fare thee well
I'm withdrawing from LJI because it has been like a chore for me. I've been burning through my byes in case my mind would change, but it hasn't. Since the jig is up, I don't see any point in carrying on with something I'm not getting any pleasure from.
Some of you who have been around for a while may remember me, even though I've never played with my "real" LJ account, soopageek.
After watching my wife welfy win the whole shebang in Season 3, I first competed in Season 4 for as srs_bidness; a goofy pseudo-meta project that poked fun at the other competitors and the contest itself. In Season 5, I created gutterlust; a dark character project that amused me on a couple of levels. I asked my pal lossfound to "play" srs_bidness in Season 5.
Back then, the contest was still sort of small, with barely 100 contestants and far more insular. It was probably unnecessary, but my assumption was that people would wonder why I wasn't competing, and start wondering about the newcomers - especially accounts obviously created just for the contest - and who they were. I didn't want anyone to think gutterlust was me, so lossfound ran interference, so that everyone would assume I was just competing as srs_bidness again.
After Season 5, I was done with LJI. I hate all the politics, drama and schmooze that goes along with it. It's a pointless amusement. Not that there's anything wrong with pointless amusements - for I have many of them - but this one doesn't do anything for me.
The funny thing is, my pal continued to compete in subsequent seasons. When this, the final season, rolled around he asked if I wanted to engage him in a tandem puppet project, I figured "why not?" It was the least I could do since he was such a trooper about playing srs_bidness all those years ago. But I also thought it would be fun to do with him in general; a final LJ exploit with a treasured friend. Our acquaintance pre-dates LJ, but it was here that it really grew into a friendship. Neither of us are really "here" any more, so I thought it'd be fun to come back and do this with him - a sort of last hurrah for the days of LJ yore.
We kicked around some ideas. At one point, we were considering playing a couple of "detectives" who had to solve the mystery of who was killing all the LJI contestants and riff on the tropes of every cop TV/movie you've ever seen. We ultimately decided it would require far too much work and coordination.
He liked the idea of two ladies engaging in a manufactured drama/feud. Now that the cat is completely out of the bag, I'll leave it to him to describe, in more detail, his vision for it. But this is what crochet_all_day was, a slightly older, far less hipster-y version of his crafty_callie. She wasn't a strong writer, but not a bad one. She could spin a yarn and hit you with an aw shucks ending.
I probably could have (should have?) capitalized on the Night Of The Living Deb notoriety. But as I said above, my heart has not really been in this. Once crafty_callie inadvertently blew her cover, any impetus I had for continuing as Deb vanished.
As you may have deduced by now, I was also dont_be_second, the tandem to lossfound's dont_be_first. This pair was actually my idea, so it's pretty funny that my contribution of the two didn't survive the first week. The general idea was that we take the first two spots in the topic posting "hostage" so that there are consequences for linking your entry first or second. The primary consequence was that the poster would be submitted to criticism, but we planned to do more elaborate things if the idea "caught on". Lossfound went his own direction with the criticism - an attempt to provide some actually constructive thoughts on the work. I went the other direction. I was attempting to create a character in the vein of Taran Killam's critic, Jebidiah Atkinson, from SNL.
Of course, being a written medium, I can't sit before you in a ridiculous costume and make silly faces to drive the joke home. I think a lot of people weren't sure what to make of some fly-by-night puppet account "attacking" another LJI contestant out-of-the-blue, despite the fact that it was so painstakingly ludicrous by design. In retrospect,we should have had DBF/DBS do something more "fun" as a consequence until people understood the premise, and not come out swinging like we did.
So anyway, there's the back story. Thanks for taking the time to read it and good luck to everyone for the remainder of the contest.
Some of you who have been around for a while may remember me, even though I've never played with my "real" LJ account, soopageek.
After watching my wife welfy win the whole shebang in Season 3, I first competed in Season 4 for as srs_bidness; a goofy pseudo-meta project that poked fun at the other competitors and the contest itself. In Season 5, I created gutterlust; a dark character project that amused me on a couple of levels. I asked my pal lossfound to "play" srs_bidness in Season 5.
Back then, the contest was still sort of small, with barely 100 contestants and far more insular. It was probably unnecessary, but my assumption was that people would wonder why I wasn't competing, and start wondering about the newcomers - especially accounts obviously created just for the contest - and who they were. I didn't want anyone to think gutterlust was me, so lossfound ran interference, so that everyone would assume I was just competing as srs_bidness again.
After Season 5, I was done with LJI. I hate all the politics, drama and schmooze that goes along with it. It's a pointless amusement. Not that there's anything wrong with pointless amusements - for I have many of them - but this one doesn't do anything for me.
The funny thing is, my pal continued to compete in subsequent seasons. When this, the final season, rolled around he asked if I wanted to engage him in a tandem puppet project, I figured "why not?" It was the least I could do since he was such a trooper about playing srs_bidness all those years ago. But I also thought it would be fun to do with him in general; a final LJ exploit with a treasured friend. Our acquaintance pre-dates LJ, but it was here that it really grew into a friendship. Neither of us are really "here" any more, so I thought it'd be fun to come back and do this with him - a sort of last hurrah for the days of LJ yore.
We kicked around some ideas. At one point, we were considering playing a couple of "detectives" who had to solve the mystery of who was killing all the LJI contestants and riff on the tropes of every cop TV/movie you've ever seen. We ultimately decided it would require far too much work and coordination.
He liked the idea of two ladies engaging in a manufactured drama/feud. Now that the cat is completely out of the bag, I'll leave it to him to describe, in more detail, his vision for it. But this is what crochet_all_day was, a slightly older, far less hipster-y version of his crafty_callie. She wasn't a strong writer, but not a bad one. She could spin a yarn and hit you with an aw shucks ending.
I probably could have (should have?) capitalized on the Night Of The Living Deb notoriety. But as I said above, my heart has not really been in this. Once crafty_callie inadvertently blew her cover, any impetus I had for continuing as Deb vanished.
As you may have deduced by now, I was also dont_be_second, the tandem to lossfound's dont_be_first. This pair was actually my idea, so it's pretty funny that my contribution of the two didn't survive the first week. The general idea was that we take the first two spots in the topic posting "hostage" so that there are consequences for linking your entry first or second. The primary consequence was that the poster would be submitted to criticism, but we planned to do more elaborate things if the idea "caught on". Lossfound went his own direction with the criticism - an attempt to provide some actually constructive thoughts on the work. I went the other direction. I was attempting to create a character in the vein of Taran Killam's critic, Jebidiah Atkinson, from SNL.
Of course, being a written medium, I can't sit before you in a ridiculous costume and make silly faces to drive the joke home. I think a lot of people weren't sure what to make of some fly-by-night puppet account "attacking" another LJI contestant out-of-the-blue, despite the fact that it was so painstakingly ludicrous by design. In retrospect,we should have had DBF/DBS do something more "fun" as a consequence until people understood the premise, and not come out swinging like we did.
So anyway, there's the back story. Thanks for taking the time to read it and good luck to everyone for the remainder of the contest.