Betzz's Place for Fannish Distractions

Seen at kassrachel and bayleaf ....

When you see this, post your favorite poem.


Hermann Hesse: Steps

Like ev'ry flower wilts, like youth is fading
and turns to age, so also one's achieving:
Each virtue and each wisdom needs parading
in one's own time, and must not last forever.
The heart must be, at each new call for leaving,
prepared to part and start without the tragic,
without the grief - with courage to endeavor
a novel bond, a disparate connection:
for each beginning bears a special magic
that nurtures living and bestows protection.

We'll walk from space to space in glad progression
and should not cling to one as homestead for us.
The cosmic spirit will not bind nor bore us;
it lifts and widens us in ev'ry session:
for hardly set in one of life's expanses
we make it home, and apathy commences.
But only he, who travels and takes chances,
can break the habits' paralyzing stances.

It even may be that the last of hours
will make us once again a youthful lover:
The call of life to us forever flowers...
Anon, my heart! Do part and do recover!

( Stufen: original German version )

 

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Almost a week (well, more like 5 days) without an internet connection and I'm back to the shaking junkie I was last August. I wish I could say that it was helpful for my exams - less distraction or something - but unfortunately, it wasn't.

Things I'll do once the exams are over (in no particular order):

* watch the first 3 seasons of Supernatural on DVD that I bought as a Christmas present for myself and vowed not to open until the exams were over

* continue co-writing a gigantic Supernatural disability!AU fic with Neonchica

* watch "Stardust" with my mother and cry through the whole film

* visit the Roman-and-Celts museum (that is about 40 miles away from where my parents live but somehow we never went there) with my father

* have my baby brother staying with me for a weekend and celebrate the fact that he can legally drink now, never mind that he has had a summer job at a brewery since he was fifteen...

* read "The Winter Rose" by Jennifer Donnelly

* try at least three cookie recipes from Martha Stewart's homepage

* go to Budapest for a weekend with my best friend from school to celebrate her 22nd birthday

* go to London for a week, stay with Boyfriend's sister and have High Tea with Boyfriend in a nice luxurious hotel there (Can anyone recommend one? I wanted the Savoy but it's closed til summer...)

* go to Egypt for a week with Boyfriend, his mother and his sister

* continue training for the half marathon in May

.......................................

Well, all these things keep me from going insane... Back to the books now.

Answer: Better don't ask....

As of today I have absolutely no idea where the following things are:

* my ID card

* my driver's license

* my camera

Oh, did I mention that The Boyfriend and I are going to Slovakia next weekend? You know, a place where I might need all these things??

Your result for The How Well-Read Are You? Test...

Incredibly Well Read

Your level of Well-Readliness is 95 %!

Take The How Well-Read Are You? Test at HelloQuizzy

You might have guessed... my computer still doesn't work. *Sigh* After another week of terror and sudden blue screen warnings, I had him sent to the magic place where they fix computers. He's still not back. I have a day dream of a computer summer camp where all the broken computers can hang out and a guy with glasses and a bad complexion teaches them how to swim. *Sigh again* Then a friend of mine gave me his old laptop and guess what? It stopped working after approx. 30 minutes in my loving hands. *Even bigger sigh* Only this time another relatively savvy friend could fix it. Now I do have an internet connection at hand, but the wireless doesn't work. The only way I can access LJ is by crouching on the floor in the hallway. Does the universe want to teach me something?

I really wanted to keep my personal life out of this journal, but I feel the need to explain some stuff... 

Probably all of you who read this found my site via the Crack Van.... and at least some of you might have wondered why the recs seem to come so sparsely this month....well.... 

I'm cursed! (or something) 

 

Ok, now we try how this lj-cut thingy works....

 In my first post I wrote that I got this account to give feedback and how bad I felt that I hadn’t done that earlier. Well, about two hours later, I stumbled over several posts about the topic, written by some of my idols (fluterbev here, with answers by

alyburns here, princessofg here and starwatcher307 here).

 

"Good Feedback – the mystery”. What do authors want, why do the want it? Just what exactly IS good feedback and why aren’t people giving more of it?  I'm not a writer and I haven't been actively involved in any meta discussions (yet), so I can only focus on one point of the whole debate: "What do writers want and why are readers not giving more of it?"  Here are my personal experiences (and maybe an explanation) ...

Oh boy, how often have I thought about "good feedback"? So many times, after I had finished a great story, cowering in front of the computer with this fangirlish humming in my stomach, knowing that the author had captured the core being of the pairing or had written a perfect piece of smut…. I tore my aching eyes away from the screen (mostly early in the morning; I like to read everything in one sitting) and … was speechless. Honest to god, completely out of words. What can you say about a perfect story - written by a genius – that can be even remotely close to its greatness. But it still is a human impulse to show affection.

Seriously, I think that fanfic writer and fanfic reader have a symbiotic relationship. The source is like the earth that nourishes both of us, the writer uses their imagination and talent like virtual sunlight to create something energetic and emotional (and even dark!fic or angst is energetic in nature as it causes reaction) and the reader receives that energy and gives it back in form of feedback to keep the writer's imagination happy and healthy.  Everyone profits. In theory.

But how does it work in real/online life?

So… on archives that give feedback via outlook  (like 852 prospect) I’m lost. My computer hates outlook for some weird reasons and crashes every time I try to open it. I have no urge to use outlook anyway, so I can’t be bothered to fix it. However, if I truly love the story, I’ll try to find the writer on one of the journals (hooray Google!) and stalk their journals, see if they’re still active in the fandom, what else they have written and so on…

 
… which leads to the next problem. Do you have any idea how intimidating you guys can be? How funny and smart and just generally admirable? I know I’m pretty much crawling right now, but hey! That’s how it is… And the poor reader sits in front of the “Leave a comment” box and despairs, because they want to express their undying love for something you created and how can you express undying love without sounding like a complete idiot? “Squee”???  I am convinced that many readers don't give feedback because they have troubles finding the right words. There's also this fangirl language with all the squees and "yummy goodness" and if you're new to fanfiction that can easily scare you away. After all, everyone wants to belong to the group; in that respect there's no difference between LJ and the first grade, only here the cool kids write smut and the reader stammers and watches longingly from the distance.

It took my half a year to write my first anonymous review and I haven’t been around long enough to speak Fangirl fluently. Hell, I have enough problems with trying to hide that English isn’t my first language (and I strongly suspect I’m not doing a good job in that department but end up sounding like a whiny idiot....)

I want to leave feedback, and I want to leave good feedback. Literature appreciation class all the years in school has definitely left its mark. I want to tell you how much I loved the flow, the characterisations, tone, mood, plot … and the “feel”. A quick "thank you, loved it" just doesn't feel right. You guys are the best and deserve the best in return for the joy you bring. 

 
What makes really really good feedback? Length? Giving details or favourite lines? Do you mind if it sounds like written by a hyper 5-year old?  

 

Please, tell me!

Dear fandoms,

my first LJ post and I'm already out of words.

For years, I have been around, roaming the webs, frequently squeeing, silently fangirling, occasionally loling.  I love fanfiction. I love slash, but I enjoy a well written het fic from time to time. The fandoms I read in are many and diverse, the authors I love even more. Good fanart for a lovely story  can make a rainy day bright and sunny.  I read many stories, visited rec pages daily, but always always always felt bad for not reviewing. I was the parasite in fandom's ecosystem.

But enough of that. I have a brand new, shiny account, I'll start hunting for icons and I'm going to tell all you wonderful talented people how wonderful and talented you really are.

Let the *facepalmsqueeletmefangirlyoutobits* begin!!!