SPEW Babble #44

[welshdevondragon]

The thing is Slumdog Millionaire wasn't trying to be "India". Any film that tried to do that would obviously fail. It was trying to be about Mumbai I suppose, but still I think it's a good film. Which bits did they Britishise? (It was a British film! I say in a rare moment of patriotism) I know Dev Patel's accent was occasionally off, but I already had a soft spot for him from Skins so I let that pass.

You're in Gujarat! I really liked Gujarat- I stayed with some family friends in Bhuj. Although I was there in May, so basically could only go out in the early mornings/ evenings before collapsing from the heat. I really want to back when it's cooler though.

When you've just discovered a chaptered fic and start reading it, do you review each chapter as you read it or do you wait until the end? Does this irritate you if someone does that with your own chaptered fics?


Mostly I review it once I realise that it's good enough for me to want to finish it. So a few chapters in, and then I'll leave a review every few chapters or so. With my own stories I'm just so grateful to get the reviews I don't really mind. Although I do love it when someone reviews every chapter, like Soraya is doing for Thin Red Lines, and Jess did for Bryter Later. When I write/ when most people write they put so much effort into each word, that it's nice when someone's clearly read it and cared about the details, and just got what you're trying to do, which is much clearer from reviews for each chapter than a general review at the end.

On an extremely random note, the weather is gorgoeus here. What's it like down your neck of the woods?

Grey skies today, but it was gorgeous yesterday. However there's a place on the site where I live called "The Woods" where the wi-fi still works and I'm sitting there now.

How did you get started reading fanfiction? Reviewing it?

I can't remember. I think it was after the GOF film came out and i was poking around MNFF and just clicked n fanfiction. I left a few squeal sort of reviews, but really only recently have started reviewing properly.

This is something I think I asked in the Gryffindor Tower, but since some of you people aren't allowed there ( ) I'll ask it here as well.

Have you ever written about OCs/ an OC and canon character in immense detail and then suddenly heard a song which describes their character/ relationship perfectly in about two minutes and far more succinctly than you've managed? Or is it just me?

[MerryD]

*pokes SPEWlings*

I was sick. What's your excuse?

The thing is Slumdog Millionaire wasn't trying to be "India".

It just sucks that when I told people I was going to India for my senior year they'd ask me if I'd seen Slumdog Millionaire in a way that suggested I was going to be living in a slum and caught up in gangster wars. (I mean, I am pretty gangsta, but you know...)

Yet another example of the stunning worldy knowledge of Americans, I suppose. >.>

oops, my bad, didn't realise it was British. Um, like the amount of English spoken in the film, the name of the game show, the way they count (hundred thousand, million, billion, etc don't exist here it's all lakhs and crores)... I don't know. Just the general feeling of the movie was very western. *shrugs*

When you've just discovered a chaptered fic and start reading it, do you review each chapter as you read it or do you wait until the end? Does this irritate you if someone does that with your own chaptered fics?

That depends on a lot of things. How long the fic is, if it's completed, if it's a WIP, how good it is, who the author is, how long it's been since it was updated... I rarely review every chapter of a story though. I usually review the first or the most recently published. There are a lot of stories I would like to review every chapter of, but I get too far into the story and am too selfish to take the time to review.

I rarely get irritated at reviewers.

On an extremely random note, the weather is gorgoeus here. What's it like down your neck of the woods?

Hot. Sunny. Humid, but scorching. For you Celsius fans it's 39˚ today and those in Fahrenheit, 102˚. Woo!

I'll come back for the other TQs later.

eee! Someone added the banner Jess (er...lullaby BANG!Jess) made for me to the BA Squee thread. I love when that happens.

--Mere

[jenny b]

I have been sick and snowed under with uni work/catching up with friends/being generally busy. I'm on my "study break" from uni (known to the masses of students as the 2 WEEK HOLIDAY WOOO) but I've barely had time to do homework! I've been busy seeing all the friends I didn't see during the past six weeks because I've been busy with uni. >.>

But rest assured, I didn't forget about you guys and now I'm all caught up on SPEW things. Sorry about the delay in assigning buddies (thanks Hannah!)

On an extremely random note, the weather is gorgoeus here. What's it like down your neck of the woods?

FREEEEEEEEZING. It's just starting to get into winter and the past few days have been below 20˚C. (Convert it to Fahrenheit yourself, I'm too lazy. >.>) Which is probably warm for some of you but I'm from sunny Australia

Also, I know there are more than five SPEWers, so could the rest of you stop hiding and pretty please do my SPEW survey? I've had some great responses, but I don't want to make any changes until I'm sure of what everyone in SPEW wants.

In other news, my boyfriend is planning a dinner party for this weekend, and I'm not exactly sure why since he rarely cooks and has never thrown a dinner party in his life. He's acting like a housewife all of a sudden. Not that I'm complaining!

Does anyone have any Easter plans?

[welshdevondragon]

]It's just starting to get into winter and the past few days have been below 20˚C. (Convert it to Fahrenheit yourself, I'm too lazy. >.>) Which is probably warm for some of you but I'm from sunny Australia

Under 20 degrees is cold? It was eighteen here today- that's t-shirt wearing weather!

As for my Easter plans, they are revision, revision, revision (WRITING), revision, (SAILING- am so excited) and then DOCTOR WHO. Really, it's nice to be home and with someone as Doctor Who obsessed as I am (i.e my thirteen year old sister). Well, not home. I'm in our holiday home in Devon (I know, we're really lucky to have one- it's beautiful here) although I'm on my own tonight. Which is slightly surreal since this has always been a place where we had more people then beds, but my sisters had been here a week already and were missing London life, and my uncles don't get off work until tomorrow morning, when they'll meet me here and we're going to our boat! (Yes, lucky to have a boat as well- it's my uncle's and was my grandad's)

In other words, apart from revision, my easter is looking pretty nice. Oh, and I'm fleeing London for the Royal Wedding.

Do the other British people here care/ do the non-British people care about the wedding?

In other questions-why do bursts of creativity always happen at the most awkward times?

Does anyone know anything about the struggle of the orders in Rome, because it's confusing me. A lot.

My family left half an hour ago, and I'm already rambling online to make up for the massive silence (although it was nice for the first ten minutes because my sister has taken to calling me pig, and telling me I belong in a sty. I know she loves me really, so it doesn't bother me. Much.)

Sorry for rambling, what's happening with everyone else?

[jenny b]

Under 20 degrees is cold? It was eighteen here today- that's t-shirt wearing weather!

Haha! It was eighteen here a few days ago and I wore my winter coat. >.>

As for the Royal Wedding - sadly, I'm ridicuously excited for it. I don't really get into following celebrities, but classy famous people like Kate Middleton are just a breath of fresh air. Plus I absolutely love weddings. I'm going to a cocktail party to watch it - it's for charity, which is nice. But they want us to dress up in wedding dresses which I'm not too keen on! Plus my boyfriend would never come with me if I wore one (he refuses to even walk into a jewellery store with me in case someone thinks we're looking at rings. ) I think I will stick to cocktail attire. I'm not that obsessed with it!

And I know what you mean about the creativity bug, Alex. I get random urges to write when I'm all cosied up in bed ready to go to sleep! And usually laziness wins out so I don't bother writing anything down and curse myself the next morning when I can't remember my brilliant idea. It's so frustrating!

Sadly I know nothing about Rome. I can do the French Revolution, and WWII in quite a lot of detail, but that's about as far as my history knowledge goes. >.> It's the two topics I studied in Year 12 History.

[babewithbrains]

Today it was 25 degrees C and I was sweating like mad. Well, not that much, but still enough for me to pong a little, and that was bad enough. Alex is right about 18 degrees being hot, though. I could never, ever wear a coat in such lovely weather!!

And I'm not a big fan of weddings. The only reason I'm happy about Prince William getting married is that we get the day off. Yay!! And then I'm going on work experience, whoopee! My hours are just beautiful: 10am to 3pm, and earlier when there's not much work. Plus, I'm near so many chip shops, I'll be as fat as Winnie the Pooh by the end of it

I have weird bursts of creativity all the time. Like today, on the bus. I was just listening to music while pretending to listen to my mum nattering away and just staring out of the window and then inspiration struck, but, dammit, I didn't have a pen or notebook or ANYTHING. It was awful, because I thought of all these wonderful ideas and now I've half-forgotten them. But it's okay, because my mummy bought me a beautiful dress from this really expensive boutique, so it kind of made up for it

/ramble

[welshdevondragon]

Originally posted by babewithbrains

like today, on the bus. I was just listening to music while pretending to listen to my mum nattering away and just staring out of the window and then inspiration struck, but, dammit, I didn't have a pen or notebook or ANYTHING.

I hate it when that happens! I do usually have a pen on me, but if I don't have a notebook I often write on anything available- a tissue, a cereal packet, my jeans...

Also- I just sent my beta the last two chapters of Thin Red Lines!!! I am impossibly excited that someone else will finally have read the entire, finished story. Although it will be a few weeks/ months maybe before it's all on archives but still. It's finished, I've been writing it for months, and I don't hate it. I love writing I'll go back to revision now whilst still with my constant fantasy of dropping out (quite possibly only to see the look on my family's faces because I'm sure if they were to guess which child would drop out I'd be the last on the list) and living in a bedsit in South London whilst writing. Hmmm....

[MerryD]

Wheeeee, I win! 38 today, which is quite a relief from last week when it was 40 every. single. day.

Don't worry, Jen, when I go back to the States next month it'll be about 16-20 ish and I'll be freezing while everyone else is running around in shorts. >.>

I don't particularly care about the royal wedding, but I do think they make an incredibly cute couple and it's such a sweet real life fairytale story.

Oh, random inspiration happens to me all the time! I have so many scraps of paper with random notes on them that don't even make sense anymore...

Hope you all are well.

[welshdevondragon]

The Royal Wedding over, onto more important things. Like Doctor Who! Cannot wait- eight minutes to go until the second parter.

Also- has anyone seen the DH part two trailer yet? It looks pretty amazing. My sister (via tumblr) found someone who had uploaded the a whole five minutes from the film (it's gone now) with John Hurt (who I think is brilliant) and it was really well done.

Can't wait for July/ exams to be over/ sea and sunlight and working in a local theatre. I suppose there's quite a few of us in exam hell at the moment- mine start on Tuesday- what about everyone else?

Alex

[jenny b]

You guys make me so HAPPY when it's the end of the month and I don't have to chase up any reviews or monthly activities!! Gold stars for you all!! And an extra one for Dinny for doing her drabble on an environmental issue. I didn't think anyone would actually attempt that!

But I do come with some sad news. Two of our members are leaving - Hannah is going on hiatus due to work commitments, and Bob (the other Hannah) is leaving for good, to move onto bigger and better things. So for now it'll just be me to rule you with my evil ways! Which sounds like fun ( ) but I will be super busy so I really hope you guys can keep up with this handing-everything-in-on-time business.

Also, Alex, I loved the Royal Wedding! I didn't really like the media frenzy that surrounded it but they're just such a lovely couple and I'm so happy for them. But I just love weddings in general. I'm a bit of a romantic

DH TRAILEEEEEEEEER!!! What did everyone think?! Personally I was a bit annoyed at the Harry-and-Voldy-jumping-off-a-cliff scene. Where was that in the book? *glares and sharpens stick*

No exams for me - I still have another month or so before my semester finishes and I don't usually have exams anyway. The joys of being a Media/English student