I was going to include this in my last post but figured it was long enough already. ;)

( Pic 13/?? )

At some point soon I am going to post a LOAD of stuff to FFN and/or AO3, namely my very recent Frasier fic, my finished-last-year-but-still-being-constantly-tweaked PotC story, "Oranges to Florida", and the JC tags, as I don't think there are going to be any more now, though they have consistently surprised me in that area. :P

Ever since "Whisper" received such a cold/silent reception on FFN I've been anxious about posting anything ever again, for any fandom. When I finally finish "A Shade of Blue" I will probably take "Whisper" down, edit heavily to cure some canon discrepancies that were helpfully pointed out, then repost it so the two stories can go side by side in preparation for the Ripper story...

Anyway, yeah. Fanfic anxiety sucks. :(

Still no internet at home; they came to instal Sky TV (painlessly, as there was already a dish) on 6th September, with the phoneline being activated a week later, but the broadband line won't be activated until next Friday, apparently. So much for my best-laid plan of having two weeks off work and catching up on internet-stuff. I haven't checked Facebook or Twitter in that time, incidentally - nor LiveJournal either - and have only checked emails briefly, so if you've done anything important that I need to know about, let me know here. I'll be checking Facebook at lunch but only scanning it briefly. :P

So, two weeks off...

( Cut for length. )

Back at work today and thankfully it doesn’t appear to be too busy, which makes a change. I shall now post this and trawl through my Facebook feed… Photos of various things coming once we have internet, so watch this space…

PS: I forgot again, but it’s Talk Like A Pirate Day. Arr, avast, etc.

Here's an interesting quandary for you: when I came back to work on Thursday after three days of leave, the work was two days behind and there were about 35-40 items in Winscribe awaiting transcription. This morning we were well within the 24-hour turnaround and there were seven items. It doesn't take a genius to work out what happened there. :P

Actually, I need to do a separate post about a related annoyance which cropped up during the course of writing this entry... Not sure when as this fandom catch-up is eating my life.

Aaaanyway, I'm still catching up on the fandom meme, so here we go.

( Days 15 & 16 )

I was meant to post this last night but we had Alex and Dina over for dinner - Paul cooked spicy peanut soup (which sounded weird but was delicious) and I did a blue cheese, mushroom and butternut squash risotto. We should be going to see Matthew Bourn's Cinderella ballet night (it's set in the Blitz apparently!) as my mum and David are too ill to go, so we're just waiting on them to pop the tickets through the door.

The plan for the fandom catch-up is: Day 17 this evening if I get chance, as it's long. Days 18 and 19 over the course of tomorrow, as 19 is long. Day 20 on Monday as it's long. The days 21 and 22 on Tuesday as they should hopefully be short, and then I'm caught up. In theory, anyway. :P

Life stuff first. Paul had to do a repair job on the oven door yesterday, as the seal was hanging down and heat was escaping to the degree that the smoke / heat detector went off during the week. I had a bit of a panic earlier because the temperature indicator light wasn't working properly and I was paranoid that the seal was still inadequate, so ended up using the slower top oven instead. On testing if a few minutes later the light was working perfectly again (i.e. actually turning off at the right temperature instead of staying on) so with any luck it's fixed.

Anyway, not much else happening, so onward with the meme. Fandom is more important than life anyway. :P

( Day 06 )

Right. I now need to have a shower, as tea look longer than anticipated thanks to oven!paranoia and my delaying it longer than I intended. I will endeavour to do a double-post some point next week, seeing as I didn't manage it today...

I'm sure I've used that subject title before... Anyway, stolen off commoncomitatus, whom I suspect will be the only person to play.

Reply with a show/fandom, and I'll tell you the following:

› Favorite character.
› Least favorite character.
› Prettiest character.
› Character I'd marry.
› Favorite pairing.
› Favorite episode.
› Unpopular opinion.

My fandoms are listed in my interests, or my tags list, but I think most of them are obvious. :P

G'wan then.

Stolen off Eni again...

Pick your five favorite TV shows (in no particular order) and answer the following questions.

01. Jonathan Creek.
02. Ugly Betty.
03. The X-Files.
04. Farscape.
05. Buffy the Vampire Slayer
(Bearing in mind I'm long over-due a re-watch on the last two...)

( Questions )

That was fun. I like fandom memes.

It's taken a while to get this up, but here it is. I commented on collie_wing's assocation meme and she gave me these five things to explain:

( Association Meme, again )

Hmm, very thought-provoking associations. Cheers, collie_wing!

I like this meme. Give me more things you associate with me, f-list!

Well, not so much a meme as a long questionnaire thing, but I have nothing better to do. Possibly I should stop hanging around online after I've done this, though, as I'm getting a crick in my neck... *adjusts chair*

( VERY LONG )

I quite enjoyed that. Insanely long, but I do like talking about fanfiction. *points to dissertation link* ;) *would point to dissertation link if it was still there...*

I've written about 1000 words of fic this evening.  Prior to that, I re-read the entire of Sweet Intoxication to try and get reinspired, as well as most of Come Forward, and a couple of fics from random fandoms - mostly awful, but anyway.

Considering I've not written anything even slightly creative in... gawd, ages.  Five months?  I can't even remember...  Considering that, this is definitely a positive development.  1000 words of fic - of anything, really - is quite pathetic by my previous standards, but after the rut I've been in for so long, it feels bloody marvellous...

I was feeling so completely, utterly helpless...  it's so strange, to have all these words, pictures and movies in my head and not be able to write them down or articulate them in any useful fashion.  Even when I had the time, I couldn't make the words flow.  I couldn't get them from my brain to my fingertips, or at least to coherency.  Somehow, somewhere, they were getting lost in translation, popping up for a fleeting moment to remind me of my creativity, before disappearing to some dusty filing cabinet in the back of my brain.  Even this entry isn't how I pictured it in my head, because the words are going too fast for me to catch them.

This is why I needed the time off.  My head has been full of a million thoughts and feelings and stories, full to bursting, with no means of release.  To stay up even this late (oh, how I miss those 4.00am struggles to finish a sentence, a paragraph, a chapter...) is a welcome change, knowing I don't have to get up tomorrow to go to work, knowing I won't be utterly exhausted.  I needed this time to find myself again, find that part of myself that lived only for writing... and I think I'm getting there, slowly but surely.

It's going to take time and effort.

Things are getting better now.  The job situation is stabilising; I'll be earning more money, as well as enjoying all the benefits of a proper employee, and by being in position - having already held down the job for over a year - my future prospects may be better.  I'm hopeful that the counselling will help, even though I know, through the nature of my personality, it's going to be hard work and emotionally taxing.

I refuse to be an outright optimist.  Things go well, but then even more things go horrendously badly to make up for it, and this is how things have always been.  I know that once I return to work in a week or so, the overwhelming tiredness will take over again... but with any luck, it may be conquerable.

I need to get back into writing, and through writing, back into fandom.  I miss fandom.  I miss the in-jokes, the quotes, the finding of new friends.  I miss being part of a greater whole, and the knowledge it brings.  I miss the character voices in my head, keeping me awake until Stupid O'Clock when I'm trying to sleep.  Fandoms come and go, but they linger.  My fandoms have been many and copious, but they have stayed with me.  More than anything, I miss the escapism that fandom brings, and the catharsis and satisfaction of fanfiction.

Still.  1000 words.  I'm getting there.

Yeah, nice way to start the week.  I did some minutes from Sparkbrook to help out their typist, who was snowed under in DoH minutes from four different chairs.  I did them all before the Christmas break and sent them back.

Yesterday morning - aside from discovering that my computer account had actually expired because they'd only set it up on a six-month basis, and then realising that, holy crap, I've been there six months - I got an email from one of the Chairs, Maxine, who I'd typed about 8 sets of minutes from tapes for.  It was a decidedly arsey email informing me that none of the minutes had any clear agendas or recommendations on them and that their typist had to correct them all when she was inundated.  I sent an apologetic email back, and then realised she'd CCed it to Tina Hartland (my line manager) and Tina Roper (the HOB manager) and thought, "Oh, shit."

So, today, Tina Hartland came over to do Sandra's CareFirst training.  I was worried.  She came in, sat by Zoe, and then said "Did you get that email?" in an incredulous tone.  Apparently, the agency temp over there had done exactly the same as me, and Tina told me to just ignore the Chair because she'd gone off on one about it.  So I didn't get in trouble, which was nice.

Some points to consider in all of this:

1) Nobody, except for Sue (who's just really anal about everything) includes the agenda in their minutes.  Especially so with the new templates, which make you put all the information in little allocated boxes which have clear, succinct headings already.  The only time you even need the agenda is for the meeting itself.  I have never had to type an agenda for any Chair in six months of working for Child Protection, and that's for five - five - different Chairpersons.
2) If they knew the minutes were going somewhere else to be typed, then surely someone should have had the foresight to perhaps mention that the system was slightly different.  Or am I supposed to be psychic?
3) Believe it or not, I do have my own priorities in my own office.  One of our Chairs, Liz D, was moving to Small Heath as of January, and was trying to shift her backlog before she left, so I had plenty of my own to do in the last couple of days without worrying about Sparkbrook's backlog as well.  And I'm sure they would have complained more if I'd left before finishing everything and their already-late minutes weren't received until yesterday.
4) I did, in fact, put the recommendations on there.  Quite clearly.  Every time.  Despite the pointlessness of it, since they're just repeated as the tasks directly underneath.  If they're in the wrong place, it doesn't take that long to move them, or have they not heard of copy-paste?
5) Just because the agency temp screwed up, don't take it out on me because I've got email access.  I did you a fucking favour by typing the damned things in the first place, and got them all done in the space of three days.  And surely the fact that two different people - one working at that office - made the same mistake indicates that perhaps it's something to do with the dictation in the first place...

So, yeah.  Annoying, but not worth worrying about.  Next time Sparkbrook ask for help, I may just refuse...

In more amusing news, we broke a chair today.  Well, Zoe did, anyway.  Liz D ordered a chair for her office at Small Heath, y'see, but for some reason they decided to deliver it here.  Zoe was about to tell the delivery bloke not to bring it all the way upstairs, but was too late, so we left our office to find the exit blocked by a very large, very blue executive chair.  Zoe 'tested' it.  Well, it was right there. :)

Cynthia and I were there, too, and Sandra at her desk behind us.  Cynthia and Zoe were having a race to see who got to try it out first, and from that point, hilarity ensued...

Cynthia: Ommm, Zoe, I wanted to try it out first!  [Cynthia, being a mother, makes that noise we used to make at school.  The "ooommmm, I'm telllliiiing!" noise.  That one.]  Has it got that special bit on the back for your back?
[Cue much prodding and poking of new chair, still partially wrapped in plastic.]
Zoe: [moves the arms of the chair] Ooh.  Oops.  [More playing with chair.  Zoe gets out of chair.]
Cynthia:  I wanna try it!  [Cynthia sits in chair, expecting it to be teH uber-comfort, and looking quite disappointed when it turns out to be... well, a chair.  Cynthia proceeds to mess about with the levers on the underside of it.]  Argh!  [The back of the chair has moved into a reclining position.  And stuck.  We can't get it back.  Cynthia gets out of chair.  We wheel it into Liz's old office and find a space to put it in.  Zoe resumes her seat in the chair to try and fix it.]
Zoe: What did you do, Cynth?
Cynthia: I dunno, I just pulled one of them lever things.  Ommm, we broke it...
Zoe: [proceeds to pull levers in the hope of the chairback returning to its previous position.]  Ooh!  [As if the stuck chairback wasn't bad enough, Zoe has now managed to tip the entire seat part forwards and slid off the chair almost onto the floor.  By this point, Your Humble Typist is doubled over in hysterics.  Zoe gets off the chair.]  Oh, well that just looks even worse now.
[We spend ten minutes playing with levers and generally physically abusing this poor chair, but it won't budge.  It looks ridiculous, and slightly forlorn.  Cynthia has long since left us to it, and my photocopying has been abandoned, and we're both having hysterics.  Possibly all of the social workers on our floor believe us insane, especially Charlie, who happens to wander past in the midst of our chair-abuse.]
Charlie: What's going on in here?  There's a lot of laughter...
Me: Zoe broke the chair.
Zoe: It's not broken.  We just need to... [continues playing with levers.  I sit on chair and see what I can do.  I manage to get the back to move, but it won't stay in any given position, and the seat just won't budge.]  We'll just... say it arrived like that.  Honestly.  Shoddy workmanship.

It's moments like that, when all the work stops and we end up in random hysterics, that I love my job.  And it's moments like the arsey email that make me want to walk out.  But luckily, the good moments tend to outweight the aggravating ones.

In other news (as if the post wasn't long enough already), I got to catch the 'encore presentation' of Carnivále last night.  It's very atmospheric, and reminds me of X-Files, a little, in the way its filmed.  And it's got Michael Anderson (the midget from Twin Peaks) and Clea Duvall in it, and the giant from Big Fish, and a Repressed Clergyman who is blatantly going to Go The Way of Sin and Debauchery at some point.  Quite looking forward to the rest of it.  They seem to be showing the entire series, two episodes a night, all of this week, so I'll have to tape it.

( And a meme, to make the night complete, stolen off Eni. )

And now I'll sign off.

Wait, no I won't.  I just remembered I still owe people things.  thefleshfailure I still owe a love post and a DJ comment (gah) and collie_wing I also owe a love post.  Will definitely remember to do those things.  Yes.

Wow, that was a long post.  Sorry. :)