Happy fandom things, links and so forth

[sholio]

genfreeformexchange is having signups now! AO3 collection here. I am 1000% on the fence about this one - it is SO MUCH my thing, but I'm definitely doing HurtComfortEx, and I'm running SSRC in March, and I still haven't started my Id Pro Quo assignment, so ... yeah. Also, thus far I would be completely unmatchable. But the tagset looks so good, and it's being run by the lovely snickfic, and I am Indecisive. Signups are open 'til March 5, so I still have lots of time to decide.

The HurtComfortEx tag set continues to entertain and delight. Current favorite off-the-wall tag: Sunburn from Perineum Sunning. (ETA: Oh my god, this actually happened to Josh Brolin. I'm sorry, it's probably terrible, but I can't stop laughing.)

ANYWAY, the tagset is still open for nominations until Friday, and signups open next week!

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I am very entertained by this Iron Fist edition of the "tag yourself" Tumblr game.

For the non-Tumblr people, these are graphics done in an intentionally rough "made at 2 a.m. in MS Paint" collage style with descriptions of the characters that are meant to read like they were written by someone with only a vague osmotic knowledge of the canon, except they manage to hit all the points that you would want someone to pick up on because of course they're written by someone who knows it inside and out. It's hard to describe; it's a very Tumblr thing.

Anyway, "looks like he would kill you but actually can't" (regarding Ward) is going to make me giggle for ages.

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Speaking as a feral watercolorist, this tutorial on painting simple leaves in watercolor looks super useful and I'm linking to it so I can find it again later.

I'm looking up links on the 1964 Alaska earthquake tonight because I was thinking about using a picture from it to illustrate one of the mailing list stories. This story about a little girl who had to watch two of her brothers swallowed by cracks in the ground while she tried to rescue them - holy shit. (And the poor mom! Do not read if child harm is a triggery issue for you.) There are also some good pictures of the post-quake rubble here, including a 1960s newsreel with video footage I haven't seen before.

During the earthquake, several oceanfront subdivisions in Anchorage collapsed and slid into the sea, and were later made into a wilderness area called Earthquake Park. When I was a young child, which was only about 15-20 years after the earthquake, there was still a lot of debris in the park, random holes in the ground and big chunks of concrete and that sort of thing. These days, 55 years after the earthquake, all of that is gone and it's just woods networked with bike paths and hiking trails. I remember climbing on big pieces of concrete and boulders there when I was a little girl, and my mom explaining that it was because of the earthquake. I had no idea, at the time, that there were unrecoverable bodies buried under the park, which was one of the reasons they made it into a park.

Comments

[flamebyrd]

Thank you for the link to the leaf tutorial! This seems like an excellent thing to try out next time I just want to do some watercolour doodling in my sketchbook.

I was fascinated by your accounts of the Alaska earthquake, although not quite brave enough to read the article. The photo gallery is incredible (in a sobering way) though.

In the interests of cultural exchange, and because I happen to have this open in a tab for unrelated reasons, here is a photo from my state's iconic 60s earthquake: https://aees.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/Rail-lines.jpg (0 deaths, flattened a small town).

[sholio]

Holy moly, those rail lines!! DDDD: Earthquakes are so insanely powerful. Where was that, if you don't mind me asking?

[flamebyrd]

Meckering, Western Australia, which is ~130km east of Perth! I love that photo because it illustrates what happened so vividly. I am told that this kind of lateral damage is distinctive to this kind of earthquake but I don't really understand it it.

There's a nice "50 years on" restrospective here: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-10-14/remembering-meckering-earthquake-50-years-on/10361796
And a lot of extremely detailed information in this PDF: http://www.dmp.wa.gov.au/gswa_enews/files/2-page-spread_Meckering_Earthquake.pdf

[sholio]

Ah, gotcha! *checks out links* Wow, YIKES. Those collapsed houses! D: Yeah, the earthquake here was much less deadly than it could have been for similar reasons - it was after business hours on a holiday weekend. If it had been during the middle of the day, a lot more people would have been in the buildings that collapsed, which included some large business structures and a school.

[sovay]

Anyway, "looks like he would kill you but actually can't" (regarding Ward) is going to make me giggle for ages.

. . . so true . . .

I also like Danny's "thinks wearing a tie makes it look like he has his life together."

[sartorias]

I remember the horror stories coming out of Alaska at the time, and the constant warnings that it could happen to us. In fact, that shaped certain nightmares for decades to come.

[sheron]

Signups are open 'til March 5, so I still have lots of time to decide.

Oh are we pretending you won't sign up until March 5th? O:)

[minim_calibre]

I used to hear about that quake all the time from Mom growing up. They were in or close to Port Alberni at the time, which was one of the tsunami-affected places. (Don't think they had any deaths there, but there was a lot of property damage.)

[kore]

I just saw this and remembered you posting about the earthquake!

https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/565952/this-is-chance-by-jon-mooallem/

[sholio]

Hahaha, yes, that is very Danny, too!

[sholio]

It must have been terrifying!

My mom lived in Anchorage with her parents at the time, but they were on a plane flying back when it happened. They had to turn around and go back because the airport wasn't capable of accepting flights.

[sholio]

*pokes you*

[sholio]

Oh wow, that must have been so frightening! It's really astonishing what a wide section of the coast was affected.

[sholio]

Oh wow, this looks really interesting - thank you for pointing me to it!