Juke Box Dive

Updated 07/14/13

My attempt to be organized! I wish I had started this ten years ago (!) when I started this journal. This is definitely a work in progress and doesn't begin to include even a quarter of the fics and art that I've read/look at and loved. It was just the ones I had at hand at this very moment. I'm working on it :D

( Harry Potter: Remus/Sirius )

( Harry Potter: Other Pairings and Gen )

( Lotrips and The Hobbit )

( Suits: Mike Ross/Harvey Specter )

( Castle )

( Emergency! )

( Other Fandoms )

I took a couple days off of work (in April, a terrible time to take off work), which I’m trying to do throughout the year. I’ve scheduled a couple of days off every six weeks and then I’ll take a full week in July. I never taken time off consistently before, which has been fine in the past, but last year it wasn’t fine anymore. I was really burnt out and the time I did take off, I spent traveling. I like traveling but I feel like I’ve really needed time to just be, too. This weekend, I did some things, like visit our zoo and a bit of shopping and out of lunch a couple of times, but mostly it was for being at home. Doing home stuff. Like my taxes and cleaning out my closet.

Yesterday (Sunday), I sat quietly cross-stitching with no music or tv. Just my thoughts. It’s been a long time since I was just quiet with my thoughts. I’ve had these waves of nostalgia recently, since the weather started to warm up, really. I’m the type of person who thinks about my past a lot, actually, which is not always a good thing. I think it’s just a symptom of my age, maybe? I’ve really been examining my job and thinking about my future, which I suppose has left me open to thoughts about the past as well.

Remember that move Peggy Sue Got Married No? Just me? I started to think about eighth grade, of all things: the classes I took, my bedroom, the town where I lived, what I did on the weekends. I thought about, if I could go back, what five things would I want to remember about now. So weird. I would tell myself to:

01) “Save money and don’t waste it on stuff.” My dad owned a business and would pay me a ridiculous amount to clean on Saturdays. This was the 80s when people would sit around and smoke inside so the glass and mirrors were always grimy. I babysat, too. And got a small allowance. And my grandparents would pay me to clean for them or work in the garden. I had, essentially, a small fortune for the time and my age. I bought stickers. And dimestore books. And music—records and tapes (that really hasn’t changed). And magazines (Tiger Beat, and YM, and 16.) I loved magazines so much. I don’t have any of that stuff anymore. I wish I had saved the money to…I don’t know. Do other stuff. Have a nice bank account back when savings actually earned interest and use to fund the college of my choice instead of the college I could afford.

02) “Focus on learning.” I was a good student, actually, but it came easy to me so I didn’t excel, if that makes sense. In the 9th grade, I really waged a campaign to try to convince my (divorced) parents to send me to a really good Catholic private school in the Ohio city where I grew up. My dad wasn’t willing to pay and my mom opted to move us to the South instead. It was traumatic and I didn’t really try too much after that because no one made me. My grades were still good but I didn’t try for AP courses, I decided I “couldn’t” do math or science, which I eventually majored in during college, and I took the easy road wherever possible—psychology taught by the tennis coach, typing (actually, I’m not sad about that), level one of multiple languages but never the harder classes. I ended up at a local college and then dropping out and then coming back but…I don’t know. Rudderless. I don’t think I would have any different luck convincing my parents to shell out for an expensive private school but I wish I would have tried my best. Learned to study. Spent less time playing Mario Bros and being an overly dramatic harridan (even at 16)(especially at 16).

03) “Like what you like.” Through my teens and 20s I was easily persuaded. I’ve been to NASCAR races and I’ve line danced. I’ve watched horror movies and pretended to be really into hair bands and NIN. Pretended to have School! Spirit! Worked on the yearbook committee. Drank to get drunk. Had sex before I was ready. I didn't like any of those things. I stopped playing guitar, hid the fact that I read a lot and had a large vocabulary. Secretly studied art and read poetry. I wanted to fit in, which…I was a teenager, it’s kinda what they do but that was my 20s, too. It wasn’t until my 30s and the internet came along that I started to just like what I like but even today I find I filter myself. It's the eternal worry: what if someone things I'm weird. (Someone is always going to think I'm weird. It's totally okay.)

04) “Give up caffeine and be a happier person.” Caffeine triggers my anxiety. I’m not allergic but I’m so sensitive to it. I can remember nights lying awake in my bed, heart pounding, trying to convince myself I wasn’t going to die in the night. This was back before you could google that shit and name a panic attack for what it was. I didn’t know until I hit grad school and realized my massive coffees where followed by the crazies. I would drink a two liter of coke and then wonder why everything felt so bad. I still drink too much caffeine (if the correct amount for me is none). I’m slow to catch on that refined sugar does me no favors, either. How awesome would it have been to discover this when I hit puberty and the world was burning to begin with?

05) “Use your body.” Run. Jump. Play. Swim. I wish I had tried out for softball or soccer. That I hadn’t given up track in 12th grade because I had a boyfriend. What sense is that. I wish I had discovered yoga young. Or at least spent more time with my mom’s Jane Fonda workout tapes. Today, I have a small fracture in my right foot. And tennis elbow, when I don’t play tennis. And lumbago and sciatica, because I’m essentially an old woman. I’m wildly out of shape and overweight. It hurts to walk a mile. I'm convinced I'm going to die everything I have to climb a set of steps. I sit competitively.

And then, when I couldn’t take it anymore, I started to think: if it was 2038 and I could come back and tell my current self some things, would they be essentially different than what I wanted to tell my 13 year old self? Nothing’s changed. I am essentially the same person but caught, thankfully, I hope, in a time where I can still change. Top of that list? “Like what you like.” I loved writing in an online journal and I miss my Livejournal like crazy. Can’t go back but I suppose I can move forward. I can at least try.

Currently reading:
Zadie Smith’s Feel Free: Essays
Samantha Irby’s Meaty: Essays
Scott O’Dell’s Island of the Blue Dolphins

Currently listening:
Book tubers. (Reads and Daydreams, Lauren and the Books, All D Books. Actually, so many.)
Neko Case “Hell On”

Currently growing:
cucumbers, carrots, basil, parsley, cherry tomatoes, and lettuce

Currently watching:
The Crown.

Currently drinking:
mango lemonade

This is my "jump starting an old lawn mower" practice. Drabbles! Precisely 100 words (or where is the challenge). Three days in a row is a start, I think. Now let's see if I remember how to post to LJ.

Title: Jump Start Drabbles
Fandom: Multi: Suits, SPN, Lotrips (so far)
Pairing: Mike Ross / Harvey Specter, Castiel / Dean Winchester, bb/dm
Rating: Pretty PG so far
Word Count: 300 (and counting)

( Day 1: Suits: Harvey/Mike )

( Day 2: SPN: Castiel/Dean )

( Day 3: Lotrips: bb/dm )

I went to Washington, D.C. this weekend and had a really lovely time. I mean, seriously, a wonderful time. I purposefully (and successfully) didn't think about work at all, and became all happy and rested and then bubbled up with hope and delight and plans and ideas. After touring about in the morning and mid afternoon, I'd head back to the room after a fairly early dinner (usually with a cupcake in hand) and spend the evening cross stitching in the room's super comfy chair whilst listening to music or reading or reading whilst bathing. I had bought this album by Olafur Arnalds and Alice Sara Ott called “The Chopin Project” and have been listening to it for days and days.

Of course, work has nearly sucked out all the joy.

Still.

There is an Elaine de Kooning exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery, which was the reason I went. She painted my favorite portrait in the place: JFK in greens and yellows and blues and light. I visit it every time I go, and I loved having a chance to see more of her work. I also went to the National Archives, the National Zoo (the suck, honestly (so many school children. Quite possibly all the school children), though I did see one and a quarter pandas before tossing my hands up in defeat and heading toward the exit. Pro tip: if you're going, get off on the Cleveland Park station. The walk is lovely and flat and there's a huge Art Deco style building and it will have you searching for the cost of homes ($210,000 for 400 square feet! I could live in 400 square feet!) The Woodley Park station is torture and hate and fear and loathing (by method of hill).

There was also food, so much food, and by liberal use of Yelp, it was all very good food: The Pita House in Alexandria (which is divine. Laura and I went there for my birthday two years ago and I've been dreaming of it since), Hill County BBQ (near the NPG), Old Ebbit's Grill (near the White House), Paul's Bakery (at the Navy Memorial. I even forgive them for putting olive in my ciabatta roll because the sandwich: mozarella, pesto, tomatoes, and arugula, was so perfect), Los Cuates (fresh, fantastic Mexican in Alexandria). And cupcakes. I might have visited Alexandria Cupcakes three times. It couldn't be helped! (coconut, carrot, lemon, vanilla with raspberry, strawberry, chocolate with mocha icing). The boxes held two! I couldn't just buy one. That would have been unAmerican.

Of course, my favorite part of D.C. is the metro. I stayed in Alexandria at the Hilton near the King Street metro and the Amtrak, which is so incredibly convenient. I could walk to the hotel from the Amtrak station (after a mere ten hour train ride) then take the metro into the city, thus never stepping foot into a D.C. cab, which is always my goal.

anyway. Back now. It was a crazy time to take vacation, especially as I had just been out of the office the week before for a conference. I'm still not caught up. I may never be caught up (especially because I'm anti-working weekends this year). Particularly as my boss and I had a very odd four hour meeting that ended up including a surprise lunch (student appreciation day happened outside her door. totally forgot about that.) It's just been two days and I'm already feeling a bit defeated and my lovely vacation glow of energy and excitement are pretty much tamped down.

For fun today, I delivered a gift that I picked up from the White House Visitor's Center (quite a nice little quasi museum btw, though I was more enamored of the space, the Malcolm Baldrige Great Hall, which had belonged to the patent office and had the most amazing plaster ceiling) to a coworker who has a weird Taft thing. She was very excited that I had found a bookmark that had President Taft in his car. (A serious Taft thing. She managed to rename our "social wellness committee", which she leads, to T.A.F.T ...let me think: Something and Fellowship Tribute committee. They picked the acronym and then made up a name to go with it.)

I ran across an entry by someone who was reminiscing about the beginnings of Livejournal, back when you had to have an invitation to join. Mine was from untappedbeauty back in 2002. I had just discovered slash that summer and began posting stories to a Lotrips yahoo group in August ( this one, actually, which I'm not going to reread because it'll make me want to crawl under a rock). She had the most gorgeous Sean Bean icon. I don't think she's around here much anymore, but then I haven't been either. I keep thinking about how much I miss journaling and then I reminded myself that there was a remedy for that.

Title:  How I Would Paint Happiness
writer: escribo
fandom:  Lotrips
pairing: billy/dom
word count: 1365
notes: Written for msilverstar for his FandomAid bid. I am woefully late, as I was quite positive for many months that I had forgotten not only how to write bb/dm but how to write full stop. My joy in finishing outweighs my need to reread and criticize myself, so no beta. I hope it still fulfills your request!

( Read more... )

Title: Runs in the Family
Author: escribo
Rating: PG-13
Word count: 2533
Summary: It's 1980 and Sybill can see into the future. There's just a small problem of her family curse.

( Read more... )

Hello! It's been a bit. I visit these parts nearly every day and yet have been extremely quiet without meaning to. Nothing exciting is happening here, and I suppose that can be considered a good thing. Spring has definitely arrived, for which I am extremely happy, though my winter here hasn't been nearly as bad as further north. Still, we ended taking five days off this year for the weather, which I don't think has ever happened in the near quarter century that I've lived in the South. I've been making a point to take my lunch outside and really try to pay attention to the flowers and trees as they bloom. It's been quite beautiful though everything now has a haze of pollen. I keep thinking I should bring my camera and take pictures but I'm the worst about that. I'm not even sure where my camera is and I haven't found my cord for it since probably 2007 (I'm exaggerating but not by much).

I started reading actual books this year, too, which I hadn't really done in a long time. I've read more books so far this year than I had all of last year. I'm five books away from having read everything by Kerry Greenwood, she of the Miss Fisher Murder Mysteries. I actually liked her other series better because it was quite different from anything I had read before. I've also been reading a lot of science essays, particularly by David Quammen, who I had never read before, and Neil Degrasse Tyson. Quammen has an interesting style. During work, I've been listening to a ton of Podcasts, mostly about history and science. My favorite has been Radiolab, which I had never heard of before, so I've been gorging though it often leaves me feeling unsettled for a variety of reasons.

I've been cross-stitching a lot this year, too, and teaching myself how to hand embroider, which is something my great grandmother used to do. I'm making a quilt for my sister's birthday, if I manage to get it started within the next couple of weeks. That led to a slight obsession with craft blogs for a few weeks :D which has thankfully mostly abated. Though just as typed that I went wandering over to look at them and spent another hour. Crafts! I'm such a sucker. I also really wish I knew how to crochet or knit, or felt inclined to learn.

For a while there, I fell out of fandom completely--all of them. I was a bit bereft about it, honestly, not fanning anything, and so not writing at all. I'd been reading some Suits fics but there isn't much fandom there, which is sad. And then I read some Remus/Sirius--I still really love them. And then, I decided to go back through some old Lotrips that kiltsandlollies wrote ages ago (literally, in some cases, ten years), particularly inclineoftrees. There is so much from that universe that we never even posted. It sparked a wee revival and I've been reading some bb/dm. I loved them so much and find that I still do (if I steer clear of Dom's twitter account). I mostly liked the characters we created, I suppose, and writing with Laura was such a joy. I'm trying to collect all that now and see what we have and what can be finished and posted. Not that I think anyone will read it anymore but I so want it to be finished. I think I'd have it all printed out just for me into a book so that I have something to read when I'm old(er) and gray(er).

This morning, I roused my mom at an ungodly hour and made her go to the farmers' market with me. Once we got there, there wasn't much going on so I only bought a wee loaf of raisin bread for breakfast tomorrow and then some cookies. We stopped for brunch and shared a western omelet and the oddest bland pancakes. After, we stopped at Belk "just to see" and I ended up buying 8 pair of capris and a new dress that I'm really in love with. The trousers were desperately needed as I only had one pair left from last summer and it's already been in the 80s here this week. The dress wasn't needed at all as I have 14 in my closet. I need tops now but can't find anything cute, all my online shops failing me for the moment, and shoes. Well, I say I need shoes but all I'll really wear until next October is flip flops :D I need more of those. We're home now and I'm planning on doing nothing save reading for the rest of the night.

And there: five paragraphs and you're completely caught up with my life (being that the less said of work the better). My big excitement for the year is that next month, I'm going to meet my most favorite author since I was 18. It's a huge deal for me. I'm really excited (and scared: what if she's an asshole?! It happens sometimes! What if I burst into tears at the sight of her? I didn't with Michael Ondaatje but you never know. What if I completely chicken out and don't go at all? It could also happen. I hope I go.) Not the only thing planned for the year, of course. There will be midsummer celebrations and my birthday and going to Ohio for nearly two weeks and to Florida with already planned Halloween costumes. I'm doing my level best to find small enjoyments every day through out the year so that I don't get as bogged down with work misery as I did last year. One small, round, orange joy is coming my way right now, so I'm going to go scoop him up and give him lovings :D

Last night when I got home from work (a bit later than usual), I looked at my girl cat. She was eating and walking around and wanting brushed, and yet cat mommy intuition told me something was wrong. So I presented my seemingly perfectly normal cat to the staff at the emergency cat clinic (an hour away from my house) and told them that something was wrong, and to find it and fix it. And I'm sure they thought I was nuts but x-ray'd her and ran blood work (all blissfully normal) and did a urinalysis and lo: massive UTI. The nurse asked me how I knew: Sophia wanted to sit on my lap. She never sits on my lap unless someone else is visiting ("my mommy"), she really wants to irritate her brother ("myyyyy mommy" usually accompanied by jumping onto the cat already occupying the lap), or she's sick. With no visitors or brother in sight, I knew she was sick even though her nose was normal and she demanded her bowl before we left the house.

We got home around 3:30 in the morning with a shot of antibiotics and pain meds, $600 lighter, and much relief (even though work is hell. soooooooo sleepy).