schneefink

Doctor Who "Empire of Death": apparently there is some confusion about season numbering?, annoying. Anyway, the most recent season finale. ( spoilers )

The Magnus Protocol: I'm being patient. While I enjoy the glimpses of the overarching plot, a disappointing amount of the stories of the week didn't really work for me. ( Spoilers )

Hermitcraft: I enjoy season 10 a lot. Everything to do with the court case is amazing. (We only got Doc's perspective so far and I'm really looking forward to Cleo's video coming out probably soon.) Not to mention the mystery of the ore snatcher! ( Spoilers? )

It's impossible to watch all the Hermitcraft streams because there's so many. I watch Scar's whenever he streams and usually watch Cleo's, either live or afterwards, and everyone else's I might glimpse at and tune in when I'm either looking for background noise, or if a bunch of hermits are together and there's shenanigans. Mostly I rely on Tumblr to tell me if anything of particular interest happened, which is not always reliable though. I very much appreciate the people making transcripts and clips. Sometimes I made highlight posts myself (I should really copy them to DW, come to think of it, because it's more reliable than Tumblr.) Not every Hermit consistently uploads/archives their VoDs so some streams are lost afterwards. It's a weird medium.

I'm playing less Hades 2 but only because I have less time atm. After over 76 hours and 91 runs I finally beat the final underworld boss without god mode! I'm so glad god mode exists, otherwise that would have been very frustrating. I can't do it consistently yet but I did it three more times, e.g. today again on run 100. ( Spoilers ) Now that I've proven I can do it, I'm contemplating going back to god mode for a bit just to practice avoiding the moves of the final boss. I'm not getting that many new dialogue progressions anymore, but right now I especially enjoy hearing more from the gods and piecing together their relationships from the tiny tidbits. Supergiant has already shown that they're perfectly willing to ignore myths that don't fit their game canon and change things around etc., so I can't just assume certain things occurred and it's interesting to try and puzzle out.

Also, new Technoblade videos just came out! \o/

Chaos and I both didn't watch the latest Doctor Who season while it aired and decided to watch it together. We watched most of it several months ago, but then we had to take a break because AV made us promise that he could be there when we watched the final two episodes and scheduling that was difficult. We finally managed last weekend.

( Some thoughts on the rest of the season )

After the season finale AV asked Chaos and me what we thought and we just screamed. (It was good that we watched it so late because as we got to the reveals I remembered that I'd seen spoilers for it before, I'd just completely forgotten them.)( Thoughts on the season finale )

And I'm sure I'm missing things but I shouldn't go to bed too late, I'm trying to be better about it. Fix-it fic recs welcome.

Doctor Who 9.02: The Witch's Apprentice
( Spoilers )


The Sons of Thestian, by M.E. Vaughan
I read this because of a Tumblr rec & good goodreads reviews. That was a mistake. 90% of the book is boring and then it has a great ending, which is wasted because the buildup didn't work. Shame. ( Spoilers )

AV is busy, no Bab5 until February :(

Yesterday I went debating again. For the first time in weeks, because some weeks I didn't have time or wasn't feeling well etc., so it's been a while. I judged, for the first time in even longer, and it was a lot of fun. There were some better speakers, some new ones (who were eager for feedback, which is always nice to see), and a decent debate despite the fact that we had at least four different definitions of a key term (patriotism.) I'm now among the "veterans" in the club, which is funny.
I hope I'll have more opportunities to go in the near future, I miss it sometimes. But in the meantime I'm using what I learned in discussions and when reading the news.

Today I'm going to look at an apartment! I'm excited.

I found out that shortly before the Hockey World Championship, team USA and team Canada will play preparation games in Vienna :) Hopefully with none of my favorite players because they'll still be in the playoffs, but it'll be very good hockey to watch. Not sure if I should go only with DD so we can talk about all things hockey fandom, or try and take as many people as possible to get them interested in hockey. I could do both for different games, but I tend towards the latter because I can talk hockey with DD any time. (And have I mentioned how great that is?)

Second to last question for the December meme, by alasse_irena: Who is your favorite Doctor, and why?"

The first answer that came to mind was "one and eight." Referring to the new seasons, I haven't even watched the old ones. So the Ninth and Twelfth Doctor. They're also the Doctors where I feel like I have a somewhat good grasp on who they are, their character, their journey etc., while the Tenth and Eleventh are more vague in that regard. Of course that's most likely also because they had more seasons.

If I had to pick one, I think I'd pick Nine. The first Doctor I watched, so there's also some nostalgia there. I really enjoyed Nine, I especially enjoyed Nine with Rose, and Nine + Rose + Jack is still my favorite group. They were so much fun together! They were very good for each other and cared a lot. And then there's a tragic ending :( Jack is left behind. But for a while the three of them travelled together, and fortunately the episodes are cut in a way that makes it possible for there to have been many adventures that we just didn't see.

I'm not going to a friend's birthday party today because I'm not feeling up for it (in a "I could go if I wanted to but I just sorta don't want to" kind of way) and now I'm wondering how many cookies I should get him next week to make up for it. I wanted to bake tomorrow anyway.

I finally signed up for fandom-stocking, my post is here. I was very hesitant because it's like I'm asking people to give me things, it'd be extra work for them, and it's not like I really need anything, and I'm not even sure how much time I'll have to stuff a few stockings myself. But then I told myself to shut up and do it anyway, so.

I'm still catching up on Doctor Who, one episode per day. At least that's the plan, but I might watch a second one today because I'm enjoying this season more and more.
( Kill the Moon )

( Mummy on the Orient Express )

I really enjoyed the last few weeks of "The Young Protectors."( Read more... )

For the December meme, a question by weird_one: What's your comfort meal?

Difficult question, but I think I'll go with home-made burgers. I don't like burgers from fast-food restaurants: sometimes they taste good, but always weirdly empty. Burgers from proper restaurants can be very good. But my favorites are home-made burgers, with a normal Semmel, minced meat, and whatever is available from salad, tomatos, onions, gherkin... We call them "Papaburger" at home because my dad usually makes them, but LK's homemade variant is also very good.

I'm tiiired. (Actually I'm so tired most of the time lately that I'm thinking it might be an issue with my meds. I have an appointment in January.)

I just need to finish wrapping presents today. Tomorrow is a birthday party/brunch, then Christmas dinner, then I somehow agreed to play in Mass. And mom and LB are playing on the 25th, so I'll probably be there as well. I should do some other stuff, but a) tired, b) it's frustrating when it's supposed to be teamwork and (almost) nobody else does anything. I don't know how much I'll be online in the next few days.

I started silk painting again! I made a nice present for a friend who's a Doctor fan.( Picture under cut )

Happy Holidays to all of you! Merry Christmas or whatever else you're celebrating. I hope you have time to relax and a good time with family and/or friends and/or pets and/or fictional characters/creatures/world of your choice.

Yesterday was the Doctor Who 50th anniversary special! I went, and I had a great time :) I went alone because my friends bought tickets much earlier than me and went to another cinema, and I was planning to meet people there but the place was so packed we didn't find each other. There were people in costumes :D Several TARDIS, Doctors, a Rose with a giant (water) gun, a Dalek, and many people in great shirts. The atmosphere was great, during and after, even in the train on the way home I found a group discussing it *g*

( Spoilers )

It's spring! Finally! Our garden already looks very pretty, this year we have tulips in more colours than I remember ever having before and already some blossoms on the plum tree, though not as many as last year. It's almost warm enough for skirts and dresses, finally. I bought a new dress a few days ago (black, because I need one for the choir concerts) and I can't wait to wear it properly.

Today I donated blood because they had a bus near our house. For the first time in a year or so, the last two times they turned me away because of low blood pressure and not enough iron. The nurses/assistants were very funny. Apparently in the beginning my blood didn't flow quickly enough, so they told me to think of my biggest enemy and then kept cheering me on and telling me how fast my blood was flowing. Very motivational.

( I finally caught up with Doctor Who: 5x06 - 5x09 )

Monday to Monday I'm in Switzerland on a concert tour with my choir! Our first concert tour, it'll be great. Four concerts, together with a Swiss youth orchestra. We're singing Mendelssohn's 42nd psalm, a beautiful piece. I have two exams the week after, so I have to find some time to study, but I probably won't have a lot of internet access, so that should help a lot. On the other hand, little internet access and it's the first week of NHL playoffs, argh!

( Last few games before playoffs )

Post-donation-lethargy has mostly worn off, back to work! Or first dinner, then work. Actual work, not just "sitting in front of the computer", self. It's not what I thought about, but my biggest enemy is definitely procrastination.

I had my first "official" driving lesson today. I'm so glad I practiced on the training area first because we started on a real street! But it went well, and the teacher said I was quite good for a beginner. I had two double units (not ideal, but scheduling was difficult) and did things like drive 80km/h, reverse parallel parking, and many left turns. So many things to do at the same time...

This term I signed up for Econometrics II (voluntarily, it's not required) and now realized that my last statistics course was over a year ago and I have to go back and relearn two semesters of statistics. Ugh. It was difficult enough the first time. Oh, and ideally until Wednesday. And then there's that Bachelor thesis I should be working on...

I watched the recent Doctor Who episodes and quite enjoyed them. The build-up is often better than the resolution, which is sometimes disappointing, but the buildup is usually ~30 minutes and the ending only ten. ;)
Wow, the fandom is huge. The list of reaction posts! I usually only read a few to check if I've missed something that others noticed (often), but other than that I'm not really interested in the fandom. It has some shiny vids, and I read a little fanfic, but for some reason I don't want more. I don't even rewatch many episodes.

SGA is different. To prepare for sga_santa I'm rewatching SGA episodes, without writing detailed reviews so it's more relaxing, and it's a lot of fun. I think the reason why I'm still interested in SGA is that I still have so many stories to tell. I can think of no other canon that makes me want to tell as many stories as SGA does, and it's wonderful. Just reading the sga_santa wishlists gives me so many ideas! I'm currently plotting the sequel to Court of Athos, and I think it'll be my story of how Elizabeth becomes a leader that I've looked for for a long time. (Rewatching The Rising it's obvious that Atlantis was basically doomed from the start in a universe with less narrativium.) I hope I'm good enough to write it well.

LB asked me to sign up for a course for him because he isn't home, I wasn't as careful as I could have been (20:41 instead of 20:40) and now he's on the waiting list and probably won't get a spot -.- It just means a more inconvenient schedule for him, but still, well done self. Now go do something productive, like study statistics.

ETA: An hour later: No, self, in this case OTW work doesn't count as being productive. This seemed extremely familiar: The Science of Procrastination...

It still feels a bit weird that at the moment I'm meeting most of my friends to watch TV together, because when I grew up I was told that watching TV is not social and I should go out and do something with my friends instead. But it's so much fun! And we only spend at most half of the time actually watching TV anyway.

Thursday, for example, I invited a bunch of people to come over and watch The Princess Bride for their first time. It was a lot of fun. I also made Caramel Apple Pie Cupcakes that took over three hours (final clean-up not included.) They did taste very nice, but not as much nicer as simple chocolate in relation to how much longer it took to bake them.

And yesterday we watched more Doctor Who!

( Amy's Choice )

( The Hungry Earth )

( Cold Blood )

( Vincent and the Doctor )

( The Lodger )

( The Pandorica Opens )

( The Big Bang )

( A Christmas Carol )