I was paying anyway. It was partially a matter of money, and at the time, very much a matter of having to buy an entire album to get a song I liked. The coming of iTunes changed that, in which I had better speeds, convenience, and music that was fairly high quality, which was a problem because once you're listening to professional recordings, it's hard to go back to napster-era quality without wincing like a lot.

Slowly but surely, I'm replacing my entire napster-era and limewire-era music downloads with the enthusiastic help of Amazon. It's not really controlled so much as running across a song while surfing music and realizing hey, there's one, and it's sixty-nine cents! (This happens with startling frequency). However, last month Sarah McLachlan was my major focus, and this month I rediscovered Roxette on one of my playlists and did a clean sweep. Also, Culture Beat for Mr. Vain, and I can't even tell you why that one stuck in my memory but it's both disturbingly catchy and it reminds me of going to a dance when I was an exchange student and dancing for hours and hours with this one coming up on rotation until I could sing along with it (at one time, I could sing along with Swedish pop as well; I didn't understand what I was singing, but autolyric memorization apparently has no language barrier).

I have to admit, this has been a really good way to actually explore my collection and find songs I forgot. Also, Christ, I have a lot of music. Honestly, my digital hoarding is reaching disturbing proportions. When i say disturbing, I mean, this is not helping when right now at Fry's, I saw a 4 terabyte hard drive that I could totally convince myself is necessary to my continued existence, or maybe two, since by my most recent check of my server, my entire media collection including all movies and television and music and ebooks is just over 5 terabytes.

...how the everlovingfuck did I get five terabytes of media? More importantly, thought. Sarah McLachlan was what I wrote my first fanfic to, and the hard drive on my computer then was four gigs. I can't even fit all my fanfic on that much space. That I wrote.

Really, I wonder how I survived back then.

Do to Reasons, those being overwhelming spam this week, anonymous commenting is off for my LJ only until it slows down somewhat. My DW will still allow anonymous commenting. Seriously, I get more spam from LJ right now daily than all of my email accounts combined and I don't even like purses. I don't even think I own a purse right now. At least spam me within my interests, for God's sake.

Trufax: the day before a major deployment at work is stressful.

Trufax: yesterday me and my boss mused if we shouldn't be so hard on dev, being as a.) obviously they'd never seen a computer before and b.) probably lacked opposable thumbs.

Trufax: my very first supervisor in the agency is now supervisor of a different unit that is equivalent pay to ours and was poaching in my unit with my lead. I made my feelings on trying to lure away my lead clear. Because I do not say this lightly, our entire section will collapse and die forever if she does. He laughed at me. Goddamn him for being awesome.

( the state is kind of like this )

The deployment was tonight, and they already scheduled people to come in tomorrow due to anticipating how badly this is probably going to go. By the grace of God I am not one of them this time.

Randomly during lunch reading the coffee shop/high school AU thread on ffa and who writes them and why, I was trying to work out if I have ever even read a coffee shop AU because honestly, I couldn't think of one except the Inception one I was recced while in a three AM chat convo fugue state and I still don't know the title because the rec was The Coffee Shop With Delicious Pastry one or something. I mean, now I do since I'm looking at it, but I'll forget in about five minutes because it's, you know, The Coffee Shop With Delicious Pastry one.

Sidenote: okay, I mentioned doing this years ago, but I actually still log on delicious everything I read by fandom and pairing, month, year, month/year, author. No, not kidding. The new delicious is way too annoying now for me to achieve the most accurate reflection of my anal nature to have more tags than actual stories, but I figured on the theory that any fandom that I read more than 100 fic in, probability suggests I should have at least a few that involve coffee shops. I lost plausible deniability on my reading habits being highly driven less by quality or believability and far more by specific id buttons the day I read the surprise!magical cannibalism fivesome semi-RPS serial killer AU fic because unrepentant evil being cuddly with each other in the afterglow of violent crime that also seems to include a digression into a la carte-ing the remains satisfies the part of me that likes how strong relationships are based on shared interests. Apparently, adding in spontaneous shared snacking on human flesh is no longer a dealbreaker, and no, I'm just not even thinking about that too hard if i can help it.

I got off topic there.

Survey says; I apparently read a lot of these, but for reasons, I've never thought of them specifically as coffee shop AU fics because this more a thematic thing for me. Most of them, unsurprising, are what I re-read during periods one might call stressful and need to be soothed, but not all of them are exactly coffee shop AUs. All of them involve coffee, sometimes to the degree it could qualify as its own character, because I associate a triple espresso with comfort and meaning in life. A couple of these are not only fandoms that I have no knowledge of the canon of, but if I remember correctly, I was unaware existed, but somehow involve people in coffee shops, though not necessarily a coffee shop AU. I really don't even remember how I found some of these, to be honest. While I'm not sure on this being universal in my readings, I sense there's a high probability that there is at least one scene in most of them where a character's coffee order requires ten or more separate terms to describe it, because I just really seem to like complicate coffee products.

It vaguely bothers me that I very early on picked up my taste for dystopia, apocalypses, wholesale urban destruction, anything involving a lot of high powered weaponry including anything involving a sharpened blade, rain, and domestic efforts at remodeling a shared space (it's curtain AU, but like, with power tools and a working design theme by one of the characters), but that Inception fic was literally (from dates so far) the first of a whole series of I Feel Things About Characters And Coffee and I didn't even notice I've been engaged in a really intense relationship with coffee through the medium of a surprising variety of characters, some whose canon may preclude being corporeal, much less the existence of coffee.

Pastries seem to show up a lot, too, but that could be because I was hungry at the time and unconsciously gravitated toward vicarious eating.

I don't know how I feel about this development in my fannish habits.