Moving Day!

So, this is it. I feel sort of sad about leaving Blogger after a year. It feels comfortable and lived in and now I'm moving to a shiney new place where the light switches and cabinets aren't in the same place and there is that new paint smell.

I'm not sure what to do about the archives. My first test post at Live Journal has a link back here but if I don't make new posts here how long will it stay up? I may go ahead and move them over when I have the time. I wish there was a quick way to do that. All I know is a lot of copy/pasting.

There are a lot of features that I like about LJ though and I think it's going to work out well. The only real snag right now is that I can read LJ entries in Firefox and reply to them but I can't post to my own blog. I just get a page of HTML code when I try. IE is good for something.

Anyway, if you will please follow me I'd like to welcome you to the new and improved Why Am I In This Handbasket! Will the last person out please turn the off the lights.

This Way Out

Input Please

Go here to see the new blog:

http://ranuel.livejournal.com/

I'm still tweaking the decoration and I want imput on how it looks so far.

Any of you LJ folks go ahead and friend me if you want. I'll be moving for real as soon as I'm sure how to do everything.

Wake Me in the Spring

When I got up at 8 this morning it was 42F.

In my livingroom, 5 feet away from where the portable radiator heater thingie was left on all night long. Out in the yard it was in the twenties. Didn't go out to get a closer look at the thermometer to see where in the twenties.

4 hours later with the oven on and a space heater going in the bathroom it is just now 60 in here. I'm sitting in the recliner wearing lots of layers with two lap rugs, a cat, and a heating pad.

I was going to go out today and do Christmas shopping and see what the RV dealer has in stock. Right now I'm leaning towards a nap and making another pot of soup for dinner.

It's supposed to be nice tomorrow afternoon. I could go shopping then.

On Being a Writer

Neil Gaiman gets to the heart of it, as usual, in his 2/4/04 blog entry,

http://www.neilgaiman.com/journal/2004/02/on-writing.asp

and makes me have a minor existential meltdown that I could get a much longer blog entry about, and just may yet, but that I need to process for a bit longer.

Pet Peeves - Great Minds

I found this at Limyaael's blog:

Diseases of the Common Fanfic Writer, V. 1.0

As usual she did it better including giving official sounding names to her peeves.

"Ultrafeminization: The turning of a male character in any fic (though usually a slash fic) into a weeping, wailing teenage girl with a dick."

I Didn't Know He Swang That Way

From the November 7th Tarzan comic strip.



I think somebody has been reading too much slash fanfic.

GOOD Fics

Instead of just complaining about Sturgeon's Law I thought I'd post recommendations of stuff I find readable. My first thought was to try and find stuff that non-fans would also be able to read if they wanted with little or no background and do a post with at least 3 or 4 with stuff from more than one fandom.

Then I got busy with the IYFG reading and never did the research.

So, a compromise. I'm going to keep a draft post going to add stories as I find them and then post whatever when I either have several OR don't have anything else to blog about. Probably it's going to be the the second options so I wouldn't expect more than one or two at a time.

These stories will not be limited to stuff non-fans will enjoy but if you aren't familier with a series you can usually get enough to go on at Wiki anyway. Plus, I'll add my own notes to help.

First up two stories from Inuyasha.

Title: Fukamoriji Shiki
Author: Scribe Figaro
Fandom: Inuyasha
http://www.fanfiction.net/s/3177384/1/

The story of Miroku's parents and grandparents but you don't need to know anything about the series to understand it.

This is Scribe Figaro's best work ever. Her use of language has really matured in the last couple of years and her characters are wonderful.

Title: Gisei
Author: Alterfano
Fandom: Inuyasha
http://alterfano.livejournal.com/48647.html

Alterfano uses both the elements from the manga and real world historical Japan to create a coming of age story in which Rin ultimately finds her place in the world after learning that some things are worth dying for. Beautiful artwork is posted along with the story.