Since Mother Eve in the Garden long ago

Just getting over a wicked cold. Every time I travel I get one! What is this! I even wore a mask on the plane (although I took it off to eat and did briefly lose it because I put it behind my back for safekeeping and then forgot). To the point where I still have a bit of a dry cough and have to blow my nose, but my sinuses and brain are fine now, so essentially all good!

Last night, I washed and ironed shirting. Came to the startling realization that the iron needs water in it to function properly even if the fabric itself is damp - mind-blowing.

The shirting is for the Countryside Blouse, which I want to make for everyday wear. The trouble is that I can't decide whether to make the long sleeves or elbow-length sleeves ... I might go with long on the basis that I could always cut them down later if I want.

Ought to be cutting right now, but I just went out and raked flowerbeds and such! So taking a breather first.

Should have done my taxes by now but ... have not. There is time.

It took me forever because I have so little time for reading, but I finished Ocean's Echo! It was just as good as Winter's Orbit, although I felt like the romance was backgrounded a little bit (I'd compare it to the difference between MDZS and TGCF for the danmei fans). Still, I loved the pairing of the dutiful soldier with the tricksy pain-in-the-ass, it's a good dynamic.

Started reading The Belle of Belgrave Square, an 1860s romance by Mimi Matthews. I picked it up because I read the first book in the series last year and found it pretty enjoyable - the love interest was a tailor/couturier with English and Indian ancestry, which is extremely unusual for historical romance (which is normally like "aristocratic/gentry white men ONLY"). Was a bit more hesitant this time because the love interest is apparently an older white military officer with a bad reputation for harshness (per the first book), but just in the first chapter the implications seem pretty clear that he's actually someone from the guy's unit who stole his identity and is now honorably taking care of the officer's illegitimate children. The heroines of these also have real problems - the first one had a sister who was "ruined" and this one has dickensian hypochondriac parents - so all in all they are satisfying stories with satisfying obstacles.

I mean, I'm only just into it and I already care even though they're an m/f couple, and I can't tell you how little I can be bothered for m/f couples in fiction these days. (It's really hitting me lately how little effort so many book and tv writers put into selling you on the couple.)

Speaking of the gays, I finished and posted another lesbian blackbonnet fic yesterday - A Perfect Pair. (I do not like the title but titles are hard and it's okay enough.) The process of writing it was really interesting because I had no real intention of it becoming sexy, events just ... happened that way as emotions carried things. I'm not generally a writer of sex scenes (I think this is only my third Explicit fic on AO3, out of 78 works? No, second, apparently the omegaverse Austen fic was M) and I nearly always have more interest in focusing on the romantic rather than the sexual, and no the two things are not inherently separate but I adore people staring into each other's eyes in the moonlight and generally have no interest in actually writing an escalation to sex - even writing kissing for me is like, eh. Not anymore, I guess!

(I have been learning a LOT about myself in the past year ... I went from "I'm bisexual in that I don't just admire women aesthetically, I think" to "oh, now I understand why some bi women call themselves lesbians," and I don't think this is unrelated to why I'm like finally discovering the appeal of sex at the same time I start getting more into f/f. Would have been useful to figure this out before 35, but oh well.)

There were multiple original writing projects I was going to try to do this month, but they just ... did not happen.

At last I have fallen to covid. :( On Wednesday afternoon I started feeling crappy, so I tested, and for the first time it was positive. Had a very bad evening and eventually had to take nyquil to get to sleep because I was so congested and had such aches in my back and shoulders. But I've been much better since then! Blowing my nose a lot and so on. At first I was very upset about the end of my vacation being covided, but I've come to realize that it's basically no different from how these days would have gone without covid except that I would have gone to the coffeeshop and/or Boba Yaga and spent more money, so.

I watched The Banshees of Inisherin and I decided early on that because it's a movie entirely about the relationship between two men, I should interpret the whole thing as about unspoken romantic love, and honestly? It makes more sense than anything else. ( spoilers )

Started reading Ocean's Echo by Everina Maxwell. (It's not a sequel to Winter's Orbit or even in the same universe, but it's the same genre/type - space opera with tropey gay romance.) Loving it. The deuteragonists are essentially Gen and Costis, but like a version of TT!Gen? Anyway, extremely cunning guy and extremely good-hearted guy, cunning guy coming up with plans to get around good guy and good guy being noble and trying to help cunning guy, neither of them being able to quite get the other. And they're being forced into an arranged soulbond. I'd love it if Maxwell would apply her trope genius to f/f at some point but this is still excellent.

Nearly done with the knitting part of the Princess Royal scarf! I am hating it and I hope my stepmother likes it because knitting a scarf lengthways suuuuuuucks.

Being on vacation, on the other hand, opposite-of-suuuuuuucks. I was grumbling to myself about having to go grocery shopping today and then I was like, oh! I don't have to do that! I can go whenever it's convenient for me! Really wishing I were independently wealthy rn so I could live like this all the time.

I decided to start exploring historybounding (which I realized is what I want to do with my wardrobe) with Edwardian shirtwaists and vests. Not sure if I want matching vests and skirts (cute) or like tweed skirts and fancy vests (fun).

Did a COVID booster yesterday and am home sick today! Not actually feeling that bad yet, but I feel like I can feel it stealing over me (right now the ache is just sort of nibbling at my edges), and it usually takes a ways into the day for me to really hurt, so I feel fully justified in staying home.

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I got my new dark brown (oxblood) Claires and my black Paris boots, and I'm pretty happy with both. The Claires have different heels than my old ones and they make a deeper sound when I walk on the tiled floors at work, which I don't love; I kept the Paris boots in the box for a week because I wasn't sure if I wanted to send them back (the toe is very pointed, not my favorite aesthetic touch) and with the leather soles it's very easy for them to show wear and be unreturnable. But I tried them on a couple of times in the house and the toe seemed long enough that your foot doesn't actually get smushed down into the point, and the upper gives enough support that my fallen arches aren't making the shoe bulge, so they're quite comfortable, although I'm slightly nervous of the heel's small footprint (for reasons of stability).

I wish AD still made the Ruth oxfords, though. They had a toe cap and were just a bit prettier than the clunky Claires. Since I had new shoes to sub in I decided to send my old Claires and Ruths to Cobbler's Direct in Houston to get fixed up - mainly the Ruths, they need new heel caps very very badly. I've never used them before but they've been around a while (I originally found them years ago as Shoe Hospital or something like that) so I'm trusting that they'll do a good job. And then I will have FOUR pairs of work shoes.

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Oh, now I'm starting to feel it.

Periodically I go, "Did I completely drop my entire online identity in order to focus solely on gay pirate fanfiction?" but then I remember that it's more like I'd been bored with my online identity for a while and hadn't been doing anything with Insta or Twitter before then, just checking in on my Etsy messages every few weeks to deal with people who couldn't understand my description of the sizing for my patterns, and then I realize that actually this is quite an Ed Teach arc when you think about it.

I love the days after we meet at work to determine what offered objects to accept or decline - there's a brief period where it's just really clear what I need to do (arrange for things to be delivered if we don't already have them, catalogue them, number them, put them somewhere). The only problem is that they're all either very quick tasks or annoying tasks that require other people to do things. But it's satisfying to update my lists as I clear levels for each object.

Time to complain about things: Everyone is always like "oh I love Mary [Bonnet] sooooo much, she's the greatest, I'm totally Team Mary," but I posted a Mary-centric one-shot and it's remarkable how much quieter the response as has been than for my romantic Ed/Stede fics.

I forced myself to wrap up the second volume of my three-volume novel, and got a couple of friends from Tumblr to look it over for an alpha read just to reassure me that it's worth continuing with. So far one has finished it and was VERY enthusiastic, which is helpful. Now I need to write that third volume ... that's the really exciting one, of course, because it has the culmination of the romance and the final reveal about the heroine's parentage, but it also has some holes in the outline. And of course writing for myself is never as fulfilling as writing for AO3 because you get so much lovely, lovely feedback with the latter.

Finally got myself to sign up for the Renegade Bindery typesetting and binding exchanges, overcoming nearly two weeks' worth of procrastination.

I've started writing a new WIP, Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea, based on the idea "what if Stede got to the dock and Ed didn't (and then things got really dark)?" Also posted a few more chapters of Prisons of Our Own Perceptions ... A fic called Waitin' For My Dearie that's basically a DW entry about why I identify so much with Stede asjdklasjklda and another, Be Careful, It's My Heart, which is another AU, where Stede somehow does everything in ep 10 faster and gets back to the ship while Ed is still in breakup depression mode. (More than halfway done with my next A Kiss On The Hand fic.)

Some time ago, I got blocked by someone who used to follow me on Tumblr, I'm pretty sure due to Discourse. It's a weird feeling, because I tend to reblog meta with a variety of viewpoints, I don't take hardline stances on fandom stuff (I'm a ship and let ship, stan and let stan person), so there's two options: 1) they were annoyed that I didn't take a hard line on something they believe ought to be banned (people being interested in Izzy Hands at all), or 2) they were offended by my "Mary is great but plays her own part in her and Stede's disconnect" and "Stede Bonnet is autistic" takes. I don't mind mind except that they didn't just softblock me (when you block someone to make them stop following you without realizing it, then unblock them), they fully blocked me, so I can see when they've been having a conversation in the replies to a post but I can't see their half of it, which is annoying - so I keep asking myself, what did I do that was so wrong that they couldn't just disengage from me but had to make it so I couldn't see or interact with their posts?? It is neurotic but like I said, I'm just not used to being blocked. Going to try to be less mentally ill about this but it's this or being worried about bears all the time, so.

Local woman puts lingerie strap guards on dress that's always falling off shoulders: her life is suddenly 500% IMPROVED, story at eleven

I swear, on the first day of my period I am at peak ADHD. I just cannot focus on anything today, got nothing done at work and am just kind of futzing around this evening without being able to write more than a basic AskHistorians "here's a link to a past answer" response. (Especially frustrating because we did a Monday Methods post about the recent AHA controversy re: the organization's president writing a ridiculous "anti-identity politics in history" letter, and a few people are being really stupid on it, and I can't keep it together enough to give any of them a tongue-lashing!)

It's been so hot and humid here. :( I had to go in to work yesterday which meant that I got to stay home today, which is mildly better as I have a ceiling fan here and nothing except open windows there.

Rec: 1980s OFMD au presented on Twitter with text snippets and, like, mocked-up images of faxes and notes and polaroids and things. I've been putting off reading it because the threaded format is admittedly annoying, but it's really the only place you could host something like that - you can put images in an AO3 work but they have to be hosted elsewhere so it's a pain in the butt. Anyway it is VERY cute. Just about any iteration of these characters makes my heart flutter, I don't think I've ever had a fandom experience like this. I think it's just that they love each other so much that it throws into clarity how SO many other things feature "romances" where the characters don't like each other that much until very close to the end.

(This is why I'm not posting here much - it would just be My Thoughts On Our Flag Means Death seven days a week. I just watched it for the eleventh time last week.)

I also finished and posted a fic, More Nicer, about Stede and Doug talking the morning after he and Mary talk it through. I quite like it! I think it's the first thing I've written for the fandom that's not some degree of Ed/Stede fluff.

*desperately floundering for something to say that's not related to OFMD* *oh no I already did the unbearable weather* I took my signatures for Female General and Eldest Princess vol. 1 with me to work to press in one of the library book presses and then punched holes in them that night, but I need to do a made endpaper for the front and sew it all together and I just can't force myself to. I think it's the heat.