And then some

[gwyn]

The inestimable X, whose art is the only thing I have ever written a story to outside of my own inspiration, has a gorgeous new piece up of Mal & Simon at her art site. I'm almost reluctant to encourage people to go, because I know she's had so many people take her art without permission, so just promise me you will go, ogle appropriately, send her fawning feedback, and behave yourself. Because man, oh man, is it a lovely picture, as pretty much all of her stuff is. For some weird reason, I don't seem to be able to write Firefly fic, slash or het, but I confess that if I was going to write anything slashy, it'd probably be Mal/Simon. I honestly don't know why, especially when there's my beloved Adam Baldwin to be had, but... the dynamic between Mal and Simon fascinates me, plus they're always, always having eye sex on the show when Inara's not in the frame with Mal or Kaylee's not there for Simon. And anyway, X's art could make a believer out of anyone.

I am finished with the next chapter of Measure of a Man. I was starting to think I couldn't do it. The sad part is, of course, that it's total pants, and absolutely nothing happens in it, just a bunch of yammering, and it's shorter than the other chapters, so all this sturm und drang for months over writing the stupid thing and it turns out to be this near-drabble pile of marshmallow fluff. Sigh. But hey! Now I can at least tackle it with a red pen and hopefully flesh it out a bit, get it in shape for a beta read (hear that, Ali?)

I decided to splurge and have a massage today because I'm in such extreme pain, and I figured that even though I have no income as such right now, I should in the near future. The therapist was really interesting, very new age woo-woo as one might expect, but she was so into hearing about some of the essays I've had/am having published lately, and we made plans to connect later. It's so odd to meet someone that way (she did an excellent job on my shoulders, too -- the pain is reduced to mere flaming agony as opposed to suicide-contemplation level), but kind of cool, too. Since I'm such a painfully shy person when meeting new people, I often force myself to go to social things so that I can meet new people. It's hard and makes me a nervous wreck, but it has benefits and I otherwise would never meet people if I didn't do stuff like that, plus the bennies can be great, as with my wonderful writing group.

Does anyone know of any sites where a person might be able to get/trade tapes or discs of TV shows eps? I'm in dire need of a couple of eps of Miami Vice to make a vid with, and unfortunately my original off-airs were disposed of by an acquaintance. I can't make the vid witout these eps, and I'm figuring I'll have to make contact with strangers if I want these. I know people with MV eps, but unfortunately they never respond, and I'm getting to that desperate "must vid, must vid now!" stage with this thing.

Oh, and I meant to comment on this earlier. Once in a great while, when I'm feeling down, fan awards can seem like a fun little thing if you need an egoboo. But most of the time I think they're absurd, and I'm always reminded of just how absurd when I get the exceedingly rare nomination for a story and hear what category it's in. Once again, an older Mag 7 story I wrote a couple years ago is being nominated for some silly Mag 7 fan awards, and it's in a category that just makes me want to pound my head against sharp objects. Adult Tear Jerker. I mean, I don't know, I suppose it could be worse, like Pseudo-Porn Consumption Fic or something, but I wonder sometimes if I'm the only person in fandom who just gnashes their teeth at these dumbass categories. Calling this story a tear jerker just... for some reason it really annoys me, it makes it sound like some cheesy Hollywood craptastic romance like Sweet November or I Am Sam or something, and I couldn't possibly have written a story with less intention of jerking any tears if I'd wanted to. Everything about this story -- probably the single thing in fan writing I'm proudest of -- was supposed to be about more than that, and for some reason, it just irrationally annoys me to have such a reductive, smarmy term applied to it. Yes, I know I'm being OTT about it, but... it's also not terribly adult, since there's no sex, just billowing curtains and fade to black (but you know, slash is automatically porn! It's all X-rated even if they don't kiss!), so I guess the two combined sort of get my goat.

Alias was fun tonight -- no spoilers, but I almost felt like they'd gotten an advanced copy of my ten point plan to make it better! They had a couple of my major points, including blowing shit up and fu. I can't say it wasn't still silly and stupid, but it sure was better than it's been all season.

Comments

[onetwomany.livejournal.com]

Ooh, more Measure of a Man. Wohooo! And there's nothign wrong with good yammering. Especially Yammering written by you :)

[morgandawn.livejournal.com]

I have some of MV (alas, not all) on SP tape. We could arrange something -- mailing, you send them back when you are done.

Come to think of it, I should do a check anyway to see what ones I missed. Checked my TIVO and it seems it is no longer airing.

Miami Vice

[morgandawn.livejournal.com]

I checked and I have all but these:

1.12 - Score
4.8 - Rising Sun of Death
4.15 - Honor Among Thieves
4.20 - Deliver Us From Evil
5.6 - Line of Fire
5.20 - Freefall (2 hr finale)

so if you ever find out where to trade/get copies, let me know.

Re: Miami Vice

[gwyn-r.livejournal.com]

Isn't that weird that none of us has the finale? I guess I thought it was so bad, I never bothered with it.

It sounds like you might have the two eps I need most -- Duty and Honor (also called The Savage, for reasons I don't understand, because they changed the name of it later after it started airing again on FX years ago), and Bushido. I have an original NBC off air of Bushido, but it's in pretty bad shape, as all of them are (two head VCR, four hour speed), and i'm planning to use the FX ones (or Spike TV, despite the wretched bug, because ufnortunately I managed to only catch one ep I needed before they stopped airing it. Grrr.

I found a R4 disc from Aus. but the seller doesn't list what's on it, so I have to look into that. I doubt the eps I need are on it, but it might be a feasible plan. Right now I don't even care about bugs so much anymore, even though they're awful, just because I'd like to make this vid that's been in my head for years, and these won't be coming out on disc soon.

Re: Miami Vice

[morgandawn.livejournal.com]

my eps have the TNN logo -- pretty garish and they put a small black matte across the bottom of the screen. It looks almost like a movie - with a bright yellow sticky in the corner.

Re: Miami Vice

[gwyn-r.livejournal.com]

Oh rats. I didn't realize it was the ones with the cut off bottoms. I don't think I can use those, because it's not really something I can fix by filling out the screen or anything, and it's too darn jarring with that text on the bottom. Phoo. I think I may never get to make this vid! There are times I really think about killing the people who lost my tape.

Re: Miami Vice

[morgandawn.livejournal.com]

well not all eps are TNN - some are FX. Send me the names again and I'll check for you.

PS. in FCE you can do a small zoom and remove the cut off bottoms -- with only minimal loss of quality. GF and I are learning a lot about aspect ratios given we're using film from 20 movies or so on Orinicco Flow.

Re: Miami Vice

[barkley.livejournal.com]

I don't know if the rest of it is letterboxed (and it probably isn't) but you can use the letterbox option under "effects" to add black stripes to the top and bottom. That one won't squish it, so it will hide things.

Thhe only Miami Vice episodes I have are the pilot and the one after that (I think - it's about four hours or so) and they're taped in SLP off of FX. I just checked bittorrent to see if they had any that I could grab and mail to you but there weren't any there either. Drats. I would love to see a Miami Vice vid from you.

Re: Miami Vice

[gwyn-r.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I actually thought about that letterbox thing, and then realized I would probably drive myself nuts trying to do it for the whole vid since I'm going to be working with such dramatically different sources. It's going to look like a patchwork crazy quilt, but... oh well.

Every time I hear Red Rain I get consumed all over again by this vid idea, and I just can't stand putting it off anymore!

Re: Miami Vice

[morgandawn.livejournal.com]

you are in luck - Duty & Honor and Bushido are the FX version. Nothing cut off on the bottom (just the lame FX logo in the corner).

Let me know if you still want them.

Re: Miami Vice

[gwyn-r.livejournal.com]

Ahhhhh... falls over in happy coma. I can hardly believe my luck -- not only that you have them, but that it's *you* who has them, my vid buddy!

[sweet-ali.livejournal.com]

(hear that, Ali?)

Loud and clear, my dear :) I shall be waiting.

And you know, i thought the same thing about last night's Alias and youre ten point list. Maybe you should mail it, just in case. After all, they can use all the help they can get.

Hello

[bluefern.livejournal.com]

Your story Mercy Street is lovely! You’ve got a beautiful way with words. I was looking for a Dana/Spike story and yours was perfect. That Peter Gabriel song is one I listen to often. ^_^

I hope it’s alright that I’ve friended you. Your Angel episode reviews are amazing and I’ll most likely just be lurking around…

Re: Hello

[gwyn-r.livejournal.com]

Hi back at ya! Thank you re Mercy Street -- I never would have expected so many people to want to read a story with Dana, it's been a wonderful surprise. I wish there were more than just a few more eps of Angel to review. Sigh.