coprime

Thing the First: I'm not planning to do snowflake_challenge this year, but I was pondering Day 1 and came up with something.

In your own space, talk about your Happy Place—the things that give you joy, calms you or keeps you sane. Leave a comment in this post saying you did it. Include a link to your post if you feel comfortable doing so.

CrunchyRoll recently put up two Haikyuu!! two movies that it said I hadn't watched, so I did! And it turned out the movies are just the third season repackaged, which I had watched, but I watched them again because I was enjoying revisiting the Karasuno boys. And then I was thinking about this question, and the thing that brings me joy is fandoms, especially revisiting old ones. Rewatching Haikyuu!! was like, "Ahh, what sweet volleyball-obsesses idiots. Noya! ♥ ♥." Then I came across links to a couple new-to-me Bashir/Garak fics, and it was like, "Ahh, yes, Bashir/Garak, so good and banter-y ♥ ♥." And I was reminded how I'll sometimes get hit by nostalgia and go searching for old beloved pairings or fandoms I don't frequent much anymore and how delightful it is to find something new-to-me or even something old that I enjoy just as much this time around as the first.

(Thinking about this made me go see if Chrome & Gunmetal and File 40 were still around. Chrome & Gunmetal, yes; File 40, not so much! So then I had to do my best to update any links in my bookmarks or coprime_recs that linked to File 40, and "Ahh, Napolean and Illya ♥.")

So I think that's my happy place? I love adding new fandoms, but there's something so nice about revisiting an old one somehow, like snuggling down in a warm blanket with something relaxing playing while wearing your fuzziest jammies.

Thing the Second: A couple friends came over today, and we played Takenoko, which was a Christmas present for me from Husband. He thought I would like it because of cute pandas, and he was totally right. We played a couple times ourselves after the friends left too. You and the other players build a garden and grow bamboo in it while the panda goes around eating the bamboo you just grew, and along the way you are trying to complete different card objectives (like, have the panda eat two green bamboo or grow three pink bamboo that are three units high), and whoever has the most points at the end wins. I thoroughly enjoyed it. Playing a game does not feel like it takes as much time as it does, which is good, and there didn't seem to be a ton of time between turns even with four people, which is also good. And it's just fun going around growing bamboo and then having the panda eat it.

Thing the Third: I feel like there is a different thing the third I was intending to blather about, but I can't remember what it was, so instead I'll blather about something that I keep intending to blather about but haven't yet: Pokemon Go.

( Cut for talk of health/weight stuff )

I really enjoy Pokemon Go! It's gotten me walking nearly every day. (The past couple weeks have been rough with the holidays and then immediately getting sick after.) And I really enjoy getting the fresh air even when it's cold. I've rediscovered the bundling techniques to stay warm outside I used to use for my college job. I'm like a serious casual player? I try to put myself in situations where I can join people doing raids or maybe get an EX pass, but I don't raid every day or go out because someone posted on Discord. (Although I will say I'm in if I happen to be out and someone else says something.) But it's so much fun for me to go out and see what I'll find. Maybe it'll be something new, or maybe it'll be another Hoppip! I have found many Hoppips, but Hoppips are cute and fun to throw pokeballs at, so it's all good. I do not think I would enjoy this game so much if I did not like pokemon designs in general. Husband is like, "Oh, you hatched another Trapinch? I'm sorry," and I am like, "Trapinch, yay, Trapinch is so cute!" It probably helps that several of my friends also play it turns out, so I had people to answer questions when I first started. And the community where I live is pretty friendly. Or at least, if there is drama, I am far enough removed from it to not know it exists, haha.

Canon: The Mighty Orinoco
Pairing: Jacques/Jeanne
Canon Level: Married

I am ridiculously into this book and couple, and I am sadly the only one. Not that I am surprised by this. The Mighty Orinoco is about a group of people traveling together to find the source of the Orinoco River, each for their own reasons. Jeanne, the lady in my default icon, disguised herself as a boy so she could go search for her missing father. While on the trip, she strikes up a friendship with Jacques, leaving him much confused until he rescues after she falls overboard and figures some things out. Jeanne is courageous and strong-willed, so it's no wonder Jacques falls head over heels for her. And it turns out I am completely weak against characters who are very confused about their feelings, most notably Jacques and his friendship with Jean/Jeanne and I do not think finding out Jeanne's gender would have made him any less confused. Verne doesn't really dwell on that aspect, but I am perfectly happy to read between the lines.

Suggested reading:
There and back again by oxymoron

Yay, I managed to finish my story just in time. I'm fairly pleased with how it came out too. And now that I can cross that off my list of things I need to do, it just leaves me with, like, twenty other things I need to get done for the holidays.

So I've been looking for something for the BF and me to watch together for ages. I think the last thing we managed to watch all the way through was Hikaru no Go three or four years ago. (I say he is far too picky, but it's more just that we have very disparate tastes. For example, he's also watching Game of Thrones at the moment, which is a big ol' pile of nope for me.)

But Steven Universe seems to have come to my rescue! It was pretty cute too. I started watching the few episodes on demand has for free, and while I know he often half pays attention to stuff I watch, it's hard to tell how much attention he's actually paying. But then later that evening, he sat next to me on the sofa and asked, "So, did the on demand have a lot of season one episodes that I missed?"

And now we're slowly making our way through the entire series. (So many spoiled reveals due to the most recent 10 episodes being the ones we saw first, haha, but that is how I roll.)

I was not expecting him to like Steven Universe! The show does manage a great blend of earnest sweetness, fun, humor, and science fiction though. Ahh, I can't decide if I want to go search out meta or leave things be so we can both watch the rest of the series without any more prior knowledge. ...Okay, I'm going with the second option, not really a debate, but I sort of wish I had someone else in my life with whom I could talk about things. I don't even know what I want to say about this show, only that I think it's super enjoyable and smarter than I thought it would be going into it.

Life has been...stressful lately. Mostly because my union's been pushed to the point where we get to have a strike authorization vote. And, while no group represented by my union has had to actually strike in almost twenty years, I would not be surprised if we break that streak given how things have been going at my work for the past two years. It is all so much ughhhh and arghhh.

(I also can't read anything about the NHLPA's contract negotiations without giving myself low-level anxiety for the rest of the day.)

The work issues have been really draining, so I've been feeling even more introverted than usual for the past couple months. But the past two weekends I hung out with a friend I hadn't seen in a while and had a good time. So go me for forcing myself to make plans and stop ignoring my friends.

Yesterday was a really nice day though. The BF gave me my Christmas present early: breakfast (pancakes because I'd been wishing for some earlier in the week), a women's style Austin Jackson jersey (that I look very cute in, if I may say so), and tickets to the Tigers game that day. It was ♥super romantic♥. The weather was just about perfect for a ball game - a little cool when the sun was hidden and occasional rain sprinkles, but not uncomfortable - and the only thing that could have made it better would have been a win. (I will be sad if Cabrera is denied winning MVP finally because the Tigers failed to make the playoffs.) It makes me smile remembering it.

I was sort of productive technologically today. I redid my journal style so that it is now spiffy and pretty, I got the FM radio working on my stereo, I finally updated the music on my iPod, and I may have bricked my wireless router trying to update it (it was only working intermittently prior to the possible bricking). I'll retackle the router tomorrow because I only have so much energy to devote to troubleshooting it.

Ahhh, we keep coming thisclose to winning and then failing to. So far this series whoever has more shots on goal is the one that loses, and Nashville is beating us 3-1. I wasn't really expecting the Wings to have a serious run for the cup, but I was hoping we could at least advance to Round 2. (We still could! It will be tough though.) We are kind of worn down as a team though, poor Cleary and Helm. I did really like how the crowd at Joe Louis Arena booed Weber every time he had the puck.

I think I need to try my hand at icon making once more, given how much I keep talking about hockey. Probably of Filppula, who I sort of randomly decided was my favorite. He's a good, solid player for the most part and probably the most attractive player on the team. This is not saying much, I know, given the average attractiveness of hockey players.

The Tigers are doing pretty good, which is nice, I suppose. I mean, if I can only have one sports team win a night, I'd prefer it to be the Red Wings since they're in the playoffs now and the Tiger's regular season is just starting. But I will take my wins where I can get them, haha. And Austin Jackson, my favorite on the Tigers, is doing much better at batting this year. Which makes me happy because he was really...not that great at batting last year.

And in much more squeeful fandom news, I finally got to watch the first episode of The Legend of Korra, and it was the bestest! So amazing! I want to watch the rest right now because everyone and everything in it is awesome.

I participated in a 5K run/walk (I walked) last Sunday. It was fun! Even despite the rain in the morning before the race. My dad, brother D, and his wife all walked too, so it was nice to see them. My ankles were so sore the next day though; I am out of shape.

I'm not really a luddite but I do tend to take my time when deciding something, so me getting a Dreamwidth account right out of the gate is a little odd. I don't know how I'm going to use DW yet (I don't feel any particular need to mirror my LJ here.), but I like DW and want to put something here.

Hey, Christal, in case we don't get to talk tonight, what do you want me to bring down with me? I know Ranma 1/2, and I think just volumes 3 through whatever I have. But are there any other books you wanted to borrow? If you want those Japanese fantasy books you bought me, tell me soon so I don't leave them at the dorm. Were there any cds or dvds to bring? I was going to bring Rhea's Obsession because I love ti and you'll love it, but anything else? And did you want me to bring my Avatar tapes? Or, oh, any comics you want me to bring? 'Cause I have good stuff.

Watch though. I'm still going to forget something I wanted to bring, I know it.

I finally got to watch the season finale with my mom (and dad, though he ignored the tv mostly). ( Spoiler cut! )

In other news, my hands smell like fish. This is odd because I cooked hamburgers and mushrooms for dinner, neither of which are fish.

I got the highest grade in my intro to astronomy class, so my professor gave me an astronomy book. Eee! It's really shiny and has pretty color pictures and has lots of useful information. So now I can do astronomy viewing on my own. It even has useful star charts for all four seasons. And it's all mine! Exciting!