bironic

So cold out. So cold.

Today I am grateful for: Heat, blankets, sweatshirts, shelter. Week-ago!me's decision to freeze a leftover takeout portion, so today!me could microwave it for dinner. Time with friends. Music and dance. Good reading. Having time to finish the Doctor Who finale. Interesting articles.

Regarding that last:

Real life robots! A photo collection. So many fabulous kinds of robots in various stages of development. Even the ones that propel along ethical debates. And the ones that make you want to slap a dude. (Titan the robot looked amazing right up until the caption said, "Titan danced for the audience, made jokes and even tried hitting on Russian women.") To recover, let's contemplate the sight of a robot transcribing a Torah. Or the "Real Android Matsuken" doppelganger. Once upon a time, I would have written an essay on all this; today I do not have the oomph.

A lovely NYT piece on passwords - sometimes obvious, sometimes circular, more anecdotal than research-based, but still lovely in its musings on private personal narratives.

On Interstellar, love, religion and entanglement

And, having finished DW, a browse around the AO3 Twelve/Clara collection, because apparently I have fallen for Twelve/Clara. Still, nothing I found in the Mature to Explicit range got them "right." There was, however, a brilliant discovery in the form of author RandomBattlecry in general and "Promises, Promises (Explosions, Explosions)" in particular. "So put on your best eyebrows, and God save the Queen." Or: In which Clara is the Doctor, the doctor is a uni professor, there's an earthquake, and a plot summary does the writing zero justice. Rated Teen.

1.

I assumed this was on Tumblr somewhere and that everyone who had a feeling about The Avengers or Guardians of the Galaxy would already have seen it. But it seems perhaps not. Therefore I share with you: If 'The Avengers' Were Cereal Mascots... Because: Groot Loops! Loki Charms! So cute.

2.

Aw, see, this is why I liked Theon Greyjoy professor. His reply to my email after we crossed paths, wherein I said I wasn't sure if he'd remembered me at first and would he like to have coffee and catch up sometime:

Hi [bironic]. I have a horrible memory for faces and names with most people, because they're boring, but I certainly never forgot yours whatsoever. I would love to get together with you sometime, for coffee/tea or even a more grown-up drink somewhere. [...] I'll save my ruminations on things gallifreyan till we meet in person. I am LOVING series 8 & capaldi. It seems as if someone's given Moffat a much-needed kick up the arse or a dressing-down or something.

Interlude:

I have been sick a lot in the last couple of months in several different fun and exciting ways, after not having been sick at all since moving to Boston. I am ready for it to end. *coughs*

3.

At

thedeadparrot's this weekend I mentioned how The Fast & The Furious's focus on Dom's family & chosen family, particularly the 6th movie, which we were watching, reminded me of Lilo & Stitch's "Ohana means family. Family means no one gets left behind," and then it turned into a sort of drinking game in which we were not actually drinking. Now I kind of want to do a vidlet of F&F set to L&S audio.

That is separate from the ridiculousness that is The Rock's biceps in that film. So large. So large. He can't put his arms down at his sides, you guys.

4.

Did you know Anne Rice has a new Vampire Chronicles book coming out? I did not know. Prince Lestat. She is coming to the Harvard Bookstore on her tour to sign it. Unfortunately it is at noon on a Tuesday and costs something like $30, so I will not be going. But I put a hold on the book at the library. We'll see if there's anything decent in it. The title is, you will probably agree, not promising.

#needsbettervampirenewssources

5.

Now off for bedtime reading. After Hark! A Vagrant and Being Mortal, there is Best American Comics 2013 to try. Interested in knowing more about current comics & graphic novels. I wanted to check out Saga from the library after hearing it recced on Pop Culture Happy Hour, but the first volume was unavailable. Also want(ed) to read Sex Criminals but didn't see it on the shelf at a glance. Oh, well.

News: Excited to see Joshua Oppenheimer (who made the brilliant documentary The Act of Killing; the next film from that project is coming out soon here) and Alison Bechdel (of the Bechdel test) on the list of MacArthur Foundation "genius grant" recipients this morning.

Music: Tuned in to my favorite NYC folk & indie station yesterday because the office was noisy, and promptly picked up some new favorite songs. Now listening to Hozier's From Eden on repeat. Love the chord progression in the chorus, especially when he adds harmony at 2:09.

Movies: I keep meaning to do proper posts about these. That doesn't seem to want to happen. So:

( Really enjoyed Tiger Eyes )

( 'Meh' on Guardians of the Galaxy )

Fic: Does reading this stuff make me feel angsty, or do I gravitate toward it because I'm feeling angsty, or do they feed on each other? Whichever, I was re-re-reading that old Hermione/Remus WIP and poked around on the AO3 again in case something new had appeared.

Ended up browsing Remus/Tonks, a pairing I'd never really explored before. No surprise that

penknife's stories were great; I read Worldly Goods (actually, more [past] Remus/Sirius than Remus/Tonks) and Easy to start. Right now I'm enjoying Grow in the Openings by mindabbles, which has Remus/Tonks in it but is really Remus/Sirius. It's nice.

Checked out the Twelve/Clara tag (Doctor Who), too. Not much there yet, unsurprisingly. It may be tough to find what I'm looking for even as the collection fleshes out; in addition to having strong personalities and voices, there's a certain frisson they've got, a certain way I'd want to see the tension break into action, that I can't even quite articulate yet but is often hard to find in pairings that don't have a large volume of fic, because half the stories seem to be well-written, well-characterized, non-explicit or gen fic and the other half seem to be generic or OOC jump-right-into-it sex. Not that I don't also love those categories; it's just that sometimes you want something that combines the best of both. For now, Into the Deep by

kassrachel will do just fine.

Any recs for any of the above media?

1.

Super brief and not really spoilery thoughts on the new season of Doctor Who so far:

( Read more... )

2.

Interesting conversations that have happened recently and may still be going on:

On capitalization in fic titles, over at

roga's

What about doing a Vidding Bingo, by

thirdblindmouse

Entries tagged with doctor who

"A robot writes a Torah"

One day there will be a post that doesn't require numbering

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