redfiona99

I was going to be posting about the gym anyway, but I've finally managed to go for the first time since their most recent rejig and I approve.

Do I approve just because they have given us another squat rack? Yes.

That means there are 5 separate racks where you could do squats (3 are proper full on, the other 2 I wouldn't necessarily trust max rep attempts to). Did this mean I got to do squats again? Yes, it did.

They've also instituted a lunges area, which again, yes.

Only downside is that they've got rid of the "free work" mats, well not got rid, but moved them near the circuits/classes area and that means it feels a bit more exposed.

But my weirdness not withstanding, very happy.

The original reason I was going to post about gyms was I'd left myself a note to talk about the following - "Why do the "do you even lift" bros always assume everyone in the weights area takes steroids?"

The basis for this was the two whingers at work who have since left both also went to the gym. And that's fine. But they always used to complain that everyone in the weights area must have been on steroids.

And fine, some people are.

(My view is as long as you're not taking part in a sporting event that presumes you are not now nor have you ever been on them, I don't care. Your body, your choices.)

But the examples they chose were based on the weights they lifted, and they were saying things like people with 1 rep maxes around 120-150 kg were blatantly on things and I'm like, nah, that's hard work and repetition achievable.

And I don't know if it's because I hang out with actual sports people or what that means my concept of reasonable is a bit skewed, although one of the whingers was decent level at badminton so that's not the explanation.

After some time thinking, I've decided it's likely that I'm very much of the "my competitor in the gym is me, past me and the limitations of my body on the day" school of thought* so what someone else lifts doesn't bother me, while they were both more the sort of people who compare themselves to others and we know that comparison is the thief of joy.

(*Before I sound too virtuous, I have reached this after many years of "okay, she's lifting more than me but it's only 5 reps" brainrot. Zen was only achieved in my early-mid 30s.)

Many years ago st_aurafina posted this link about writers being plotters or pantsers (https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1125856091261136896.html) specifically talking about George R. R. Martin vs the Game of Thrones show runners.

Obviously no one, not even GRRM, falls all into one category.

I am more a plotter than a pantser. I can't just sit down and go "okay, that's how this goes." I have to have a solid idea.

On the other hand, my initial idea is often an image, and then I work out how everyone got there, and where they go from there. I have to have a road map then I can sit down and write the damn thing.

But I know that if, while I'm writing, there is suddenly a castle in the road map that wasn't originally supposed to be there, I should probably include it, because that's the story telling me that character, concept or action needs to be there.

Probably the best example is The Time Between, which was written for the XMM ficathon to this great prompt "Erik and Charles or Erik/Charles. Anything about them both living at the school, daily life or mutant heroics. Any era or AU is fine; feel free to mix and match any canon you like, including comics."

So I read that prompt and go, "what sort of thing would make those two get back together? It's going to have to be something serious, something that threatens mutants."

That already tells me I'm writing something action/thrillery, feeling a bit like the middle section of First Class (which was the only nu-trilogy/quadrilogy film at that point).

Next point, why isn't Magneto just going to stop the problem himself? He's got a telepath, a teleporter, a shapeshifter and someone who can fly, plus him and Riptide. They can handle most things. There needs to be a reason they reach out. It's Magneto, it's going to have to be a damn good reason. Man doesn't seek help, unless something dire is threatening mutantkind.

The only person on Magneto's side he can't replace, in the sense of someone else in the team's powers can do something similar or the use of a power would lead to a similar effect is Emma Frost, which is why Emma Frost is the one who is injured. So it had to be the type of mission where a telepath was needed.

The first image I got was Alex thwapping the solid, really good quality paper that Magneto and Mystique sent their missive on.

So I write from the arrival of the letter, then there's the explanation of the why, and all the characters interacting (one reviewer did spot that this is a series of character vignettes held together by plot).

In the initial thought, Magneto had been given the info on the government's plan by an undetected mutant FBI agent who happened to have had the file cross his desk. Completely inconspicuous character, looks a bit like a less sinister Victor Freeze from Batman: The Animated Series.

And I'm writing the scene where they go to visit the informant, and it has to be a bar so no one knows that they all know each other, and he's really scared, and I realise that there's already an FBI character, who knew about mutants, and might see this sort of file, who could remember Magneto, but couldn't remember where Charles was now, and was very resourceful and would somehow attract Magneto's attention if she needed it. And Magneto would trust Moira not to be lying, not about this (because I don't think he liked her, but I think he at least accepted she was more on their side than not, and that's the most he hopes for from non-mutants, and that he'd trust her if she came to him with this information) in a way he wouldn't about any given FBI agent.

And Moira coming back, and why she couldn't take the file to Charles, is a far more interesting story than random FBI dude who happens to be a mutant.

Moira was not in this fic originally, but she made it a better fic.

I have just finished writing nearly 2000 words of somewhat fluffy Solly/Gloria It Ain't Half Hot Mum fic.

Solly/Gloria is one of my pairings from before I knew what shipping was. They're pretty much unique in that sense because they're non-canonical. Young me was not a shippy person (okay, so present me isn't a shippy person either but young me even more so). I think part of it is that it took me until I was older to realise it wasn't canonical.

I first saw It Ain't Half Hot Mum when I was somewhere between 8-11. And I just presumed that Solly was Gloria's boyfriend because he always stepped in when the 'orrible Sergeant Major was being horrible to Gloria, more so that he did when the horrible Sergeant Major was being horrible to anyone else.

I caught it again when I was a bit older (14-18), and I realised that I may have misread (miswatched?) the show because I saw things that were not there.

I rewatched the show for the fic and the thing that interested me is that I could see why mini-me had seen what she saw. It's mostly due to the set up of the show.

Because Solly is the ranking member of the Concert Party, he's got to stand at one end of the line when they fall in. For camera work it makes sense that the more one note characters* are at the other end of the line so they can be ignored if they don't have anything to do in that scene. You can't put Gloria next to Gunner Sugden if you want the full effect of Sugden's lack of height (I think that's also why Sugden's placed between Atlas and Parky in the line up, who are the tallest of the regulars), and putting Gloria next to Solly is therefore the sensible thing.

That means Solly has to react when Shut Up shouts at Gloria because he's next door and in camera. The synchronised sour look he and Gloria do is also probably just for giggles, but the fact that he also reacts every time the Sergeant Major says anything about homosexuals might be where tiny-me got confused. It also means that it makes some sort of sense for Solly and Gloria to get teamed together whenever the gang have to split into twos.

It's really clear where tiny-me got confused and why and how much of it is down to the constraints of the medium (TV sitcom), which are "rules" that you don't know at that age.

*sorry Nobby, Nasher and Atlas

The one thing that really threw me while watching was when they had Alexander VI crowned to the tune of Zadok the Priest (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p1W1XJ96y9k - chosen as Andrew Davis is the conductor). Now it's not that anything was wrong with the acting (Jeremy Irons deserves all the awards), or the music but Handel is so much a product of an era after Alexander VI, such a totally different culture, a post-Reformation culture at that, that using his music was jarring. I refuse to believe they couldn't have found something else.

It also stuck out because the rest of it was so attempted accuracy. In something where there is no attempt at historical accuracy (A Knight's Tale, which I love, or the Elizabeth Taylor version of Ivanhoe), I don't think I would even have noticed.

It's odd what throws people out, I mean, I've cursed 300 for it's lack of proper phalanxes, and I remember several people complaining about the body hair (or lack thereof) in Rome, but I think this is the first time I've had the problem due to music.

There's a recently been a documentary on BBC TV called 'The Secret Life of Manic Depressives' or something similar. Anyway, in the blurb there was quite a bit of talk about the presenter, Stephen Fry, and how it was amazing that someone who is as undoubtedly talented as Fry is would be best by the feeling that he was worthless and that he had a little voice at the back of his head telling him he was 'a useless shit'.

That was where I got confused, 'cause I mean, I thought everyone had something similar and that the difference was that people with depressive disorders just had it worse (I'm the first to admit that I know nothing of psychology or psychiatry so if I've got that wrong, would someone tell me). Only the blurb made it sound like the voice of self-loathing was not normal. Which is when I got to wondering what was normal?

I mean, to me, normal does mean I get the occasional voice in the back of my head pointing out that I'm a waste of space, and repeated replays those moments of my life where I've seriously wanted the Earth to swallow me up whole. Then I read one of Topknot's posts about this idea of there being more than one version of you that faces the world, facets like diamond, and that these can be controlled to your advantage.

Again to me, this is normal. There's two of me, the one here who jibber-jabbers like a jibber-jabber doll, and worries and is generally flustered and nervous, and the other one who rises above all of that, Emergency Red to steal a name from someone else, and doesn't have the background chatter. Now noticably that only happens when I don't have time to jibber-jabber, like when I'm in a fencing bout or in an exam, so I can't say she's not useful, even if she does get me into some interesting situations at other times.

I do worry sometimes though that my idea of entirely normal is not, well, normal. I just assume I'm worrying about nothing though and that everyone's idea of normal is skewed by their own experiences.

Watched the first part of a two part Arena on Bob Dylan and much as I loved it (there was Dylan and Joan Baez and Pete Seeger and Peter, Paul and Mary and the usual.) it left me feeling depressed. Where are the musicians standing up and saying the present war is fucked up beyond belief.

I'm getting Green Day and that's about it.

And the worst of it, Green Day are getting flack because coming out and stating their views is selling out because no pop-punk band is allowed to be serious. (Also serious hugs and kisses for Bon Jovi for doing their thing and Kanye West, whatever his affiliations, for speaking his mind.)

I realise you've got all the bands who did the Live8 thing, except, really, what did it accomplish? (Is well aware of the stick I'll get for that opinion)

At this point may I state my undying love for Pete Seeger and Joan Baez. 'Cause it might just show that the first song about love written in the last century that I heard was "It ain't me babe". It, and my Mum's opinion which is much the same, may have had some effect on my opinion on marriage.

That's part of the problem, for me folk music is soul music, in the sense that it's the music of my soul.

Example - the folk nomination for this year's Mercurys was a young West Country (Dartmoor to be exact) singer/violinist called Seth Lakeman, and he played the title track of his album "Kitty Jay" and I knew it. I'd never heard it (or him) before, it wasn't a tune I knew but I knew it in my heart like I knew my name.

And I know that sounds insane.

BTW - I must recommend said personage and his album, at least what I've heard of it.

And therefore, in rambling conclusion, if anyone has any politicised music recs, or decent folk recs I'd be mightily obliged.

You all knew I was far too opinionated to keep quiet on that topic for long.

First for a declaration of interests - I'm not Catholic, the nearest I got was that the kindergarten I went to was run by nuns. I'm non-aligned Protestant, except I haven't been in a church for something that isn't hatching, matching or dispatching or tourism since I was 11.

I'm not Polish, but I have been there and this is important later on.

~~~~

I'm 20 so I've only ever known one Pope. He was the one steadfast point in an increasingly crazy world. And it's going to be very strange when the Pope isn't John Paul II.

Like I said I'm not Catholic and there have been times when I've not agreed with the Pope's stance on an issue, contraception being the most obvious one, but I always got the feeling that he said what he did, not out of some attempt to gain favour or curry this country or anothers belief, but because he thought it was morally right. To me that's a most important thing in a Pope.

And he seemed like he truly believed in what he said, which again is something I find important, and on occasion lacking in certain members of the clergy.

I never saw him before the attempted assassination in 1981, so my main memory of the Pope is of this kindly old man who, though his suffering was great, didn't give up. That's what my Mum and Nan thought he should do, and I was stuck trying to explain that from what little I could gather, the Pope thought that God would tell him what to do when the time came for him to do it.

I was in Poland in the summer of 2000, I don't know how many of you have been there but it's a lovely place and I recommend that everyone go, and that was the thing that impressed itself on me the most, how very religious the whole country seemed to be and how much the Pope meant to them. And he did, he wasn't a remote figure in Rome he was one of their own.

And that's it, the Pope mattered to people, but it wasn't just people in Rome, or in Poland, or Catholics but it was an awful lot of people like me who aren't Catholic, aren't Italian, aren't Polish, aren't even particularly religious but he mattered, because he was real. In an age where image was all, and I'm not debating that he could use the media masterfully and did, he was utterly, utterly real.

My Mum would say I'm probably being horribly sentimental, but I hope the Pope is at peace.

Reading something on my friends list about ancient Greek gods set me thinking. It was a really good piece and used an old myth to fantastic effect.

And then there was a programme about King Arthur and one of the end lines was about how each new generation/group of people/what have you retold Arthur's story and added some parts and took away others and that was what kept it fresh and alive.

That's what a lot of ancient myths are - stories told around campfires finally set down in writing and every time the story was told, a different spin would be put on it because someone else would be telling the story. The lore-writers, the minstrels, the travelling story tellers they used characters people knew and told new stories featuring them.

And that's kind of what fanfic is. We're all gathered round the warm glow of the internet and we want to hear a story featuring heroes and adventure, or romance, or a different plot. New stories featuring a character we like, whether it be Arthur, once and future king, or Aragorn or Evolution.

I find that inspiring in some way. I'm part of a slightly off-centre branch of a tree that leads back to the great storytellers of yore.