there will be a fish

Meme yoinked from this lovely Middleman fic:

The iPod Challenge: Put your MP3 player on shuffle and write a flashfic (I refuse to call these drabbles; I am a term purist!) about each of the first ten songs to come up. The catch? You only have the duration of the song to write it in.

I haven't really looked at these since I wrote them at 5am, so hopefully they're not terrible. I also cheated on the rules for a few of them (you will likely be able to tell which, because they are significantly longer).

Also, I have no idea where the serial killer one came from. I kept trying to figure out who the character was, but I don't think she's anybody I've met before. Whoops, accidental original!fic?

1. ( Fringe )

2. ( Generation Kill )

3. ( not sure; any female lead + serial killer, I suppose )

4. ( Supernatural )

5. ( The Pretender )

6. ( Sherlock Holmes )

7. ( Primeval )

8. ( Sports Night )

9. ( Middleman )

10. ( Magnificent Seven )

For a meme from dsudis – when you see this, post a poem – and because the first stanza was quoted in this week's Criminal Minds episode. It is my very favorite Emily Dickinson poem. I first read it in my high school sophomore English class, and I still remembered it well enough to continue reciting the poem when it showed up on CM:

"Hope" is the thing with feathers—
That perches in the soul—
And sings the tune without the words—
And never stops—at all—

And sweetest—in the Gale—is heard—
And sore must be the storm—
That could abash the little Bird
That kept so many warm—

I've heard it in the chillest land—
And on the strangest Sea—
Yet, never, in Extremity,
It asked a crumb—of Me.

Oh, I love this meme! Glad to see it going around again so I have an excuse.

1. I write down a list of 10 characters.

2. You choose however many of those you like and ask me a question about them. Examples: "What happens when 5 and 9 are forced to take care of a baby?" or "1, 4, and 8 walk into a bar. What happens next?" or "7 and 10 are held hostage in a bank while it is being robbed. What do they do?" You get the idea. :D

3. I tell you about these scenarios!

I've been seeing a lot of posts and discussions recently about writing female characters in fanfic. There are too many for me to address specifically, but it seems to boil down to what it always tends to in fandom: there are a lot of people out there, each with their own backgrounds and reasons and hang-ups and issues. Oh, fandom. And as usual, my reaction tends to be: whatever you do, it's usually a bad idea to let fear or anticipation of other people's opinions control your actions, especially when those opinions prevent you from creating things. Others' opinions expanding your worldview and inspiring you to take action is one thing; being guilted or pressured into action is something else.

( wherein I ramble about writing women )

I wandered a bit there, but my point is this: IMO, there's no good reason not to write female characters, and lots of valid reasons in favor of the practice. If you do look at yourself and see that you don't, I think it's worth your while to try to figure out why. If you look around and see others not writing, try to understand that, too, rather than attacking them for it. I think stopping at "because it's fun to write men" isn't good enough. If it's "because it's fun to write these men," that works better for me – but there are very likely women out there with similar characteristics, so what's stopping you from writing them, too? These are questions well worth asking of yourself. What you do with the answers is your business (although please don't let fear or self-consciousness decide your actions), but at least try to understand it rather than being blithely righteous about doing it the way you always have.

Anyway, enough with the srs bzns meta portion, and on to the fun part! It's one thing to talk the blah blah blah, but allow me to demonstrate via fun with memes:

Give me a female character and a prompt (feel free to use any number of meme formats; give me someone you'd like her to have a conversation with, give me a pairing, a theme, a mood word, a situation – whatever you like!) and I will write you commentfic. Feel free to tell me a little something about why you like said character in your comment, if you wish, and I will try to tailor my ficlet accordingly. ♥

Oh, what the heck. From thespatz and yahtzee63:

The first TEN people to comment in this post get to request that I write a drabble of any pairing/character/prompt of their choosing, in any fandom I am familiar with. In return, they have to post this in their journal, regardless of their ability level. (If you absolutely can't write, I don't see why you wouldn't be able to offer drawings or icons or dirty limericks or something instead.) I'll even write you a dirty limerick, if you prefer that to a drabble.

For the record, I recently got into Generation Kill, re-watched all of Lie To Me and Fringe with my twin, and am having a Southland renaissance, so I'd be particularly thrilled by prompts in those fandoms. But I'm really really easy if you want to pull out something random like, say, The Pretender. :D

All y'all should check out cidercupcakes's Home Team: The 2009 Matches. Like, now. Each awesome female character nominated has their own thread, and people vote by commenting agreement. There are characters from everywhere -- TV, film, comics, and literature.

The post is kind of cool. It could just be a dry nom post, but instead has turned into a pithy lovefest. No one's doing any epic pimping, but each nomination generally has a short, to-the-point reason to vote for the character, which makes it fun to read through even if you don't feel like voting. Everyone is being very positive, nominating and replying to threads with enthusiasm about awesome women.

It's a lovely sight. Warms the cockles of my heart, it does. :D

I nominated: Dana Whitaker (Sports Night), Natalie Hurley (Sports Night), and Lacey Thornfield (Middleman). I couldn't believe no one had put any Sports Night women on the list yet. They could use some votes!

And there are still more women who could stand to be nominated! I may get around to doing the following later, but feel free to beat me to it. :) ( In no particular order: )

My voting process was a little haphazard and impulsive, but I can't vote for everyone. So ( I voted for: )

So go forth! Vote and nominate! Revel in the fact that there are so many awesome fictional women!

Had a job tonight and made a nice chunk of money. Which is awesome, because I am broke.

I like this meme, and thus am inflicting it on you all. :D There were about a zillion more pairings that didn't make the list, and I had a hard time deciding what to choose, but here it is...

List your 10 favorite 'ships and ask your friendlist what trends they see.

1) Benton Fraser/Ray Kowalski [Due South]
2) Dan Rydell/Casey McCall [Sports Night]
3) Jarod/Parker [The Pretender]
4) Donna Moss/Josh Lyman [The West Wing]
5) Temperance Brennan/Seeley Booth [Bones]
6) James T. Kirk/Spock [Star Trek]
7) Harriet Vane/Lord Peter Wimsey [Dorothy Sayers' Lord Peter series]
8) Arthur/Merlin [Merlin]
9) Alec Hardison/Parker/Eliot Spencer [Leverage]
10) Penelope Garcia/Derek Morgan [Criminal Minds]

For the record, more people should write #10. There is not nearly enough fic out there with this pairing.

ETA: ( might as well get this Which Trek Character Are You? meme out of the way at the same time )

I bored. Let's do a meme! Courtesy of marinarusalka.

You see me in the back of a police car. What was I arrested for?

Hi guys! I have to do domestic things around my suite this afternoon. Please entertain me?

1) Make a list of fifteen characters first, and keep it to yourself for the moment (so as to avoid leading questions).

2) Ask your flist to post questions in the comments.

For example: '10, 6, and 7 are stuck in the same holding cell. How did they all get there, and who from the rest of the list is coming to bail each out?'
'What board game would 11 and 3 play together, and who would win?'
'Everyone on the list is trapped in a room with a ticking bomb. Which character would disarm it?'
'1 and 2 suddenly find themselves as business partners. What business, and are they successful?'
(feel free to use any of these, btw)

3) After your flist has asked enough questions, round them up and answer them using the fifteen characters you selected beforehand, then post them.

Going back through some old comments, I see that I've signed up to do the icon meme twice, so this is a double meme (although, the first was for three icons and the second was for five, and they both picked one icon in common, so it's really only a little longer than normal).

( icon meme )