girlofprey

I had tuna fishcakes for tea tonight, but when I got them they were a bit cool. Mum made them so I assumed they'd just been left out for a little while when she was doing other things. It only occurred to me after a while that they'd been frozen, and might just not have been cooked through properly. So now I'm concerned about the food poisoning. Still eating though.

Things that have happened lately that I took note of:

• Microsoft have apparently dropped or debunked a bunch of the features in the Xbox One that everyone was furious about, which is probably for the best. The camera and microphone that watches you all the time can apparently be switched off in the menu - if you remember to do that; you can trade in and play used games, but only with 'selected retailers'; and the fact that it was going to need to 'check in' with the Microsoft online servers once every 24 hours or it wouldn't let you play offline, which they seemed adamant about, has now apparently been changed. That last fact is pretty good, since it apparently pissed off every army in the world. I'm still not planning on getting an Xbox One right now, mostly because I have a Playstation and I'd like to stick with them. Although Microsoft's tendency to use their money to buy exclusives for insanely popular games might one day change my mind - people have been talking about Fallout 4 being an Xbox One exclusive lately, although they've also pointed out that even if it was you'd probably still be able to get in on PC. But regardless, it's nice to know that Microsoft are actually listening to people, and capable of not being so crazy.



• ( Kickstarter did something terrible, cut for sexual assault, rape culture and misogyny )



• I love this girl:
  
  
  Watch on YouTube



• Interesting history and the films that are being made based on it.



• This cartoon about birth control:
  
  
  
  

In other news, tonight David Platt picked up Becky's sledgehammer. Reason #538 why they should have been friends.

And Despicable Me 2 is out next week. And the week after there's Now You See Me, the film about magician thieves with Dave Franco in it, and The Internship. I feel ambivalent about The Internship, ever since another internet article pointed out there are no films out at the moment in most of America about a woman or a group of women, and I realised it was also true of England, or at least my bit of it from what I could see. And The Internship does like a film about two guys, hanging around with a bunch of other people who are mostly guys, trying to prove they are still worthwhile/man enough to have around. But on the other hand, Vince Vaughn is in it, and seems to be playing a part that doesn't mostly involve being a dick, unlike a lot of his roles nowadays. So I will probably give it a watch after all, if I have time.

My parents are home. My mum said they'd probably be back by about 3pm, but just I was getting ready to come downstairs at about quarter to 2 I saw them pulling into the driveway. Almost the first thing my mum said to me as she came in was how horrible it had been - while laughing - and showing me her bitten-off fake nails. I get the feeling I made a wise decision not to go with them.

At first the kids stayed for a bit, while mum and dad unpacked and sorted out which things were theirs and which weren't. While mum and dad were sorting things out the kids were basically demanding to go home, and when everything was unpacked and my parents were ready to take them, they were demanding to stay. I beat a hasty retreat to my bedroom. Where I have been pretty much ever since, apart from going down for dinner. I think everything's basically back to normal now though.

What I do want to say is that this week I was largely entertained by Got To Dance semi-finals, which they repeated on Sky 1 every day this week. I LOVE GOT TO DANCE SO MUCH. I love all the judges. And we have some amazing amateur dancers in the UK. The only real low point was that each of the judges performed a dance themselves on each show, and Kimberley went first, and she is basically my favourite judge and was going to be doing some contemporary dancing, which she originally trained in, and I was really excited...and then her dance turned out to be slightly racist. The staging at least. It wasn't like the worst thing I'd ever seen, but it leaned pretty heavily on the 'problematic and kind of appropriative' line. Which was a shame. Apart from anything else, I couldn't concentrate on her dancing, like I wanted to, because I kept getting distracted by how awful it was. Oh well. Later on in the week she did another dance with Adam Garcia, although it was more along the lines of her commercial dancing. But it was also less racist. Which was nice.

Anyway. The show itself made me grit my teeth repeatedly, because of their habit of making all the contestants read and look at a few of the Twitter/Facebook/livechat comments about them online after they get their judges' comments. Which Davina McCall makes them read, and reads out LOUDLY AND MEANINGFULLY. Every time it happened I basically wanted to smash up my TV. Also I really hate the way they 'excitingly edit' dance routines on shows like that. Maybe it's just my OCD talking, wanting everything to be the same, and I've probably complained about it before on other dance shows. But I just think that performances like that are meant to be watched on a stage, where they are performed. By members of the audience who have one vantage point, and only one, all the way through. Not constantly cutting to an overhead shot, and then swirling round them. JUST LET ME WATCH THE DANCING. FROM THE FRONT. So yeah. That was annoying.

But mostly it was lovely, and showed me some amazing dancing. Like, some beautiful poledancing:





And Hoofing, which is a style of dance I didn't even know about:



All of which was lovely. And Adam Garcia did a performance that kind of blew me away. Which was odd, because of the three judges, he's probably my 3rd favourite. I still love him, but you know, Kim and Ashley. But still. And then he and Kim danced together. And Ashley was obviously so sad not to be dancing with them. THEY EACH PROMISED HIM ONE DAY THEY WOULD DANCE WITH HIM. I love them. Apparently they are adding a fourth judge in the next series. I am mostly excited by this, for some reason, but also slightly worried it will ruin the current brilliance of them. DON'T RUIN THE CURRENT BRILLIANCE OF THEM. That is all.

ETA: I am wrong - the new judge is replacing Adam, who has left for...reasons. See, this is why he is my 3rd favourite. Maybe. The new judge is a guy from JLS. I am slightly more apprehensive about what the new series and judge-dynamic could be like now. But. It could still be GREAT.

A list of things I was going to post earlier because basic reactions were all I had, but you can have them now just because:

• Vera is amazing. The show and the lady.



• I am annoyed with Infamous, because it has so many problems and is kind of shit, but I also really enjoy playing it, and like the story-telling, if not the story, and now I have a pairing. A pairing with no fandom. Home at last.



• There is no kink meme for Infamous, but there is for the game it's apparently constantly having fights with.



• However, I've decided Infamous is probably the most difficult fandom there is to Google, especially when it comes to kink memes, because almost everyone non-fannish who talks about a fandom's kink meme seems to describe it as 'infamous'.



• I really think I would be less annoyed about Infamous if more people talked about the problems with it, in a way that didn't make me think it was just me, and in a way that there was a good chance of the creators seeing it, so there was just a chance they would try not to make the same mistakes next time. There isn't even an 'Unfortunate Implications' link on the TV Tropes page, and they tend to be pretty good about things like that.



• I did find the last pigeon in Infamous though. Hurray!



• I commissioned a piece of work from an artist on Etsy. But apparently she just got a deal with a children's publisher, and has been working to deadline, and - even though she's apparently done it - she keeps forgetting to talk to me about it. This wouldn't be so bad, except one of my emails got lost on it's way to her before, or 'buried in her inbox', so whenever there's a long gap in emails, I'm never sure if she's just busy, or actually hasn't seen it.



• I still haven't seen the film I was planning to see for ages, Lockdown, with Guy Pearce and Peter Stormare in it.



• The Avengers film is out (I think), and I still haven't seen Captain America. I did not realise it was coming out as soon as April. However, given how popular it already is, chances are it will be in cinemas for a while. However, given how long it sometimes takes me to watch one film, never mind two, that might not necessarily help.



• On the plus side, I've been largely ignoring the long, long pre-release buzz, so maybe I can mostly ignore the post-release buzz until I've seen it as well.



• There also doesn't appear to be a Prison Break kink meme. That seems impossible to me. I was going to say that, well, it started in 2005, so maybe it just didn't quite catch that boat. But then just the other day I found out there was a Kiss Kiss Bang Bang kink meme. So I don't know. Unless I'm just not googling properly.



• Guess which Playstation game I'm playing at the moment? If you guessed "Saints Row 2 again, because you love it", you are correct. If you also guessed "Shadows Of The Damned, because you saw it on Two Best Friends Play and it looked wicked", you are also correct. But that's a bit creepy. Shadows Of The Damned has a non-white main character. In terms of race, it's already streets ahead of Infamous. There is some slightly odd stuff about his white (white, white!) girlfriend who he almost constantly refers to as 'Angel' though. Hmm.



• I hate my dad slightly less now. He's still a cunt though.



• There are about five million dance shows on pretty much this month and next, mostly in London or other parts of the country where I don't live, which I'd really like to go see, but it's really just not feasible at all. Really. Which kind of sucks.



• I don't feel like throwing up anymore. This day is looking up.

( Further thoughts on Coronation Street )

Well. I've pretty much enjoyed this week of Coronation Street, even with it's occasional lows, anyway.

Also, some Emmerdale news! ( Possible future Emmerdale casting/return spoiler )

Also, I'd like to tell you that in the end I just gave up and decided to open the MP3 player and start using it. I've been gearing up to buy it for a while, and the one from the website wouldn't come for at least 3-5 days, and I'm going on holiday in two weeks, so I don't really want to be messing about or possibly missing the return date. And it's only £10, and I didn't go to the cinema this week, so it probably evens out. I'll probably be annoyed if I have to pay for another customs charge on some Threadless t-shirts though. Growl.

The only problem now is that I've plugged it in to charge, and the only user's manual I got is a tiny booklet that explains what the buttons are for, so I'm not really sure how I'll be able to tell when it's charged. Hmm.

I want to go check if So You Think You Can Dance is on now. I don't think I ever said how sad I was about Charlotte going last week. It's really kind of a shame that the first week she wasn't with Matt, she got pretty bad comments for pretty much all her dances, and then got sent home. But I could kind of see some shortfalls in her dances compared to some of the other girl's dances. I have decided that Matt is my favourite now. Especially after that boys' group dance. With Kirsty coming in probably second. And Lee B probably in third. Ironically, I decided I quite liked Bethany Rose last week, for the first time, while she was doing her hip-hop dance, which the judges hated. I get the feeling Katie will win though. Partly because she's a really good dancer, partly because she's quite pretty, and partly because she's been pretty popular all the way through. I'll still probably be watching until the end though (or until all my favourites go, if that happens, I guess).

So. I've had an interesting and full day. I went to the doctor's this morning, and got my second sicknote. Which was nice, because my mum seemed to think that the doctor I was going to see wasn't someone thought much of mental health issues, or something. She said she'd seen him with my grandma sometimes, and he seemed to be of the opinion that people should just get on with things. But he turned out to be really nice. He asked what the problem was, whether I'd been working before my OCD 'flared up', and where I was supposed to be heading with the sicknote and benefits and stuff. I said OCD, that no I'd mostly been unemployed for the last year or so, and that I was on the waiting list for some counselling, and they'd said they were meant to be contacting me in mid-April, so hopefully I'd hear from them soon. And he said okay, and gave me a sicknote. Hurrah.

But due to some mix-ups with me and mum, who'd given me a lift to the doctors and then went shopping, and me having not much credit on my phone and not calling her when I got out of the doctors, in favour of going to buy some toothpaste, and my phone being on silent so I didn't hear when she tried to call me, she ended up driving home from town without me. Which meant I had to get a £1.30 bus journey home, and then walk back from the stop, with my OCD kicking in all the way. Which led to me crying on the bus and in the street. And then at home when I sort of confronted my mum about it. It probably wouldn't have been so bad, but I really didn't expect her to go without me, even if I didn't call her; and I have no idea what it is, but I had the sheets changed on my bed the other night for the first time in a while, and the duvet sort of moved around so it's not so heavy, and since then I've had really weird unsettled sleep, waking up every few hours; and after I got upstairs after talking to my mum I started having some adbominal twinges, which suggest I'm going to be having a period soon. We sorted it all out, she came upstairs and we hugged, and I apologised for crying at her, and she apologised for going home without waiting to speak to me. I do think it was a bit weird of her, but I probably overreacted a bit, and we got it all sorted out.

Anyway. But then, my mum informed me that unfortunately, today was the day when we - or my mum and my dad - were meant to be taking both my nephews off my sister and her partner's hands so she and he could have some time together alone. My parents did this a few weeks ago, and I assumed it was a one-off, but apparently no, it's something they're meant to be doing every month. So. Anyway. My mum said that she and my dad would take them out, so I wouldn't need to see them or play with them until the evening when they came back to the house for their tea. But they were planning to take them to Halfords for some helmets to ride on their bikes with, and then to the park. And then it started raining in the afternoon, so they ended up bringing them back here. It wasn't too bad though, there were a few fights and tears, and then the rain stopped and they went out to play on their bikes and there was a bit more bad behaviour, and then it was about time for them to go home, and then there was a lot of bad behaviour. But they were pretty okay most of the time. It did feel like a different day to the one where I went to town this morning though. But anyway. Then my parents and I had our tea and watched tonight's So You Think You Can Dance. I disagree with the judges pretty often in that show, but I do tend to enjoy the dances. Especially the hip hop dances. I might start trying to watch that regularly again.

And then I came upstairs and went on my computer, and started listening to the rest of the Adam and Joe Show from today that I missed on the radio today. Hurrah.

In between all of that I have been watching more old Coronation Street episodes I have found on Youtube. Oh. I have found things I had almost forgotten about, and things I never saw and wished I did. I did not get to see the episode where David and Gary met for the first time, but I saw the episode where the Windasses moved in next door to the Platts/Mcintyres. It's weird how crazy and violent Gary was when he first came to the street. In some ways I kind of miss crazy thuggish Gary and evil mastermind David, who were obsessed with each other. Always with the underlying feeling that if some greater evil, like a MOTORCYCLE GANG came to the street, they might band together, and become an unstoppable two-boy gang. It's nice to see it though. I just recently saw the episode where David freaked out at his mum for letting Anna hug her, because he can't stand the idea of 'physically touching' one of the Windasses. Oh. And it's sort of the start of Steve and Becky's relationship, properly, and oh God. The first time they properly deliberately had sex, and it wasn't just a drunken mistake, Becky stopped and wasn't sure what she was doing because she'd never had sex sober. OH. In some ways Steve was her first. And these are also the episodes with Sad Detective Maria, who's convinced that Tony is a murderer and had Liam killed, and everyone else is just telling her she's mad. I'd almost forgotten how great she was then. It's weird, but even now, watching it back, I kind of hope she uncovers Tony's lies and gets him sent to prison. Even knowing like I do what happens later, and loving it so much. It's just good writing I guess. I LOVE OLD CORONATION STREET. I AM GOING TO KEEP WATCHING TO SEE WHAT HAPPENS AND WHAT HAPPENED.

I have come back from my weekend in London with cakesy. Over the weekend, I:

• Went to see Love and War by the Mark Bruce Company, which I loved, with K. It was a little bit nerve racking at first because K and I didn't really agree on a place to meet up, specifically, we just said at King's Cross at about 6.30. Then she called me at 6.25 when I was on a train, just about to pull in, to say her phone was really low on battery, but that she was there, and she said she'd wait at the tube station, opposite where the ticket-buying place was. It turns out there's quite a few tube station entrances near to where you can buy tickets. And her phone was off when I tried to call again. I basically couldn't find her, and ended up having to go to the theatre to pick up our tickets, and I didn't know exactly where the theatre was, just that it was close by. It ended up being easy to find, thankfully, but K wasn't there, and she didn't turn up while I was waiting for her outside. Eventually I went inside, and the show was a bit delayed, and as I was sat there waiting for it to begin K suddenly walked over and asked for her ticket so she could give it to the nice ticketman who'd let her come in to find me. She'd been considering giving up, but then just went to an internet cafe, found out where the theatre was and come to find me. It turned out she didn't know there was a ticket buying place in King's Cross King's Cross, and had been waiting at the one in St Pancras. But anyway. She made it, and we had a great time, and the show was good, yay!



• I had found out just before I came to London that Luke Rattigan was in a play, over the weekend, in London. And it was basically right next to where me and cakesy were already going to see a comedy show later that night. And she is kind and said yes, of course we can go, Rachael. So we went to see Luke Rattigan in a play. And it was very good, and he was good, and it was about gay people and gay rights in the last few decades, and when he was in the audience pretending to be a protester at an anti-gay show thing, he made out with another actor about two rows down from me. It was quite good. And the play was good. And he was good.



• And then later on that night, as I said, we went to a comedy thing, which cakesy had agreed to, once again, because it was Tom Stade, and he was on in London the weekend I was in London, and I kind of love him. And he was great, and he didn't tell any jokes playing on the word 'faggot', hurrah, and he kept picking on a guy in the front row who he informed us all was called 'Heroin Jim'. Oh the things he and Heroin Jim had been up to. He was brilliant. I love him. Except for that one joke. And THEN a man came on doing comedy and magic tricks, and THEN Paul Sinha came on, and he was pretty funny too. Hurrah.

And in between all of that, cakesy and I watched Blades of Glory, and about 2 and a third seasons of The Office (US). Ryan is my favourite, he is young and smart and kind of amoral, but also I love Dwight, and I love Toby, and I love Oscar, and I love Angela, and I love Phyllis, and I love Stanley, and I love Pam sometimes, and I love Michael sometimes. AND OH. Pam was in Blades of Glory too, it turned out. That was quite suprising and special. Hurrah. So all in all, I had a good weekend.

Things I have decided there should be:

• A website place, sort of like imdb, where you can check to find out if actors you like are on stage any time soon. Finding out just afterwards, sometimes, is not really good enough in my opinion.


• A Disney kink meme. I cannot be the only one who thinks this, right? I mean, I probably could be, but I would prefer not to be. DISNEY KINK. COME ON.


• Office AUs. The ones I came up with so far are:
  
  • Desert island
  
  
  • Michael is a pimp and the rest of the office are his hos.
  
  
  • Crime syndicate
  And probably a bunch of others I can't remember now.

And, ( Coronation Street tonight )

I just watched The Apprentice Does Comic Relief, but Jonathon Ross did keep me from enjoying most of it. Jack Dee sort of made up for it. But anyway. The point of this post is that I have been around doing stuff. This stuff is:

• I had my first Jobseeker’s appointment for my current claim on Monday, and I gave in the book with my little diary in it as I came in, and when I got called to the person seeing me's desk, he asked me how the job search was going, told me about a Jobseeker's job that I'd already heard about, had me sign the little signing on form, and told me I could go. IT WAS A WHOLE NEW EXPERIENCE IN JOBCENTRE APPOINTMENTS FOR ME. I liked it. I get the feeling the appointments will get longer as the claim goes on, however.



• I saw Watchmen on Monday. I really quite liked it. Well, apart from ( Spoilers )
  . I'm speaking as someone who has not read the book, though, I read a few pages a couple of months ago and liked it but never got around to finishing it, so I don't really know what issues there were about adapting the comic to the screen, or (I assume) shortening the story. But as a film, I thought it worked really well, and I didn't feel lost for not having read the book. And no, I really liked it. It will probably surprise no-one that I liked Rorschach the best, and I thought Jeffery Dean Morgan was great even if the character of the Comedian is a bit 'hmm'.
  
  What I'd like to know now is if there's an AU out there where it's just the masked heroes and Doctor Manhattan never existed. I get that the story is mostly about nuclear power and the bomb and stuff, but from a character point of view, since they don't seem to actually be super-powered like I was sort of expecting them to be. ( Vague spoilers for the plot )



• I went to see Northern Ballet Theatre's Swan Lake on Tuesday, even though I probably can't afford it. But I missed the one on at Christmas, and I did want to see a traditional version. It turned out this wasn't a traditional version at all, they'd changed the story so it was about an 1920s/1930s-ish boy in a wealthy family whose brother drowns in a lake on their estate one night while they're both out playing, and who then grows up into a teenager struggling with this tragedy and homosexual feelings for his best friend, and who sees visions of swan maidens one night when he's upset and sitting by the lake. It was very good though, I really enjoyed it. I really like ballet, it's just a shame it's so expensive. Oh well.



• Speaking of dance-y things though: Sadler's Wells, what is up with you putting on the very shows I'd like to see at a time when I can least get to them or afford them? A Flamenco festival. An entire festival of flamenco, just as I found out I couldn't go see that Tango show I wanted to in April because it's sold out. Beginning THIS WEEKEND. Honestly. Is there a flamenco festival in Nottingham? No. Is there a tango festival on in Nottingham anytime soon? No, but there's apparently a show on in London in, oh, a few weeks time. I suppose I should just take the ballet and the dance things that are on in Nottingham and be happy with them, and possibly get a job so I can go to these other things. Still. Hmph.



• On the other hand, I was looking up British lighthouses, and I found out about one in Whitley Bay that's decommissioned, and which visitors can go look round at low tide. it turns out it's about one stop down on the metro from where you have to get off to get to the hotel for Connotations. I might go and have a look around it if I have time before the con starts. Rah.



• And I finally watched Mohabbatein, some weeks after whatho sent me the discs. ( Spoilers )
  . whatho, I will mail it back sometime next week probably. THANK YOU FOR LENDING IT TO ME. Sorry for keeping it for a bit.



• Tomorrow and next week my plan is to actually get around to applying for some jobs. I get the feeling I should be getting a move on with that.

::love::