schneefink

I got my assignment for mcytrecursive a little over two weeks ago and have since then finished two treats, am around halfway done with my assignment, and am planning another treat. (Definitely not because I'm procrastinating on my assignment, ahem. It's a bit trickier than I expected it to be.) Every time I'm stuck in a period when writing is hard I forget how much fun it can be, and right now I'm really enjoying it. Feels good.

I've stumbled across "this fic was written by Chat GPT" on AO3 for the first time and I hate that this is apparently a thing now. I also found a post with replies on Tumblr that articulated some of the reasons for that. It feels a bit like, hm, regurgitated writing mush: no thought behind it, no ideas. I think Chat GPT could be useful as a tool for writing sometimes, for prompt generation or brainstorming or something like that, but I don't want to read stories written by an AI. I know that probably at some point soon an AI will be able to read a story that I can't say for sure is written by a real person or not but that's not the point. I want fandom and the fanworks in it to be in conversation with other fans, not translated through a machine copying from other writing.

I also think that out society is woefully underprepared for the current challenges posed by the use of AI but that's entire topics on top of that.

I just saw that I have not posted in a week, which feels weird because I've been writing so much, including things for DW: my "things I want to post" word doc is 42 pages by now - though, realistically I could probably delete about thirty of those because I'm never going to post them.
My current WIP, which started as a oneshot, is at 12k and already the third longest fic I've written (excluding the self-insert Mary Sue fic I wrote as a teenager that I never intended to show anyone) and might end up my longest when it's done, which might not even take that long at my current writing speed. (I wrote several hundred words at the office today, I'm not proud.) Probably depends on how much additional canon review I want to do for accuracy's sake. At least I already have a title I like.

I spent the last weekend at my grandparents', my first visit in almost two years, because a cousin of mine got married. I was originally worried that it was just a courtesy invite because we were never that close and even before COVID I barely saw him more than twice a year because they live on the other side of the country, but he and his lovely now-wife seemed sincerely happy that LB and I managed to come. (My mom couldn't because she finally caught COVID a few days before. Thankfully she seems fully recovered by now.) They had an ice cream wagon at the reception, which was a brilliant idea especially in that heat, and I also ate a lot of leftover ice cream the next two days.

This week I started watching "Severance" with DD, who watched it recently and loved it. Three episodes in and I appreciate it and find it interesting but I don't really enjoy watching it because it does such a great job with the uncomfortable atmosphere. DD reassured me that it doesn't have a tragic ending so I'll keep watching for now.

I'm also still watching many videos of people playing Minecraft, and I also, uh, started playing Minecraft. I know, I know, what a surprise, nobody could have expected that. Current task: get more iron to make a bucket to get milk to lift the ~curse so I can go back to the village.
ETA: I finally got a milk bucket! Only to realize I don't need it anymore because I died at one point ^^ (thankfully recovered my items though.)

Countdown timer for sunflower_auction: here.
(Reminder to self to check on my bids right before the deadline.)

My offers (a game review and a fic) are here.

Speaking of fic, yesterday I wrote 2k and finished the rough first draft of my next PHOA fic, my favorite method of procrastination. Needs quite a bit of editing, but still, I wrote something, always feels good. And this fic was inspired by its title so even one of the most annoying parts is already done.

I think I just realized something about my writing that I somehow hadn't noticed in several years even though it seems completely obvious in hindsight: when I don't pay attention my imagination tends to default to the canon medium, especially when the stories are taking place in familiar locations. Not always, but often. This might be normal? Makes sense, in any case.
I didn't notice that much while writing SGA or NiF because it's live-action (and for SGA, a lot of what I wrote took place on different planets I made up.) I didn't really notice while writing RPF because, well, the real world is the medium, sort of. I wasn't really aware of it while writing fic for book canons because same medium and even if locations were familiar, I often reread those scenes to make sure I remembered the descriptions correctly and could imagine the places. I only started noticing when I wrote more fic for podcasts because while it became a lot easier to hear the characters' voice in my head, it also became harder to remember to imagine their surroundings. And I finally realized while writing Hades fic and feeling satisfied that I could see a scene very clearly before me, only to realize that the scene I was seeing was from my/the player's perspective and not the character's.
This is helpful, because it'll hopefully remind me to pay more attention to how I imagine scenes and how readers might read them.

I can now report that there is no unique dialogue for having gotten all the bounties, i.e. reached 20 Heat with all weapons. I'm slightly disappointed - but not too much because hey, I got 20 Heat with all weapons! Faster than expected because I finally decided to just concentrate on spear and rail, regardless of Dark Thirst. I got 20 on Varatha today with a great ME build that was only missing ME, and then I did 18-20 Heat on Exagryph in a row after reading a tip on reddit that for rail aiming is much easier if I disable "attack at cursor." I never thought of that, but it immediately made a difference. It made it much harder to use casts, but hitting things with my attack became much easier! And on my last run I got Deadly Reversal, Lightning Rod, Splitting Bolt, and Divine Protection, so that was fun.

This week I also wrote a few hundred words of fic, for the first time in weeks. Idk why I was blocked for so long, and if it was just a two day thing or if I will manage that again in the near future, but some words happened and it feels good.

This weekend we had wonderful spring weather, so DD and I finally used the picnic blanket! Twice, even. It was great, we need to do that more often. But probably not soon, because the weather report predicts much colder temperatures and rain again. April weather indeed.

The exam last week went okay (I think.) This week will be very busy at work, which I would be less worried about if I wasn't still feeling bleh, which is annoying.

I donated to AO3 for a set of rainbow kudos stickers, I might finally put a sticker on my laptop.

On Friday I watched the finale of the last Hermes Cup, a Hades speedrunning competition. The interview with Greg Kasavin and the third place race were good, and the finale was a fantastic race, I do not regret staying up late at all. (The whole video can be watched here on Youtube, here on Twitch with chat, and here a fun clip with the winner's reaction. Chat recommended for fun details like Amir Rao of Supergiant Games commenting during one of Jerds and Haelian's digressions (paraphrased) "now I understand why this is the last Hermes Cup," and, after the VA of Hermes asked Greg Kasavin about the Charon/Hermes ship, the person asking "there's a Charon/Hermes fic?" – yes, there's 176.)

Playing at my own speed, today I finally collected enough Darkness to buy the Chaos theme, I look forward to seeing a victory screen with that. I'm currently trying to get used to Forced Overtime *shakes fist at Asterius*


Instead of a rec list of existing fic, have a list of Hades fics I wish would exist, but don't want to have to write myself:

( a selection )

Today there was a remembrance march for the victims of the terror attack in Vienna, with several hundred people, and I'm looking at the latest COVID infection numbers and worry. Not the most important but a personal concern, I really don't want to have to work from home again. I'm very bad at it.

Between the terror attack, the pandemic, the US elections, and my uni deadline... yesterday was a bad brain day (at least I went for a run), but today it almost felt like it all balanced out, and I enjoyed the brownies with sprinkles we made yesterday and and felt surprisingly calm. Still did not manage to get any uni work done, however.
Edit: I did manage a few paragraphs after all, which is better than nothing. Small steps.

I also posted a very short Skyjacks snippet about Travis getting bitten by a werewolf that I wrote for sholio's comfortfest back in September: Winter, Spring, Summer, Fall, Full Moon.

I used to be more hesitant about posting stories but by now I figure that if even one person liked it then it's a net positive. I'm also currently editing a Skyjacks Star Wars fusion and more Dice Disasters fic, and I need to start working on my Yuletide fic beyond brainstorming.

Day 4 and I very much enjoy playing #WaitForMeRPG so far. Writing a chapter a day is a lot, especially since it's supposed to be one story, and I want it to be good, and I keep thinking of more things to add and then the chapters become longer, and it takes a lot more time than I originally thought. And figuring out a time travel plot that makes sense when I don't know what jumps will come when is difficult. For now it's fine, but for three weeks – eventually I need to start doing work for uni again, too…
The best part is playing together with DD, because almost as much as I enjoy writing my own story I enjoy helping her brainstorm hers.

Skyjacks #72
( Travis processes the fact that other people are also capable of lying. )

Skyjacks #73
I was making so many excited high-pitched noises while listening to this episode that DD said she would try to catch up as soon as possible ^^ ( Time to toast the Axel )

For the TMA Rarepairs exchange I was assigned someone who had excellent prompts. I then made the huge tactical mistake of picking the prompt I was most excited about and starting to write a story for it. I kept having more and more feelings about these characters - they're so fascinating! There's so much to think about! And from "hey this could be fun to write" I went to "I really really want this to be good," and with that came the insecurity about every line, and the stress because I have a deadline (tomorrow morning.)

I think I could even write a decent version of that fic, but it really needs more time than I have, so I've decided to leave that one for later and write a different, shorter one for the exchange. The minimum word count is 500 words, this is doable. I even have a great idea! ...oh no I'm starting to develop more feelings.

(This is me procrastinating. Bad self, go do something.)
ETA: I went for a run, that totally counts as something. Now for the writing...
ETA 2: Writing happened! Success. (Next, editing, uh-oh.)