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And now I'm hooked on White Collar. And do not have time to finish watching the season right now and that makes me grumpy.
Anyway, I think I'm going to be a bit of a freak in this fandom for a few reasons, the most important being that as much as Matt Bomer is hella dreamy...I think I'm more of a Peter girl. It took me several episodes to realize this, but seriously. PETER <3 <3 <3
If anybody sets up an RP comm Peter's username should be istealforneal just because that would make my fucking day.

Good things:
-I think I'm going to actually really enjoy writing my final lit theories paper (!). I'm actually worried at this point about keeping it short enough when I'm not even positive what my thesis is yet.
-I'm in the possession of two very big bang-workable plot bunnies. I've already signed up for scifibigbang but haven't begun to narrow down what I'll actually be doing for it. But every time there's any kind of update at startrekbigbang I'm just like OMGSOEXCITED and have to tell myself sign-ups aren't even for one or two more months, CALM THE HELL DOWN. Hopefully my productivity lines up with good timing, not only in terms of getting stuff done but not getting stuff done too early...
-The weather. I know everyone else gets anxious and just wants to go frolic outside when it starts to feel like spring, but for some reason when it's nice out that's when I get the most done. Cause I'm all happy and LA LA WHO CARES YAY STUDYING!

I absolutely hate that every once in a while I figure out that there is a Limp Bizkit song that I like. And that I've been listening to "Radio Is Dead" on repeat for like half an hour. And appreciating the irony that it was never a hit.
I'm recalling that my best friend's dad reportedly went through a Limp Bizkit phase, which is still funny.

I wish I had time to put up a big long reaction post after catching up on the episodes, but I will leave it at: CAPRICA IS GOOD. I haven't shipped an already married pairing so much like ever. Once upon a time I shipped Don/Betty, though :( Or is it Bettie. I think it's Betty.
Anyway, I'm starting to realize that grief is kind of an exceptionally interesting thing to me in terms of what fiction deals with. Obviously it's really hard to convey it as something other than a hard-to-watch angstfest, but when it's done well...Yes. BSG was always kind of intriguing to me in that it was basically an entire cast of grieving characters (+ Baltar? LOL) from the start. The opinions of other viewers that annoyed me the most were the ones that seemed to fail to take this into account.

And then of course exile/separation/expatriation/things-that-mean-you-can't-go-home-again which are always the perfect recipe for slightly angsty but golden character growth are like YES YES GRABBY HANDS GIVE IT TO ME YES.
And um, current plot bunny that I've been writing snippets of in the middle of my classes is sorta guilty of this tendency. FML, why can't I just write some fluff every once in a while.

As I write more, I'm starting to realize my word choices are driven very much by what I think sounds good, almost in a poetic sense. This means my writing is most likely robbed of any words I just don't like the sound of. As I was reading a Margaret Atwood story the other day, I came across the phrase "he'll be bald as an egg" and my mind immediately was like, Ew, no. I don't like the word "egg" at all. It's such a weak word for metaphors. Okay, "egg" is not a very valuable addition to vocabulary, as I would obviously have no aversion to using it literally ("he picked up eggs at the store"), cause in that case it's like...not my fault. But I have found that I, as well as a lot of other people, really hate the word "tender." I often write a sentence like, "He tenderly handled..." and then end up backspacing and replacing it with "gently" because I REALLY HATE THAT WORD. It just reminds me of a steak or something when I read it. Like, I'm holding you in the same way that I chew on my filet mignon, baby.

I have arrived at the fact that I am really not sure whether I am ever going to finish my super-long QAF W.I.P. There are several...problems...with it. I recently saw a comment - I think it was somewhere in qaf_marathons - when someone said that she is dissatisfied with the plethora of AU fics that don't recognize the automatic result of the alterations they'd made as a result of relationships developing in different ways. Certain questions have to be considered, such as, "Would Brian have taken as much of a part in Gus's life if Justin hadn't been around?", because Brian's actions, particularly, are often influenced by other people in his life, if they are important. The problem with my fic is not that I didn't consider these things, but that perhaps the result of distorting canon in the way that I did leads to an alternate universe that maybe nobody wants to read. I decided that if such-and-such happened, Justin Taylor would not be the Justin that we know, but does anybody want to read a story in which Justin isn't Justin, and more importantly, do I want to write it? And is it even possible for my au jus to come through and recover himself in a way that does justice to the bravery and independence that was so strongly attached to his character in the show? I guess it's not surprising that the thing is starting to seem a lot longer than I expected it to be (though not exceptionally long compared to other fics I've seen by any stretch), when the process of developing a relationship in the given situation would realistically be no less than an extremely gradual process.

I'm not really agonizing over this at all; the muse has gone on quite a respite and I'm mainly planning out my most recent plot bunny. I think I'm doing an overall better job now of thinking about the process of writing a longer fic, which is something I've never completed before (the kind of overwhelming unfamiliarity of it is part of the reason the other AU is kind of a mess). I often find that a change of location kind of alters my writing psyche or whatever-the-fuck, sometimes in a good way and sometimes not. I'm always coming up with new ideas when I'm on vacations, sleeping in unfamiliar towns. But my mind was completely dead the night I moved into my dorm.