rarelywritten | Member Posts

It's that time of year again...

The 2025 Gender Census is now open!

This survey is open to anyone, in any country, of any age, whose experience of their gender doesn't fit tidily into the strict binary of female/male. It seeks broad statistical data about the language we use to refer to ourselves in English, e.g. pronouns, identity words, titles. The results will be made public for use in activism, self-advocacy, business and academia.

The survey takes five minutes* and is open until August 30th.

* Theoretically, unless the questions give you an existential crisis and you spend longer than that staring into space.

sanguinity

The historical saber class I took on Sundays at Fort Vancouver doesn't meet during the summers, but at the end of the 2024 spring term one of the more advanced students (a guy I like very well: knowledgeable and generous with his knowledge, but never overbearing), invited me to his Thursday evening workouts with some of the other students. Despite being interested, I never made it to a Thursday evening session, mostly because it would involve driving from Portland to Vancouver during rush hour, a drive that's a full thirty minutes in good traffic, and more like an hour in bad. The idonwannas as each Thursday came and went were prohibitively strong.

But then the Sunday class at Fort Vancouver never reconvened in the fall -- the class's main advocate at the Fort had retired, upper management at the NPS was iffy about the concept, and the fort was planning on renovating the building the class met in. It's been a year now, and afaik, the Sunday afternoon class is never coming back.

In the meanwhile, Thursday night attendance at the student-led group was becoming thin. The organizer floated the possibility of a new time; I said how about Sunday afternoons, since we all once used to meet during that time frame. Lo, they started meeting Sunday afternoons in addition to Thursday evenings.

Well. I suggested the time. Now I had to go.

After warning the organizer that 1) I am nursing a foot injury* and 2) I haven't touched my saber in a year**, yesterday I went to the Sunday meet-up workout thingie, in which the two guys present very graciously worked the basics with me. And by "worked the basics" I mean "reminded me of what the basics even were."

God, but I hate being bad at things. Inconveniently, the only way to stop being bad at things (other than refuse to do them, and what kind of way to live is that?) is to be bad at them for a while. I comfort myself that blorbos-from-my-fandoms also were once bad at this thing too.

(Speaking of blorbos, a fun fandom moment: One of the guys was trying to explain why I should follow through on a cut, and then got tangled in his hypothetical: after all, even without proper follow-through, the first cut of his hypothetical should have incapacitated my opponent, and so why would I need to worry about what happens after? He was trying desperately to come up with a hypothetical that might suit his proposed lesson, when I said, perfectly dryly, "Or I might be in a Highlander situation." Both guys lit up and agreed, yes, that were I to unexpectedly find myself in a Highlander situation, I would absolutely need to follow through on my first cut, so that I would be in a position to make a second cut, which of course should be to the neck like so! I was unreasonably pleased by their enthusiasm for this exchange: I am not the only one who plays blorbos-from-my-fandoms while practicing!)

(I am reminded of the afternoon in class when I likened my ineptitude to Danny Kaye in The Court Jester. My exercise partner at the time, the organizer of this student group, lit up and went on a long monologue about Danny Kaye and Basil Rathbone, and what training Kaye had done to achieve the "competent" personality, and what tricks he and Rathbone had used to pull it off. And how we all might take a lesson from Danny Kaye...)

I'm glad I went. It was a good session, fun and frustrating in equal measure, and I felt very welcomed by both of the more advanced students. It was good to get out, good to hang with some people I like, good to work on a physical skill. We meet on an elementary school playground (with the permission of the administrators), and were closely observed by the small children, who would curiously circle us on their bikes before zooming off. At the end of the session, one of the guys wanted to test out his new armored coat, so he suited up and the two of them went to town on each other: the children called to each other to come watch, respectfully agog.

This morning, right back/neck/shoulder/bicep/forearm are all pleasantly and mildly sore. Happily, it is not the excruciating soreness of that one story I wrote -- apparently I remember more of proper posture than I feared. (Also, the guys were intent on dropping all the knowledge and lore at me, so it was a less athletic session than it might have been -- which is fine, they were having a good time and I was learning stuff.) I'll have to try to find space somewhere to practice mid-week, and see if I can gain some ground both in technique and strength. They also gave me some hand exercises to do to improve my saber-handling, which might incidentally help with the arthritis-mediated weakness in my hand. (The exercises aren't for arthritis, but they do not seem to irritate or pain my arthritic joint, and are enough like some of the OT exercises I used to do that they will likely do me some good even in a day-to-day sense. It is a sad irony that exercises-for-swords are more motivating than exercises-because-its-good-for-me, but whatever it takes, eh?)

--

*An inflamed heel of some kind? I have no idea what happened. It was fine when I went to Atlanta. It was not fine when I came back.

**A lie. I have opened a bottle of champagne with it and showed it to an interested house guest.

--

ETA: As the morning has progressed, I've become sorer and sorer. Once again, I am starting to feel like a fiddler crab...

brightknightie

I've been in a writing slump since the end of

fkficfest. I had expected

saturdaymorningex (where I ended up unmatchable) and

everywoman (which isn't happening this year) to help me re-engage.

Now, I'm thinking of trying

seasonsofdrabbles, which is coming right up, and overlaps some already-planned time off from work: Sign-ups close August 11, assignments out August 13, due August 23. The minimum required is just one drabble, the maximum required is three, and while I don't specialize in drabbles, I feel I should be able to deliver something enjoyable. Fingers crossed.

Nominations remain open through sign-ups, so I've just now added Dungeons and Dragons (Cartoon, 1983), Battlestar Galactica (1978), and The Journey to the West (classic Chinese novel) to the line-up, and added some characters for Highlander: The Series and The Legend of Zelda, which were already nominated.

Do you have any experience with this exchange?

brightknightie

Here are some recent fannish things I've happened to see and would like to share!

Spotlight: I feel that both Superman (2025) and Fantastic Four: First Steps (2025) are good movies and strongly recommend them to general audiences looking for a pleasant time at the cinema this summer. I have literary and fannish critiques of the execution of each (of course I do), yet I feel bad about critiquing at all. I so want them both to succeed! And I so wanted them both to be not just good, or very good, but indeed knock-my-socks-off great, and I don't love how the release proximity invites ranking... but that would have been present, anyway, as each has just about the same "job" not just as an IP entry but in its writers' and director's choices. ( Very light spoilers )

Ficathons, fests & communities

Create & engage
- fan_writers is a community for discussion, reflection, and tools for writers, with emphasis on writing fanfic but not excluding writing original fic (or non-fic).
- dreams_mayhem is a competitive creative challenge with weekly games for points.
- seasons_of_fandom is the landcomm formerly known as lands_of_magic, relaunched to reflect that they are panfandom, not fantasy-exclusive.
- ficinabox is a somewhat complex exchange, with a 10K+ words minimum that may or may not be spread, via swaps, across multiple works and/or multiple fandoms and recipients. Nominations through August 12; sign-ups through August 31; due October 19.
- fffc is a low-pressure challenge community for creating something small-ish each week (like a drabble or haiku or equivalent in another medium). Prompts post on Fridays.
- fic_promptly is a comment-fic community.
- trope_of_the_month's August theme is "omegaverse."
- pinchhits is a forum for pinch-hits in exchanges. For example, caseficexchange is seeking pinch hitters.
- whenisitdue tracks many more events than I note here!
Enjoy & share
- fancake (themed fanfic recs); August theme: "marriage of convenience"
- gensplosion (gen fanfic recs)
- het_reccers (m/f fanfic recs)
- fanart_recs (fanart recs)
- recthething (fanwork recs)

Sidelight: Did you know that Marvel Comics released a "prequel" comic (single issue) to the Fantastic Four: First Steps (2025) movie? The first print run sold out; I'm waiting for a copy from the second. It's not just any old prelude to the events of the movie, but covers the same ground as some of the cut footage. Specifically, it sets up ( mild spoiler )

pauraque

In this puzzle platformer from Swedish studio Wishfully, you play as a girl named Lana who lives with her sister in an idyllic fishing village. The game is very cozy for about a minute and a half, until the village is abruptly invaded by giant robots that kidnap everyone and take them away, while Lana is the only one who escapes their clutches. She appears to be her people's only hope for rescue, so you'd best get to puzzlin'.

Lana and Mui stand on platforms preparing to evade a patrolling robot

Lana and Mui stand on platforms preparing to evade a patrolling robot

I would say this is on the easier side as puzzle platformers go, and wouldn't be a bad pick if you're new to the genre. I rarely got stuck for more than a few minutes, and sometimes when I thought I was stuck I was actually overthinking the puzzle because I was expecting it to be more complex than it was. ("Okay, I'll use the magnet to move the box so I can climb up on—oh, I can just jump up there. Okay.") Checkpoints are plentiful so you can't lose progress.

The feature that stands out the most is Lana's companion Mui, a cute little catlike creature who helps her in her quest. Though you primarily control Lana, you can also direct Mui and use the two characters' complementary abilities to get past obstacles. Mui can jump higher than Lana but can't swim; Lana can climb ropes but can't go through tunnels, etc. This gives the game a bit of a co-op vibe even though it's single player.

( Read more... )

Planet of Lana is available on PC and consoles for $19.99 USD, which I think isn't bad considering the production values are pretty high, but it is only 6-7 hours of gameplay so you be the judge.

sanguinity

Intro/FAQ
Days 1-15

zwei_hexen is hosting for August, so head over there to continue the party! (Thank you,

sylvanwitch and

ysilme!)

Final tally for the latter half of July!

Day 31:

badlyknitted,

brithistorian,

carenejeans,

chanter1944,

china_shop,

cornerofmadness,

glinda,

goddess47,

luzula,

sanguinity,

shadaras,

sylvanwitch,

the_siobhan,

trobadora,

yasaman,

ysilme

Day 30:

badlyknitted,

brithistorian,

callmesandyk,

carenejeans,

chanter1944,

china_shop,

cornerofmadness,

glinda,

luzula,

nafs,

sanguinity,

shadaras,

sylvanwitch,

the_siobhan,

trobadora,

yasaman,

ysilme

( more days )

When you check in, please use the most recent post and say what day(s) you’re checking in for. Remember you can drop in or out at any time, and let me know if I missed anyone!

graycardinal

And we continue the "Into a Bar" catch-up process. This one sat idle as long as it did because while I had a premise in mind almost at once, the execution stalled almost as soon as I'd had the idea. And then this past week, once I'd looked at it again, I realized where it really needed to go.

I probably owe a little bit to Chelsea Cain for this one, because what I've done with Ned here is at least partially inspired by what she did with him in Confessions of a Teen Sleuth.

Title: Why Me?
Fandoms: Jacqueline Kirby series (Elizabeth Peters) / Nancy Drew - Carolyn Keene
Word count: ~1500
Characters: Jacqueline Kirby, Ned Nickerson
Relationship: Nancy Drew & Ned Nickerson
Rating: Suitable for all ages.
Warnings: None.

Jacqueline Kirby ~~goes into a bar~~ visits a jail … and meets Ned Nickerson.

Current Mood: accomplished
Current Music: "I'm Late, I'm Late" (Alice in Wonderland)

sanguinity

Herodotus, The Histories (trans. G.C. Macaulay, 1890)

My dim memory of Herodotus from my college days was my VAST sense of superiority over this man who got basic facts about the world LAUGHABLY wrong. People in the past were so STUPID, I laughed callowly. So GULLIBLE.

Now, reading this with decades more experience behind me (and Wikipedia at my fingertips) I deeply regret my teenage arrogance.

( The forerunner of academic rigor and a ripping good storyteller )

So I'm not going to say it's an easy read (and it sure as HELL is not a short one!), but I found it rewarding and scandalizing and horrifying and humorous and affecting and sometimes even wise. But abso-fucking-lutely do yourself a favor and read either an annotated edition with maps, or with Wikipedia open on your phone.

Thucydides, History of the Peloponnesian War (trans. Rex Warner, 1954)

Herodotus covers the Greco-Persian Wars, beginning with Troy and leaving off in 479 BC or so with the Battle of Palataea and the confirmation of Athens as a great sea power. (Yes, yes, the sea power thing was actually at the Battle of Salamis the year before, hush.) Thucydides picks up a few decades later (440 BC), at the beginning of the hot (as opposed to cold) conflict between Sparta and Athens, and details the first stroke of the collapse of Athens' naval dominance. So in some ways these two books are a pair, inviting a lot of comparison and contrast between them.

( Trust me I know everything, even the stuff I just made up )

When I finished my freshman year, back in the dark ages, I sold my copy of Herodotus and kept my copy of Thucydides. Now, if I were to do it again, I'd do it the other way around.

Also, because I didn't say it during book group but it absolutely must be said: never go up against a Sicillian when death is on the line.

(Heh. Is that too soon? I know it was twenty-five hundred years ago, but it feels too soon.)

thisbluespirit

Okay, I knoooooow I am being rubbish at all my other bingos currently, but if

allbingo's August theme happens to be irresistible, everything will be different this time, right? XD

(Tbf, the odds are rather better than the last few weeks anyway...)

But, I give you a Crime Classics Bingo Card made from titles from the British Library's crime catalogue:

Someone from the Past	He Who Whispers	Tour de Force	Fear Stalks the Village	Antidote to Venom
Family Matters	Foreign Bodies	Tea on Sunday	It Walks by Night	Green for Danger
Settling Scores	As If By Magic	WILD CARD	The Black Spectacles	Somebody at the Door
Twice Round the Clock	The Man Who Didn’t Fly	Excellent Intentions	Crossed Skis	Serpents in Eden
The Wheel Spins	Final Acts	Deep Waters	Not to Be Taken	Bats in the Belfry

I love it. I even got the source for The Lady Vanishes, go me! Any suggestions? (With the usual caveat of me probably doing something else anyway, heh.)

brightknightie

So how about that Hyrule Warriors: Age of Imprisonment footage from yesterday's Nintendo Direct? I have no intention of playing a Warriors game (they're battle, not exploration+puzzle, games), but my goodness do I look forward to all the cutscenes and lore! Spoilers ahead...

I'm happy to see the Gerudo sage's face reveal and learn not only that the player will likely be recruiting each sage through the course of the game, but specifically that the Gerudo sage in particular looks likely to have been loyal to Ganondorf before she turns on him; excellently rich story and characterization potential there.

I'm happy to see Sonia broadly active, and the touching artwork expressions when she and Raru look at each other. I'm sure we all recognize the continued thematic emphasis on hands, hand-holding, shaking hands, and cooperation, collaboration, mutual support from Tears of the Kingdom, which was meant to contrast the isolation of Breath of the Wild. I found the new footage of the ancient original palace interesting; it's bigger than I had imagined, though still not as imposing as I imagine Gerudo civilization was at the time.

Which brings us to the final shots and their soundtrack. I expect that Fi's theme playing over that construct implies that Fi will populate and/or guide the building of that construct, likely giving Mineru the idea for her own later construct. I see that many people are expecting that the construct will house the Spirit of the Hero, which doesn't appeal to me, personally; the hero is a mortal being, and the hero's spirit belongs in life or the afterlife, not in a construct, while Fi was created by her goddess specifically to inhabit and animate an unliving item, the Sword of Evil's Bane. Of course these are not the only two possibilities! We shall see. What do you think?

sanguinity

Intro/FAQ
Days 1-15

zwei_hexen is hosting for August, and has their Day One post up already. (Thank you,

sylvanwitch and

ysilme!)

In the meanwhile please check in for July 31 here (or for anything in the July 16-31 window, really!) I'll post a final tally in another day or so. It was a pleasure hosting you all, and good luck with your writing!

My check-in: Wrote a bunch of beta comments!

Day 31:

china_shop,

sanguinity

Day 30:

badlyknitted,

brithistorian,

callmesandyk,

china_shop,

cornerofmadness,

nafs,

sanguinity,

sylvanwitch,

trobadora,

yasaman,

ysilme

pauraque

The flowering season comes and goes quickly here. The same hillside can be purple one week, yellow the next, and then everything's gone to seed. But we do have some wildflowers still going.

cluster of yellow daisy type flowers with dark centers

cluster of yellow daisy type flowers with dark centers

Black-eyed Susans.

( more flowers [3 photos] )

( flower aftermath: fruit [3 photos] )

( (not) mushrooms [1 photo] )

( birds [3 photos] )

( lepidoptera [4 photos] )

( my favorite sighting of the month: feed me, Seymour! [2 photos] )

sanguinity

Intro/FAQ
Days 1-15

zwei_hexen has graciously agreed to host us in August. (Thank you,

sylvanwitch and

ysilme!)

My check-in: Went to the river today, so all I've got is an alibi sentence. Well, two of them. But they're good ones.

Day 30:

china_shop,

nafs,

sanguinity,

ysilme

Day 29:

badlyknitted,

brithistorian,

callmesandyk,

carenejeans,

cornerofmadness,

glinda,

goddess47,

luzula,

nafs,

sanguinity,

yasaman,

ysilme

brightknightie

I have a small theory of the story to be revealed Hyrule Warriors: Age of Imprisonment that I haven't seen, which means the fandom at large considers it unlikely and unsupported.

Still, fwiw, as I think on the conjunction between the official statement that the story will be canon and a HW game's need for more playable characters than we currently have pinned down from Tears of the Kingdom -- Zelda, Raru, Mineru, the four masked sages; Sonia until she's murdered; maybe Ganondorf and Twinrova -- the more I suspect that the Ancient Hero (this guy) will be there. Like many, I suspect that he's part Zonai. A question is whether he's also part Hylian or part Gerudo or both (red hair always makes fans suspect Gerudo lineage, e.g. Malon, Groose) or whether he's part of that lost frog-like people seen only in statuary.

But as he is from 10,000 years before BotW/TotK canon, he can't be native to Raru's and Sonia's Founding Era, which is much further back. He can't be their son. (Separate theory: We could be getting their adult children in this game, as new characters.) He could be a descendant of theirs. He could be the Eighth Heroine of Gerudo legend (speculated by fans to have been male). And... he could have gotten to their era by the power of the Zelda of his own era, who could even have accompanied him, adding two to the playable line-up.

Or he could actually be their adult son, who gets catapulted to 10,000 years ago from the Founding Era by our Zelda in the course of the game.

Officially pronouncing this story to be canon, TPTB limited the possibilities for timey-wimey shenanigans messing with the story we know, but left them wide open for the stories we don't know.

pauraque

This chronologically-earliest Hainish novel depicts the events leading up to the invention of the ansible, a device that allows instantaneous communication across any distance. Though it's this technology that eventually fosters the books' interstellar alliance, the science behind it is developed against a backdrop of interplanetary strife. The brilliant physicist Shevek comes from Anarres, a harsh desert moon organized on anarcho-syndicalist principles, completely collectivist. When his own people prove intolerant of his new ideas, Shevek travels to the planet Urras, a lush world of plenty, where he encounters capitalism and formal hierarchies for the first time. Here he hopes to finally finish his work, but first he must face the fact that the greatest barriers are not the expanse of space or thorny questions of physics, but the walls we build between ourselves and our neighbors, as well as within our own minds.

Re-reading this book was not the experience I thought it was going to be.

( The part I remembered: capitalism as dystopia )

( The part I forgot: gender politics (cn: sexual assault) )

( The question I'm left with: what is this book actually about? )

sanguinity

Intro/FAQ
Days 1-15

zwei_hexen has graciously agreed to host us in August! (Thank you,

sylvanwitch and

ysilme!)

My check-in: Messed about with cables and mics, getting set up for podficcing again. (Hooray, I successfully recorded myself saying 'Hello!') Then, uncertain if podficcing counted or not, started making beta comments for someone else's story. (I know, I know, my own rules say "if you think it counts, it counts" -- but I don't know if I think it counts!)

Day 29:

glinda,

sanguinity

Day 28:

badlyknitted,

brithistorian,

callmesandyk,

carenejeans,

china_shop,

cornerofmadness,

glinda,

goddess47,

nafs,

sanguinity,

sylvanwitch,

trobadora,

yasaman

brightknightie

My copy of OSP Red's Aurora (Volume 1) webcomic compilation is out for delivery. Your copy may be on the shelves at your local bookstore or library by the end of the day, or at least by sometime next week. Or you could just read it instantly and for free online, of course: https://comicaurora.com/books/

She's been publishing 3 pages per week, Monday - Wednesday - Friday, give or take occasional healthy vacation breaks, for ~6 years now.

If you like a motley five-man-band questing party with superhero-team dynamics, power-of-friendship energy, and a self-sacrificing leader in an endangered, pseudo-medieval, fantasy-races, elemental-magic world influenced by everything yet like nothing else ... come play. :-)

sanguinity

Intro/FAQ
Days 1-15

zwei_hexen has graciously agreed to host us in August! (Thank you,

sylvanwitch and

ysilme!)

My check-in: Inspired by how much fun

brithistorian has been having writing pomegaverse these last couple of days, I ditched my other projects and started on my Keep Fandom Weird bingo card. Someone's terrible horrible no good very bad day just got even worse. :-DDDDD

Day 28:

china_shop,

sanguinity

Day 27:

badlyknitted,

brithistorian,

callmesandyk,

carenejeans,

china_shop,

cornerofmadness,

sanguinity,

sylvanwitch,

the_siobhan,

trobadora,

yasaman,

pauraque

This sequel to King's Quest celebrated its 40th anniversary a few weeks ago. It was not my plan to review each game in this series 40 years after its release, but I've done two in a row now so we'll see. (Mark your calendars for my review of King's Quest VIII, coming November 2038!)

graham stands by a bridge with narration box saying it is rickety and asking coyly if the player is entertaining thoughts of crossing it

graham stands by a bridge with narration box saying it is rickety and asking coyly if the player is entertaining thoughts of crossing it

Graham now sits on the throne of Daventry, and it dawns on him that he will need an heir. Rather than sending some random guy on a quest to prove himself like the old king did with him, he opts for the more traditional route of getting married and having kids. Having scoured the kingdom for a suitable bride and come up empty handed, he consults his magic mirror and swipes right on a hot maiden named Valanice. Unfortunately she is currently imprisoned in a crystal tower in the distant land of Kolyma, so Graham puts on his adventuring cap (literally, he takes off his crown and puts on the Robin Hood hat from the first game) and sets off.

( Did you know the Robin Hood hat is called a bycocket? Today I learned. )

King's Quest II: Romancing the Throne is commercially available on GOG in a pack of the first three games for $9.99 USD, though it's also on all the abandonware sites and no one seems to mind.

graycardinal

Reading online this morning, I find news of Tom Lehrer's passing. This is not perhaps unexpected in itself; he had led a long and fruitful life, but it's definitely a moment for reflection, as Lehrer was possibly the cleverest and most literate satirist of our time, not to mention the funniest.

More than usually, though, one of my favorite Diane Duane quotes applies: "What's loved, survives." We still have the music (and that's a very literal "we"; per his Web site, Lehrer a couple of years ago released his entire oeuvre into the public domain.

And in the wake of the news, it turns out he also left behind a (formerly) top secret mathematical joke that took more than half a century to fully detonate. (sanguinity, you should appreciate this....)