the deep moans round with many voices

Long time no write!

All my energy has been draining away to other sites lately, probably because most of what I have to say is either images (I've continued to work on cross-stitch projects) or responses to Tumblr posts that would be weird to post over here without context.

Anyway, work continues onward. I have been having some issues at Not the IRS because corporate has been pushing our manager to cut hours while simultaneously pushing for us to complete more returns, which, um, there is a certain logical disconnect there. Tonight I plan to go into the office and check on some in-progress returns without actually punching in because I am trying to communicate with clients and don't want to leave them hanging until my next scheduled shift on Sunday afternoon. This is, frankly, ridiculous, but I'm not sure what else I can do -- I can't exactly access our secure messaging system from home!

Meanwhile at the rental company, we have finally gotten shot of a disaster tenant who was creating intense and poisonous interpersonal tension among the tenants of the first floor of our boarding house style property. It wasn't entirely her fault -- the other tenants certainly contributed! -- but she was clearly the inciting factor and could not follow our repeated requests to please stop interacting with the other tenants, don't try to do them favors, you know it always goes bad, for your own sake just BACK THE FUCK OFF. *headdesk* She had a family crisis, moved out abruptly after a VERY dramatic weekend, and sent a moderately incoherent email in which she stated she did not intend to return. So we took her at her word and changed the locks.

Hopefully we will now be able to actually rent rooms on that floor again.

Hmm.

Oh! And in fandom new, the Narnia Spring Bacchanal Prompfest (aka Narnia After Dark) is now open for prompts. You can read more details here on the NFE journal: https://narniaexchange.dreamwidth.org/150860.html. Or if you just want to jump directly to AO3, here's the link to the collection: https://archiveofourown.org/collections/Narnia_After_Dark_2023/profile

Three-Sentence Ficathon 2022, courtesy of the amazing rthstewart!

I am at work and trying to actually Do Tasks, so I will not be participating just yet... but the moment I get home, I intend to dive in. :DDDDDDDD

Things done recently-ish:

1. I gave blood on Tuesday. This was my first time donating from my right elbow vein instead of my left, but I have been advised that since I have two good veins, I should alternate to keep the left one from getting too scarred up.

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2. At work, I rented a bunch of apartments. \o/

I have also been putting together some stuff relating to pre-inspections, which is basically... okay, so we inspect apartments after tenants move out, right? This is so we can find any damages, which we then compare against the move-in inspections the tenants did at the start of their leases, and anything that wasn't reported at the start can be assessed for damage charges. (Not normal wear and tear, but like, burns on the carpet or hideous mildew in the bathroom or leaving a whole bunch of junk in the room.)

A pre-inspection is performed only if a tenant specifically asks, and happens at least one but no more than two weeks before the end of the lease. One of us inspects the apartment at a time when the tenant is there, and then says, "Here's some stuff I noticed that you might get charged for. If you'd like NOT to get charged, you have a week and change to fix those issues." It's not a guarantee that you'll get out of charges -- for one thing, it is damn hard to get burns out of a carpet, you know? -- and it's also not a guarantee that the final inspection won't turn up more problems (because I'm not going to move your furniture or peel your posters off the walls for a pre-inspection), but it's a nice little heads-up.

Anyway, we didn't have good information and procedures related to those, since hardly anyone asked for a pre-inspection prior to some new laws passed a year or two ago, so I've been trying to fix that.

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3. Listened to a very nice oboe and harpsichord concert on Sunday afternoon, courtesy of NYS Baroque. They're running a virtual concert series this spring, and so far the programs have been lovely. I am trying to chuck some money their way via "buying" imaginary tickets to each concert I "attend." And you know, given that the concerts are entirely virtual, you too can attend them, regardless of where you live!

Their next concert will be on April 29 (7:30pm Eastern US Time) and May 2 (4:00pm Eastern US Time).

Here's the description:

Stories of Jewish Musicians and their Contemporaries in Early Modern Europe
Musicians and musicologists Liza Malamut and Rebecca Cypess, and Incantare: violins, sackbut & organ

Following the expulsion of the Jewish population from the Iberian peninsula in the fifteenth century, Jewish musicians resettled in various regions throughout Europe, Africa, and Asia. Our story takes as its starting point the rich musical cultures fostered by Jews in early modern Italy and their points of contact with non-Jewish traditions. From there, we touch on the influences of Italian, German, and English music and Jewish culture, highlighting Jewish musicians, the non-Jewish composers they influenced, and composers who inspired innovations in Jewish composition.

You can also watch/listen to their previous concerts via the link above. :)

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And three things is enough for a post, so now I shall head off to bed and hopefully not suffer any cramp-related insomnia -- this bloody fucking menstrual nonsense can eat my entire ass. Gnrgh.

snowflake_challenge Day 3: Pimp your favorite communities, fests or challenges!

I feel like everybody knows about Yuletide and the concept of remix challenges, yeah? So I will talk about some smaller ones!

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First, there is the Narnia Fic Exchange, aka narniaexchange, run by the inimitable snacky and aurilly. This is a small single-fandom exchange run annually in the late summer/early fall, which does exactly what it says on the tin. The quality of fanworks is quite high and people are generous with feedback. I have been participating since 2011 and it is one of the highlights of my fannish year. :D

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I also enjoy wipbigbang, though I don't participate every year. I feel like their profile blurb explains their purpose better than I could, so I will just quote it here:

Got a rough draft of that fanfic you started writing but then real life made you abandon it? Is it just sitting around in a folder, gathering dust and making you feel guilty every time you glance at the file or think about that pairing? Do you want an opportunity to sit down and finish it like your greatest enemy in Mortal Kombat?

You've come to the right place!

Greetings. We are the WIP Big Bang and our goal is to take the stories we've already started and to finish them by [date subject to change]. We are an all-fandoms-welcome exchange and will have artist claims and everything. It's like a real Big Bang, with a twist. You only need at least 500 words of a story you've already written prior to signing up and the goal isn't a word count* but to finish the thing.

So, are you ready to defeat that WIP?

(*to make it worthwhile for our artists, we do request that stories do end up being over 7500 words!)

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And third is the Three Sentence Ficathon! This is a concept more than a fixed challenge; I have participated in iterations hosted by caramelsilver over on LJ, and by rthstewart here on Dreamwidth, at varying times of the year. The basic idea is like any prompt meme -- people leave prompts (signed or anonymous) and other people fill them -- but the fills can only be three sentences long. It's extremely multi-fandom and open to original fic as well. And if you run over the three-sentence limit? Oh well, stories do that sometimes. ;)

This is a very friendly and low-pressure event. It's also a great way to dabble in fandoms you enjoy but aren't necessarily comfortable enough with to write a full-length story.

I believe rthstewart plans to host another Three Sentence Ficathon iteration starting February 1st, so keep an eye out and come have fun!

Both the Remix Revival 2019 archive and the Remix Madness 2019 archive have gone live, and I want to tell you about my two wonderful gifts!

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As The Morning And The Night (The Rockabye Remix) (2055 words) by Anonymous
Fandom: Chronicles of Narnia - C. S. Lewis
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Relationships: Edmund Pevensie & Lucy Pevensie & Peter Pevensie & Susan Pevensie, Edmund Pevensie & Peter Pevensie, Aslan & Peter Pevensie
Characters: Peter Pevensie, Susan Pevensie, Lucy Pevensie, Edmund Pevensie
Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Gender Changes, Siblings, Family Dynamics

Summary: Mary Pevensie, in word and deed. (For a female Peter Pevensie, Narnia is when everything falls into place.)

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This is a remix of The Spell Begins To Break, which is part of my As the Morning and the Night gender change AU, in which I flipped all four Pevensies' sex and gender to see what effects that would have on their basic characterizations and the plot of LWW, since C. S. Lewis relies so heavily on gender assumptions as a shorthand in that book. My remixer has also included elements from some of the other fics in the AU, which focus more on the interpersonal family dynamics between the Pevensies, but the plot is firmly anchored in "The Spell Begins To Break," which is where Mary receives her sword and shield from Father Christmas.

As I said in my comment, if I ever write further in this AU, I'm going to have a lot to live up to, in the very best of ways! ♥

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A Perfectly Good Monarch (252 words) by Anonymous
Fandom: Enchanted Forest Chronicles - Patricia Wrede
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Cimorene/Mendanbar
Characters: Cimorene (Enchanted Forest)
Additional Tags: Magic, Kings & Queens

Summary: Mendanbar also had excellent taste in choosing his Queen.

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This is a lovely remix of my tiny three-sentence ficlet a real magic, in which Cimorene has a somewhat overwhelming first day as Queen of the Enchanted Forest. My remixer wrote from the Forest's own perspective, and captures Wrede's tone delightfully! :D

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And now I'm going to attempt answering comments on my NFE fic. Here's hoping I won't run out of either spoons or coherent words. *crosses fingers*