UC Ficathon woes

Hmm. So, I'm trying to write Giles/Ethan set in the 70s (you should see how many sentences I have bolded to remind myself to check and make sure this TV show or that shop isn't an anachronism - how do people write historical fiction? I'm writing about a country I know, less than a decade before I was born, and it's hard!) And then I remember Band Candy and that Giles was already Ripper/ticking-timebomb-destroy-the-world guy at 16... oops. Because my 18-year-old Giles is pre-Ripper. Frankly, that was the only way I could have him at Oxford, unless he did his O- and A-Levels astonishing young and had already dropped out of university by 16. (Or while conducting dark magic rituals and/or generally doing the mega teenage rebellion thing he still not only turned up for but managed to pass his exams.) Sod it, I'll pretend Band Candy's Ripper was 18 or 19.

Some would say I overthink things.

(And I have to go and get this bloody essay done before I finish the fic. Will be up tonight, though. Last night I had two Word windows open, one with my essay on "Why John Bell Was an Important Physicist" and the other with my Connor/Angel incest fic. And a post-it stuck to the monitor saying 'for God's sake, don't mix these up'.)

(no subject)

My Physics essay kills me. Clearly it's not going to get finished tonight - will finish it tomorrow, meaning my astrophysics homework will be done in an all-nighter on Sunday night, or in my 4 hours between classes on Monday (that's doable, especially if I can corner a study group).

The topic's pretty interesting, except that nearly every single book and essay about Bell I'm looking at has references to "Whitaker, blah blah book titles". Whitaker's the big expert on this guy. He also happens to be the lecturer who set the assignment and who's going to be marking it, so I'm just slightly intimidated. I mean, I'm turning in an essay about an area of quantum mechanics in which my understanding is shaky at best, to the person who literally wrote the book on the subject. Sigh.

Let's see, other stuff I've done today - bought hideous Daniel O'Donnell CD for my mum for Mother's Day, on the understanding that she's not to play it when I'm in the house (if I'm not allowed to play any song that has the word 'fuck', she's not allowed to play dire Irish twee aimed at middle-aged women). Got a fiver for babysitting my neighbour's kids, and felt guilty about taking it, considering I just spent the afternoon playing the Playstation with them. They're really well behaved and astonishingly smart for their age. The oldest, Josh, is seven, and is probably the smartest child I've ever met. Two years ago we watched the Star Wars movies while I was babysitting him, and we ended up in a long discussion about whether Anakin was always destined to go evil or if he was a victim of circumstance - I was sitting there thinking "I cannot believe I'm having this conversation with a five-year-old child."

(And I am such a big child: today I stayed at their house for half an hour after their mum came home because we hadn't finished the game yet.)

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I'm bored. I keep obsessively checking my email for replies to comments, and nada. Entertain meeeee. Tell me about your favourite weird 'ship, or the sekrit pairing you wish there was decent fic for. Ask me that burning irrelevant question you've always wanted to know the answer to. Pimp something. Anything to save me from the pain of no new messages...