trinityofone

Ugh. Ugh. Ugh. I hate writing papers. So far I have 2,402 words of this piece of dreck--which, out of 3,500, isn't so bad, but it's painfully slow-going and I had to do a whole section on economics and just...yeah. Yuck. However, one of my main sources is named Daniel Snowman, so I get to write a lot of fun sentences that start, "According to Snowman..." or "As Snowman asserts..." Which, when you've been working on a paper for six hours, is really funny and diverting.

Last night was awesome, though. I went over to siriaeve's house and watched the Eurovision contest. It was my first Eurovision--a very special occasion indeed! For those of you in America or other non-European parts of the world, I wish I could convey the utter cracktastic awesomeness of the Eurovision experience. toft_froggy has a great post with some of the highlights here. And, thanks to the wonder of YouTube, you can experience it for yourself. Here's a short guide.

The first thing you need to understand is that everyone who performs for Eurovision is really, really bad. No serious artist would go anywhere near it. I think the most famous person to perform a song in the Eurovision contest is Céline Dion--that pretty much sums it up right there.

Here, for example, is an act of pretty typical badness: Shame, Spain! That should give you a general idea of the direness of the proceedings.

Or, take Ireland. I was actually rooting for Ireland, for obvious reasons, and Ireland does indeed hold the record for most Eurovision wins (it's also the only country to have won three years in a row). But this year's entry was, shall we say, dismal? It was Brian Kennedy performing "Every Song Is a Cry For Love." (Right of the top of my head: like, say, "Psycho Killer"?) I can't find a clip of his live performance, which was mostly very dull and very, very green, but to give you an idea of the utter, utter cheese, here's the music video. *snerk*

But there were some shining stars. One was the winner, Finland. I...don't actually want to say anything about this. You just have to watch it: unspoiled, utterly surprised. So, just remember that most of the acts were in the same vein as Spain's entry or Brian Kennedy's pap, and then watch this.

They totally deserved to win. Still, I think my heart belongs to the cheeky Lithuanian monkeys responsible for this. See? Now that's awesome. That's taking the piss. Ireland appreciates piss-taking ability: we (see how possessive I've gotten?) gave our largest percentage of votes to Lithuania. So why are we stuck entering greasy dullards like Brian Kennedy? Yeesh.

Still. Everyone knows that this is the greatest Eurovision entry ever. Pure Irish glory, that. *vbg*

I am currently writing the world's worst essay on James Joyce's Dubliners (except for any essay ever written by my 12th grade English teacher, who claimed that the creepy old dude in "An Encounter" wasn't whacking off, when clearly...he's whacking off*), but an important question has arisen that must be answered:

[Poll #700967]

ETA: Dude, why're y'all voting for The Puddlejumpers for Shortest Band in the World? I'm sure Shep appreciates the publicity, but don't you think they're disqualified on the strength of Ronon alone?

Also, in other random Irish literature news, suitemate Jean just told me that John McGahern just died. That is so weird: I just finished reading his Amongst Women, and we're discussing it in class on Monday (with hot Scottish tutor Peter Mackay, no less!). All this, I know, has absolutely zero cosmic significance, but...I still feel it as odd, as quite sad.

*She also claimed that the line in "The Convergence of the Twain" about "that august event" referred to the month, "because the Titanic sank in August." When I pointed out that no, the Titanic sank in April, she got really huffy and was weird with me for the rest of the year.

I am hungover and I am in a great mood, and that is the wonderful contradiction of life in fandom. Yes.

So yesterday was my birthday (guess how old I am. No, go on, guess! And no peeking at my userinfo!) and it was wonderful and incredible, first and foremost because a bunch of fabulous people put together the community day_begins and gave me prezzies! First you should go check out the hilarious and wonderful list of interests in their userinfo (my own interests seriously need to be updated), and then you should check out the amazing things people made for me. Which I will now proceed to gush about.

*reccea wrote the lovely, subtle story Campfire, which is wonderfully atmospheric and has an excellently characterized John who just breaks my heart, but whom I have real hope for, too. It's great.

*smittywing wrote Padraic's Legacy which...well, I don't want to spoil the AWESOME, CRACKISH DELIGHT that is this story, so let's just say that it starts out with John quoting Indiana Jones, proceeds to take full advantage of the St. Patrick's day theme, and ONLY GETS BETTER FROM THERE. I'm into obnoxious caps-lock territory because of this story. *glee*

*tardis80 made me ( this )...which I have to display in its fully glory here. I just...*spasms* It's enough to make me find religion.

*stop wrote Going Soft, which has puns, euphemisms, and FOOTNOTES. Sing with me now: "These are a few of my favorite things..."

*Speaking of euphemisms, _inbetween_ performed a truly miraculous feat, writing Pull My Daisy, a story featuring every single one of the penis euphemisms listed here. And it has an actual plot! It's a scary, scary genius that _inbetween_ has...

*megolas wrote Entanglement, which is a simply gorgeous look into Rodney's mind and which makes both math and physics incredibly SEXY. *boggles* Go boggle, too.

*dar_jeeling made me six gorgeous icons, including the one proudly sported by this post. (And how much do I love that I seem to have created a new phrase?) There is even an icon of Ralph the Elephant! *loves*

*not_sally made me a beautiful Shirley Manson (of Garbage) icon and wallpaper, and also (scroll down), possibly the most hilarious and clever SGA icon EVER. Just...*is filled with gleeful pride*

*fyrie wrote me Playing the Game, an adorable fic about Rodney and Radek, with some fab Cadman bits lurking in the background, too. I don't want to spoil this, either, but let me just say that I can TOTALLY see this happening. In fact, I bet it already has.

*And last but so, so very far from least, siriaeve wrote Sfumato, which is an absolutely breathtaking fic about John and Rodney in Italy. But it's about so much more than that, too. You must read this, and tell Siria how wonderful it is, and encourage Siria to write more, more, more. I'm just...guh.

(Verklempt, Siria: now would be a very appropriate time to say I am verklempt. *g*)

Thank you, also, to everyone who wished me a happy birthday yesterday, and to the anonymous person who bought me the pint of Guinness in my userinfo. You're all wonderful; you make fandom a fabulous place to be, and I love you all. *big squishy hug*

NOW, onto what I actually did yesterday to celebrate...( There was a big parade and it was all for ME! Or possibly for some dude named Patrick. Whatever. )

So it was a fabulous, fun, crazy, dorky birthday, and I loved every minute, even if my toes didn't. Then this morning I woke up, ate some more Nutella, and wrote a piece of baddirtywrong smut that'll probably never see the light of day. And thus my 23rd year looks to be following in the footsteps of the last: full of porn and chocolate.

Well. Can't complain.

First, everyone everyone everyone needs to go check out the beautiful banner (and new layout) siriaeve made for me: looooooooooooook! So. Pretty. *happy sigh*

Second, I pretty much tied myself down and made myself write something for sga_flashfic: Truth, and Other Literary Endeavors, McKay/Sheppard (do I really need to specify that every time? When do I write anything else?), far from my favorite piece ever, but my God, was I glad to have written it. Writer's block sucks.

Third, thanks to the fabulous stop, the mix I made for _rfa has a permanent home. You can check out the track list here, and then the .zip file is available here (right-click save): I Think We're Gonna Like It Here.

Fourth, boggle at the fuckin' fantastic icon siriaeve made for me! This is from a shop in Dublin that I have written about before, and have since taken:

( Gratuitous photos of Sheppard's Hairdressing and Weir & Sons )

( Now, dorky photos of me, randomeliza, and siriaeve being...well, dorks )

( And the photo taurendur has been waiting for: me on top of Tara )

( Finally, my two favorite places I've never been )

Sometimes I love the world.

So...I haven't read my friends list in about two weeks. Anything vitally important I need to know about? Anything completely trivial you want to tell me anyway?

In the last three days, I've:

1) Drunk absinthe;
2) Watched Boa vs. Python;
and 3) Gotten violently ill.

Not in that order. *g*

What happened was this: Friday I woke up with positively the worst case of food poisoning I--or, I am still somewhat convinced, anyone has ever had. I had to cancel my plans with jarsy, and spent the entire day unable to get out of bed except for when I was dragging my sorry self to the bathroom. What a perfect farewell gift from 2005! Finally, a little after 10 p.m. I made one last stumble across the room to turn out the light, then collapsed back into my bed and slept for over 12 hours.

I woke up feeling, if not Magically All Better, then much less likely to pass out when I tried to take a shower, which was one of Friday's more entertaining interludes. When jarsy texted me to make sure I wasn't dead before inviting my reanimated corpse to a New Year's party with her, I decided I was well enough to go based on the fact that I was really, really bored. I got the DART out to Glenageary and met up with jarsy, who fed me yummy Malaysian food--the first thing I'd been able to keep down in almost two days. Then we watched part of The African Queen (a McKay/Sheppard fic absolutely needs to be written with the line, "I pronounce you husband and husband. Proceed with the execution"), raided her parents' liquor cabinet, and walked down to Dun Laoghaire for the party.

( trinityofone meets the Green Fairy--a tale of New Year's debauchery, with photos! )

The next morning, we summarily flipped off the entire concept New Year's resolutions by lounging around in our pajamas for hours. We watched the copy of Where the Heart Is that I had on my computer and cooed at David Hewlett in all his blond, babyish, bewinged glory; then jarsy finally got to see 'The Tower,' and our cooing turned to mockage. Eventually we decided we needed some fresh air, so we walked over to Dalkey, which is an adorable little town with a good bookstore and a nice, big pub. (If they built a movie theater, I could just about live there.)

( I took some pictures of Coliemore Harbour )

Once we had proved that we were Good People, At One With Nature, we went back to jarsy's house and ate some cheese. jarsy's mom was making liver, so I tried some. I can now say with certainty what I once only assumed: liver is disgusting. Then it was back to the guest room for several more episodes of SGA. We watched 'Duet' and 'Grace Under Pressure'--a hell of a one-two punch, that. Then we decided that we needed some variety, so we walked over to jarsy's local DVD rental shop. We were browsing and--I swear to God--looking for a nice screwball comedy like The Awful Truth when, lo and behold, what did my little eye spy? Yes, indeed: Boa vs. Python! jarsy was almost too embarrassed to rent it, but how could she--or any sane person--resist such a blatant show of fate, not to mention the lure of teh Hewlett? So out we waltzed, meeting the delivery man on the way and thus arming ourselves with curry as we prepared to watch the fakest snakes ever poorly animated.

( I can't believe I'm saying this, but--spoilers for 'Boa vs. Python' )

Eventually, I had to bid jarsy and the House of Hewlett Worship goodbye. I took the bus back into central Dublin, reading The Thorn Birds on the way. ( This was the last paragraph I read before I got off: )

Er, the bus. Before I got off the bus. *eg*

Anyway, it's been a pretty good resurrection so far. Happy New Year, all!

My parents are coming tomorrow, and I sense I'm close to being pretty really extremely freaked out. I want to see them, but I know it's going to be weird, and then in a week they'll leave, and I'll have to go through the adjustment period all over again. Yes, I know: way to look on the bright side, trinityofone! Sorry. I'm just, well...freaked out? Yes, I think I mentioned that.

Anyway, good things: yesterday I got to see siriaeve, who I would like to inform you is more exciting than doing laundry. (I know. I just did mine.) Actually, she's a blast AND she lent me the first eight seasons of SG-1, which was pretty much the best unofficial Christmas present ever. So I may actually catch up with that half of the canon eventually. You know, if I never do homework or leave my room again.

She also took me to Dublin's Natural History Museum, which is officially the coolest museum I have ever been to, ever ever ever. Better than New York's Museum of Natural History, which I adore; better than the George C. Page Museum at the La Brea Tar Pits, which will always maintain a special place in my heart for still having the same video presentation I remember from, like, 1988. But this place... Let's just say that you really got a sense that this was what the monkeys in Planet of the Apes got their inspiration for their Human Museum from. I think it's sometimes referred to as the Dead Zoo--every kind of creature you could imagine, and some you couldn't, stuffed and mounted, pinned and wriggling on the wall. It was incredibly creepy and so, so awesome.

Words can't really do it justice, but you're not allowed to take pictures, and besides, my camera was broken. ( So here are a few images I gleaned from the web, including a cheesy watercolor and one with a toy monkey )

siriaeve and I kept giggling about Stephen Maturin was probably gaga over this place, and hey, if Stephen likes it, you know it's gotta be cool. So if you're ever in Dublin, this is now my official recommendation for the No. 1 thing you should go see. St. Stephen's Green? Pish. Dublin Castle? It's mostly rebuilt anyway. Trinity College? Whatevers. GO TO THE DEAD ZOO. Yes.

Speaking of dead things: plainsong_x, I finally finished Exquisite Corpse while I was doing my laundry this afternoon. I have no real coherent thoughts, but I would like to point out that I ate a burrito whilst reading it. *perverse pride*

And because I promised siriaeve that I would post it:

I Touch Myself - Scala

It's a Belgian girls' choir singing The Divinyls' "I Touch Myself." Yes, you read that correctly.

Oh, and whoever guesses what my subject line is from wins...well, my eternal respect? That should be worth something, right? No?

So I obviously smoked some serious crack before going to bed last night, because my dreams were a multifandom extravaganza.

( BtVS, HP, QaF, and SGA wackiness )

Yesterday, I finally got fed up with Trinity's intensely irritating library and went to see if I could find a good used bookstore. For a city that trades so much on its literary reputation, used bookstores are not thick on the ground here in Dublin. Everyone talks about Books Upstairs, which is right across the street from campus, but I've been in there twice and--how can I put this delicately?--it sucks. It has, like, four books in it, and three of them are by Dan Brown. (The fourth is some pretentious piece of literary theory--gag me.)

Anyway, I had heard that Abbey Street had a couple of decent places, so I took the long way 'round, mostly to avoid crossing the River Liffey at O'Connell Street--it's always horribly congested. I ended up in Temple Bar completely by accident, and, I think, stumbled across U2's recording studio there. I think. I didn't look too closely. *is resolutely Not A Stalker*

I started out with a list of ten books, and on Abbey Street I was able to find three of them. Two were at Chapters, which has a decent, if horribly organzied, used section. (What is with bookstores that insist on dividing fiction into "Literature" and "Fiction" sections? It's not only pretentious, it's stupid--you end up with the same book shelved in multiple places, and nobody can find anything. Chapters was even worse--I stumbled across The Great Gatsby in "Literature," "Fiction," and "Classics.") The third was at a bargain store that basically looked like a room where somebody had emptied a carton of books out onto the floor--and not in a good way. Then today I managed to pick up two more at Hodges Figgis, which almost wins Favorite Bookstore on name alone--it sounds like it should be located in Diagon Alley. ;-)

In case anybody's curious, these are the books I was looking for:

( My Reading List )

Seven are for class, three are potential pleasure reading. Anyone who can guess which three (or which one of the others I've actually read previously) will impress me deeply, and probably knows me better than I know myself. ;-)

(Oh, and in case anyone is in terrible suspense: I found the Haggard, the Hogg, the More, the Stoker, and the Wolfe. You can rest easy now. *g*)

ANYWAY...none of this was actually the highpoint of the day. That was my discovery of what I think must be the only Mexican restaurant in Dublin. It's called Taco Taco, it's in a food court off Abbey Street, and it's really not that good. But MY GOD--I ate a quesadilla yesterday, and it was the best thing I had ever tasted. I think I must've been experiencing salsa withdrawal. Bless you, Taco Taco. Bless you.

Whee! I have internet!

*flails arms weakly*

Okay, the truth is I just got back from spending five hours (yes, FIVE HOURS) at the GARDA station getting my immigration status sorted. The good news is that it looks like I'm not going to get kicked out of the country--um, yay! The bad news is: I am so, so, so very tired that I don't want to move or do anything again ever. So the big update'll have to wait 'til tomorrow, when I am slightly less dead.

However, feel free to post/e-mail me things to entertain me, 'cause hey, I can actually access them now.

*world's most feeble squee*

*passes out*

The night before she went to London, trinityofone was not enjoying herself.*



*Actually, I'm enjoying myself just fine; I've just always really, really wanted to say that. And now, after all these years, it's finally true! Well, the going to London part, anyway. *g*

I HAVE A PLACE TO LIVE IN DUBLIN!

And may I say, thank god. I leave in less than a month (!) and up until now, it looked like I was going to be sleeping in doorways. But hurrah! My housing application--submitted late because of a bureaucratic fuck-up (I still haven't gotten one of the packets I was supposed to receive in JULY)--was accepted, even though I was told it probably wasn't going to be AND I was even given an ensuite single instead of a double or something horrific like that. Now I have to go look up PEARSE STREET and check out my new neighborhood! Yay!

Also, in less vital but nonetheless wonderful news, I wrote some fic for sga_flashfic. It's called "Sexual Healing," it's extremely silly, and it's here. And people like it! Wow! I am so relieved because this was my first attempt at writing SGA humor and I of course convinced myself it was crap. As usual, my reaction to my own writing went something like this:

While writing 1st draft
OMG, I am TEH BRILLIANT!

First re-read
Huh. That sentence doesn't make any sense. And all of this "humor" is kinda...forced.

Second re-read
I SUCK. For the good of humanity, I must never touch a keyboard again!

Two days/a month and a half/seven years later
Hmm. Maybe some of this is salvageable.

An hour later
Oh, what the fuck. *posts*

But yeah, I'm glad I got over myself because from what I've seen, SGA readers are encouraging and responsive and wonderful and I love them.

I LOVE THIS FANDOM!!!

Ahem. Well, I do.