the night has a thousand saxaphones

( The news coverage of CPAC was so fun to watch over these last few days )

Another thank you to everybody who sent birthday wishes!

Those of you who are having some of the same problems I am these days might want to read Seven Tried and True Ways to Stifle Your Creativity.

Why I would not have greenlit Dollhouse does the best job I have seen of dissecting exactly why Dollhouse is so very very disappointing. Those of you who know me know that I hate disliking something without being able to articulate why, so. This is why.

And for those of you who, like me, are watching Dollhouse in the vain hopes that it will improve, or who, also like me, watched Merlin and hoped forlornly that the Next Big Fandom would be something with a little less cheese and a lot more weight, I feel the need to remind you that NBC's new show, Kings, premieres on March 15th.

It's a re-working of the story of David, as in "David and Goliath," as in "David and Jonathan." It stars Ian McShane, so right there you know at least one character will fucking rock, and I saw the first twenty minutes of it at Comic-con, so I can tell you that the look of it, visually, is just phenomenal. No cheesy campy CGI dragons here- this is a pseudo-modern AU setting with utterly gorgeous outdoors location shoots and lush sets and beautiful camera work and the whole thing is just nice to look at in a way that goes well beyond the (admittedly in some cases very pretty) pretty people. And it has the advantage of both being a story that I would watch even if there were no slash potential at all- because the story of David is a good story and the potential for action plus political intrigue plus intense emotional portrayals of psychologically fascinating people plus really interesting worldbuilding is enough to make me sit up and pay attention- but also having slash potential out the wazoo- because, you know David and Jonathan.

I know I cannot wave my wand and make this the Next Big Fandom, especially given the crappy job NBC is doing promoting it, but I would if I could, and I'm begging you all to check it out.

( There are things they never tell you about running your own business )


In more fannish news, Leverage! I am so endlessly, endlessly in love with Elliot and Hardison and their dynamic. SO IN LOVE. Apparently there was a new SPN. I am having a hard time caring. I finished the season of Merlin, and it still is giving me lots of thinky thoughts about why I love shows, which I still do not quite have the energy to type out.

The Flist Knows All: Surely there is somebody on my flist who watched Boston Legal, right? Would you by any chance have strong opinions as to where I should start? Which episodes (or what season, or whatever) is the must-see for my little slashy James-Spader-fangirly heart?

Yuletide is by far the awesomest part of the fannish yearly calendar. This year I wrote a main story and a last-minute Treat. (The main story, which I researched for weeks and though about for a month and worked on for days and days, has one comment as of this writing. The dashed-off treat has 12. There’s no accounting for the vagaries of the Claw, I guess. I’ve been told that staying Zen about these things is one of the secrets to being happy in fandom. I am trying.) That said, I got a wonderful present! And have found more than enough beautiful stories already in just the tidgy bit of surfing I was able to do on Christmas Day.

( First, the personal pimping )

( Before you do any other Yuletide reading... )

Recs list to come: Original list of 115 fandoms knocked down to 70! I am going to bed.

Oh my God, Canadian politics is fucking fascinating. Seriously, the current crisis is a beautiful, beautiful thing for the political gawkers among us. It turns out that the PM of our neighbor to the north has been a brilliant, scheming, manipulative, beautifully Machiavellian tool for a really long time now. Why did nobody inform me I should be paying attention? *glees*

SGA: On the one hand, the writers sure do suck balls, don't they? On the other hand, they ship Bill Nye/Kaylee. I can't hate them, just for the awesomeness of that.

Chuck: When did this become the Weekly Adam Baldwin Feeds the Slashers Hour? Because I really approve.

Pushing Daisies: I want to find whoever wrote the "fear leads to anger, anger leads to hate, hate leads to stress baking" conversation and kiss them. How is this show so wonderful?

Reason to love Rachel Maddow #3,754: She has a cell phone ring tone on her site titled infrastructure porn. *hands* I am so hot for that woman.

An open letter to the SG1 fanfic community:

Dear writers,

The Air Force does not court-marshal anyone. Ever. For any reason, even sleeping with people of the same sex directly under their command. They also do not court-marital people, though I admit that's a pretty funny image and possibly more appropriate to the crime. And let's not even get started on what the plural is of that word you keep trying and failing to spell.

Amused,
-me

wyomingnot asked my why there isn't more Daniel/Jon chan in SG1 fandom. The answer, of course, is that synecdochic has pretty much carved out the entire niche of clone!Jack fic, such that trying to write him at all feels like stepping on her toes. But it's planted in my head, and now Daniel and Jon have taken up residence and won't shut up. Daniel is pretty regularly making beer runs for Jon, and they have these hilarious, wildly tipsy conversations about the horrors of high school a second time. Jon has taken up with the marching band, so you can imagine how amused Daniel is by that. Daniel thinks it's wonderful- like he has Jack back, back the way it was before year five when Jack pushed him away and he still doesn't know why, back when it seemed like they genuinely... had something. But poor Jon. The cracks are starting to show. I don't know how much longer he can go on like this.

Of course, all this is happening in my head, not on paper, and I will lose all the best bits if I try to write it down. But they won't shut up.

Hi, flist, I need your help.

I need you to rec me fic with NC-17 hatesex. Any fandom, any pairing, slash preferred but anything goes. This is just not in my normal reading repertoire- I read some Harry/Draco when I very first got into fandom where Draco was just a Misunderstood Good Guy and they became Best Buds, and it kind of soured me on hatesex fic. So, bonus points for actually somewhat hateable characters, and characters who are still genuinely enemies after all the sex and complicated emotions.

Come on, SOMEBODY must be hiding the explicit Jack/Harry Maybourne somewhere! (I kid. Really. Though if you have it, hand it over!)

Oh my God, I WILL do some mini-nano writing before I sleep, but Yuletide signups opened and I am so excited I could die. For serious.

Dear Yuletide Santa,

First of all, thank you SO MUCH for agreeing to write me a present! I picked four fandoms I just love and crave fic in, and I hope you won't find my requests all impossible. I wasn't going to write a letter, but last year I saw some friends of mine freaking out because their recipients didn't, and I don't want to be difficult. ( So I shall go the 'tell you what I love about these fandoms' route. )

I hope those were helpful rather than demanding; I'm sure that if you loved these fandoms enough to offer them, I'll love the story!

-DragoJustine, excitedly

Wow. Apparently babbling about cooking and domesticity really hits hot buttons on my flist. Kind of like my office supplies lust, I am like, "who knew?" I keep writing these things and then I end up feeling much less alone. General hugs at y'all.

The stunning eighth_horizon wrote The gayest gen story ever. It's glorious (SPN, NOT Sam/Dean).

TOMORROW. TOMORROW MY SHOW COMES BACK. I could capslock forever. All squee here is redundant. I won't actually get to see it till Friday, but still. I just rewatched the Dean-on-Dean scene in Dream a Little Dream of Me. Oh, Dean. *flails*

I just read the casting descriptions for SGU. I could die laughing. Those really could be fantastic characters in a fantastic show-- there's a shitload of potential there, and with SGA fans moving over I assume the fic will be good-- but obviously the actual show won't be any good. Plus, have you noticed all the emphasis on how beautiful everybody is? Just once, I would like to see a set of character descriptions of perfectly average-looking people.

Remember, writers: If the character is good enough, and the acting is good enough, people will eroticize him anyway. Just look at Rodney McKay!

*Just watched "Birthright" (7x10) for the first time. My "I love Teal'c, but just cannot eroticize him" problem, it is GONE. That man looks like an utterly amazing kisser. Christopher Judge's lips + Jolene Blalock's lips = hot beyond the telling of it.

*Every time I watch SG1, I am stunned anew by how sexy Michael Shanks is, and by Jack and Daniel's fantastic comic timing and subtle eye-contact/eyebrow plays off each other.

*jd_junkie wrote me "Jack and Daniel watch Wormhole X-treme together." And lo, it is adorable.

*There is a very good discussion on writing smut going on here. I disagree on one point, but not drastically. The real thing to come out of this, though, was my realization that I really WANT to write het porn, and have just been stopped by The Terminology Problem. If anybody has solutions to The Terminology Problem, I would love to hear them. *sigh*

*I am continuing to delay my spn_nostalgia commitment. Apparently, I am not as good at being polyfannish as I thought. FAIL. The more I try to write Sam/Dean, the more Jack/Daniel bunnies assault me. I have come up with FIVE I could write right now, in just the last hour, while getting not even a paragraph of Sam/Dean done with.