Um, hi. It has been an age, hasn't it? (If anyone is still here? Are you still here? I hope you are, I've missed you.) I come bearing fic?

Anyway, I shan't bore you with my frankly non-adventurous adventures over the last couple of years, except to say that I am currently shin-deep in a PhD program, trying to get back into the writing thing (which, for various reasons of busyness/block/stress, hasn't been happening much of late), realising I am horribly out of practice, and... yeah. So I dug out a half-baked ss/hg fic I started back in the day and I've been prodding at it a bit and thought I'd throw the first chapter out into the wide, cruel world.

This was a fic inspired by a prompt harmony_bites gave me about a billion years ago, in which Snape does hot yoga. She reminds me of it every now and then with only a touch of bitterness, bless her. He doesn't do hot yoga in this chapter, though, because things got out of hand and ideas exploded. As they do.

( Chapter 1Collapse )

Finally saw DH2. General impressions:

1) De-aging Alan Rickman was surprisingly convincing, especially since grown-up Lily and James looked a similar age. (But, honestly, do you think they put him on a diet for those scenes?)
2) Oh, Snape.
3) Oh, Draco, you adorable weaselly failure at evil.
4) Oh, Rupert Grint.
5) Loved Snape's hilariously over-done 'I'm evil, bitches' eyeshadow. Continuity from the PS adaptation, non?

And, as I posted that to Google+ (even though I'm still not sure why I should be excited about G+) and I would hate for you to feel cheated by my crossposting, this is officially the best Harry Potter youtube video I have seen:




Also, it's an epic rap battle between Gandalf and Dumbledore.

I AM NINE DAYS AWAY FROM SUBMITTING MY THESIS.

If you attempt to speak to me between then and now, I may only be able to respond with jumbled quotations from Mansfield Park and related criticism.

BUT. BUT. OMG. Nine days. And then I will have a month of freedom before my defence. You have no idea how excited I am.

And the rest of life is going fabulously. I am pleased and Zen. I can do this, you guys. Right? Right?

Also, can someone tell me if awesome fandom stuff is going down on Google+? I have a RL account and am reluctant to make a fandom account for fear of crossed wires, but if it seems worth it I will.

Edit: Never mind. I am on Google+ as silbury girl. Add me if you like.

Comment with "Come at me, bro," and:
- I'll respond by asking you five questions so I can get to know you better.
- Update your journal with the answers to the questions.
- Include this explanation in the post and offer to ask other people questions.

I was asked five marvellous questions by bluestocking79; you will find them and their accompanying answers behind the cut!

( Austen, yoga, magicCollapse )

Yesterday was the First Day of Real Summer. Not because of the moderately cool weather (although it was sunny). Not because of any sort of event bearing that name. Simply because I decided to make it so.

During a particularly sweltering yoga class yesterday morning, I began to fantasise about swimming in lovely, cool lakes. Unlike it usually does, this fantasy did not dissipate with my emergence from the hot room, so I texted the friend that I had made plans with and suggested we drive out to one of the nearby lakes. She thought I was crazy, but when I pointed out that it was marginally better than Plan B: Swim in the North Pacific (which is a painful experience in actual heat, never mind the pleasant but not particularly warm temperatures of yesterday), she agreed, with the caveat that she would sit on the shore and mock me.

The water was actually lovely. I'm not making this up in an attempt to convince you that I am not insane. (I am. This is established fact.) But I paddled cheerfully around for about twenty minutes while my friend shivered on the shore, and then we sat in a sunny spot for a while, before going in search of food.

( ramble ramble rambleCollapse )

And then we went to the new Pirates of the Caribbean movie, which I totally recommend if you have very low expectations going in (I did) and love Johnny Depp (I do). I missed the Orlando Bloom/Keira Knightley/Jack Davenport characters quite a bit, and I'm not sure Penelope Cruz quite made up for their absence (although she wasn't bad and Anthony Hopkins was pretty delightful). It seemed like they tried to make up for some of the lack of plot and character consistency with the camera work, which seemed to be imitating some of the scenes from the first film almost shot for shot. (I now want to go back and see if the second and third films do the same.) But overall? Much fun. I giggled a lot.

And, because I need a mental break from the book I'm reading, 40 Questions Meme, stolen from a few people.

( 40 QuestionsCollapse )

Stanley Cup finals, baby!

[insert gloating fist pumps here]

Sorry, I ran out of people to text superfluous exclamation points to, long before my enthusiasm waned.

Since returning from conferencing/visiting friends, I have been basically semi-comatose, probably because I averaged four hours of sleep a night the entire time I was away. I was also teetering on the edge of sickness, and felt awful, probably due to the large amounts of cheese I consumed due to the lack of adequate, filling vegetarian provisions at the conference, as well as ten days of fairly uninterrupted drinking (visiting with friends, followed by nightly cocktail receptions with an open bar, which mostly involved making new friends and going out on the town with them). Obviously that meant it was a fantastic time to start another 30-day yoga challenge! So, today will be Day 5, and I'm feeling un-sick and still tired, but much better. Hooray for detox!

Since I've also been feeling totally braindead, I've been cooking a lot, as that is my favoured (flavoured?) form of procrastination. For example, yesterday, I woke up, chatted with an overseas friend on Skype, baked scones, and then curled up to munch and watch the hockey game, which aired at noon. (Midday hockey games are the best, because they take up nearly the entire day, leaving no guilt about failed productivity.) Oh, and then went to yoga and came home and made dinner.

Both meals were totally delicious, so I will share them with you! Yay! (Also, apparently it is National Vegetarian Week, so you may consider this my friendly attempt at indoctrination.) Everything I've been cooking lately is totally vegan, so in addition to being meatless, they are also dairy and egg free.

( Tomato Rosemary SconesCollapse )

( Sesame Lime Soba Noodles with Shiitake Mushrooms and Snow PeasCollapse )

So, those things were delicious. You should try them.

If you are a lover of desserts, may I also recommend these delicious pumpkin brownies? I used half a pound of puréed silken tofu in place of eggs and Earth Balance soy-free buttery spread instead of butter, and they were perfectly fudgey and delicious.

Go forth and nom!

Oh, LJ, of course your current header is loaded with vaguely religious symbolism. So excellent.

You know what else is excellent? BSG, which I finally finished this past week. Way to kill me, last episode. Way to just utterly emotionally destroy me. (Actually, that's an accurate description of the entire fourth season. I cried at some point in more episodes than not.)

It would take a really long time to type up a post that encapsulates everything I think about the show, and I'm sleepy, so I'm going to limit it to thoughts on the fourth season, with a special focus on the final episode, which I have come down on the side of thoroughly loving (I might be the only person in the world who thinks so, I know).

( here be spoilersCollapse )

Anyway, that doesn't even begin to say everything that there is to say, but those are the things that struck me, particularly. And, now, bed.

(Because if you are anything like me, I know you are probably reading this right now.)

I can be sold on almost anything, if it's done in a way that I like. Really. But if I asked you not to do it on the sign-up post, then it would be best avoided.

Instead of dwelling on the things you can do wrong, I will ( provide you with a list of some things that you can do very right, indeedCollapse )

This is devolving into a passive-aggressive rant about my fandom pet peeves. Oh, dear. Anyway, if you don't do the things listed, that is fine. They are mostly just delightful seasonings that, when added to fic, make me smile extra hard, but if you don't like them, you do not need to include them.

I think we can safely say that absolutely no one predicted that. But for all that the overall result is pretty grim, there were many good things.

( boring Canadian political stuffs, really just so that I can look back at it laterCollapse )

All right, Canucks. It is time for you to redeem my country to me. Please to not be losing to Nashville, of all teams.