This was a darling little movie. Visually gorgeous, and the soundtrack was charming. Arrietty is a fantastic little (heh) heroine, a 10cm little person who lives under the floor with her parents, who 'borrow' things from upstairs to make their homes. I grew up on the early 90s Ian Holmes version, and on the original book, so it had some pretty big childhood shoes to fill, and it did it well. It kept the spirit of the original, and spun it out in Ghibi ways that pleased me.

I have nit-picks: many of the things in their home were Borrower-sized, rather than visibly appropriated or cut down to size. I was totally charmed by the use of stamps as paintings, though! The gender roles were almost painfully stereotypical, and I feel like with a tiny moment or two you could have established Arrietty's mother's fretting as, say, a completely legitimate response to a really hard and stressful life. Also, subtitliers! Please call SBS and ge them to explain how it's done Properly. :P But these are comparatively tiny things.

I was delighted by the details everywhere, and how fearless and curious Arrietty was. I was struck by having a female protagonist, an actual point-of-view character, and how many of Ghibi's films do this, and how Pixar is only just getting around to it. I was also struck by the fact that there was actually two early-20s guys sitting behind us, and they seemed to enjoy it as much as I did. It's the little things!

Also, my new 'if I won lotto' dream is to pay Valve to make a Portal-2-quality-graphics Borrowers game. Seriously! A tiny little third-person-character, creeping around a giant-sized house, looking for things to complete their home and combining 'borrowed' items to make X, which would get you into room Y, which would enable you to... etc *cough*

In sum: Arrietty was wonderful. I recommend it :)

Or know someone who does?

We're moving this weekend, so having someone who is like "hells yes, and I can come over in the next few days" would be ideal.

It disassembles into three bits. The veneer is peeling on one panel, but it wardrobe is otherwise in very good condition. Clutter not included :p Free! Just BYO transport :P

ETA: Measurements! It's 150cm wide (50cm a bay), 57cm deep and 237cm tall.

Dear Yuletide author!

Hello! I hope you're excited, and not freaking out too badly! I'm probably going to be switching between the two pretty rapidly :). I hope we've matched on something that you're like 'hell, yeah, this is going to be awesome.' Or feel free to check out something else on my request list, obviously.

As always, optional details are optional. If you've looked at my character list and gone 'hells yeah, I'd love to write X about them!' go write X to your heart's content.

Things that I love!

• I am delighted by gen, het, slash and femslash equally. Femslash makes my heart sing, but is probably harder to come by in my requested fandoms, so no stress :P


• I have a competency-kink a mile long. It doesn't matter what people are doing specifically, anything from baking a cake to putting together machinery. I just really enjoy watching people do things well with assurance and skill. See also: physical competency, the ability to kick someone's butt etc. :D


• Intimacy. I don't just mean sex or physical touch -- that ease you get with someone when you've been together forever, and can hang out in their personal space and never bump into them; all the inside jokes you build up; knowing they're okay or not okay at a glance. That sort of thing.


• Happy endings, although looking at my fandom list, that might be a bit of a stretch *laughs* I'd totally go for bittersweet 'things are still fucked, but we're still together and hanging in there' in its place :D


• Also! I struggle with plot at the best of times myself. If you find yourself writing a plotty epic, that's fantastic and go for your life. Or if you're sitting there thinking: 'they have to do stuff? ohshit.' I am A-OK with a thousand and one words of worldbuilding, or lazy Sunday afternoon sex, or character study or whatever takes your fancy with these characters

Things I'd rather not read for Yuletide:
Rape/non-con; (major) character death (random people getting shot in The Suburbs, for example, is fine); mpreg; partner betrayal. I have a major embarrassment/humiliation squick. Please don't show characters getting their hopes up, or getting excited, and then getting squished for it.

( On to the fandoms! )

If you have any questions, contact meghanc, and she’ll ask me and get an answer back to you.

Wow, that got long. To sum up! Optional details are optional; go have a ball :D

Because I realised I haven't posted in forever.

Tonight I have: washed my sheets! hung out my sheets! changed my sheets to pretty, pretty summer blue sheets! and cut my toe nails. For some reason, all of these things are weighted equally in my head.

Also, I love this more than I can properly articulate; it almost makes me cry from the happy.

When the others all joked around about code names -- seriously, Havok? -- she told them her stage name was Angel. That was true. She didn't mention that it was also the name her mother gave her at birth. Angel has never been anyone but herself.

How the west was won by kaydeefalls

Fantastic short fic.

(text from Samvara)
The wise and beauteous Chaosmanor needs support fixing up her house as part of the grand plan to sell it for a handful of beans and some magic rope… or was that magic beans and some rope? Anyway there’s a house, and a bean… or was it a lentil? And we have gaffa tape, so who needs rope anyway?

We’d love to have company and support so if you’re up for some form of moral support including but not limited to telling amusing stories, lifting, carrying, cleaning, painting, sprucing, spackling and generally joining in we’d love to see you there.

Saturday 28th May from 1pm onwards; we will be providing hot beverages and fast food
Address provided on request

Confusion and gnashing of teeth 1: Adblock is failing me! I have moving, flashing things in the corner of my vision in Yahoo and there are ads in Facebook and all these places they weren't before. I've tried reinstalling adblock and restarting firefox, to no avail. Has anyone else had this problem> Any ideas on how to fix it?

Angst 2!: I want a smartphone. I'm very much liking the look of the HTC Desire.

Things I'm after in a (smart)phone:
- ability to make calls, text (with threads!), and take photos
- a good calendar, with a weekly-ish view of what I'm doing
- ability to use GPS and maps while on foot
- good browsing ability for blogging sites (LJ! DW, oh how I miss you!)
- potential ability to read e-books
- ability to listen to (and store) music

I'm pretty sure iPhone and Android both do these things admirably. Just that the android OS looks pretty and seems to be slightly cheaper, depending. I'm not deep about this. If there's something in that list that Android doesn't do well, shout out.

Angst the 3rd: what carrier should I go with? I'm currently pre-paid just-phone-no-internet with 3 on a $29 cap. Which... I resent paying $29 every month after Virgin's $50 'yeah, use it whenever,it's cool', but it works for me just fine, other than that. samvara has mentioned the roaming rates that kick in for internet (they kick in for my phone, too, but only when I'm using it, and even then I've never spent more than the cap's worth). So I'm wary of that.

The best deal I've found so far is this one from Vodafone: $50 a month for a two year contract: 1 GB of data, unlimited this, unlimited that. Only thing I'd want to double check is if they really, really did international texts. Pro column: 3 and Vodafone are completing a merger. They'll be delighted to swap me over, says <user name="samvara>. Con column: their service has been up and down because they're... upgrading things? doing hardware things? I'm not too clear. Can anyone advise? Who are you with, carrier wise? What do you think of them? Aid the confused!

Shiver by Maggie S: Girl is transfixed by wolves in the woods at the back of her house. Wolves are werewolves. It had a pretty, pretty cover and a few people talked approvingly of it. I kept reading this partly because it was a substantial writing-improvement over the last two books I picked up, and partly because I was curious to see if there would suddenly be plot in the second half. Answer: not really, although at nearly the half way mark it mentions wonderful backstory of made-family as a lead up to sudden tension... and then drops the tension until the last hundred pages when finally I’m engaged and want to know what happens next, but god it was a long time coming. I’m not sure if I’ll pick up the sequel or not.

Before I die by Jenny Downham: Tessa is sixteen, and she’s dying. She has a list to finish before she goes *exhales* This was a wonderful read. Poignant without being sentimental, and angry and freaked out and delighted in all the right places, this hooked me from the first few pages. The time-jumps between chapters jarred sometimes, but this is still a fantastic, beautifully written book. Highly recommended.

Winter’s Bone by Daniel Woodhouse: I enjoyed the language, and the grimness and Ree and Gail’s relationship and care for each other in particular, but I never felt emotionally gripped by the story. M pointed out that Ree is basically taking on the man’s role, and wondered (paraphrased) if that’s what made Ree’s story ‘worth’ writing about. We’re both wondering if and how it would have been written differently if a woman had told the story.

Night watch by Terry Pratchett: I was delighted by lots of this book, the ‘seamstresses’ and the actual seamstresses; Vimes setting himself up as Keel, and whole bunch of things. I feel like I’m... missing something, possibly not having read a Guards book before. To other books in the series!

Extremely loud & incredibly close by Jonathan Safran Foer. Huh. I started this book being entranced and impressed by Oskar’s voice, and enjoying it. I loved his search for the lock, and the way he went about it, and the whole resolution of that arc. I found myself being mostly confused irritated by the grandmother’s and grandfather’s story as it went on that I spent half the book speed-reading. I’m not sure, on balance, if he has an excellent grasp of character voice (namely Oskar’s), or if he’s writing the same character again and again. Also, I somehow got it into my head that Oskar had Asperger’s, although it’s never explicitly mentioned, to the point where I’m not sure if I mixed it up with something else or what. I was utterly, utterly delighted by Stephen Hawking’s letter, regardless. *draws little hearts*

Possibly, my standards have lowered, so a solid, tempting trailer is "Wheee!" but I'm excited now.



Dear James McAvoy and Michael Fassbender: Ian McKellan and Patrick Stewart worked that slash. Don't you let us down now.

Isn't it shiny?

Thank you slashgropers! :P