The problem with writing female characters who originated as expies of preexisting male characters (this is a case of "strongly inspired by," not a genderswap AU, although admittedly the lines can get a little fuzzy), is that sometimes it feels weird to write them as doing anything particularly feminine or strongly associated with women, particularly in the early stages of writing when they haven't established their own distinctive personalities as strongly. For instance, given her personality and the age she would have been at the time, I don't find it implausible that Lilith (resident self-proclaimed Evil Twin in my weird MGS-pastiche-meets-Bee Train WIP thing) was a Hole fan in the early to mid nineties. The problem is, my brain keeps bringing up the image of some hypothetical ffrants poster demanding the brain bleach for having been exposed to Liquid Snake in a babydoll dress and combat boots. So yeah. Mental associations are weird things.

I know that writing to create a particular audience reaction is kind of a chancy affair - if the author takes this too personally, it can lead to things like derailing a perfectly interesting set of character dynamics because the fans are liking the wrong people in the wrong ways - but lately I found myself with two original story ideas whose raison d'etre is "mess with the expectations of the audience." I blame tvtropes and Hideo Kojima.

Idea Number One (tropes: Women In Refrigerators, Sissy Villain, Bishonen, Foe Yay) - the androgynous, flamboyant, scenery-chewing evil prettyboy (although how much time can he have to devote to evildoing when he spends so much of it stalking the hero and flirtatiously taunting him) turns out to be the hero's presumed dead semi-girlfriend in disguise. Her reason for doing this probably has something to do with being annoyed with how he's more interested in avenging her "death" than he ever was in her as a person when they were together.

Idea Number Two (Designated Hero, Designated Villain, Perspective Flip, Moral Dissonance, Start of Darkness, Jerk Sue) - epic fantasy with an extra dose of Dark and Gritty. You have the Chosen One, an inexplicably charismatic macho asshole whose main distinguishing feature is his tendency to make multipage speeches about Why He's Right And Everyone Opposing Him Sucks that are treated by his listeners as if he were the second coming of Demosthenes and Oscar Wilde combined (but more manly and heterosexual). He is, needless to say, ridiculously powerful, and shows an unusual lack of regret, or even the most stoic, understated sort of emotional distress, about his many Shoot the Dog incidents. He and his allies consider any enemies not converted by his awesome charisma to be complete monsters, never mind that they're no more ruthless than he can be and some of them have much more character development. Of course, he inevitably triumphs.
Then we get to the next book in the trilogy, and discover that Our Hero has become the new Dark Lord.

Despite its usefulness in other areas, the internet is being remarkably unhelpful about telling me how and where an American-born thirteen year old who's just moved to Quebec can get some help with her French, or if she's expected to pick it up from her surroundings. (She's at about the "plume de ma tante" level when her family moves to Montreal, which isn't really sufficient for book reports.)

On the bright side, I have learned some interesting things about Esperanto profanity! (Thank you, wikipedia.)

Next time I get to a comic book store, I'm going to look for some Ted Kord Blue Beetle. I like what I've heard about him via fannish osmosis, and Nite Owl II was one of my favorite characters in Watchmen, so it's certainly worth a try.

If wikipedia is to be believed, at one point Kurt Russell was considered to play Dan Dreiberg (presumably not for the adaptation that actually made it to the screen, given the age issues.) Maybe Kurt Russell is a more versatile actor than I'm giving him credit for, but - the mind, it boggles.

Note: I'm writing this from the perspective of someone who reads a lot of fanfiction, occasionally writes original fiction of a generally non-graphic but weird and at times potentially disturbing nature, and has no triggers but a generous handful of squicks.

I'm generally a believer in authors letting readers have some idea of what they're in for, although if you're writing a mystery story or certain types of mind screw, you'd probably want to be vaguer than if you're writing the warnings for smut. It's sort of an artistic social contract.
I believe that enabling people to avoid things that, regardless of execution, would be automatically bad experiences for them is advantageous for both artists and audiences. One the producer level, you can stop worrying as much about audience reactions to your topic because the people who would find it inherently upsetting now have the ability to avoid it before they've invested any time or emotional energy, and the people who like what you're trying to do will be better able to seek it out. It's kind of like baking - I want people to eat my almond cookies, but preferably the people who *like* almonds, not the people who are allergic to nuts.

The practicalities of warnings seem to pose a bit of a dilemma, though. I don't write much that's graphically violent or sexual, but possibly triggery stuff that's either implied or is mentioned as having happened in the past or off screen is fairly common. Do I warn for Ekaterina talking about how horrible Colonel Shostakov's interrogation techniques are? Dani's stepdad going to Casa Mayakovsky-Lovelace to retrieve her and acting creepy until Kate pulls a paring knife on him? Ada (as a thirty-two year old) telling Chava about the screwed-up family dynamics of her adolescence? Any of the Tykebombs reminiscing about their childhoods? Not that I mind getting detailed if it would really help potential readers' peace of mind, I just don't want to put effort into a huge eye-glaze-inducing header if it isn't giving people information they specifically care to know before reading the story.
(Of course, in my case the whole matter is largely theoretical, as I don't write much, don't post much of what I write, and don't promote it beyond my own journal, but if I ever have a fit of industriousness followed by a fit of self-promotion, this may be an issue.)

In a weird sort of way, Hideo Kojima encourages me. By which I mean, "Okay, so pretty much all your ideas are, in a large portion, based on homages to your latest pop cultural interests, author appeal, and general WTF-ery, but that hasn't stopped *him*, has it?"
Whether or not my being thus encouraged is a good thing, I suppose, depends on one's opinion about the place of steampunk biolectric mutated-through-self-experimentation mad scientist lesbians in modern fiction.

Because I'm not optimistic about the chances of finding Elegant Gothic Aristocrat/steampunk/pseudo-Victorian stuff in my size at a local thrift shop - even if one expands the definition of "local" to include the higher-end ones in Seattle - and under my current financial circumstances I can't really justify spending a hundred dollars for a dress, but - so pretty! I want to run around dressed like a steampunk adventuress, damme! So it seems that, in the absence of my personal economy receiving a great upturn, my best bet is to learn how to make my own darn promenade dresses. (Maybe I should switch to Elegant Byzantine Aristocrat - the clothes back then seemed to have much simpler basic structure.)

After a cold winter and spring, the weather kami have heard the Pacific Northwest Coast's collective kvetching about how people in other parts of the world get *real* warm weather, and has obliged with a vengeance. At least the basil and tomatoes seem to like it.
Heat waves give you lots of incentive to try new recipes for cold drinks. The following recipe (inspired by something I've read in an Indian cookbook) is, I've found, good as a change from plain water or sweet stuff.
Mix up some tart plain yogurt with a little fresh lime juice and salt, and stir until the mixture is creamy and semiliquid. Mix in some chilled plain seltzer. Serve in a tall glass with a few ice cubes. This would probably be good with spicy food.

* I haven't written much that could be classified as remotely smutty, and none of that was from a male POV, I don't have a great record of keeping up with online RP commitments, and it's not even my favorite opera, but for some reason, some part of my mind thinks that playing Don Giovanni in Amat Omnes would be a dandy idea. (Probably a better idea than bringing Scarpia in, even if Scarpia has sexier music.)

I keep imagining "His Majesty's Dragon" as a video game. It starts out as a dragon-rearing sim, with the additional element of building Social Links with other dragons and officers once you get into formal training, and then you get a midstream genre shift into aerial combat. And you can unlock different dragons to raise if you replay the game. I'm thinking of giving a nonstandard game over when your relationship values with your dragon get too low (they eat you, or something), but from what I've read so far that seems uncharacteristic. Look at what poor Levitas puts up with.

Things have been at sixes and sevens around here lately. My paternal grandfather died (which was not completely out of the blue, as he'd been having health issues for a while, but was still somewhat unexpected as he'd made it through much worse medical crises recently and recovered), and my parents are in charge of all the post-mortem arrangements. The living room's currently filled with his various personal documents and old furniture. It all feels a bit surreal, because a few weeks ago I was thinking things like "when he goes off that special diet he's on, I want to make him a cake."

My mother's assistant has the flu this week (she doesn't seem to be dangerously ill or anything, just feeling crummy) and so for the past couple of days (and probably tomorrow) I've been helping her. At least my mom had warning this time, so I didn't get dragged out of a sound sleep at seven AM after staying up until three goofing off on the internet.

I make a lot of character portraits with online dollmakers. Mostly I do my own OCs or my friends' RP characters, but sometimes I do things like this.

Inspired by some fanart I saw at capslock_mgs a little after Sweet Snake and co. made their appearance. Here's ( Not-Really-That-Sweet Mantis demonstrating her telekinetic powers. )

So, if it's an "always been a girl/guy AU" not a "hey, how did these get here?/where the heck are my boobs?!" scenario, how do you handle the character's altered gender expression? Of course, since they're the same people, they'd keep the same interests, but having stereotypically masculine or feminine hobbies doesn't necessarily translate into one's overall butch or femme-ness (I've known more than one conventionally manly guy who was interested in both cooking and textile crafts.)
So, if you're writing an AU version of a very manly Even The Guys Want Him action hero, do you make her a badass hot butch girl or badass, glamorous and feminine in a hard-edged sort of way (sort of a grown-up version of the Tall, Dark and Bishoujo aesthetic, although she might not fit the physical stereotype)?
An odd thing if you go with the butch option is that a really manly girl has a different relationship to societal gender stereotypes than a really manly guy does, which may be of interest to queer theorists and femslashers out there.

For some reason, grimdark game settings make me want to play cheerful, reasonably moral, well-adjusted people (or at least people whose personal pathologies are "amusingly neurotic" not "Axe Crazy.) I think this is a manifestation of my inner fanbrattishness, but I suppose it could be channeled in worse ways.

Anyway, it would be fun to play Vampire: the Masquerade again. I've had my run with Cloudcuckoolander Malkavians, now I want to play a Nosferatu who doesn't spend her unlife bitterly resenting all the pretty people. I kind of like the idea of playing a "Cleopatra" (pretty person Embraced out of spite) who happened to have, unbeknown to her sire, hideous body image issues, and despite the social fallout found it almost a relief that the self she'd always seen and the self other people saw finally matched. Playing a Nosferatu rock star would be fun, too. Maybe she'd even cover songs from "Phantom of the Opera."

Something similar to steampunk (as in, retro-high-tech and Swashbuckling Adventure), but based off of Chinese technology and adventure fiction (wuxia novels?) could be very interesting. Given that a lot of the most famous Chinese inventions appeared pretty early and didn't happen as part of an Industrial Revolution in the modern European sense, it'd be more clockpunk than steampunk, but that's fun too.

Vegan coconut cake - use the basic Betty Crocker plain yellow cake recipe, only substitute 1/4 cup coconut butter for the 3/8 cup butter, 1/2 mashed very ripe banana for the egg, and canned lowfat coconut milk for the milk, use no vanilla, and mix in some chopped white and dark chocolate and shredded coconut at the last minute. Bake as usual.
This turned out tasty (and very delicate and rich), but the layers were pretty flat (an occupational hazard of vegan baking, in my experience), so I sandwiched them together with some canned white frosting we had on hand and more coconut.
Milk chocolate, macadamia nuts, or almonds would probably be good in this as well, as would a cream cheese or yogurt-based frosting.

I put in a job application this morning. A local bakery is hiring, and they said "no experience necessary - will train," which given my state of cultivated unemployability was rather encouraging. I had been kvetching about only having my immediate family and gaming friends to inflict my baking efforts on, so this seemed like a worthwhile option to pursue, even if it would involve getting up at 3:30 AM. At least I'd have my afternoons free.

First, I've given up baking and am going on the Atkins diet for an indefinite period. I really need to lose some weight around my hips and thighs if I'm going to pull off my new wardrobe of hot pants, spike heels, and Lycra minidresses.

I'm also putting all my current writing projects on indefinite hold in order to concentrate on something more artistically worthy - an epic social realist saga about the personal struggles of an all-male cast of factory workers in the late twentieth through early twenty-first centuries.

I've also decided to give up on roleplaying and spend my gaming time on first person shooters instead. It's a much more efficient use of one's time if you don't let all that icky plot and character interaction get in the way of killing things.

I should probably stop worrying so much about whether my characters are sympathetic or not - people will like whomever they like, as the "Watchmen" fandom so clearly demonstrates - and I don't want to get so invested in other people's opinions that I go around telling reviewers that they're reading the text wrong and making inferences about their probable psychological disorders. But still, I haven't reached a state of sublime artistic detachment, and so I worry about the line between "easy to exploit due to her tendency to trust the wrong people, especially when the alternative is believing something horrible about someone she knows and wants to like" and "criminally morally irresponsible and too dumb to live."

These are mildly sweet, denser and chewier than commercial muffins, and very easy to make if you have experience in baking from scratch. I think that they're tasty in a health-foody sort of way.

( Spiced Cider )


( Pseudo-Jaffas )


( Apricot-White Chocolate )