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Re: today's update -

Pleased to meet'cha, mister. New to the city and you've already seen a body! Ain't life exciting!

Many hours later, and I'm still cackling over this page. Georgie is my new fave.

"'Orrible murder" indeed. Ffffffff-

It's so nice to see updates from this comic. :'D And this page in particular is very... I mean, aside from colourful dialogue, it has some nice movement and so on, I like all the body language and such. 'Course, Elli's art is always lovely.

Brrrr, it's cold! -22C this morning... Getting that smack in the face when you're walking to work sure is a way to wake up. But, enough of that.

☆ Fandom Battle! This is an event in Russian fandom over at diary.ru; the SSSS Team has posted information in English about participation in the Winter edition - I of course can't participate directly via writing (alas) because all submissions have to be in Russian, but I can offer permission for others to do fic translation! So hopefully some people on the SSSS team will have a go at my work. :D It would be so exciting if that happened - this is an event that I've always kind of lurked on the corners of, never really able to join because of the language barrier.

☆ Since I'm on the subject, I'd like to remind everyone that anyone is permitted to translate any of my fanfiction at any time, as long as I'm informed of it. :D (And of course I'll want the link to it, so I can include a link to the translation in my author notes!) ...Anyway.

☆ There is a Kickstarter for the first chapter of Tistow; just under two weeks left, and fully-funded. I'm so glad that there will be a print version of this - Elli's art is so gorgeous, and I want to have it on my bookshelf. <3 Only question is, should I order an extra copy to give away? HMM... I can't decide.

☆ How about that Yuletide, eh? ;V Man, I hope you all who are participating are having an easier time than I am... I don't have much written yet, though it's mostly because I haven't really had the necessary peace and quiet for it. And also, admittedly, because my recip has too many good ideas, and it's hard to make a decision about which to write. (I have a lot of half-baked plot notes. So many.) I'm sure that when I finally sit down and work on it, it'll go great. Usually I end up drafting my Yuletide fic in one or two sessions, and I expect this year it will be the same.

☆ Oh man, the cold and dark is making me so lethargic... I end up wanting to go to bed at 8PM. Brrr. (Maybe I should do that, and end up well-rested for once, instead of only getting 5.5 hours of sleep...)

☆ RL: Grumble mutter municipal election mumblemumble stood in line for an hour BLARGH. Oh well, at least that's over with. I really should have gone with my instincts and voted in advance, I mean, really - ah, well.

☆ More RL: Augh it's getting so dark so early and it's starting to drive me batty already, this bites. But at least it hasn't snowed again. And the moon was so pretty this morning...

☆ Random music rec: Into the Trees by Zoe Keating. 's another good one for those who like cello music. Favourite track on this is, hmm... Probably "Hello Night", or "The Path", or... it's hard to pick one, honestly. They're all lovely. Anyway, yes, give this one a listen if you love beautiful string instrumentals, and cello in particular.

☆ Signups for mini_wrimo are open! It's a bite-sized version of NaNo - the goal is to write something every day; the amount you do is up to you. I don't think I'll be doing this, because I can't manage it every day (though I'm going to try anyway) but I figured that perhaps some of you would be interested in it.

☆ Speaking of NaNo... hooo boy, I'm not sure what I'm even going to do. I kind of want to try to write 20k, but who knows? 5k is probably more realistic. WE WILL SEE. (Come to think of it, I... should check to see if there will be write-ins in my town again. At a time that I can attend, that is. Hmm.)

☆ Tistow: Ahhh so, Elli's started posting it! Finally! Yay! First page* is the only one up for now, but she'll be posting one every two days until the 31st. Fooor those who don't know, Tistow is a comic inspired by Victorian England, with a focus on the working class. Identity will also be a major theme. And there'll be a dollop of magic as well, a bit later on. So, if that sounds interesting, perhaps check on the 31st when the first 8 pages will all be up - or read along as they get posted. <3 (Also, have I mentioned that Elli's art is gorgeous? Because it sure is gorgeous. Hooo boy. If you like pretty webcomics, well, here's one.)

Today was kind of stressful for a whole bunch of reasons. Plus, we had a ton of smoke blowing in from BC, so it was dark and smokey on top of that. Lovely. But! There are also lots of nice little things, so I'm going to concentrate on that instead.

✿ I found out that there is a lovely little walkway down by the Snye! Normally, I don't go to that area - when I was growing up, that part of the city was kind of sketchy. But it's really clean and nice now. Hopefully it won't be so smokey tomorrow; it would be so nice to go down there in the morning for a good, long walk.

✿ I asked directions from a stranger, and Did Not Die. (...I unfortunately didn't find the thing that I was looking for, either, but that's not the point.)

✿ To reward myself for Not Dying, I had cake. And it was delicious. Chocolate and raspberry with white chocolate shavings, mmm... It was quite a cake, though. I kind of wish I could have shared with someone (but only kind of). It was a lot of cake for one man to handle. (But I defeated it! So. ;V )

✿ Did a little bit of driving practice today! Result: I Did Not Die, I did not damage the vehicle, my mother did not have a heart attack, and I did not have to go out into the smokey air for a second time! Groceries were obtained! Practical left-turn practice happened! Driving during construction also happened! ... xD It was a short but fruitful session.

✿ There was a LGBT display at the library (yay!) and one of the books they had available was the manga My Brother's Husband by Gengoroh Tagame. Started reading it this afternoon; holy shit, is this manga ever adorable. And it isn't all that often that I get to read about a Canadian character in works by authors from outside Canada, so that is really nice. (Though I must admit that I find it funny that the first thing out of Mike's mouth is... profuse apologies. xD It makes sense with the situation but ffffff. Very Canadian.)

✿ It's always so nice to be able to watch artists streaming while they work. <3 Caught some of Elli's stream yesterday and today, and it's just very relaxing to watch. Plus, getting previews of what people are working on is always cool. I am SO happy to hear about the Tistow bookmark set (even though it will be a while before this comes out xD ) Prints are lovely, but kind of a pain because I have so little room in my living space. But bookmarks, now, THAT's something that I have room for, AND something I can use. Most excellent.

✿ I'm going to try a new brownie recipe tomorrow! This one, which is gluten-free and uses black beans in place of flour. I don't have GF requirements, but the idea of using beans as a flour replacement just seemed really interesting to me, so I'm looking forward to trying it. Plus, my pal Tesla recommended this one, soooo hopefully it'll turn out as nice for me as it did for her. Have any of you tried something similar?

So. Yes. Lots of nice little things. I feel pretty good. Have a nice weekend, everyone. <3