ugh I need a vacation

[elsane]

Sadly, I do not get one; on the other hand, vacations with toddlers don’t count anyway, seeing as a key component of vacations is, on one hand, sleeping in, and on another, experiencing life at the pace of your own choosing, which is to say, I would like to spend unaccounted hours at art museums and obscure operas and walk long miles to sit on a balmy hillside to drink wine at sunset, and none of these things are likely to happen any time soon.

I have finished several things and am mired in the grim Zeno’s paradox stage with too many others. I have decided that my least favorite job responsibility isn’t grant writing after all, but rather the kind of writing that is really editing other people’s technical drafts; guess what I have been doing all summer. All summer. I am so tired. (Guess which projects are still Zenoing. The lament of a tired academic: Several of nature’s people I know, and they know me; I feel for them a transport of cordiality. But never met I this fellow, attended or alone, without a tighter breathing: Zeno at the bone.) I give up on deadline frogging; I am too tired.

I have just started Nirvana in Fire. I am watching it with someone, which means I can’t watch it on random Wednesday evenings when I am wandering tired onto the Internet. This is a Hard Fate which I am attempting to bear bravely up under because I am only through episode 7 and it is so very exactly my jam. Waiting is very hard, and filling the intervening time by wallowing in old discussion posts is also out because pretty much all the plot is still spoilers! So far I am delighted by everyone, everyone in this bar, but especially Nihuang, and I am rooting very hard for Nihuang and Lin Shu to ride off into the sunset together but I don’t exactly get the impression that this is what canon has in mind.

I had some vague ambitions toward un-rusting the fic engines tonight, but I seem to have diverted myself into discovering that the heliacal rising of Arcturus is in October, thus requiring either a different symbolic star, some justification for why a seasoned military commander would start a military campaign in October, or a desperate reckoning of orbital precession to account for however long ago the First Age was nominally supposed to be and hope that it winds up in the spring. I have thus accomplished nothing of note except to learn some fragmentary elf astronomy and roll around in evocative old calendars, and now I am going to declare that a little space of vacation and go to bed.

Comments

[genarti]

I saw this first on tumblr and replied, but I'm going to re-reply here, because I find DW such an infinitely more comfortable place for conversations and friendship (as opposed to scrolling and clicking like on gifsets.) Anyway, it's good to hear from you, friend!

But ugh, I'm sorry your summer is being so very un-vacation-y. There's a lack of vacation, and then there's a lack of very much needed vacation, and THEN there's having entirely too much of your least favorite kind of work to do while also having a toddler underfoot and also also needing the vacation you're not likely to get soon. :-/ I hope you at least will get some restful corners of days here and there, for fragmentary elf astronomy and balmy hillsides.

skygiants and I have been watching Nirvana in Fire, and enjoying the heck out of it! It's so compelling, and also so ridiculous (we about fell off the couch at the CUNNING PLAN involving fight-training the slave children, which we immediately dubbed the Three Orphans In A Trenchcoat plan), and all the actors are so very fun to watch. So many tiny expressions! So much amazing fashion! I could watch Nihuang and Lin Shu flirt by blandly baiting each other all day long. I very much want them to ride off into the sunset together, and very much doubt it'll happen. I also love General Meng, even though we were like "oh buddy, you're so doomed :( :(" as soon as he started talking about friendship and loyalty, and all of Fei Liu's sulky teenaged faces, and aside from those extra-favorites I also love everyone in this bar. We're only on episode 8, though, so in a similar place in terms of avoiding other people's meta that will inherently involve major spoilers.

[skygiants]

THE FASHION IS SO CONSISTENTLY COMPELLING. We also love Jingrui and his bestie, whom we called Bertie Wooster and Bertie 2 before learning their names for their obvious propensity to ignore all serious plot developments in favor of cheerfully bouncing off to play polo, and are pre-emptively sad for both of them that inevitably serious plot developments are going to drag them in anyway.

(I also hope that you are able to grab something for yourself that is at least a little vacation-like in the near future!)

[elsane]

Oh my gosh the fashion is AMAZING. I spent most of the first scene with the empress and the evil consort distracted by the headdresses. The whole drama is so pretty!

BERTIE WOOSTER hahahaha that’s almost unfair, Jingrui is very accomplished! But yes, such puppies! so clearly being set up for impending SRS BZNS. I like Jingyan too! (Tropes and all — so far I’ve called almost everything about his plot line, but this is still just getting all the pieces set up on the game board.).

Thank you for the good wishes <3 I am going out of my way to change up my daily routine for the next couple weeks, which should help a little bit. I hope you are having an excellent summer!

[elsane]

Gen, it is so great to see you :) and yes, DW is so much better for talking!

Nirvana in Fire is so good! How fast are you watching, ie, are we likely to stay in sync? We are slow: 2 or 3 episodes a week, alas. The CUNNING PLAN with the children was such a a “ok just how tropey is this thing” moment, lol, I was relieved to hear about the SEKRIT EXPLANATION but (1) oh it’s THOSE tropes, I won’t complain too hard, it’s much more my jam, and (2) ...where is the fic explaining why the Bear is going along with it and what the fallout is for him, lol

The actors are so good! The cinematography is so beautiful! General Meng is GREAT, I had exactly your reaction, and my SO just as certainly said, “oh he’s going to be a villain” — one of us is going to be wrong!

I am deliberately planning a few weeks in a lower gear, and putting time into the more fun pieces of my job, as insurance against burnout. Here’s hoping; the start of the new semester is coming up way too quickly! How has your summer gone?

[magnetic_pole]

I wish I could offer you a few days of my vacation! If only life worked like that.

Zeno at the bone made me laugh.

Sometimes the research for the fic is just as fun as the fic itself. Glad you got a tiny break there. M.

[elsane]

Aw, thanks, M; I hope you are enjoying your hard-earned vacation!

<3

I was feeling irritated with myself for failing to be productive on my night off! -- until I listened to myself and realized what I was saying.

[cahn]

ahahaha, I am totally hearing you on the vacation with toddler being no vacation at all. Generally I feel rather relieved when coming back from a family vacation and going back to work, where I am able to check email, or get a glass of water, without someone needing immediate help with a book that simply must be read to him Right Now, or complaining that the toddler is Encroaching on her and Urgent Action is Required (which, okay, he does do).

(on the other hand as a special treat I do get to go see Nozze di Figaro tomorrow night, which doesn't at all count as an obscure opera but I will take what I can get; three hours all together seems like an eternity when all my other opera-watching lately has been ten minutes at a time on my phone while doing chores or answering email, which still is adding up to quite a lot but isn't really the same)

[elsane]

ugh, it turned out I burnt out so hard that I couldn't even manage Dreamwidth for three weeks :(

Yes! Quiet adult worktime! Our day care has many great things to recommend it, but every summer it closes for the two weeks right before term starts, and those are LONG EXHAUSTING weeks. I love my daughter enormously, she is very rewarding, I treasure the time I spend with her, and I am going to be so happy come Monday.

Nozze is not at all obscure but it is my favorite opera, in a tough competition -- what a delight, and I'm so happy you got to see it! I hope it was a good production? I, mumble, I have been loving your opera posts, by the way, though I have to fess up to being too shy and/or tired to comment. I adore Verdi, his brilliant music and his great heart, excessively condensed plots and all. I do not trust myself to watch ten minutes of opera and then stop, which means I have mostly been scratching the itch by listening to podcasts about opera while cleaning house; this is not at all the same!

My dad got me to watch opera as a kid by the sneaky tactic of letting me stay up past my bedtime to do it. I'm wondering whether or not this would work on my daughter (in a few years!), since I've given up my husband as a lost cause.

[cahn]

Ahahaha, I saw this response while... on vacation. We went to Legoland; it was super fun, both kids had a great time, it was lovely to watch the toddler go on a roller coaster for the first time, and now I really really need to get caught up on my sleep and introvert time alone with my computer!

Nozze was brilliant and the production was quite good and Figaro and Susanna (especially) were amazing! Oh yay, I am so glad you are enjoying my opera posts; I worry that people are super bored by my going on and ON about how many FEELINGS I'm having because I just discovered VERDI and he broke my brain so all I want to do now is shout at people about opera, my shiny new fandom! But I totally understand about being too tired to comment, although I hope you don't feel too shy because of all my Feelings; I could try not to shout capital letters at you? :)

(I, uh, have also been letting out feelings by writing all the operafic I wanted to read but wasn't actually on AO3, Onegin and Traviata and Don Carlo so far. Also, perhaps I should not be tempting you, but I have been ripping the opera DVDs I own to mp4 so that I can watch them on my phone. I'm just saying, PM me if anything I've said I own looks interesting :) )

Hmm, I should try that with my kids. Both kids like the swordfighting between Carlo and Filippo in the auto-da-fe (I turn it off before the actual auto-da-fe) and the toddler additionally seems to be in love with Netrebko in clock!Traviata, which is a little concerning to me because clock!Traviata is a little... disturbing. (It is undeniably my fault for watching it a zillion times, some portion of which were in front of him.) My husband is also a lost cause but he has been lovely about letting me go do opera/music things once in a while even though he very much does not see the appeal, although he put his foot down when I brought up the idea of driving two hours to see Domingo do Don Carlo.

...I think everyone I know on DW is watching NiF and loving it. I Do Not Need another fandom to have Feelings about, and yet I'm still curious.

[glass_icarus]

YESSSS ANOTHER NIF FAN! :D :D Also, hello!

[elsane]

I, uh, it turned out I burnt myself out so much I couldn't even manage Dreamwidth for three weeks, but a very belated hello! :D

I am somewhat regretting my decision to watch NiF with someone since if it were up to me I would've finished the series by now and probably be in the middle of a rewatch, it is SO GOOD and I can't even read anything on the Internet about it for fear of spoilers! All the actors are so good, all the shots are so pretty, the plot and character writing is so good, I love it. I am just at episode 17 and it's clear the drama is only starting to take its gloves off, it's so hard to watch only 3 episodes a week!

[athenejen]

Nirvana in Fire looks amazing! I will have to check it out.

I hope you can find some more moments of rest and refreshment within your busy daily life! Decompression is important for further productivity, after all. *hugs*

[elsane]

WELL it turns out I burnt myself out so badly I couldn't even manage dreamwidth for three weeks, oops? I am not beating myself up too much about it, though, so perhaps I do learn a few things. Next week our semester starts (and so does our daycare again, thank god), and I'm back to feeling energized about it, so here's hoping...

YOU SHOULD WATCH NiF it is really really good! The SO thinks it is a bit slow and needs more fight scenes, which I mention only so that you can come back and read this later and boggle at the wrongness.

So good to see you around ♥ I hope you are well!