i've already got friday on my mind
So yesterday afternoon at around 2:30 I went to the new independent coffee shop up the block. It is staffed by hipster dudes in wool watch caps and is owned by the same people who own this dog rehab place. Those of you now writing a barista!Jensen and dog therapist!Jared AU may now thank me.
Anyway, I ordered an iced latte and it was very tasty, and it kept me up until nearly 4 am last night. The last time I looked at the clock, it was 3:40 am, and I could still feel that slightly heart-racy thing going on before I fell asleep. I woke up with my alarm at 7:30 am with no real trouble. I'm sure I will be paying for that at about 3 pm this afternoon.
What did I do with that extra time? Well, I did a lot of fiddling with a preliminary remix participant spreadsheet, so I could get a very tentative idea of what fandoms need more people in either direction. And then I apparently didn't save it. because I am a moron. An overcaffeinated, common sense deprived moron. I could have sworn I was saving it along the way, but it is possible that I'm still not used to using the command key (why not just put it where the ctrl key is on a PC? ALL MY TROUBLES WOULD BE SOLVED.) and I was just putting esses in random cells of the spreadsheet. Oops?
So you know, that was about three hours' work lost. Yay? Hopefully I'll have that info tonight, and all y'all can pimp Remix out to your fandoms. You should be doing that anyway, you know.
On the upside, I spent an earlier three hours trying to get my old laptop to boot, and indeed, it did so with the aid of my father's Windows XP CD and some directions helpfully provided by
inalasahl.
There's still something not right with the old thing, but it finally booted - first into safe mode and then regularly - and allowed me to copy most of my files onto the external hard drive. (It wouldn't copy some of my purchased iTunes music, which is irritating. The stuff I ripped from CDs or downloaded from you guys worked fine. The stuff I actually paid for in that format, not so much. Fucking technology.)
Since "The Good Wife" was a repeat last night (which, wtf, CBS?), I rewatched Home 1&2 (possibly my favorite episodes of the series, along with The Hand of God), Final Cut (I wish they'd had D'Anna spar with Kara - come on! Xena and Starbuck throwing down, even in a training match? THE AWESOME CANNOT BE TEXTUALLY RENDERED!), and Flight of the Phoenix (I always tear up when they christen the blackbird).
I realize it's almost a cliche, but wow, the music on BSG is beautiful. Sometimes it's overly manipulative, and sometimes it sounds too much like the Adamas are frolicking in the Shire, but mostly it just works, in a way that both makes me notice how beautiful it is and also how fitting it is to the action. Which is what a good score should do, I guess. It's not something I generally pay a lot of attention to, unless I really like or dislike it. I'm more prone to notice actual songs used than the scores of things, which probably has to do with my preference for music that has lyrics.
Speaking of things that go into making good television,
hradzka linked to David Mamet's letter to the writers of The Unit, and I think there's some really valuable advice in there: ANY SCENE, THUS, WHICH DOES NOT BOTH ADVANCE THE PLOT, AND STANDALONE (THAT IS, DRAMATICALLY, BY ITSELF, ON ITS OWN MERITS) IS EITHER SUPERFLUOUS, OR INCORRECTLY WRITTEN. [...] LOOK AT THE *SCENE* AND ASK YOURSELF “IS IT DRAMATIC? IS IT *ESSENTIAL*? DOES IT ADVANCE THE PLOT?
ANSWER TRUTHFULLY.
IF THE ANSWER IS "NO" WRITE IT AGAIN OR THROW IT OUT. (ASSCAPS are his)
hradzka also has a really interesting post on Why AUs don't work for him, with
thefourthvine holding forth on why they do work for so many people - it's an interesting look at just how many different things people come to fandom and fanfic for, and how they get (or don't get) what they need out of it.
Because I like some AUs and really don't get others. The only non-magical HP AU I ever really liked, I think, was Marauder Rhombus, and that's because it's basically MWPP as a fucked up punk band touring in a van. WHAT'S NOT TO LIKE? Otoh, one of the better stories I wrote back in my XMM days was a non-mutant-powered Elseworlds noir with Logan as the in-over-his-head PI. And the longest thing I've ever written was an always-a-girl!AU. Otoh, I really don't like AUs where Sam and Dean grow up 'normal' and still have an incestuous relationship. It tells me something about the characters all right, but it's not something I generally believe or am interested in, so I don't have the buy-in necessary to make a story like that work for me.
Much like crossovers, AUs of any sort - always-a-girl, gladiator detectives, Jenny Calendar doesn't die, Dean really is Dean Smith, Director of Marketing (canon AU!), whatever - require buy-in right from the start. I do think they can shed light on characters and their relationships, but as with so many things, it all depends on how it's done, and how much it aligns with my own views of the characters, relationships, and canon.
***
This entry at DW: http://musesfool.dreamwidth.org/146809.html.
people have commented there.
Anyway, I ordered an iced latte and it was very tasty, and it kept me up until nearly 4 am last night. The last time I looked at the clock, it was 3:40 am, and I could still feel that slightly heart-racy thing going on before I fell asleep. I woke up with my alarm at 7:30 am with no real trouble. I'm sure I will be paying for that at about 3 pm this afternoon.
What did I do with that extra time? Well, I did a lot of fiddling with a preliminary remix participant spreadsheet, so I could get a very tentative idea of what fandoms need more people in either direction. And then I apparently didn't save it. because I am a moron. An overcaffeinated, common sense deprived moron. I could have sworn I was saving it along the way, but it is possible that I'm still not used to using the command key (why not just put it where the ctrl key is on a PC? ALL MY TROUBLES WOULD BE SOLVED.) and I was just putting esses in random cells of the spreadsheet. Oops?
So you know, that was about three hours' work lost. Yay? Hopefully I'll have that info tonight, and all y'all can pimp Remix out to your fandoms. You should be doing that anyway, you know.
On the upside, I spent an earlier three hours trying to get my old laptop to boot, and indeed, it did so with the aid of my father's Windows XP CD and some directions helpfully provided by
inalasahl.
There's still something not right with the old thing, but it finally booted - first into safe mode and then regularly - and allowed me to copy most of my files onto the external hard drive. (It wouldn't copy some of my purchased iTunes music, which is irritating. The stuff I ripped from CDs or downloaded from you guys worked fine. The stuff I actually paid for in that format, not so much. Fucking technology.)
Since "The Good Wife" was a repeat last night (which, wtf, CBS?), I rewatched Home 1&2 (possibly my favorite episodes of the series, along with The Hand of God), Final Cut (I wish they'd had D'Anna spar with Kara - come on! Xena and Starbuck throwing down, even in a training match? THE AWESOME CANNOT BE TEXTUALLY RENDERED!), and Flight of the Phoenix (I always tear up when they christen the blackbird).
I realize it's almost a cliche, but wow, the music on BSG is beautiful. Sometimes it's overly manipulative, and sometimes it sounds too much like the Adamas are frolicking in the Shire, but mostly it just works, in a way that both makes me notice how beautiful it is and also how fitting it is to the action. Which is what a good score should do, I guess. It's not something I generally pay a lot of attention to, unless I really like or dislike it. I'm more prone to notice actual songs used than the scores of things, which probably has to do with my preference for music that has lyrics.
Speaking of things that go into making good television,
hradzka linked to David Mamet's letter to the writers of The Unit, and I think there's some really valuable advice in there: ANY SCENE, THUS, WHICH DOES NOT BOTH ADVANCE THE PLOT, AND STANDALONE (THAT IS, DRAMATICALLY, BY ITSELF, ON ITS OWN MERITS) IS EITHER SUPERFLUOUS, OR INCORRECTLY WRITTEN. [...] LOOK AT THE *SCENE* AND ASK YOURSELF “IS IT DRAMATIC? IS IT *ESSENTIAL*? DOES IT ADVANCE THE PLOT?
ANSWER TRUTHFULLY.
IF THE ANSWER IS "NO" WRITE IT AGAIN OR THROW IT OUT. (ASSCAPS are his)
hradzka also has a really interesting post on Why AUs don't work for him, with
thefourthvine holding forth on why they do work for so many people - it's an interesting look at just how many different things people come to fandom and fanfic for, and how they get (or don't get) what they need out of it.
Because I like some AUs and really don't get others. The only non-magical HP AU I ever really liked, I think, was Marauder Rhombus, and that's because it's basically MWPP as a fucked up punk band touring in a van. WHAT'S NOT TO LIKE? Otoh, one of the better stories I wrote back in my XMM days was a non-mutant-powered Elseworlds noir with Logan as the in-over-his-head PI. And the longest thing I've ever written was an always-a-girl!AU. Otoh, I really don't like AUs where Sam and Dean grow up 'normal' and still have an incestuous relationship. It tells me something about the characters all right, but it's not something I generally believe or am interested in, so I don't have the buy-in necessary to make a story like that work for me.
Much like crossovers, AUs of any sort - always-a-girl, gladiator detectives, Jenny Calendar doesn't die, Dean really is Dean Smith, Director of Marketing (canon AU!), whatever - require buy-in right from the start. I do think they can shed light on characters and their relationships, but as with so many things, it all depends on how it's done, and how much it aligns with my own views of the characters, relationships, and canon.
***
This entry at DW: http://musesfool.dreamwidth.org/146809.html.
people have commented there.