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+ Signups for crackthewip have started! The goal for this event is to finish a work in progress; posting closes June 30. I really like this event, so I'm glad it's running again. I think I will try to finish the rarepair WIP I started a few days ago. Maybe something else too, if I have time. Though I'm at the point where I'm like, "What do I even have in the WIP folder, anyway?" Going to have to, uh, take a look through that mess and see what's what.

+ I made bread for the first time! The recipe I used was Classic White Sandwich Bread by King Arthur Flour. It turned out pretty okay! Not perfect, but like, it's definitely edible bread. Turned out more heavy and dense than my liking, but I am going to assume that's to do with my exceptionally Beginner kneading. The instant yeast came in a package of 3, so I am definitely going to try to make bread 2 more times before deciding whether I enjoy making bread or not. Jury is currently out on that front, but I do feel pretty pleased with myself for actually trying it.

+ The set of Beam Paints watercolours I received the other day is just as nice as I'd hoped it would be! They're very vibrant and pigmented. Because the tin doesn't have a mixing surface, I have to be careful and mix directly on the paper - which is not bad, just a technique that I typically do not use. And just as I expected, the travel brush that came with the set is very, very good - perfect size for the postcard-sized sheets I prefer to work with. I'm so happy I decided to buy it; I mean, yeah, my tubes are nice, but this was a wonderful little treat and the quality is amazing.

+ Livejournal: A reminder to back up your LJ and/or import it to DW if you haven't already. Recent dust-ups in the RU side of LJ have led to speculation about the site's future. There is a thread about it by Rahaeli on Bluesky over here. I think I backed up everything the last time stuff looked shaky, but I'm going to have to check to see if I downloaded fics by my friends who didn't make the import. (I think I did, but where the heck did I save them? Who knows.)

+ I love the start of a new year. It feels so good to put together my annual to-do list and figure out all the new things I want to try, plus the stuff I already enjoy that I want to do more of. Happy 2026!

+ I did a shitload of chores this weekend and I STILL haven't wrapped the Christmas presents. Guess I'll have to figure out some moment to do that in between, well, everything else.

+ Mom brought me a ~chocolate wine~ the other day. Supposedly it's a digestif made up of chocolate and red wine, but it doesn't taste like wine at all. It tastes kind of like chocolate milk mixed with rum or something like that. Very interesting drink; probably not something I'd pick up myself mind you, as it's a little gimmicky (and was probably expensive), but interesting.

+ [Event] beagoldfish is a fandom event taking place from Jan 01 to Feb 28. It's centred around short works - there's a 1k maximum. It sounds fun! I think I might try to whip up a short work for it, or finish off a draft (if I can find something suitable). It's been a while. I like that it's a fest rather than an exchange - I don't have enough fandoms these days to do multifandom exchanges like Candy Hearts, but a fest is definitely something I can participate in.

+ I didn't set a wordcount goal for myself for 2025. On the one hand, I found it much easier to work around my schedule than previous years, which is good. On the other hand, I didn't get much writing done (though I did do some!). I'm wondering what I should do this year... Like, should I set a (low, manageable) wordcount goal, or should I set a goal to finish a handful of specific fics? Hard to say! I'm going to have to take a look at my WIPs before I make any decisions.

+ I really miss Hetalia roleplaying. ;~; I was thinking back on some of the threads I've done over the years, and feeling very nostalgic. Playing Nor was a total blast - but it's also very important that I had some really awesome partners. ;~; Folie, Wald, Chi, Jay... They were all so good at their characters. (And all seem to have dropped out of my orbit and/or fandom in general in some cases, unfortunately). Sometimes I feel like seeking out new people to play with, but the thought of trying is so daunting, I wouldn't even know where to start. Plus, I doubt I'd be able to commit.

+ And also I think in general I miss having random places to braindump Hetalia thoughts. Finding a good fit for me is hard. Probably too nostalgic for the LJ/DW era.

Me, thinking about writing while working out: Haha, what if I wrote something super artsy and pretentious just to take the piss.

Me, still thinking about writing while showering off: But what if you did it earnestly, though? What if.

To be fair, the last few times I did something artsy and pretentious and earnest I was very pleased with the results.

Hmm.

Hmm.

I found myself thinking that I really miss NaNoWriMo. It's not so much a Thing any more for various reasons; a lot of people have tried to cook up replacements, but of course it's not quite the same.

There used to be in-person write-ins here in Fort Mac, and they were pretty fun while they lasted. Bummer that they aren't a thing any more. (Not that I'm going to put the effort into starting that up again.)

:Va I was kind of thinking about making a Writing Goal for November, but I think it might be more achievable to aim for finishing at least one thing, rather than a specific wordcount. We'll see!

Ugh, I feel kind of poorly. I thought my throat was irritated because of all the smoke outside, but now I'm wondering if I'm coming down with something. Apparently there's a bug going around.

I guess I'll have to see how I feel tomorrow.

On the upside, my toe is looking better. It's probably not actually broken, just very bruised. So I'm not going to worry about it.

I also finished working on my IIBB fic. I posted it in a private forward-dated entry on my fic DW, and made a separate entry with the template for the IIBB posting filled out. So, I won't have to do much on Wednesday; I'll just have to change the security setting and so on. Which is good, because Wednesdays are usually pretty busy for me.

I'm still disappointed that I wasn't able to shape that fic into something that I am truly happy with. But it's an okay fic, and it does have some scenes that I do like, so I guess it's fine. Not everything is going to be awesome all the time.

+ Thursday and Friday were very tiring and stressful. I had a very hard time at work. It all got sorted, but... ugh. My coworker bought me ice cream though, which was super nice of her.

+ Planned to go to judo Saturday. Got all the way downtown and into the parking lot when I received a text saying that there wouldn't be Saturday judo for two weeks due to schedule conflicts. Why wasn't this message sent out earlier on the week, like Wednesday or something? To be perfectly honest the club seems really disorganized lately as far as announcements and admin-related stuff goes, I'm not very impressed.

+ Posting for IIBB starts on Friday the 12th. I still really hate this fic. But I don't think I will be able to make it something that I will be happy with, so I'm going to focus on making it something acceptable. A few more line tweaks and it should do okay; I'm not going to crosspost it to Ao3 though, just post it on DW.

+ Went to a pride meetup today. It was kind of meh. Like, not bad, but I think I could have spent my time better if I'd done something else. Then again, this particular meeting only happens once per month.

Man, I have been absolutely flat out lately. Here are some things I've done between the weekend and now:

+ On Saturday, I drove down to Anzac to attend an event. The local pride group was having a ~beach day~ at an outfit that does private lakeside events. It was my first time driving so far - I've never driven outside town, and this place is about 55km away. It's been about 25 years since I was last at Gregoire Lake, and I've never been to Anzac, and I kept thinking I'd get lost (and I did get lost once I actually got to Anzac, but I found the lakeside place eventually!).

+ The beach day itself was nice! The beach wasn't very beach-y, but the weather was good. I'm glad I remembered to bring a towel. I also brought my watercolour paints! And I sat there and painted and chit-chatted with some acquaintances. All in all, it was very nice, and I'm glad that I actually got up the nerve to go, because I'd been kind of 50/50 on it before that.

+ ...Anyway, I feel a lot more confident about my ability to, like, drive outside the city now, even if it was just brief. (And also it gave me some increased appreciation for T-sensei, because he comes all the way from Anzac to teach us, and wtf, that's such a long way to drive, especially in winter.)

+ As for watercolours, doing plein air stuff was fun and I'm so glad that my new palette works well - something with a cover is convenient for that, more portable than what I was using before. I did some works with plain watercolour, and others that also included watercolour pencils and gouache. I think I prefer the ones that include gouache over the plain watercolours - they're more vibrant. Though also I think I have a tendency to dilute too much and work too wet. IDK, I'm going to have to experiment a bit more.

+ On the Sunday I went to a talk about the various transphobic bills that are being implemented by the Alberta government. I took some notes and have some thoughts on it, but I want to make that its own post. Anyway, it was a good talk.

+ Worked a little on my IIBB fic. At this point it's just line editing. There's one separate scene I want to write and possibly post as a DVD extra, but that's unnecessary. Mostly I just reaaaallly want to get the line edits done because that deadline is looming, auuuugh. ...But this fic was written several years ago and I can't read it without thinking "ughhhh". It's pretty decent, but still, ughhhh. (I'm so sick of looking at it.)

+ But speaking of writing, someone recently posted one of the nicest comments I've ever received. It had something about appreciating that I trust the audience to pick up on subtlety. That felt really good.

+ Had my last physio appointment for now. I'm cleared to go back to judo in September. I'm looking forward to starting again, but I'm also going to have to try to take it easy on that arm. ...Honestly, I think last year, I may have been overdoing it. But it isn't so much that I want to do less judo as it is that I want to also have time and energy to do things that are not judo. IDK, going to have to figure out how to balance it better. Three classes per week might be too much for me.

+ Honestly, I've been feeling very flat out all week. It's like every day this week there has been something that needs to be done after work, some kind of chores or favours for other people or appointments or SOMETHING, and I honestly just want to kick back and read a goddamn book. But that will have to wait for a bit. :V Ah, well.

Gonna put these here because otherwise I'll forget, probably.

Re: Fic wip for IIBB -> Setting details

Actual location vague and unnamed. Stand-in location: Stavanger

Night-time details: Very similar to home. Ex: sunset time July 16 is 10:30 ish vs home 10:00 ish; sunset time August 14 10:00 ish vs home 9:26 ish.
Sun graph - Stavanger
Sun graph - Fort McMurray
THEREFORE night scenes won't need much adjusting. Roughly comparable. Probably will need to fix my attempts to "fix" before I realized I should do some research before assuming longer sunlight hours.

Note: Research fjords
also lakes

Sometimes you're puzzling over why the characterization doesn't seem right, and then you realize that it's because you wrote someone having wayyyy more maturity and self-awareness than they should. Hoo boy.

Well, at least now I know how to fix this thing. :V

Speaking of writing, signups for iddyiddybangbang will be opening on July 10! This is a panfandom fest where the goal is to write a fic of at least 5k featuring whatever fulfills your desires/tickles your fancy/brings you joy. You can sign up with a WIP, too, rather than starting something totally new.

I've participated in it a few times before and always found it good fun. The July signup + September deadline + minimum wordcount has done wonders for getting me to tackle ideas longer than my usual and finish things that have languished in my WIP folder for years.

+ Weekend wasn't very restful. Kind of disappointed in that.

+ Managed to get some work done on a fic, though. Not a lot, but it's something. Finished one scene, started another. I've decided to kind of let it go wherever it wants to go. It's for that Prussia/Romania fic I've been poking at for ages. The pairing is growing on me a lot - it's a weird kind of thing, because I don't like Prussia much as a character, but I do think this pairing is interesting, and it's easy for me to see why Ro would like him... maybe Prussia will grow on me. Like mould.

+ I feel like part of the reason I've been having trouble writing, aside from lack of time, is that I'm not excited about anything I'm working on. Like, I write, but I'm just going through the motions. I did kind of have fun working on this thing today, though. I found myself thinking, "Why don't I put this little thing in? I could do it. Sure, why not". So then I put the thing in. The writing isn't amazing, but the scene is cute.

+ Went for a long walk today. Very tired now.

+ It's very hot out.

+ Looked through the personal trainer suggestions that were recommended to me. Not all of them suit me, but one of them seems like a good match. I'm going to contact her. But first I'm going to put together my list of priorities (which I've been meaning to do but keep having trouble finding time for). I think it will be easier to send an email requesting more info if I first have a concrete idea of what I want.

+ Pride month starts next Sunday. I'm looking forward to it.