girlofprey

Hello! I haven't been around for a bit. I got really into Fallout 3 after it got suddenly emotionally harrowing. Also I broke into the kink meme because I needed some hurt/comfort and tales of companionship like, badly. But now I've finished the main quest! And got a new friend. And have a new weird pairing to keep me warm at night. And a slightly less weird pairing! It's all very good.

I want to say that I really love Bethesda games. I have no idea how much input into storylines and stuff they have, or whether or not they suck in many many others ways, but I like the fact that in their games, they make a point of not really having anyone be The Good Guys or The Bad Guys. In Fallout 3, the bad guys/enemies had a few moments of goodness, or moral ambiguity at least. And there were quite a few times when the supposed good guys acted like jerks. And I really love them for doing so. Hurrah.

I did not watch the Olympics opening ceremony. Or any of the Olympics really so far. Mum asked me if I wanted to watch the ceremony with her, and I kind of did, especially after all the good things people said about China last time. But then I noticed that it was three hours long. And then I decided I'd rather be playing computer games. But I've seen bits and pieces of the good bits. And I read my Twitter feed afterwards. It was kind of hilarious how often my flists' comments matched up with Ryan Sampson's. I think it gave a good impression of what it was probably like to watch.

I am still watching Poltergeist: The Legacy. It got so much better when I learned to just ignore the bits with Derek and Philip in them. Recently, they've decided that rather than keep Derek 'mysterious', they will give him characterisation in the form of relationships/UST with a number of women-of-the-week who are considerably younger than him. I can't believe I didn't realise how shit he was when I was younger. Also I can't believe I didn't remember how bizarre their mansion is. They have servants. Actual servants like, wandering in with tea every now and then. Multiple servants. And peacocks! And yet their Secret Society is a secret, I say! Except probably to all the servants, who are around all the time.

In other news, my home life gotten a bit topsy turvy. My sister and her partner and kids have moved into the new house, finally, and it's the summer holidays, and the kids are acting up and apparently my sister can't really cope. So my mum has basically sort of decided to have them every weekday, when their dad's at work. She has list with things to do on for every day of the summer holidays I think, minus the week when she and dad are taking ON and MN to the lake district for a week. I have no idea if she actually planning to carry this out, or if things will settle down, but she was pretty much at my sister's house most of the day every day last week, until some sort of fight happened, I think. And this week we've had at least one kid over every day so far. So yeah. It seems to be the plan for the moment. And I wouldn't mind, but when she makes these plans she always asks me and drops hints about whether I want to come, I think because she'd like an extra hand with them. But none of it's my fault, and I've already told her I don't feel able to hang out with the kids every day, and it's not like she asks me before she makes all these plans. So whatever. But it's what's happening so far.

Anyway. I'm going away this weekend, so chances are I probably won't be around again for another few days. Oh! Also, Vexed is coming back, which is a series I thought was cancelled forever, and asked a friend to help me get the first three episodes on DVD, because the company went bankrupt and I figured they'd never officially come out. But no, they've released a DVD of series 1, and they're about to broadcast a new series. But without Lucy Punch. WHAT IS THE POINT WITHOUT LUCY PUNCH? She was like the best thing in it, and the main draw for me. Probably there were scheduling conflicts or something. But still. WHAT IS THE POINT WITHOUT LUCY PUNCH? Man.

Internet wasn't working again this morning. But now...it is. Okay. I'm not exactly complaining.

On the other hand, while I was on internet blackout last night I started watching Season 1 of Poltergeist: The Legacy again. One of my favourite fantasy/horror shows I used to watch when I was young. It's a weird combination of half shit, and half amazing. Which is basically as I remembered it. There was some stuff that happened that I did somehow forget about, but happily they did pretty well with it for a fantasy/horror show I think, and bothered to handle the consequences at least a little bit. The main thing that's pleasing though is that Nick is still pretty. As is Rachel. One of the other characters, however, seems to be a bit bipolar, on rewatching. But I never cared for him that much anyway. My favourite bit so far: the tent that somehow had a fax machine in it. Awesome.

My sister and her family are supposed to be moving into their new house (the one nearer to us) this weekend. My mum said something about just getting my YN and getting out of the way, so they can focus on moving instead of watching him. But that didn't happen, and she's been out all day, she just came back about half an hour ago. Oh well. But still. Supposedly they're supposed to be all moved in by tomorrow.

Also in Fallout 3, I finally caught up with my father. It turns out he's a bit of a dick. Oh well.

We went to Cannon Hall Farm on Saturday. It was only a slight debacle - my mum was working until 2 o'clock, and the night before I asked mum if she'd told dad what was happening, and she said yes, and that morning I asked dad if he knew where we were going, and he said yes. But mum didn't know dad was expecting her to call when she got out of work, rather than just turning up at 2.15 like she'd told him. And then when we picked her up, dad didn't know we were going all the way to Barnsley, he thought we were just going to a local farm shop, and he didn't know exactly where it was and he didn't have his sat nav. I ended up looking up the webpage on my mum's slightly old-fashioned phone, and we ended up driving up and down looking for it for about half an hour, on the right main road but on the wrong side of Barnsley. But anyway. We got there in the end. At about 10 to 4 when my mum hadn't had any lunch and they were claiming the cafe would stop serving food at 4 o'clock. But everything was fine. And I had some quite nice onion rings.

And when we got into the farm there were plenty of animals and baby animals about. Baby goats, a few baby donkeys, piglets, one single calf, and lambs, lambs everywhere. Right up to proper newborns that had apparently only been born the night before. The goats were probably the best value for money - they all kept fighting each other, even the ones that looked heavily pregnant, and they had just two kids running around, harassing the adults, sneaking under fences and leaping up in the air. The lambs did plenty of springing up and down though. And in one building there was this one single little chick running around on it's own. Apparently it's brothers and sisters hadn't hatched yet, and it didn't need it's parents around, so it was just there on it's own in a pen. I hope it has some company by now. Or soon. Also we were promised baby llamas, but we didn't see any. Only adults, hanging out with goats and looking like they might spit at any moment.

Also I have started playing Infamous 2. I had sort of forgotten how much fun it is playing Infamous. I have some issues with the story, but the gameplay, kdjfslk. It's basically just flipping around and having superpowers. Playing as a guy who can be either good or evil, so they have him just be sort of flippant and annoyed as a baseline. Annoyed but basically good superheroes are one of my favourite things. Also, I think the games are really good because you always play in a city, and they REALLY go to the trouble of making their cities beautiful. I mean, it's not like it's all their own idea. The first game is set in "Empire City", which BEARS NO RELATION TO NEW YORK, and the second game is set in "New Marais", which BEARS NO RELATION TO NEW ORLEANS. But also the graphics are beautiful, and all the building sort of look like they're part of the same neighbourhood but are all different, and they have billboards and ads around, and little details like plants climbing up walls and grills on the windows and stuff. It's lovely. I really love the Infamous games.

I'm also waiting for a game to download, which is why I'm writing a slightly rambly post. Black March is also over, and I went a whole month without buying any entertainment products, which is quite a long time for me, woo hoo! I've also gotten interested in Prison Break, after finding out that Peter Stormare is in it, but the boxsets are weirdly still expensive. It's also Eastercon on Thursday, and I need to pack at some point, yay. My game has also finished downloading.

It snowed here today. My mum swore it would today - I think from studying the weather reports - and indeed it did. She also said it would be at 1pm, and it didn't start until about 2:30, but still. It's really deep now, the back garden looks like a swimming pool. A white swimming pool. Or at least less deep than usual. You know what I mean.

This afternoon I watched about 4 Got To Dance: Auditions Uncut episodes in a row. Which was basically just extra amazing auditions they hadn't had time to put in the actual shows. I really love Got To Dance. I love all the judges, I love the fact that it's had the same judges for three years so they all know each other really well, and I love the fact that it's all amateur dancers, and a lot of them are really wicked.

But probably the best moment - aside from all the dancing - was probably when a cheerleading troupe came on called The Nixon Vixens. Which mostly made me think of cakesy. I imagine the Nixon Vixens were what his trashy all-female bodyguard/assassin squad would have been called if they'd ever made brilliant action films about him. I don't know why they didn't. It's hard to imagine Nixsploitation films being anything but amazing and definite money-makers.

Then mum and I went for a walk in the snow to the local Aldi for supplies. We got a bit cold and wet. I had to run back for a hat. But it was pretty lovely all the same.

Then I came back and played Skyrim. I LOVE SKYRIM. I don't really talk about it because I'm sure it's annoying and I don't really want to spoiler anyone. BUT I LOVE IT. ( Mild spoilers )

And then Saints Row 2. Sometimes I think maybe the best part of Saints Row 2 is being able to customise the cars. I FOUND A PLACE WHERE I CAN CUSTOMISE VANS, OH JOY OF JOYS. But that clearly isn't the best part of Saints Row 2. It's when you get unlimited rifle ammo.

In other news, I hate Tumblr. Sort of. There are many many things I hate about Tumblr. Which I will list now:

• When you go to look at a picture to see what it is, and there are no tags, so you don't know what it is.



• When you think a picture has no tags, but then you realise it - and possibly many others - actually does, they're just in a different place than you're used to, because customisation and everything, but having a set place for tags when sometimes you just don't have any, MIGHT BE ACTUALLY FUCKING USEFUL.
  
  
• How hard it is sometimes to get an actual permanent link for a picture or post, because you want to bookmark it as well as Like it. Clicking it just gets you a link to an image file. Clicking notes sometimes takes you to a tag list, or your own Dashboard for some reason. I don't want to reblog it. ASkjdsdjfksfk.



• When you open link to someone's Tumblr in a new tab, and it playing music, and there is no obvious place on the page to switch the music off. Sometimes this leads to you discovering wonderful music you used to love, like Always by Erasure. Sometimes it's just really fucking annoying.

Phew. And in other news, you know how sometimes one thing is enough to suddenly make you remember and love an old fandom/show again? Someone did a pimp for Total Recall 2070 on smallfandomfest - which looks really brilliant, by the way - and I spent ages trying to work out who the guy who plays one of the leads is, before working out/looking up that yes, it is Michael Easton, who, yes, was in Two. Oh. Two is a show that I used to watch when I was really young. It was on Five late at night so I had to watch it in bed on school nights before I went to sleep. It was about a man, an English teacher, played by Michael Easton, who is really lovely and has a great life and a lovely wife and everything. Then one day he discovers he has an evil twin brother, and before he knows it, his evil twin has murdered his wife and a bunch of other people, framed him for it (because no-one knows he has a brother, and there is no evidence of it anymore), and then gone on the run. His evil brother did NOT have a good life, having been kept with their crazy mother, or kidnapped by a crazy woman? Rather than adopted by loving parents like the good brother was. Then the evil brother found out he had a brain aneurysm, and no matter what he did, was probably going to just drop dead one day in the near future. So he decided to use his last few months making his long-lost brother's life hell. Michael Easton also played the evil brother. His name was Booth. I LOVED HIM SO MUCH. Mostly every episode was the good brother (Gus) trying to track down his evil brother before he died, and running from the cops, while also trying to help whatever poor woebegone souls he met in his travels. And usually, about once an episode, got a psychotic phonecall from his evil brother, who basically called to smoke and be sarcastic and taunting at him. I loved Two so much. It's a shame they never put it on DVD so I could buy it. A CRYING SHAME. And I had forgotten all about that, and now I have suddenly remembered again because of the pimp on smallfandomdest. Hmph.

I am also going to start watching Series 3 of American Dad. It's sort of the last go I am going to give American Dad. I do find a lot of it quite funny, and some of the characters I really love. But the character I was most interested (in American Dad, I know, I know), is sort of mostly being used as a plot point for other characters. Which I kind of understand, but still. And I know it's satire and all, but sometimes I really can't tell whether they are satirising an issue or just getting a cheap laugh out of it. And that problem basically just got worse in Series 2. Also there's a rape joke in basically every episode now. And sometimes, there's two. So. Essentially there's an episode I'm really interested in seeing in Series 3, so I'm going to watch series 3 or at least up until that episode, and if it hasn't improved by then, I will probably stop watching it. Yes.

One of my main projects at the moment, other than playing the computer games I got for Christmas (and not for Christmas), is trying to find a joke 666theheartless666 tells in one of his Alan Wake videos. Except that I can't remember which one it is, and he has about 50 of them, pretty much all 10 minutes each. And there's nothing in any of the descriptions about that bit, and I can't exactly remember when it was, except the vague situation. Which is taking a while. It almost as bad as when I remember a joke I liked on an Adam and Joe podcast, and try to trawl through a couple of MB of them. Not quite as difficult as that. But still.

Besides that, the only annoying thing about having Christmas money is planning what you're going to spend it on, then realising you can't afford everything you're thinking about anyway, probably, and THEN remembering that actually, there's a bunch of stuff you kind of need to buy. Like a new desk chair, and jeans, and really, a Microsoft Office package at some point. However, I am definitely getting Scrubs season 9, Oz seasons 1 and 2, and one of the Oglaf paper copies. And there is just no argument about that. Also a trip to Lancaster. No doubt.

We have so much chocolate and dessert in the house, and I both feel like I can't eat it all, and feel like we're running out. Help.

I was in Wakefield yesterday, and the day before. We had my oldest nephew on Tuesday, and my youngest nephew yesterday. I just came back from Nottingham last Sunday, and I'm going on holiday with my parents and both nephews tomorrow. I really want to do nothing today, but I probably am going to have to pack today, and possibly wash my hair. Although I'm probably just not going to wash my hair.

There's a big part of me that wants to say I'm going to stay home for the week. We've had some problems with trying to house the dog - we normally leave him at a local kennel, but we arranged for my sister to have him this year since we're taking both kids so my parents didn't book, and then last Sunday my parents took him to their house to see how he got on with my sister's dog, and my sister's partner (who'd apparently forgotten they were having the dog) said she wouldn't be able to cope with them both, now she's pregnant. My mum has been ringing up kennels and possibly the RSPCA all week, with no luck, so my sister's basically going to have to have him. But if I stayed home, I could look after him, obviously.

I probably won't though, I'll probably end up going. I'm feeling a lot better about it today than I was yesterday, and I was going to discuss it with mum today, but she's working till half 8. So. Yeah. I'm just not really looking forward to a week of looking after both kids and running around, and then getting back and having to unpack and catch up on soaps and all the programmes I've missed. Emmerdale has sort of just started getting good, with Aaron getting all self-destructive over killing his boyfriend, and Carl sort of being almost nice about it, because he obviously understands guilt over killing people. But I probably will end up going. It seems a shame to miss my youngest nephew's first holiday away with us. And I've already discussed with my parents that if I find it all a bit much I might just need to sit out of looking after them or being in the middle of things and stuff. And it's only for a week. It probably wouldn't be so bad if I hadn't just been to Nottingham last weekend, and then had two appointments this week. But it's not like I could rearrange the Riverside Festival. So there we go. Also, I probably won't need to pack much - we're going to Wales, and with the weather being like it is I'll probably be dressing much the same as I always do. And we're going to a caravan park, so it's not like I'll need to be dressing up for dinner either. So today probably won't be that bad either.

In other news, I finally got the second series of George Gently on DVD yesterday, so there's no point in watching it now. Will have to save it till after the holiday. Sigh. But I do love Single-Handed and Jack Driscoll. He's like a terminator. And I like him a lot better now he's proved he's a terrible boyfriend, because he's a good garda. Also I'm really liking Emmerdale at the moment, especially if it continues in it's current vein, even if Carl is still being a twat. Also I love Seth in Hollyoaks. Yay!

Sigh.

I bring you a post of good tidings.

• Last week I made a post about a pairing from the adaptation of Agatha Christie's The Pale Horse, and said in the post and told doyle_sb4 that the episode wasn't available on DVD yet, and wasn't looking to be any time in the near future. However, it turns out I was wrong, and searching for it again reveals that that series is being released on June 20th. Hurrah.



• Snooker is going well, or at least FINE.



• I managed to get my sick note from Saturday posted off, with a little explanation of why there was a gap in my sick notes for the benefits office. So hopefully that will be alright, or at the very least I've done it now.



• I may have been a bit wrong about how annoying I thought it would be to play Keats in Folklore. He hasn't done anything as annoying as the thing I really didn't like before then, and you do get a lot of different information by playing as him, and there are a lot of different creatures and quests he gets that Ellen doesn't. And he does have quite a lovely accent in the cutscenes. So it's not too bad I guess.



• And I've found some ice-skating now. Hurrah.

A few minutes ago the phone rang, and when I answered it it was my aunt. I knew she'd want to speak to my mum or dad rather than me, and I was so prepared to not be the person she wanted that when she asked me "Is that Rachael?", I said "No".

My self esteem is currently in a slight state of flux.

( Daria thoughts )

Another clothes-related post I have saved you from: dresses. I don't know what it is, but I am feeling interested in clothes at the moment. Possibly it's from buying those jeans. But anyway, I may have bought myself some dresses online in the past few days maybe. Only because I found really beautiful ones that were in my size and in the sales. And I only own one dress at present. But shhh, anyway. Partly, it's kind of to cheer myself up over the fact that this dress might be one of the prettiest dresses I've ever seen, and as far as I can tell, they only ever made it in sizes up to 12. Possibly this is because the form-fittingness might not suit a larger woman/person as well. But I'm choosing to assume that it's because high street shops and boutiques hate larger women. But in any case: sigh...

In cheerier news, another Christmas present I got, a few days after Christmas, was the complete series of Daria on DVD, which I have been watching for the past few weeks. God. I can't say I'd forgotten I love Daria, but I might have forgotten how MUCH I love Daria. I love Daria (the character). I love Jane. I love Quinn. I love Helen. I love Jodie. I love the female science teacher whose name I can't remember at the moment. I love Jake. I love Mr DeMartino. And quite a few other characters besides. And I love Daria (the show). It's a little bit of a strange way to watch it, because they've just put a certain number of episodes on each disc, so I don't really know which season I'm watching at the moment. But they kind of all follow on from each other anyway, so it's not too jarring. And in some ways, it's kind of nice to just have ROLLING DARIA. Anyway. I'm massively enjoying it is my point, I think.

And I have been watching Got To Dance lately, which I keep meaning to talk about, but keep forgetting. Got To Dance is sort of the poor cousin of all the dance shows that are out at the moment, I think, but I really like it. I'm not a big Pussycat Dolls fan, but I like Kimberley, and I like that she's the strict one. And I like that the judges just have to give their judgements based on the dance, before asking any questions or hearing any stories about the dancers themselves. They can change their mind later, and often do, usually one of the boys with Kimberley judging them from one side (although last night Kimberley did it, to the boys' amazement), but I like that they just have to make their judgements straight away, to begin with. And I quite like the ethos of the show, that it's just about giving little dance troupes a chance, not necessarily making them into stars, but letting them be in a competition and be on TV and hopefully win some money. And this series they're doing a thing where they've started a fund, and they sometimes go to dancers who didn't go through to the shortlist but who they think had potential or clearly had a passion for dance, and they give them some money to just train and maybe build up their technique, which is quite lovely. And sometimes some of the dancers they have on there are fucking amazing. So yes. I'm really enjoying it.

And finally, a thing I didn't know before and learned yesterday from a nature documentary: killer whales are apparently technically part of the dolphin family. Which I would not have guessed. It kind of explains their viciousness a bit though. And a thing I didn't know before and learned a few months ago from an encyclopedia: dolphins are actually mammals. I SHOULD BRUSH UP ON ANIMALS, MAYBE.

This time next week, I'll be in Spain. Assuming there are no more clouds of volcanic ash. At any rate, I'm not quite prepared for it. I haven't done any holiday shopping, but happily, I have been buying new tops recently. Unfortunately some of them are those new tunic tops, and I don't really have anything to go with them. But I do have tops. And some pretty new jeans. And my dad bought me some new trainers, because he wouldn't let me take my current ones which are black with flames up the side. I can't imagine why. But anyway, I've got some stuff. No swimming costume, and no night wear, really. But I'm sure I can pick something up and get it all packed by next Saturday. Probably.

A thing I have done is finally paid off my final bills from my flat, emailed the paid bills to my landlords, and got my deposit back. Which is probably the last thing I'll have to do about my old flat. My deposit turned out to be a lot more than I thought it was going to be a few months ago, at £365. My only problem now is what to do with it. It has quite nicely paid off my overdraft, so I could just leave it there and switch to a regular account that I don't have to pay £7 a month for and one I wouldn't have to pay off if I wanted to switch to another bank. But my mother has suggested putting it back into my savings account, and given how much I have been taking out of it lately, that probably wouldn't be a bad idea. OR I could keep it, and...spend it. There's a lot of nice stuff I want. Nice nice stuff. The possibilities are not endless, but difficult to choose between.

( DVD talk for a bit )

One thing I DID try to buy earlier, though, was Colour: Travels Through the Paintbox by Victoria Finlay, which I'd seen for sale at thebookdepository.com a month or so ago. I finally decided to buy it a few weeks ago, but when I went to thebookdepository.com, it was out of stock. I was worried that it wouldn't be available anywhere, but it was on sale at amazon.co.uk, and at play.com. I ordered it from play.com, and the web page said it was in stock, and 'usually dispatched within 24 hours'. I waited a week, and never got a 'We have dispatched your item' email. I thought maybe my order had gotten lost, so I cancelled it, and ordered it again. And again, I didn't get a 'We have dispatched your item' email, and when I checked the page again after a few days, it had changed to say 'usually dispatched within 6-8 weeks'.

Not wanting to lose my chance at getting it at all, I didn't cancel my order, but looked around, and found a seller on ebay.co.uk selling the books, brand new, for not much more than play.com would have charged. I ordered it - and recieved no 'We have dispatched your item' email. Something I'd ordered the day before came, the t-shirts I'd ordered from threadless.com a few weeks before came, and still no book. Finally, last Wednesday I checked my email, and there was an email saying they'd dispatched my book, and it would probably be there the next day. And sure enough, the next morning it came. But my mum has my youngest nephew over on Thursdays, so I spent most of the day with him, and then I was watching TV in the evening, and then our internet was on the blink that night. I managed to get on my dad's internet the next day, but I was meant to be going to get my oldest nephew so he could come to our house, and I forgot to go to play.com and cancel my order. That night, I went on again, went to play.com, thinking I would probably be okay since they'd said it would be 6-8 weeks. And what happened? They were bastard packing it, so I couldn't cancel the order. I can't cancel the order. So I'm going to have to wait for this book to arrive, and then send it back, which I've not done before.

Unless anyone on LJ would like a brand new book about the history of colour, and the travels of the woman researching it, for £7.49 plus postage? I haven't read it, so I can't say much about how good it is, but it looks pretty wicked. Alternatively, I will swap it for a DVD of Brotherhood. Or Danny Phantom.

Anyway. Enough of my capitalist woes. One thing I did buy without too much trouble was a little guide to British wildlife, in WH Smith reduced from £7.99 to £3. It is quite good, and I have also realised while reading it that the cutest baby animal, in my opinion, is fox cubs. Part of it is that they are adorable, part of it is the colour, and part of it the knowledge that when they grow up quite a lot of people will probably consider them vermin. But still. Fox cubs.

And I also realised that the more I learn about pikes, the less I like them. When I was at university part of our university handbook had something to say about the pike in the campus lake, and the fact that skinny-dipping wasn't a great idea given that it had been known to bite off fingers 'or other body parts'. The next year they brought out a new handbook, and made no mention of the pike. Naturally, I smelled a cover-up. I actually did a piece about it for the student radio I was involved with at the time. And the research I did on them for it gave me more than enough extra reasons to fear them. Check this out, from the new book: "The pike is a vicious predator that hunts alone. It lurks motionless amongst vegetation, waiting until its prey is close enough to reach." And, "At breeding time, the female is courted by two or more males and will eventually lay up to 500,000 eggs"(!) And, "Once they have reached three centimetres in length they begin to feed on small fish. From then on they are fully carnivourous, even eating other pike or fish the same size" (my emphasis). As far as I can tell, pikes? Are out to get us.

I was considering making this post just a big list of all the dvds I wanted to buy, but couldn't really afford. Count yourselves lucky you didn't get that.