still, pretty good year [ver. 2004]

[sab]

I started my 2004 Year in Review, more for my own archival purposes than any sort of catharsis or advertising needs, but, bein' cruisy and stupid, I backed out of the browser window without realizing it, forwarded to a different LJ, and started surfing around Livejournal, effectively erasing/eating my post so innocently sitting in an Update Journal window I can't get to. (Note to self: use Semagic)

C'est la way it goes, and in the interest of not going through all 39 questions again, I give you the salient points.



sorlklewis's behavior merited celebration, for picking herself up by them bootstraps and coming out here and setting an example for us all. The election's the issue that stirred me the most, made me the maddest, wiped me out. A pox on the Religious Right for taking my country away, for ignoring my civil liberties, for removing any trace of the good ol' Separation of Church and State, and for making me an alien in my own home just for wanting liberte, egalite, and fraternite. Fuckin' A.

Me, I am thinner and poorer, sans car, avec promotion. TK aka selenak's the best new person of my year, and what I've learned, if nothing else, has been to give my time and energy and love to folks who genuinely care about me, folks who have been my friends through thick and thin and thaw. Happy New Year, I love you, TK, RTM, SNK, VSPG, JLR, GMH, NB. The rest.

ETA: Drove up to Hillside manor sometime after two a.m. and talked a little while about the year. I should be asleep, a joint and a tab of Melatonin later, but I ain't. So I've paraphrased the lost answers to that meme, for the time capsule, doncha know.

It was the year of the tinhats. The year of the Ficathon. The year the Religious Right nailed a second victory in American and global politics. The year of rebirth; the year of theatrical_muse; the year G'Kar fell his Narn self in love with londo_mollari. It was the year of flacking for the Democratic National Committee, for partying with rockstars, for sharing a bed with the French. It was a new age, for graphic novels and Strangers in Paradise and JMS's Amazing Spiderman. It was the end of sharing a tent with ptpatricia and the beginning of Sab's Home for Wayward Uruk-hai. It was the year of pumpkin pie. It was the year SNK came to town, the year of kickin' it country-style and also the year of Maroon 5.

It was the year before Brad Fitz sold LJ; the year before President Bush's second term. It was the year I bought every show on DVD, and the year I sold 'em all back to Amoeba when I went broke. It was the year they took my car away; the year I went to court. It was the year the Secret Service snuck around anniesj. It was the year of the eraser in Photoshop 7; the year of the grande shaken 3-pump iced coffee; the year of Shox.

I didn't write a lot (read: I didn't write enough), but what I wrote I really nailed, and I'm proud of it. 2004 was the Year of the Ficathon, and I didn't meet a one I didn't like. Here's what I did this year, and I swear I love 'em all. If you haven't read 'em, you should. I got smart in '04, and streamlined and wicked. Some highlights:

Pissing in No-Man's Land: kicked off the year with the yuletide bunch, written for little Caroluna who asked for H:LotS Bayliss/Kellerman and got some vaguely uncomfortable prison!fic instead. I did about six months of research for this fic, and I fuckin' love how prison-y it is, with jumpsuits and footlockers and plastic mugs and commissary credits and belts and bars of soap.

Al Bester is Alive and Well and Living in Syria Planum: for the Babylon 5 ficathon, being a marvelously bitter neo-futuristic love story without any aliens in it at all.

General, dein Tank ist ein Starker Wagen: a panicky blowjob for "Blow it with Feeling." Here we've got Band of Brothers, Nixon and Winters getting all hot and bothered in the cold snowy front of the Ardennes.

In bed, I am an Astronaut: for kernezelda, who asked for John/Chiana for the Farscape ficathon. Written in almost epistolary first-person, with Harvey and alien porn and black-nippled loomas and Hubero.

Time Flies You Can't (the Da Sou Qiang remix): for the Remix/Redux II challenge brought to us by a grant from musesfool. Here I took mollita's tasty little River snippet and made it into a Full Fledged Incestuous Adventure, including sex in three (3!) Firefly pairings all of which are het.

April in Paris (the Hemingway remix): wins for Most Underappreciated, but who the fuck cares, because shaye liked it. *g* This one's Sports Night, Hemingway style. No, really.

Dislocation, Condemnation, Revelation, In Temptation: for the DS9 ficathon held over ds9agogo way. This is Kira/Dukat, though hardly a fraction of what we really need to say about this pairing. Still, it's got sex and nipples and nightgowns and guns.

My Big Breakup: arguably my most laudable accomplishment of a year. This is the Scrubs fic that launched a thousand shippers, and I am so very proud of it in its easy breezy humorous satisfying sexiness, despite the fact that it was written under heavy medication in four hours that no human should be awake.



*


I think the Firefly remix is my favorite, with the H:LotS prison fic and the BoB tank fic sliding in close behind. If I can do at least that well, if I can write at least that much, if I can write at least that well, 2005 will be just fine. And if I get better, if I learn something (understanding it'd be nearly impossible not to), well, it looks like I've got the pieces in place to be a fine damned writer after all.

For posterity:
This was me in '03, baby.

Comments

[mcfeste.livejournal.com]

I shall peek out of lurkdom to say love the icon and that "My Big Breakup" is why I friended you, like, months ago. Bloody brilliant.

[selenak.livejournal.com]

*hugs* 2004 is the year of Sab in my mind, too. Though I'm terribly torn in regards of your stories, as I loved both the Bester/Carolyn one (and not just because it was written for me) and the John/Chiana one so very much.

(I did like the Scrubs one, but as German tv cancelled after the grand total of five episodes, I did not have the chance to really fall in love with the show, which reduces the effect...)

[illmantrim.livejournal.com]

All you have written was grand and goldeny sweet and you have had, we all have had a long year. May this one be a damn sight better than the last one!

[sorlklewis.livejournal.com]

{{{you}}}, 'cause you're sleeping.

Your behavior merited celebration, for taking me in, for fighting for democracy and getting me to fight too, for the job, for many, many things.

[wearemany.livejournal.com]

hey, this was the year where we picked the alternate ending, the one where we both end up in LA.

call me when you wake up so we can talk about laxcourt?

[thassalia.livejournal.com]

Hugs you, and am so proud of and awed by you. The way you keep going, and keep growing, for the way you write and the way you think and for your House of Wayward Uruk-Hai. Stay safe and warm and dry (although I've heard tell that last is less and less likely by the moment).

[fourteenlines.livejournal.com]

Heh. I always get a little smile when I see a link to a story I truly loved.

And I think I might love you forever just because of the random Counting Crows lyrics, 'cause I always know where you're coming from with the music, baby.

Except for Maroon 5. Sorry. *g*