This post (https://notalwaysright.com/without-his-help-the-music-would-b-flat/319010/) reminded me of my own experience in the Kennedy Center. My parents have always loved Les Miserables, and had gotten tickets to see a special anniversary performance of it in the Kennedy Center. Unfortunately my mom ended up sick, and my dad was left with a ticket he wasn’t sure how to […]
In these days of climate change, the notion of coastal areas going underwater is a familiar fear. But it's not a new one; we have stories of drowned lands going back for thousands of years.
The famous example, of course, is Atlantis. Which Plato wrote about for allegorical purposes, not literal ones: he was making a point about society, building up Atlantis as a negative foil to the perfections of Athens. That hasn't stopped later writers from taking the idea and running with it, though, with interest particularly surging after Europeans learned of the New World. That's one of many locations since identified with Atlantis, with considerable effort expended on identifying a real-world inspiration for Plato's story (Thera leads the pack) . . . alongside wild theories that build up the sunken land as a place of advanced technology and magic. The supposed "lost continents" of Lemuria and Mu -- which may be the same thing, or may be synonymous with Atlantis -- are later inventions, discredited by the development of geological science.
We don't have to lose whole continents to the ocean, though. The shorelines of northern Europe are dotted with legends of regions sunk below the waves: the city of Ys on the coast of Brittany, Lyonesse in Cornwall, Cantre'r Gwaelod in Wales' Cardigan Bay. Natural features can contribute to these legends; the beaches of Cardigan Bay have ridges, termed sarnau, which run out into the ocean and have been taken for causeways, and environmental conditions at Ynyslas have preserved the stumps of submerged trees, which emerge at times of low tide. The so-called Yonaguni Monument in Japan and Bimini Road in the Bahamas are eerily regular-looking stone formations that theorists have mistaken for human construction, again raising the specter of a forgotten society drowned by the sea.
Many of the examples I'm most familiar with come from Europe, but this isn't solely a European phenomenon. I suspect you can get stories of this kind anywhere there's a coastline, especially if the offshore terrain is shallow enough for land to have genuinely been submerged by rising sea levels. Tamil and Sanskrit literature going back two thousand years has stories about places lost to the ocean, which is part of why some modern Tamil writers seized on the idea of Lemuria (supposedly positioned to the south of India). It doesn't even have to be salt water! A late eighteenth-century Russian text has the city of Kitezh sinking into Lake Svetloyar: a rather pyrrhic miracle delivered by God when the inhabitants prayed to be saved from a Mongol invasion.
Some drowned lands are entirely factual. Doggerland is the name given to the region of the North Sea that used to connect the British Isles to mainland Europe, before rising sea levels at the end of the last glaciation inundated the area. Archaeological investigation of the terrain is difficult, but artifacts and human bones have been dredged up from the depths. If we go into another Ice Age, Doggerland could re-emerge from the sea -- and if it had been flooded in a later era, what's down there could include monumental temples and other such dramatic features. We're robbed of such exciting discoveries by the fact that it was inhabited only by nomadic hunter-gatherers . . . which, of course, need not limit a fictional example!
Doggerland was submerged over the course of thousands of years, but most stories of this kind involve a sudden inundation. That may not be unrealistic: after an extended period in which the Mediterranean basin was mostly or entirely cut off from the Atlantic Ocean, the Zanclean flood broke through what is now the Strait of Gibraltar and refilled the basin over the course of anything from two years to as little as a few months. Water levels may have risen as fast as ten meters a day! Of course, the region before then would have been hellishly hot and arid rather than the pleasant home of a happy civilization, but it's still dramatic to imagine.
Then there are the phantom islands. I have these on the brain right now because the upcoming duology I'm writing with Alyc Helms as M.A. Carrick, the Sea Beyond, makes extensive use of these, but they've fascinated me for far longer than we've been working on the series.
"Phantom island" is the general term used for islands that turn out not to be real. Some of these, like Atlantis, are entirely mythical, existing only in stories whose tellers may not ever have meant them to be more than metaphor. Others, however, are a consequence of the intense difficulties of maritime travel. Mirages and fog banks can make sailors believe they've spotted land where there is none . . . or they see an actual, factual place, but they don't realize where they are.
To understand how that can happen, you have to think about navigation in the past. We've had methods of calculating latitude for a long time, but they were often imprecise, and a error of even one degree can mean your position is off by nearly seventy miles/a hundred kilometers. Meanwhile, as I've mentioned before, longitude was a profoundly intractable problem until about two hundred and fifty years ago, with seafarers unable to make more than educated guesses as to their east-west position -- guesses that could be off by hundreds and hundreds of miles.
The result is that even if you saw a real piece of land, did you know where it was? You would chart it to the best of your ability, but somebody else later sailing through (what they thought was) the same patch of sea might spot nothing at all. Or they'd find land they thought looked like what you'd described, except it was in another location. Well-identified masses could be mistaken for new ones if ships wrongly calculated their current position, especially since accurate coastal charts were also difficult to make when your movements were at the mercy of wind and current.
Phantom islands therefore moved all over the map, vanishing and reappearing, or having their names reattached to new places as we became sure of those latter. Some of them persisted into the twentieth century, when we finally amassed enough technology (like satellites) to know for certain what is and is not out there in the ocean. There are still a few cases where people wonder if an island appeared and then sank again, though we know now that the conditions which can make that happen are fairly rare -- and usually involve volcanic eruptions.
The sea still feels like a place of mystery, though, where all kinds of wonders might lie just over the horizon. And depending on how much we succeed or fail at controlling global temperatures and the encroachments of the sea, we may genuinely wind up with sunken cities to form a new generation of cautionary tales . . .
1. If there was a K-9 comm, I would post stuff like the translations there. And if there were like at least TWO just two other Dreamwidthers as much into it as I am, I'd go for it and create it. But most people I got my claws into are on Discord only/mainly, and thus so it goes. I don't have it in me right now to create another comm where I end up doing most of the posting XD But it's funny to imagine creating a weekly reaction post for the new chapter, then the only reply is a self-reply of me losing my shit on my own. Actually not that far from reality really. I shall continue monitoring the Dreamwidth K-9 temperature XD
2. I'm posting a lot right now both here and on AO3, but I assume it will all go very quiet again once I return to working on the novel(la)s?? Takes longer to form insights and also no finished projects to share heh.
3. I am thinking about those original projects again, which is good!! Unfortunately my mind is looking for wider, very high-level themes unifying the drafts of every original novella/novel I ever finished and oh my god I found it and I need to stop thinking about it or I will never write again. Feels like strolling down main street in my underwear even just mentally.
4. You! Do you write fic? Are you suffering reception anxiety after posting?? Try This One Neat Trick: read or watch something obscure, then create a new AO3 fandom tag for it and write! Obviously, I'd like to connect with readers, but there's also something liberating to posting something that has a single digit audience at best. Possibly literally, as in max one digit on one hand XD
5. A friend gifted me a really cute 2026 late last year. It's about the size of my palm. I knew I wasn't gonna use it for my actual TODOs because incredibly, my Bullet Journal system is still working super well for me, and as cute as it is it would be a downgrade. I thought I'd use it for something writing-related, since writing is happy-inducing and so is this little planner thing but... I can't figure out what, still T_T I thought I might jot down notes on what projects I do or times or word counts, but that feels like a chore and not joy-sparky. I'm already tracking the few writing stats I'm actually interested in. And now we're mid-January and every day is a missed page opportunity and I still don't know what to use it for orz Suggestions welcome! Even if not writing related at this point. I guess maybe I could do a gratitude journal...? I like to do that randomly in my paper journal though, rather than on command daily. Hmmmm.
6. If you like Wind Breaker and are looking for icons, there's been quite a few posted over on malagraphic lately! I snagged crying praying Endou as used on this post :D To be used when Grateful, keeping in theme here.
Which is how the fandom ended up with a sort of folk hero who appears as a naked man with a jar on his head holding two katanas and soloes the game's hardest boss for you:
Customer: "Gimme a national lottery ticket. Make sure it's a winner! Ha ha!"
Me: "Every ticket is a guaranteed winner! Either you or the state will win!"
Customer: "That sounds like a rehearsed answer."
Me: "It is. I use it multiple times a day."
I hope you're all ready to start recruiting your sidekicks because nominations are open! But, before I link to where you can nominate, there is one big difference from last year… I'm allowing detectives to transfer accepted nominations from last year's tagset. Please read the guidelines in that section before requesting a transfer.
Please read the guidelines before nominating, and keep an eye on the comm in case clarification is needed from you before a nomination is accepted.
Nomination guidelines
You can nominate up to 10 fandoms with 10 relationships (this includes characters, relationships, and groups) each.
All nominations must be disambiguated with the name of the canon after the ship/group/character, e.g., "Veronica Mars/Logan Echolls (VMars)", "Solo: Joe Goldberg (You TV)", "Solo: The Crows (Six of Crows Series)", "Fred Jones & Daphne Blake & Velma Dinkley & Shaggy Rogers & Scooby-Doo (Scooby-Doo Cartoon)".
Please avoid nominating "All Media Types" and "& Related Fandoms".
Crossovers belong under "Crossover Fandom".
Please ensure you properly capitalise your tags, otherwise we will either fix them or reject them.
Please remember that you do not have to nominate canons that are investigative in nature. We will accept any canon! The work created for the request needs to involve an investigation, so please nominate what you're eager to receive and/or offer.
Please remove diacritics (or accent letters) from nominations to help us avoid having accidental duplications. We won't be querying or changing these, but it's a preference to make it easier to search for tags if we need to move or edit them.
Disambiguations
Disambiguations help us identify which canon a character, relationship, or group belongs to, and are mandatory as part of your nominations. These assist us greatly in the backend, and also allow requesters and creators to know which version of a character is nominated, especially for large fandoms with various mediums or character versions.
You are welcome to abbreviate the fandom name when nominating your characters/relationships/groups to save space, although please make the abbreviation distinct for someone who is canon blind, i.e. for The Hunger Games, you could use "THG - Collins" and "THG Movies". If your tag goes wandering, we want to be able to put it back in its rightful place.
Examples of disambiguation are below (the disambiguation is bolded):
Detective investigating murder or disappearance & Fake medium & Crime suspects (OW)
Fandoms
We have no restrictions on rarity or media on fandoms. You are more than welcome to nominate a very popular fandom or very rare fandom.
For more specific canon types:
RPF: RPF is permitted. Non-famous family members and under 18s are not eligible. We will not be allowing nominations for world leaders and reserve the right to reject any RPF nomination that we feel will cause distress to our participants.
Original characters in non-original canons: You may nominate Canon Character/Original Character(s) and Canon Character & Original Character(s). You are welcome to be as specific or as broad as you wish, e.g. "Veronica Mars/Original Female Character (VMars)" or "Abed Nadir & Original Male Character (Community)".
We highly encourage you to ensure your nomination specifies the gender of the OC unless you're interested in receiving a fanwork with any gender, i.e., "Misty Quigley & Original Character (Yellowjackets)" is broad and unspecific, and means your creator will be allowed to define the gender of the OC. If you are interested in a specific gender for the OC, please nominate this specifically, i.e. "Misty Quigley & Original Female Character (Yellowjackets)".
We will not accept participants who try to box their creator into a specific type of relationship using their optional details in their sign-up. Please keep that in mind while nominating.
Original Works: These must be nominated under "Original Work" in the format "Character Type/Character Type", "Character Type & Character Type" and "Solo: Character Type", e.g. "Female Detective/Male Criminal Mastermind (OW)", "Female Pirate Captain & Male Privateer (OW)", "Solo: Female Archeologist (OW)", etc.
We encourage you to be specific regarding gender and what you're after. Please try not to be overly specific—our tags have character limitations, and we also will not allow boxing in creators.
Recursive: These fandoms will be allowed as long as the nominators provide evidence that the creator has given permission for recursive works. This should be submitted either via email at gumshoeagency@gmail.com or on this post. Recursive nominations that fail to provide this proof will be rejected. Please ensure you include "DFE" ("Disambiguated for Exchanges") in the disambiguation.
Crossovers: Crossovers are permitted. These should be nominated under "Crossover Fandom" with the fandom name for each character in brackets, e.g. "Taissa Turner (Yellowjackets) & Michelle Jones (MCU)" or "Solo: Elmo (Sesame Street) in Home Alone (Movies)".
Threesomes/moresomes: These types of relationships are permitted, whether they are romantic or platonic. (Romantic is to be signified with an "/" and platonic with "&".) If you are nominating characters that do not exist in the same canon, please ensure you do so under "Crossover Fandom".
Canon/Reader: We do not allow Reader/Canon Character to be nominated in any form.
Creator's Choice of Fandom: We do not accept any CCOF for this exchange.
Nominating specific fandoms
Assassin's Creed: Please nominate Assassin's Creed under "Assassin's Creed - All Media Types".
Buffy: The Vampire Slayer and Angel: The Series: Please nominate these under "Buffyverse (TV)".
DC's Arrowverse: Please nominate characters from Arrow, The Flash, Supergirl, Legends of Tomorrow, Batwoman, Superman & Lois, and Black Lightning under "DC's Arrowverse".
DC Comics: Please nominate all DC comics under "DCU (Comics)", but please disambiguate which version of the character you want in parentheses if that information is important to you.
DC Extended Universe: Please nominate all DCEU movies under "DC Extended Universe".
Dimension 20: Please nominate all campaigns under "Dimension 20 (Web Series)".
Dragon Age:
Nominate all video games under "Dragon Age (Video Games)".
Nominate all comics under "Dragon Age (Comics)".
Nominate all books under "Dragon Age - Various Authors".
Nominate all tabletop RPG under "Dragon Age (Tabletop RPG)".
Final Fantasy VII Remake: Please nominate this under "Compilation of Final Fantasy VII".
Marvel Cinematic Universe:
Please nominate all MCU movies under "Marvel Cinematic Universe".
Please nominate all Netflix Marvel TV shows under "The Defenders (Marvel TV)". This includes Jessica Jones, Luke Cage, Iron First, Daredevil, and The Defenders.
Please nominate the MCU television shows separately from the MCU. These should appear as separate entities within the tagset, i.e., "WandaVision", "Ms Marvel", "Loki", "Falcon and the Winter Soldier", "Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.", etc.
Marvel Comics: Please nominate these under their appropriate Marvel universe, i.e. "Marvel 616", "Marvel Ultimate", etc. We won't accept "Marvel Comics" as a fandom.
Naruto (Anime & Manga), Boruto (Anime & Manga), and Dreaming of Sunshine: Please nominate these separately. Dreaming of Sunshine should be nominated as "Dreaming of Sunshine - SilverQueen (DFE)". If your nomination involves one or more Dreaming of Sunshine characters and one or more Naruto/Boruto characters, nominate this under "Crossover Fandom" with the proper disambiguations.
Star Trek: Please nominate these via their separate shows and the Alternate Original Series, such as "Star Trek: Alternate Original Series ", "Star Trek: Deep Space Nine", "Star Trek: Discovery", "Star Trek: Enterprise", "Star Trek: Picard", "Star Trek: Strange New Worlds", "Star Trek: The Next Generation", etc. Crossovers between these shows must be nominated under "Crossover Fandom" and correctly disambiguated,
Star Wars:
Star Wars movies: Please nominate under the appropriate movie, i.e. "Star Wars: Original Trilogy", "Star Wars: Sequel Trilogy", "Star Wars: Prequel Trilogy".
Star Wars TV shows: Please nominate under the appropriate television shoe, i.e. "Star Wars: Rogue One". We will allow "Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types" to be nominated.
Star Wars books: Please nominate under either "Star Wars: Legends Books" (Old EU) or "Star Wars: Extended Universe Books" (new/current books).
Star Wars comics, video games, etc.,: Nominate what's normal in the fandom or by individual title. If you're unsure, comment below and we can figure out how to proceed.
Star Wars in-universe crossovers: Please ensure any Star Wars crossovers are nominated under "Star Wars - All Media Types", i.e. "Leia Organa (Star Wars: Original Trilogy) & Ahsoka Tano (Star Wars: The Clone Wars)". Please ensure you disambiguate which version of the character you want.
The Witcher: Please nominate via media, i.e. "The Witcher Series - Andrzej Sapkowski", "The Witcher (TV)", and "The Witcher (Video Games)".
X-Men Movies: Please nominate either "X-Men (Movieverse) (OTM)" for Original Timeline Movies and "X-Men (Movieverse) (ATM)" for Alternate Timeline Movies.
Tag formats
We accept:
"/" nominations signifying romantic and/or sexual relationships, i.e. "Logan Echolls/Veronica Mars (VMars)".
"&" nominations signifying platonic and gen relationships, i.e. "Logan Echolls & Veronica Mars (VMars)".
"Solo:" nominations will work in two ways: (1) signifying a single character to be the main focus of the fanwork, i.e. "Solo: Veronica Mars (VMars)" and (2) signifying a group, such as "Solo: The Muppets (Sesame Street)", where one or more Muppets will be the central focus of the work as chosen by the creator.
"Solo: Character (Fandom A) in Fandom B" and "Solo: Relationship (Fandom A) in Fandom B" — This signifies a crossover where the nominated character (or relationship) from Fandom A is visiting or already exists in the world of Fandom B. Please disambiguate Fandom B if there are multiple versions of this fandom available.
You may nominate tags in the format of "Character A/Character B & Character C" to request two characters in a romantic/sexual relationship having a platonic interaction with a third character. Please ensure you disambiguate correctly.
Tag examples:
Daphne Blake/Fred Jones (Scooby Doo Cartoon) — The fanwork you will receive will be primarily about this romantic/sexual relationship interacting with the exchange's theme.
Daphne Blake & Fred Jones (Scooby Doo Cartoon) — The fanwork you will receive will be primarily about characters interacting as friends, neighbours, family, acquaintances, enemies, etc. in a platonic/non-sexual way with the exchange's theme.
Solo: Velma Dinkley (Scooby Doo Cartoon) — The fanwork you will receive will be about/centred around Velma Dinkley, but other characters can appear while interacting with the exchange's theme.. She will be the primary character interacting with the exchange's theme within the work.
Solo: Mystery Inc. (Scooby Doo Cartoon) — The fanwork you will receive will be about/centred around one of any member of Mystery Inc. but, can potentially be more than one. They will interact with the exchange's theme.
Fred Jones & Daphne Blake & Velma Dinkley & Shaggy Rogers & Scooby-Doo (Scooby-Doo) — The fanwork you will receive will be about/centred around the nominated Mystery Inc. members, who interact platonically with one another with the exchange's theme.
Solo: Scooby Doo (Scooby Doo Cartoon) in Sesame Street — The fanwork will be a crossover about/centred around Scooby Doo visiting or already existing within the world of Sesame Street and interact with the exchange's theme. This will be nominated under "Crossover Fandom".
Elmo (Sesame Street) & Mystery Inc. (Scooby Doo Cartoon) — The fanwork you will receive will be a crossover work in which Elmo and one or more of the members of Mystery Inc. meet or have some kind of pre-existing platonic relationship and interact with the exchange's theme. This will be nominated under "Crossover Fandom".
Daphne Blake/Fred Jones (Scooby Doo cartoon) & Elmo (Sesame Street) — The fanwork you will receive will be a crossover work in which Fred and Daphne have a romantic/sexual relationship and platonically interact with Elmo with the exchange's theme. This will be nominated under "Crossover Fandom".
Group nominations
"Solo: Group" tags mean "one or more of this group" whether or not they have "any" in front of them.
If you request an ambiguous group, i.e. "Solo: The Avengers", we will assume any possible member(s) of that group fulfil the request. If you want specific members, please nominate them in the "Character A & Character B & Character C" format. (Please select the characters you absolutely want.)
You may request "Any" of a character type, e.g., "Mikhaila Ilyushin/Any Female Talos I Employee". Please make sure any important information is within the Any character tag.
Where there is ambiguity created by a nomination, we will likely side with the creator. If you want to ensure you get specific characters, then nominate them by name. If you request "Veronica Mars (VMars) & The Avengers (MCU)" and include in your DNWs that you do not want Bruce Banner, this may not be enforced.
Transfer 2025 nominations over
One of our fellow detectives asked about this as an option for 2026's round, which I thought was a great idea! I apologise to anyone this may blindside, as I hadn't considered it and didn't build it into the schedule.
I'm allowing transfers from last year's tagset into 2026's tagset. This means these nominations will not count toward a nomination slot. I will batch load these into the 2026 tagset, provided the request follows the guidelines below.
Each person can only request a maximum of 10 fandoms to be transferred.
Anonymous comments must sign their comments with their AO3 usernames.
If you do not provide the information in the format specified, I will not be transferring your selected tags over.
Please reply to this post with your fandom and the tags you want transferred. Please format it as follows: Fandom,Relationship,Relationship,Relationship, with each fandom on a new line. Please do not change these tags and do not add spaces. The tags must be exactly as they appear in the 2025 tagset.
If you can title your comment's subject with "Transfer", that will be very helpful for me! This isn't mandatory, and I will process these transfers even without a subject line. (Please don't stress if you forget!)
Transfers must be requested on this post only. If they are asked on any other post, I will ignore them.
Please be patient with me as this is my first time offering this.
Questions
You're welcome to drop any questions below or email gumshoeagency@gmail.com.
If you see any errors in the tagset, please point them out, preferably on nomination-related posts, so they can be amended before sign-ups open.
*
Thanks very much to the ficinabox mods for letting me steal some of their nomination guidelines. 🩷
Based on how sad a lot of this album was, I had been wondering if William Prince was okay, but he sounds like he's doing well? This song is so pretty, anyway.
Only a month left until International Fanworks Day 2026! On February 15 we’ll celebrate IFD 2026, and all things fandom. Find out more about this year’s theme, our upcoming events, and how you can participate at https://otw-news.org/2p84duud
The next Firewhiskey Fic event for the altered-states creation of fanworks along with lots of sociability amongst fellow participants will take place from Friday, February 13th to Sunday, February 15th. If you'd like to spend some time creating fanworks while either imbibing or doing the 420 in an environment of online partying with the FWF fen, join the comm at Firewhiskey Fic on Dreamwidth. No signups, no stress, no sobriety.
More info will be posted the week before the event.
It’s no longer the 15th of the month as I’m finishing this post…but I ran all the numbers on the 15th, so I’m counting it as a regular scheduled update.
I’ve finished one A-to-Z pass of “handing off and/or punting specific webcomics.” In total, that knocked a couple hundred fandoms off my list. Guess I’ll do another, go harder, and knock out a couple hundred more.
There was a point when I thought about starting a habit of “sweep the Unassigned Fandoms list for tiny underloved Christmas movies,” because sweeping for underloved webcomics was working well. Didn’t end up doing it regularly, though — I just got 12 movie fandoms with 1 fic each, and stopped there. So I dropped all of those in an afternoon. (In the years I was babysitting them, the most active of these fandoms came out with…a whole 2nd fic.)
(There’s still only one fic for Shadow Man – Melissa Scott…and it’s the one I wrote. Guess it’s depressingly safe to leave “the queer intersex revolution/romance where everyone’s on space drugs” unwrangled, huh.)
With bigger Random Things, when they’re active enough I don’t want to leave them unwrangled, I’ve been making the occasional post about “looking to hand off this fandom, will anybody take it?” Breaks up the monotony of the batches of webtoons, I think. And it’s had maybe a 50-50 success rate — not bad. I’ll keep at it.
…I did actually add 2 new fandoms since the last update. A couple fans wrote about the Toon Makers US Sailor Moon pilot for Yuletide 2025, so that has a fandom tag now, and I picked it up to go with the rest of the Sailor Moon fandom tree.
Then it came up in the “wranglers wanted” channel that Pet Shop of Horrors was unassigned. And how was I supposed to resist picking up PSOH? I love PSOH. That manga reread I just recently started will pair perfectly with a review of the existing PSOH tags.
So my current total number of fandoms is 1183. (The number of “fandoms that actually have any new tags to deal with right now” is 28.)
Don't forget to double check your matchability! You can browse people's requests using the AutoApp. If you are unmatchable when sign-ups close, you will be emailed and will have 24 hours to respond.
Make sure to finish up your letter before assignments go out and unlock it if it is locked! Additionally, don't forget to make sure your DNWs are in your Ao3 sign-up and clearly labeled as "Do Not Want(s)" or "DNW(s)". DNWs that are only in your letter will not be enforceable.
If you have any questions, feel free to comment on this post or email us at traumaticexperiencesmod@gmail.com!
Got any Follow Friday-related posts to share this week? Comment here with the link(s).
Here's the plan: every Friday, let's recommend some people and/or communities to follow on Dreamwidth. That's it. No complicated rules, no "pass this on to 7.328 friends or your cat will die".
New Year's resolution to update DW more: already failing! New Year's resolution to start titling my posts: already achieved, A+
The final roundup for last year's reading! November and December book reviews. Lots of graphic novels and a highly anticipated sequel in this one. I don't know if I'm going to bother with a book 'year in review' or just do a general review meme, or maybe neither if I keep slacking off lol.
Final Fantasy X came out for the first time in Japan on July 19 2001 for the Playstation 2. For almost 25 years, this game has touched many players regardless of whether you’ve been a longtime Final Fantasy fan since the series’ inception or a newcomer who just picked up the game very recently.
This project (charity fanthology & community zine) is meant to celebrate its 25-year anniversary of the game coming next year, and of course, will focus on Tidus and Yuna’s journey of hope and resilience, their bonds with the guardians and the rest of the cast, as well as celebrating the beautiful world of Spira.
Due to the nature of this project, this zine will contain major spoilers for FFX.
This zine project is split into two pieces: a paid charity zine and a slightly larger free community zine. Applications for the charity side are now open. The charity we will be donating to is the SE Asia Foundation. This charity focuses on lifting people in Southeast Asia out of poverty, with a focus on educating girls.
Honestly we didn't get a lot of snow but under it was ice. On the road between Jackson and Gallipolis (the two places I talk about all the time) had TWO five vehicle crashes and multiple small ones including the fire chief getting run over by someone who doesn't know what red lights mean (he was transported to the same trauma center I had been in) By 1 pm the most of it had melted but you know what I'm not arguing with a day off.
Mom, of course, thinks any spare second I have should be me cleaning. She's not wrong but still...that said I DID pick one major project and I did it, namely three bins of sockets and undies and a huge ass pile of clothes (still mostly socks) so I made 5 piles, summer socks, winter socks, fuzzy socks, socks I don't want period and lonely socks looking for mates.
So the piles are gone. The undies are gone because why in the name of god was I holding onto them. Many socks ready for donation and two uncomfortable realizations.
1. I have more fuzzy socks that any one human should. I know some are tight and need to be donated. Some have holes that I wear in bed in the fall/early spring while reading if my Raynaud's kicks in. Well pick two pair Dana and toss the rest.
2. That was NOT a bin of old undies. Under them was dozens of printed out stories, catalogues for book clubs that have been online only for YEARS and books. WTF? At least the books are now out on a shelf, the catalogues in the recycler and I'll sort the stories later to see what needs read and what can hit the recycler.
I did finish the last two stories I could possible write for fandomtrees and maybe if we're lucky everything will release this weekend. Both of the recipients had 2 by the time I got these done but that's fine. Now they have 3.
I found a place in Pittsburgh I need to visit (and I thought about a little vacation right there in the city if it's not crazy expensive) the weeping glass
I have some community recs this thursday fandomtrumpshate is gearing up so if you want to look it over to join in an raise money to do good now's the time.
And I got a few communities (new to me) from tozka that looked cool. Check them out
vintageads I think I'll need to join this one. It'll be a good source for historical fic
bookclub_dw This is a monthly book club where members of the community host book club discussions once a month. - I don't need a new one but maybe you do
Got up at 9:15 and showered and dressed. mashfanficchick had a very bad backache, so ultimately we decided to not take the subway to the Moynihan Train Hall, but take a Lyft instead. Which I think was a very good idea, because we were wrestling with three suitcases, two backpacks, my laptop case and purse, and zer cane.
So we got to the train hall with just enough time to buy breakfast before our train, but not enough time to eat it. So we boarded and found seats together, somehow, and ate there.
The ride was supposed to be four hours but was late getting in, so we arrived around 5:00. Called for a Lyft and got to the hotel and checked in.
The room is very nice. We went down to the con suite to see Larry, and then came back and settled in. I Teamed the FWiB, after much trouble with the computer and the hotel WiFi.
At 8:00 we watched 911, and then 911: Nashville. mashfanficchick started feeling unwell, but thinks it may just be lost sleep due to the back pain. We ordered food, Thai, and Japanese, and had it delivered.
The Kid is already here, but I don't know her room number. She's on the 10th floor.
The con starts tomorrow. Can't wait!
Gratitude List:
1. The FWiB.
2. Got here safely.
3. Good dinner.
4. Fun TV.
5. Nice room.
6. Arisia!
Edited to add: Forgot to say, called Middle Brother, he's fine. Nothing new.
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swan_tower
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malagraphic lately! I snagged crying praying Endou as used on this post :D To be used when Grateful, keeping in theme here.
ALT
