Updates and stuff

I've spent most of the last two days updating Sleeping With Ghosts, and have attempted to change the layout a bit. Not much - a new banner, which I'm quite pleased with, and lots and lots of tables - but it looks a little better. I'm always plagued with an inferiority complex when it comes to designing websites, because my skills are so minimal. My website is not my canvas, it is my all-purpose bin for fic. Hence the usual crappiness of the layout. Anyway, it's almost done and the banner is driving me mad. It looks much too big in 800x600, and stupidly small in everything else, and I definitely don't want to make two versions because that would indicate commitment.

Still, I suppose it's the fic that counts. Five Doctor Who fics - Flowers For The Doctor, Bohemian Rose, After Ever Happily, Children of the Revolution, Effects and Lovers, 'Tis Almost Fairy-Time - one Buffy fic - In Blue - and three old PegB stories - Walking Barefoot, Love Story and Killing The Cat.

There are some recs, too, but they've all been on LJ already.

just a twinge of cosmic angst

So, hathy_col came round and there was geekdom. We spent the time profitably eating sandwiches with chilli and without mayonnaise and watching The Five Doctors and Pyramids of Mars. Logically, we didn't watch them in the right order. It made sense at the time, especially as I wasn't looking forward to "borrowing" Pedar's laptop.

Anyway, The Five Doctors was fab. The basic plot of the episode involves the first five Doctors being put in a quarry while everyone else takes potshots at them. There's no plot to speak of, really, and Four isn't really in it, but the amazingness remains. It sort of transcends awful and comes out smelling wonderful; the dreadful spinning triangles and the ridiculously funny bouncing robot ("No, not feeling the terror," declared Colleen sagely at that point) were balanced out by such wonders as a sequence with Four and Romana II in what looks like Oxford, the reappearance of Susan and the unbearable cuteness of Five. Five angsts so well. He calls it cosmic angst, and proceeds to pass out. Omgtehcute.

Other choice bits included Five and a harp, trying to figure out what tune to play to open the lock (Colleen suggested The Muppet Show theme; I resolved to remember this for when she goes crazy and starts her own Death Zone), to find Borusa, who has been offscreen for about five minutes and yet has changed his clothes. "What, he has bad guy clothes?" Colleen asked.

"There's a changing-room just off-camera, obviously."

Five minutes later: "That's not the coronet of Rassilon! That's been nicked from a BBC production of Hamlet!"

Five minutes later than that, the slashiness of Five and Borusa. "Of course, it does that icky teacher/student vibe to it," I mused.

Colleen gave me an incredulous look. "Look who's talking!"

[Actually, Five is slashy with everyone in the world; Turlough and the Master being the other notable examples.]

They resolve everything, save the day, and then we get an entirely irrelevant shot of Four and Romana. He is, for reasons best known to himself, lying flat on his back on the pavement; he leaps up, joins Romana (who is wearing a hat with fruit on it) in the TARDIS, which dematerialises with most of his scarf still hanging out. Colleen and I exchanged glances before falling about. I kind of wish Shada still existed, or ever existed at all, what with this kind of brilliance.

Five then becomes Lord President of Gallifrey (as you do) and does a runner. Fade out. The whole thing was wonderful. And I'm impressed we got through the tape, as it's older than we are.

Pyramids of Mars came next. I was extremely impressed with how little it's dated; by virtue of being set in the past, I suppose, it hasn't got much in it to date, and it starts off just like a Stargate episode and gets more and more like it as it goes on. It has pyramids, doomed archaeologists ("Don't open the sarcophagus!" I said at the beginning, but of course they do), aliens masquerading as Egyptian gods, with glowing eyes, and then lots of running about in forests that look strangely like British Columbia.

Actually, not a lot happens in the first half of the episode. There are mummies, and exploding gelignite (is there any other sort?), and lots more running about, but then everything happens all at once and Four gets tortured and possessed by Sutekh. Which is all darkly lit and tightly scripted and you get the feeling there were lots of small children at the time getting very upset. This of course culminates with Sarah Jane lying beside what she thinks is the Doctor's body, at which point he smacks her in the head.

All in all, much fun. Quite dark, though - later on, Colleen and I were making notes on who died.

"The poacher."

"The brother..."

"...the other brother..."

"The butler."

"The doctor."

"Sutekh..."

"The mummies were already dead..."

Pedar broke in at that point. "Wouldn't it be easier to list who didn't die?"

All the minor characters die. I think that's a record. Anyway, I still have the DVD and plan to watch all the good bits again, as I am a big geek. Actually, I'm spending much of tomorrow getting thoroughly vaccinated. I think I deserve the geekdom.

Sigh. Bed. Jet-lag still hanging about.