- So cold. It's been getting down to -9C at night. My hands are really dry and cracking - they're even dry on the insides of my fingers, and it's usually only the outsides of my hands that get that bad. The worst part is that the heating at work is rubbish, so it's freezing all morning and boiling in the afternoon. Friday, which was particularly cold, was so cold at work that I couldn't feel my fingers with fingerless gloves on. Which is because they're fingerless, but I just can't type with gloves on.

- Sunday evening my heating started humming when the boiler went off. It took me ages to track it down because it sounds like a transformer hum. Things work so fast when you're renting - I called the estate agent on Wednesday, they're sending someone to look at it next week. If the heating broke I definitely wouldn't ring the estate agent.

- Because my boiler is so loud I don't have it come on until I get up. Thursday morning it was 10C in the house, Friday morning it was 9C. Even my head was cold. I ended up leaving the heating on last night turned down, but due to that and the humming I've been wearing ear plugs, which irritate my ears, but they're the good ones. And I've still been waking up at the noise and I'm really not good on no sleep.

- Finally made it to ballet, after missing the first two weeks of term due to being dizzy. The good part is that I actually managed to get all the way round on a pirouette this week. It helped that I was actually well enough to balance, as it does involve standing on the tiptoes of one foot while going round quite quickly.

- Joined the local choir. You don't have to be able to sing, which is handy because I haven't really sung since primary school. Being able to read music helps, but I was very glad I'm not a bloke because some of their parts was in bass clef and my bass clef reading was shaky enough when I had to do it regularly. I enjoyed it, but it's going to take a bit of getting used to, reading two notes at the same time, working out which one is mine and reading the words at the same time. I was very welcome as I'm an alto and they were short of those last term. (I wasn't sure at first because the parts didn't have names in primary school and I'm sure my voice has changed since then, but having been I can confirm I definitely can't sing as high as soprano).

- Managed to kill Firefox on my netbook by accidentally upgrading 3.6 to 9 and then 7 wouldn't accept it was my default browser. I finally managed to get 9 to use my profile for 7, which solved the problem.

- General other things on my computers being a pain that required time to fix

- I have eaten quite a bit of wheat! I've had whole meals of wheat pasta and wheat spaghetti and not been ill. I bought myself some bourbon biscuits and haven't been ill on two of those a day either. But it was really hard to go down the biscuit aisle and choose a biscuit because there was so much choice. I haven't brought myself to eat bread yet because I don't want to remind myself what it tastes like if I have to go back to Genius bread (which I currently think tastes nice).

- Managed to pull down the curtain rail in my bedroom. I am getting a friend of mine to fix it, but I feel like such a useless girl to have to get a man to help. But it's not because I'm a girl it's because I'm accident prone and likely to make it worse if I'm left to do it myself.

- Still feel like I'm waiting to get my life back and it's been a few weeks short of three years.

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Last year I said I would go on a day trip at least once a month. If you count up the number I did and divide my twelve I succeeded. If you count it by month I failed in October. I knew it as well, I just didn't want to go anywhere.

This year I have resolved to put things off less. Before I was ill I used to try and get things done, then I could sit down and do what I liked. But that doesn't work any more because I have to stop and rest. So instead I am going to write down things I need to do as I think of them, and then do them. And try not to leave them all until the weekend, but it doesn't matter, as long as I do them. And writing them down should mean that I remember to do them. I already have three things on the list...

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Friday was our work Christmas party, which I've only just recovered from. All I did was to sit around and talk (and stand for an hour) but I was tired from it I slept for 11 hours Friday night, still felt tired and slept for 10 hours last night. Now I don't feel tired.

In the work secret santa for the first year in I don't know how many, I didn't get a Doctor Who related thing. I got a rabbit instead. Which is good, because generally you can't go wrong with with rabbits. However, this one has a hole in it that you're clearly meant to put something in, but no one knows what. There was no packaging, so presumably my santa doesn't know either. The most suggested things at the party were mobile, iPod and remote control. I tried putting my phone in it and the hole holds together too well to get anything in there easily. So I am stumped.

There was also food, which I mostly couldn't eat. The chef wouldn't understand that I just wanted to know what was in it, I didn't care about contamination, which she was more interested in telling me. I don't think she wanted me to eat at all. Fortunately, I brought my own - I remember last year well when I got a salad.

I have things booked for January now. I am going to see the Gymnastics at the O2. It feels like we can't get away from that place. I'm also going to see Spamalot. For the third time. But the first and second times were on Broadway and in the West End, this one's in my nearest city.

Permalink | No comments | Categories: Life, TV, Work: Doctor Who (Classic), Life, Work

But at least there's only 11 days of work left. Well, 10 and a half for me as tomorrow I am off to see Coldplay. Annoyingly we have to be there two hours before it starts to avoid the rush hour, as it's on the wrong side of London. And by the time it finishes we'll be on the last train and I'll get home at 1.15am! Which is why all I have planned this weekend is to catch up on some of the stuff on my PVR because that's definitely all I'll be capable of. I know I will enjoy it, despite the fact that I got dizzy last time I was in the O2 and the last time I was up that late at night I couldn't stand up without falling over...

Permalink | No comments | Categories: Life, Music: Coldplay, Life

But I do have a meme from selenay936:

Comment to this post, and I will list five things I associate with you. They might make sense or they might be totally random. Then post that list, with your commentary, to your blog/LJ/DW (or just add a reply back to me). Other people can get lists from you, and the meme merrily perpetuates itself.

selenay936 gave me:

Rotaract
It has been my source of friends, social life and knowledge of the local area since I moved here. It's weird not having it in my life quite so much any more. I collected for Children in Need on Friday, as I've done every year, and I had to wear a Rotary tabard. And we have to be more organised about seeing each other socially now that we're not meeting up anyway at least once a month.

So that's a fairly reasonable thing to associate with me. And I'm glad I have got the Rotaract name out a little bit because not many people have heard about it. Amusingly, while I was writing this bit, I was interrupted by a Rotaract-related phone call.

Tennis
Wimbledon's always been this big fixture in the calendar. It's only recently that I've started going to tennis matches. I'm going to the ATP World Tour Finals semi-final on Saturday. And next year I'm definitely going to two Olympic tennis days and two Paralympic tennis days. Plus am also hoping to go to Queens, Wimbledon and the last ATP World Tour Final in London. Which is quite a bit of tennis...

But there is something about Wimbledon and the atmosphere. More so for home Davis Cup matches where almost the whole crowd on Court 1/the NEC are cheering for Team GB so loudly. Except when we're losing when it gets a bit depressing.

So, yes, I like tennis. Although mostly I only watch the men because the women are boring and grunt, which is annoying. The men's game feels like it has more stars. It certainly has more status in this country, but at least some of that could be due to Henman/Rusedski/Murray versus no decent British women players.

Doctor Who
I do like Doctor Who. Doctor Who fandom makes me think I don't and it's only when I see a new episode that I remember I like it. It's not my favourite TV programme, it's just the one that I am involved in (bits of) the fandom currently.

But I do like that it has time travel (I love time travel - time is my favourite bit of physics). I also like that it has historical episodes, so that's two of my favourite things.

Cats
My parents have always had cats. So I like cats. I can especially talk about cats when I've just been home for a long weekend. Not that I actually played with Timmy - he did all his playing outside. But he did take great delight in sleeping where other people wanted to be sitting, investigating an Amazon box by getting in it and answering questions by making noises. No idea what they mean (except for the noise that means he wants someone to play with him and the ones that means there are birds outside). Cats are entertaining and relaxing and useful for eating spiders that have come in the house.

Having Interesting Adventures Unintentionally
Er, I do this? I would say I don't mean to, but that would be the point of the unintentionally bit above. I think it comes from a mixture of bad luck and a tendency not to know when to leave well alone. But at least they're interesting adventures.

Permalink | No comments | Categories: Animals, Life, Meme, Rotaract, Sport: Cat, Doctor Who (New), Life, Meme: other, Rotaract, Tennis, Timmy

I have got used to people spelling my last name wrong so generally I spell it straight after saying it. It cuts down on people saying "Is that with an e?" me saying that it is and them then putting two es in. Yes, there is an e in my surname, but not there.

I have got used to people getting my pseudonym wrong. No one ever spells it wrong, but people do put random capitals and spaces in there. The only capital is a p and there are no spaces. Despite it being two words put together it really is one word. But I reached the stage of not caring about that long ago.

My first name, on the other hand, that I care about. People spelling the shortened form wrong is quite annoying, but people give you odder looks for spelling it than they do when you just tell them what it is, so I've given up on that and just don't look when they write it down, it saves time. My full first name on the other hand... There are some other spellings of it, but on the whole they're rare and people don't guess those. What they are incapable of is one letter that changes my whole name. That's not my name and it's not me and there's nothing that annoys me more than people getting that wrong. Even the Tories having a general election five days before my 18th birthday is only second on the list of things that really wind me up. Don't get me started on that.

So I get annoyed my proxy at people writing Sarah-Jane Smith or Elizabeth Sladen or Russel T Davies because that's not their names (and there's no excuse given that they're clearly written on screen). It's also because I can't personally mix and match spellings. I can't remember someone's name unless I know who it's spelt. Even though they're only one letter difference and pronounced the same, Clare and Claire are different. Perhaps it's the way my brain works, but it probably has something to do with why I can never remember character names on TV programmes. Although in that case it doesn't help that people mumble and pronounce things differently and it turns out that what you thought was Emma was in fact Erin.

So the moral of this story is, get my name wrong at your peril. Or at least be prepared to apologise profusely afterwards.

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So I am being better for November. I'm already going to the tennis at the end of the month and home for a long weekend. At some point once I can get everyone to agree on a date we'll have a Wii night at my house, where we can use my big lounge to its full advantage. And I'm going to the fireworks on Saturday - I haven't actually been to a firework display in years. It looks like it might be dry, not too cold, but muddy.

I have still been going to ballet. Last half term there were only three of us, none complete beginners and it was nice to have a small class. Now we have more beginners and it's nice to see how far I've come in a year. Although I still get very confused. The most amazing part about it is that, given my dizziness, I am getting better at pirouettes. Last night I even managed a couple where I didn't completely fall off at the end. But when the Winter Olympics were on one of my exercises was turning round in a circle slowly, which I could just about do. So pirouettes is a major advance. I can't do many, but then I wouldn't have been able to do before I was ill either.

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So as I bought two at once, that means if one's gone, the other's going to go too. And do New Look still do the same style of jeans? Of course not. And, at least according to the website, all their jeans are £20, which is twice what I'm prepared to pay for jeans. Which means I now need to find some jeans (and buy about six pairs this time when I find some). What I really need are children's jeans, because they fit properly, but it's impossible to find some that aren't cool or girly.

And then in the afternoon we had team building exercise, which involved making chocolate. Well, that was my contribution to the creating a chocolate brand (no one in my team would let me create an evil brand). So I spent the entire afternoon with chocolate around the room and on the table. It would have been so easy just to eat some, but I couldn't. I was so hungry by the time I left and could still taste chocolate when I went to bed. I'm halfway through my everything + sugar free diet and I haven't ever wanted chocolate as much as I did yesterday.

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• Made a shepherd's pie for the first time ever. It didn't stick together, but it tasted nice and that's all that counts
• Had a fry up for breakfast because I ran out of porridge - well, I say fry up, but actually only the tomatoes were fried. The has browns were cooked in the oven the previous night and microwaved. But they did taste very nice
• Got the car out of the garage without having to go forwards for the first time ever
• Seen a lot of tractors on my way to and from work. On Wednesday I managed to get stuck behind one when it was stuck behind a cyclist going up a hill...

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Yesterday I managed to post my femgenficathon fic: Stuck With You, featuring Jo Jones née Grant.

I've been watching Downton Abbey too. I kept meaning to watch it, being as so many people talked about it, and then I heard there would be a second series in the autumn, so I thought I ought to get on with it. I was expecting it to be the usual serious period drama, but it's actually quite ridiculous and I am liking it.

Permalink | No comments | Categories: Fan fic, Life, TV: Downton Abbey, Life, My fanfic

Then Wednesday afternoon I felt all weird. It wasn't until after I left work that I realised that maybe it was a mild migraine, but with none of my usual triggers. So after that I was tired. But last night I slept for 11 hours. Now I feel great, except that I have conjunctivitis...

On the plus side I am off on the annual trip to the windmill with no TV and no internet for four days. Based on past experience my conjunctivitis will be getting better by the time I leave...

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A couple of weeks ago we moved offices, so it now takes longer to get there and back. But I have been exploring different routes and discovered they all take the same amount of time. Although there's one I don't really want to do in the winter because it's narrow and has no streetlights - the main road doesn't have streetlights either, but at least it's the main road.

So then I overdid it with work and extra driving and randomly waking up at 5.30am for no reason. I was so tired a couple of weeks ago I slept during the day. And then slept for twelve hours, which would have been better if I hadn't then woken up dizzy.

So then I spent a week being dizzy. Which was just what I wanted when I was already feeling behind.

I went to see a ballet choreographed by my former teacher. Which I actually enjoyed (the only other time I went to the ballet I found watching the orchestra far more interesting than watching the dancing). It was interesting to see them perform movements we've learnt, but I got to see how they're supposed to look.

I did manage to see a house that I liked and now I am moving into it! I had a list of all the things to look at (so I know, for example, that the bathroom mirror is too high for me to see in, but at least isn't over the sink, so won't involve me standing on one foot and leaning over the sink to see in it), but I mostly just liked it. I am moving mid-August. I need to sort out some men with a van to pay to move my furniture, but any help anyone can offer would be appreciated as it's not likely to do my dizziness any help for a start... If anyone is curious I can message/email them the estate agent's listing.

I also signed up for femgenficathon, which is due around the time I'm moving. And 100 drabbles of summer, which is due a couple of weeks later. Neither of them have any penalties for defaulting, so we'll see. The main trouble I'm having with femgenficathon is which female character to write, there are so many to choose from...

I am on the last edit of my Big Bang. I will be done before Wimbledon.

Tennis! As great as it was to see some of the French Open I could have done without the camera work. Any time the players weren't playing a point the shot would change to the spectators and then move along and zoom in on a player and wave about and zoom in and out. I swapped to the radio commentary at one point because it was making me dizzy. I did hear the commentator remark that Federer looked calm after losing the first point in the tie-break. Which of course is nothing like how he usually is... I've seen a bit of Queens so far and I'm much preferring the camera work. And looking forward to going to the final on Sunday. Fingers crossed for nice weather (or at least no rain).

Permalink | No comments | Categories: Fan fic: Ill, Life, Moving, My fanfic, Sci-fi Big Bang, Tennis

Thursday I went to London and met up with just_ann_now, munditia, jay_of_lasgalen and some other people I didn't know. I managed to find the British Museum on the first attempt, although not the statue we were meeting by - that took me ten minutes of wondering around. Then after lunch me and munditia went in search of Foyles and nearly ended up at Forbidden Planet. In my defence the street did look familiar. Fortunately I had a map and there were maps on the street which told you where you were. I ended up buying the three Chalet School books written by other people that they had there.

So then I felt awful on Friday, which was why I'd taken the day off. I watched a lot of Castle. So much so that I have on episode to go, that I'll watch tonight, and I'd only just started season 3 on Friday...

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But I did sort out, with my sister, what Olympics tickets we want to apply for. We ended up with the maximum number of sessions at £1550 between us... But think we'll only get half of them, if we're lucky, so it won't cost too much. And it'll be the price of a holiday, so it'll be my holiday for the year.

In an effort to wake me up from the hot weather and holiday stupor, have a meme, that I saw on lost_spook's LJ:

Give me the name of a character and I will tell you the following:
1. How I FEEL about this character
2. All the people I ship romantically with this character
3. My non-romantic OTP for this character
4. My unpopular opinion about this character
5. One thing I wish would happen/had happened with this character in canon.

PS Doctor Who was good, I liked it. And if anyone's not following Stephen Fry on Twitter, who announced it this morning, John Sullivan (writer of Only Fools and Horses) has died. It's clearly that sort of week.

Permalink | No comments | Categories: Life, Meme: Life, Meme: fandom

June - I have tickets to the finals at Queens! I was expecting a stampede when they went on sale at 10am on Wednesday, but I could have got any tickets at all. And at 10.30 there were still tickets left for Centre Court on the Sunday. I've never been to Queens before and it will definitely make up for not going to Wimbledon this year.

March - this doesn't count as a day out, but I am going to see Chris Addison on his next tour. Yes, this is March 2012. But he's coming near here and how can I not go? And there shouldn't be anyone I know likely to get married then.

This still leaves April. I've been thinking about getting away from the Royal Wedding. Especially if there are likely to be street parties anywhere. And to celebrate my birthday. So a day out would be a good way to do it. But I can't go to London or to the seaside (since it's the start of the May Day bank holiday weekend) or anywhere full of tourists. So I think I might go to Bletchely Park since I've wanted to go for ages and there's a coach to Milton Keynes which is ridiculously cheap. I am quite happy to go on my own, but does anyone want to come along?

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• The bulb in the lounge going - which meant having to climb up and reach up to the trip switch which is above the front door
• Finding a house with a garage and discovering so many people are viewing it the landlord doesn't want any more people to see it
• My credit card company stopping my credit card due to suspicious activity. As far as I can tell, said suspicious activity was me donating to Comic Relief online.
• Getting a cold
• Being woken up at 8.30 GMT this morning by the builders next door re-fitting the bathroom
• Running out of ice cream
• Discovering my (red) Dalek keyring torch no longer has a gun. I think it's only a matter of time before it loses its sucker and eye too.

On the plus side:

• I have worked out how to get fanfic to display better on my ebook reader (I thought printing it to pdf would work, but the pdf printer can't cope with lines going over the page. But if I save the html page Calibre automatically converts them to epub, which works fine)
• I am going to see a house on Saturday (with an estate agent who sounded much better than the ones I rung earlier in the week)
• My new netbook worked out we'd changed the clocks this morning all on its own (the old one never did)
• I have caught up with Taggart - the last episode (which was on just over a month ago) had Steven Pacey in it, doing a Glaswegian accent
• I've changed to the doctors near where I live (rather than near where I used to live) and my new doctor is not only very nice, but also has had the same dizziness thing I've got. My previous doctor would ask me what sort of dizziness it is (me moving or the room moving), but this one told me how it feels emotionally and was exactly right.
• I have written the first draft of my Remix fic
• I have actually had the energy to read my twitter feed for the first time in over a week. I'm not feeling like I've missed anything mind you...

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First I found my Dalek 10 colour pen! It had got itself in the gap between the seat and the back of the driver's seat. Which explains why the seat was so uncomfortable all of a sudden. But doesn't explain how it got on the seat at all - I last saw it on the passenger seat. It must have jumped. But at least I have it back now.

Red ebook readers don't seem to be available online for love nor money. So I went to PCWorld on the basis they have one on display. And they don't have any in stock anywhere in the area. So I have ended up buying a silver one and a red cover. They should be here by the weekend, so I can play with it.

I have this morning off, which is very nice because I've had the chance to do a few things. Especially because I woke up at 7.30am...

I also posted a couple of Ian/Barbara fics this week. The Right Track I had the idea for at Christmas and wrote while I was avoiding writing any of my Big Bang fic. And then I wrote The Dalek Invasion of Johnny’s Wardrobe while I was still avoiding writing any of my Big Bang. They're both around 1000 words and utterly pointlessly fluffy, which has been a nice change to writing unending plot.

Permalink | No comments | Categories: Computers, Fan fic, Life: Ebook reader, Life, My fanfic

Good: It was very sunny and light when I got up
Bad: I had to scrape the ice off my car. It wasn't thick ice, but I am definitely moving to somewhere with a garage, I can't be doing with that any more.
Bad: Both my bosses are off during most of Wimbledon, which includes the date my tickets are for. No one else is allowed time off during that time.
Good: Work gave me money for having worked there for ten years (it's not actually quite ten years yet), so I am going to use it to buy myself a red ebook reader.
Bad: Where did the time go? I feel old. I don't want to be old. I want to be 22 again.
Bad: I took my new 10 colour Dalek pen into work and it vanished into thin air. I do it with pens all the time, but I thought this one was big enough not to lose.
Good: I wasn't too busy today.
Good: It was still light when I left work.

Permalink | No comments | Categories: Life, Work: Life, Work

Thursday: Coventry/University
I met hhertzof in Coventry to show her the sights. Which mostly consists of the cathedral, but we did walk all round the centre of it. Most importantly, I went all the way up the 180 stone steps on a narrow spiral staircase. Which you wouldn't think would be much to write home about, but the last time I tried a spiral staircase I couldn't manage any more than two storeys. But I was fine this time, although I don't think I could do that too much. I did take some photos.

Then we went to the university. I acted like a tourist, taking photos of bits of it and we had a drink in what is no longer the Airport, but is now called "the bar". I was surprised that my orange juice was so cheap until I remembered that the last time I bought a drink there it had vodka in it... Interestingly, although they've completely re-done the bar, the toilets have not changed at all.

Then we discovered you can't go through to the union, so we went outside. The door is now after Natwest. HSBC has changed into Satander and is inside the union, as is the chemists. I had to stand there for a while, trying to work out where I was because there was nothing familiar I could use to get my bearings. I eventually worked out that I really was standing in what used to be the Marketplace. I didn't look round it that much, but I think the Cooler is now the Copper Rooms. On the plus side, at least the koan was still there.

After that we met up with selenay936 in our room and worked out who was having which bed. And went to dinner. Which was exactly the same as last year - I could eat two things, but they had to get me a separate thing without the gravy/sauce. I didn't help stuff con packs on the basis that it involved walking round a table, and then went to bed early.

Friday
I had a restful day, apart from taking hhertzof to Forbidden Planet and ending up buying the first three Doctor Who stories on DVD. The first panel I actually went to was the first book one.

Book Thread 1: SF Shorts: The book panels make me feel like I've read very little SF, which is true. But they come up with some interesting ideas for books to read and without one in 2005 I'd never have read any Lois McMaster Bujold.

Writing Blake's 7 audio: This was really interesting and made me want to listen to them (they are all sitting on my PVR after BBC7 broadcast them). They said that the reason they didn't make a sequel was because not enough people remembered the original. The CDs were aimed at fans, but also at people who'd never seen Blake's 7. Simon Guerrier said he'd written one having only vague memories of bits of B7. Ben Aaronovitch rang him up in a panic giving him a week's deadline, which actually meant he needed it that year as Ben has the same thing about deadlines as Douglas Adams had. Simon had it done the next day! And then Ben made him make the science real.

Artificial Intelligence: This was an interesting discussion, but I can't remember any of it, apart from Dexter.

Starship Cool Wall: This was a fun panel. It included lots of shouting to try and get ships put on the right side of the cool wall (it went from supernova to uncool to cool to positively cryogenic). They had Space Stig to settle arguments, who was dressed in white and wearing a Storm Trooper helmet. But I still think Liberator should have been further over the cool side.

Atlantis and Universe: The new Voyager or Next Gen?: This was mostly the three panellists talking, and although they had interesting things to say, I much prefer panels with the audience getting to say more. They did go off on a big tangent about what they disliked about Atlantis, but did agree that Universe had a good premise and aren't using it. And there was universal dislike of the communication stones, despite there being a few instances when it was used well. Apparently Universe isn't technically cancelled.

And then it was midnight, so I went to bed.

Saturday
Rather than doing nothing until midday, I went to the Vices in fanfic panel. Which apparently was supposed to be at 10pm. There was lots of talk about what was a vice and commonly used ones (drinking, smoking, coffee drinking) and how vices tended to be put in because the characters do stressful jobs, but we don't want their vices to kill them.

At this point I sat in the bar and I want to say I spoke to altariel and Simon Guerrier and another bloke who's name I've forgotten, but they were all writers and talking about writing. So I just listened, since I didn't feel qualified to be in the conversation. But it was interesting all the same. And I got altariel to sign her Doctor Who book.

Why is new Dr Who more popular than old Dr Who?: The panel all agreed right at the start that it's not. There were graphs to prove it. They pointed out, rightly, that even when it wasn't on people knew what a TARDIS was and what a Dalek was, even if they hadn't seen Doctor Who. And it's just as soapy now as then, it's just that soaps are also more soapy.

After a break for lunch and signing up for Redemption 13, where I failed to remember my address (fortunately they could look me up in the computer and copy my Red 11 registration), I went to Does listening to fans make a show better or worse?. I think the conclusion was that it's a bad idea because the fans are just a small proportion of the number of people watching.

Tips for playing Scrabble was useful, although some of the things they came up with I'd worked out on my own. I'm still upset you don't get bonus points for cool words.

Poi workshop: I'd wanted to do this last time, but it clashed with something else I wanted to go to more. I think. So I tried it this time and enjoyed it. It's harder than it looks, which can be said of a lot of things. I was just about getting the weave when we had to stop. But I bought the poi and discovered our hotel room had just enough space to practise in. As does my lounge if I move the dining room table. I can now nearly do it for quite a while before I hit myself in the head because I'm not doing it vertically enough.

Cliches in fanfic: I remember this being interesting, but can't remember what was discussed at all.

After that I went to the bar. I think. It all blurs together after a while.

Sunday
Writing bad Blake's 7 fiction was hilarious. We had to fill in the blanks in a story. I was useless at coming up with suggestions, but other people came up with some great ones.

After that I went to the dealer's room to pay Richard for the poi and then ended up going to the charity auction, which was in the same room. And then ended up buying a Star Trek glass (which sounds good until I tell you it has Nero on it). But it was only £1.50. I escaped before I could buy any more to play pass the hotel key with my roommates.

I then fulfilled my resolution for the day to talk to some new people. And then went to get the guests' autographs and managed to go down there after the session ended, so ended up getting them to sign my CDs as they were standing at the book stall chatting.

Worst SF show of all time showed me that I don't watch that much TV and perhaps it's just as well...

Man of Iron script reading: this is always the highlight of the con. It's a Blake's 7 script by Paul Darrow and two years is long enough to forget how awful it is. You might think some of series 4 is bad, but this is far worse. Fortunately, the script reading makes it hilarious. The sexy Servalan this year was disturbing (in a good way).

Computers in SF. I really enjoyed this panel. We collectively came up with names from computers in SF. Then we classified them into whether they could move about on their own or not. Then into whether they had free will or not. Which involved some discussion on the part of some of the computers. And then whether they had only one function or lots. Which led to the conclusion that the way to create a homicidal computer is to give it free will and only one function.

Then we stayed up at the Dead Dog Party. At least until I realised I was too dizzy to sit up without falling over. At which point I discovered the lift stopping and starting produced a really horrible sensation. Unfortunately we were on the sixth floor and the stairs made me dizzy from going round and round.

Monday
It seemed like the whole con decamped to the waiting room on Platform 1. But, on the Monday after the con two years ago I was coming down with labyrinthitis and felt dizzy. This year, the Monday after the con I felt better than I had two years previously, which was amazing.

Tuesday: Doctor Who Experience
I met shinyjenni and hhertzof in London. We first ate Chinese (there's a Chinese in Earl's Court that does Beed Ho Fun (noodles I can eat!) with no sauce. Result!) and took photos of the TARDIS at Earl's Court. Then we got to Olympia and discovered you have to go up in a lift...

Then we did the experience part, where you can't take photos. Basically, you have to save the Doctor. So you get to walk through Starship UK, fly the TARDIS (how exciting was that?), get threatened by Daleks (two of them were red so that was ok), walk through a forest that apparently had Angels, but I didn't see any (also had UNIT symbols, which I missed), and get threatened by more monsters in 3D.

And then we took lots of photos of everything.

Then we looked round the shop. I was determined not to buy anything, and ended up buying a program, a Dalek keyring torch and a ten colour pen with a Dalek at the top. The person who served us said it had been a nightmare last week when it was half term. Because we'd gone on a weekday in term time, it was nice and quiet.

After that I had mandarin sorbet and a really nice smoothie at Patisserie Valerie and accidentally bought two books in Foyles. So that was more of an expensive day out than I planned...

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But mostly, I feel that I ought to post today, of all days, because today is the two year anniversary of me being ill. Which is not really something to celebrate, but is something to mark.

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