catching up

[raven]

Oh, hey, scrubbing the bathroom for three hours is not guaranteed to leave you in a sunny mood, who knew. At least I have done it, and may get maybe a teeny weeny bit of my deposit back. Tomorrow, my bedroom, and the day after, the kitchen. Hello, domesticity. But my exams are over! Thank you, kind people who commented, it was good of you. I am feeling... well, not good, exactly, but a lot less stressed. When Cornell and my letting agent(s) and tutors send me emails about Things That Need Done, I do them rather than sitting in the corner to cry. It's refreshing.

(It scares me a little, though, that I will be in the US by the time my results come out. C'est la vie.)

One of the things Cornell want me to do is to write a 250-word biographical description of myself for a little booklet they're going to distribute to the faculty, containing inter alia, "my educational background, work experience, academic areas of interest, family, hobbies, career goals, etc." The memo promises that "sample biographies are enclosed", but they're... not. Anyone ever done one of these? How do you begin? Do you just put, "My name is Iona [last name], and I read PPE at Oxford, and I like science fiction and travel"? (Gosh, how tedious.) Do you even do it in the first person? I'm not even sure.

Also, I know I have academic areas of interest, but am I the only person who feels oddly illegitimate about this sort of thing? I mean, who am I to have academic areas of interest? I have one joint-honours degree and two very-rapid diplomas, it's only five years since I left school. I feel like I'm going to be in a cohort with Real People, whereas I am... not. I'm just me, for heaven's sake. I just write stories. Don't take me too seriously, I want to put, because I certainly don't.

Anyway! Speaking of stories, I am still writing ficlets - I believe we're on four down, eight to go, because two of you helpfully requested the same story - but I'm taking a break this weekend, if no one minds, for a story of my own. tau_sigma was visiting today and yesterday, and we had a lovely time. We went wandering around the Botanical Garden - which I have somehow failed to visit in five years of living in Oxford - and spent the evening drinking pink wine and watching Doctor Who, and making happy noises.

Please no one comment and tell me it's actually series 31. Series five. And I just want down for the record, I love it, I love it more than any other series of Who I've seen. My favourite episode of the season was "Amy's Choice", but only marginally; I loved Liz Ten, I loved the weeping angels, I loved River Song, and by the time the finale rolled around, I thought that the five of them - Eleven, Amy, River, Rory and Amelia - were all characters I'd had a chance to fall for, and more than that, actually fallen for. I was doubtful about Matt Smith, at the beginning of the season, and I'm really not, now. I think he's lovely, and love him possibly a leetle more than Tennant (though, I love him too!) because he pulls off aged and magnificent whilst also being a much softer, sweeter Doctor than any of the others, I think - I love how he kisses Amy on the forehead and cups Rory's cheek with a kind of loving ease that never becomes cliquey or annoying (remember "Tooth and Claw"? yeah, not like that). And I love how Amy and Rory both love the Doctor, too, and they all go travelling at the end because yes! Why would you not go on travelling with the Doctor?

Also? Also, I love, love how "Amy's Choice" sets up this choice between the Doctor and Rory - and then we think Amy chooses Rory, and that makes sense, for a while. But then both realities are a dream - because why should a woman choose having a partner over having a life and not choose both? So what Amy does becomes an act of love, not an act of self-limitation - and the same theme comes out in "The Big Bang", when the wedding is not the end of the fairy-tale, it's the beginning.

Also Amy is beautiful and Scottish. Yeah.

Have two fic recs:

Vita Longa, by sam_storyteller.
Rufus Atius Ferox remembers two childhoods. This is great: long, sensitive and fabulous, and rich in the way it fills in Rory's life alongside the life of the Roman legatus.

Wondrous Strange by lixia84
Eleven/Rory, NC-17. I very rarely just delve for fic these days; I tend to stick to authors I know and reclists. But for some reason I clicked, and this was just a gem. The Doctor and Rory are out getting into trouble, and somehow they're being chased by aliens at the premiere of Puccini's Tosca, and then for some other reason there's a bathhouse, and then. Well, and then. I was impressed with the dialogue - the Doctor in particular really sounds like the Doctor - and the way the author has these two together but doesn't erase Amy at all.

What else, what else? For my leaving Oxford/the UK party, jacinthsong and I are dressing up as Kira and Dax. I have at least spent an entertaining half-hour looking at purple dresses on eBay, which has improved my mood greatly.

(Although, I've been writing this wondering why my hands feel strange - and then remembering why I remember the weird feeling. I have clear memories of Chemistry A-level and spilling NaOH on my hands, trying womanfully not to swear, while my marvellous chemistry teachers explained, meticulously, the lipid reaction going on under my skin and how it was turning my hands into soap.

Guess I know what the active ingredient in the bathroom cleaner was. Ewww.)

Back to writing, I think.

Comments

[kuteki.livejournal.com]

♥!

[stained_glass]

I wanted to come as SHARPE but I have neither the time or the resources to make a BAMF outfit, so I am just going to try to wear as many things indicative of stuff you like as possible. You are going to adore one of them... XD

I think you should write a really exciting biography. Like, "Iona was discovered in the year 3454 at the very centre of a black hole by the Dalek Empire. Her powers and intelligence were so great that she could unravel the very fabric of the space-time continuum. She was rescued by the Doctor, travelling with the crew of the USS Enterprise NCC 1701, which was then pulled through the black hole - Iona's presence turned it into a wormhole, which led to Deep Space 9. After loving and brief relations with most of the crew, she decided that in the interests of the safety of the universe, the Doctor would hide her within the passage of time, until her extraordinary powers could once again be utilised for the betterment of existence. They decided together upon England, in the 20th century, where she was born to two doctors. ETC."

[rhipowered.livejournal.com]

Also, I know I have academic areas of interest, but am I the only person who feels oddly illegitimate about this sort of thing? I mean, who am I to have academic areas of interest? I have one joint-honours degree and two very-rapid diplomas, it's only five years since I left school.

Sounds like Imposter Syndrome. Affects entirely too many of us, I fear.

[stained_glass]

*puts hand up*

[highfantastical.livejournal.com]

I want to come but apparently am destined Never To Leave Southampton Ever Again (except in my Grad School Fantasies [tm]...actually no wait, can't really tm that... which all involve Leaving Southampton quickly and decisively). ANYWAY SO MY POINT IS. I guess I can come up with a fantasy costume of epic win since I don't have to actually find the materials with which to construct it! *finds brightsides*

I was genuinely baffled at why you had spent three hours cleaning yr bathroom until I got to the deposit bit. I mean, you do not really strike me as the kind of person who CUSTOMARILY goes in for lengthy scrubbing of bathrooms.

By which I do not, obviously, mean that You Are Unclean. But there is a comfortable middle ground between Unclean and 3-hour Scrubbing, and I have always...assumed that you inhabit it. As do most of us. Except Sophie. Speculations as to which extreme she falls under ARE WELCOME.

[msilverstar]

those of us who read your journal think you are wildly interesting :-D You could pluck some from your most satisfying posts, thinky or funny, and that would describe you very well.

Same for "academic interests": that just means they don't want to know about some student's passion for snowboarding, or dollhouses. They want Torts or Intellectual Property or Laws of the Sea, stuff like that.

[msilverstar]

This.

[loneraven.livejournal.com]

Oh, I wish you could come too! I remember the last costume party of mine you came to, but can't remember whether you were dressed as Orlando or as Cassandra Mortmain. Which makes no sense, because surely they don't look anything alike...?

I am very much not a scrubbing-the-bathroom-for-three-hours sort of a person, unless my mother is coming to visit. Mostly there is a happy medium, yes. Let me guess - does S fall under the fanatical scrubbing ambit, perchance?

[loneraven.livejournal.com]

Hello, you! How are you?

[loneraven.livejournal.com]

Oh wow, you as SHARPE. Maybe it is a good thing you're not, because I don't think I could take the awesome. Wow. (I never thought Sean Bean was attractive before I met you. This is trufax.)

I much prefer this version of my life story to the real one. Especially the part where I was discovered! I am A NON-STELLAR ENTITY, HURRAH.

[stained_glass]

I know - I think one needs to watch Sharpe to get the UTTER FITNESS.

YOU ARE A STELLAR NON-STELLAR ENTITY, MY DEAR. And you of course get many wonderful adventures in the Tardis with the Doctor and AMY if you so wish!

[tempestsarekind.livejournal.com]

Hmm. I've only ever had to do that sort of thing in bullet points, but I can't imagine trying to write a bio of myself in the third person without feeling a little odd about it. I think I did wind up just listing some books I loved (though I left off the TV shows, out of embarrassment. Not that everyone doesn't know by now).

Also, I'd assume that academic interests =/= areas of expertise. Or at least, that's how I manage to claim any of mine. :)

Re: Doctor Who:
I think he's lovely, and love him possibly a leetle more than Tennant (though, I love him too!) because he pulls off aged and magnificent whilst also being a much softer, sweeter Doctor than any of the others, I think - I love how he kisses Amy on the forehead and cups Rory's cheek with a kind of loving ease that never becomes cliquey or annoying (remember "Tooth and Claw"? yeah, not like that).

So, so much this. I'll always love Ten and Tennant both, but Eleven just delights me with his offhand kindness. Probably 1/3 of my DW posts this season are about how gentle Eleven is, after the "fire and ice and rage" of Ten.

Also--I loved the false dichotomy of "Amy's Choice," too. I read some people's interpretations that Amy had committed suicide because she couldn't live without Rory, and I boggled a bit; such a reading hadn't even occurred to me.

[sirona-gs.livejournal.com]

Me too.

[sirona-gs.livejournal.com]

"I think he's lovely, and love him possibly a leetle more than Tennant (though, I love him too!) because he pulls off aged and magnificent whilst also being a much softer, sweeter Doctor than any of the others, I think - I love how he kisses Amy on the forehead and cups Rory's cheek with a kind of loving ease that never becomes cliquey or annoying"

THIS. This exactly. I love his old-man clothes, the weird shoes that he wears (that are almost falling apart), the 'bowties are cool' thing, the strange expressions - there are so many cool one-liners in this series, much more than in the Tennant/Eccleston ones. Just - the tale of a very old, brilliant man that still finds something worth living for.

I loved Rory's reaction in The Big Bang - "How could we have forgotten The Doctor?" - because they do love him, he and Amy. And Amy's realisation absolutely rocked - well done Moffatt - the "I remember you, [raggedy] man, and you are late for my wedding!" was AWESOME.

I hope you enjoyed the Botanical Gardens!

[sir-rosealot.livejournal.com]

Ooh, when is your party going to be?

[loneraven.livejournal.com]

email to come!

[cscottd.livejournal.com]

I loved this series of Doctor Who so much!

I'm really hoping, based on the way the finale ended, that Amy and Rory are both going to be full companions next series.

[kuteki.livejournal.com]

I am all right, more or less!

[tau_sigma]

Ooh, which one of you will be which? Also, which Dax?! *g*

It was so lovely to see you. *g* Thank you, my dear!

[littlered2.livejournal.com]

Oh, I know that one ...

[parrot-knight.livejournal.com]

I think that with Doctor Who you can number the seasons any which way you want, as the whole concept is so elastic and stretches and compresses in more directions than we can conceive.

I remember being utterly taken aback, in 2006, that so many people thought everything in Tooth and Claw was the best thing ever when the Doctor and Rose were behaving insufferably...

[nerves-patterns.livejournal.com]

I felt like a fraud with the academic/professional interests thing as well (although I dutifully listed my professional interests on our school's website, including things like "redefining literacy for the 21st century" - wtf?). But you can say whatever you like. You're coming from Oxford - my guess is that everyone is going to be terrified of you (in a totally admiring way) anyway. ;)

[loneraven.livejournal.com]

OMG AMY IS BEAUTIFUL AND SCOTTISH

(I am really predictable, aren't I? Party tiems soooon!)

[loneraven.livejournal.com]

Ah, you're right, you're right. Still can't get out of the mindset, though.

[loneraven.livejournal.com]

I know what they mean by them, but am still not sure what to write - because my academic interests are entirely shaped by my undergraduate and diploma work, I haven't given them enough study to really feel comfortable calling them my academic interests, if you see what I mean.

And, thank you, that is kind. :)

[loneraven.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I think you're definitely right about that! The first person it shall be.

Oh, Eleven. Gentle is just the word for him, I think; and oh, I love how much he cares for Amy and Rory without jealousy or rage or scary stuff. I really can't wait for Christmas, now!

[loneraven.livejournal.com]

They're wonderful, aren't they? This team TARDIS is my FAVOURITE. I love the dynamic of having two companions, I love the way they interact, I just. Love.

The Botanical Gardens were lovely! Everything was in bloom, it was idyllic.

[loneraven.livejournal.com]

Me too! Oh, me too. It'd be so marvellous.

[loneraven.livejournal.com]

She will be Kira, and I will be Jadzia Dax. If everything comes from eBay in time, that is. :)

Oh, you're welcome! Having you here was so nice, I had such a lovely time.

[tau_sigma]

There must be photos of your SEXY TRILL SPOTS^*, yes? (Also, I hope you are planning to wear a short skirt, so people can see spots all down your legs. Admittedly I don't know when I've seen Jadzia in a skirt/dress, except at her wedding.)

^*Unlike SOME PEOPLE *coughColleencough* I fancy a race of aliens who are actually sexy. Ys.

[marymac.livejournal.com]

*adds to the chorus*

[marymac.livejournal.com]

I dearly love the Team TARDIS and desperately envy Matt Smith his ability to project age and authority because that would be immensely useful. And mostly I love wee Amelia, for she is dubious and awesome.

I have 90,000 bound words of area of academic interest and the ability to talk about another one for three hours without repeating myself and I still go 'Err, um, I WANT MY MAMMY!' when confronted with the demand to write them down. Just write something down in something that resembles English, nobody will hold you to it.

[jacinthsong.livejournal.com]

http://such-heights.dreamwidth.org/268993.html !!!!! IOAN HAVE YOU SEEN THIS IT'S LIKE PEOPLE KEEP MAKING AMY/AMELIA VIDS TO VIENNA TENG JUST FOR US

By which I mean, um, it's actually series 31, you know. :P

But then both realities are a dream - because why should a woman choose having a partner over having a life and not choose both? So what Amy does becomes an act of love, not an act of self-limitation
is lovely, both the point on the episodes' writing and the way you put that.
xxx

[fyrdrakken]

Liquid eyeliner is especially good for the Trill spots, since I don't recall it as rubbing off against the collar of my uniform too badly when I costumed as Dax a time or two years ago. (Also, I did a very tidy job of it and then afterwards took a good hard look at a screencap and realized the makeup artists do them kind of sloppy and with blurred edges.)

[bornofstars.livejournal.com]

re. Series Five - yes, yes, yes. I love Liz X, I love the timey-wimey plot, I love Amy, I love the wit, I love the aesthetic, and most of all I love Matt Smith's Doctor, who is professorish and kind and lovely in every way. I never thought I could love any Doctor more then Ten, but I was so very wrong. It took a little time for me to accept him, but now I adore Eleven.

Hopefully during the Christmas special we'll get lots of awesome and hilarious married-couple-in-the-TARDIS dynamic. I love Steven Moffat for so many different things, but I was most surprised and pleased at how he cheerfully flew in the face of gender roles and stereotypes. Mr. and Mrs. Amelia Pond fly off into space and time because, as you said, it's not the happy ending, it's a beginning. ♥ Oh, I love my show.