offcntr | Network

Day 24: Alibi editing, but that's fine, since the 24th is the main Christmas celebration in Sweden. How about you?

Tally:
( Read more... )
Day 23:

luzula,

trobadora,

sylvanwitch,

sanguinity,

goddess47,

chanter1944,

cornerofmadness,

china_shop,

badly_knitted,

chestnut_pod

Day 24:

luzula,

china_shop

Bonus farm news: Put my chainsaw lesson to use by cutting down our Christmas tree. : D

china_shop

I received an utterly gorgeous, poetic post-canon moment between Keema and Jun, and I love every single word. If you know the canon, please check it out!!

After the Moon Rose Anew (1048 words) by Anonymous
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: The Spear Cuts Through Water - Simon Jimenez
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Keema of the Daware Tribe/Jun Ossa
Characters: Keema of the Daware Tribe (The Spear Cuts Through Water), Jun Ossa
Additional Tags: Post-Canon, Established Relationship, Introspection
Summary:

After the curtains close on the Inverted Theater, there are still moments of interest in the lives of these two young heroes who are no longer gods but mortals seeking contentment in their second lives.

This is one such moment.

yuletidemods posting in

yuletide_admin

Hello, Yuletiders–as you may have noticed, the anonymous setting on the Yuletide collection, which should hide all author names until reveals on January 1st, does not seem to be working as expected, and shortly after our planned works reveals, we had an unplanned reveal of author names. We’re very sorry for this unexpected breaking of anonymity!

We’re reaching out to AO3 to help us resolve the problem. In the meantime, we have updated all works manually, and author names should now be hidden again. If you notice we have missed any, please reach out to us privately at yuletideadmin@gmail.com.

Again, our apologies–and we hope you enjoy the collection!

Yuletide Madness is scheduled to reveal at 9 PM UTC on 25 December, but this may be delayed if necessary to ensure author anonymity.

ETA: We know many of you have received email notifications to say, "The collection maintainers of Yuletide 2025 have changed the status of your work [work] to anonymous..." This is a result of us updating them manually to hide author names, in order to achieve the same effect you would expect from reveals in an ordinary Yuletide. Sorry for the confusion! You can safely ignore these notifications; we will reveal author names on January 1st, manually if we have to.

petra

Galavant:

Note the part where this is tagged as Original Music Composition! I GOT A GALAVANT SONG FOR YULETIDE!

There is a bug de-anonymizing the collection, so with any luck, my author will be willing to post more than the sheet music and save me from my current predicament of "I can sorta sight-read but not that well." I love the Madalena voice in this, so perfectly discontent with her amazing lot! and there's MUSIC!

Madalena's Ballad of Vast Success (1264 words) by Anonymous
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Galavant (TV)
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Madalena (Galavant), Brief ensemble Galavant cast appearance
Additional Tags: Character Study, Inspired by the song What Am I Feeling (Galavant), Original music composition, Post-Canon
Summary:

Madalena stood on her balcony, in her castle perched high on a cliffside overlooking her vast and endless empire. "This is the best life has ever been. Everything I wanted is now mine... Yet sometimes it seems that there's something out there that eludes me, something I can neither buy nor take. But that's crazy! Who would dare deny me? Deceive or defy me? None at all! Well, almost none!"

Galavant 2:

The share button isn't working on Tad Cooper, a Life, which is an adorable summation of the life and times of Tad Cooper, as one can imagine from the title. I enjoyed the POV the author chose!

Slow Horses + Rivers of London:

My other Yuletide author took me up on my deep and soulful desire for Slow Horses + Rivers of London, and does great things with the interaction of law enforcement and Regent's Park, and the various characters. Spoilers for Diana Taverner's fate if you've only done the first book/show, but nothing that will surprise anyone. I love the way the mundane and magical intersect here:

The Spirit of Regent's Park (2370 words) by Anonymous
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Slow Horses (TV), Rivers of London - Ben Aaronovitch
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Thomas Nightingale, Diana Taverner, Jackson Lamb (Slow Horses), Emma Flyte, Molly Doran
Additional Tags: Canon-Typical Violence, Crossovers & Fandom Fusions, Yuletide Treat, add some magic to your spy show
Summary:

Newly minted First Desk Diana Taverner visits the Folly to find out who this Thomas Nightingale fellow is, and learns a few things about London that are closer to home than she expects.

*

What I wrote:

2 stories!

Spot either and I'll write you a drabble. One of them is so me it hurts and the other is less obviously so but still extremely Petra.

Current Mood: pleased
Current Music: Bear McCreary and sight reading

soemand

At the in‑laws’ place, the outside world barely exists—one flickering bar of service, if I’m lucky. The Bay of Fundy stretches out in front of us, grey and endless, the tide doing its slow, ancient breathing.

Inside, the little one is on high alert, glued to the window, waiting for a certain jolly, oversized visitor to make his grand entrance. Every creak is a possibility. Every gust of wind is a sign.
Disconnected, quiet, and oddly perfect.

yuletidemods posting in

yuletide_admin

Yuletide 2025 Collection Is Live Here!

Enjoy 1539 works in 992 fandoms! (The number will go up as wranglers canonize fandoms - this will take a little time, though.)

The reveals process takes a little while to work in a collection of this size; if a story in the collection is still a mystery work an hour after opening, please let us know.

Finding works
You can find your own gifts on your AO3 gifts page: https://archiveofourown.org/users/YOUR-NAME-HERE/gifts, or by searching the box at the top of the collection works page for the full name you signed up with, or by checking your email if you get email notifications from AO3. Note: your email notifications may bundle together, and it might look like you only got one gift, when in fact you got more.

You can browse the collection by tags or by fandoms. Some fandoms are new and may not show up immediately (wranglers are working on this) or where you expect them; please check labels such as Original Work, 19th Century Historical RPF, Object and Concept Anthropomorphism, and Unspecified Fandom. More info about Unspecified Fandom here.

Anonymity
Yuletide is an anonymous exchange until creator reveals January 1. Please don't give away what you've written. When logged in, you can, if you want, reply to comments on your own works, and you will show up as Anonymous Creator until the authors of the collection are revealed.

Commenting!
Please comment on your gift(s) to let your writer(s) know you appreciate them. We also recommend commenting far and wide to spread the comment joy around! You may enjoy the challenge of a comment bingo card [update for this year's link!].

AO3 changed default comment settings last year. If you want to make sure people can comment on your gifts when they aren't logged in, you may need to change a setting on your work. More information here, under 'Your comment settings'.

Recs
Making work recommendations is a tradition. Please see more information at the participant community (

yuletide) about where you can post your recs.

Madness
For those still writing, the 2025 Yuletide Madness collection will stay open for new stories to be posted for 24 hours. It will close for posting, and open for reading, at 9pm UTC 25 December. If you're looking for prompts, there's a roundup of links here.

Problems
If there is something wrong with your gift or you have another concern, please contact the mods at yuletideadmin@gmail.com.

the_shoshanna

My low-key obsession with Heated Rivalry continues, and a local friend and I are planning to marathon the whole show on Boxing Day, whee! She will have already seen the final episode, because she is high-key obsessed and has been watching each one when it drops at midnight; I'm not that gonzo and will probably wait to watch it with her, thus also giving her the fun of watching me watch it. At least, I find that incredibly fun, so I hope she does too -- and I got to show

dorinda the first two episodes a couple of days ago, which was wonderful!

Other than that, we're not doing much for the holidays. Geoff and I lit Hanukkah candles; he makes me actually light them, because it's traditionally the role of the woman of the house, and yeah that's very gendered but I mean so are we. And we both sing the blessing. We went to one sister's family Hanukkah meal, and are not going to the other sister's huge Christmas party; we're just going to have a quiet night in. And I'm roasting a duck, a thing I have done only once before!

(And then the next day I get AAAAAAAALL THE AMAZING TV, of course, and Geoff's on his own. He remains politely a- and be-mused at my hyperfocus.)

🇨🇦 "Canadian Economy Rallies as #1 Export Now Heated Rivalry" 🇨🇦

Oh, and we're having a couple of friends over for a NYE dinner. They have non-overlapping dietary restrictions, so I need to think about the menu! I suspect we're looking at roast squash and a salad of some kind...

In other news, I'm reading a book called How to Winter, which a friend recommended to me. I've never liked cold and generally don't enjoy winter (therefore I moved to Canada, because I'm also very smart), so anything that might make it less unpleasant is worth checking out! It's mostly about cultivating a mindset that focuses on the good in the season, and also about letting it affect you appropriately -- like, if winter dark means you want to sleep more and do different things than you do in summer light and warmth, that's okay, it's natural, don't fight it. It all makes perfect sense and yet I'm still grumpy about winter? On the other hand, I am trying to relax into the season a little more, and I think it's working, but it's also not as cold here as it might be and I rarely have to fight the weather in any way (I don't commute, e.g.), so maybe I'm playing on easier mode now. My SAD light helps with the lack of sunlight, so it's really being cold that I find hard. I've started wearing thermal leggings in the house; we have the heat at a comfortable enough level, but I'm really sensitive to drafts. (My desk faces two windows, and even with the leggings I still sometimes pull a heated throw over my legs.) And I think the leggings have made a huge difference.

I finished the most recent series of Shetland and

have spoilery reactions under the cut.

unfortunately I was extremely unimpressed. The revelation about Ed being involved in drug trafficking came completely out of the blue; no ground had been laid for it at all. I really didn't like the Bad Seed mentality behind everybody going "ooh, there were concerning reports about Stevie while she was in care" -- like, no shit a traumatized child ripped away from every familiar place and face "was manipulative," in other words she tried to regain some control of her environment and didn't trust adults? And just a lot of things that I can more or less accept as required by TV crime drama logistics but are still dumb, like Tosh and Ruth accepting that the AirBnB guy correctly identified Stevie in Edie's garden, when that was like the third version of the story he'd told (why should they suddenly believe him this time?) and he was some distance away, in the dark; at first he said "it was probably a man" and now he confidently declares "it was definitely this woman," and they just go yup, hard proof that she was there? Sorry, no. (I mean, she was there, but there's no way they should take his statement as proof of that, and they do.) Morag behaved like an idiot. And BILLY WOULD NEVER. I haven't looked but would not be at all surprised to find that the actor wanted off the show (is he the only person other than Tosh who's been there since series 1?) and this was the clumsy way they decided to write him out. I finished the series annoyed, and I really hope the next one is better. Preferably with a new writer.

icon_uk posting in

scans_daily

...it's that time of year when there is a crisp chill in the air, a gentle hint of longer days to come, Santa Claus gagging a trussed-up Robin, and Batman proving that his claim to be “The World’s Greatest Detective” might be a little optimistic… (I mean… it’s fricking SANTA CLAUS Bruce!)

(It's from Batman #33 which came out in December 1945, so 80 years ago now!!)

ratomira

Watch on YouTube

ysabetwordsmith

What you eat could decide the planet’s future

What we put on our plates may matter more for the climate than we realize. Researchers found that most people, especially in wealthy countries, are exceeding a “food emissions budget” needed to keep global warming below 2°C. Beef alone accounts for nearly half of food-related emissions in Canada. Small changes—less waste, smaller portions, and fewer steaks—could add up to a big climate win.

( Read more... )

Current Mood: busy

conuly posting in

agonyaunt

Dear Carolyn: I’m a year out from chemo and still officially cancer-free. Also, my hair is back to normal — yay. To celebrate, I had it dyed a beautiful violet shade, my favorite color.

Now my dad is giving me so much grief about it. He keeps asking why I need everyone to notice me and ask about my cancer. I don’t care if anyone notices my hair; I did it for me. The color makes me smile every time I look in the mirror. And if anyone does mention the color, I tell them I did it because I like the color purple. I never mention cancer at all. Why would I want to talk about that? I feel good, I can run and hike again, and I want to focus on things like that.

My dad refuses to accept my explanation, because he believes everyone who does anything he considers to be out of the ordinary does it “to get attention” or to “freak people out.” I can’t seem to convince him how stupid that is, that people do things because they want to and it makes them happy.

Can you think of a way to get through to him? I’m really tired of having to listen to him criticize my hair every time he sees me.

— Celebrating

( Read more... )

loganberrybunny

Public

327/365: Confused car?
Click for a larger, sharper image
As usual, I'll be completely offline on Christmas Day, so first of all I wish everyone a very Merry Christmas! I hope for all of you it's as good as it can be. :)

As I won't be here tomorrow, the 365 photo I take will be uploaded on Boxing Day, along with the one I take that day. This amused me in a small car park today: it's clearly a Mercedes, but apparently it thinks it's a Jaguar. :P

Current Mood: amused

ysabetwordsmith

Today is partly cloudy and mild.

I fed the birds. I've seen a mixed flock of sparrows and house finches.

I put out water for the birds.

EDIT 12/24/25 -- We hacked up most of the remaining brushpile in the parking lot, and some of the older one by the driveway, feeding those into the chipper.

EDIT 12/24/25 -- We moved the new mulch to the mulch pile.

EDIT 12/24/25 -- I did a bit of work around the patio. As it is getting dark, I am done for the night.

Current Mood: busy

ysobel posting in

agonyaunt

Dear Miss Manners: I have long been troubled by the carol “We Wish You a Merry Christmas,” specifically the intimation that if we don’t give the uninvited guests their figgy pudding, they “won’t go.”

How are we to address this request? I don’t want to be ungrateful for their wishes, but think that their insistence is a bit beyond what is considered polite and reasonable. Can you advise how to proceed?

What was that? Miss Manners couldn’t quite hear you over the ruckus made by the geese a-laying, the calling birds, the French hens and the turtledoves. The partridge, fortunately, appears to have passed out under the pear tree.

Current Mood: amused

soemand

Bonne et heureuse année! J’vous envoie mes meilleurs souhaits pour la santé, l’amour, pis ben d’la joie. Qu’la nouvelle année vous apporte tout c’que vous espérez, pis encore plus!

sineala

What I Just Finished Reading

Nothing. Working on it.

What I'm Reading Now

Comics Wednesday!

( 1776 #2, Marvel Winter Break Special 2025 #1, Will of Doom #1, X-Vengers #3 )

What I'm Reading Next

I woke up this morning to find that

lysimache had gifted me an ebook entitled Here Comes the Pizzer: The Found Poetry of Baseball Broadcasts, by Eric Poulin, so I guess that's what we'll be doing dramatic readings of aloud for Christmas Eve. While eating pizza.

The title is a reference to this extremely classic Red Sox broadcast moment. Here comes the pizza.

(We usually read the Christmas story in Greek, Latin, or Old English for Christmas Eve but we can probably make some time for this.)