[mishmash] 004

[krickets]

→ So today there was an awesome ladies podfic anthology posted at halfamoon. rhea314 read my teeny tiny [out-of-nowhere] fic, to the other side, about luisa from y tu mama tambien. I'm very honored to be a part of it and it's really neat to hear someone reading your work. So you guy should go check it out if you want.

→ I got this awesome "mallow kebab" for my parents for valentine's day at World Market today. The thing is at least two feet long. (Maybe longer? I don't know. I'm a bad judge of size, haha.) Just look!:


None of that candy is mine by the way. That's all from me and to other people. I am skipping the whole candy thing this year. Instead I got a marble heart:

It's heavy and cool like a marble, only a bit larger and just the right size to hold in the palm of your hand. [I'll pause for the collective awwwwwww!]

→ Speaking of valentine's day treats, thank you to angela_weber for the awesome valentine's day fic she wrote me! Yay!

→ I don't know if I mentioned to anyone but I deleted my tumblr about a week ago. There are a myriad of reasons but the major one was that it just wasn't for me. I'll probably refrain from discussing it at any length, but there is a certain sociological element to it that I just couldn't seem to get on board with. And I really had no interest in trying. I pretty much posted every graphic both here and at livejournal, so it's not like you won't be able to find me or the random stuff I may make from time-to-time.

→ There is only one graphic (and not just colored pictures) that I made and posted there that I hadn't had a chance to post here yet:

Tyler from The Vampire Diaries.

Comments

[blighted-star.livejournal.com]

I'm actually really relieved to hear another person doesn't care for tumblr just like me.

Love the Tyler art.

and yum, Valentine's Day candy.

[crickets.livejournal.com]

Have we talking about this before? I don't remember. It's, uhm, yeah. I don't even know what to say about it. [Except that I am also relieved, and I am totally open for discussion, I was just trying to sum it up in one single word which is hard, haha.]

Oh, Tyler, at least some of us haven't given up on him. Haha.

I want to eat it so bad. I had like five M&Ms today and that was it. I'm not currently consuming sugar, lol. At least in theory. Today was hard.

[blighted-star.livejournal.com]

Yea, I'm pretty sure we've talked about the fact that tumblr is impersonal and confusing.

I think Tyler will eventually come back and he a confident (hopefully non-evil) wolf. He's got a good heart for the most part.

I say give into the sugar, You only live once.

[crickets.livejournal.com]

Ah okay. I think for me though, "impersonal" and "confusing" are really just the tip of a very large, very cold iceberg.


I hope so! I hope he comes back and saves the day! (I mean, in case the day should need saving.)

Some might turn that around and say, "Don't give into the sugar, you only live once."

I'm reminded of bill murray in Groundhog Day eating a breakfast that filled the whole table because he knew there would be no consequences.

[blighted-star.livejournal.com]

If the sacrifice does happen I hope Jules is sacrificed instead of him. I hate her more than I like her.

Never saw Groundhog Day, but if I had one day to live i'd eat all kinds of chocolate and ice cream.

[crickets.livejournal.com]

Yeah I haven't yet found any redeeming qualities in Jules.

He just kept living the same day over and over with no consequences. Everything always re-set first thing in the morning.

[blighted-star.livejournal.com]

Yea, the only way she can redeem herself for hurting my bb's Damon & Caroline is by not making Tyler into an asshole.

That would be depressing to never move forward and always live the same day over.

[crickets.livejournal.com]

It's actually a comedy but it's probably one of my favorite movies.

[ozmissage.livejournal.com]

That's an impressive amount of marshmallows, but my coconut loving self can't help but be drawn to the coconut ice in the background. What is that and is it as delicious as it sounds?

I hear you on tumblr. I pop in once a week reblog thirty things in a row and then promptly disappear again. I just don't understand it and it feels like everyone else has mastered the art of communicating over there, but for me it's a bit like visiting a fannish museum. I look at the pretty things and then I leave. *shrugs*

[crickets.livejournal.com]

It's called coconut ice and mom says it's some kind of sweet coconut treat with lots of shredded coconut all packed together? Maybe some other flavors. It sounds delish. I love coconut too.

Apparently the marshmallows are a bit fruity tasting!

I found tumblr really constricting in terms of communication. I don't think it's intended for real communication. People found a way around it by adding 10 steps to their methods, or by holding obnoxious public conversations on their dashes (even twitter doesn't force you to read other peoples @replies). If every comment (ask) someone left in my livejournal had to be answered in a public post, I would never have stuck around here. Sorry, that's not something I'm willing to settle for. But apparently other people are more lenient, lol.

It kind of makes a person reliant on this system that is incredibly flawed. Part of what "the cloud" or whatever you are calling it has given us is the ability to share things with many different people at one time. But the other thing, and I think this is more important, is that it's given us the ability to connect with someone one-on-one. Putting these complicated barriers between that connection was just inherently wrong, in my opinion.

There's no appreciation for archiving over there either. Everybody's got tags but there is no way to actually see a comprehensive list and no way to really go back through their journal and find things (in an organized way). You can go through chronologically if you feel like fumbling through their awkward and slow-to-load archive page, but there is nothing that's user friendly. Especially for those "high-volume" users.

Calling it a "museum" is an interesting way of putting it. I felt like I was just throwing something into this giant pile. Each new thing just gobbles up the next. Which might be okay, but there was no real human connection in it for me.

And don't even get me started on the sociology of it all. Why do we do what we do? We do it to CONNECT -- (to share, to learn, to contribute) if you were talking about something other than this week's top 10 or 20 -- you weren't making that connection.

I've said too much.

[ozmissage.livejournal.com]

The public nature of conversations makes me uncomfortable, I don't like the idea of everyone reading what I'm writing to one specific person or having my conversation reblogged and carried on by people I don't know. It's all very weird. So much so, that I just don't do it. I don't comment on posts and I rarely send people messages or participate in memes. In many ways, I wonder what's the point? But I enjoy looking at the graphics so I stay simply because the art doesn't seem to make it's way over here.

Everybody's got tags but there is no way to actually see a comprehensive list and no way to really go back through their journal and find things (in an organized way).

So much word. I can't even remember what tags I have, so I end creating new ones and it's just a mess. The site is designed to be as difficult to use as possible.

I definitely prefer LJ, I just wish more people agreed with us because half of my flist is over there and true fact: I miss talking to them. Looking at the pictures they reblog isn't the same as actually squeeing with them about that awesome thing that happened on whatever last night or even just chatting about their day. It's all so impersonal.

Blerg. Okay, I'll stop blathering now. ;)

[crickets.livejournal.com]

Well this comment thread right here? I'd call that a public conversation. And at the same time a one-on-one. People can see it and could respond if they want to. But it's here in this entry, I'm responding directly to your comment, you get an e-mail when there's a response and vice versa. Every time I make a public response, my entire flist doesn't have to see it. If somebody is interested in a particular conversation, they can easily come back here to see what else has been said. They could even track the post if they really want to see every time someone comments to this post -- like their own personal "dash" update. It makes sense that it's here and not scattered about in 7 different posts. It's just logical to me. I will never understand why somebody thought it was a great idea to make that sort of interaction impossible, or at least exceedingly difficult, over there. [Not entirely impossible of course, if you had a layout that had disqus, and you turned it on, and if you had a disqus account, and if your followers had disqus accounts, which NO ONE DID.]

Anyway, I totally agree with you. And I am still super bummed that the art has sort of disappeared from LJ. I do have some tumblrs on syndicate though, which you can set up if you have a paid LJ account. (Maybe even if you don't have a paid LJ?) So I do still see some tumblr posts on my LJ. There are really only a few that I still follow though. I can always add more if I feel the need.

ETA AGAIN: You can follow syndicates without having a paid LJ, but I think you have to have a paid account to create a new one -- is someone hasn't already created one from the RSS feed. And in that case all you'd have to do is subscribe to see the updates on your flist.

[ozmissage.livejournal.com]

I might have to look into that. It would make things easier to have the few blogs I like just show up here because I only make it over there about once a week anyway and that's like a year in Tumblr time. ;)

[liebmich.livejournal.com]

That mallow kebab.. thing looks like it could cause a sugar coma. Haha.

But, I agree with what you said about Tumblr. I used it for a while, but it lost its appeal - to me. Personally, while I enjoy looking at picspams there's more to life than pictures of pretty scenes. I'd rather talk with people about said scenes, instead of just squeeing over the pretty. If.. that made sense?

[crickets.livejournal.com]

It's a kebab! Made of mallows! Hahaha. And yes, it sure does!

Yes, there's more to fandom than that. I feel like it oversimplified this really complicated and wonderful thing. It stripped it down to the most basic element. "Pretty colors!" And yet it is so much more. Not that you can't say a lot in a graphic that you'd played with an manipulated, but for me there's still [a huge] something missing.

[liebmich.livejournal.com]

That's how I felt about Tumblr, while I was using it. I met some pretty amazing people while on there, but it's nothing compared to the people I've met on LiveJournal. It's nice to know people aren't just watching shows because they're pretty (though, I'm sure some people enjoy that it's pretty, also), but can actually talk about them - because they have feelings. Tumblr, to me, always felt like (in the words of Explosions In The Sky) a "cold, dead place."

[crickets.livejournal.com]

I think I felt the same way, just not in so many words.

[gottalovev.livejournal.com]

I hope you had a lovely day and that everyone loved the candy! ♥

and awww, Tyler. I hope he comes back soon. that's a fantastic graphic!

[crickets.livejournal.com]

Thank you! It was an ok day. Sans valentine and all. (30 years and counting -- that's depressing.)

Thank you! I hope he comes back soon too.

[siluria]

When I read mallow kebab I wasn't exactly sure what you meant... I'm glad you pictured it :) Love the TVD picture!!

[crickets.livejournal.com]

Haha yes, I could be confusing without the picture!

Thanks! :)