SQUEEEEEEEE!

Well done everyone for guessing the meme!
The final answer was:

07. Clue 1: Ages old story. Love isn’t the only thing to conceal. Clue 2: Legends in training.
       Merlin/Arthur  (Merlin) oz_the_bobble and plum177  who played remotely via text as she is currently without Internet.

And as I am an idiot and forgot to put all of innerbrat 's correct answers up yesterday, I'll list them all here in case you missed it.

01. Darcy/Elizabeth
02. Kirk/Spock
05. Holmes/Watson
15. Rimmer/Lister

and an honourable mention for 06. Fraser/Ray V cos she got the right fandom, but the wrong Ray :)


And some thoughts that came to me and Teaboy whilst watching my brother and my father in Aladdin.

La Cage Aux Folles should so do a panto!

It would be FABULOUS! It would be somewhere between normal panto and student panto. So then we cast Aladdin. With the Cagelles.

So Zaza would be Widow Twankey. Albin would want to be the Princess, but Georges would convince him that Widow Twankey got better dresses and wigs.
Georges would be Abanazer.
Albin would nag Georges until he convinced Jean-Michel to be Aladdin. The words "you owe me" would be used. Anne would think it was hilarious.
At this point, Jacob would immediately decide to be Princess Yasmin, and fight off anyone who tried to challenge him.
Hannah would be the Genie.
Angelique aka the small belligerant one, would be the Slave of the Ring. And glare at Francis in the wings because it's him in charge of the smoke machine.

Err.. that's it really. Except to say, that Jon Culshaw's Michael McIntyre impression is hilarious (guess what I'm watching)

Have a very Merry Christmas Everybody!!!

ETA: I am an idiot and forgot to list all of  innerbrat's correct answers, so have changed them accordingly.

What fun this meme has been! I'm taking a leaf out of plum177's and requiem2adream's books; as there is only one more pairing left to guess, I will give you the answers to the ones that have been correctly guessed, plus an extra clue for the one that hasn't been guessed so far. You obviously all know me too well!
In fact, as it's Christmas and I'm feeling generous, I will continue to post a new clue each day until one of you gets it correct *doesn't think this will actually take more that one day*

So without further ado, the answers and the wonderful people who got it right:

01. Just goes to show that first impressions can be wrong. Love in breeches and bonnets.
      Darcy/Elizabeth (Pride and Prejudice) oz_the_bobble , bethan_b_bad , plum177 , innerbrat 

02. Logic and emotion. Breaking frontiers.
       Kirk/Spock (Star Trek TOS) requiem2adream , oz_the_bobble , bethan_b_bad , plum177 , innerbrat

03. Addict and enabler. Best friends. Stolen food and snark.
      House/Wilson (House) imsane_honest , oz_the_bobble , plum177

04. Timeless love. Intangibility no barrier.
       Al/Sam (Quantum Leap) requiem2adream , oz_the_bobble , bethan_b_bad , plum177 

05. The brain without a heart and his faithful chronicler solve crime that baffles Scotland Yard.
       Holmes/Watson (Conan Doyle) requiem2adream , oz_the_bobble , bethan_b_bad , plum177 , innerbrat

06. Two breeds of cop. Red serge. And doggie makes three.
       Fraser/Ray V (Due South) plum177 and an honourable mention to innerbrat  who got the right fandom, but the wrong Ray :)

07. Not guessed - see below for new clue

08. Wouldn’t stop for red lights. Seven years isn’t too long to wait for true love.
       Josh/Donna (The West Wing) bethan_b_bad 

09. Four failed marriages between them. Old friends reunite to make the world a safer place.
       Hotch/Rossi (Criminal Minds) plum177 

10. What ho! Good chap rescued from scrapes by faithful genius. Jolly good fun.
       Jeeves/ Wooster (Wodehouse) requiem2adream , oz_the_bobble , bethan_b_bad , plum177 

11. 20 years. Separate but together. Shepherds on the hill.
      Jack/Ennis (Brokeback Mountain) plum177 

12. Galactically stupid? Fooled by glasses. Love as true as steel.
       Lois/Clark (New Adventures) bethan_b_bad  (yeah she said Lois/Superman, but meh, a rose by any other name...)

13. Twenty years together doesn’t dim the splash of the waves on the sand.
       Georges/Albin(La Cage) requiem2adreambethan_b_bad , plum177 

14. Opposite sides. Sometimes the more different you are the more you are the same.
       Crowley/Aziraphale (Good Omens) requiem2adream , plum177 

15. When you’re the only one left, hatred blossoms into something special. Bunks.
       Rimmer/Lister(Red Dwarf) oz_the_bobble , bethan_b_bad , plum177 , innerbrat


Well done to every one who guessed correctly. Number 7 is the only one left to guess, so here it is, the original clue and your new clue:

07. Clue 1: Ages old story. Love isn’t the only thing to conceal. Clue 2: Legends in training.

Stolen from plum177!
- Pick up to 15 OTPs
- Describe them in less than 15 words.
- Have your flist guess the OTP!

Some are obvious. Some are fairly cryptic. Some only a few of you will guess. I ship all of them. There are 3 het ships. The rest are slash. And I think some have been picked by other friends who did this meme earlier.

I had so much fun thinking of these. Like writing haiku.

01. Just goes to show that first impressions can be wrong. Love in breeches and bonnets.
02. Logic and emotion. Breaking frontiers.
03. Addict and enabler. Best friends. Stolen food and snark.
04. Timeless love. Intangibility no barrier.
05. The brain without a heart and his faithful chronicler solve crime that baffles Scotland Yard.
06. Two breeds of cop. Red serge. And doggie makes three.
07. Ages old story. Love isn’t the only thing to conceal.
08. Wouldn’t stop for red lights. Seven years isn’t too long to wait for true love
09. Four failed marriages between them. Old friends reunite to make the world a safer place.
10. What ho! Good chap rescued from scrapes by faithful genius. Jolly good fun.
11. 20 years. Separate but together. Shepherds on the hill.
12. Galactically stupid? Fooled by glasses. Love as true as steel.
13. Twenty years together doesn’t dim the splash of the waves on the sand.
14. Opposite sides. Sometimes the more different you are the more you are the same.
15. When you’re the only one left, hatred blossoms into something special. Bunks.

Go to it :)

ETA: I'll post the answers in a week, or when they've all been guessed correctly, whichever comes first :)

I was on my way home from my lecture just now, when I realised I hadn't posted for a while. I started mentally composing my post (as you do) which very quickly deteriorated into a rather wanky moan about how I felt like I was being overwhelmed with work, how I wasn't going to get a decent break at Christmas, how my computer breaking in the middle of term couldn't have happened at a worse time and how I was worried I might not get top marks in my coursework this term.

Then it started raining.
And I thought, great, now I'm wet as well.

Then I realised the rain was cold.
And I thought, brilliant, now I'm cold and wet.

Then it started raining harder.
And I thought, for FUCKSAKE!

And then it started to hail.
By which stage it had become sublime in it's ridiculousness and I had to laugh.

And by the time it had started raining still harder I had realised that I wasn't cut out to be emo, and that I was depressing myself with irrelevant bollcoks.

So I say BEGONE NEGATIVITY!!!! and will instead list the things in my life that make me happy.

I have my health.
I have my friends, who don't just put up with my eccentricities, but positively encourage them.
I have my family whom I love and who are always there for me when I need them.
I am living in a city I love, studying a subject I love (most of the time) that will help me get a job that I will love.
I have a shiny new computer.
I'm going home for Christmas in less than a week, and I can pretend, even if only for a few days, that I'm five again.
Pretending that I'm five again is something I can do quite often.
I have waking up on a Saturday and realising that my hot water bottle is still warm and I don't have to get up.
I have coming in from the cold and snuggling under a blanket.
I have lazy Sundays reading fic.
I have all of my shiny things.
I get to watch my friends and family open Christmas presents that I hope they will love.

And to the emo goblins I say fuck off, you won't be taking up residence in my brain.
And as soon as I thought all this, it stopped raining. Go figure.

So now, I shall put on Christmas music, start writing the report for THE MOST AWESOME COURSEWORK EVAH! and remember how lucky I am.

I GOT FUCKING STUNG BY A FUCKING WASP THIS MORNING!!! It had got caught up in my top somehow, and when I put it on I felt a godawful pain in my shoulder like I'd been injected with something (which, in fairness, I had). After frantically checking my shoulder in the mirror to try and work out what the hell it was that was causing the pain and finding no visible sign, I turned round to discover a slightly groggy wasp crawling over my slipper. I then turned back to the mirror to discover that I now had a giant red mark, which pretty much confirmed my diagnosis. I fuzzed the wasp out of my front door, which personally I think was very nice of me considering what it had done to me.

But seriously WHAT THE FUCK???!!! I'm in fucking Cardiff! In FUCKING NOVEMBER!!!! THERE SHOULD NOT BE WASPS IN MY CLOTHING!!!!


Also 1) It's been *years* since I last got stung and I've forgotten how much it hurts and 2) THE PAINKILLERS AREN'T WORKING!!!! Seriously, this happened an hour and a half ago now and it still hurts like a bitch.


Stupid fucking nature.

Some days the intertubes is a scary pit of hell, that makes me cower under my bed with a colander on my head, but some days I just want to give it a great big hug. Today is one of those latter days.

I'm sure by now most of you have read the hateful, vile column that Jan Moir, that polyp on the rectum of humanity, has spewed forth into the already shit-soaked pages of the Dail FAIL.

If you haven't http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-1220756/A-strange-lonely-troubling-death--.html here it is.
Although, it should be noted that the Daily Mail have changed the headline, it used to read "Why there was nothing 'natural' about Stephen Gately's death" - as Charlie Brooker has documented in this Twitpic - http://www.twitpic.com/lqchu
The Fail have also removed all advertising from the page. So there you go, Jan Moir, too hate filled and bigoted for the Daily Mail.

It is a horrible article, and I won't waste my brain cells thinking anymore on such dispicable arse-gravy.
Because there are much better things to focus on, namely, the reaction of the Internet. Jan Moir has become a trending topic on Twitter, and many people more learned and intelligent than me have had their say.

ETA:
A couple of tweets to start:

Charltonbrooker: RT @disappointment: Jan Moir manages to walk the difficult tightrope between being a bitch and a cunt http://bit.ly/1GGI4S

Stephenfry: I gather a repulsive nobody writing in a paper no one of any decency would be seen dead with has written something loathesome and inhumane.

And now some wonderful satirical pieces as well as some opinion blogs

http://notsowunderbar.blogspot.com/2009/10/why-there-is-nothing-natural-about-jan.html

http://www.dailyquail.org/2009/10/jan-moir-why-theres-nothing-natural.html (read the comments on this one too, some are quite wonderful)

http://newsarse.com/2009/10/16/jan-moirs-career-to-die-of-perfectly-natural-causes/

http://enemiesofreason.blogspot.com/2009/10/why-there-is-nothing-natural-about-life.html

But the best part of it all?

The PCC (Press Complaints Commission) website has crashed under the shear volume of traffic from people complaining. 

To quote Oz: The people have a twitter shaped voice.

The PCC site seems to be hobbling along now so complain here: http://www.pcc.org.uk/complaints/form.html

She has breached clauses 1,3,5 & 12 of the Code.

Well anyway I think I shall go and write some slash. Because I can.

ETA:
I have written my complaint, which I show you here:

Jan Moir's article is a vile concoction based on rumour and insinuation. She takes it upon herself to question the findings of the official inquest, suggesting that Stephen Gately's death was a result of his lifestyle, and not natural causes. Whatever Stephen Gately did or did not do the night before his death has no bearing on it, if the experts say that it did not.
Jan's article is littered with unpleasant homosexual stereotypes of the very worst kind, suggesting that promiscuity is inherent to homosexuality and that civil partnerships are damaging to all parties involved. She also makes snide comments about the tragic death of Kevin McGee, as further "proof" to back up her claims of the evils of civil partnerships.
She makes the ridiculous and wildly inaccurate claim that men in their 30s don't "just die", which is obviously and patently untrue. She goes on to imply that Stephen Gately's homosexuality was a contributing factor to his death and that somehow it was his fault and that he deserved it.
Jan Moir is perpetuating hideous and unpleasant untruths to suggest that being gay is some kind of affliction that will adversely affect the mental and physical health of those who come into contact with it.
She is intruding on the grief of a young man's family in the most vile and terrible way, before he has even been buried.


ETA2:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/oct/16/stephen-gately-jan-moir - Charlie Brooker's Guardian article about it.

O HOLY SHIT!!!!

I AM GOING TO SAN DIEGO COMIC CON 2010!!!!!!!!


FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCK!!!!


I can't quite believe I'm actually going through with it, but there you go. I've actually done it, I've actually registered, coughed up my $100 so now I *have* to go.


Now all I have to do is organise, book and finance flights and accomodation and.... seriously am having a bit of a "WHAT HAVE I DONE?!?!?!?" moment here.

I mean, OMFG YAY! I'M FUCKING GOING TO THE GODDAMN SDCC!!! (and this fact is only just properly hitting me too) but for serious, I'm gonna have to do proper grown up things to organise this.


FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Got a phone call from my dad today. Yesterday one of our cats got run over. Vets said she was DOA. She was only 6.

Worst part is she was sulking at us for getting the kittens. I never saw her the last time I visited my dad.

She was always more my brother's cat. Ruby, her sister, I kind of see as mine. But Sapphire was one of the most beautiful and lovely cats I  knew. Only Jello had a louder purr.

Gonna miss you Saffy.

Welcome to the second half of the picspammy goodness, starting with a picture of me and Teaboy looking sickeningly happy, and then  a poster that's so true it hurts.

So I come bearing picspam. The presentation, could, perhaps, be better, but I am going to let the pretty speak for itself.

Many of you, I am sure, will not particularly care about it, but those of you who do, *really, really* do.

So without further ado, I give you, in no particular order, Philip Quast!

 

Because I am an idiot, I missed lots of things, so check this new post for thoughts on John Barrowman’s hands, a comparison of Jacobs and the official Quallam ratings of couples in the show.

( Things I forgot )

So this weekend, I went to see La Cage Aux Folles twice. We saw the last night of Philip Quast and Roger Allam’s run on Saturday night, and John Barrowman and Simon Burke’s first night on Monday. This marks the fourth and fifth time I’ve seen the show since the end of May, and I probably should feel bad about that, but I don’t because the show puts me in a wonderful mood and I love all of it. For a while now, I’ve been thinking of writing an essay, trying to express just what it is I love so much about this show, but I’ve never been able to find quite the right words. However, we spent most of Monday night and much of Tuesday morning dissecting the two different performances of the weekend, as not only did Quast and Allam leave the show, but quite a few of the supporting cast did as well. So now I feel able to show my appreciation by comparing my reactions to the show with the two different casts.

I have tried to be objective in my comparisons, but I’m not entirely sure I can explain just how much I was blown away by Quast and Allam’s performances every time I saw them. I walked into Barrowman’s opening night, firmly of the opinion that they were never going to cast the show better than with the actors who had just left. Never have I seen a show before when I have turned around and said “This show is perfectly cast” until I walked out of the Playhouse Theatre for the first time.

( Cut for length and spoileryness )

So, I think that’s everything. Please, feel free to add your own thoughts and assessments, and point out anything I missed, or of course disagree utterly with everything I have said.

Reply to this meme by yelling "Words!" and I will give you five words that remind me of you. Then post them in your LJ and explain what they mean to you.
Stoled off of plum177
( Cut for length! and vague picspammyness )

Edit: Whilst I was typing this, a Frenchman came to buy a smart car that my stepdad had bought to do up and sell on. He was very vaguely teddybearish, and my brain was going "Georges, Georges, Georges" the entire time I was speaking to him, with the result I didn't really concentrate on what he said. I then took Ninja!photos out of my window whilst he spoke to my mother. I would post them here, but you know, privacy, so I shall show relevant people at the weekend and you can see if you can see where I'm coming from.

Well hopefully I get to close the book on summer from well maybe not hell, but possibly the kitchen of a vaguely malevolent demonic entity. Finally, finally bastard boss has paid me. Well he has sent me the cheque. Which may or may not go through. But I can pay it in tomorrow and hopefully have money again.

And all it took was a reminder email. Another reminder email, and finally a third reminder before he called me to say he was putting it the post that evening.

He was "busy" apparently. For four fucking weeks. So busy for four weeks that he couldn't sit down and write a cheque. But he could go on holiday.

I have bitched to Shell Step who put us in touch originally, and he may get blackballed from taking on other students. So that's one good thing.

Of course, his douchebaggery would not be complete without one final douchebag move. Instead of paying me for two weeks work, he has paid me for the hours I worked. Which means, mostly due to him letting me go before the end of the week, that I am about £40 down. Ok, so he paid all my train fares, and also paid me £10 too much for the first week (shh!!) but £40 pounds really isn't that much money, but on the other hand is enough to make a difference when you are a student. I can't see how it would have  harmed him to pay me the extra as a good will gesture, but there we go, he is a sod and I'm well shot of him.

On a better note, I have spent the last few days in a Merlin fic induced haze and it has been awesome. It really is the gayest show ever to gay, and me and Oz decided that even if Jack appeared in the Hub in a rainbow kaftan singing "I feel pretty", Merlin would still be gayer than Torchwood.
The we realised that Gaius would totally rock the rainbow kaftan more, and thus the phrase "Gaius in a rainbow kaftan" has apparently been burnt into my brain, causing me to use it as an error message when I was debugging code the other day.
Also, in more adventures of my brain being twisted, the great and wonderful Slash Dragon that lives beneath Camelot got named the Great Soup Dragon by my mind, and now will be stuck as that for the rest of time.

Also yay! London! and can has a Bethan this weekend. And possibly seeing La Cage more times than is healthy. Hang on. there is no such thing!!

Well yesterday was kinda shit. Had to email wanker ex-boss because he hasn't paid me yet. This just brought home to me how much he has screwed up my summer, and to some extent, the rest of the year, and may have impacted my chances of going to America next year. So I ended up both upset and pissed off that one tosser can have so much influence over my life.
For the first time in a long time, I just needed to get out of the house, mostly to get away from the computer and obsessively checking for a reply, and also just becasue it happens sometimes when I get too het up about stuff.

So I escaped to my Dad's for kitten therapy, cos really, who can be uncheered when you're watching two boistrous kittens running around like loons and playfighting in a box.

And this morning I had a reply telling me he'd sort my pay today.

So now I'm in a state of mind to be able to concentrate on the coursework I need to do, and hopefully get it finished by the weekend.

Then I can tackle the various bitsof fic bobbing around in my head.

My Daddy (technically my whole other family) is getting a kitteh! There is even the possibility that we might get two.

We already have two, hmmm, they must be about 6 or 7 year old  cats that  we've had for about 4 or 5 years. Which is mad that we've had them that long but still

.
This is Ruby, who somehow I always regard as *my* cat, with Sapphire being my brother's. Not sure why.


And this is Sapphire.

Parentals now having more time to look after tiny cats means we went to look at kittens yesterday. There was a litter of 6 from the cat rescue lady we got Ruby and Sapphire from  and they are adorable. White and ginger tabbies, 17 weeks old. They were discovered under someone's BBQ, and the mother had all burnt paws, one assumes from trying to get food. The lady who found them (I think|) was going to keep them all, but her dogs didn't like the kittens, so to the shelter they went .  As happened before we were only going to get one, but they were so cute we couldn't split them up. There are 3 boys - Rupert, Barnaby and Dino and 3 girls - Athena, Topaz and Demi. Rupert, funnily enough, looks lie a cat called Rupert that my step-dad had as a boy. I never knew Rupert, but I knew his brother Sydney in the last few years of his life.

This is Dino, coming to investigate my phone as I tried to take a picture.

Demi is the one with her head hanging over the side of the basket, and the other is Athena.

Barnaby is the one giving me evils and Rupert is the all-ginger one (though apparently he has a splash of white on his chest) with his back to me

And this isTopas, who has gorgeous white tips on her ears.

We are definiitely getting Dino, a cheeky little monkey of a kitten who has rather a thing for feet and kept playing with toes and shoelaces. He also was climbing the side of the cage and generally being a little character. We was also hand-reared slightly for a few days as he didn't like being weaned, and consequently adores being picked up and held, useful when sharing a house with a cat loving small boy. Young Dino was apparently called Dotty before they found out that he was a boy, and it has to be said the name suits him.
The other cat is more of a bone of contention, as my brother really likes Topaz, and my step-mum likes Arhena. Neither me nor my father really formed an opinion either way, except to note that Topaz seemed kinda scared and skittish, whereas Athena seemed more relaxed. So Nicki and Mattie are returning to the cat lady today to see if they can come to a decision.

Rupert and Barnaby didn't move from their fluffy perch the entire time we were there, although apparently normally they were more playful. Demi was a little more active, but content to stay out of the lime light

ETA: Breaking News: Just got off the phone from my father, and we have kittehs! They did indeed go back today to decide on the second cat, and as the cat lady had conducted the home check for Ruby and Sapphire, she didn't need to do a second (altohugh she will have to come and do a check up once they've been neutered) and said they could take the kittens tonight. Dino, was indeed, a given, but in a surprise upset Rupert is the second. I can't wait to go and see them tomorrow, and make friends and find out how this came to be. As far as I know the names are staying, Dino for sure, its a good cat name, and personally I'd like Rupert to stay, because of the connection. Will be taking my camera to try for awesome shots. EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE Kittehs!

In other news, I am currently using my brand new TV that arrived this morning as a computer monitor. Umm... talk about geek!gasm this morning setting it up :) It was bought by my parents partly as a congratulations you survived second year present and I think partly to cheer me up because of the stupid job of fail. And partly because it was on offer and cheap. It is a 22" HD ready beauty with built in freeview and DVD player and I think is possibly the shiny-newest piece of tech I've ever had. Well after my laptop. There is something quite wonderful about typing an El Jay (and really that's just to make Lauren do the funny voice) post on my TV.

My shiny new TV!!!

And proof that I am actually using it for my computer.

And Teaboy? We're *so* using it for Ashes to Ashes marathon!

And finally... I get the feeling I might end up committing La Cage Fic again... Albin is steadily becoming more insistent

Umm yeah, so what started as a short exercise to get my head back has turned into a 6,000 word epic.

It’s long, rambling, and time jumps like woah.

That being said, hope you enjoy it as much as I enjoyed writing it.

So, part backstory, part worldbuilding and part character study, this is what happens when an overgrown teddybear of a man takes up residence in my brain and refuses to leave.

Based on La Cage Aux Folles, so funnily enough, contains teh gay. Umm… PG-13ish I guess.

Warnings: Sybil. And might be dangerous to diabetics – the boys can be stupidly adorable at times.

 

( Georges wasn’t sure when he realised he wasn’t like the other boys in the village... )

 

Just a heads up, my phone seems to be being a bit of an arse at the moment over whether it actually sends messages when it tells me it has. So if you text me and I don't reply, I'm not ignoring you, I just don't know you haven't received my reply.