a vintage year for scoundrels

Handed my dissertation in yesterday! Calloo, callay, etc. I considered doing something to celebrate, but then remembered that I'm going up to London to see Lashings of Ginger Beer Time on Saturday, then possibly seeing King Lear the weekend after (if I get round to organising it, and it's not sold out), then going to Barcelona to see The Sister (WARMTH. SUNSHINE. BRING IT TO ME.), and then it's Vidukon, so... I think I'm sorted, celebration-wise.

Instead I watched a FILM. (This is rare.) It was The Sapphires, about an Aboriginal Australian girl group in the sixties, and I liked it a lot. It had a lot of stuff about race that I am SPECTACULARLY ill-placed to comment on, being a white Englishwoman, and mostly I think it handled it well: ( ok, let's cut for spoilers here ) Basically, if you're looking for a feel good film about women which also has something to say about race, I think you could do a lot worse than try The Sapphires.

- In dissertation news: sent the first draft of my findings chapter to my supervisor. GULP. I'm slightly behind where my plan says I should be, but said plan was deliberately a bit overambitious so I wouldn't panic when I fell behind, so I'm only panicking a little bit. Just a tiny little bit.

- My laptop is slowly dying. (Back up ALL the things!) Does anyone have any advice for speeding up an old laptop? I already have CCleaner and my defragmenter runs regularly. (Could I reformat the hard drive? Would that help?) Failing that, does anyone have any advice for choosing a new laptop? I want it for internets, word processing, image editing, watching TV and vidding, but I have no idea how powerful is the right amount of powerful for all that. I'm planning to get another Dell, as I've had my current one since May 2008 without any major problems, and that's as good a way as any to narrow down my choice. Also, student discount.

- From the department of potentially awesome things, here is the kickstarter for Nine Worlds Geekfest, pan fandom London con like all those massive ones they have in the US, hoping to run this August. I haven't backed it yet, but I'm definitely thinking about it.

1) Last night I read this post about DCU heroines who deserve their own films, and now I want to move to the alternate universe where there's a Birds of Prey film that was done in the same way as the Avengers was in this universe. IT WOULD BE SO GREAT. There'd be individual films for the Birds, starting with Black Canary, and Oracle would have the Nick Fury cameo role... why can't we have this? Why? Not to mention the "Batgirl and Spoiler" idea, YES PLEASE. I've just ordered the two volumes of Batgirl that Spoiler appears in (due to some bitterness over Cass being described as "one of several former (and temporary) Batgirls", TEMPORARY BATGIRL MY FOOT), and I am ridiculously excited about them.

2) Speaking of comics-related things I am overexcited about, ( a spoiler for the Smallville comics, which probably doesn't need to be cut as it's all over the place, but just to be on the safe side )

3) In between flailing about comics, I have been writing the research proposal for my dissertation (due in today). D: IT IS THE WORST. (It is probably not the worst.)

Had an exam yesterday, it was rubbish. Well, it was alright. No, it was rubbish. Either way, it's over now and I can relax a bit, apart from the fact that lectures start again on Wednesday and I have stuff to read for them, and the going to work every day thing, and also my flat's a tip because I've been ignoring things that aren't revision... ANYWAY, I do have a bit more time now to do important things like watch TV. And last night I had time to finish looking at all the fantastic things in my fandom_stocking! ♥ ♥ ♥ I didn't manage to make/write as much stuff as I wanted to for other people, sadly: combination of revision and terrible time management, sorry! I did make some podfics, though, which was a lot of fun (apart from the probably-inevitable moment of "is that really what my voice sounds like? ...oh dear."). Here they are:

Not Only The Rivers Dream
Author: glinda
Reader: usuallyhats
Rating: Teen
Fandom: Doctor Who
Characters: Ace/Kaara
Summary: She carries part of that world with her where-ever she travels, the one who made her part of that world, held safe in her dreams.
Original story | Podfic (3MB, 3:13)

If Love Is A Red Bus
Author: glinda
Reader: usuallyhats
Rating: Teen
Fandom: Doctor Who
Characters: Iris Wildthyme/Sam, Eight/Fitz
Summary: It's draftier than she's used to and the hot water is, if anything, less reliable than in the Doctor's ship.
Original story | Podfic (2.8MB, 3:06)

I have changed ALL MY OPINIONS about Downton Abbey. (Disclaimer: this may be an exaggeration. Verging on a lie.)

( spoilers! Mostly about shipping. )

In other news, term has just started and I am at that stage where I feel like I should be reading ALL the things but I'm not sure yet which things would be best to read. I don't want to leave everything til later in the term but I also don't want to race too far ahead of the lectures or anything. And I have NO IDEA what to write my dissertation on. Well, OK, I do have some ideas, but they are NEBULOUS and RUBBISH.

Have had two weeks of lectures so far! Am enjoying them, though have not quite settled in yet. We are expected to do a lot of extra reading, but I am not quite sure what to read (it is not like English where it just goes: "read book/play/poem, read books/journals about said book/play/poem, go hmmm for a bit, move on with your life), so there is a fair bit of reading ejournals at random and going AAAAARGHHHH. But I got some books out of the library last night, which is a very reassuring thing to do, I find. One of this term's two modules is a management one and my coursework is to write a report; I have no idea what to write it on AAAAARGHHHH. Well, that is not quite true, I have ideas, but they are vague and amorphous (and possibly unworkable), so I need to catch one and pin it down. WITH PINS.

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I am THISCLOSE to finishing a fic (which I have been thisclose to finishing for about a year, I must admit), so this seems like as good a time as any to mention again that I have a beta filter where I post nearly-done fics in the hope that anyone who is passing by and in the mood for some betaing will have a look at them and point out all my terrible errors. If anyone would like to be added to it, just give me a shout - I would be very grateful! It is not what you might call a heavy traffic filter, as you can tell by the fact that this is the first fic I have even come close to posting to it all year. (Yes, I completely flaked out on my tardis_bingo fic. And I still owe people stuff from fandom_stocking. OH SELF.)

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Dear people who walk two abreast along narrowish pavements: if someone (ie me) is walking towards you, you might want to think about activating single file mode, since the other person cannot in fact get any smaller. Hope this is helpful! Love usuallyhats