Meme from lightbird:

Comment on this post and I'll ask you five questions. Answer them in your own journal, offer to give the first five commenters their own sets of questions, and let the cycle continue! (or if you prefer you can answer in the comments).

lightbird asked me:

1. I know you create your own graphics and wallpapers, and you shared many of your color scheme experiments during the last sunshine_challenge. Do you do handcrafts or painting on canvas or other types of art like that?

Not recently. When I moved in with my mother at the end of 2013, everything had to be put away; and I'd been dealing with renovations for quite a while before that, which made it hard. I do want to get the room that used to be her bedroom fixed up as a library-cum-workroom, and the shelves were installed about three years ago; but the place is full of boxes, and I don't have enough money to put in the additional shelves I need to unpack everything.

However, I used to make dolls' house things. I've done some polymer clay food, sewn miniature clothes, made furniture, and painted/assembled garden plants, all in the one-inch scale.

I've done a little painting (and then photographed the pictures, since I don't have a scanner) for picture book fanfic and fan art; and I've also done some manips. You know my FK icons, probably; but I've also done fannish bookcovers for a couple of Mary Renault's books.

If you're curious, the two picture book fanfics are "The Church Mice and the Choristers" and "Hairy Maclary - Big Game Hunter". I guess you could call them pastiche: I tried hard to copy the authors' own styles when doing the paintings.


2. What was the best book you read this year? What made it special?

Oh, this is hard! It reminds me of Grade Eight, when we had Library period once a week, basically as a part of English. We were supposed to rate the books we'd taken out the previous week—the usual sort of five-part scale, you know. It ran from "Didn't Like" up to "Best Book I Ever Read". I never gave anything that top rating. I simply read too much!

I think, though, if I had to pick just one, it would be Naomi Novik's first Scholomance book. I got it for myself at Christmas; and, since I never read my presents until after the day, I read it sometime either the following week or the beginning of January. It flat out clobbered me. I've read it three times this year! Bought myself the sequel for my birthday, and plan to get the third one for this Christmas. She's a good writer, of course; but the worldbuilding in the Scholomance series is stunning.

3. What's your favorite season? What about it makes it your favorite?

I guess I like autumn best. The heat of summer is past; we're not chilled by winter. Spring always seems to go by so fast; and, as I hate heat, summer looms threateningly in a way that winter doesn't. Even with the a/c on, summer is harder to take than winter. I can always put on a sweater.

So I prefer autumn. Also, the leaves look so gorgeous.

4. I've really enjoyed your FK fics and one of the things I admire about them is how much research goes into them. How much time do you spend researching a story before you even start writing?

It depends on the story. A lot of shorter stories, especially little ficlets, I can just knock off with no research at all. I'm pretty familiar with the characters by now! Longer stories that are canon based will be researched by rewatching the appropriate episodes. For major stories with an historical setting, though, I will spend a long time (usually on line) checking every detail that occurs to me. For such stories as "The Siege of Hastings", "Couched Work", or "Phases of the Moon", I might spend as much as six weeks in research—to the point where I actually start to wonder if I'll have enough time to write the story!

For non-FK fic, if I'm utterly familiar with canon, the same is true. I will at least re-read/re-watch as far as possible to make sure I get canon details right. If I intend to write pastiche, i.e. in the author's style, then usually I'll reread twice. (When the story starts writing itself in my head in style, then I know I'm ready to put fingertips to keyboard.) I always do quite a lot of research for historical fic, though. I like to get details right.

5. What's your favorite hot drink?

Mocha! For years, I used to buy General Foods' Suisse Mocha; but it's no longer available round here. So I worked out a recipe that tastes very similar: a blend of Fry's Cocoa, instant coffee, Splenda, and powdered skim milk, mixed with real skim milk, and heated in the microwave. A year or two later, I found I'd left a tin of the commercial stuff at my sister's, and found very little difference in flavour. However, it is true that, when I next had a full physical, my doctor said my cholesterol count had gone down. So clearly the homemade version is actually better for you!

Failing that, at home, I'll make hot cocoa using skim milk and a lot of Fry's cocoa powder, but NO sugar. Or instant café au lait, with hot milk, a little instant coffee, and some Splenda. However, the mocha is my go-to hot drink.

As a complete change, I also like hot mulled cider.