A day to breathe
I've taken a day off from work after losing Saturday to Remix and yesterday to a combination of having slept only half the hours I need to feel human, going to a (lovely!) fangirl housewarming party, and deciding to try the train instead of driving, which translated to almost four hours of travel instead of less than two (although I got some reading done). The thought of using every night this week just to catch up made me queasy, so I called in one of the "mental health days" my manager gave me after the marathon project in December.
In three hours, I've already done 10 things on my should-have-been-weekend list. What a relief. I've worked from home a few times since the new year, but I couldn't tell you the last time I took a day off when I wasn't sick.
.
In fannish news, "Substitute" was nominated for an SGA Kink Award (voting is here). I was completely surprised and thrilled by the news. I don't think the little guy has a shot at winning, but as everyone says, just the fact that it was nominated is great.
I've never had a fic nominated for an award before. House was the first fandom I contributed to online, and I can't recall any contests except for possibly a House/Cameron one. BtVS and HP had many, and SGA seems to have several as well. This particular set of awards is new for 2008. They've broken down the nominees into categories; "Substitute" is listed under "That's… Actually, I like that (Best 'I didn't think I'd like this Kink until your story...')" in the slash PWP section. You can vote for the fic you like best in that category or check out all the nominees at the main site.
While, as I said, it was a thrill that someone liked the story enough to submit it for consideration, to be honest, on viewing the other nominees, I'm a little disappointed.
One of the things I love about SGA fandom is the quantity and quality of its kink fics, and yet very few of them are represented among the candidates on the Kink Awards site. Lesson one: Don't assume other people have already taken care of nominating the stories you like. Not only does that mean many good stories won't be recognized, it also means winning won't be as sweet for those who pick up awards because the competition was sparse.
Second, there are too many categories for the number of stories nominated. Many categories have only one story: automatic wins. Some have just two. If I were the mods, I'd have combined those categories with related ones for greater selection/competition, or automatically given the award out in those single-story categories instead of putting them up for voting.
Third-and this is completely personal-"Substitute" is up against just one other story that (a) is quite hot, which makes it a worthy winner, (b) is by a popular author, which means it will win because the awards are decided by popular vote, and (c) as a cross-dressing fic, really ought to be in the cross-dressing category instead of this one ("I didn't think I'd like this kink until your story"), which makes me bitter. Again, if I were the mods, I'd've eliminated this category when only two stories appeared in it, put "Substitute" in the sex toys one and put the other story in the cross-dressing one (which, again, has only one nominee). I opted to put "Substitute" where it is instead of in the sex toy category because golf clubs are not traditionally sex toys and because I knew it wouldn't stand a chance against the meltingly hot toy stories that are out there. As it turns out, *grumble grr*, most of those fics didn't make the list, for some reason.
Fourth and finally, on a technical note, and I'll be suggesting this to the organizers in case they run this again, when you click on the "vote" link (which IMO should say "Vote for this story" instead of "Click here to vote," since that's what the link does, with no warning or intermediate step), there's no confirmation page; it just takes you back to the index. Then you have to navigate back to the category and make sure it took your vote. Confusing. Just to warn you if you do go over there.
So there are my complaints, but whatever. It is a great feeling to have a story nominated, and I'm glad to see that some of the fics I've enjoyed, like briar_pipe's Full Moon Sky, will get the recognition they deserve.
Last night when I was feeling grumpy I considered talking about Remix and why I don't like when people log in with their sockpuppets and read stories ahead of time, since it keeps popping up on the f-list, but I couldn't figure out how to do it without making people angry, and anyway, enough griping for one day. The sun is out! There's fic to be written! There's soup to be made! Only two Mondays 'til House comes back!
In three hours, I've already done 10 things on my should-have-been-weekend list. What a relief. I've worked from home a few times since the new year, but I couldn't tell you the last time I took a day off when I wasn't sick.
.
In fannish news, "Substitute" was nominated for an SGA Kink Award (voting is here). I was completely surprised and thrilled by the news. I don't think the little guy has a shot at winning, but as everyone says, just the fact that it was nominated is great.
I've never had a fic nominated for an award before. House was the first fandom I contributed to online, and I can't recall any contests except for possibly a House/Cameron one. BtVS and HP had many, and SGA seems to have several as well. This particular set of awards is new for 2008. They've broken down the nominees into categories; "Substitute" is listed under "That's… Actually, I like that (Best 'I didn't think I'd like this Kink until your story...')" in the slash PWP section. You can vote for the fic you like best in that category or check out all the nominees at the main site.
While, as I said, it was a thrill that someone liked the story enough to submit it for consideration, to be honest, on viewing the other nominees, I'm a little disappointed.
One of the things I love about SGA fandom is the quantity and quality of its kink fics, and yet very few of them are represented among the candidates on the Kink Awards site. Lesson one: Don't assume other people have already taken care of nominating the stories you like. Not only does that mean many good stories won't be recognized, it also means winning won't be as sweet for those who pick up awards because the competition was sparse.
Second, there are too many categories for the number of stories nominated. Many categories have only one story: automatic wins. Some have just two. If I were the mods, I'd have combined those categories with related ones for greater selection/competition, or automatically given the award out in those single-story categories instead of putting them up for voting.
Third-and this is completely personal-"Substitute" is up against just one other story that (a) is quite hot, which makes it a worthy winner, (b) is by a popular author, which means it will win because the awards are decided by popular vote, and (c) as a cross-dressing fic, really ought to be in the cross-dressing category instead of this one ("I didn't think I'd like this kink until your story"), which makes me bitter. Again, if I were the mods, I'd've eliminated this category when only two stories appeared in it, put "Substitute" in the sex toys one and put the other story in the cross-dressing one (which, again, has only one nominee). I opted to put "Substitute" where it is instead of in the sex toy category because golf clubs are not traditionally sex toys and because I knew it wouldn't stand a chance against the meltingly hot toy stories that are out there. As it turns out, *grumble grr*, most of those fics didn't make the list, for some reason.
Fourth and finally, on a technical note, and I'll be suggesting this to the organizers in case they run this again, when you click on the "vote" link (which IMO should say "Vote for this story" instead of "Click here to vote," since that's what the link does, with no warning or intermediate step), there's no confirmation page; it just takes you back to the index. Then you have to navigate back to the category and make sure it took your vote. Confusing. Just to warn you if you do go over there.
So there are my complaints, but whatever. It is a great feeling to have a story nominated, and I'm glad to see that some of the fics I've enjoyed, like briar_pipe's Full Moon Sky, will get the recognition they deserve.
Last night when I was feeling grumpy I considered talking about Remix and why I don't like when people log in with their sockpuppets and read stories ahead of time, since it keeps popping up on the f-list, but I couldn't figure out how to do it without making people angry, and anyway, enough griping for one day. The sun is out! There's fic to be written! There's soup to be made! Only two Mondays 'til House comes back!