Thanks, and looking forward to the weekend

[hobgoblinn]

I just saw the final nominees list for The New Library Awards. This is the comm I have been incessantly reccing fics for since I stumbled across it soon after its inception, and have now somehow got roped into being a judge for the judged portion of the Awards. For those who hadn't heard, this is a very cool and ambitious new community, designed to bring attention to new and underappreciated authors in the Harry Potter fandom.

I will not, however, be judging in Serpensortia: Best Original Character, nor in Episkey: Best Gen Hurt/Comfort, nor in Diffindo: Best Gen Angst, as "Lost Boys" was nominated in all those categories. I have to own up; I nominated Lost Boys for some categories myself while submitting my great honking list of great fics. However, I did not nominate myself for best new author, and I did not second myself in any category at all. I was chuffed to have been nominated as best new author, but not at all crushed not to have made the final cut, because I'm not. Best new author, that is. And that's a Very Impressive List as it stands now.

But I'm pleased and humbled beyond measure to have had Lost Boys seconded in its categories, some of which I know are larger than the mods had intended, which means it got multiple seconds for some things to keep it in the running. So, thanks to any and everyone who made that happen. I urge all of you to go start reading that list of fics now and Vote when the time comes. I dipped in to a few things while making my seconding list and, wow. There is some really surprising neat stuff out there.

I still think zeegrindylows should have been nominated for her first completed fic Where Your Treasure Is (and I will rectify that for round 2), but I think in her case that fic is so good, people Thought it was by an established author in the fandom. It's already a classic and people think of it as such. The only reason I remembered to nominate "De Profundis" is that I had recced it on my journal back when it started and I used that list to compile my list (okay, jog my memory.)

But again, thanks. And now, what mischief does hobgoblinn have planned for the weekend?

Why, the annual Play Reading in the Park Backyard of my Friends' House. I got the idea 5 or 6 years ago, that I'd always wanted to read "A Midsummer Night's Dream" in a park, so I conned/cajoled/bullied my friends into coming out to Pyramid Hill Park with a picnic and copious amounts of Mead and Ale to aid the performance. We have since moved it to my friends' house, where we can stay late into the evening and have a proper bonfire/ Solstice celebration. We've done other plays, but this year we're back to Midsummer, and Wee Hob is itching to play Puck. We swap off parts every scene or so, to let everybody do some things they like. Wee Hob was so impressed, about the time I got him back, that I could recite Puck's last lines, from "Now the hungry lion roars, and the wolf behowls the moon..." and he himself can rattle through "If we shadows have offended" now. It should be a cool day. We also sometimes have a jam and I get to play piano for that, along with the Cincinnati Symphony's Principal Violist and my friend Rick, who is a working composer and flautist. It's always great fun, and I am beyond looking forward to it.

And finally, guess what I had to do at work today? If you guessed "Math", you would be right. I had to write and check a subroutine to generate a mod11 check digit for a numeric code, and then I had to manually calculate a few of the results to see if the number came up right. Wee Hob is still laughing about it.

Happy weekend to all.

Comments

[tx-cronopio.livejournal.com]

Oh, the play reading sounds so fun! Good for you!

[miamadwyn.livejournal.com]

Congrats and good luck in TNLA!

The play reading sounds absolutely divine.

::dreamy sigh::

Math does not.

[hobgoblinn.livejournal.com]

Thanks!

[emmeline33.livejournal.com]

The play reading sounds like a heavenly way to spend a summer's night (the ale and mead don't sound half-bad, either!). I shudder in sympathy with your work-related math. Math and I...not the best of friends.

Congratulations on your nominations/seconding! I just started reading "In Loco Parentis," and I am really impressed with your writing.

[hobgoblinn.livejournal.com]

The funniest part? I have a master's in English. But I program computers for a living. I got out of my undergrad with several creative substitutions for maths (the benefits of a liberal arts college in curriculum flux) and no formal computer science classes to speak of. Funny how life works out.

And thanks for the well-wishing. The definitive version of Lost Boys, which is a Much better story than In Loco, is at ff net, but it also exists, with comments from the f-list at the time, on my journal. Of perhaps more interest if you read that one is the fic postmortem for it. I learned a ton of stuff writing that story.

But I better get back to the next ch of In Loco. Wee Hob has demanded Beta rights on it again, and he is getting quite stern with me that I don't have anything else to read him.

[emmeline33.livejournal.com]

That is so cool, Wee Hob beta'ing your story!

English majors never, short of academia, seem to land jobs having anything to do with our degree.

[zeegrindylows.livejournal.com]

Aww.. thanks so much for the mention. It's still rather odd for me to think of Treasure as a classic, as, of course, when I look at it, all I see are the mistakes and bits where the writing is terrible. I was trying to actually read it through the other day (something I have not yet done) and could only make it to chapter 10 before I threw my hands up in disgust and gave it up as a bad job.

Congratulations on your nominations! I'm rather thrilled about mine, although I feel guilty also, as I haven't put up a new chapter in ages. I'm working on one though!