Scales and Tales

I got the giggles from this news article about a 27 kg pearl, which mentions that it's valued at $200m but "its owner is in no rush to sell it, for very personal reasons."

Tell me Jingyan isn't the owner of that pearl, and refuses to sell because he's going to put it in Lin Shu's shrine or drop it on his foot, in the AU where Lin Shu survives in spite of himself!

Lots and lots of politicking in this one! Everyone's got headaches from the rapid fall of two major political players, and Sir Su is ready to topple another. Gong Yu, Xinliu and Xinyang set the plot in motion to take down Yu's ally in the Ministry of Personnel.

( Wheels are turning below the cut! )

AKA, "Nobody Knows How Much of This Was Planned Except Mei Changsu"

Seriously, what's a Divine Talent gotta do to get credit around this town?

Prince Yu: "Good for Mei Changsu. He bought a mansion at random and gave me such a big gift."
Jingrui: "Why must you be involved in this political chaos?"
Banruo: "Mei Changsu seems to be acting on his own."
Mei Changsu, deep in his heart, probably: Random? Chaos? On my own? THIS WAS ALL DONE VIA MY HARD WORK OVER LITERAL YEARS IN ADVANCE, THE LEAST YOU COULD DO IS RECOGNISE IT!

( More thoughts under the cut! )

In an effort to keep myself on track with various things, including posting, here's a round-up of where my current fannish efforts are focused.

Rewatching Nirvana in Fire
I've just started this, so if anyone wants to join in - either rewatching, or as a first-time viewing - I'd love to have company. :D At the moment I'm just four episodes in. If other people are interested in watching along, we can come up with a specific schedule and I'll make regular posts designated for discussion! If it ends up being just me, I'll probably be quieter about it; I feel like I've flooded everyone with NiF reactions lately, and you've all been very patient about it and deserve a break in return. :D

Reading Yami no Matsuei
I started this a while ago but got sidetracked, so I plan to start over at the beginning. I'll try to post after each volume completed, to avoid being sidetracked again. No specific schedule in mind, but I should manage at absolute minimum a volume a week.

Watching Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood
Believe it or not, I've never watched FMA:B before! I didn't want to watch it before finishing the manga, and when I'd finished the manga it wasn't readily available, so it's taken me all this time to get round to it. :D The first anime will probably always be my true love, but for completion's sake I do want to get through Brotherhood as well. There may not be much to post about, though, given that this is the third incarnation of FMA for me.

Reading new SF/F from my To-Be-Read Pile
Most of my reading thus far this year has been rereading, but this pile needs to shrink, and this year is as good as any. :D No idea what will call to me first when I start going through it, but as long as I pick something, it's progress! (Reminder to self: take a picture of the pile and post it!)

Rec Some Fics
The lack of fic recs in this journal is just sad. Gotta get back in that rec habit, even if it means stumbling through different ideas on how to approach it till I hit on one that works. (By fandom, by trope, by length?) DW friends, if you have suggestions for recs you'd like to see, now is the time to toss them out here! I had fun posting about Identity Porn, and I've made at least one other post about a beloved trope before, so maybe that's a good approach. Or maybe it should be under a separate heading like "Write Some Meta" that would include stuff like characterisation notes and thoughts on archive warnings.

I'm almost through - there's just one episode left!

Lin Chen is rapidly installing himself in my heart; every time he manages to make Mei Changsu smile I also smile like a fool. I also love his Drama Fan (seriously, he just carries a fan around so he can make melodramatic gestures with it, guys, it's hilarious!) and his squabbling with Fei Lu; the scene where he's unexpectedly drenched made me scare the cats by bursting into helpless snickers!

Loved the confrontation between Mei Changsu and the Emperor; it hit me exactly in my appreciation for stories with "family connections are not sacred and there are valid reasons to extinguish them" outcomes. I was your uncle, I took you on outings doesn't stack up next to I agreed to the execution and slander of your entire family under false accusations, no matter how tearfully offered. His hesitation, and then retreat without speaking, was so satisfying; I read it as not only a personal decision, but also an echo of his promise that they need never meet again - a conscientious display of his own honour, in contrast to his uncle's.

I'm so happy for Jingrui; for a while there I had decided that it was his fate in life to be disappointed by family members, but his mum came through in the end! If anyone deserves to have a little family success, it's that boy. Somebody coughcough Yujin cough needs to hug him! For like the next three days straight.

Next episode, here I come!

Last week, novembermond posted with a meme to talk about three selected icons.

Here are the ones I was assigned:




An old icon! So old that I honestly have lost a lot of the details. :D I think this one dates back to when I first started using this account; I needed some icons and figured that my limited icon-making skills would probably be better off if I ran with the snake theme than if I tried to make fannish icons. The snake in it came from a Google image search, most likely, and I just trimmed it down to fit. This is/was my "humourous post" icon, because to me the snake looks like it's laughing, or smiling.




A new icon! Very new; I made it on 1/2/19. :D I'd been watching and posting about Nirvana in Fire, and really wanted an icon to go with those posts! Again, I don't actually have icon-making skills, so this is really intended to be a placeholder until I find some nice professional ones. It's just a screenshot of the NiF episode page on Viki, cut down and slightly resized. I like both characters, I like blue, and the lack of background detail meant iconifying it was near my skill level... though I think it still took me half an hour to get it cropped just right. :/




Another new icon! But it's a new icon about being an old fan. :D It was made by china_shop, and I saw it in this icon post along with a number of other old!fan icons. It reminded me of LJ and the way people always had some new fashion to complain about: Why are all the icons full of tiny text nowadays? and People, please stop with the eye-searing custom colours! or What's with all these desaturated pastel icons lately?

I am not quite 40, but I have been in fandom since about 1997 (okay, I chose that date almost at random, because trying to define "in fandom" would be a huge post in itself) and find myself a little nostalgic now and then about the ways it changes and the ways it doesn't.


If you would like me to pick three of your icons for this meme, comment with "Pick me!" Or just comment and tell me about your favourite icon, yours or mine. :D

Consort Jing and Su Zhe meet at last!

Jingyan is 1,000% convinced something hinky is going on, but can't find the cracks that would let him in on the secret.

Su Zhe, meanwhile, is radiating Thank you, Doctor Mom interspersed with fervent wishes that she not blow his cover.

Poor suspicious Jingyan! He is doomed to further frustration, I fear. :D

A couple weeks ago I asked nonnies to talk me into trying Nirvana in Fire, and the first response of "watch if you like this stuff" was a list that was practically custom-tailored to my id. The list as it was given to me is below the cut!

( If you like any or all of: )