i feel like there should be some catching up in the fannish doings of me

[jmtorres]

My festivid is a hit. I am refraining heroically from answering comments, which are awesome. (I also keep seeing my gift, the awesome Marion from Indiana Jones vid, on recs lists, which brings me glee.) niqaeli is collecting an entry of quotes from the vid mines that I wouldn't let her post at the time because they're spoilery, but the schedule on festivids is so stretched out that we're reaching the point of losing context. "Why was [char] a vampire?" I found myself asking regarding one of the quotes that was hilarious at the time. I remembered eventually. It's spoilery.

Today I discovered a new portmanteau for niqaeli's favorite SPN pairing: Casquatch. We died and died of laughter.

Last week we went to see Red at the dollar theater--that being the flick where aging ex-spies (Bruce Willis, Morgan Freeman, John Malkovich, Helen Mirren) are on somebody's hit list and being pursued by up-and-coming spy (Karl Urban). We found it hilarious and adorable. It almost but not quite passed Bechdel. I'm not sure I would find it as charming on second viewing because I figured out exactly what scene was omitted from the narrative to make Frank's (admittedly well-intentioned) kidnapping of Sarah palatable: the part where he tied her up and duct-taped her mouth. Or at gun-point made her duct-tape her own mouth. Really no scenario I can think of makes that potential scene watchable, because if she didn't resist, why did he tie her up and shut her up? And if she did resist, the whole scenario is ugly to contemplate. Made uglier by the line later about how it wasn't her worst first date, which as niqaeli pointed out in the theater, implies she survived date-rape in the past.

Watched the last two episodes of White Collar. My memory for the one last week is full of holes. Oh wait, it's coming back to me. Burke's Seven. Right. Did you know niqaeli and I have a pet theory that El totally was a con and Peter figured her out in a way he couldn't arrest her for (among other things I like this theory for decreepifying the surveillance photo courtship: it was legitimate case surveillance!) and either she knew Neal and lets Neal think Peter doesn't know this for hilarity or Neal has only recently discovered her shadowy past and recognizes her reputation and is all OMG HOW WHAT YOU WERE SO AWESOME I DON'T EVEN. Anyway, with that theory, most El scenes get an extra twenty points of sweeeeeet.

So the most recent episode had the potential to joss the vid I'm working on, and I've been expecting to be jossed since--okay, no, I was expecting to be jossed last November but I've since given up on it (my attitude at this point is SHOW, PROVE ME WRONG! JOSS ME!)--but far from jossing me, this episode provided more fodder for the vid. Hahahaahah Jeff Eastin finally figured out what Neal's backstory was and had to share RIIIIIGHT NOW. This from a man who originally swore NO FLASHBACKS. Oh my god. I'm so glad the frame was there because so much of that was bullshit and it's good that Eastin left himself the hole of "ah but how honest was Neal?" if he needs to change anything later, and left fanwriters the loophole too so we can make some of that shit make a little more sense.

I should clarify--I enjoyed the episode. I laughed my ass off. I also think you could drive a Mack truck through the plotholes if we're meant to take that straight. If Kate wasn't a grifter before she met Neal, how did she adapt to the life so easily and maintain it even after she broke up with him (and arguably with greater skill than he did, since they never caught *her* and she was able to hide from him so well?). And let's discuss the fact that she'd pulled a disappearing act before the stunt with the prison visit. That, that, it, now I want an explanation for why the fuck she was visiting him in prison every week if they were for all intents and purposes broken up with prejudice before he got caught and he only found her because Peter laid a breadcrumb trail and not because she decided to see him again or even made an honest mistake in her hiding?

Also: were the origami flowers on Kate's dad's grave a message from Alex or is the only-Alex-does-origami thing a giant retcon? (For that matter Neal does origami, and while I'd buy Alex turned him onto it, it does mean that Peter going "origami with a current receipt means Alex had to be here, no one else would do it!" is a little wtf, because um, Neal.)

But yeah. The intersection of "everyone in the show first got together DUE TO THIS FLASHBACK" is ridiculous and hilarious. I couldn't stop laughing. I do not think that was what Eastin was going for. I take my joy where I can. Speaking of joy from hilarity, the wine bottle was from MOZZIE? That makes the superromanticization of it more hilarious than ever. Also, dear Eastin, you are hilarious for answering the nit about the shape of the wine bottle. Pat pat.

In other news, Ivan quietly went under and waited out Yuletide and Festivids and this week resurfaced. Bits of three of my four active Vorkosigan novellas of last year are once again taking over my brain (and the fourth is waiting for Bel to come out of hibernation). And I haven't even reread the books again or read any fic lately (except for dira's this evening, which made me cry at the sweet, and I would link but I'm on bit and I can't be bothered to deal with the annoying screenness to hunt down the URL ETA http://dira.dreamwidth.org/561801.html /ETA). So I decided to try for 300 words a day all year on one of those four plot bunnies, which at this point in the year would give me 100K by December 31, and hopefully enough pieces to string together a whole postable story or two and a lot of hilarious outtakes. Those of you on my WIP filter will get to watch me muddle through out of order!

Work: my hours are getting cut stupid low sigh.
School: I have another nominee for the "film class from hell" tag.
Cope: Hahaha what is that. At least I am still to some extent getting shit done?