(no subject)
So I'm stealing this from a few people, kataclysmic, everysingleway and tuveuxmoi_ if I recall correctly. I've gained a bunch of new friends recently and if you were just judging me from my entries at the moment, all you'd learn about me is ... well, I'm not really sure what you'd learn. Other than that I'm very random!
Fandom:
Eek, where to start! The first fandom I was really involved in was Angel. We hadn't had the internet long when Channel 4 over here aired Hero, and I went online to hunt out stuff about Glenn Quinn/Doyle to see if he really died. From there I started reading fic and joining message boards, and I've never looked back! It was somewhere around the middle of season five Buffy and season two Angel in the US when I first got into it, so I had a bit of catching up to do as BBC were only just showing season four of Buffy. It took me such a short time to be completely immersed in the fandom; I remember reading the wildfeed transcript of The Gift, and I loved knowing what was going to happen in advance. I've been a spoiler ho ever since, although I've been toning it down a little lately. It was around this point I started teaching myself HTML; my very first site was a completely crappy geocities one for all different types of fic. Then I got the Keepers Network site for Fred, when we had confirmation she was going to be a season two regular and I'd already decided I liked her a lot. With Wesley. Which is when A Whole New World started. Which is roundabout when I met puppetoflove, and she was my first real online friend. I used to go to boards and see people who had big circles of online friends, and I didn't think I'd ever have that. Then Regina and I bonded over Wes/Fred - I hated her because her site was prettier than mine, she hated me because I had the first W/F site - and then we started to realise how well we got on, really.
Some time after, I was linked to a board called Shippers United from my usual haunting place of the cityofangel.com message boards. This was back in the days when SU was an EZboard and full of pop-ups and forums for individual 'ships. I met somefairytale there; we were both moderators of the original board. Then Princess Twilite paid for shippers-united.com, moved everything over there, and I met so many wonderful people. tonya1980, everysingleway and I started hanging out in all the same threads and it generally felt like I'd known them for absolutely ages.
I've had so many sites since then, most of which I still have. I've got seven domains, and I try to update all of them regularly. I've got one for graphic related sites, one for fanlistings, an Ant & Dec fansite, a Jack & Bobby fansite, a Wes/Fred screencap archive, and one domain for everything that doesn't fit anywhere else.
As far as other fandoms go, after I set myself away with BtVS/AtS, I think I jumped into Alias. I still love the show, but I don't think I would ever really consider myself to be *in* the fandom. Scrubs is my main fandom these days, although I can't manage to write fic for it, I make a lot of icons and just generally have the Scrubs love. I mod the Scrubs board at fanforum.com with jennperry, and have a ridiculously large amount of Scrubs related fanlistings. Not forgetting my treasure-trove-esque memory for obscure Scrubs details!
There are a LOT of other shows I watch, and I collect TV series on DVD. I have Wonderfalls, CSI, The OC, Due South, Friends, Arrested Development, the 4400 as well as the series I've already mentioned (still waiting for my Scrubs season one to arrive, though). I own a lot of British stuff as well (since I am! *g*) - gotta love Alan Partridge, Black Books, Phoenix Nights, etc.
Firefly is also a big love for me. I couldn't lump it in with the "shows I own" section because I love it too darn much. I bought it last summer, and I didn't really like the first few episodes. But because I'd paid for it, I figured I may as well watch it all, and as soon as I got to Shindig, I was so hooked in. I find the characters so loveable and believable, and the future that Joss has created here is just awesome. At first I was captivated by the canon 'ships - Mal/Inara, Simon/Kaylee and Wash/Zoe being my favourites. But now I can whore them around with the best of them, and will read pretty much anything that's not Simon/River. That squicks me just a tad too much.
Fandoms I haven't really gotten into that everyone else has: Lost, Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, Veronica Mars. Lost, I watched the first four episodes and just found myself getting bored. I'll probably give it a go when it finally airs here, but I'm not expecting a lot. I downloaded one of the eps later on in the season and enjoyed it slightly more, but not much. Harry Potter is a different kettle of fish for me. I *love* the books, I have done since Mam bought me the first one (which, for the record, is called Harry Potter and the PHILSOPHER'S stone, not Sorceror) when it was first released; WAY before it was remotely a big thing. I hate the movies, although PoA was better than the first two, I think they just suck completely. Especially a lot of the casting, but thats for another rant. I've never seen Lord of the Rings, and I don't really like the look of any of them, either. My parents have seen all three and agree I probably wouldn't enjoy them. Finally, VM. I took two attempts at watching the first episode and fell asleep both times, so I never bothered downloading any further. All that said, I have no problem with people fangirling over these things! They're just not my cup of tea.
Then there's Queer as Folk. I'm working on it. I've seen eight episodes of the first season and it's growing on me a little, but still, Michael is the only character I can remotely stand to watch! We shall see how that goes...
I go to conventions, too. The first Buffy star I met was James Marsters back in June 2002 (so long ago!), at a signing in Forbidden Planet in Leeds, with a few friends. Then I went to the Caritas event, also in Leeds, because _helygen_ had a spare ticket and I bought it off her. I met Mark Lutz and Andy Hallett at that one ... best double act ever! Almost. I love those guys. Then I went to End of Days in 2003, where the headline guests were Alexis Denisof, J August Richards and Amy Acker, but the other guests made the weekend so excellent, too, like Stephanie Romanov. That weekend I met up with ficbitch82, kika32 and and_only for the first time, as well as meeting larakailyn in Amy Acker's autograph session. And I got to deliver Alexis's pizza for lunch on Saturday! :D I met up with Lara again at the end of August when I won two tickets to the David Boreanaz Event in Brighton, near to where she lives. She gave me a place to stay for the night, and I gave her a ticket! We were glad we hadn't paid, it was a complete shambles, but meeting Nick Brendon, Kelly Donovan and Kristine Sutherland was pretty worth it; and Mark Lutz was there again, as ever on fine form, and causing me to form Groo/Xander shippy feelings.
I met Tony Head and Iyari Limon at Collectormania 4 in October 2003, Juliet Landau in May 2004 at a Forbidden Planet signing. My RL friend quinnykins and I went to see Alyson Hannigan in When Harry Met Sally in March last year, with wes4fred. She was awesome, and such a lovely person when we met her afterwards! I met up with Lara *again* at SFX early June last year, where we were supposed to meet Alexis again, but he cancelled. Greg Grunberg also cancelled, so Billy Boyd (see my earlier thoughts on LotR!) and Chris Barrie were the only guests attending I'd heard of. I managed to fulfil a dream and tell a hobbit I've never seen LotR, though, which was awesome. Dominic Keating was a laugh riot, I loved his guest talks. Definitely glad I still went, even without the guests I knew! Then came Hyperion, the best con of them all (for me). It was a year ago this weekend, and everysingleway flew over from Texas to spend two weeks with me. Then ellie79 and satine79 flew in from Carolina the day the con started to spend a week here - the guests at this con were Amy Acker, Andy Hallett, Julie Benz, Vincent Kartheiser and a bunch more. All adorable people. The weekend was even more special because it was my birthday, and having all my online friends was absolutely awesome.
After Hyperion I went to Collectormania 6 last October, to meet Tom Lenk, Danny Strong, Adam Busch and Nick Brendon. Then there was The White Room, where J August Richards, Christian Kane and Stephanie Romanov were the advertised headline guests, but Nathan Fillion and Morena Baccarin were the real highlight for me, and they were surprise guests on the weekend :D After that, the next con I attended was Serenity at the end of April this year. I stayed with emony and we hung out with niannah and odycee. That was one of my best con experiences; Nathan, Summer, Morena, Jewel, Alan and Ron all made it over, along with Mark Sheppard (Badger) and Chris Buchanan (exec producer and ex-president of Mutant Enemy), who were all so fantastic. Absolutely cannot wait to go to Serenity Squared in November and meet Nathan again! Plus, this time? Sean Maher :D *g*
I'm going to Quor'toth in a couple of weeks time, which is an Angel con with Amy Acker (Amy's doing a photo shoot in full Illyria makeup!) and Andy Hallet (with a bunch of others, Laurel Holloman, Sarah Thompson, Jenny Mollen, etc) as the guests. I'm rooming with larakailyn and wes4fred, and probably going across to Earl's Court on the Sunday for LFACC3 to meet Charisma Carpenter and Adam Baldwin. Then I have Prime in September, which is a Buffy con, and should also be awesome :D
I've seen a rough cut of Serenity. I saw it in February, and it was awesome. I can't wait til the UK gets more screenings and I can see it again!
As for non-TV fangirlishness, I have an unhealthy amount of love for Delta Goodrem. Her music is just wonderful, I love it, and her, and you'll hear a lot of rambling about her! She's an Australian singer/actress, such a strong person, only a few months older than me (she turned 20 in November). She was diagnosed with Hodgkins Lymphoma in July 2003, and fought it. She's now in remission. *hugs to Delta* As well as the Scrubs board at FF, I also mod the Delta board with _over_protected.
Real Life
I'm fiercely loyal to my friends, I love them to bits. I have a circle of close friends around me, and although we're all at University in different cities, we come back home in the holidays and its like we've never been away. We stay in contact while we're away, too.
I've known youngdavid the longest. In fact, we had our tenth anniversary this past February. Contrary to what you might guess from her name, she's not a guy, or called David. She's called Hilary, and why her LJ name is David ... well, it's a long story, and quite a boring in-joke. *g* I met her when we moved from the north east to Yorkshire when I was nine, and we've been friends ever since.
Then there's Jen. I met her when we started secondary school when we were eleven, but I hated her then. I don't even know why, really, I just did. It wasn't until year eleven that a couple of other friendship groups started to split and we started hanging out together more that I really got to know her, and I love her to bits now. She's just ridiculous, and great fun!
I met quinnykins a year or so after that, when she started our school after moving to the area from the south. I hated her at first, too. LMFAO, sensing a pattern here? I lured her into Fandom, and although her chosen area is LotR (and now CSI), I made her a Firefly fangirl and she's coming to Serenity Squared with me in November. Her name is also Rachel, so she gets called by her surname (Quinn) and I get called by mine (Toad...my name's Toaduff, but Toad makes for a better nickname!) to avoid confusion.
alan_beansheaf is another close friend. I love Bry to bits; she came to our school for sixth form, so I've only really known her for four years, but it seems so much longer than that. She fits in to our little gang so well!
Then there's Tim. He's my on/off flirting partner. We dated for a month and a half in year ten (we were fifteen, bless us!) and I've had a crush on him, on and off, ever since. We sometimes almost get it together, but never quite manage it, and then I whinge about it on here. For the record, now is one of the times when I'm NOT crushing on him, lmao.
I'm a Sunderland supporter. I adore football (soccer), and have a season ticket at Sunderland, which means I go to all home games and have priority on tickets for away games. We just got promoted to the Premiership this past season, which is the UK's top league. I'm also at University in Sunderland, something I chose partly because of the football being round the corner, and I'm not ashamed to admit it! I love being able to wander through the city and see the football ground that I normally have to travel two hours to reach, I love the feeling that I'm back at home. I also tend to go to the pub to watch the match when we're playing and the game is being screened on TV, and tend to hang out with Dad's friends that we sit/hang with at the match. Which is good, because they're awesomely funny guys, and always buy me drinks *pets them* You'll hear their names mentioned often, although the season doesn't begin again til August, so you have a month or two repreive from that! The guys I see the most are Andy, Dave, Paul, and Peter, but there'll be others too :)
Speaking of University, I'm studying Film & Media, and I've just finished my second year. Expect bunches of dissertation whinging from September onwards! I live in a house at Uni with three other girls (although apparently a fourth has just moved in!) called Laura, Michelle, and Steph. So they'll be getting fairly regular namechecks, too. When I'm at Uni I have pathetic, expensive dial-up, but we've been trying to get the broadband sorted for six months now. Now I'm at home, I'm spending all my time online! *g*
As for jobs, in the Uni holidays I work in the Travelodge near my house with youngdavid. I got the job through her; she'd worked there for about a year when I started, and I've been there three years now. I used to work there weekends and holidays when I was at school, and our boss kept us on the payroll when we left for Uni, so we can go back and earn money over the holidays, which is awesome. Sometimes it sucks as a job, but more often than not it's a laugh. We get to watch TV while we work if we want, and Hils and I always manage to wangle it so that we have a break just before 2pm to watch Neighbours. *g* As jobs go, in general, it's not the worst we could have, and the money isn't terrible.
So that's me!
I really can't keep anything short.
Fandom:
Eek, where to start! The first fandom I was really involved in was Angel. We hadn't had the internet long when Channel 4 over here aired Hero, and I went online to hunt out stuff about Glenn Quinn/Doyle to see if he really died. From there I started reading fic and joining message boards, and I've never looked back! It was somewhere around the middle of season five Buffy and season two Angel in the US when I first got into it, so I had a bit of catching up to do as BBC were only just showing season four of Buffy. It took me such a short time to be completely immersed in the fandom; I remember reading the wildfeed transcript of The Gift, and I loved knowing what was going to happen in advance. I've been a spoiler ho ever since, although I've been toning it down a little lately. It was around this point I started teaching myself HTML; my very first site was a completely crappy geocities one for all different types of fic. Then I got the Keepers Network site for Fred, when we had confirmation she was going to be a season two regular and I'd already decided I liked her a lot. With Wesley. Which is when A Whole New World started. Which is roundabout when I met puppetoflove, and she was my first real online friend. I used to go to boards and see people who had big circles of online friends, and I didn't think I'd ever have that. Then Regina and I bonded over Wes/Fred - I hated her because her site was prettier than mine, she hated me because I had the first W/F site - and then we started to realise how well we got on, really.
Some time after, I was linked to a board called Shippers United from my usual haunting place of the cityofangel.com message boards. This was back in the days when SU was an EZboard and full of pop-ups and forums for individual 'ships. I met somefairytale there; we were both moderators of the original board. Then Princess Twilite paid for shippers-united.com, moved everything over there, and I met so many wonderful people. tonya1980, everysingleway and I started hanging out in all the same threads and it generally felt like I'd known them for absolutely ages.
I've had so many sites since then, most of which I still have. I've got seven domains, and I try to update all of them regularly. I've got one for graphic related sites, one for fanlistings, an Ant & Dec fansite, a Jack & Bobby fansite, a Wes/Fred screencap archive, and one domain for everything that doesn't fit anywhere else.
As far as other fandoms go, after I set myself away with BtVS/AtS, I think I jumped into Alias. I still love the show, but I don't think I would ever really consider myself to be *in* the fandom. Scrubs is my main fandom these days, although I can't manage to write fic for it, I make a lot of icons and just generally have the Scrubs love. I mod the Scrubs board at fanforum.com with jennperry, and have a ridiculously large amount of Scrubs related fanlistings. Not forgetting my treasure-trove-esque memory for obscure Scrubs details!
There are a LOT of other shows I watch, and I collect TV series on DVD. I have Wonderfalls, CSI, The OC, Due South, Friends, Arrested Development, the 4400 as well as the series I've already mentioned (still waiting for my Scrubs season one to arrive, though). I own a lot of British stuff as well (since I am! *g*) - gotta love Alan Partridge, Black Books, Phoenix Nights, etc.
Firefly is also a big love for me. I couldn't lump it in with the "shows I own" section because I love it too darn much. I bought it last summer, and I didn't really like the first few episodes. But because I'd paid for it, I figured I may as well watch it all, and as soon as I got to Shindig, I was so hooked in. I find the characters so loveable and believable, and the future that Joss has created here is just awesome. At first I was captivated by the canon 'ships - Mal/Inara, Simon/Kaylee and Wash/Zoe being my favourites. But now I can whore them around with the best of them, and will read pretty much anything that's not Simon/River. That squicks me just a tad too much.
Fandoms I haven't really gotten into that everyone else has: Lost, Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, Veronica Mars. Lost, I watched the first four episodes and just found myself getting bored. I'll probably give it a go when it finally airs here, but I'm not expecting a lot. I downloaded one of the eps later on in the season and enjoyed it slightly more, but not much. Harry Potter is a different kettle of fish for me. I *love* the books, I have done since Mam bought me the first one (which, for the record, is called Harry Potter and the PHILSOPHER'S stone, not Sorceror) when it was first released; WAY before it was remotely a big thing. I hate the movies, although PoA was better than the first two, I think they just suck completely. Especially a lot of the casting, but thats for another rant. I've never seen Lord of the Rings, and I don't really like the look of any of them, either. My parents have seen all three and agree I probably wouldn't enjoy them. Finally, VM. I took two attempts at watching the first episode and fell asleep both times, so I never bothered downloading any further. All that said, I have no problem with people fangirling over these things! They're just not my cup of tea.
Then there's Queer as Folk. I'm working on it. I've seen eight episodes of the first season and it's growing on me a little, but still, Michael is the only character I can remotely stand to watch! We shall see how that goes...
I go to conventions, too. The first Buffy star I met was James Marsters back in June 2002 (so long ago!), at a signing in Forbidden Planet in Leeds, with a few friends. Then I went to the Caritas event, also in Leeds, because _helygen_ had a spare ticket and I bought it off her. I met Mark Lutz and Andy Hallett at that one ... best double act ever! Almost. I love those guys. Then I went to End of Days in 2003, where the headline guests were Alexis Denisof, J August Richards and Amy Acker, but the other guests made the weekend so excellent, too, like Stephanie Romanov. That weekend I met up with ficbitch82, kika32 and and_only for the first time, as well as meeting larakailyn in Amy Acker's autograph session. And I got to deliver Alexis's pizza for lunch on Saturday! :D I met up with Lara again at the end of August when I won two tickets to the David Boreanaz Event in Brighton, near to where she lives. She gave me a place to stay for the night, and I gave her a ticket! We were glad we hadn't paid, it was a complete shambles, but meeting Nick Brendon, Kelly Donovan and Kristine Sutherland was pretty worth it; and Mark Lutz was there again, as ever on fine form, and causing me to form Groo/Xander shippy feelings.
I met Tony Head and Iyari Limon at Collectormania 4 in October 2003, Juliet Landau in May 2004 at a Forbidden Planet signing. My RL friend quinnykins and I went to see Alyson Hannigan in When Harry Met Sally in March last year, with wes4fred. She was awesome, and such a lovely person when we met her afterwards! I met up with Lara *again* at SFX early June last year, where we were supposed to meet Alexis again, but he cancelled. Greg Grunberg also cancelled, so Billy Boyd (see my earlier thoughts on LotR!) and Chris Barrie were the only guests attending I'd heard of. I managed to fulfil a dream and tell a hobbit I've never seen LotR, though, which was awesome. Dominic Keating was a laugh riot, I loved his guest talks. Definitely glad I still went, even without the guests I knew! Then came Hyperion, the best con of them all (for me). It was a year ago this weekend, and everysingleway flew over from Texas to spend two weeks with me. Then ellie79 and satine79 flew in from Carolina the day the con started to spend a week here - the guests at this con were Amy Acker, Andy Hallett, Julie Benz, Vincent Kartheiser and a bunch more. All adorable people. The weekend was even more special because it was my birthday, and having all my online friends was absolutely awesome.
After Hyperion I went to Collectormania 6 last October, to meet Tom Lenk, Danny Strong, Adam Busch and Nick Brendon. Then there was The White Room, where J August Richards, Christian Kane and Stephanie Romanov were the advertised headline guests, but Nathan Fillion and Morena Baccarin were the real highlight for me, and they were surprise guests on the weekend :D After that, the next con I attended was Serenity at the end of April this year. I stayed with emony and we hung out with niannah and odycee. That was one of my best con experiences; Nathan, Summer, Morena, Jewel, Alan and Ron all made it over, along with Mark Sheppard (Badger) and Chris Buchanan (exec producer and ex-president of Mutant Enemy), who were all so fantastic. Absolutely cannot wait to go to Serenity Squared in November and meet Nathan again! Plus, this time? Sean Maher :D *g*
I'm going to Quor'toth in a couple of weeks time, which is an Angel con with Amy Acker (Amy's doing a photo shoot in full Illyria makeup!) and Andy Hallet (with a bunch of others, Laurel Holloman, Sarah Thompson, Jenny Mollen, etc) as the guests. I'm rooming with larakailyn and wes4fred, and probably going across to Earl's Court on the Sunday for LFACC3 to meet Charisma Carpenter and Adam Baldwin. Then I have Prime in September, which is a Buffy con, and should also be awesome :D
I've seen a rough cut of Serenity. I saw it in February, and it was awesome. I can't wait til the UK gets more screenings and I can see it again!
As for non-TV fangirlishness, I have an unhealthy amount of love for Delta Goodrem. Her music is just wonderful, I love it, and her, and you'll hear a lot of rambling about her! She's an Australian singer/actress, such a strong person, only a few months older than me (she turned 20 in November). She was diagnosed with Hodgkins Lymphoma in July 2003, and fought it. She's now in remission. *hugs to Delta* As well as the Scrubs board at FF, I also mod the Delta board with _over_protected.
Real Life
I'm fiercely loyal to my friends, I love them to bits. I have a circle of close friends around me, and although we're all at University in different cities, we come back home in the holidays and its like we've never been away. We stay in contact while we're away, too.
I've known youngdavid the longest. In fact, we had our tenth anniversary this past February. Contrary to what you might guess from her name, she's not a guy, or called David. She's called Hilary, and why her LJ name is David ... well, it's a long story, and quite a boring in-joke. *g* I met her when we moved from the north east to Yorkshire when I was nine, and we've been friends ever since.
Then there's Jen. I met her when we started secondary school when we were eleven, but I hated her then. I don't even know why, really, I just did. It wasn't until year eleven that a couple of other friendship groups started to split and we started hanging out together more that I really got to know her, and I love her to bits now. She's just ridiculous, and great fun!
I met quinnykins a year or so after that, when she started our school after moving to the area from the south. I hated her at first, too. LMFAO, sensing a pattern here? I lured her into Fandom, and although her chosen area is LotR (and now CSI), I made her a Firefly fangirl and she's coming to Serenity Squared with me in November. Her name is also Rachel, so she gets called by her surname (Quinn) and I get called by mine (Toad...my name's Toaduff, but Toad makes for a better nickname!) to avoid confusion.
alan_beansheaf is another close friend. I love Bry to bits; she came to our school for sixth form, so I've only really known her for four years, but it seems so much longer than that. She fits in to our little gang so well!
Then there's Tim. He's my on/off flirting partner. We dated for a month and a half in year ten (we were fifteen, bless us!) and I've had a crush on him, on and off, ever since. We sometimes almost get it together, but never quite manage it, and then I whinge about it on here. For the record, now is one of the times when I'm NOT crushing on him, lmao.
I'm a Sunderland supporter. I adore football (soccer), and have a season ticket at Sunderland, which means I go to all home games and have priority on tickets for away games. We just got promoted to the Premiership this past season, which is the UK's top league. I'm also at University in Sunderland, something I chose partly because of the football being round the corner, and I'm not ashamed to admit it! I love being able to wander through the city and see the football ground that I normally have to travel two hours to reach, I love the feeling that I'm back at home. I also tend to go to the pub to watch the match when we're playing and the game is being screened on TV, and tend to hang out with Dad's friends that we sit/hang with at the match. Which is good, because they're awesomely funny guys, and always buy me drinks *pets them* You'll hear their names mentioned often, although the season doesn't begin again til August, so you have a month or two repreive from that! The guys I see the most are Andy, Dave, Paul, and Peter, but there'll be others too :)
Speaking of University, I'm studying Film & Media, and I've just finished my second year. Expect bunches of dissertation whinging from September onwards! I live in a house at Uni with three other girls (although apparently a fourth has just moved in!) called Laura, Michelle, and Steph. So they'll be getting fairly regular namechecks, too. When I'm at Uni I have pathetic, expensive dial-up, but we've been trying to get the broadband sorted for six months now. Now I'm at home, I'm spending all my time online! *g*
As for jobs, in the Uni holidays I work in the Travelodge near my house with youngdavid. I got the job through her; she'd worked there for about a year when I started, and I've been there three years now. I used to work there weekends and holidays when I was at school, and our boss kept us on the payroll when we left for Uni, so we can go back and earn money over the holidays, which is awesome. Sometimes it sucks as a job, but more often than not it's a laugh. We get to watch TV while we work if we want, and Hils and I always manage to wangle it so that we have a break just before 2pm to watch Neighbours. *g* As jobs go, in general, it's not the worst we could have, and the money isn't terrible.
So that's me!
I really can't keep anything short.