nineveh_uk | Signs of the season

You're viewing

nineveh_uk's journal
Create a Dreamwidth Account Learn More

Reload page in style: site light

Conkers, conkers everywhere, the surprise of how dark it has suddenly got, annoyance of booking a flu jab and having the time suddenly altered on one, and even new students. Fancy eating apple cake but not cooking it. Miss blackberry season. Again. Realise you ticked off family birthday (1), but now have three more within the next 11 days you need to sort out. Oops. Er, party conference season.

And of course the Yuletide tagset. Hurry to find out if someone more organised than you nominated what you want. Find new canons that look interesting. Find existing ones you'd not have thought for fic for, but would absolutely read. Wot no Nirvana in Fire? Outrage! Ah, way over the limit. Marvel at ever more professionally published Jane Austen fanfic. Consider that maybe you'll sign up this year, but probably not. Haunt the nominations spreadsheet anyway. Look forward to what there might be to read.

In short, autumn.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

azdak

I can’t get a flu jab because my doctor‘s office keeps saying they haven’t got them yet. Saying „But Dreamwidth is full of people from other countries who‘ve had theirs!“ seems unlikely to be effective. At least I’ve managed to have my Covid jab.
The early dark is as depressing as it is every year. I’m feeling a strong urge to hibernate - tummy full of pine needles and don’t wake up till spring.

From:

Hurrah for the Covid jab. Infuriatingly, I can't get one, "serious illness due to Covid" not being a qualifying condition... Flu jab next week, though, and if Covid rates keep rising like this, maybe the option will become available.

There is a lot to be said for hibernation. This evening I get to drive round the ring road in the dark, in the rain, to the dentist. What on earth was I thinking when I booked an evening appointment?

From:

antisoppist

But Midwinter when Moomintroll wakes up in the middle of hibernation is the best book!

From:

azdak

It is! But I imprinted very strongly on Comet in Moominland, which I think I must have read first, for some reason.

From:

I must actually read a Moomins book one day...

From:

antisoppist

THAT CAN BE ARRANGED

Although the latest lovely hardback versions no longer mention the original translators. GRRRR.

From:

It is not that I have never dropped hints!

From:

Same here. The sea, going back, and back, and back, and only the dry bed left...

From:

Next volume, Tsunami in Moominland?

From:

It is a plot point!

From:

wellinghall

Adeaze made an appointment at our local pharmacy for a flu jab. She went along yesterday, and not only did they not have a record of her appointment, they weren't doing flu jabs there - not just that day, but at all.

From:

Oh dear! That is even worse.

From:

azdak

Who on earth did she talk to on the phone? Some practical joker who happened to answer the wrong number? A disgruntled about-to-be-ex employee?

From: (Anonymous)

I have been given similarly duff information by a very junior employee before.

From:

wellinghall

I have had similarly duff information from a junior employee, but it does seem to be a very strange mistake for anyone to make. (Having said that, there is clearly a lot of incompetence there, both individually and corporately).

From:

That sounds very annoying.

From:

Booking a flu jab is very annoying. Twenty minutes on hold with the GP's surgery and then they only have appointments at really weird times which you try to negotiate with a stressed-out receptionist... I'm eligible for the covid jab too and that is so much easier to book, all online and you can see all the slots and choose what you like, it's a shame the flu jab isn't along the same lines.

So far my favourite 'I wonder what fic will come of that' Yuletide fandom is Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel, a staple of my toddler years.

From:

antisoppist

My flu jab was on those lines. I got a text and clicked it and then picked a slot on my phone. But although I'm eligible for a flu jab because getting flu is an asthma trigger, I'm not eligible for a covid jab because my asthma isn't bad enough. (Unless I get a bloody respiratory illness FFS).

Despite the appointment booking, the actual jab involved a queue standing all the way down the road from the surgery. But it moved fast and possibly they were making us queue outside because it was a bright, sunny Saturday morning at 9.15 and it was safer for everyone that way.

From:

It is a good thing it wasn't raining!

From:

My Covid and flu jabs were the "click a link in a text" version. It feels most unfair, because as far as I know the only reason I get either of them early/free is kidney disease 40 years ago with no recurrence, but I wasn't going to turn them down.

The child is also eligible for an early Covid booster, but I am not sure why. I booked it anyway.

From:

Hey, you might as well take the benefit! Possibly your child is eligible because you are 'vulnerable'?

From:

Further investigation suggests it may be because she is autistic.

From:

Ah, so each in your own right. Enjoy your Covid protection!

From:

I suppose the upside of not being eligible forma free flu jab is that I just did it via the Boots website. That said, I tried to see if I could change the time after they changed it for me, and there were no appointments at any local branch. Clearly lots of people are trying to get it quickly.

I should look up my childhood favourites and see if they are there! Wasn't there an annoying steam shovel book in Ramona? Your comment had prompted me to look up what one actually is

From:

My memory is a little hazy, but is that the one where Ramona got in trouble for wanting to know when Mike Mulligan went to the bathroom? Both were staples of my childhood, first Mike Mulligan, then later on Ramona.

From:

I also can't remember any details, though that seems a plausible Ramona question. Mike Mulligan himself was not in my childhood reading.

From:

Fancy eating apple cake but not cooking it.
I misconstrued this as "Just imagine, eating apple cake without cooking it first!" and was confused about raw apple cake for a moment until I figured it out in context...

Wot no Nirvana in Fire? Outrage! Ah, way over the limit.
I noticed the Langya Bang novel is in there, but I don't know if that's any good to you...

From:

The justification was that it was different enough from the show to merit being a separate fandom, but I think in practice it's going to be a distinction without a difference

From:

azdak

Unless all the offerings focus on how Prince Jing discovers Mei Changsu's true identity.

From:

Don't eat that biscuit!

I'm now reflecting on the fact that Lin Shu's hazelnut allergy was enough of a secret for Xia Jiang not to use it against him.

Edited Date: 2023-10-12 12:45 pm (UTC)

From:

azdak

And yet the number and position of his moles were known to a wide circle. It does seem odd.

From:

Possibly he took part in the Da Liang all-comers oil wrestling championships as a youth?

From:

azdak

And since they used peanut oil, the allergy wasn't obvious.

From:

Rapeseed oil - historical accuracy!

From:

All that effort to get hold of the incurable poison and he could just have gone for the staff biscuit tin.

Except he was clearly too cheap to pay for the *good* biscuits.

From:

The Xuanjing Bureau budget only runs to the ones made with hazelnut flavouring, not hazelnut extract.

From:

I suspect that you are right. Genuinely book-only fic would be interesting (someone write the epic Nihuang/Nie Duo romance! Princess Jingting!) But it probably won't be.

From:

The fandom always needs more Nihuang.

Not that I needed the plot bunny, but from a conversation I had with legionseagle in the depths of my email, I find:
LE: Throwaway line from the novel: Duchess Mingzhu has consumption, Duchess Mingchen has a crippled left leg, Duchess Mingrui left her home six months ago and shaved her head to become a nun, and Duchess Mingying is said to be mad."
I cannot help wanting to read the spin off adventures of Duchesses Mingrui and Mingyang in the jianghu….

Me: Duchesses Mingrui and Mingyang currently run one of the smaller and more mountainous states in the Jinagzuo Alliance, of which they were early members. History does not record what happened to the leader of the aspirant state that tried to impress the leader of the Jiangzuo Alliance by suggesting he should throw them out because clearly no state that was led by a couple of women was to be taken seriously, but it is noted that nobody ever made such a suggestion again.

From:

azdak

I wish the head of the Jiangzuo Alliance was the sort of man to think like that, but alas, all the evidence is that Prince Jing actually thinks more highly of Nihuang's martial prowess than Mei Changsu (and thanks to Part II we all know how far military women got under *his* emperorship).

I like the fact that Duchess Mingying is only "said to be" mad, that leaves lots of scope for her really being able to tell a hawk from a hacksaw.

From:

"saw it as a convenient way to get the hell out of ~~Dodge~~ Jinling."

From:

azdak

I have often considered the nun option as the lesser of two evils had I the misfortune to be born in Ancient China (having previously considered suicide but rejected it once I realised that female suicide was frequently employed as a tool of the patriarchy and not wanting to give the bastards the satisfaction).

From:

The options really are generally so terrible that being a nun looks quite good in comparison.

From:

Jingyan was too busy controlling his wobbly lower lip to pay attention to gender equality in the military.

From:

azdak

You may have a point. And writing out all those lists of The Dead every night can't leave much energy for addressing pressing issues that don't ipact him directly.

From:

That's just the excuse he gives to his wife and concubines. Sorry, darling, I've got two thousand members of the battalion to memorialise before dawn!

From:

azdak

Oh, that makes perfect sense! The Emperor is officially Too Sad For Sex.

From:

It's the other reason why he doesn't seem to have many sons in NIF2.

From:

Either they made excuses and scarpered, or the Xiao family had some Hapsburg issues.

From:

I am fond of this one https://www.deliaonline.com/recipes/seasons/what-should-you-be-cooking-in-september/chunky-apple-cake

I have read the NIF book, but what I'm looking forward to is the publicstion of the manga in English, which I am sure I read somewhere will be happening.

From:

I nominated three fairly obscure fandoms and was pleased to see that I wasn't the only nominator for two of them, though I was for the third. (I didn't do any politicking, so not surprising.)

By the way, the link attached to "Jane Austen fanfic" appears to be malformed.

From:

The true spirit of Yuletide!

Thanks - I had messed up the html.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Profile

nineveh_uk

June 2025

S	M	T	W	T	F	S
1	2	3	4	5	6	7
8	9	10	11	12	13	14
15	16	17	18	19	20	21
22	23	24	25	26	27	28
29	30

Most Popular Tags

Page Summary

Active Entries

Style Credit

Style: Blue for Skittlish Dreams by Kaigou
Resources: Circular Icons

Expand Cut Tags

No cut tags

	
		OSZAR »