Date of Birth!

[stunt_muppet]

Two days after it, technically. I don't feel any older, but then I said that last year.

My family (and M and J, the next day) did take me out to dinner and the waiter didn't ask for my ID when I ordered a glass of sangria, though, which considering I tend to get mistaken for a sixteen-year-old was rather nice. And I got to go to one of my favorite tapas places and have my favorite Spanish omelet ever. Good times all around. :)

I really think that Americans should take up the practice of eating tapas-style. Cycling through different dishes allows you to experience a variety of tastes throughout a meal without offering too much of any one thing; you never lose the sense of novelty and pleasure in the new flavor. Plus, you eat slower, which makes you less likely to overeat. Meals become occasions, inextricably social and linked to your dining partners.

Granted, it's pretty much impossible to make a tapas course for home consumption, especially if you're trying to feed a family - think of all the different dishes you'd have to prepare ahead of time. You'd pretty much spend your whole day cooking dinner unless you were super-coordinated. But as far as eating out goes, I definitely prefer it.

Also, as a belated birthday present, Mom took me and my brother to see Toy Story 3 yesterday morning, for which I am grateful because I adored it.

1. I found the opening sequence very touching, in that it recreates the playtime scenes from the first two movies from the point of view of the toys - as if, now that Pixar has the money and technology to create these lush sequences, they're showing them off to the kids who grew up with the first two movies and Pixar in general. Like saying "look how far we've come, look how everything has changed". On a meta level, it was really heartwarming.

2. SPANISH BUZZ . Everything about Spanish Buzz is wonderful. And Jessie's expression while Spanish Buzz is trying to seduce her with flamenco dancing makes my life better. Also it's a tribute to the Pixar writing staff that this is the third time "Buzz thinks he's really an agent of Star Command" has shown up as a joke and it's still funny.

3. So did anyone else find Big Baby kind of upsetting? Especially near the end when Lotso broke his pendant with Daisy's name on it? HE JUST WANTED HIS MAMA. *cry*

4. Other things that make my life better: Timothy Dalton as a tiny stuffed hedgehog and Very Committed Thespian. "I'm trying to stay in character!" Eeee. Also, Bonnie has a Totoro. I don't know why that makes me so happy but it does.

5. Speaking of which, Bonnie is so cute it makes my teeth hurt. And she is such a perfect mirror to young Andy during her playtime that every scene with her made me all warm and fuzzy. And the scene with Andy playing with her at the end and him spending all that time with her and the toys, playing with them one last time...and how he finally puts them away and gets ready to go to college and then Bonnie makes Woody wave at him and he just stops and looks like he's about to cry...*sniffle* Yeah, the ending might not have been the emotional punch in the stomach that Up or Wall-E was, but I still cried like a baby. Like I said, I grew up with these movies, and now that I'm older that feeling of saying goodbye and having to grow up and move on, characters that you've loved and followed for years waving goodbye after one last adventure. It's making me well up a little just typing this, because I'm a baby.

6. Speaking of endings, OH DEAR LORD THE INCINERATOR. I don't get it; Pixar movies consistently have a happy ending. How do they keep on making me believe, for one awful second, that they really are going to send everyone off to a horrible death while they hold hands and accept it? They did the same thing with WALL-E losing his memory and I have no idea how they keep on doing it. Dammit I should know better by now.

7. Is it bad if I missed Bo and the little pair of binoculars and the Army Men and everything? Especially Bo. I liked Bo. :(

8. So before I saw this movie the Toy Story series was much too connected to my childhood for me to even consider being fannish about it in any fashion, and it still kind of is, but now...I kind of like the whole Woody/Buzz/Jessie OT3 they've got working there. I like it in a completely wholesome and G-rated fashion of course, but, still. I'd go look for fic but I'm scared of what I'd find.


So, yes. Good show, Pixar. Good show.


Requisite Writing Blather:



Yeah, I knew this was a mistake. *grumbly discontented noises* *pokes at five total sentences of her springkink  fics*

Why is it, she said sullenly, that I can't seem to write anything without it turning into a Big Huge Exploration of the characters and their ~problems and their ~feelings? Why do I require so much buildup? Why does everything have to proceed so slowly? Why can't I just write effing porn? Gah.

And then because I do get into this mindset that I have to write a long, in-depth piece that's about the characters and logically gets them to a place where the sex scene makes sense, I end up not writing at all because I get so nervous over getting it wrong, or somehow not doing justice to the characters. And then I make no progress.

And then for the one fic that is supposed to be meta and crap I haven't watched the episodes in question yet. And also when I'm supposed to be writing I get distracted and Wiki Walk all over the place.

For example: I've been trying to write that Optimus/Ironhide fic, which I want to be set pre-series during the war, at some point where they're both isolated and surviving on their own (the idea that I had was that they'd been taken prisoner and escaped). That allows for the "cowboys" prompt, but I can't just have them wandering around the wastelands on their own
having awkward physical contact until the "kink" part of "Springkink" comes in. They need something to talk about, something to do until then.

So I start looking for things for them to talk about, and I end up going off on two separate tangents that tie back to the theme of Optimus as commander/superior officer versus Optimus as Ironhide's friend, and how Ironhide has never known Optimus without knowing Optimus The Autobot Leader. And, because sparks are a rather handy device for robot sex but the whole "Matrix vs Spark" problem from Beast Wars has never, to my knowledge, been resolved, I ended up on yet another diversion about where the Matrix (and its influence on Optimus) began and Optimus's spark began, so there was talk about that, but then there are three more problems. One, that leads to a lot of sideways and meandering conversations that don't go anywhere until the two robots in question reaffirm their relationship or whatever, which is (two) the exact same damn thing I did in Connections. And three, I really should save these ruminations on the Matrix and Sparks and whatnot for the Primal/Prime fic, because it's bad enough I'm reusing story structure; re-using subject matter is just too much. But I don't know where to go with those topics in the Primal/Prime fic, and I've got not clue what Optimus and Ironhide are going to talk about without that particular topic of conversation and aaaugh.

This is what I get for writing three different fics about three different Optimuses. Did I mention I haven't even started the Animated!Optimus/Blackarachnia one and I haven't even decided if I want it to be angsty or straight-up porn? Yeah.

Oh, and I should probably study for the GRE and apply for jobs and stuff, there's that too. Sigh




And once again it is incredibly late and I must go to bed. Hopefully by the time I wake up I will no longer have the Bokusatsu Tenshi Dokuro-chan theme song stuck in my head.

Comments

[stunt-muppet.livejournal.com]

Talking it out still mostly works with things that I'm on a deadline for and thus have some obligation to finish, too - long fics or things I have no outside impetus to finish, I tend to forget about or fall behind on if I talk about them too much. But that might just be that I'm really bad at writing longfic anyway...anyway, I do encourage you to give it a try, at least with an idea that you're not terribly attached to or urgent about writing (so that way it's not as discouraging if you lose impetus to work on it). There was some study done somewhere demonstrating that the way we best learn and memorize information is by explaining it to someone else, because then we have to know how to rephrase and re-conceptualize it; same thing, I find, goes for stories. You have to know more about them and structure them a bit more to explain them to someone else.

I hope you don't find this creepy but there are so many different points in this conversation where I just want to jump up and down and squee because you have so many of the same tastes in fic that I do! Domestic fic involving characters that we usually see being badass is my favorite, because I just love imagining what they'd do in their offtime and extrapolating bits of their personality into hobbies and interests and guilty-pleasure TV programs. Or the equivalent thereof for robots, in this case. I suppose it's also a handy way of world-building, now that I think of it.

I'd love to get around to using it myself, and maybe someday I will, but we'll see.

*nudges you*

so instead: how's the story going?

Er. It's kind of like the story that wouldn't end, at this point. >__> I've got 1400 words thus far, and only about 200 of them are porny in any fashion - the rest are all setup, and I can't even do that thing that some writers do where even the setup sounds sexy. I've got the bit where they first meet and she "invites" him back, part of the second night (I have Blackarachnia collar him from the trees before he sees her and then negotiating what they're going to do from there, though what she suggests is more that he be willing to be led around on a leash rather than sex in particular - though I figure if she's already got him by the throat I can start turning up the temperature a few degrees so the progression from not-sex scene to sex scene doesn't feel jarring), and a tiny bit of actual kink in there, but it's just not getting written and I'm worried it's way too long and my readers will lose patience midway through and aaaaah. WRITING IS HARD.

And I have no idea if this comment made any sense or not, it is 2 a.m. here and I'm rambling all over the place.

hmmm. Let me give you a place to start - you have any more Blurr fic you're thinking about writing? Which reminds me, I must go and leave a review for your Longarm/Blurr fic, which I've read and adored but I've been a terrible commenter these past few weeks...

[spacehussy.livejournal.com]

That makes sense, actually! If you have that obligation to finish it, talking helps to stay focused on the story. Sometimes, when my friend and I are stuck on our respective projects, we'll take turns asking each other what happens next, sort of dissecting it, and it has worked on occasion. Man - when I think about it, I know so many tricks to get myself writing, and get myself motivated, but, when it comes down to getting it done - poof, I never remember any of that stuff when I need to.

_{as a head's up, I'm about to give it a try at the end of this comment. *sheeps* Please forgive me XD}

HEEE. No, I don't find that creepy at all! Clearly the friending meme was kismet because I keep thinking that too :D I definitely want to explore more Badass Robot Domesticity while I'm in this fandom. The only part that I find challenging is figuring out, good lord, what do they do in their off-time? What makes sense for them, as a character? While they're on Earth there's a lot of good starting points, but occasionally when I write fic that involves them being on Cybertron, I get rather blocked because I don't know which Earth-equivalent entertainment they should have, or which would just be silly and fit at all.

...Although, I just caught myself thinking, why not just go crazy with it? Worldbuilding in fic has always been so much fun for me.

WRITING IS TOTALLY HARD ;_; That sounds frustrating, ahhh. 1400?? Damn, still, that's impressive. I don't know if this is helpful or harmful advice: I was trying to write a drabble for a prompt, and no matter what I did, the setup kept getting away from me. Eventually I just looked at it, determined what was relevant, and completely axed the rest. >_>

God, I love the idea that she's perfectly content to have him on a leash for a while, then sex comes up. That's - pretty hot, yeah. o_o

No worries, there was much sense to be had XD It was cool getting your comment so late because I work until 5am today.

Aww, thank you so much. That means a lot to me! And you're evil, because you've said the magic word: BLURR. I... write a lot for Blurr. Most of it involving Longarm/Shockwave, big surprise there. I have three in various stages of completion.

One of them is the first story I started for TF, and I really ought to get back to it at some point - I hit almost 4k and haven't touched it in months. It's roughly about Blurr damaged in space, and Longarm helping him find his way home. It sounds kinda cheesy for a pairing like theirs, but... I don't know, maybe I can pull it off.

The most recent one is nothing but pervy self-indulgence and the last... I don't even know how to make Disassembled sound not-insane. It's a collab with a friend (not an RP, I always feel like I need to make that distinction), it's already hit 11k, and it's maybe 2/3rds done. It hits a lot of the usual stuff you see with Shockwave/Blurr, where he's kept rather than cubed, Stockholm'd, etc - but honestly, I love this story probably above anything else I'm working on. I think the primary difference between Dis and other stories like it (that I've read, at least) is our Shockwave. I love a pervy Shockwave, oh yes, but in Disassembled, there was no intended sexual component to Blurr's capture. There's a lot more to it but, wow, I think I'll stop there or I'll be blabbing all night.

omg tl;dr XD I AM SO SORRY.

[stunt-muppet.livejournal.com]

A ha ha ha your icon is hilariously relevant.

Sometimes, when my friend and I are stuck on our respective projects, we'll take turns asking each other what happens next, sort of dissecting it, and it has worked on occasion.

This is exactly the kind of trick I'd use to get my homework done in college - I'd work with a friend, and we'd check on each other every so often, talk over our papers and vent our frustrations. Plus, that'd allow us to goof off in manageable doses; we could take time off and be silly but also check each other so we didn't futz around on the internet for too long. So I guess talking about fic on the internet is kind of the same principle? Only not really?


...Although, I just caught myself thinking, why not just go crazy with it? Worldbuilding in fic has always been so much fun for me.

If there's any venue where you can go crazy, fic for this big, open, nebulous canon would certainly be it. :) I tend to cheat and make Transformer society very humanlike because I'm lazy and rubbish at worldbuilding, even when I'm writing original fiction, but then I suppose there's enough humanization in the actual canon that I suppose a certain amount in fic is to be expected/can be overlooked.

See, this is why I end up writing so much wartime fic - it gives the robots something to do without making me think about what an all-robot society would actually do in its downtime. Whereas if I'm writing TFA!fic on Earth, I can just start asking all the boring grown-up questions that don't get addressed in the show itself, i.e. how are the Autobots paying the electric bill on that warehouse of theirs after Isaac Sumdac disappears, how are they feeding Sari if their grasp on what food is is tenuous, etc. And voila, instant fic potential.

That is good advice - maybe I can just roll with it and write as much intro as I feel like I need, and then, when I'm done, go through and cut out anything that seems unnecessary once the story finishes. No guarantees that I won't just post it by that point because I'm tired of looking at it, but I promise I'll at least try to take the editor's pen to it. Once I learn how to write again. Ahem. *looks shifty*

Heh, I figured Blackarachnia seems to love being worshiped - for all that she talks about the Dinobots' fawning over her "getting old" she never does anything to dissuade them. So collaring would be an aspect of that servitude and worship, not so far outside what actually happens in the show. And then there's her issue of that one TFA manga that ups the dominatrix imagery by kind of a lot, so...yeah, I don't think that's reaching much.

And you're evil, because you've said the magic word: BLURR. I... write a lot for Blurr

A HA HA I KNEW THAT'D WORK. :D You know, up until I started reading your stuff I wasn't all that enthused about Longarm/Blurr because I can never get the impending cubification out of my head while reading it, but I'm finding that that can make a fic more interesting if it's written right, so I'm eager to hear what else you have planned for them. I'm especially excited about Disassembled, because I love the concept of Blurrbeing held captive instead of cubed, but, like you said, so many of the fics using that plotline have a sexual element to them, and while it's as often dubcon as straight-up noncon I have something of a noncon squick, so I'm wary of fics in that vein that I don't know anything about. And a whole long, epic fic about it that would really get into the process and consequences of it? Sign me up!

You are going to tell me more, right? :D

[spacehussy.livejournal.com]

Man, I don't know if it's because I'm talking about writing so much lately, but something is jarring some shit loose up in my head and I have been writing every single day. This hasn't happened to me in ages. I don't want to jinx it, but I bring it up because I do think threads like this one have something to do with it, so thank you ♥

I tend to cheat and make Transformer society very humanlike

You and me both :( I tried, I did! I tried to think outside the box and whatnot but it never really worked. One of my final straws was reading one of the IDW comics where I saw, on Cybertron, what looked like a billboard with a sexy femmebot on it. I gave up after that. Their culture is different, of course, but there are enough Earth/human-equivalents that give us a place to start out.

I still have a hard time picturing what TV would look like on Cybertron, and yet I have no problem picturing, say, live performances. Not just gladiatorial combat, but there are so many types of bots and modifications that surely, some can be used solely for artistic/theatric purposes. (Hell, isn't Sunstreaker an artist in the Dreamwave comics?) Especially with a history spanning trillions of years. I keep wanting to go into this more. Hmm. I need to think of an awesome story to use it for.

I can just start asking all the boring grown-up questions that don't get addressed in the show itself

That's it. That's EXACTLY it. A huge chunk of my stories come from basically asking myself, "Wait, how does that work?" over something they imply through the show, and then I'll spend a whole story just making it make sense just for myself.

But yessss. All you can do is get the story out of your head, then you can determine what needs to stay. And hell, I'd even recommend keeping whatever you cut from the finished prompt, because you never know, maybe you can address those ideas again someday.

I can hardly blame her, wanting to be worshiped. Her body is an alien, organic thing, where the majority of Cybertronians *cough* Sentinel probably see her as an abomination. She could use a little sexy attention, and like you said a while back, if just to make her feel less like a freak for a while. Even being wanted by the Dinobots is a reprieve from the usual, but she's too badass to admit to such tiny vulnerabilities.

Aww, thank you so much. I completely understand though - when that TF pairing meme went around (*still needs to do it, heh*), a lot of dislike for Shockwave(Longarm)/Blurr came out into the open. I get it though, any reasonable person can see where that pairing is just fucked up. However~~~ Perfectly reasonable people can still be interested in exploring it. I like Longarm/Blurr because the audience knows what Blurr does not. Everything that Longarm does and says has a double meaning. That is genuinely fascinating to me.

Okay, I would love to tell you more about Disassembled, but I need to preface it by telling you it's absolutely id-candy for me. A lot happens that I find seriously interesting on a psychological level, and other things I just wrote because that's how I deal with stress. Those things are not pretty. I do like dubcon and even noncon when it's appropriate, which is why I'm going to make a hilarious author's note when we post Dis that will read "this story has an alarming amount of consensual sex, and by 'alarming amount' we mean all of it".

If I were to give you a basic run-down... It's told in three parts, where Blurr goes from being an object to be tinkered with (even if Shockwave doesn't have rape in mind, he's still a Decepticon), to being something like a pet that needs to be fed and kept watch over, to actually being allowed to be himself again. My favorite part is Shockwave, though. How he comes across in our story is like... He's ancient. He's so very ancient, and yet in some ways he's completely inexperienced, because his service to Megatron has dominated his entire existence. Blurr is something that needs him. He's never experienced that. He wouldn't have asked for it, but Blurr's dependence on him happens so gradually, he just gets caught up.

Okayyyyyyy comment got away from me again. I hope you like text! :D