It smells like autumn today

[sholio]

So I went a little wild adding new autumn icons from roxicons. I love autumn (even though it leads to winter), and I've been feeling the need for some new icons recently.

Please tell me I'm not the only person who goes to answer comments and bans/unfriends people by accidentally clicking on the pop-up. Hopefully not too many people have notifications turned on for that sort of thing, but, uh, if you ever get a notice that I've banned and then immediately unbanned you, or unfriended you and then friended you again, that's why.

*facepalm*

Anyway, spook_me is happening again! HOW IS IT THAT TIME ALREADY. This is a fun, super-low-pressure Halloween ficathon. I've only ever managed to finish my story one time (and the story I wrote was Ghost in the Machine, which is NOT short, so it took me a year to actually finish it). I've been wanting to write a White Collar ghost story, but in 2011 I was trying to finish the horse farm story in October, and last year I was having a set of emotional issues which included kinda dropping out of fandom somewhat. But this year, THIS year I will not only sign up, but I will write that ghost story! You can sign up for original fiction as well as fanfic -- you pick a creature from the list, and then receive prompts, which this year are based on Tarot cards -- and the deadline (Oct. 26) is a loose guideline only. Signups are here.

arduinna suggested an Idyll Challenge, described as "a story in which the characters are stuck in a peaceful, comfortable, well-stocked place, usually with some kind of swimming available". And then went and created an Idyll Challenge Collection on AO3. There are no signups or anything; just write a story in any fandom that fits the above description and upload it. The deadline is Sept. 22, but it's flexible. (Still trying to figure out how I can get the White Collar characters into a situation like that without the FBI being 5 minutes behind them ...)

Comments

[veleda_k]

I'm eyeing spook_me and thinking it would be a good excuse to dust off that ghost!Kate fic I abandoned, except a) NO MORE FIC CHALLENGES EVER OH MY GOD ("ever" being "until Yuletide or possibly that Diana fest we talked about"), and b) I abandoned it because I had no idea what to do with it. Of course, now the gears are turning.

Or it might be a chance to write something not White Collar. Yami no Matsuei and Count Cain are both great for spooky stories. (But NO MORE FIC CHALLENGES EVER. *sob*)

RE the Idyll Challenge, you could set it pre-series with just the criminal characters, if you wanted.

[sholio]

... and now I added some Halloween icons. BECAUSE I CAN. :D (Except now I'm out of icon slots. Woe!) The nice thing about this ficathon is that they don't really care if you make the deadline or not, so there's neither penalty nor guilt for not making it, or posting late. (Say, a whole year late, in my case.) But I can see why adding yet ANOTHER deadline to the bunch wouldn't be a good thing.

For the idyll challenge, the time between seasons three and four would also work. But I wanted the whole group, darn it. Maybe something post-anklet would be fun ...

(Season four did a lot to sell me on the idea that Peter and Neal, much as they care about each other, are objectively terrible for each other, and I suspect they would be much better off if they don't end up in a situation where they have a lot of contact with each other, like, say, working together. But I like the idea of everyone staying in touch, if only in a casual way.)

[veleda_k]

Now you're giving me ideas for the idyll challenge. Post-anklet, Neal and Sara in the English country side, Neal having to convince Sara to stop checking her email every ten minutes... (Though I guess that's not really stuck. But I can have the idea without writing it for the challenge.)

So many ideas! But, the good new is I can write as many or as few as I want, in whatever time frame I want.

[astridv]

Oh, I loved Ghost in the Machine! /random observation

Do people get notifications for when someone bans them? I know you can get them for un/friendings but don't know about bans.

That pop-up is designed very awkwardly. One time I accidentally friended someone when all I wanted was add a lj-note. And I only noticed when they friended me back for some reason, so I couldn't even fix it because that would've topped the awkwardness. Now I triple-check when I click anything on that menu.

[sholio]

Thank you! :)

I suppose that sending notices for bannings would be kind of socially awkward, wouldn't it? (When someone bans you, do you ban them back as a general matter of etiquette?) But, yeah, the pop-up has a tendency to pop up at the worst possible times. I worry that I've accidentally caused people to think I hate them by unfriending them by accident (it's happened at least a couple of times -- but I friend them back again immediately!).

[astridv]

Nah, when you fix it immediately it's pretty clear that you hit it by accident, so I wouldn't worry about that.

Before I discovered how filters worked, I used to just un-friend and re-friend people depending on our changing fandom interests. I had no idea it was a source of Angst, back then. Ah well. ;)

[sholio]

It's interesting to look back to when LJ was new to us and we were still trying to figure out the etiquette of it ... sort of like I'm still trying to figure out the etiquette of Twitter and Tumblr (and probably sucking at both). I think I've finally got LJ culture pretty well nailed, though, at least in the broad strokes. :D

[meridian_rose]

"Please tell me I'm not the only person who goes to answer comments and bans/unfriends people by accidentally clicking on the pop-up." I've never actually done it here or on LJ but it's been close on many an occasion!

[sholio]

I'm glad I'm not the only one who does that. :D In fairness to myself, I've only actually clicked on it a few times (I banned someone once, and friended/unfriended people on a couple of occasions) ...