I actually emailed people! Been a while since I’ve been out there at all with anything other than an exchange due fic. True, writing has happened, and I’m still throwing things in the Notebook Archive, both original and fannish, and hoping to get back up on the poetry train like a good girl.

I have been writing poems, which is kind of great. I’m well on track to beat my goal of 1K poems this year, which is exciting, though now I want to slow down and write a long one or two again as well. Narrative poetry has fallen off my plate, but it’d be fun.

Work has been crazy. I was sick with a touch of strep then working through my recovery while still being sick and exhausted, so suffice to say, been swamped and lurking and barely getting through my days before crashing. But par for the course. I’ll live and I’m grateful that I can feel that way at this point. Maybe it means my ability to manage my chronic health issues better and my feelings about them is getting better. (Don’t tell my doctors I’ve skipped every single exercise or special thing I’m supposed to do while dealing with strep/recovery. At least I’ve been taking the ghastly number of pills I’m supposed to.)

That said, I am also enjoying writing again and trying to write something family-safe for the family, though I’ve been still ploughing through exchanges, so that’s slow going. Only so many writing hours in a week. Alas! I’m the master of overextending.

Been watching anime when I’m mentally out of it or physically not up to stuff, or on the weekends because I got hooked on a few.

So thoughts.

Starting with, why anime? In short, because I really, really love superhumans and living weapons and overpowered characters and my favorite settings sticking around with my favorite characters in it with domestic fluffy moments and established relationships with history that see on-screen development.

Aka, MCU broke all kinds of trust with me and I am bitter and all my attempts to try the Marvel shows (Marvel was my home, my fandom, and it’s all broken and I am bitter) only led to hating them and noping out partway through. Anime delivers on these things without utterly destroying everything I love about a canon. It builds on them and also superhumans who aren’t always playing vigilante as the core and almost sole conceit. Yay.

Violet Evergarden — Made for me. I always knew that even by osmosis, because living weapon learning to human is my trope. Well, that and soulmates, but seriously, they’d have to botch this bad for me to not like it. I loved it. I binged the anime in less than 2 days and loved it.

Afterward, I went looking for the LN translation because she didn’t get any reconciliation with the Major and I was hopeful, and discovered that LN lovers pretty much hated the anime. So I’ll read the LN when the bad taste gets out of my mouth and carry on loving both if possible.

It’s also super pretty, I don’t care what anyone says. I could get fannish about this but I don’t know if I’d feel confident about writing a lot of the characters, especially considering I haven’t read any LNs yet. Eh, might not fic this one too hard unless some flist joins me in my pain.

Boku No Hero Academia — Did I mention I really, really hated the art for this and thought I would never even try it? I hated the art through two and a half episodes but the characters hooked me and now it’s fine, I’ve adjusted. I tried this because gecko. I stayed for all my faves. I like what Midoriya does to the narrative, but he is not one of my faves at all. My favorites are Tsu and Ochako and Shouto and Katsuki and a leetle bit of Momo and Toshinori when he’s deflated and a leetle bit of Aizawa. But I like most of them and I really like the learning elements and the quirk training is fantastic and Katsuki’s breakdown was kind of wonderful and every single thing about Shouto protecting his mom and Ochako just deserves all the love but her and Tsu both don’t give me nearly as much fanficcable space where there’s iceberg material to go play with.

So… Crossovers maybe? I don’t know. I want something meaty and BNHA keeps its meat on the big three and their emotional growth and issues and that’s part of why I’m a serious multishipper and here it’s almost all passive shipping. I like reading quality stuff for some of the big ships or the obvious ships but I don’t actually actively ship anything. It’s weird. I’d like to.

That said, I’ve started writing some in it for exchanges mostly and don’t know that I’ll get any ideas that aren’t prompted, but it’s a thing.

Lord El Melloi II Case Files: {Rail Zeppelin} Grace note — So I really enjoyed the first LN and adored Flat and his relationship with Waver Velvet from Fate/strange fake, but this anime is like the best little fantasy mystery series and I have stars in my eyes over the characters, the details, the credits, and I’m loving it utterly. This from someone who has an extremely low tolerance for gore. This series should absolutely not be my cup of tea and somehow it absolutely is.

Gray is a sibyl, so her village (and family) wrote a Servant face/body over her but weren’t able to displace her spirit yet with the Servant, so she’s still her own person saved by Waver, who hates that face as much as she does. I really like the complexity of their relationship and how understated the identity issues are there. Also, her girl day with Reines was adorable and it was nice to see Reines’ nicer side.

Reines is an adorable little sadist and I love her way too much. Mages are an interesting bunch for sure.

Flat and Waver (and now Svin) remain some of my favorite characters ever. Flat Escardos is just a cinnamon roll with a great heart and cheerful disregard for important rules and I love him utterly.

I’d ask somebody to save me, but I don’t want to be saved. I want other people to fall in love with this show so I can squee with them and write fic and all that.

Fate/Grand Order — I watched the movie in time for the preview first episode of Babylonia to come out and that first episode was just like a very long preview with some scenes in it. If you don’t know a lot about the story, including some spoilers, it really sucks as an episode. That said, I’m interested in seeing what they do with it. Hopefully something good.

Dr. Stone — Oddly charming. I don’t think I’ll get fannish about it, but I’ll keep watching and enjoying it. I tried it entirely on a whim and was surprised I ended up liking it after a bit. Senku is fun after a bit, Tsukasa is irritating but not present enough to be a problem yet, and the villagers are mostly delightful. The science stuff is really fun, so I’m sticking with it.

Yuuri on Ice — I’m 2 and a half episodes in and going slowly. Because I don’t care about Victor or Yuuri yet and I ought to. I like Yuri, but we’ll see if it gets better or he’s worth it.

Fruits Basket (2019) — OMG, I’m in love! And I have a new favorite grumpy redhead! And I love Uo-chan sooooo much. And Hana and her family. And Tohru. And so many of the Sohmas being Sohmas. And Kisa trailing after her big sister. And there’s just so much good backstory whump and hugs! and not nearly enough of them doing stuff with their animal totems like in the first episode or two, so great loss there, but soooooo much good stuff, I’m hooked anyway.

I spoiled myself on endgame ships and am less sure I still ship everything I started off shipping, but I do have a little fondness for Arisa/Kyo, Kyo/Yuki/Tohru, besides Kyo/Tohru. Ah well, we’ll see how that pans out.

And here I shall stop going on and on for a bit. How’s everyone doing? What are you getting into?