I would say the unifying themes of this post, to the extent it has any, are Victoriana, costuming, and crossdressing. Also, Things I Have Scanned. So let's get on it, shall we?

( First, people wanted to see the pictures of the 1890s silk dress I was fixing last week, so here they are. )

( And while I was scanning those I went ahead and scanned a few other things. )

Meanwhile, I have acquired another supply from my secret-source-of-free-comics-in-return-for-reviews! And they seemed to fit the theme, so, hey, since I have read them all already,a here are scans and reviews:

( ADELE BLANC-SEC by Jacques Tardi. )

( The CBLDF 2010 Liberty Annual )

( Scarlett Takes Manhattan )

( And, okay, the other comics that didn't fit the theme. )

1. Ebook piracy: the latest hot topic. I have been staying out of this discussion, mostly because: I have been listening to pirated audiobooks since before I could *read*, since pirated audiobooks meant "check the LP out of the library and copy it on to reel-to-reel tape." I worked through all my moral and ethical questions about the issue by the time I had hit kindergarten, with the assistance of the fact that *all* of my peers and authority figures did the same things; I had picture books that were photostat copies bound with brads; I had Boxcar Children books that were bookstore remainders with the covers stripped.

My father was a math and programming teacher in the early 80s; the county-wide department inservice days were the best thing ever, because Dad would come home with 5.25-inch discs holding pirated copies of all the latest Apple II games that all the teachers were trading around under the desks. (True story: I once asked Dad what the "kracker" did in programming, since all the programs we had at home had a "kracked by" credit before the opening screen.) In fact, I have never met a single teacher, at any level, and growing up a TK I've met a lot, who has taught for more than five years and doesn't routinely make illegal copies of things for her classes. When a law is that widely flouted (by pretty much everyone who doesn't directly benefit from its existence, and also often, quietly, by them as well), what you need to do is change the law, not human nature.

Which is to say, I got over this topic two decades ago. Can we move on and stop acting like fainting flowers about it? ^_~

2. Still listening to (pirated) Dresden Files! 3.5 books in have reached Step 10 in the getting-into-a-fandom timeline. Current fic bunnies: A Day In the Life of Father Forthill; 5 Times Harry Dresden Narrowly Avoided Learning About Slash; and Ray Kowalski Dances With The Winter Lady. Also did another meme fill, which was probably obvious to anyone who knows me and is reading over there. However, I've reached the point where I know just enough canon that I no longer feel comfortable writing fic without knowing it all, sigh, so that's stalled, mostly.

Luckily, the anon meme is keeping me in fic for now! Actually I was just thinking that maybe Dresden Files has finally cured me of politics RPF, given the relative numbers of times I've been reloading the two memes, but then Dresden Files fandom decided on its own to adopt Rahm Emanuel as a character, so I suspect I'm just cursed to read politics RPF forever. (Oh, Rahm, oh.)

3. I am almost finished with my mending basket! Which means time to start a brand-new sewing project, maybe! (Or go back to a years-old retired one.) The last thing in the basket was the Madelyn Mack dress I wore at con-txt and ripped the hem out of. It's 100-year-old black silk, so thin it's translucent in sunlight. I have a picture of my grandmother wearing it, c. 1930, in an "Old Hometown" history pageant; I have a picture of her grandmother wearing what might be the same dress, 30 years earlier. I was really, really nervous about attempting to repair a dress that's practically an artifact and such fragile fabric, too - until I actually started the repair.

I am at *least* the fifth person who has attempted to repair the hem of this dress! (And a better seamstress than at least two of them.) That makes me feel a lot better, and, somehow, love the dress a lot more, too. In fact, its value as a historical artifact may not so much be its value as a dress, as it is a record of Edwardian and early-20th-century home clothing repair techniques; this dress wears its scars proudly, and I'm learning things about effective and efficient repair just from studying it that even my mother's generation seems to have forgotten. (I never did get a picture of me wearing it last summer. Maybe once the repair is done I'll attempt a photographic record. Repair being done make take awhile - there is literally six yards of hem around this skirt.)

4. Last Thursday was the first 10 O'clock Live! It was not terrible! It could use some settling-in time, but it was legitimately good. It actually feels like it's kind of halfway between wanting to be the Daily Show and wanting to be something more like W$W - a serious but irreverent real current events magazine. Am looking forward to more.

...and then the next day Keith Olbermann signed off for the last time. D: D: He wasn't always right and he wasn't always good, but he almost always said the things that the American left needed said but was afraid to, and shouted them when they needed shouted, and now who's to do that?

5. I joined inkitout - the DW community to challenge yourself to keep writing all year - and so far, thanks to Dresden Files, am doing okay. But! This week's support post was to introduce one of your characters, and I was like hooray! I always want to talk about my original characters! Until I tried, and realized I couldn't do it. ( original character wibbling )

Back from con.txt! I survived! Okay, I came home on Sunday, fell in to bed at about 6 PM, and slept though until Monday morning, but still, I survived!

...and now there are two years to wait until the next one. ):

I went to sixteen panels (and modded or co-modded six of them); still managed to go out to an excellent lunch with starlady and an excellent dinner with zana16, erinptah, and nakedbee; taught my self to fold dirty origami at the dance, then some stitch'n'bitchery downstairs with synecdochic, sarah, and some of the other usual suspects; then there was the vid show, the Dr. Who viewing party, and the late-night trivia quiz; cosplayed, dropped off and took some stuff at the swap table, sold something at the art auction; got a lead on Dr. Who slash 'zines from a dealer, stayed for Dead Duck, and even did a little bit of freeform socializing.

I think I used up all my extroversion points for about two months. There's a reason I've spent all my free time the past two days basically lying on my bed watching UK Parliament.

Also, my laptop didn't *technically* completely die! I had to stop using the heavy-duty replacement power cord (which now emits sparks and smoke, and never quite fit the socket) and go back to using the original power cord (which atm transfers current only through creative placement of electrical tape and bulldog clips) but at least the cooling fan motor didn't actually burn out like I thought it had! I mean, unless I'm wrong about that and the whole thing's going to melt into my lap as soon as I post this - I'm not sure how I'd tell, given ambient temperature around here.

( A few more details under the cut, through Friday )

Anyway. That's Friday. I think I'll stop here - there's a werewolf book I pulled off the swap table that's calling to me. And precious sleep, of course.

This is me, lindentreeisle, and kyabetsu trick-or-treating! We were spinking.


(I am the baby spink. They are the momma spinks. Until we traded costumes partway through.)

Then we wheeled and dealed over our candy (of which there was lots!) and now we are preparing to start NaNo in an hour! (Yay NaNo!)

ETA: 2,000 words! 2,000 words of utter crap, but it's prologue, and that's always utter crap anyway. But it's done!

So I was going to remember to actually watch SPN tonight, but considering we're like ten minutes in and I've already hit embarrassment-squick-mute three times, I think I'll just wait 'till Sam shows up again. Maybe. Or just read fic instead.

Meanwhile, Halloween plans have officially fallen apart. Must find a plan B.
[Poll #291]

So, this is what I did last night:

Me, kyabetsu, and some other friends got in to the gala opening of the Star Wars exhibit at Geppi's Entertainment Museum, and of course we went in character. :D It was weird to wear that and *still* get called 'normal people'. (By Rebel Legion Organizers, who granted have a somewhat skewed idea of "normal", but, y'know, just because people aren't obsessive Star Wars cosplayers doesn't mean they're not obsessive cosplayers.

Not that I'm really a cosplayer. I am less likely, on my own, to waste the effort on making a weird outfit to wear only to special events when I can put the effort into just dressing weird ALL THE TIME.)

Unfortunately the Anakin costume is all storebought - I was smartchicken enough not to want to wander around in Maryland June weather in tons of makeup and a heavy headdress, unlike some people (kyabetsu in that picture) so I just used one of the costumes they had in storage instead of the one I made. (More pictures here.)

Crossplay is fun. Even if I totally suck at it, even when playing one of the femmier guys in my canon. :D Remembering to walk like you have the family jewels between your legs is not too hard, but otherwise my body language is about as butch as John Sheppard's. And my voice is squeaky. :-P

I seem to have come down with some variety of dreaded lurgy over the past few days. The main symptoms are an all-expenses-paid grand tour of all the known varieties of runny nose, and an intermittent cough of the sort that leads to pulled muscles if it goes on long enough. The most annoying of the symptoms, however, is way it's making me feel as if I've moved to a planet with twice the gravity of Earth's and it's too much work to move. Bah. At least the weather's been nice the past few days.

And I was feeling very up last night, so possibly unwisely I went trick-or-treating with the costume group that enemy_anime put together (and did most of the work on!) There are pictures here, here, here, here and here so far, from the three days we dressed up, links to be kept updated as people post their pictures. (I didn't have my camera around, so I haven't any pictures of my own to post, alas.) I'm the one who matches my icon. (head-tails ftw!) We got lots and lots of candy and had lots and lots of fun and were total and utter *geeks* and it was awesome. Too bad I'm too oogy right now to even feel like eating my chocolate.

(Also by last night I was so dead that the idea of chronicling the adventures of the brainship OA-1320 (Anakin as shellperson and Obi-wan as brawn, of course), roaming the galaxy as troubleshooters attached to the diplomatic service, actually seemed like a *good* one. yaar. Possibly this is the result of all the cripple cracks we were making because the person in the Vader suit was half blind, half deaf, and had limited mobility - hooray Spam in a Can!)

Anyway, before that was spending all my spare time helping him finish making the costumes, and right now, I feel like just curling up on the sofa and sleeping for three days.