yuletide reveal

[raven]

Seriously, what is it like to be able to sleep at night? I'm genuinely interested in knowing. What do you do with all that spare time?

(On a related note, this story made me FURIOUS, quite possibly irrationally, but still, how dare they basically imply that depression is your fault for going to bed too late. If you just went to bed early you'd be happier! It's essentially "early to bed, early to rise....", isn't it, and the people who say that are always heading for justifiable homicide. I'm maybe just cranky, but it's six degrees below, I have no heating, I cannot use the kitchen because the fuses have all gone so none of the lights are working, and I can't sleeeep, waaah.)

Anyway, a brief note: I want to make a post about various new-year things, but before that, a quick and final yuletide note. I wrote these:

Advent (Connie Willis' Oxford time-travel universe) for scintilla10
This was my assignment, and it was hard work, but in the end I was pleased with it. (Especially with the pun in the title, because I'm a dork like that.) My recipient wanted a story about Verity, but I had read Doomsday Book much more recently than To Say Nothing of the Dog, and the finished product had something of a sense of gloom. Interestingly, last year's story was also a story about Verity, and although I do try not to repeat myself, I can't resist writing all my stories in the same universe. Once again, shimgray sorted out the plot holes for me very nicely indeed.

Oh, and! It has a cameo by absinthe_shadow in it. I was trying desperately not to make it too obvious, but finally bowed to the inevitable, asked her permission and wrote her in.

Prawn Crackers (dinnerladies) for lilka
dinnerladies is not actually a fandom of mine - in the sense that, I love the show very much and think it's wonderfully written, but I've never wanted fic for it. Only, a few weeks ago I went over to see lilka, we had a lovely evening drinking wine and watching the Christmas episodes, and when I saw her request drift past I couldn't help myself.

(Also, a little of this story may have been drawn from life. Just a little.)

Boy Trouble (Discworld) for duckgirlie
This one was the definition of a last-minute treat. I wrote it the night before the deadline, the hour before, even - I wish I'd had time to make it longer, actually! - and enjoyed myself far too much in the writing. On a serious note, it was fun to write the "ordinary" Discworld women (i.e., the ones who don't have the benefit of being able to do magic), and show up their small human awesomnesses, and on a truly frivolous note, I had great fun with the jokes. I had a vague sense that the joke in the first paragraphs isn't translating very well - if it helps, British hen parties traditionally involve L-plates. No one knows why.

Ingenué (Slings & Arrows) for beautifulside
Again, I wish this one was longer. I had as much again written, and it was becoming a story of sorts, about returning and going home and other overdramatic themes like that - but then it was the night before the deadline and I didn't want to scrap it, so I rescued these 500 words and realised I liked them by themselvs, after all. I do love Kate. And Geoffrey, but that goes without saying.

I'd like to apologise, also: I really, really appreciate (and, indeed, encourage!) the feedback I've got on these stories on AO3. But I just can't reply to comments right now - I am trying to take a bunch of exams and apply to grad school simultaneously this week, which is sort of why I'm awake at 4.58am - and so in lieu, I am just saying thank you here. Thank you all.

Onwards and upwards, I guess. I do wish I could sleep.

Comments

[msilverstar]

Study leader Dr James Gangwisch said although it it was possible that youngsters with depression struggle to sleep...

OH FUCKING DUH!

Am a parent. "Setting" a 17-year-old's bedtime is a polite fiction.

[shehasathree]

oh butbutbut OF COURSE correlation implies causation!!1! (how would it even be possible to tease such an issue apart, when it is extremely well-documented that a very high proportion of people experiencing depression also experience sleeping problems?!)

[47-trek-47.livejournal.com]

I see I am not the only person to show up here saying that those studies should really be more careful about implying what causes what. Of course kids with depression sleep less at night. DUH. I need a mental health icon...

[tau_sigma]

I don't have time to read properly, as I'll be late for work (this job thing, it is odd), but oh, that makes me SO ANGRY too. And on a skim read, I can't help but think that they haven't considered that they may be mixing up cause and effect. Bugger them, anyway. Bugger them with a spiny anteater and NO LUBE.

(Shall return to read the rest of your post, after work.)

[tmpe5t.livejournal.com]

Duh, when you're depressed you can't sleep either. This just is more evidence to me that as far as mental health goes (although doctors i've had have called it 'psychological wellness, which means they must think i'm REALLY barking in a 'please don't hurt me' way...) medical science is still in the 'a course of leeches' stage.

I actually think that for depression (having lived with it in a bi-polar sort of a way for years), addiction is a better model to work with. But anyway... Love the discworld fic! Being transgender but in a 'running jumping climbing trees putting on makeup*' sort of a way, i really have identified with Cheery, and you capture her (and all the others too) brilliantly... :)

*Basically i want to be Ellen Ripley when i grow up...

[absinthe-shadow.livejournal.com]

I JUST COMMENTED ON THE FIC WITH MY SQUEE BUT NOW I WANT TO SQUEE ONCE MORE, BECAUSE, JUST, OMG! FIC. FIC WITH ME IN IT!

[emerald-embers.livejournal.com]

Ugh, these "Well, if you hadn't done _blah_ then you wouldn't have this condition!" implications always drive me up the wall. I've seen dyspraxia blamed on everything from eating wheat and dairy products to falling over too much as a child, it's silly.

I can't really quantify how I sleep in any realistic manner because I have my dad's habit of sleeping maybe three to five hours a night during the week and then ten to sixteen a night on the weekend; I don't really notice how it affects my day to day life for the most part because I'm generally just as active/inactive on three hours sleep as I am on thirteen.

Similarly, both dad and I will go for hours, even days without food or drink and think nothing of it then eat whatever we're given; both of us don't quite seem to do sleeping/eating/drinking as if they're necessities, we do them more as hobbies, and it's a little odd, but it's nothing either of us would consider a condition because in all fairness neither of us struggles sleeping/eating/drinking, we just have a habit of forgetting to do it if other people don't remind us to.

Btw, I'm slightly confused as to what you mean by "What do you do with all that spare time?" and don't want to accidentally answer the wrong question - how do you mean spare time when it comes to sleeping?

[lilka.livejournal.com]

*reads BBC article* *sighs* You know, sometimes I want to write 'correlation does not equal causation' on a stick and beat people over the head with it. Many, many people.

And thanks again for Prawn Crackers, it was genuinely delightful :)

[thunderemerald.livejournal.com]

Ah ah ah, I love the Slings & Arrows fic! How lovely. Although the thought of Kate in Passchendaele makes my head hurt with meta, a little. ;)

[walkertxkitty.livejournal.com]

I wouldn't know about sleeping at night: my body rhythms carried over from college and I tend to stay up late myself. When I do sleep, it's interrupted. I wake several times a night.

No, going to bed earlier won't fix depression. They need to STFU about that. When I'm depressed, I have the opposite problem: getting out of bed to do ANYTHING is an issue.

Hmmm, good stuff to read *waddles off to do so*

[subservient-son.livejournal.com]

I really hope my dad doesn't see that story, I'm not in the mood for this argument again.

[tempestsarekind.livejournal.com]

Hello--I recently discovered (and loved) your S&A fic, and have friended you (hope that's all right!). Anyway, thanks for linking to your Yuletide fics; I'm very much looking forward to reading "Ingenue" (and "Advent" as well; yay Connie Willis!).

[the-acrobat.livejournal.com]

I guessed two of your stories. :D
Also, the BBC, seriously. *flail*