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Today is one of those days where I look at my to-do list and go "nope".

To be fair, none of it is stuff that can't wait until tomorrow. But most of it involves replying to people - roleplay tags I need to send, a reply email to my Norwegian studying partner, etc - and I feel bad leaving it go for a while.

... But not badly enough to get to it right away. It can wait.

I'm at a point in the Kittens Civ Game where I can't get anywhere without titanium and science upgrades. So, right now I'm just poking around and maximizing resources and optimizing trade and things. I can't decide what I want to do next. You need Chemistry in order to get the calciner upgrade to produce your own titanium rather than trading for it, but you can't get Chemistry until you discover Physics. And I'm not quite there yet.

... Ah, well. Might as well create more buildings in the meantime. And save up for trade ships. (Fucking trade ships, man. I am constantly building scaffolds. WHY DO THEY REQUIRE SO MANY SCAFFOLDS sob)

I had a more intelligent entry planned, but I've forgotten what it was going to be.

☆ Signups for nordipalooza are open! ... Well, I opened them last night, a few hours early. I figured that I might as well do it now, rather than fiddle with it in the morning. This is the fourth year that I'm running this fest, and I'm excited.

☆ Prompts for historyfest are closed now. I think I'm going to try to fill one of my own prompts, but I also want to fill someone else's. Haven't found one that I can do yet, but I'm not finished poking through everything. Something might turn up. I really hope that there will be a lot of responses to the prompts here, because practically everything sounds good to me, and I want to read all of it. :D

☆ I've become completely addicted to this Kitten Civilization Game. Fortunately, I've reached a place where my resources are pretty balanced and I can leave it alone without needing to check it obsessively. My kittens have now invented philosophy. ;p I guess I should warn, though, that this game is a major time waster. It's delightful, but - might as well be up front about it.

☆ I've finished reading Good Omens! There was a lot more going on in it than I remembered. I barely remembered most of the stuff near the end, except for the part with the flaming Bentley, so it was a bit of a surprise. Like reading it for the first time. Good stuff. Not sure if I ship Aziraphale/Crowley the way that I did the first time I read it... mostly what I want now is just for them to be together, doing their thing. Just like in the book. (And yeah, I want to read fic. Maybe when I'm feeling not-lazy, I'll look.) Next... I don't know. I dug out The Colour of Magic and tried to read it, but found myself getting misty-eyed, so - I might need to find something else. Or read a non-Pratchett novel first. But I'll give it another try, first.

☆ Though, since I'm thinking about the subject, if anybody has a favourite Good Omens fic that they'd like to rec, that would be cool. I'm mainly interested in reading about Aziraphale & Crowley, The Horsemen (especially War and Death), Anathema, and Agnes Nutter. And also Pepper, or stuff about Them in general where Pepper plays a large part in it.

☆ The Weather Network informs me that we're sitting at -16C due to windchill. I am annoyed. Equinox was yesterday. It's supposed to be spring, and I want to wear my warm-weather clothes. What we're having right now is just... Winter with less snow and more ice. That's all this is. But, I'll still go out and head down to the cafe to read, because if I don't then I won't get any writing done, and that would be terrible.

☆ I have three packages in the mail on their way to me, and none of them are close to arriving yet, and it's driving me nuts. ALAS.

I finished a fic! And I'm very happy about it!

'Course, I still need to tweak it and proof it and fiddle with it a little, and decide on a title too, but the main thing is that it's finished. This thing has been in my WIP folder since late 2013, and I'm going to be so glad to be done with it.

It wasn't a Hetalia fic, either. The fandom was Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds; that Link & Ravio friendship fic that I posted an excerpt from a few months ago. It's so rare for me to write anything outside of Hetalia fandom... man, I'm so glad that I'm finished it.

With all the excitement about the Majora's Mask re-release, I guess that's what kicked me into gear to get it done, even if they're completely separate games.

Some of my friends have already received their copies of MM - mine's still in the mail. That's fine, though. Honestly, I haven't even managed to play the 3ds Ocarina of Time yet, and I do want to go through that one before tackling MM. That's the thing about me and games - I'm so horrible about actually setting aside time to play them.

Anyway! This thing should be done... soon. And then perhaps I'll get around to gaming. Maybe. (Probably not.)

I was going to be productive tonight, but I decided not to bother. Today was a very long day and I needed to relax a little instead of worrying about writing fic and whatever else.

So, I played some Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney. I've had this game for quite a while but I'm only just now working through the last case. Going to be perfectly honest here - it's an okay game, and I'm glad that I understand some of the inside jokes that fly around fandom about the series, but it's not one that I'm going to be replaying. And I probably won't be playing the other games in the series either, unless I can find them used and for a good price.

I'm actually rather disappointed - I was hoping that I would latch onto it, because a lot of my friends like it. And one of my favourite authors has written for the fandom, I think? Though it's hard to be sure, and I don't even know how I would find their stuff, since they're always anonymous (... It's a long story). But yeah, probably won't be seeking out anything for this. Oh, well.

Speaking of games, I replayed some of the later chapter seconds in Valiant Hearts today. I'm trying to 100% it, but some parts of it are hard. Like that one part where Anna needs to save Karl again without making any mistakes and it's like - okay, I'm crap enough at rhythm games as it is, but it's even harder when there's a guy screaming in agony in the background as you do it. :'D

To say nothing of the actual end of the game. Yeah, I cried. Again. I thought I could get though it but nnnnope. Managed to get some useful caps for the VH wiki, though. And photosets, perhaps. And icons. And.... Well, anyway. I technically shouldn't think of that stuff right now because I have so much to do but we'll see.

I found out today that there's going to be a 3DS remake of Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask! I am so excited about this! I know that the fans have wanted it for ages. As for me... I actually can't remember if I ever finished playing the N64 version. It's possible that I found it too difficult at the time (I'm terrible at playing games, always have been). But it's a really interesting game, and I am totally looking forward to buying it. Amazon gives the release date as late June 2015, which is shortly before my birthday. Perfect.

Of course, I haven't played the 3DS of Ocarina of Time yet, and I should probably do that before the MM release. And I should... finish the other 3DS games I have on the go. If not Pokemon X, then at least Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney. I've been stalled on that one for ages. I was hoping to fall in love with it, because some of my friends really enjoy that series, but while it's an okay "playing on the transit" distraction, I just... don't love it. I'm not sure why. I don't get that spark from it in the same way that I do with some (but not all) of the LoZ games. And VH as of late. Oh, well, at least now I get some of the references and jokes.

For a while there, I was kind of stalled out on LoZ. I think it's because, while A Link Between Worlds wowed me and reminded me of everything that I love about Legend of Zelda, the game I played directly after that was Phantom Hourglass, which just... didn't give me what I was looking for. It wasn't the visuals - I saw a lot of people complaining about that aspect of the Wind Waker/Phantom Hourglass/Spirit Tracks set of games, but that didn't bother me. I think the issue was that there were so many alterations to the setting that in the end it didn't feel quite like the Hyrule I was familiar with, so it fell flat for me. Even though I own Spirit Tracks, I haven't even taken it out of the packaging yet. But maybe I'll get around to that eventually.

Though one thing in Phantom Hourglass's favour - it did give me Linebeck. I can't help but love that guy. I think I just have a thing for greedy but secretly kind characters. He grows on you like mold.

Anyway. Definitely looking forward to the Majora's Mask re-release, though it will be a while before it happens. And maybe me getting a refreshed interest in LoZ will be enough for me to get my ass in gear and finish that ALBW fic that I started earlier this year.

So, I played more Valiant Hearts. Now I've passed the end of Chapter 3. Haven't started Chapter 4 yet though.

( Spoilery flailing )

Ahhh ahhh I really want to play more, but since there's only one chapter left I'm going to try to draw it out. And then re-play like, all the levels, so that I can 100% it. But yeah.

Sob. I want to like, make icons and stuff, but I'm not about to go searching for screencaps and stuff because I don't want to spoil myself. And I could use screencaps that I took myself but they're all on the other computer and I'm too lazy to transfer them, woe is me.

I've put a little more time into Valiant Hearts. Holy shit, I love this game so much.

( Flailing, probably spoilery in a minor way )

If I'm not careful, I might eventually get fic ideas for this game, and then it's all downhill from there. (WHY do I keep getting interested in stuff that doesn't have fandoms?!)

I haven't really been up to much lately. Well, I mean, I've been doing stuff, but nothing too exciting. But that's fine.

Been discussing my travel plans for this autumn... from the sound of it, it'll be BeNeLux in early September. It's just a matter of figuring out where we (well, myself and my travel partner) want to go, specifically. Aside from the capitals, of course. I'll be there for longer than they will, since I get more vacation time, so I'll be able to wander a bit on my own as well.

It looks like the quickest and least expensive way to get to Europe is by going through Iceland, so I'm probably going to end up sending a day or two in Reykjavík in addition to the rest. Getting to meet up with Kainoliero will be pretty awesome. :D Sooo going to also have to put looking up things to do there on my to-do list... I just hope she won't mind how quiet I am.

Still another week before Nordipalooza signups open. I'm excited! We have about 1/2 of the prompts prepped already (I wanted to have 30 done ahead of time, because it means we're doing less work during the signups). Really not sure what the turnout will be this year... but I hope it'll go okay.

Other than that, nothing much going on! ... I haven't made it very far in Pokemon X. I'm just past the 1st gym. I'm so lazy (and spend most of my time grinding it when I do play it, oops)

Last time I updated, it was "I think that I'm coming down with a cold". Lo and behold, I did come down with a cold, and it knocked me out for about a week. After that, I had some scheduled time off to use some leftover vacation hours from last year that I didn't know I had. Spent that time (and the week) agonizing over an exchange fic. And now here I am.

That exchange fic didn't turn out as well as I'd hoped. Even though I love Netherlands/Norway, I still haven't written a good fic with them, not something with any actual length to it or any kind of development or anything. I'd originally hoped to do that here, but I ran out of time... If I hadn't been knocked flat out by that cold, I might have been able to manage it because I'd had a pretty decent idea in the beginning, but it just didn't happen.

Anyway. Finally finished playing Phantom Hourglass. Going to start on Phoenix Wright next! I'm really interested in seeing what all the fuss is about. Most of the people who recommended it to me have similar tastes to mine, so I think I'll enjoy it. As for LoZ - well, I didn't 100% Phantom Hourglass. Not even close. After a while, I got kind of frustrated with it, because there were lots of fiddly little things that I had to do in order to complete all the subquests and upgrades, and eventually I was so ready to be done with the game that I just went ahead and finished it. This is quite different to my feelings about A Link Between Worlds... I definitely preferred ALBW to PH. Though Phantom Hourglass does have some good points. (Mainly, Linebeck. I love that grumpy greedyguts to pieces!)

... Other than that, nothing's going on with me. I've been spending so much time flailing over that exchange thing that I haven't been able to do any other writing. And to be honest, I don't know how much would get done even if I weren't. I'm kind of poking half-heartedly at the stuff in my WIP folder. None of it inspires me right now. But it's possible that I'm just sick of looking at it. Especially that big long thing I was working on - then again, I've been taking a break from it, so I can't possibly still be sick of it, right? Maybe I should look at it again.

I received a huge package of doujinshi yesterday. Bought it from a friend who'd been downsizing her collection. I'm really satisfied with what I have here; it's a nice little package. Still need to go through everything to get a look at what, exactly, I have. Probably the best one is a nice little historical Den/Sve - I was surprised she had it, actually, as she doesn't really like that pairing. Regardless, going to need to update the photos in my collection index... but I am lazy, and also le tired.

Aside from that, not much is going on. Started up some new roleplay threads, which is nice. There's a great plot-oriented one that I've been working on for a couple of weeks now with a friend who plays Germany, and then I started up one with a buddy who plays Belgium. We used to thread together all the time, so it's nice to be doing something together again. (And it reminded me of how much I like that pairing... I should write something with it eventually.)

☆ So, I've started watching Mushishi! Only been through one episode so far, but I think it's safe to say that I'll be watching the rest. It's just so... atmospheric and pretty! Think I'll try to go through this one slowly... it doesn't seem like the kind of series I'd want to marathon. Maybe after I'm finished it, I'll read the manga, but we'll have to see.

☆ Started reading a book about medieval Venice a while ago. Nearly finished it now. The main thing that I'm taking away from this is that I know very little about medieval Italy, and even less about the Ottoman Empire, and it also reminded me that I've wanted to read a bit about Romanian history, and a bunch of other things like that. I know very little about the Mediterranean after ancient Greece and Rome, and I really should fix that. Eventually. After I go through the massive stack of books on Scandinavia that I haven't read yet.

☆ Started playing Phantom Hourglass because I was getting a little bored with A Link Between Worlds. Not that ALBW is a dull game, but well, doing two runs so close together, when it's fresh in my mind like that - it's hard to keep my attention. I was partly doing the replay as a refresher for Ravio's characterization for that fic I'm writing, but then I realized that I can get all of his text-dialogue and cut scenes from the internet... so. As for Phantom Hourglass, holy crap, the controls are so weird. Or maybe it's standard, I don't know -- It just feels really weird to play using a stylus rather than buttons! I'm so glad that there is an option for left-handed play; I have no idea how I'd be able to play it at all if I had to try to go through this thing right-handed.

☆ I've been feeling kind of vaguely grumpy in a really vague way for the last week or so, and I'm really annoyed at myself. Like, I want to be social, but at the same time everything under the sun annoys me! I think the problem might be that I'm sick of winter and this frustration is manifesting in other ways. But, it's hard to tell. Regardless of what it is, I hope it fixes itself soon. :T