Pebbles in the water

The sun is shining, it is a glorious May day, and I only have to work for one more week!  You know when you have that incredible lightness-of-being feeling?

That.  Just that.

I am taking my daughter out to a gorgeous National Trust house with a huge woodland walk, there may be some highly-frowned-upon paddling in the little stream, and I'm sure there will be an enormous unhealthy ice cream at some point. 

I have decided my self-imposed hiatus from all fannish and lj-based activities can be relaxed a bit, as it's been over a year since I pulled an all-nighter reading a fic that I just could not put down.  It has been a hell of a year, family-and-friends-wise, both good and bad but mainly bad.  But things are now back on track and apart from the usual too-many-bills-not-enough-money, everything is looking up.

And to celebrate being 'back', I have to rec Dies Irae by AlchemyAlice. This is the way the Apocalypse should have been. 

.... no, not the kind Sam broke.

We went on a boat yesterday to see the seals!  OoooOOO they were gorgeous.  A whole bunch (colony?  pack? wtf do you call a load of seals?)  It was FREEZING out there, but we circled just off the beach for nearly an hour and took loads of photos, and a seal hit the water and came up to LOOK AT US CRAZY HOOMANS.

And there was one itty bitty baby on the beach, waaay up there hiding behind Mom.  It was cute in the extreme but I couldn't get a decent close-up shot because the boat was pitching.

SEALS FTW!!!!!!!!!

Aaaand now I'm waiting for my friend to get back from the dentist, and we are going to sit down with coffee and chocolate and watch Sam, Interrupted, which I have to download and burn to DVD and watch DAYS after y'all because, you know, our TV SUCKS and is only just starting to show the FIRST EP OF SEASON 5.  Which also means I have to avoid my flist from Thursday til Monday because I don't wanna be spoiled.

Grr.

"Dear UK TV,

Get with the program.  BUY THE DAMN SERIES STRAIGHT AWAY, NOT SIX MONTHS LATE.

Yours irritatedly,

Lorin."

BTW, did you know that if you call the radio station whilst en route to the beach to get on a Seal Trip boat, and tell them it's your daughter's 12th birthday and the trip is a treat for her, and they then ANNOUNCE THIS including her full name and wish her a happy birthday ON AIR and also send you a personal text wishing you a great time and hoping you don't fall in (!), apparently this is NOT COOL and said daughter will be in a huff all day.

Hahahahahaha.  I WIN.

We took a weekend off and went down to our caravan at Butlins (I don't know the US equivalent: it's a cheesy holiday camp with Redcoats and catchphrases and hundreds of screaming kids).  But apparently they have Spring Festival for the next two weeks - no 'regular' holidaymakers, just church groups and Christian fellowships and - sheesh.  So there we were, wandering through a hall packed with crucifixes and Christian booksellers and people with bibles discussing the finer points of scripture, and there's me with a pentagram necklace getting glared at (because obviously I'm going to HELL and of course I must be a terrible influence on the eleven-year-old holding my hand).  Nobody actually accosted me, for which I am eternally grateful. 

Aaaand then we were driving home this evening, hubby and daugher in the front seats and me in the back with my mp3 player, listening happily to poisontaster 's Light Verse read by nu_breed which is just incredible (if you haven't heard it, you are seriously missing out - find it here), and they had the music up loud so I had my player on LOUDER so I could hear it.  I had just gotten to one of the good parts, and the word "cock" was coming up (hee!  ok, so I'm shallow...) over and over again in nu_breed 's amazingly dirty voice, when I suddenly became aware that I wasn't straining to hear over the music.  So I opened my eyes and hit 'pause', and there was hubby staring at me in the rearview mirror, with a sort of confused look on his face, saying "what ARE you listening to?".  Because apparently the CD had ended and they could hear - well, SOMETHING.  I told them it was Needful Things, while hoping to hell daughter couldn't actually make out the words (she couldn't, I made sure to check when we got home!), and hubby said something about Stephen King, which, well - yeah.  That was kind of the idea, and I didn't even have to lie.

And of course a few minutes later (with the volume turned way, way down), I did my usual trick and fell asleep in the backseat.  Some time later the car went round a sharp bend and I woke up with a jolt to the words "...feel so good. God, Dean, feel so good..."

Which kind of made the whole weekend a whole lot better.

Yay!  Back from vacation and exhausted, but OMG we had a fantastic time!  Looking forward to catching up on all the SPN finale codas - I just KNOW everyone's been in a writing frenzy. 

Driving home, I was navigating, and this MADE MY DAY OMG:



Funny thing was, I tried to find it on an online map, and they all put Dean as somewhere to the southeast.  So y'all get a fuzzy photo of my road atlas instead of a nice clear pic.  Don't you just love British placenames?

I don't care if my map is wrong.  *loves*

ETA: in case the pic is TOO fuzzy, yes it DOES say "Dean" just north of Winchester!

TITLE: The Mark That Still Remains
AUTHOR: oriundus 
CHARACTERS: Sam, Dean.
RATING: (Gen) PG-13
WARNINGS: none
WORD COUNT: 1,121
SUMMARY: Just why exactly is Dean so attached to the Impala?
A/N: Supernatural is as much about the car as it is about the boys. Title from Mama Said by Metallica, which is the closest description of Dean I’ve ever heard in music.
Thanks to dragojustine  for an awesome beta and much comma removal; thanks also to antigonesgift  for the amazingly quick beta and the squeeing and general encouragement!

( The sky is darkening to black... )

TITLE: No One Ever Died From Using Too Much Lube
AUTHORS: thenyxie and oriundus
PAIRING: Sam/Dean
RATING: NC-17
WORDS: 1570
NOTES: CRACK!  TOTALLY!  Ignore whatever thenyxie   says, it is ALL HER FAULT.
SUMMARY: Sam and Dean have been messing around for months, but have yet to go all the way. And then, one day, Sam comes home with an book on "How to"... hilarity ensues!

Sam clears his throat, reads aloud. "Chapter Two: The Anus, Getting to Know Your New Friend (Or, a Rose By Any Other Name...)."

I've read half a dozen SPN fics in the past week where one or the other of the boys has an injury needing stitches, and THEN they go and jump in the shower.  Heck, I even read one where one of them was *bandaged* and then immediately got in the shower.  But I figure that was just sloppy writing.

Now I know "heading into the shower" is one of those fanon things, heralding the end of a conversation or showing one of the prettybrothers is pissed at the other, and it's obvious that they end up covered in some pretty rank slime and suchlike in their line of work, but is it REALLY ok to get stitches wet?  I mean, is "keep the stitches dry and covered" one of those things that the doctor tells you "just because", or is there actually a medical reason for it?

For that matter, should ALL wounds be kept "dry and covered" or not?  I've got to admit, I've NEVER kept dressings on as long as the doc tells me.  I have this insatiable curiosity as to what is going on under the bandages.  And I have always showered when I have stitches, and they've never, like, disintegrated or scarred unexpectedly badly or anything.

OK, now I have to go catch two cats for their annual checkup and shots.  And they are going to be pissed at me all day, and like as not, one of them will pee on my slippers out of sheer hatred, and then come curl up with me on the bed tonight for a fuss.  I love my cats.