Beyond the Roundels

1. intoabar is open for sign-ups! I need to contemplate who to send into the bar this year - always the tricky bit!

Anyway, it is a great long-running fest where you sign up with a chosen character from one fandom plus a selection of 1-6 other fandoms, and then the mod(s) randomise you a character from one of those fandoms for your character to meet in the bar or bar-equivalent. Hopefully I will make the deadline this year for a change, but I usually manage to do it in amnesty if not, and it's too much of a favourite for me to miss it.

I need to decide whether or not to do what I did last year with particular-character-from-tiny-fandom + my regular fandoms as potential crossovers, OR choose a character from one of the regular go-anywhere fandoms and some smaller fandoms, which I have narrowed down to "fandoms I haven't already used for 51pluscrossoverfandoms" because that seems like a sensible plan. I'm leaning to the second at the moment, in which case I miiight do Fifteen, but I'll swear to nothing until the day that sign-ups close.


2. tardis_remix went live yesterday with 10 works, and I've very much enjoyed what I've read so far. I haven't quite finished yet.

romanajo123 did a fun little remix one of my old meme ficlets, even though I didn't write anything myself (which I am a little sad about; I adore a Remix, but it was not realistic this time around):

Bedside Manner (The (Im)Patient Peri Remix) (734 words) by human_nature
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (1963)
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Peri Brown & Sixth Doctor
Characters: Sixth Doctor (Doctor Who), Peri Brown
Additional Tags: Remix, POV First Person
Summary: Peri's really not feeling well...


3. edwardianspinsteraunt has also written another lovely The Winslow Boy fic, so it has been a good weekend for nice fannish reading!

Hopeless Causes (9633 words) by edwardianspinsteraunt
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Winslow Boy (1999)
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Robert Morton/Catherine Winslow
Characters: Catherine Winslow, Robert Morton (Winslow Boy), Grace Winslow
Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Getting Together, Slow Burn, Developing Relationship, Minor Character Death, Grief/Mourning, Women's Suffrage, Period Typical Attitudes, Emotionally Repressed, Marriage Proposal
Summary: Arthur Winslow dies before Winslow versus Rex can come to court. Sir Robert attempts to help the surviving members of the family and - with rather less success - to prevent his feelings for Miss Winslow from getting the better of him.

I'm not being terribly good at updating, but I am mostly okay, so that is good. Last week my Mum sent me a package in the post which, when I opened it, contained a small clear plastic packet with mystery white powder inside it. When I stopped laughing for long enough to read the accompanying note, I discovered it was washing powder. XD

Anyway, fannish things:

1. no_true_pair's four character mini round is open for sign-ups!

The prompts don't get posted till the 17th, so I have to think about which characters I shall put down this time, because I definitely find the four characters one weirder to do than the full-range glory of the eight-characters one, but it does usually kick off something unexpected and worth writing, whether fannish or original. It would only be more delightful if more of us also did it, of course. (No penalties, only fun prompts to use or not use! What is there to lose? ;-p)


2. edwardianspinsteraunt also wrote a little (Modern) AU for The Winslow Boy, which made yesterday evening a whole lot better immediately:

The Facts of the Case (634 words) by edwardianspinsteraunt
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Winslow Boy (1999)
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Robert Morton/Catherine Winslow
Characters: Catherine Winslow, Robert Morton (Winslow Boy), Arthur Winslow
Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Coffee Shops, Lawyers
Summary: Catherine was well aware that Robert Morton hadn't taken her family's case out of principle.


3. I was thinking about what to do after I finished 100fandomicons. I remembered working through a set for an old icon comm (icons200, I think), doing 20 prompts at a time, but also that it is no fun to do such things alone for defunct comms.

Anyway, the upshot was that it struck me there was no current icon comm that had the kind of thing I was thinking of, so I have now very nearly finished making one!

It is called 20icontables. There are lots of 20 icon tables to choose from and you can suggest more at a suggestion post. There are no deadlines or limits and hopefully it will provide laid back inspiration for when needed, or no-deadline ongoing projects, or the excuse to icon a thing you've been meaning to icon etc. Or whatever. Speedy people who eat icon challenges for breakfast can work their way through every single table if they want. There will be more.

If people, especially any icon-makers, but anyone, want to poke around it and see if it looks okay, that would be great! It's fairly straight forward and I think it's okay, but stupid errors gratefully received as it were...

I need to add a few more tables before I start launching it officially, just because I don't want to be flooding it with tables once it has subscribers.

(So if there are there any obvious omissions in tables, especially technically then let me know here or go right ahead and submit to the suggestion post there already.)


4. I keep linking to SesskaSays's reactions, I know, but she reached Vengeance on Varos on Friday, which people round here with long memories will know I am a tad obsessed with and I was v gratified to see her completely blown away by Part One. \o/ I thought she'd probably like it, given her track record, but you never can tell.

I started this on 27th Feb 2021 for 100fandomicons and have finally completed it, after taking longer than anybody else ever has, which I suppose is one claim to fame. (You can see the fandoms if you hover over the icons.)

( 100fandoms table under here )

I fell out of posting and managing to keep up for a bit, for various reasons, but anyway, here are some things:

1. halfamoon is running again, with prompts every day - it's an annual two-week fannish celebration of female characters etc (1-14th Feb.)


2. fic_promptly has started up again, if people want regular commentfest type posts!


3. In Brit Cosy Crimes fandoms, what they give you with one hand, they take away with the other, which is to say that the BBC has brought Shakespeare & Hathaway back from the dead and Sebastian will get to wear more ridiculous costumes, but ITV countered by cancelling McDonald & Dodds, so there will alas be no more improbable crimes in Bath.


4. I don't want to keep linking to Sesskasays's reactions, but she made it unspoiled to Caves of Androzani, really appreciated it and was not ready for the ending, and it was probably the best first time reaction to that one I've seen. (Of course, this now means that she has to contend with The Twin Dilemma, but we all have to go through that sooner or later... ;-p)


5. In things I have been watching and listening to and should write about properly, because they were all good and interesting: - I listened to another J B Priestley Time Play adaptation, I Have Been Here Before.

In a charity shop (one of my reasons for not keeping up was my friend took me to town for the first time since November) I found one of those inexplicable 3 films in 1 DVDs that are usually random things you have never heard of, only this one was Tom Jones (1963), A Passage to India, and An Ideal Husband; and I'd wanted to see Tom Jones - I think I must have found it via Julian Glover being in it, but parts of it were filmed in my home town! But it was quite expensive online secondhand so I'm still impressed with this piece of serendipity. I enjoyed it and I recognised said home town quite clearly. XD (The street they used, Castle Street, is not only where I was born, but, if you have been around long enough to remember me talking about my family history, it was where one of my direct ancestors came to a tragic end in a cesspool. Yes, I am working class, lol.)

Also I have now finished The Jewel in the Crown! It was indeed very good and the last episode suddenly produced unexpected Peter Jeffrey, who wasn't even actually evil as such, for a wonder.

I actually managed to do this meme this year! I haven't got more than partway through it since about 2021, which I do regret, but here we are, I've been chipping away at this for a week or so:

Your main fandom of the year?:

Doctor Who, as ever. Not that I don't run off to flail at least briefly about many other deeply obscure things every other day, communicating my enthusiasms to the distant and patient sympathy of the flist by means of semaphore or something, but that only feels fannish if someone responds, and that can't be expected very often.


( Cut for length of me wittering about TV, film, audio & books under here )

This was going around, so I said baa like the good meme sheep I haven't been for ages:

TV questions: pick your five favourite TV shows (in no particular order) and answer the following questions. Don’t cheat!
1. Doctor Who
2. Blake's 7
3. Sapphire & Steel
4. Spooks
5. Once Upon a Time

( 19 Questions )

Happy 61st Doctor Who anniversary! <3

If you like audios, Big Finish are giving away a free download of one of their audios, The Five Companions to celebrate!


Also, a really sweet First Doctor Era fanvid that someone just posted:

I sort of temporarily stalled again on the icon-making, but the new graphics software is nevertheless conquered to a reasonable degree, and I have enough icons to make a post. So, here is an icon post! (I did post ten of these previously under flock, in case anyone's getting confused.)

Teaser:



( This is 1873. Emotions are like port - to be corked up tight, left in the cellar for forty years and given to your godson on his 21st birthday. )

Another fic for this round of no_true_pair, this time for the prompt "September Seven - the Brigadier & Thirteen are temporary neighbors."

weirdest side of the street (1314 words) by thisbluespirit
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Doctor Who (2005), Doctor Who (1963)
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Thirteenth Doctor & Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart
Characters: Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart, Doris Lethbridge-Stewart, Thirteenth Doctor (Doctor Who), Thirteenth Doctor's Fam (Doctor Who)
Additional Tags: Community: no_true_pair, Community: allbingo, Holidays, Humor, Explosions
Summary: The Brigadier and Doris are enjoying a peaceful holiday - and then they find out who's moved in next door.

Also written for lyricaltitles bingo square "Last line;" and allbingo (Valentine's Bingo 2023) square "The Lady of the Storm."

I'll probably repost these again in a larger set when I (hopefully!) have more - BUT over the last few days, post-doing some larger graphics, I tackled my new graphics editing software again, and managed to finally make some icons! I'm back at the 'child with crayons' stage, but that's usual for me when I've had one of my stupidly long breaks from it, and I'm actually getting an end result that is more or less what I intended now, and I'm SO relieved I could cry. I do like making 100x100 pixel shiny things, even if I'm not the best iconmaker in the world or anything.

Teaser:



( To go into battle the British soldier has to be incredibly drunk. Aiming is out of the question. )

I've still not really been around properly, although hopefully that should improve again soon, fingers crossed. Both because I've been quite ill most of this summer, for reasons, but also because the ancient borrowed laptop I was using the last couple of summers to get over the lack of access to my PC now sometimes makes sparks when I plug it in and I feel this is a bad sign in an electrical appliance, so I have been saving to only use at great need. ETA: Not sparks, that was a bad description; a back surge from the charger, I think, and I saw a blue flash. (obv = saprks when typing wildly at night.)

Anyway, the other day when the weather cooled down for a couple, I had a go at the poetry meme, but I was too tired/ill to do the full thing. But since I also did that earlier in the year, I realised between the two I had five efforts. And if I post it, now with new working replacement random poetry site links (!! \o/ !!), maybe it'll spread about the place again, and that'd be nice.

1: Pick five fandoms. List them in alphabetical order.

2: Visit this site* to find your first RANDOM POEM OF POWER. Write down the 5th line (yes, even if it's an E.E. Cummings poem and you wind up with an apostrophe). Repeat five times and - you guessed it - list them in alphabetical order! (No cheating, mind! This is a challenge and it's always been about creativity.)

3: I think you can see where this is going. Write a very quick 50-word half-drabble for each fandom (try to do it all in one sitting), using the line from the poem as a prompt. You don't have to include it in the half-drabble - it's just inspiration.

4: Bravo! Have a cookie.

( Smushed results of two attempts under the cut )
* I found two replacement sites. This one seemed the nearest match to the lost one (although so far it has more of a Byron fixation than an Emily Dickenson one), but this one also works too.

1. We have another trailer!



(Still generally crossing my everything. I don't trust RTD any more but... it does look shiny still!)


2. In gifmaking, I did make some more s1 gifs of Wish Me Luck and actually did some Liz and Matty ones as well as a bit more Colin:

( Hugging gifs )


3. I did actually write stuff for no_true_pair, so that was good, but only original (rainbowfic). I had ideas for that for the first 3 days, and then hoped to write 1-2 ficlets for the fannish prompts for the last couple, but I just wasn't feeling up to writing this week so much, so it didn't happen. I think the best thing for me to do is to ask for some more 500 Prompts from people again soon maybe. <3 But I did write things! So that was fun. (I don't really think I've found a good fannish strategy for the mini-round; the more random things tend to work better in the larger round.)


4. Other stuff I have forgotten? Please insert topic of interest here. ;-p

I had to go out yesterday (last official appointment for a while, hopefully!), so am all tired/ill again for a bit, but in the meantime, have some things:

1. no_true_pair's spring mini round is open for sign-ups! (It's like the 15 characters meme, except you actually write the random prompts. The mini round is for only 4 characters, but you can have multiple sets of four if you want. I don't know if I'll manage anything, but I shall try and think of some characters sets - there's no penalty and who knows? Better to sign up and see what fun prompts I get than not!)


2. The vidder who made a lovely whole-era First Doctor vid has done one for the Second Doctor's era and it's pretty great and adorable and cheering:




3. Courtesy of persiflage_1 who alerted me to this on tumblr: 1000 radio plays have been returned to the BBC! (They're going to actually broadcast some of them as well over the upcoming months. And, as ever, BBC Sounds is not region-locked, unlike the rest of the Beeb.)


4. ( Gifs of Jacqueline Pearce in Ep3 of the 1974 BBC David Copperfield what I made )


5. As usual, I'm sure there was something else! Ah well... (Tell me what it was in the comments, lol.)