This is a really interesting article: That's Not a Real Game: Videogames, Gender, and the Popular Imagination. (Though it is long and white text on black background, so my vision is swimming a bit.)

Not really the point of the article, but made me think about my relationship to video games growing up. I have been a fan of video games ever since I can remember. First it was arcade games (played mostly at Shakey's or other pizza parlors), but then my dad bought me an old Atari 2600 at a garage sale when I was seven. I got an NES in high school, and started subscribing to Nintendo Power, then Electronic Gaming Monthly and others (I think at one time I was subscribing to three or four mags and bought a couple others in the store whenever I could). I've played just about every sort of game over the years and at one time had a collection of video game systems that included every major system and a lot of minor ones. Now I only have a Wii, a DS, and a PS2 (oh, and an SNES in a drawer). The games I play most often are Peggle and Mahjong and stuff on the PC, because I just don't have the time to devote to gaming like I used to. But I still think of myself as a gamer and it's still one of my favorite hobbies.

I can see now how they're marketed to guys (with things like Barbie and virtual babyfactory or whatever as special girl games), but I never really thought of them as a boys' thing growing up. No one ever told me that I shouldn't be interested in them, and I played video games a lot with Erin a lot. (I can also remember times when I thought I was playing video games "with" other girl friends, but looking back, I can see I was just playing them at their houses (on systems that belonged to their brothers) and not actually interacting with the friends themselves. But at the time, I did not have the necessary social skills to perceive that difference.) Looking back now, in high school, the friends I really connected with over video games were guys, but at the time, I never made the connection that gaming was considered a guy thing.

1. A while ago I tried to do the 100 pushups thing, but found that because it was every other day, not every day, I had trouble remembering to do it. So I gave up and then later thought maybe I'd try to do a similar thing but daily, and I ended up dropping that, too, because it's just a pain to have to get down on the ground and do pushups. I can't do them on my toes anymore, because I get a painful twinge in my foot when I do. But we have hardwood floors, so in order to do them on my knees, I have to get a pillow or something and it's just...a pain. I can't be bothered.

But then Bruce suggested wall pushups (or push-offs, I guess), so I started doing those. I don't think it's quite as much of a workout as pushing up from the floor, but I can definitely still feel it.

It's much easier to do, though, because I can pretty much do a set every time I get up from my desk to get a glass of water or go to the bathroom or whatever. I'm much more likely to do that than to get down on the floor for pushups.

So I have been doing 30-40 per set, trying for at least a hundred a day, for the last week or so. Now I'm up to 30-50 per set. I think I did 80 or 90 already today, so I'll probably do another couple reps.

2. I made chocolate chip cookies with dark chocolate M&Ms last night. I really wanted to make them with peanut butter M&Ms, but the store didn't have them. Boo. We're going to a BBQ later today with Alexander, so that's what the cookies are for. They turned out really good.

3. This is cute.

So I was poking about on queerlygen earlier, as one does when one is procrastinating writing one's remix (I do have an opening sentence, though!), and I thought I'd look back through my own fics and see what I had written that might qualify. My own definition of gen excludes non-canon pairings, so I don't have too many by that definition, but if I were to broaden the definiton to be stories about other than sex/romance/relationships, whether or not the people in them are in a non-canon relationship, I would have quite a few more.

Rest Stop (I Knew You When Remix)
Supernatural. No pairing. Dean is ftm. Sam and Dean do Sam and Dean type stuff like hunting and patching each other up after a hunt and having awkward conversations about things.

Morning Sunlight
Hikaru no Go. Hikaru/Akira. Hikaru thinks about Sai one morning while lying in bed with Akira.

Team Q
Harry Potter. Dean/Seamus. Dean and Seamus try to figure out what to do with their lives after leaving school and hit upon the idea of creating a queer superhero comic together.

Out of a Picture Book
Harry Potter. Dumbledore/Grindlewald. Just a little snapshot of Albus and Gellert and Ariana.

No Rules for This
Digimon. Daisuke/Ken. This is a little more relationship-focused than the others, but mostly it's about being a gay teen and trying to navigate things like Valentine's Day when the rules don't apply to you.

Our House
RPF. Jason Isaacs/Liam Neeson/Carrie-Anne Moss. Ficlets about parenting in a poly relationship.

Learning as You Go
RPF. Jude Law/Ewan McGregor. Ficlets about two guys raising a son together. Also includes one fic about having to explain to your kid that sometimes sex involves things that leave bruises, and that's okay. (I'm particularly fond of that one.)

I also have some Vampire Chronicles fics where Louis and Lestat are gay for each other while Lestat is obsessed with iPods or Dance Dance Revolution, while they receive odd souvenirs from Lestat's mother, and when Lestat accidentally kills David by reading Merrick to him and he and Louis set off on a cross-country trip to catch Anne Rice before any more innocent lives fall victim to the book's powers, in a parody of Chuck Palahniuk's Lullaby.

I know it's considered a huge faux paus to say so in fandom, but I really think my writing is pretty awesome, and when I read over old stuff like this, I'm always impressed. Randomly, here are some other fics I read and thought were awesome while going through my old fics tonight.

Holidays
RPF. Jude Law/Ewan McGregor. Jude and Ewan meet as kids on holiday and then again later as adults.

Drawing his knees up, Jude wraps his arms around them. He wants to ask this boy why he hates school, and if it's because the other boys beat him up and call him queer and poof and Judy. Well, they wouldn't call him Judy, but they might call him some other girl's name.

Elijah flips the switch and leans back against the wall, breathes deep, eyes closed so he can't see himself disappear. The one time he'd looked, he'd ended up collapsed on the floor in a puddle of his own vomit, his hand and arm transparent in a way flesh and bone definitely shouldn't be. The technician on duty had fixed him up, no problem, but it's not something Elijah can easily forget. That doesn't stop him from using the machine, though. He just makes sure he closes his eyes when he gets in. He can still feel it, though, and sometimes that's enough to make him sick, leave him feeling nauseated on arrival.

She read Alma Jr. a story; Snow White was her favorite now and Alma'd been reading it every night for near on two weeks. Her voice didn't break and she didn't say don't you wait for your prince, 'cause he ain't comin', or other things a four-year-old wouldn't understand.

It's not til a few days later that he finally picks it up, muttering Reparo under his breath. He stuffs his wand back in his pocket and slides the photo out of its frame. It doesn't want to tear at first, but once he gets it started it rips straight down between Sirius and James. James is too busy making eyes at Lily to notice anything wrong, but Sirius looks startled for a moment before Remus crumples him up and tosses the scrap into the bin.

He puts the photo back in its frame and sets it on the bedside table. The Remus in the picture keeps laughing at Peter's joke, but his eyes are focused on the ragged edge where Sirius used to be.

Title: Honey and Clover vols. 1-4 (out of 10)
Author: Umino Chica
My Rating: 2/5

This is a ladies slice-of-life manga about college students at an art school. I wanted to like this series, since it seems to be pretty popular, but I just...didn't. It's cute, but I wish it would decide if it wants to be a cute college slice of life thing or if it wants to be wacky crack, because I don't like the combination of the two. Also, the story is not keeping my interest for this many volumes. I had really meant to try and read the full series since it's only ten volumes, but I tried to read volume five and I was just bored and finally thought, Why am I forcing myself to read this just so I can say I read the whole thing? So I gave up on it.

I also was weirded out by the fetishisation of Hagumi's childlikeness, both in terms of her looks/size and her personality. Not only does it make it kind of icky for guys to be in love with her, but I'm just kind of over that obsession with female innocence/purity. It's not special and attractive. It's just kind of icky.

One Big Bang and a couple others. All recs! Amazing.

As I Descend the Stair by busaikko 4/5 Recommended
5900 words. Life, as it flashes before the eyes: "I don't know how to be what anybody expects --" and Sam's hand draws a sharp head-to-toe line -- "but I was halfway to figuring out how to be me."
( Finally an SPN transfic that's not about Dean! )

Dead Soldiers: An Oral History of the End Times by fryadvocate 5/5 Recommended
43,400 words. Although much has been written about the sociological and theological importance of the "End Times War", there has been much less written about the individuals directly involved. Using interviews with primary sources, this paper seeks to examine how Dean and Sam Winchester, two criminals with a history of violence and petty theft, became commonly known as a prophet of the Lord and the Anti-Christ.
( How could you not want to read it with that summary? In a word: awesome. )

Accidents Will Happen by holli 4/5 Recommended
6400 words. Some Goth teenagers accidentally resurrect John Winchester. No, seriously.
( Hilarious. )

So apparently not so much with that going to bed early thing. I felt wide awake as soon as I lay down. Boo.

Anyway, when I got back up and checked my flist, I saw that my Teyla/Rodney fic, Right Where I Want You is up for discussion on sga_talk.

1. Got my Vamps ticket in the mail today! :D

2. This morning Bruce woke up fairly early, around 6.30, and I was still up and it was nice and overcast outside, so he suggested we walk to the doughnut place. It's over a two-mile walk, so I figure if you're going to get a doughnut that's the best way to do it. The sun was starting to get blinding by the time we got home (we have to walk towards the sun homewards), but it was a really nice walk. We then took another two-mile walk in the evening when I woke up. :D

3. Someone scanned Bleach really early this week, so I actually got that done last night, and they got me Naruto and Bakuman right away (-ish) and so I was done with my Weekly Jump stuff before 11! They've been really late getting me scans lately, so this was really nice. I am taking this opportunity to go to bed "early" (it's not even 4 yet!).

4. This was amusing.

queerlygen sounds like it could be interesting. It came about because of a discussion about how het is often lumped with gen in a way that reads as rather homophobic. I really haven't come across that much myself, but that's probably just because I don't really hang out in het- or gen-exclusive areas. Anyway, so this fest is for gen fics about queer characters (either canonically queer or not). It seems like it could end up with a lot of Very Special Episode stories like lgbtfest does, but hopefully there will be some good stuff, too.

In other more-enraging news, the discussion on Questioning Transphobia about the Pam's House Blend fail is up to nearly 400 comments. O_o And still the fail is strong with the PHB folks, including Pam herself. A bunch of the recent entries here are about it, too.

1. I signed up for a beginning yoga class with Bruce at SMC for the fall semester. It's $66, but I think that's a pretty decent price considering it's 18 weeks, 2 days a week, plus I get a student ID which means I don't have to pay bus fare for the whole semester. By comparison, the college also offers community classes that don't require you to actually enroll for the school, and the beginning yoga class there was $79 for only six sessions, and Bruce and I both would have had to pay that price (whereas with this class, it will be covered under his financial aid, so only I'll be paying).

2. I bought new shoes last night. I hate that I had to buy a new pair so soon, but I made a bad choice with the last ones. They are really cute, but they are not good for walking at all. I have constant pain in my right big toe and the ball of my foot from them. So I got some Adidas trainers and wow, the difference is amazing. My feet don't hurt at all in them. They were only $40 (got them at a shoe warehouse place), so I don't feel too bad, as they will likely last for many years. I'll just wear the other ones when I know I'm not going to be walking much.

3. Bruce's desk chair broke a wheel and so he's been having to use his backup chair, which is also broken and just generally in worse shape. We have been dithering over what to do, because the chair with the broken wheel is really nice and still in great condition otherwise. Staples sells replacement wheels online, but they're like $50, which is kind of ridiculous. So finally we decided to take a wheel off the replacement chair and see if that would work. It did! So we took the other wheels off to save for backup in case this chair breaks another one. Now we don't have a chair for the living room desk, but if Bruce wants to use it, he can just wheel his chair out there.

4. I don't think I mentioned this site before, but it's my new favorite blog.

5. This is hilarious. Be sure to hover over the red dot for a bonus comic, referencing yesterday's xkcd.

1. Had a nice walk down to Barnes & Noble last night to use the gift card I got for my birthday. Just over four miles round trip. We had dinner at Fat Burger and I got one of their delicious banana shakes.

Unfortunately, because BookMooch was down, I hadn't been able to make a list of books I wanted, so I just kind of wandered around looking at the shelves and wasn't really seeing anything. There are a lot of books I want, but I don't know that I want any of them enough to pay $15-25. But I have the gift card, so I have to use it... D: I ended up buying Ian McEwan's The Child in Time, which is one I've had on my wishlist for a while and never seen any copies of. That was $15, so I still have $10 left on the card. Will go back again once BookMooch is working and I can get an idea of what I might want to look for.

2. Here's some stuff I liked today:

The US Finishes "A Strong Second" in Iraq (the Onion)

Lego arcade games (check out other videos by the same person for more awesomeness)

Today's xkcd

I really want this!

1. We got two nice walks yesterday. One about three miles and the other about a mile and a half.

2. This is hands-down the best fandom secret ever. (Except maybe that one with emo Jensen.)

3. I got some writing done last night. Really not much at all, but it felt good to get back to the story.

4. Speaking of writing, team_war won the drabble contest, so that means our deadline for mcshep_match is two days later, August 21st. Yay! I have a good idea of what I'm doing. I just need to concentrate on remix first (which is, of course, not what I was writing last night).

5. I finally cut my hair this morning. It looks pretty much like in my icon now. (Set the clippers to 3.) It had been annoying me for a while, especially on the back of my neck, but I was just too lazy to do anything about it.

This is an interesting article about a thirteen-year-old boy who used a walkman for a week instead of his iPod. He didn't realise at first that tapes had a second side! D: But while it's tempting to laugh at him for being stupid...why would he automatically know that? If he has been exposed to tapes at all, it's probably been VHS tapes...which have only one side. But really, at thirteen, he has probably only been exposed to DVDs, CDs, and intangible media.

*

This is a good post about sizeism, springing from discussion of a fic written for spn_j2_bigbang. I saw the story when it was first posted and the summary was enough to make me want to stay far, far away. It was about Jensen being really fat and being sent to a fat camp sort of place, where he meets Jared, a trainer, and loses weight and falls in love. Oh yeah, and he's a thirty-year-old virgin. And he's in really bad health. And the reason he's fat is because he stuffs his face all day and is lazy and never exercises.

Yeah...that sounds awesome. But of course it was a huge hit.

The idea that fat people would be thin if only they exercised and didn't eat so much is so pervasive, but it's just not true. Skinny people are not necessarily skinny because they don't eat much, or because they eat healthy food, or because they exercise all the time. Sure, some do those things. So do fat people.

I have been fat almost all my life. I have also been very active most of my life. When I was a kid, I rode my bike everywhere. When I was in high school I played sports (and still rode my bike all the time). When I was in college I walked a lot and rode my bike (UCLA is built on a mountain; going to school there will guarantee you a lot of exercise). Through it all, I was in great shape, but was still fat, and not just a little fat, but "obese". The only time I have not got a lot of exercise is the ten years or so that Bruce and I had a car. You know what happened then? I got out of shape. Being out of shape is not the same as being fat. Being in shape is not the same as being thin.

Now that we don't have a car anymore and are walking a lot again (we are now walking an average of three miles a day, and the better shape we get in, the longer our walks are getting), guess what? I am in so much better shape. I have also this past year or so made it a goal to eat healthier, and have been keeping to it really well. I have never eaten a lot. When we have family meals, I am always the one who eats the least, less than both fat and thin relatives. I only eat when I'm hungry, not for "comfort eating" or because I'm bored. I drink water almost exclusively.

Despite all this, while Bruce has lost about thirty pounds, I've lost maybe five or six. I exercise a lot and eat well, but am still over a hundred pounds overweight.

Of course I would love to be thin. I would love to just weigh less than I do now, even if I never got actually thin or "normal" weight. But I am not going to go on a diet, because diets are the worst thing for you.

And I resent the idea that I should starve myself because if I only ate less I wouldn't be fat! Eating healthy food isn't enough. Eating only enough to fill my stomach and stop it from hurting isn't enough. I'm really not fit to even eat at all. That's the message that it sends when people say all you have to do to lose weight is eat less.

*

But enough ranting. Now for some of those interview meme questions.

From helens78:

( click! )

From mikotokun:

( click! )

And from bell:

( click! )

1. Saturday was the Santa Monica fireworks show. They always have it the Saturday before 4th of July. It's over at the college, which means we have a perfect view right from our backyard, so we went out to watch the show and I have to say, it was probably the best I've ever seen. They had several new types, new colors, and they had ones that were higher and bigger than I'd ever seen before. We didn't take any pictures, but I wish we had. It was really great.

2. Yesterday Yash was having a reunion BBQ over at our house for people we went to school with (she was planning it, but we were hosting because we have a grill). It started out as something for people we went to elementary school with, but when she sent out the invite, she invited people we went to elementary school and high school with, which...I was not really down with, because those two groups do not overlap except for me and Yash and one other person. But as it turned out, only people from our high school said they could come.

I was still kind of dreading it, because I don't really have anything in common with these people and what do you really say to people you haven't seen in fifteen years? (I have them friended on facebook and I don't know what to say there, either. I only friended them because I'm nosy and want to see what people are up to!) So it was making me stressed out to think about it, but as it turned out, only two people showed up, one of whom, Mimi, was actually a fairly good friend I haven't seen in several years, so we talked a lot and that was pretty fun. I'm glad it was a lot more lowkey than I was expecting.

The one annoying thing was that when Yash's two- and four-year-old were outside playing, they kicked some tomatoes off our plants. :( At least the plants seem to be doing really well otherwise. I even saw a couple tomatoes I hadn't noticed before, plus a lot of new blossoms.

hey
hi megchan! takuyachan here ,a request.can u trnslate mysong in romaji 4me? coz i wan2 per4m it

*

Hi,

Please tell me the artist name.

*

No no i hv written the song n want u 2 help me trnslate it

*

hey i hv written the song
i want u 2 help me translatin da song i've written ....well wat's ur cell no

*

Sorry, I can't do that.

*

but why?
but i promised my frenz ...that i'll get it trnslated 4m sum1 .canU atleast tellme where i can find

Title: Darling no Ataman Naka
Author: Oguri Saori
Rating: 5/5

This is the third in the Darling wa Gaikokujin series (though I haven't got my hands on the second one yet) and unlike the first one, which focused more on the differences between Japanese and foreigners, this one is more about language and linguistics and the differences between Japanese and English. Lots of interesting stuff.

Just posted the last of my recs for lgbtq_recs. Links to the previous batch can be found here if you missed them.

Author: Jackie Kay
Author: Sarah Schulman
Book: Hallucinating Foucault by Patricia Duncker
Comic: Just So You Know by Joey Allison Sayers
Music Video: Sing Me Spanish Techno by The New Pornographers
Movie: Kinky Boots
Movie: Love My Life

kakeochi_umai, I think you would really like Love My Life.

I think I may have had the best birthday ever yesterday. Alexander picked us up a little after three for an hour of karaoke (would have liked longer, but we had dinner reservations). Since it was my birthday, he and Bruce let me sing most of the time. :D

I sang Weezer's Pork and Beans, My Chemical Romance's I'm (Not) Okay, Welcome to the Black Parade, and Famous Last Words, Pink's So What, Yuzu's Karappo, Mr. Children's Yurikago no Aru Oka Kara and Anmari Oboetenai ya (both of which choked me up a bit), Hirai Ken's Even If, and L'arc~en~Ciel's Jiyuu e no Shoutai. I ruined my throat on the English songs because they were all kind of shouty (except Pork and Beans), but the rest were slow songs so I was okay singing them (except the last, by which I'd rested enough). I remembered to only pick songs within my range, yay. I always want to sing a lot of female songs because I like a lot of female artists, but they're almost always too high for me. Pink is low enough that I can sing her okay.

I kind of wish I'd written down some stuff before going, since I had my usual brain freeze and couldn't remember any artists or songs I liked. :p Usually I get more time to search while other people are singing, but since I was mostly the only one singing, I was like uh...gotta choose! I can't believe I totally forgot about The Killers! D: Oh well, next time.

After that we headed over to Fogo de Chão, a Brazillian restaurant Bruce had suggested. It's the most expensive restaurant I've ever esten at by a long shot, but Alexander was paying (both for my birthday and celebrating our reconcilliation). It was omgsogood. I'm glad we had a chance to try it (definitely a place for only super super special occasions!).

We were all super stuffed afterwards, so we headed back to his place, where we watched a Kinky Boots and eventually got unfull enough for rootbeer floats. After that we just sat around chatting for several hours and finally got home after midnight.

Such an awesome day.


Oh, and in other good news, Bruce got his grades the other day and got As in both his classes. :D He also had an idea of taking some sort of PE class next term and I think we're going to take something together, maybe yoga. I would like to get limber again. Back when I used to play sports, I was really limber, but not so much anymore and I hate it. I registered online for SMC last night, so once they email me confirmation, I can sign up for the class. :D

Title: Just So You Know #1
Author: Joey Alison Sayers
Number of Pages: 36 pages
Book Number/Goal: 34/75 for 2009
My Rating: 5/5

By the author of Thingpart. Excellent comic about the author's transition from male to female. Funny and touching and generally awesome. I just wish it were longer!

Posting my happiness early today because I'm so excited! Although I suppose it could also be considered late, because I think I forgot to post last night.

But! Bruce has been bugging me about what I want for my birthday, and there's really not anything, so I kept saying I'd look on Amazon and then not getting around to it. Then today I happened to look at one of the many concert emails I get. I've been deleting them without reading since we don't have a car and concerts I want to go to are never in Santa Monica. But on a total whim I decided to click this Live Nation one and...Vamps! Playing in LA! On August 1st!

If you don't know Vamps, it's Hyde from L'arc~en~Ciel's new band. I would really love to see L'arc, but anything with Hyde is good. I really love pretty much any music he's involved in. I saw him solo a few years ago at House of Blues and he was awesome. I have only heard a couple songs by Vamps (their first single and its coupling track), but by coincidence, I had just downloaded a couple more singles and an album last night. So now I'm all set.

Whee!

Also I got a $25 Barnes & Noble gift certificate from Bruce's aunt and a check for $75 from his parents, so it's feeling like my birthday already! :D

She Only Reveals What She Wants You to See by amadi 3/5
The West Wing. 1900 words. They've been together for two years. Now Donna's dropped a bombshell on Josh. What's next?
( Enjoyable, even not knowing the fandom. )

The Pattern of All the Process by raedbard 4/5 Recommended
The West Wing. 19,000 words. At the Emergency Room the doctor calls Huck your brother. Molly doesn't bother to correct him, neither does dad, not at first anyway, though she does wonder -- not for the first time -- why, with her short hair and dungarees, she never gets mistaken for a boy anymore.
( I liked the story, but not the writing style. )

Making Your Bed in the Prison of Your Mind by merle_p 3/5
Leverage. 3000 words. There are a lot of reasons why coming out is a bad idea.
( Interesting, but I couldn't really get into it. )

The Epiphany Job by shrift 5/5 Recommended
Leverage. 3600 words. When he rolled out of bed that afternoon, heated up some Philly Steak & Cheese Hot Pockets for breakfast, and then went to the office, Alec Hardison was not expecting to experience a paradigm shift.
( Oh man, this is so awesome. )

1. I wrote more last night! I forgot how much I really enjoy drabbles.

2. Better Off Ted is back! There was a new episode last night (downloaded, but haven't watched yet) and new eps for the rest of the month and all through July. Yay!

3. We got a 3.5 mile walk last night, which made up for the fact that we stopped at Coldstone. ^_^;; I haven't been there in years. Got a scoop of cake batter ice cream and a scoop of mint, with a brownie mixed in. Yum.

4. It's nice and overcast this morning. I hope it stays that way when we go out for a walk later (though with my luck it'll be all sunny).

Thought I Was Getting Carat Gold, and What I Got Was You
200 words :: Stargate: Atlantis :: John/Rodney :: 6/24/09 :: warning policy
The thing they both keep wondering is where did it go so wrong?

( Thought I Was Getting Carat Gold, and What I Got Was You )

This Feeling Won't Go
100 words :: Stargate: Atlantis :: John/Rodney :: 6/24/09 :: warning policy
"That was..." Rodney reaches out and plucks at her garter. "This is really hot."

( This Feeling Won't Go )

This entry was originally posted at http://kanata.dreamwidth.org/42899.html. Please comment there using OpenID.

1. Excellent walk yesterday. Four miles, plus we got lots of errands done while we were out. The main errand was to go down to Sears and see if we could get Bruce's glasses fixed. On Saturday he found they were suddenly bent out of shape, though he didn't remember doing anything that could have done that. He was able to wear them, but they were askew and pressing into his nose and ear uncomfortably. Thankfully the woman at Sears was able to fix them right up. I had several packages for the post office, so we stopped in at the main post office while we were down there. Whole Foods is just up the block from there, so Bruce got some more of the 99 cent popcorn he loves. Then we walked back home, stopping at Arby's for dinner because we were both really, really hungry. Oh, and while we were down there, we saw there is a Penzey's Spices in Santa Monica now! We didn't go in as it was on the wrong side of the street and we didn't feel like going back down the block and crossing, but we will probably walk down there sometime soon.

2. Speaking of mailing packages, they were all from BookMooch and one was nineteen comics and a book. That takes me down to just thirteen comics left out of a whole box full. I remember when I first put the comics up, I was wondering if it was even worth the effort. It was such a pain in the ass because comics don't have ISBNs, so I had to hand enter them all, and because they don't have ISBNs, that means it's less likely that people are going to be looking specifically for them. But I guess a lot of people do search BookMooch for comics in general, because I have been getting steady mooches ever since. About half the box was Star Trek stuff and I've definitely seen a boost in Trek since the movie (both comics and novels). So yay for that. Always glad to get rid of stuff!

3. The best part of waking up is Folgers on your butt.

4. I found this awesome webcomic yesterday thanks to Bruce (which is how I found most of the comics I read, actually). I really like this one and this one.

5. Also Dinosaur Comics is hilarious as usual.

We had a nice afternoon yesterday. My mom and Tom and my grandparents came over for Father's Day/my birthday. There was pie and cake and ice cream, yay. I got $100 from my grandparents, which I promptly handed over to my mom towards the July rent. ^_^;; (And my mom's present to me was $200 off the June rent. So exciting! Yet necessary, so I'm definitely not complaining.)

While they were over, we told Tom about the problems with the shower/bathtub. It's had two problems (which may be related) for at least six months, but I haven't said anything because he was in the hospital, then recovering, plus they have so much going on with their own remodelling right now. But the water runs constantly (not just drips, an actual (thin) stream) and when you turn on the shower, over half the water comes out of the faucet instead of the showerhead. I think we could fix the running faucet by replacing the washer in cold water faucet, but because it's been so long since it's been replaced and we have really horrible hard water, it's completely welded on with minerals and we couldn't remove it when we tried. Anyway, it's not urgent stuff (obviously we've been living with it for a while), but I'm glad he's got it on his list now.

Also in good news for them, it looks like my mom and Tom have finally sold Tom's dad's house (it's been almost a year since his dad died now). I think my mom said escrow starts this week.

I got my cliche_bingo card and posted an HTML version over here to keep it with my kink_bingo one.

I'm kind of meh about several squares, so I think like with kink bingo, I will probably just use them as prompts rather than trying to get a bingo. (Why did I have to get hypothermia and illness? I don't like H/C! And crossovers, gah. So not a fan of crossovers.)

I think with genderswap, I might take it literally rather than the bodyswapping fandom usually means. *already has an idea* There's several others I'm excited about, too, but I haven't really done too much thinking about it.

McShep Match and Remix definitely have priority right now. Remix is due on July 12th and Match is due on August 19th. I'm actually better set on Match, because I know what I'm doing and even have some of it written. Still not sure about Remix.

I also have a fic I'm in the middle of that I really would like to finish maybe this week sometime.