for the most sensitive among us the noise can be too much.

ATTENTION! FINAL REMINDER.

More thanks to give for extra special pimpmasters! Thank you ayesakara and suzvoy! You ladies are fantastic. Thank you to everyone else who passed this message along!

Messages will be sent to me. You can reach me here: amelia.lourdes@gmail.com

The submission deadline is: FEBRUARY 12, 2010, MIDNIGHT. This is midnight your time zone in whatever part of the world you live in. As long as I get them on the 12th. That is this Friday. That is the start of the Winter Olympics, this Friday.

Messages will be posted on February 14, 2010.

The messages make the posts. Let someone know (anonymously) that you admire them, secretly stalk them like them, miss their stories, love their art, etc. The possibilities are endless. It's a really nice thing to wake up to on the morning of the 14th. This is it. This is your final reminder. Send them in by Friday to see them posted on Sunday.

Just like last year? I don't have a limit. Send as many messages as you want to whomever you want. This is about spreading the love, you guys. I'll be posting this message every week and a little bit more when February hits. Questions, comments, suggestions, and contributions welcome! ♥

I should've posted this on Monday but I forgot. So, let's just pretend that this was posted earlier. Thank you to my pimps url_girl and severina2001 who pimped this out on your flists. I'm your ho for life, srsly.

It is now February 4, 2010. This means that you guys have 8 days to submit your Valentine's this year. Need the reminders again? Here they are:

Messages will be sent to me. You can reach me here: amelia.lourdes@gmail.com

The submission deadline is: FEBRUARY 12, 2010

This gives me two days to put it together and then entries will be posted on February 14, 2010.

The messages make the posts. Let someone know (anonymously) that you admire them, secretly stalk them like them, miss their stories, love their art, etc. The possibilities are endless. It's a really nice thing to wake up to on the morning of the 14th.

Just like last year? I don't have a limit. Send as many messages as you want to whomever you want. This is about spreading the love, you guys. I'll be posting this message every week and a little bit more when February hits. Questions, comments, suggestions, and contributions welcome! ♥

Thank you so much to the people that have already sent in their messages. I haven't received many but you guys are ahead of the game! I'll be replying to you soon to let you know that I've received them. Just 8 more days! Deadline will be FEBRUARY 12, 2010 so don't forget to send them in! I'll be posting reminders next week but that's it. February 12th is the deadline.

I've gotten permission again from the wonderful severina2001 to host this year's Valentine's Day Secret Admirer Extravaganza 2010! This time I'm giving myself about a month to put it together and give you guys a deadline to have the messages submitted.

In case you don't remember what this is, here are the two posts from last year: part one & part two.

So, this year, it's going to work the same way.

Messages will be sent to me. You can reach me here: amelia.lourdes@gmail.com

The submission deadline is: FEBRUARY 12, 2010

This gives me two days to put it together and then entries will be posted on February 14, 2010.

Please, please, please try to have messages in by February 12, 2010. This is plenty of time. You don't have to wait until the last minute. You can send them in to me tonight if you want. But, have them in by the deadline.

The messages make the posts. Let someone know (anonymously) that you admire them, secretly stalk them like them, miss their stories, love their art, etc. The possibilities are endless. It's a really nice thing to wake up to on the morning of the 14th.

Just like last year? I don't have a limit. Send as many messages as you want to whomever you want. This is about spreading the love, you guys. I'll be posting this message every week and a little bit more when February hits. Questions, comments, suggestions, and contributions welcome! ♥

Well, technically Buffy but since it's about Angel and Spike then I'll just say it. I'm doing a James Marsters interview and he said that Angel's all about lines and sophistication and Spike's more working class. Now how ... did that happen? Angel came from the Irish (haha) kind of small town background and Spike came from the upper class kind of crust. His inner circle (or the circle he attempted to include himself in) were all kind of posh and hoity-toity. Did anyone ever explain this? Ever? How did things reverse like that in the future where Spike was the one with the torn jeans and kind of biker personality and Angel was the clean cut one. I suppose it has to do with the good and evil aspect but still, you know.

I'm not a writer. I don't consider myself one. I'm not really good at it. I think once upon a time I had an imagination and creativity to write but I think that I've lost it. That said, I've always received pretty high grades when it came to English, grammar, phonics, reading comprehension, language, etc. I consistently wrote in college and graduated with a degree that is based on literary and visual analysis. I think that I have a pretty firm grasp on the English language. That said, when I see badly written fan fiction? I cringe.

Bad fic? It happens. For whatever reason, people make up what they make up without any regard or consideration of the personality of the characters that they're using. They write what they write without care or acknowledgment of their own terrible spelling and grammar. They don't bother with betas because a few fawning reviews means that they have fans and it doesn't matter what the writing looks like.

That bothers me. It bothers me. Every time someone spells something wrong and it's posted for all to see, it makes the angels cry (quote courtesy of Quinn from Glee). Someone on my flist has recently spoken a lot about the writing process and writing in fandoms and her perceptions are dead on. It's refreshing to find someone who's receptive to critique and commentary about her work. Of course, it wasn't always that way. It's never that way in the beginning. In the beginning, I imagine that people do think that they're good writers and for whatever reason (I blame fawning reviews with no critique) aren't receptive to criticism.

Fandom is supposed to be fun, yes? The stories are just stories. They're not up for Pulitzers or even national writing contests. I understand that. This is just a major, major, MAJOR pet peeve of mine that I want to address for myself and to share with anyone who may feel the same. Or! Feel differently. I'm open to both ideas. I'm not having fun if a large chunk of a story doesn't make sense. I sometimes try to look past the errors to just read the story itself but then it's bad characterization that gets to me.

So, if you're a writer or if you're an active reader, what in fandom fanfiction bothers you if you're bothered by anything at all? No specific fandom here. Any fandom at all. What will turn you off of a story? If you're a writer, why do you/would you not accept constructive criticism? Are you open to constructive criticism?

I just realized that it's September and that means that it's been some five four years since Queer as Folk ended? Five years, yo. That's a long time. Since I've never been able to let it go then it feels like just yesterday to me. So, because of my inactivity at work, I'm going to have to jump on to that nostalgia bandwagon. Join me for a little while, will you?

- B/J spoilers in the Yahoo Groups (because they had awesome spoilers)
- Andrea's (sandstorm's) site with just the episode clips on them that we got to see ahead of time. Oh man. I was the worst spoiler virgin ever. As soon as I knew those clips were up then I ran to that site and was like, "I'll just look at one ... okay, two. Maybe all of them." I sucked.
- Everyone being secretive about spoiler tapes and yet for some reason like half of us had them. We never told anyone else though. We just knew that we had them and were keeping that to ourselves.
- And with that said ... gotfolk :)
- brianakinney and justintheartist? I was strangely addicted. I hated original characters but Michael Rappaport will always be Brog to me and Ashton Kutcher is Brian's cousin. Forgot his name though. :|
- The fact that Randall never finished The Quiet Men will forever kill me. Well, that and the Season Six he was writing. I shall miss. :(
- Is It May Yet?
- Did anyone go to the summer Babylon events? I went to Ancient Babylon up in Vancouver since you had to be 21 to get into the ones in the States and only 19 to go to the ones in Canada. I got a Qaf shirt there. I was also 19 that year.
- Randy in Wicked and becoming ridiculously obsessed with the musical. My favorite Elphaba is Eden.

Anyone got more?

Almost the six year "anniversary" of when I went to see Peter Paige in La Jolla and Jonathan B. at the premiere of his movie. Oh man. I went through some trauma that weekend. My first time (and last for Jonathan) ever seeing them both and Peter's play was scheduled on the same day as Jonathan's premiere. Thankfully, the playhouse allows you to exchange tickets so I just went on Saturday instead of Sunday. Or one of those weekend days. Crisis averted.

Qaf recap 107 and 109 coming up this weekend!

May I also add to the above "... loves Justin!" It just wouldn't fit with my theme. :|

Again, there are a million things I totally love about Ree and if you don't love her for her creations, her graphics, her doodles, then there's more. Yes, there's more. Ree's never lost her love for fandom or fandom squee particularly concerning Queer as Folk, Gale Howard Harold, and Queer as Folk's Randy Harrison. She's an equal squee opportunist when it comes to the above. Let's take a little trip down memory lane, shall we?

( The Chronology of Ree. )

HAPPY BIRTHDAY REEFACE!
I ♥ YOU LOTS!
YOURS, AFACE

[ if there are any errors/broken links lemme know and I'll fix it ASAP! ]

Back to Part I
Back to Part II

So, I started this little project because I wanted to look back and find some icons that I remember wanting to save again in url_girl's journal. It started out innocently enough. Then, I just kept going through icons and posts after posts of really memorable moments that I wanted to post about for nostalgia purposes. Finally, I just decided to turn it into a Ree Raid Project.

Fandom is an interesting place. Ultimately, fandom can be a very happy place and I think that Ree's journal is that happy place. She's posted icons, written stories, pastede on hedz that make everyone laugh. She's not selfish with her offerings, always willing to share something that she finds with everyone so that many can see what they may not be able to see where they are (example: Qaf alum activities but particularly Gale and Randy). So, in honor of her birthday and her five year anniversary here on LJ, we have the Ode to Ree.

Ree's first icons date back to August 16, 2004. Now, I've always loved her icons. Why? You know you have a great icon maker when they immediately catch your eye (in a good way). Look at her sense of humor:

Hysterical.

( The Queer as Folk Fandom. Warning: VERY image heavy. )

So, I think that I'm all caught up on her icons for Queer as Folk anyway. You mean that there are more awesome icons that she does? You are correct my friends. When Ree ventured into the world of Luke and Noah on As the World Turns, I went all Scooby Doo on her. "Bzzzzuhhh?" Were my exact words if I remember correctly. But, what can I say, pretty, good looking men in a dramatic/sweet storyline on television? Count me in. Not only has she made wonderful icons for that fandom but also incredible recaps that are not only detailed but her observations are hee-larious. Coming up in Part II!

Part II
Part III

Who is the person in fandom who called the parking lot where Justin got hit "the parking lot of violent homophobia"? I laughed my ass off about five seconds ago just thinking about it. This was around 2004 and it may have been a TWoP recap but now I'm not too sure.

I thought about it because I'm reading my memories and it was a conversation that I had with my bestie. :)

Wow. I am completely blown away by how many people spread the love for their flist. This is a tradition that I do hope will continue on in the future and I was more than happy to do it this year for everyone. Since I opted to cancel the recommended 10 people on your flist the love definitely poured in for more than 350 PEOPLE this year. Wow. Incredible! So, thanks for letting me do this and have a wonderful Valentine's Day!

The Valentine's Day icon provided by the very talented kinnetik_vision. If you feel like using some Valentine's Day icons today hers can be found here. The graphic above was made by me! And since there are so many people I've split the post into two parts. The other one coming up!

Edit: Official count 402 people! Way to go!

( List, part one. )