Just the start of it all

Title: The Appliance of Science
Author: ionlylurkhere
Pairing: Gwen/Tosh
Rating: NC-17 for sex and swearing
Word count: 2500
Spoilers: Vague allusions to Greeks Bearing Gifts but that's about it. Set somewhere around the end of S1/beginning of S2.
Notes: written for fajrdrako in the Fall Fandom Free for All. (ETA: Thanks to who_anon for acting as a sounding board.)

( But you're so good at technology, Toshiko my dear ... )

See, that's what happen when you get a competent writer. More work for Mr Lidster, please, Cardiff. (I have forgiven him Terror Firma, 'twas clearly an impossible brief.)

( It's radio! Let me narrate everything for you! I'm typing on my keyboard now to tell LJ to put in a spoiler cut! )

And finally: if you're the sort of heathen who doesn't check xkcd first thing every Monday, Wednesday and Friday and so haven't seen it already, today's LHC related strip is superb. I have spent all day doing the second panel at people.

( This is all getting needlessly messianic (TW Exit Wounds) )

( What's the point in being grown up if you can't be childish sometimes? (DW Partners in Crime + some later season spoilers I'm not sure of the veracity of) )

Oh, and sod Jack, I am still holding out for Bonnie in the background next week.

The spoilers I read after the BBC3 airing pretty much nailed the ep, which is actually slightly surprising, but I'm still going to wibble a bit at you.

( Torchwood 2x12, Fragments )

Speaking of next week, am I reading the schedules right that the first airing of ep 13 is 8pm on BBC2 next Friday? Pre-watershed is interesting. ( Trailer spoiler )

Also, is anyone watching Dirty Sexy Money? I really can't work out what to make of it. It feels like a Frasier-like farce, with misunderstanding piling up on misunderstanding until you have situations that make complete sense in terms of what's gone before but are also intrinsically hilarious, except that it keeps seeming to want to take itself quite seriously and I end up alternating between laughing uproariously and feeling all uncomfortable. It also reminds me a lot of the bestest book ever What A Carve Up by Jonathan Coe, with the exploration of a rich family that embodies all the various ills of society (present-day America in DSM's case, Thatcherite Britain in What A Carve Up) through an outsider figure who becomes embroiled in their affairs.

And is the definitive word on the FNP Tennant-meet-your-smutfic thing that they'd cobbled together their own parody? I can see why they would but it's a pity if so.

Still haven't seen Ashes to Ashes. Am downloading the iPlayer client now so I can download the whole thing and then watch it non-jerkily.

Title: Recruitment Policy
Author: ionlylurkhere
Characters: Tosh, Jack
Word count: 850
Rating: PG-13 for references to torture and one swearword
Spoilers: Torchwood 2x12, "Fragments"
Summary: Jack's persuasive talents sometimes need a little help.

( Toshiko has lost all sense of time. )

So I have no willpower and read the:

( honking huge Torchwood finale spoiler, and also DW S4 finale spoilers, and my slightly intemperate reaction )

For a change, I am going to spam you on a Wednesday. 'Cos this week really finishes tomorrow, not Friday. Or because (my comics geeking having moved up another notch to checking the Internet to find out what's coming out) I have discovered that it seems the only thing worth buying tomorrow is Angel. Or because I've had the whole night to myself to listen to audios. Take your pick; they're all true.

1. Arthur C. Clarke.

Arthur C. Clarke is dead, just in case you've been hiding under a rock (this is the first time I found out about something like this from my flist, which felt a bit weird tbh). This makes me quite sad -- he was the first author I did my now traditional "read nothing but this person's books for several months until you run out" thing to, back when I was ... about eleven maybe? I forget now -- but I must confess it's a rather abstract sort of sadness: he "had a good innings", as they say, and (this feels horrendously selfish) it doesn't feel like we've been deprived of any great works he had yet to produce.

I think Rendezvous with Rama is my favourite, when all's said and done. Very good at sensawunda, was Clarke.

Let's all build a space elevator and name it after him.

2. Gallifrey (the audio series, not the planet)

So, after the Pandora plotline wrapped up for some reason I never got round to carrying on with the rest of the third series ... until now.

( Spoilers for <i>Gallifrey</i> chapters twelve to fourteen )

3. Crotchwoot

( 2x10 )

( 2x11 )

( Random eps 12 and 13 speculation but no non-trailer spoilers )

... so, wait, when they said the next BBC3 ep was Friday, they meant this Friday? So we're going to end up way ahead of BBC2, surely.

4. Friday

Signups for the EDA ficathon close on Friday night, everyone. (Officially speaking; I won't actually be online 'til some time on Saturday.)

Incidentally, I am deeply ambivalent about this strike thing. LJ has always been dumb, I don't like the removal of Basic on principle, I don't think the strike will be effective as anything other than a way for people to feel better about their powerlessness. I probably won't be posting on Friday itself, just out of not being online much more than anything.

EmuchlaterTA: OK, so this puts me pretty firmly in the anti-boycott camp (seen via a comment on neadods). Though I don't subscribe to the OMG!Good-Friday-on-purpose tinhattery -- if it is the choice of Russian anti-semites, then it seems more likely they'd be going with Orthodox Easter which is apparently not until next month.

New Comics Day spam

( Angel: After the Fall #4 )

( House of M: Avengers #5 )

Buying HoMA got me a crappy free Marvel plug themselves thingy called "Marvel's Best Selling Authors". It led off on their Stephen King adaptation but very quickly we were at Laurrell K Hamilton and "OMG we got Orson Scott Card to write Iron Man". Fail.

I badly want Cable and Deadpool #50 but last week it had sold out by the time I got to my LCS (and my not-quite-so-L CS had closed down completely in the month since I last went there, which scared me a bit) and they hadn't got any new ones in with this week's comics, which is a bit disappointing. Anyone know where I might find scans?

Random (i.e. largely DW) spam

Oh, my flist is so much more manageable now I'm not watching doctorwho and the big fic comms. Yay! *hugs you all*

Things that are lolarious: Watching crappy music TV and seeing Eric Roberts turn up in an Akon/Eminem video. Oh, TVM Master, you are quite lame really ...

Have just started reading Trading Futures because it's supposed to be good fun it's apparently got good Anji and I need to nail her characterisation so I can have a fourth stalled Martha-slash fic on my hard drive I want to, because I want to (thanks Billie). I get that it's meant to be "what if the Doctor was James Bond?" but so far the whole non-violent action man who uses brains and improvisation to sort things out is giving me more of a MacGyver vibe ...

( Minor Torchwood-eps-with-Martha-in-them spoilers )

Meme spam

I don't normally do "tell me about my fic" memes for various reasons, but this one does look like it might have entertaining results if anyone does want to have a go (been all over the place, but last seen with astrogirl2):

The thing is, when people look for stories, they always make it sound like badfic. Now, often that's because it really is badfic, but sometimes it's good and they just suck at describing the story.

So, your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to summarize badly any one (or more!) of my stories and I'll try to guess which it is. You could even pretend you don't remember the pairing or fandom to make it harder to guess.

(Almost all my Who fics are at the Teaspoon -- I'm about to belatedly add my not-so-awesome LoM drabbles-of-awesome -- if you wanna refresh your memory, but I think that kind of defeats the point.)

ETA: point-and-laugh link spam

Oh, this is special. (It's the overelaborate rules for a forum for people who like those Twilight books [the chaste Mormon vampire ones] a whole lot, but don't really like the Internet at all. Seen via The Smooter Report.)

ETA2: Ashes to Ashes spam

( Fairly minor spoilers for 2x4 )

( Probably incomprehensible stuff I typed as I watched )

I don't think I'm going to stick around for Freema-fronts-the-freak-show.

Oh. Dear. Everyone seems to like this one but I seem to have nothing but objections.

( Spoilers and Whining for Dead Man Walking )

I appear to have started writing Torchwood-ish fics.

Femslash from a week or so ago:
Passion and Paranoia (PG-13 Martha/Tosh on martha_and_tosh, logically enough)

And freshly minted 1918 fic, OMG:
Secret Desires (NC-17 Harriet/Gerald PWP on torchwood_fic)

Who stuff

( Torchwood 2x3: a disordered list )

I'm halfway through The Silurians on DVD at the moment. First time I've seen it since the '90s repeat run. Season 7 really is good, isn't it? I do love Liz, and Pertwee's great when he can be bothered.

Before we leave Who: Tat Wood in About Time 6 is wrong about several important things. But not Ghost Light. And he is normally quite funny even when he's wrong. (Yes, I have had a nice package from Mad Norwegian recently.)

This week's comics

( House of M Avengers #4 )

( New Avengers Annual #2 )

( Green Lantern #27 )

( Suburban Glamour #3 )

Silly Big Event comics from a while ago

I had a look at, but didn't buy, ( the Civil War script book -- warning, rant )

Oh, and earlier in the week, I finally caught up with ( Infinite Crisis, which I'm not sure why I'm spoiler-cutting for, but here we go. )

Proper reaction later (along with Suburban Glamour #3 squee if, as I sincerely hope it will have done, it's managed to reach my local Forbidden Planet), but in the meantime ( minor spoilers here )