Sunday morning blues
I'm still fuzzy-headed, but sort of doing a minor freak-out over just how much I need to get done today. I have a mild headache, my knee went out and in the TMI category, I have cramps. Some Sumatra Mandahling should help with the headache and I just took a couple of Naproxin, which should help everything else. Hopefully I'll be functional soon. Meanwhile I'm going to bitch. I bitch, therefore I am. Yay.
I brought a loaner laptop home with me so I could work on one of my larger month-end tasks. I lost 3 days working on a data problem, so I'm behind schedule. Every damn month I vow to begin work on the Spreadsheet-from-Hell earlier and practically every month something comes up and I can't. Because of reasons I won't explore at this juncture, I can't really work on it at home anymore. Essentially, it's gotten so big and complex my home computer would have a meltdown.
Things were going swimmingly yesterday. I was re-watching The Quest P2 and while the laptop was a bit slow, I was making progress. Then it asked me to attach the power cord. Uh... I don't have it. I looked everywhere in the laptop bag. No power cord. In the meantime the computer shut down. Shit. I brought some other stuff home to work on, but basically I went into a pout and couldn't get into anything else. Not even fic. I hate when I'm like that. I think I used to be better about being able to switch gears.
All this is a round about way of saying I'm going to have to go into the office today to work on that bloody thing. Actually it's two bloody things and while the first one is almost done, I haven't even started the second. There's one for each half of the month.
I should have been coding yesterday afternoon. I'm not horribly behind on it, but we want to get just as much in before close and they can't key it if I haven't coded it. I can do that at home, so that might be how I spend the evening.
Balancing out my frustration is my joy with SG-1. I was pretty unspoiled for it despite having downloaded this ep months ago. But I only watched through the dragon thing and then gave up. It was really too dark to see much and I wanted the full experience. Really, was there any doubt they'd get by the dragon? So it didn't feel very spoilery for me. Now I'm really glad I didn't watch any further. The full experience was definately worth waiting for.
I've sort of been surprised at the Daniel/Vala squee because it didn't feel very shippy to me. NOT that it wasn't nice. It was very nice and somehow the writers got something very right about it. Personally, I'd been having a bit of a negative knee-jerk reaction to what felt a little like the Daniel and Vala Show. I don't hate the pairing, but I dislike when the show slants too much toward one set of characters to what feels like the detriment of the others. I also enjoy Daniel/Sam, be it simply friendship or more and it felt like that dynamic was being pushed aside for Daniel/Vala. Even the Teal'c/Daniel friendship seemed to suffer for it. So basically why I couldn't find much to squee about in the whole Daniel/Vala dynamic.
Here it's more balanced and if Daniel/Vala shippers found stuff to squee about, that's great. It felt to me like all the relationships were honored here, both old and new. Vala and Cam feel less like the new kids and more integral to the team. Fandom seems to be split on the Vala/Cam moment where he calls her on her worry for Daniel, but I adored it. Cam's also very obviously worried sick about what's going on with Daniel, but he pushes his personal feelings aside for the greater good. Hence why he's a little tough on Vala.
Sam just totally rocked the house. surrealphantast mentioned that she thinks there's something subtlely different about the character and I tend to agree, though it wasn't as obvious to me. I think it's something that's sort of been evolving through this season. Let me theorize for just a moment with all apologies to Jack fans.
I think some of Sam's evolution is a direct consequence of Jack's absence. NOT that Jack was 'bad' for her in any way, but... part of her couldn't evolve in his shadow. And this sort of relates to real life. No matter how you see the Jack/Sam dynamic, he was a very strong influence on her. Her respect for him, possibly complicated by her personal feelings, made it hard for her to break out of an established set of behaviors. The roles that had been set early on in the team dynamic aren't easy to break out of. On whatever level you choose, despite being a strong independant woman in her personal life, Sam sought Jack's approval. His positive regard was important to her. It doesn't matter if it was because of her professional respect for him or for more personal reasons - the result is the same. Sam is sort of trapped in her role and established behaviors. Even when he rose to SGC command and was no longer going on missions with them, she remained in that subordinate role.
I can even make a case for her somewhat uneven... performance in Season 9. She was still trying to work things out for herself. It's hard to lose that influence, whether she was pushing against it or leaning on it. Let's face it, Jack's a larger than life person. I think even Daniel had a little trouble coping with the changing team dynamics. Teal'c was less affected because, well, he's Teal'c. He was probably the closest to Jack's equal, so therefore relied on Jack the least of all of them.
Add in Cam and Vala and everyone was flailing around a bit. Where does everyone fit? What is my role now? Daniel was especially irritable because in addition to trying to find his professional feet in the new team, now also had this incredibly attractive woman who kept stealing his focus with her antics. She demanded his attention. As much as I liked seeing Daniel off-balance, it became annoying for me too. But it served its purpose and we've moved on from that now.
Bringing it back to Sam, I think she's got her legs now. She was understandably stung when she didn't get command of SG-1, but you have to remember that she had already transferred to Area 51 when Cam was brought on board. No one anticipated that he'd 'get the band back together'. Logically she understands that it's impractical for the military to revoke his command to give it to her, but it still hurts. A more petty, selfish person would not have re-joined SG-1 at all, since presumably Sam had some kind of command of her own at Area 51.
Sam has finally moved out from behind Jack's shadow. Cam's more than willing to let her shine in her own right - he's a much more fluid commander than Jack was. Cam knows that he'll get more out of them if he lets them be who they are rather than trying to shove them into defined roles. They all job-share now. Daniel can handle himself in a firefight or pilot a spaceship in a pinch, Sam and Teal'c can translate some simple Ancient. Sam can be a negotiator. She can also punch a former Goa'uld system lord in the face and make it count ;)
Since I'm all about subtext, I adored Teal'c in that scene. I can almost see him thinking, "Pissing off Col. Carter is NOT a good idea" as Ba'al goads her. She turns the other cheek the first time and I think Teal'c admires her restraint. But even more telling, when she does punch Ba'al, Teal'c doesn't move a muscle. He just stands there, relaxed, a little satisfied smile on his face. He doesn't tense up or prepare to move to Sam's defense. He knows he doesn't *need* to. He knows that Sam can more than take care of herself and I think that's a massive show of respect for her.
So yes. Sam's lost some of that... I don't know how to put it. She doesn't censor herself anymore. She doesn't look away, embarassed, from Cam with no pants. She *watches* him dress, unabashedly appraising his legs, and teases him about it later. I think she feels herself attracted to him on some level, but she's not apologizing to anyone about it, least of all herself. She's not making any excuses. Of course, he's not her superior either. In fact, in everything but rank, she's superior to him and they both know it. It makes her feel powerful in all the ways that matter. As a woman. As an officer. As a team member. She feels more effective and confident. Not to mention that I think Cam grooves on it. He respects the hell out of her, but doesn't put her on a pedestal. Her power and confidence is a big turn on for him. Hell, I think it's a turn on for both of them because they're very well matched. Cam's moved beyond being a fawning fanboy. He's a powerful, confident man in his own right with a healthy respect for others.
Er... I didn't really mean to do a whole meta thing on SG-1, but hey, it's all good. But I've got to get a move on and get to work. Bleh.
I brought a loaner laptop home with me so I could work on one of my larger month-end tasks. I lost 3 days working on a data problem, so I'm behind schedule. Every damn month I vow to begin work on the Spreadsheet-from-Hell earlier and practically every month something comes up and I can't. Because of reasons I won't explore at this juncture, I can't really work on it at home anymore. Essentially, it's gotten so big and complex my home computer would have a meltdown.
Things were going swimmingly yesterday. I was re-watching The Quest P2 and while the laptop was a bit slow, I was making progress. Then it asked me to attach the power cord. Uh... I don't have it. I looked everywhere in the laptop bag. No power cord. In the meantime the computer shut down. Shit. I brought some other stuff home to work on, but basically I went into a pout and couldn't get into anything else. Not even fic. I hate when I'm like that. I think I used to be better about being able to switch gears.
All this is a round about way of saying I'm going to have to go into the office today to work on that bloody thing. Actually it's two bloody things and while the first one is almost done, I haven't even started the second. There's one for each half of the month.
I should have been coding yesterday afternoon. I'm not horribly behind on it, but we want to get just as much in before close and they can't key it if I haven't coded it. I can do that at home, so that might be how I spend the evening.
Balancing out my frustration is my joy with SG-1. I was pretty unspoiled for it despite having downloaded this ep months ago. But I only watched through the dragon thing and then gave up. It was really too dark to see much and I wanted the full experience. Really, was there any doubt they'd get by the dragon? So it didn't feel very spoilery for me. Now I'm really glad I didn't watch any further. The full experience was definately worth waiting for.
I've sort of been surprised at the Daniel/Vala squee because it didn't feel very shippy to me. NOT that it wasn't nice. It was very nice and somehow the writers got something very right about it. Personally, I'd been having a bit of a negative knee-jerk reaction to what felt a little like the Daniel and Vala Show. I don't hate the pairing, but I dislike when the show slants too much toward one set of characters to what feels like the detriment of the others. I also enjoy Daniel/Sam, be it simply friendship or more and it felt like that dynamic was being pushed aside for Daniel/Vala. Even the Teal'c/Daniel friendship seemed to suffer for it. So basically why I couldn't find much to squee about in the whole Daniel/Vala dynamic.
Here it's more balanced and if Daniel/Vala shippers found stuff to squee about, that's great. It felt to me like all the relationships were honored here, both old and new. Vala and Cam feel less like the new kids and more integral to the team. Fandom seems to be split on the Vala/Cam moment where he calls her on her worry for Daniel, but I adored it. Cam's also very obviously worried sick about what's going on with Daniel, but he pushes his personal feelings aside for the greater good. Hence why he's a little tough on Vala.
Sam just totally rocked the house. surrealphantast mentioned that she thinks there's something subtlely different about the character and I tend to agree, though it wasn't as obvious to me. I think it's something that's sort of been evolving through this season. Let me theorize for just a moment with all apologies to Jack fans.
I think some of Sam's evolution is a direct consequence of Jack's absence. NOT that Jack was 'bad' for her in any way, but... part of her couldn't evolve in his shadow. And this sort of relates to real life. No matter how you see the Jack/Sam dynamic, he was a very strong influence on her. Her respect for him, possibly complicated by her personal feelings, made it hard for her to break out of an established set of behaviors. The roles that had been set early on in the team dynamic aren't easy to break out of. On whatever level you choose, despite being a strong independant woman in her personal life, Sam sought Jack's approval. His positive regard was important to her. It doesn't matter if it was because of her professional respect for him or for more personal reasons - the result is the same. Sam is sort of trapped in her role and established behaviors. Even when he rose to SGC command and was no longer going on missions with them, she remained in that subordinate role.
I can even make a case for her somewhat uneven... performance in Season 9. She was still trying to work things out for herself. It's hard to lose that influence, whether she was pushing against it or leaning on it. Let's face it, Jack's a larger than life person. I think even Daniel had a little trouble coping with the changing team dynamics. Teal'c was less affected because, well, he's Teal'c. He was probably the closest to Jack's equal, so therefore relied on Jack the least of all of them.
Add in Cam and Vala and everyone was flailing around a bit. Where does everyone fit? What is my role now? Daniel was especially irritable because in addition to trying to find his professional feet in the new team, now also had this incredibly attractive woman who kept stealing his focus with her antics. She demanded his attention. As much as I liked seeing Daniel off-balance, it became annoying for me too. But it served its purpose and we've moved on from that now.
Bringing it back to Sam, I think she's got her legs now. She was understandably stung when she didn't get command of SG-1, but you have to remember that she had already transferred to Area 51 when Cam was brought on board. No one anticipated that he'd 'get the band back together'. Logically she understands that it's impractical for the military to revoke his command to give it to her, but it still hurts. A more petty, selfish person would not have re-joined SG-1 at all, since presumably Sam had some kind of command of her own at Area 51.
Sam has finally moved out from behind Jack's shadow. Cam's more than willing to let her shine in her own right - he's a much more fluid commander than Jack was. Cam knows that he'll get more out of them if he lets them be who they are rather than trying to shove them into defined roles. They all job-share now. Daniel can handle himself in a firefight or pilot a spaceship in a pinch, Sam and Teal'c can translate some simple Ancient. Sam can be a negotiator. She can also punch a former Goa'uld system lord in the face and make it count ;)
Since I'm all about subtext, I adored Teal'c in that scene. I can almost see him thinking, "Pissing off Col. Carter is NOT a good idea" as Ba'al goads her. She turns the other cheek the first time and I think Teal'c admires her restraint. But even more telling, when she does punch Ba'al, Teal'c doesn't move a muscle. He just stands there, relaxed, a little satisfied smile on his face. He doesn't tense up or prepare to move to Sam's defense. He knows he doesn't *need* to. He knows that Sam can more than take care of herself and I think that's a massive show of respect for her.
So yes. Sam's lost some of that... I don't know how to put it. She doesn't censor herself anymore. She doesn't look away, embarassed, from Cam with no pants. She *watches* him dress, unabashedly appraising his legs, and teases him about it later. I think she feels herself attracted to him on some level, but she's not apologizing to anyone about it, least of all herself. She's not making any excuses. Of course, he's not her superior either. In fact, in everything but rank, she's superior to him and they both know it. It makes her feel powerful in all the ways that matter. As a woman. As an officer. As a team member. She feels more effective and confident. Not to mention that I think Cam grooves on it. He respects the hell out of her, but doesn't put her on a pedestal. Her power and confidence is a big turn on for him. Hell, I think it's a turn on for both of them because they're very well matched. Cam's moved beyond being a fawning fanboy. He's a powerful, confident man in his own right with a healthy respect for others.
Er... I didn't really mean to do a whole meta thing on SG-1, but hey, it's all good. But I've got to get a move on and get to work. Bleh.