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Brrrr, it's cold! -22C this morning... Getting that smack in the face when you're walking to work sure is a way to wake up. But, enough of that.

☆ Fandom Battle! This is an event in Russian fandom over at diary.ru; the SSSS Team has posted information in English about participation in the Winter edition - I of course can't participate directly via writing (alas) because all submissions have to be in Russian, but I can offer permission for others to do fic translation! So hopefully some people on the SSSS team will have a go at my work. :D It would be so exciting if that happened - this is an event that I've always kind of lurked on the corners of, never really able to join because of the language barrier.

☆ Since I'm on the subject, I'd like to remind everyone that anyone is permitted to translate any of my fanfiction at any time, as long as I'm informed of it. :D (And of course I'll want the link to it, so I can include a link to the translation in my author notes!) ...Anyway.

☆ There is a Kickstarter for the first chapter of Tistow; just under two weeks left, and fully-funded. I'm so glad that there will be a print version of this - Elli's art is so gorgeous, and I want to have it on my bookshelf. <3 Only question is, should I order an extra copy to give away? HMM... I can't decide.

☆ How about that Yuletide, eh? ;V Man, I hope you all who are participating are having an easier time than I am... I don't have much written yet, though it's mostly because I haven't really had the necessary peace and quiet for it. And also, admittedly, because my recip has too many good ideas, and it's hard to make a decision about which to write. (I have a lot of half-baked plot notes. So many.) I'm sure that when I finally sit down and work on it, it'll go great. Usually I end up drafting my Yuletide fic in one or two sessions, and I expect this year it will be the same.

☆ Oh man, the cold and dark is making me so lethargic... I end up wanting to go to bed at 8PM. Brrr. (Maybe I should do that, and end up well-rested for once, instead of only getting 5.5 hours of sleep...)

☆ [Life] UGH, IT'S SNOWING. It's snowed every day for the last three days or so. This is terrible. Damnit, Marzanna, couldn't you put off murdering your husband for a couple more weeks? (He had it coming, though.)

☆ [YiH] So, the Year in Hereafter giveaway is happening. Details here, basically the same as all my other giveaways: contact me privately, I'll add you to my spreadsheet, winner will be drawn in two weeks (Oct 26). ...I wonder if I should drop this in the Discord or something, that platform has a PM system, doesn't it? (Will have to see about this)

☆ [SSSS] Hey look, my mate Scout drew some new art of Lalli, and it's gorgeous, as usual. (Worth a look even if you don't follow the series, I'd say; it's really pretty.)

☆ [Books] No ~Reading Wednesday~ this week, since I'm still on It, but I should have that done by the end of the week. It's good! I like it! Yay, Stephen King. Yay, horror. <3 Hmm, now, looking through my reading goals, I've met everything except... "Read 10 books that you already own". Oh. WELL. (Nearly done, I just need to finish four, but pfff). WELL. Uh. I... guess I should tackle some of those that I bought on vacation, shouldn't I... (But library books are so SHINY. Well, I can do both.)

☆ [Movies] 'tis the season for horror. Forgot to mention - at the beginning of October, I watched Ravenous, and that was quite a good one. Creepy, fun, pretty gorey, and doesn't take itself too seriously. Very recommended if you like wendigos and "group of people trapped in a remote area; something horrible happens" narratives! ...Avoid it if you're squicked by cannibalism, though.

WELL. STAND STILL STAY SILENT SURE IS EXCITING LATELY.

( More about that )

So, fics for raremaleslashex were revealed today. I received three (!), which is amazing in itself. But not only that, they're all really amazing. I'm so lucky. <3

I haven't had much time to read everything yet, so for now, I'm just going to rec my gifts here. More might come in another entry later, maybe. (Unless I decide to dump the other recs on twitter, perhaps.)

A Redtail's Dream
*Both of these are Joona/Hannu, and both of them are SSSS Year 0 crossovers. :D

☆ Harbors. 0+, 1.7k; Ville is there too.
It was only by the soft light of the rising moon that Hannu even saw the figure sitting on the porch outside the cabin, holding a crossbow on his knee as he waited for them.
Reccer's notes: Great atmosphere; just the right amount of comfort + apocalyptic grimness.

☆ Surely Some Revelation. 13+, 4.2k.
The Rash Illness has come to Hokanniemi. A contingency plan of Hannu's leads to some unexpected revelations.
Reccer's notes: Lots of nice worldbuildy bits to chew on; builds up the rest of the village in addition to the main couple really well.

Year in Hereafter
*This one is Jaako/Veeti. Both author and I are aware that the scenes will get hella jossed when the rest of chapter 05 drops but la la la I don't miiiind. xD

☆ In Need For Company. 0+, 1.7k
Jaakko struggles with extending a helping hand to the newcomer at Rautiola. In the end, he's glad he did.
Reccer's notes: I asked for hair-washing. I received hair-washing and it is glorious and lovely and everything I could have wished for. xD And I really like the way the author wrote Jaako (I find him really difficult, so I appreciate that they managed so well with him.)

straightforwardly asked for some SSSS recs, and I kind of got carried away. Whups.

I'd like to stress that there are a lot of really good fics that aren't on this list. I mostly just went through my gifts + my bookmarks. Also, I haven't been reading recently, so it's 100% likely that awesome stuff was posted after, ehhh, January or so, and I just didn't see it. I also included some of my own stuff if it fit the requirements, though only what I have posted on Ao3 (as opposed to over at roesslyng, which is... twice the amount).

I tried to list stuff that contained at least one of the following, as requested:
-Prologue stuff
-Main cast gen and/or neat worldbuildy stuff
-Emil/Lalli romance

( Prologue and Post-Prologue era )
( Year 90 cast era )
( Emil/Lalli Shipfic )

☆ I'm looking forward to Camp NaNo. Who else is planning to do it? I realized today that I have just over 14k to go before I hit my year's goal of 50k, and while I don't think I can manage to write that much in a month, I'm going to try.

☆ Found out that I might have the house to myself on Canada Day weekend... I'm crossing my fingers in hope that everything will turn out. It would be nice to just dogsit by myself and not do anything much. I tend to feel a little melancholy on that day, so the less time spent around people, the better.

☆ It was sooo sunny today. Maybe even a little bit too much. I'm melting. x_x I'm glad that it's so bright, but then again, little bit excessive....

☆ Have discovered that I like having breakfast outside in the mornings. Sure, I need to put on bug spray first, otherwise the mosquitoes will totally eat me, but after that... it's fine. Maybe I'll start doing this on weekends. It's nice to have the peace and quiet.

☆ I get so much joy out of seeing people get excited about their OCs in SSSS fandom... I can't put my finger on why, but it just makes me so happy. Not to mention, of course, that when people actually sit down and write these things, it opens up so many worldbuilding possibilities. Fun! (Also, I guess, seeing such enthusiasm in others makes me feel like less of a weirdo.)

Aaaaah, so! Nice things that happened today:

✿ Laufey received the package I sent! And the Icelandic post didn't do anything questionable to it. Hooray! (We've had some difficulty with mail going between Canada and Iceland, so - it has made me a little cautious about sending things other than cards/letters.)

✿ I came home to a parcel full of handmade marshmallows, courtesy of my mate Tesla. What a delight. Some day I'll learn to make them on my own (maybe) but until then... it's always nice when you can trade weird Canadian potato chip flavours in exchange for somebody else making candy for you.

✿ My lavender plant is Not Dead Yet. More specifically, lavender plants. There are four (4!!!) seedlings, and they seem to be growing well! Though, I... think one of them might not be lavender, actually. It looks quite different from the other three. I have no idea what it is. Hopefully it'll survive and grow long enough for me to transfer it to its own container, and then (maybe) find out its identity.

✿ Today's SSSS update is awesome. We finally get to see Ensi Hotakainen get some page time, aaaahh! With dialogue and everything! She seems exactly the way I'd imagined she would be. What a wonderful stern old witch. <3

So. Yes. Today was good, even if I'm utterly exhausted because of the pressure at work due to shutdown season.

I was going to write this evening. Something to go with the Vesa/Suvi ficlet I wrote last night*. I got to thinking about Suvi's reference to those poor sods stuck on night duty when it's so horribly cold, and it seems like a perfect opportunity to do something from Niko's point of view. Yessss, time to make him uncomfortable, excellent. I need to become more accustomed to writing him, anyway; his voice is still tricky for me, and I really want to nail it down before I write anything serious or difficult (and I do have some ideas of that sort).

...Buuuut, that will have to wait for tomorrow, because writing Did Not Happen tonight, as I went for a walk instead. It was a bit cold out, and threatening to rain, but still tolerable. And that's fine. I think I needed it. So, tomorrow. I've already met my Camp NaNo goal, so tomorrow I'll smash it! (Maybe.)

✿ Noms for the nightonficmountain close on April 1st, so if you're thinking about signing up for that one and haven't added anything to the tag set, there's still a bit of time. (NOFM is a multifandom exchange centred on rare/small fandoms, for the record. ...I'm going to request so much obscure stuff, hot damn.)

✿ Camp NaNo starts tomorrow. I'm VERY excited about it. As to whether I'll actually make my wordcount goal... that is questionable. Going to have to get into the habit of writing every day - again. This will be hard. ;V

✿ Random music rec: Í Tokuni by Eivør, a singer from the Faeroe Islands. I stumbled across her music recently, and ahhh she has a pretty cool voice. <3 Her sound is very... I'm not sure what to call it. Ethereal, I suppose one could say. There is also an English version of this song, Into the Mist, which will be released on the English version of her album Slør in late May (the Faroese version was released in 2015). I think I prefer her work in Faroese, and if I end up picking up one of her albums it'll probably be the original version of Slør, though she of course sounds great in English too.

✿ Tumblr user drepedetihjel drew fanart inspired by one of my SSSS poems about Ensi and Veeti (Second Sight) and I can't get over how cool this is. <3 <3 <3 (Note to self, link it in the actual fic post later.)

Nice little things: Date cookies, peppermint tea, and days that look cold outside but are actually surprisingly tolerable.

Considering where to go for my vacation this year. Last year, I'd been thinking about Seattle, because one of my friends lives there, and it'd be nice to visit. But, uh, any trips to the USA are on hold until further notice, for obvious reasons. So, now I don't know. Victoria again? Halifax, maybe? I miss Nova Scotia an absolutely ridiculous amount, but it's such a hideously long flight. :V We'll see. It'll have to be somewhere in Canada, at any rate.

I had thought I wouldn't be able to make my writing goal for the month, but thanks to idleleaves and Synchronised Screaming, I managed to break through it. Feels good! Speaking of which, Synchronised Screaming is a weekly flashfic-a-thon type thing for some fandoms that a bunch of us are into - currently it's SSSS, aRTD, and YOI. Details over here.

I ended up writing two Hannu/Anssi fics for that, which isn't a pairing I would have ever thought of, but somebody prompted it and I was interested. That, combined with the Joona/Anssi prompts that someone put up for PBAM, make me feel like aRTD fandom is telling me to write some Anssi fic. xD Which is fine with me. Poor guy, his sister Riikka gets so much fic written about her, and he has... hardly anything. Well, we'll see what happens. And maybe I'll get some ideas for gen plots, who knows. That would be nice. Right now the only possibility I can think of is some vague slice-of-life stuff. And I suppose there's always the SSSS apocalypse crossover too, but eh.

Oh, I just remembered - for those of you who use ssss, I've posted an idea on the discussion post re: opening up a new disco post. So, please let me know if you have any thoughts on that.

☆ Spent almost the entire day at the library yesterday. Sweet. Good times. It's so cozy in there. Anyway, I picked up Thomas King's The Back of the Turtle, which I've been meaning read for a while. Also found a book on the cultural history of Chinese cuisine, and that looks pretty interesting - hopefully it'll actually be as cool as it looks. Ooh, and they had Paprika, which is a film I've heard good things about but haven't seen yet - probably going to watch that one tonight. Anyway, books were obtained and writing was done. Life is good.

☆ What the heck, I had no idea Bastille released another album this past September... man, I really need to get better at keeping up with bands I like. Haven't been able to go through all of the tracks from Wild World yet, but man, I do like Fake It, it's pretty good. <3

☆ I have three stories that're all drafted out by hand, and I need to type them up, and I really don't want to. Arrrgh! This is one of the worst parts of writing, well, anything. I write best when it's by hand (with a few exceptions) but then there's the whole trouble of... getting it onto the computer. OH WELL, looks like I'll be going to the library again today, in that case. :F For the curious, the fics are my chocobox assignment, and an 18+ aRTD fic (Jonna/Hannu), and a SSSS fic with my OCs from the Kajaani settlement (Vesa/Suvi <3).

☆ SSSS: I've been thinking again about that SSSS fic that I wanted to set in my area - specifically in Fort Chipewyan - and I keep feeling overwhelmed. In some ways the situation in northern Alberta would be a lot different from the canon's Nordic setting, and I keep getting varied ideas about how to account for that. But it's a lot of stuff that I find hard to articulate; partly caught up in how the geography is somewhat similar, but the population distribution is very different, and how would that affect life 90 years after the apocalypse etc. And the technology available in post-Rash Denendeh would be much different from what we see in Finland, I'm sure.... ALSO I keep tripping over things like what to call Beasts and Trolls - an obvious parallel for Trolls would be Wihtikiw, but that is not a Dene legend. There is apparently a Dene concept that is sorrrrt of similar, Wechuge, but it isn't really the same thing. I'll probably try reading a little bit more before I settle on the fussy issue of vocabulary - I mean, it would make sense to go with the Dene word, but the problem is that I haven't tripped over it in any reliable sources for that yet. So... to the library, then. :V Again. (Oh no, how terrible, how will I survive, haha <3 )

☆ YOI: There is a White Day Exchange; I just heard about it today. Minimum for fic is 700, which is doable (I had to ask the mod on twitter about it - the minimum wasn't written in the profile/faq - hopefully they fix that). Today is the last day of nominations, so I threw in a few pairs... I'm waffling on whether to sign up for it, but at least I have a week or so to decide. Could be fun! Or, eh, maybe I'll just treat. Who knows!

☆ YOI rec: A Hundred Flowers in Bloom by Chiharu. Leo/Guang Hong, M, 9k. Summary: The 2022 Beijing Olympics open on the fourth day of Chinese New Years with twelve lines of lion dancers forming into a dragon. This year, Guanghong only has three resolutions: to not drop the flag on international television, to win Olympic gold for China, and to fall out of love with Leo. | YOU GUYS, oh my god. I love this fic so much. It's lovingly-crafted, you can really tell that the author put a lot of heart into it, both into the story as a story and also into giving everything the right "feel". I just - pining, and skating a program about unrequited love, and then the ending...! So lovely. There's only one thing I'm not crazy about, and it's Phichit's characterization - but I can't put my finger on why, exactly. That's such a small thing, though, and it doesn't distract from how awesome the rest of the story is.