In the end, I decided to go to the central library after work and see if some of the books from my to-read list were on the shelves. The one I probably wanted most was not, but I did borrow two books. The notices about the move have been fairly vague about when the new location will open, just saying "in the summer", but perhaps the due date on the books gives a hint: mine are due back on 2 July. I'll just have to see how it goes, but I expect I'll be finished by then and I'll probably have to return them before that anyway, as I'll be away when 2 July comes along.

After the library, I dumped my bags at home and went out to vote. We're electing a third of the council, and the expectation is that the council will be less Labour-dominated than currently, but the councillor facing re-election in my ward is Green, so I'm not really expecting a change there. No queues at the polling station but seemed to be a steady stream of people going in and out. I and the 2 people just in front of me did end up forming an orderly queue in front of one of the two desks while the other was unoccupied, given how the split into two groups of streets in the ward worked out.

Snufkin: Melody of Moominvalley (plus the DLC "Fuddler's Courtship") did indeed take me much closer to 10 play hours than the 3-5 hours cited for most folks. I enjoyed it! I'll watch for more like it. This cozy adventure is surely delightful for anyone attracted by having all the goodness of story, characters, side quests, exploration, collection, and puzzles, with not a single battle. Snufkin defeats his foes -- such as they are: misguided officials who dam rivers and forbid people to enjoy parks, clinging forest children, a giant crab... -- with music, friendship, stealth, and occasionally a burst of speed. (Of course those of use who already know and love the Moomins get waves of nostalgia when the characters are exactly like themselves.)

I did encounter two hiccups in the game. ( Read more... )

Finished since the last reading post
Finished Blanka, Itämeren tytär. It begins in Tallinn, where Blanka's sister is getting married to a merchant from Lübeck, someone with whom their father trades. But the sister dies after the wedding, so the solution to the contracts is to marry Blanka to her sister's widower almost immediately. When she's travelling to her husband's home the following spring, she and her maid are kidnapped by pirates, which leads to something of an adventure up and down the Baltic Sea. Eventually she makes it to Lübeck and starts to grow into her role as a merchant's wife.

I then read the next book in the same series, Seitsemän tornin varjossa, set in Lübeck some years later when a plague epidemic hits the city and disturbs Blanka's steady existence as a rich merchant's wife. This one involved some interesting role reversals, women's friendships, and resilience.

I also read Vaeltajat (Bieguni) by Olga Tokarczuk in Tapani Kärkkäinen's Finnish translation. I read the first half or so on the train to Basel, and the second half on the train back, so it was a bit of a split experience, especially how it's got all sorts of fairly independent strands.

Breaking the Rules by Brigham Vaughn, a romance novel, to complete the series. Not one that engaged me that well.

Currently reading
No progress with The Sutton Hoo Story because I was away. Started reading The Tarot Reader of Versailles by Anya Bergman on the bus this morning. I actually had it with me in Switzerland and I even had it my bag most days when out and about, but I did not get round to starting it there.

Reading next
Not sure. Something already on my shelves, probably. The central library is closing for a move from Monday. I tried to check online if a couple of books I've been thinking about reading and know are held there are on the shelves. I was thinking if they were, I might pop round tomorrow to borrow them. But it seems they've hidden all central library books in the catalogue, so it seems I will not know in advance if it's worthwhile to go or not.

My journey home yesterday went really according to plan, all the way to not having to wait long at Paddington for the next train, and emerging from the station in Reading with a couple of minutes to spare to catch a bus, rather than waiting close to 15 minutes for one.

I'd usually have gone to the office on a Tuesday, but this week it actually makes sense to go in on Wednesday and Thursday, so that and coming home past my usual bedtime made it easy to decide to work from home instead. The morning was pretty much just catching up with messages, emails, and other things, then we had a team meeting after lunch, and then I got going with a piece of work I was in the middle of when I finished on Wednesday. Feeling pretty tired and definitely not my sharpest, I still made decent progress on it.

And I fit in some German homework too. We had a writing task for homework and I was not entirely convinced I'd get anything done. But I did some work on it on the Eurostar leg, although it was not very easy, on a phone. I was writing it in Keep for simplicity and ended up with all sorts of mistakes and auto-correct weirdness. I used most of my lunch to get it done and submitted. For all I thought I'd struggle to write more than two sentences, I think I had the opposite problem: I did not have the time and the calmness to keep it short, I kept rambling. But I got it done, and I was not sure I could. What I've tried with some of the recent writing exercises is to write them, and then get Claude to give feedback on the text, which has been helpful for pointing out errors and explaining them. Then I've been able to look at the feedback and decide which corrections I'd like to make and how.

Yesterday, by coincidence, I stumbled across the news that Lois McMaster Bujold had a new "The World of the Five Gods" e-book novella coming out... yesterday! Darksight Dare, the 16th Penric & Desdemona story. See it on Amazon. Also, the next (fourth) hardcover compilation of the e-books comes out... today! Penric's Intrigues (containing "The Assassins of Thasalon" and "Knot of Shadows"). See it on Amazon.

Darksight Dare is set immediately after The Adventure of the Demonic Ox, so this is in the era of Pen's life when he's got himself (vocation, relationships, etc.) mostly figured out, just barely in time for his kids to start figuring out theirs.

I hugely enjoy Bujold's "The World of the Five Gods" (formerly "The Chalion Saga" for where the first two were set). Varying by setting, they're either pseudo-medieval or pseudo-Renaissance, and the fantasy elements exist within the cultures' theologies, which are very "high" (that is, not classical myth demigods running around physically in people's lives, but more metaphorizing real-world modern understandings of God). While of course some of the stories are better than others -- and the re-routing from the first three novels to the Pen novellas leaves me sometimes longing for the more novels of the original vision we might have had if the muse had moved Bujold that way -- every story has something to say that I find worth listening to.

I'm so grateful to our pinch hitters! 5,000 words or 5 pages is a big commitment without any guarantee of a gift in return.

A number of people are writing pinch hits but didn’t sign up for the exchange, and we’d like to give them the opportunity to leave prompts for treats. Treats for pinch hitters go in the same location as treats for anyone else, in the main collection.

If you picked up a pinch hit, aren’t signed up for the exchange, and would appreciate treats, please leave your AO3 name in a comment here along with the fandoms you’re interested in. You can specify characters/relationships, fic or comics, genres, prompts, and DNWs--as much detail as you'd like. Linking to past letters is also fine.

On the Eurostar, so for practical purposes in the UK already although the train is still in France. All the new border formalities seem to have made travelling trickier, now that UK requires dual passport holders to use their UK passports on the UK border, and the EU requires entry and exit checks for non-EU passport holders. So it does matter which one you present at which point. I used to think I knew how to do it and which to show when, but queues at St Pancras became a little complicated and I feel a staff member at Paris Gare du Nord pushed me into exiting the EU on the passport I did not use to enter it. And in my experience, neither Eurostar nor airlines make it easy to enter two different, but situationally appropriate Advance Passenger Information, one for each leg of your return journey.

fkficfest prompt submissions are open through May 16: Check it out. This year, we're trying a new prompts method: a common pool made of one anonymous prompt per community member who chooses to share one. No voting, no eliminations, no reveals.

Gifting a prompt to the community is not a commitment to play the game! What would you love to read?

Two prompts have arrived already. Coincidentally, both are quotations. I hope that coincidence won't mislead others to suppose all prompts should be quotations. (One of the two cited its source. If the other prompter doesn't edit theirs to add the attribution by the end of the poll, I'll of course do it for the official final list, as always.) (Did you know that you can edit your answers while a poll is open? You can!)

The deadline has passed! We have some returning Pinch Hits and some new ones.

Please reply to this post or email sufficiently.advanced.ex@gmail.com to claim. Please include your Ao3 username and the number of the pinch hit you are claiming. These will be due Sunday May 10 at 10 PM EDT (UTC-4). Due date countdown: (link)

We have granted extensions to some participants, so don't worry if you still don't have a gift but don't see your name here!

---

( PH 6 - Black Magician Trilogy - Trudi Canavan, Traitor Spy Trilogy - Trudi Canavan, The Extraordinary Adventures of the Athena Club - Theodora Goss )

( PH 7 - 千秋 - 梦溪石 | Thousand Autumns - Mèng Xī Shí, Riddle-Master Trilogy - Patricia A. McKillip )

( PH 8 - Crossover Fandom, xxxHoLic (Manga), Mercy Thompson Series - Patricia Briggs, Protector of the Small - Tamora Pierce, 나 혼자만 레벨업 - 추공 | Solo Leveling | Only I Level Up - Chu-Gong, Emelan - Tamora Pierce, The Malazan Book of the Fallen - Steven Erikson )

FK Fic Fest 2026

Let's share prompts for fkficfest 2026!

As announced, our game is much the same as usual — challenge-style, minimum 500 words, minimum 51% FK in crossovers, 2 months to write, etc. — but we're trying a new prompts method: every FKFicFest community member may anonymously submit one (1) prompt, for writers to use, combine, or ignore as they please. No claiming (multiple people may use the same prompt). And no reveals (the prompts stay anonymous, including to moderators).

How to compose a great prompt:

• Definition: For our game, a prompt is a word, set of words, phrase, sentence, question, verse, stanza, lyric, canon reference, etc. meant to inspire an FK story. (No multimedia, but if you'd like to describe an image or sound, great.)
• Success: As a community, we'll likely get the most from prompts that can flex across different interpretations, while also being specific enough to spark personal reactions. If several writers choose your prompt, awesome!
• Requirements:
  • 1-30 words. (If a prompt is a quotation, include a citation; the citation is not part of the word count.)
  • No exact re-runs from previous years (neither winning prompts nor unused nominations). Evolutions/re-imaginings are okay.
  • And, of course, please, no vulgarity, incivility, that kind of thing.

How to submit your great prompt:

1. By May 16, 2026, compose your one (1) prompt. If you have multiple accounts, pick the one (1) from which you will prompt.
2. Check that you are signed in to Dreamwidth and a member of fkficfest. (If you're not, you can't answer the poll.)
3. From one (1) Dreamwidth account only, type or paste your prompt into the free-text poll field below in this post and click Answer.
4. After you submit your prompt, to see all the submitted prompts so far, click View Answers.
5. If necessary, to edit your prompt before the poll closes, click Change Your Vote.

Submit your prompt in the text field here:

Questions? Advice? Please chat in reples to this post! Again, every community member may share one (1) anonymous prompt this year. Prompting is not a commitment to play. The final prompt slate and game guidelines will post on May 17 (Sunday). Stories come due in queue on the AO3 on July 18 (Saturday) and begin releasing on July 20 (Monday). Thank you for sharing your fondness for Forever Knight!

This morning, I went to Kunstmuseum Basel. I started with the Neubau and the special exhibition, Helen Frankenthaler. I enjoyed it very much. Afterwards, I visited the collection displays in Neubau, followed by the The First Homosexuals, which was fascinating. And seemed very busy (but it was also effectively free on a first Sunday of the month, which I had not realised it was).

Then I went to the other side of the street and visited the collection displays in Hauptbau, which primarily displays pre-20th century art.

After all that art, my plan for the afternoon was a 75-minute Rhine cruise. It was good to see the city from another angle. The cruise first went up the river before turning in front of the Birsfelden hydro power station. Then it went down river to the port, which is by the point where the Swiss, German and French borders meet. It was interesting to see the port with all the containers, cranes and buildings, even if it seemed rather empty of any activity on a Sunday afternoon.

Today was not quite as warm as yesterday and also cloudier. From the river it looked like it might rain any minute, but it did not. It may rain in the night though, and tomorrow's forecast has also featured the chance of rain. I hope it stays dry until I'm on the train towards Paris.

Nine pinch hits have been added to our notice board! All the requests are guaranteed (meeting the minimum 3 unique fandom requirement), which means that we need to get these filled in order to open the collection.

If you are a pinch hit and you'd like to add new requests, please email gumshoeagency@gmail.com. I will update your requests for the pinch hit post that will be published after the extension deadline. Please see this post for details (under "non-guaranteed to guaranteed") for the form to use to submit additional requests.

Quick links: Rules and guidelines · 2026 Collection · Mod contact: gumshoeagency@gmail.com

This batch of pinch hits are due on Friday 5 June at 11:59pm Eastern time. [ In your timezone + Countdown ]

Pinch hits must comply with the exchange's rules. Pinch hits must meet the minimum assignment requirements of a completed work of a minimum of 3,000 words for fanfiction, a minimum of 10 panels for a comic, or a recording of a completed fic of 3,000 words minimum with "casefic" as one of its tags. Works must include a fandom, character/ship and be of a medium that the recipient has requested, with the requested character(s) at the forefront participating in the investigation. You must have an AO3 account to participate.

We guarantee gifts for requests that feature a minimum of 3 unique fandoms.

Please take note of the mediums as some requests have a combination selected.

To claim, please either reply to this post or email gumshoeagency@gmail.com with your AO3 name and the pinch hit number you want to claim.

Comments are screened, so if you reply anonymously, please include an email in case I need to reach out to you. You will not be able to receive a reply from me if you comment anonymously on this post.

---

( PH 1 (Comic, Fanfic) - The Defenders (Marvel TV), Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency (TV 2016), True Detective: Night Country (TV), Crossover Fandom (Knives Out/Murder She Wrote, Knives Out/Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency, Knives Out/Death in Paradise (UK TV 2011)</small> )

( PH 2 (Comic, Fanfic, Podfic) - DC's Arrowverse, Boardwalk Empire, Rounders (1998), Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy - John Le Carré )

( PH 4 (Fanfic) - Chalion Saga - Lois McMaster Bujold, Nancy Drew - Carolyn Keene, Nancy Drew/Hardy Boys Super Mysteries - Franklin W. Dixon & Carolyn Keene, G.I. Joe (Cartoon), Jem and the Holograms (Cartoon), Crossover Fandom (Babysitters Club [Martin]/Nancy Drew Hardy Boy Supermysteries, Babysitters Club [Martin]/Nancy Drew [Keene], Jim Cartoon/Nancy Drew Hardy Boys Supermysteries, Nancy Drew Harcy Boys Supermysteries/Jem and the Holograms Cartoon, Nancy Drew [Keene]/Hardy Boys [Dixon]), Star Trek: Strange New Worlds (TV), Perry Mason (TV 1957) )

[ PH 7: Includes canon consumption tips. ]
( PH 7 (Fanfic) - 神さまのいない日曜日 | Kamisama no Inai Nichiyoubi | Sunday Without God (Anime & Manga), Octopath Traveler II (Video Game), 少女たちの痕にくちづけを | Shoujo-tachi no Kizuato ni Kuchizuke wo | Kiss the Scars of the Girls (Manga), よるのないくに | Yoru no Nai Kuni | Nights of Azure (Video Games) )

( PH 8 (Comic, Fanfic) - Winx Club, W.I.T.C.H., Heart of the Woods (Visual Novel) )

CLAIMED! ( PH 11 (Fanfic) - High Potential (TV), Dimension 20 (Web Series), Veronica Mars (TV) )

( PH 12 (Comic, Fanfic) - Buffyverse (TV), DC's Arrowverse, Star Trek: Strange New Worlds (TV), Star Trek: The Original Series, Marvel Cinematic Universe )

( PH 14 (Comic, Fanfic), - カラオケ行こ！ | Karaoke Iko! | Let's Go Karaoke! (Anime), サイレント・ウィッチ 沈黙の魔女の隠しごと - 依空まつり | Secrets of the Silent Witch - Isora Matsuri, 凸变英雄X | To Be Hero X (Cartoon), 时光代理人 | Link Click (Cartoon), Pluribus (TV 2025), 延禧攻略 | Story of Yanxi Palace (TV), Redtape Series - Rounderhouse, Bloodborne (Video Game), Dark Souls (Video Games), Elden Ring (Video Game) )

( PH 15 (Fanfic) - The Divine Cities Series - Robert Jackson Bennett, The Founders Trilogy - Robert Jackson Bennett, Shadow of the Leviathan - Robert Jackson Bennett, Crossover Fandom (Knives Out/Death Note, Knives Out/The Shadow of the Leviathan [novels]), Shadow of the Leviathan/Divine Cities) )

( PH 16 (Fanfic) - To Have and Have Not (1944), Perry Mason (TV 1957), Crossover Fandom (Modesty Blaise [books]/Avengers 1961), Miss Marple Movies (1961-65), Starsky & Hutch, Supernatural (TV 2005), Riptide (TV) )

( PH 17 (Fanfic) - House M.D., Lewis (TV), Murder Most Unladylike Series - Robin Stevens, Murdoch Mysteries, NCIS: Los Angeles, Numb3rs (TV), SEAL Team (TV), Sherlock (BBC TV 2010), The Secret of Chimneys - Agatha Christie, They Came to Baghdad - Agatha Christie )

CLAIMED! ( PH 18 (Comic, Fanfic) - Poirot - Agatha Christie, Crossover Fandom (Miss FIsher's Murder Mysteries [tv]/Miss Marple [books]), Crossover Fandom (Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries [tv]/Lucifer [tv]), Babylon 5 (TV 1993), James Bond (Craig Movies) )

( PH 19 (Fanfic) - The Brokenwood Mysteries, Jonathan Creek (TV), Ludwig (TV), Shakespeare & Hathaway: Private Investigators (TV) )

( PH 20 (Fanfic) - 憂国のモリアーティ | Yuukoku no Moriarty | Moriarty the Patriot (Anime), Nightmare - Cornell Woolrich (Novella), Father Brown (2013) )

( PH 21 (Fanfic) - Hellboy (Comics), Bureau for Paranormal Research and Defense, World of Warcraft, Marvel 616 )

( PH 22 (Fanfic) - Highlander: The Series, The Listener (TV), The Saint of Steel - T. Kingfisher, The Magnificent Seven (TV), Sanctuary (Canada TV 2008), Numb3rs (TV), Clocktaur War Series - T. Kingfisher, Stargate Atlantis, Original Work )

Thank you!

This morning, I set out to make an excursion on the other side of the border in Germany by taking the tram to Weil am Rhein. Approaching the border, the tram stopped and German police came on board to check everyone's IDs. I had not properly checked if it was something that might happen, but I had decided it was a possibility and I've been carrying my Finnish passport for that reason while I've been here. So it was fine.

In Weil am Rhein, I walked to the Vitra campus, housing furniture manufacturing, exhibition spaces and a museum of design. It was a fun place to visit. I climbed up to a viewing platform, but also took the stairs down rather take the slide option for descending that was also an option.

After Vitra, I returned to Basel and had a late lunch. Then I took the local train out of the Basel city to visit the ruins of the Roman town of Augusta Raurica. They were a bit spread out, so I did not see quite everything, but you certainly got a sense of the scale of things. And it was wonderful to be outside and out of the town enough to get better views.

Both of the places I visited today offered a discount with the Basel card, but because they were out of Basel city, you needed to pay for the public transport, which is also covered by the card in the city. So that's why I did both the out of city things today.

Yesterday, I got an email saying that the Gizmoplex is shutting down. Read it on their site.

Oversimplified, Mystery Science Theater 3000 (MST3K) is: a space castaway and two robots hilariously mock bad movies (usually old and always genre). Back in the day, my family would watch it on cable on Saturday nights. As adults, my sister and I went together to a handful of live touring performances. MST3K sits at the rare and invaluable intersection of her tastes and mine; it's also something best shared in real time.

I've supported every "Bring Back MST3K" effort, including the one that failed disastrously because people were still really mad about the super expensive, slow shipping of the cheap plastic bonus knick-knacks from the previous one (because: pandemic). I own ("own") digital copies of everything on the Gizmoplex. Now, I have until June to stream it on my TV as I always have, and until September to download as many files as I want to keep.

My sister paid the extra to get DVDs instead of streaming, so in that sense she's definitely wiser than me. I didn't expect the Roku and other integrations to last forever, but I did expect the website to last... a little longer than this. On the other hand, I watched every new episode as it became available, especially during the pandemic, making a Saturday-night event out of it, reminiscent of those childhood family viewings, while I know my sister instead put her DVDs away on a shelf and still hasn't watched them all, though it's been years. So in that sense I'm the winner. They're downloaded to my brain.

But of course I would rather have had more seasons, more years, more tours. And especially more sharing with my sister.

Hi all, we hope you've been doing great so far! There are under two days left in the creation period!

The due date for assignments is on May 3 at 10 PM EDT (UTC-4). Due date countdown: (link)

---

Here's another Pinch Hit! Please reply to this post or email sufficiently.advanced.ex@gmail.com to claim. Please include your Ao3 username and the number of the pinch hit you are claiming. This will be due 6 days later than usual deadline, on Sat 09 May 2026 10:00PM EDT!

---

( PH 6 - Black Magician Trilogy - Trudi Canavan, Traitor Spy Trilogy - Trudi Canavan, The Extraordinary Adventures of the Athena Club - Theodora Goss )

Dear detectives, private investigators, criminal masterminds and nosy busy bodies,

The assignment deadline has passed!

Extensions:

We have many extensions across the agency. Happy creating and giving those fabulous works a final touch!

Extensions are due on Friday 15 May at 11:59pm EDT. [ In your timezone + Countdown ]

No further extension dates will be given (pinch hitters who claimed in the last two weeks leading up to Friday 1 May are exempted). Extenuating circumstances will be treated on a case-by-case basis.

If you requested an extension via email and did not hear back from me, please reply to this post with your AO3 username and recipient's AO3. There is a chance I replied and your email has eaten my response, or I filed it away by accident while believing I had responded. Please reach out before Monday 4 May.

If you default on your extension, or I have to default you because you are a no-show, you will be required to complete a make-up gift to participate in the next round. (These are due before the next round's sign-ups.)

If you receive an extension and have extenuating circumstances between Friday 1 May and Friday 15 May, please reach out. I don't need the details (give me an elevator pitch of context) and we can work out a new deadline date that works with the exchange's current timelines.

Pinch hitters who claim a request after Friday 1 May who need extensions will have their requests treated on a case-by-case basis. (I don't have any further extension deadlines.) Extensions won't be given to anyone who was assigned a request before Friday 1 May (excluding pinch hitters who claimed in the two weeks leading up to that date).

Defaults:

I will default anyone who has not completed their gift or who has submitted a draft. Completed gifts that can stand on their own in the instance you win the lottery, acquire a Wi-Fi-less island and move there are required at the assignment deadline.

Repeated no-shows may be banned from participating in the next round.

Non-guaranteed gifts becoming guaranteed gifts:

Participants who chose to sign up with less than 3 unique fandoms and who do not have a gift have until Friday 15 May at 11:59pm EDT to add additional fandoms to their request [ In your timezone + Countdown ].

I will not be updating any requests after this date. This is so I can manage pinch hits in the post-deadline phase of the exchange.

These fandoms need to be unique and not subfandoms to qualify, i.e., if your request only consists of Doctor Who 2005, Doctor Who 1963 and WandaVision, you do not meet the minimum unique fandom requirements.

If you are a participant who has not requested a minimum of 3 unique fandoms who wants to be guaranteed a gift in the post-deadline stage of the exchange, you will need to meet the following criteria:

• have completed a gift for the exchange
  
• have not received a gift (not having a gift means you are either a pinch hit (as part of our existing slate or post-deadline slate) or your creator has an extension)

If this describes you, please email gumshoeagency@gmail.com by the deadline with your additional fandoms, providing:

Canon: As it appears in the tagset.
Relationships: As they appear in the tagset.
Mediums:
Optional details:

I will update your requests if you become or remain a pinch hit during the post-deadline phase of the exchange. I will confirm via return email when this is done so you are aware that these changes have been made to your request.

If you do not complete your assignment, I will not update your request to meet the minimum of 3 unique fandoms and you will not be a pinch hit as you'll be considered a default.

If you do not want to add additional requests to slip into "guaranteed gift", that's fine! Please remember that the exchange may open without you receiving a gift.

This is a new aspect of the exchange that I'm trialling. We will see how we go!

If you currently do not have a gift:

If you do not have a gift, you're welcome to email me to confirm if your creator has an extension.

Post-deadline pinch hits:

These will be posted in the next day after I confirm all extensions and defaults, as I will be AFK for the rest of the day/evening (see this post for details).

I've submitted my gift and it's been accepted into the collection. What now?

Congratulations! 🥳 You can spend the time from now until I announce the collection reveal date editing your gift.

You are welcome to add words or panels to your gift as you see fit. Works must meet the minimum requirements for comics, fic and podfic.

If you don't intend to edit your gift because it's already polished to your satisfaction, you can sit back, relax, and perhaps look at our active pinch hits during this time! (Post-deadline pinch hits will be posted in approximately 24 hours.)

The collection will not open until all guaranteed gifts are in. I'd appreciate any help in getting pinch hits filled!

Get in touch!

Please email gumshoeagency@gmail.com if you have any questions or concerns. Please provide your AO3 username so I know who I'm speaking with!

*

Happy creating to those with extensions, and good luck to those of you editing during this period! Thank you in advance to participants, passers-by and the PH nonnies of BFE who assist in filling our pinch hits.

P.S. Comments on this post are screened.

Gorgeous sunshine today too. The forecast for the morning had fairly low temperatures so I was not quite sure how many layers to wear when I was going out, but ended up choosing just one long-sleeved top over a t-shirt and I was fine.

Because it's 1 May, most shops and some touristy things were closed today. So I decided to head out to the Zoo. It was really green and lush there, with trees providing useful shade on the paths. No wonder the advertising talks about the oasis in the city. It was wonderful just to walk around there. And the animals were interesting, of course. The elephant house and area were currently empty of occupants, who had been moved to other zoos and new ones had not yet arrived, but the house had really beautifully done information boards. And I saw a great one-horned rhinoceros looking like it was enjoying itself by submersing most of its body in its little river very close to the path. Not something I've seen before. And they had a viewing platform from where you could have a really nice view of some storks' nests full of chicks. That said, I was not very impressed by some of the animal enclosures, which seemed smallish and did not seem to have that much vegetation in otherwise very lush park.

There was an exhibition about what the future of the Zoo will look like, Zolli in 2049, with more space and reconfiguration of the existing space, including making better use of what's currently used for parking cars. And as far as I understood, some of the current animal species will be going as part of the transformation, and at least some of those were ones I thought needed better spaces.

After the Zoo, I walked to town and did some more aimless walking. I also visited the Naturhistorisches Museum. I did not know in advance they had an exhibition of the Wildlife Photographer of the Year photos, so I saw that. And also had a look of the ordinary exhibition featuring geology, fossils, extinct animals and so on. They had a really nice section on evolution of human species, and I was pleased I understood it fairly well given it was all in German. And they also had a very nicely done exhibition on animals of Switzerland.

Thinking about what I love about Dreamwidth, verbs occurred to me. That is, first one, and then more, action words that most characterize this specific kind of sharing and community for me (and, I hope, for you) bubbled up. And the more I thought about them, the more I realized their weight and valence.

Blogging. Conversing. Journaling. Discussing. Connecting. Replying. Catching up. Curating. Commenting. Reading and writing...

♥

Hello detectives,

May has come… and our assignment deadline approaches!

🚨 Assignments are due in ONE DAY! 🚨 [ In your timezone + Countdown ]

Extensions:

If you need an extension, you have until Friday 1 May 11:59pm Eastern to request it [ In your timezone + Countdown ]. The deadline for assignments with extensions is Friday 15 May. Everyone who requests an extension before the assignment deadline will be granted one. (I may be delayed in confirming.)

No further extension dates will be given. Extenuating circumstances will be treated on a case-by-case basis.

Please email gumshoeagency@gmail.com with your AO3 username and your recipient's AO3 username when requesting an extension.

If you default on your extension, or I have to default you because you are a no-show, you will be required to complete a make-up gift to participate in the next round. (These are due before the next round's sign-ups.)

If you receive an extension and have extenuating circumstances between Friday 1 May and Friday 15 May, please reach out. I don't need the details (give me an elevator pitch of context) and we can work out a new deadline date that works with the exchange's current timelines. I want everyone's experience with Casefic Exchange to be fun, but my number one priority is to run the exchange as smoothly as possible and open before 2027 arrives.

Defaults:

If you cannot complete your assignment, please default before the assignment deadline. There is no shame in doing so! Please press the 'default' button on your assignment.

I will be defaulting anyone who is a no-show and you may be banned from participating in the next round. If you were a no-show last year and are a no-show this year, you may be banned. If you want to participate in the next round, you will need to complete a make-up assignment if you are a no-show twice in a row.

I will not be emailing participants to check whether they are submitting works. If you do not submit a work, ask for an extension, or default, you will be considered a no-show.

What comes after the assignment deadline passes:

• Please make sure gumshoeagency@gmail.com is whitelisted so that you get my emails if I need to contact you. I will not be reaching out to anyone via any other method other than email, so please make sure you can receive my emails. I will use the email attached to your AO3 account.


• You can keep editing your assignment after you submit it. Please ensure you submit a completed work. A completed work is a work that can stand on its own if you happen to win the lottery and purchase an island with no Wi-Fi and immediately move there.


• For full transparency, I will be AFK for the deadline and won't be actioning anything until it's past 9am on Sunday 3 May AEST [ In your timezone. ].
  
  What does this mean for you? I won't be immediately actioning things and you have a little wriggle room in submitting your completed gifts, but I ask that this is not taken advantage of! There is one caveat: If you need a few extra hours because of timezone or because-it's-a-workday reasons, please email me to let me know. You will not receive a timely reply, but I ask so that I know it's intentional and that you've read this post and understand that you need to get your assignment in. If your work is not in the collection by the time I start mod work (see time above), you will be mod-defaulted and considered a no-show. Please aim to get works in via the assignment deadline time.


• I will publish a post declaring our assignment deadline has passed and a reminder regarding participants who do not have a minimum of 3 unique fandoms that they have until Friday 15 May at 11:59pm Eastern to add fandoms to become eligible for a guaranteed gift. There will be more information on that post.


• I'll post a new slate of pinch hits several hours after the deadline.

I will see you at the finish line!

- Commissioner Clawseau

P.S. Comments on this post are screened.

It was an early start today: I got up at about ten to four and was heading out about five past. But early morning trains do not run very frequently and take longer with more stops, so I did really have a choice if I wanted to allow some time for delays. But today everything went to plan and it seemed I managed to time myself perfectly for the tube, as a train just pulled when I got to the platform.

So I was at St. Pancras in good time for the Eurostar and the Eurostar terminal was its usual busy self. The journey to Paris was uneventful—this was the first time I took it to Paris—and we even arrived at Paris Gare du Nord a few minutes early. I was nervous about the cross-Paris change of trains, even after reading the Man in Seat 64 guidance and watching the handy video he's done, but the journey went smoothly, just like in the video. I bought the RER ticket on my phone and it was fine. Everything going to plan meant some idle time at Gare de Lyon for getting something for lunch for later and walking around both Halls 1 and 2.

The journey from Gare de Lyon to Basel was also uneventful. My seat was upstairs, there were some nice views but also some rather boring countryside.

One thing that I'd forgotten to check was roaming for Switzerland. My phone contract is with Lebara precisely because you can get a plan where European roaming is included as standard, but it turns out Switzerland is not included. So after I'd checked in to my hotel and had access to wi-fi, I bought an add-on, so I'm sorted now.

I didn't have any specific plans for today beyond some aimless walking, so I did some of that. Gorgeous sunshine today, and warm, around 23 degrees in the afternoon.