Maius Intra Qua Extra

Travel shenanigans

2026-09-09T06:40:01Z

Just wanted to share some funnies from a recent trip. Maybe I'll write about the actual trip later. Maybe not.

( Airport security )

( The stewardess )

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"Four Shalle Ryde, and Four Shalle Alfo Ryde"

2026-08-30T08:09:52Z

Title: "Four Shalle Ryde, and Four Shalle Alfo Ryde"
Fandom(s): Doctor Who, Good Omens (the novel, not the show)
Characters: Fourth Doctor, Leela, Twelfth Doctor, Clara Oswald, Tenth Doctor, Donna Noble, Eleventh Doctor, Amy Pond
Rating: G
Genre: General
Word Count: 1612

Summary: Four more Doctors, four more (not-)drabbles

Read it on AO3.

Author's Notes:

Down to the wire! But yes, I got this in just before the month ended, so I've extended my streak. Interestingly, the dates on the story are published 2026-08-30 and completed 2026-08-29. No idea how that works. In my time zone, it was definitely 2026-08-29 (around 6:30 p.m.) when I posted it, and I did all four chapters within about 10 minutes.

I happened to see the original story, "Four Horsemen", a few weeks ago and immediately thought I should continue it. But how do you add more horsemen to the traditional team? Well, the answer to that produced the ideas for the second, third, and fourth stories -- they're very tied to their titles. The third story was the hardest. I spent probably two weeks trying to come up with what should be thumped (I was mostly thinking about the Doctor thumping the TARDIS console with the rubber mallet), and then finally, just a couple of days ago, I realized who really should be thumped.

Anyway, none of the ideas could fit in a 100-word drabble, so I threw the format out the window and went with it.

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Part two of event #4

2026-08-09T07:58:19Z

... from the last post. That's the one about the guy in my band who cornered me after the last concert to complain about our conductor.

( Read more... )

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Jeez

2026-08-06T08:17:40Z

It's been kind of an interesting past couple of weeks, maybe a bit more than that. I don't know, it's all kind of a blur now.

( Event 1 )

( Event #2 )

( Event #3 )

( Event #4 )

( Event #5 )

( Event #6 )

( Event #7 )

( Event #8 )

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DWFO Fifteen!!!

2026-07-20T16:53:06Z

The Doctor Who Fan Orchestra published the Fifteen medley!!

I'm pretty amazed that they managed to mix everything within a month of the submission deadline. I had tons of fun practicing and performing this, and I learned a lot about microphones and recording. I'm especially chuffed to have gotten a chance to perform the newest version of the theme (which might very well be my favorite version of it).

Yes, I'm playing in this. Yes, my name's in the credits. No, I didn't submit a video and am not shown in this video.

Info on the project:

Stephen Willis, the project coordinator, arranged this orchestral medley of music from the most recent seasons of Doctor Who, then invited musicians across the world to participate. Each musician was sent the sheet music and recorded their part in time with a click track, and Stephen mixed the recordings to create the final production. Participants could also send in a separate video of them performing their part, to be used in the final video.

This is the list of songs in the medley:

"Ruby in the TARDIS" -- theme for the companion Ruby Sunday
"Fifteen" -- theme for the Fifteenth Doctor
"Finetime" -- background music for the episode "Dot and Bubble"
"Joy to the World" -- background music for the episode "Joy to the World"
Doctor Who theme -- the most recent arrangement of the Doctor Who heme

All of the music except for the Doctor Who theme was written by Murray Gold and originally performed by the BBC National Orchestra of Wales. The Doctor Who theme was originally written in 1963 by Ron Grainer and realized by Delia Derbyshire, and the version performed here was arranged by Murray Gold.

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"Right-Hand Man"

2026-07-15T18:34:42Z

Title: "Right-Hand Man"
Fandom(s): Doctor Who
Characters: Alex Klein, Malcolm Taylor
Rating: G
Genre: General
Word Count: 2997

Summary: Alex has worked for UNIT for going on twenty-five years now. He's not a soldier, a scientist, or a director, and it's never him who saves the world or assists the Doctor, but he's there, working behind the scenes, keeping everything running at top efficiency. You just never get to see him. (Well, actually you did, just once.)

Read it on AO3.

Author's Notes: I don't know where this one came from. Actually, I do know, but I won't say because it'd be a spoiler for the story. (Not a big spoiler. You probably won't even notice it and make the connection.) Basically, I noticed a detail that I wanted to explore more, and what better way than to write a story about it?

However, this isn't much of a story. It's just one of my "let's write about that guest character you forgot existed and didn't even know had a last name" things. Go find something more entertaining to read.

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Ponderings on music philosophy

2026-06-28T18:50:03Z

I got into an interesting discussion with another member of my Friday night band, so I'm gonna ponder about it here. If you have any experience performing with a group of musicians (any type - concert band, rock band, choral, whatever) I would love to hear any thoughts you might have on the subject.

( Read more... )

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Hitting the big time!

2026-06-25T18:11:54Z

I feel like I finally achieved fame and glory! I got targeted by an art scammer on AO3! :D

To be entirely fair, it's not actually a scam. The person is legitimately trying to get you to commission them to produce art, and that's not a scam. The scam-y part is that they leave a comment pretending that they enjoyed your story, and when you reply to thank them, they then say that they "have some great ideas" and ask you to talk to them about it. "Great ideas", of course, means what they want to draw for you. So they aren't really scamming you -- "scam" implies that they get you to pay them and you don't receive anything -- but they are leaving you a comment to make you feel good, only to reveal that they were lying.

This one was on my most recent fic, the stupid one about Fifteen meeting Tadge the engineer working on the Dalek ship. I "fell" for this scammer partly because her username was very similar to that of someone else who has commented frequently on my other fics, so I didn't realize it was a new person. She'd left a short comment about the story, as opposed to the long AI-generated comments most art scammers leave (I've seen tons of them on the AO3 sub, so I know what they look like), and when I replied that I'm starting to think about how a Dalek-run company might operate, she said something to the effect of "You should totally write more about it! I have some ideas for characters if you'd like to chat about it."

I should have been tipped off by the word "ideas", as that's what the art scammers tend to say, that they have "ideas" they'd like to tell you about, but as I thought she was my other commenter, who I'd chatted with previously, it didn't seem sus to me. So, we got on Discord and after some small talk, she said she'd send me her character ideas.

What followed were the following two paragraphs, behind the cut, in case you don't care to read them.

( Read more... )

My first thought was, "Who in the world needs to describe the Doctor?" The second thought was, "Why is she describing my own characters to me? Oh, of course, she wants me to buy a drawing of them." When a writer has "ideas for characters", they're talking about the personality and backstory. When an artist has "ideas for characters", they're talking about how they look.

And then I laughed at how both paragraphs were obviously generated by AI. No real person would describe a person in a drawing with "carries a playful smile that can quickly shift into confusion or amazement" -- obviously the prompt she used was, "Describe the Fifteenth Doctor", and since she didn't tell the AI that it's a single shot of the character, the AI responded with his look on film and in motion. And Fifteen has "messy black hair"? She didn't even read what it spit out.

Tadge, on the other hand, had little physical description in the story except for the jumpsuit and utility belt, and so his description was made up out of whole cloth, and honestly doesn't match the personality I intended for him at all, which, I suppose, is my fault -- obviously I didn't write him well enough so the AI just made stuff up.

But most of all, though she was trying to sell me on a drawing of these two characters (and I have to wonder, why Tadge? I'd think she'd be more likely to get a sale if she aimed at two popular characters, like Fifteen and Ruby or Fourteen and Donna. But it's probably because this story just got posted.), she didn't actually tell me about the drawing itself. She just blathered in extremely general terms about the characters.

That's the biggest indication this was written by AI. A real artist would say, "I'd love to draw the moment where the Doctor runs around the corner into Tadge," which tells me what image they're picturing. Yes, I've worked with real artists before, and that's how they speak when they're trying to tell you what they want to make. They tell you about the image, not about the characters' personalities.

And of course, if she's going to use AI to describe what she's going to make, I can only assume she's going to use AI to make it as well.

But that's all beside the point. As soon as I read those paragraphs and realized what she was really after, I told her that I'm happy to talk about the characters, though what she wrote about Tadge wasn't correct at all, but "I should note before you spend any more time on this, I'm not looking for art and will not order or pay for any."

She responded with a sentence about how she hopes that I'll write more for this idea, then "So should we go with the Tadge's idea doe the illustrations?" I guess she figured that 1) she could just ignore what I'd just said and if she kept on me, I'd finally acquiesce, and 2) though I'd said that she got Tadge wrong, it'd be fine to draw him the way she sees him, not the way I see him. I also guess that she uses AI to write because she doesn't know how to write or type correctly herself.

I replied, "No. No illustrations. I do not want art," to which she replied, "Alright alright just calm down," which made me laugh again. You, lady, are the one who's trying to scam me, and you're the one getting offended when I say no?

But that was the end of it. I still have the conversation open in Discord, to save it for posterity, because there are actual real art scammers on AO3 who, after talking to you once, will come back months later claiming that they sent you what you ordered and demanding payment or else they'll take you to court. It's not that I'll need the discussion transcript to prove anything (these scammers never actually take you to court; they are just hoping you'll get scared and send money), but it'll be nice to have it to remind me what had actually happened.

Anyway, yay! Someone's seen my writing and tried to scam me with it! I'm famous!

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DWFO done!

2026-06-20T06:47:23Z

I submitted my recordings for the Doctor Who Fan Orchestra today! The deadline is Sunday, but I won't have time tomorrow to work on them, so I made a schedule to get everything done by today (it's still Friday here). So it's off and away, and hopefully it's good enough. I did talk to the coordinator/conductor beforehand and he said that he accepts any skill level, but, well, I can't but worry. I've been watching the message boards and a lot of the participants are professional musicians, and I wonder how he's going to be able to mix professional performances with extremely amateur performances and make it sound good. Ah well, the important thing is that I had a lot of fun getting to perform DW music, and I learned a lot.

We had to use professional equipment to do the recording, for both fidelity and noise reduction, so I had to learn about music microphones and purchase a reasonable one. I didn't want to spend a lot on a microphone that I might only ever use once (not to mention, with us both being unemployed, my husband wasn't happy with me spending on this) so I purchased the most inexpensive acceptable microphone, a CAD U37. It seems pretty good except that it makes a weird staticky noise when I'm playing upper chalumeau (which is another thing I learned -- the words for the upper and lower register on a clarinet, "clarion" and "chalumeau"), but I figured as a clarinet in an orchestra, no one is going to hear me anyway, and thus, certainly they won't hear a tiny bit of static.

But I also learned a lot about my own playing. I've always been told this but never actually tested it: the best way to improve your own playing is to listen to a recording of yourself. When you're playing an instrument, what you think you sound like is nothing like what it actually sounds like. You can only hear what you're doing wrong if you listen to a recording of yourself.

My friend Tim has always said that I have this weird kind of bloaty sound when I'm trying to put an accent on a note, and I finally heard on the recording what he's been talking about. And then I figured out what the problem was: I've been putting the ligature too low on the mouthpiece. This gives the reed too much play and it over-vibrates. I moved the ligature up and now it sounds a lot better; further improvement will come with better embouchure, which I'm working on.

Another thing that I noticed on the recordings was that I've gotten lazy with lower clarion fingerings, such that I'm starting the note slightly before the fingers are all firmly in place, which causes a slight squeak. So, I'm now paying a lot more attention to how I do that.

As far as the actual music goes, after playing this ten-minute medley of DW music over and over and over again for the past few monhts, I noticed that the music is actually really repetitive. Note, of course, that it has to be, because the main purpose of the music is to be played behind scenes in the show and cannot run out before the scene is over. Murray Gold has to write the music to be long and repetitive so that he has a lot of of recorded music to splice and fit into the TV show. (He was at Gallifrey One a few years ago and demonstrated how he does that -- it was fascinating.) Fifteen's main theme, which is appropriately titled "Fifteen", is at least fast and fun, so the repetition isn't boring. But man, if I never hear "Joy to the World" (which I assume was the theme for the character Joy in the eponymous episode) again, it'll be too soon. (Of course, it's the one that still stuck in my head. Because it's repetitive. So it just repeats. Over and over again.)

The medley ends with the current version of the main theme, and that was brilliant to play. I'm not actually sure if I prefer this version to the series 1-2 version, which was my previous favorite of the modern versions. I think I have to rank them in this order: Fifteen, series 1-2, Thirteen, series 4, Twelve, Eleven. Actually, Eleven might have two versions -- series 5-7a and series 7b. Or he might even have had a different version for "The Day of the Doctor". Not sure; all I know is that I wasn't fond of his versions.

Anyway. Current main theme = awesome. Getting to play it = even more awesome.

Okay, at this point I'm rambling. I'm just happy I got this opportunity and it was brilliant. And I practiced more for this than for any other performance in my life! That's how much I enjoyed it.

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"Human Resources"

2026-06-17T17:36:26Z

Title: "Human Resources"
Fandom(s): Doctor Who
Characters: Fifteenth Doctor, Ruby Sunday
Rating: G
Genre: General
Word Count: 1042

Summary: The Doctor sneaks onto a Dalek saucer in order to sabotage the reactor and shut down their weapons.

Read it on AO3.

Author's Notes: This is entirely absurd humor and isn't really all that interesting -- no plot, no character work, nothing. Just a setup for a joke. Ruby only speaks thrice, over a comms device. Just an experiment in comedy, which isn't something I do well or often.

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Thoughts on the current state of DW

2026-06-15T20:01:01Z

It really feels like all my journal has talked about lately is bad news. Ah well, things are as they are. I know I don't need to say what I'm talking about.

( Read more... )

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While I'm talking about sequels... Guild Wars 3

2026-06-08T07:38:17Z

I've mentioned a number of times that my husband and I play Guild Wars 2, starting from its launch in 2012 and only taking a couple of years off from it sometime in the teens. I've created cosplay characters of all the Doctors in the game and have been meaning to post them here. Well, the devs of GW2, ArenaNet, just announced the sequel, Guild Wars 3. Yay, I guess?

( Read more... )

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Less Stargate :(

2026-06-04T18:10:48Z

Amazon announced a couple of days ago that the new Stargate series has been canceled. They'd announced it back in November, that it would be continuation of the franchise rather than a reboot. For the past six months, then, it's been developed by some of the writers from the original SG-1 and supported by the original producers.

The announcement from Amazon came from whatever department head is in charge of those types of shows, and it said that they decided that the franchise doesn't have a broad appeal, that it only appeals to fans of the original series. The announcement also stated that they might choose to resume the project in the future, but if they do, it will be without anyone associated with the original three series.

Which tells me that what they really want to do is slap the "Stargate" name on a generic sci-fi property that they already have in the works. This may even be similar to the possibility that Doctor Who is changing formats, which I talked about in my last post. The rumor is that DW is changing from monster-of-the-week to a full-season story format, because that's what's popular now. Well, SG-1 and SGA were both planet-of-the-week series and the writers that were working on the series said that's what they were trying to preserve. So, it makes sense that the same thing would happen to the new SG show, that it would be shoehorned into the newer popular format, just like DW.

Anyway, time will tell. At this point, I'm mostly just living for Nathan Fillion's new Firefly cartoon. SG is just sad. DW will sort itself out and, as I said last time, I'll watch it and will turn back to the stuff I love if it isn't for me.

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Is this the end?

2026-06-01T14:16:44Z

More news and rumors about Doctor Who. Not exactly excited.

( Read more... )

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Of bees and business

2026-05-22T07:03:10Z

We have a camera mounted on the wall above the front door so that we get alerts on our phones when a package is delivered and when someone knocks on the door. Well, to be honest, it's an alert on my husband's phone, because frankly, I don't care. If there's a package coming, I already know about it and are probably checking the Amazon listing every fifteen minutes to see if it's been delivered yet. If there's a knock on the door, we won't answer it because we know it's a solicitor; we never have anyone come over, and if we did, we'd know about it beforehand, so any unexpected knock is nothing we want to interact with. However, my husband likes to know about anything going on out there. I'm quite happy to not get extra useless notifications.

But I digress.

Interestingly, no one ever notices the camera. It's up in the corner above the door, quite above anyone's head but not hidden in any way, and when it detects motion and it starts recording, a blue light on its face turns on. I guess people haven't quite realized that door cameras are now very common, so they don't look for them. Yet.

Now that it's spring, though, my husband has been getting tons of notifications of motion detection from that camera. We get year-round visits from the neighborhood cats (they are adorable; we have tons of clips of cats wandering up, scratching on the welcome mat, and often curling up and going to sleep on it) and the occasional fly-by by a bird. We got a bat for the first time a few nights ago, and we once saw a waddling blob that we could only guess was a nutria. But, with spring, the vast majority of interruptions are bees.

It's not a constant thing, mind you. We were getting probably five to ten notifications a day, usually clumped together in a fifteen-minute period. Thing is, my husband is deathly afraid of bees. Well, mostly deathly afraid of wasps, hornets, and yellowjackets, but he'll still also panic at bees. So, of course, he wanted to get rid of them.

He thought that the appearance of the bees meant that there was a hive behind the camera or in the hole above it where the two walls meet the awning. I didn't think so, because if there was a hive, we'd be getting constant motion detections, not just a few. But he wanted to kill it, so we sprayed poison into the hole a couple of times, and of course, nothing really changed.

Then he actually did some research and discovered that to detect motion, the camera emits IR, which bees can see and think is a flower. Thus, they approach the camera as bees do, flying in and out trying to figure out what's going on and triggering the camera repeatedly. The best thing to do in this case is to get bee repellent.

So, we ordered a bottle of bee repellent from Amazon. It's non-toxic, a mix of essences from various plants that has a smell that bees don't like. Luckily, it actually smells rather nice. The instructions were what you'd expect: saturate the area well with the spray the first time, then follow it up every couple days to keep the aroma steady. That's what we did, and it worked nicely, no bee notifications for the next two days.

Then, as it happens with Amazon sellers, I received an email from the retailer with instructions on how to use the repellent and a note to please be sure to contact them if I had any questions. Okay, that's odd, as the bottle already has instructions on it, but that's nice customer service at least. Then I read the email's instructions, which started like this:

On the first day, be sure to spray the whole area liberally to show the bees you mean business.

And that's now my husband's mantra. He has stepped outside with the bottle and yelled, "I mean business!" as he sprayed. He has gotten up from his desk and said to me, "I am going to show them I mean business," before going downstairs to spray. He has casually commented to me in the middle of conversations, "You know, I mean business."

So, I guess, if you're a bee, now you know to stay away from our front door, because my husband means business.

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A Lesson in Characterization

2026-05-19T20:30:45Z

Of course I’ve been thinking more about Good Omens 3, and in mulling over a particular scene, I identified one of the weaknesses in my own writing. (Well, I’ve always known it, but this really drove the point home.)

( Read more... )

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"Good Omens 3" redux (review)

2026-05-17T08:12:51Z

Okay, we finally got a chance to rewatch Good Omens 3 and I've decided that I really like it.

( Read more... )

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"Good Omens 3" (short review)

2026-05-13T21:22:19Z

Just got done watching the series ender!

Spoilers...

( Read more... )

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"Masters and Ceremonies" (original fiction)

2026-05-10T19:24:47Z

Title: "Masters and Ceremonies"
Fandom(s): Original fiction
Characters: Mike, Chris, Amanda, Don, and Rick -- members of a software development team
Rating: G
Genre: General
Word Count: 464

Summary: A software development team's reaction to new Agile processes and ceremonies

Read it on AO3.

Author's Notes: fandomweekly's current prompt is "ceremony" and that word is only going to make me think of ceremonies in Agile methodology, because it's always struck me as odd that we use that word for a non-ritualistic process. In fact, many would argue that the whole point of Agile is to not get stuck in a codified, calcified way of thinking.

This was a fun little write and it made my husband laugh out loud (as we both have been on both sides of this, as both ICs and scrum masters). And that alone made it worth it.

Also, apparently I have invented the "software development" and "Agile methodology" tags on AO3.

Easter egg: All the characters are named after the main actors in Stargate SG-1.

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Part Two!

2026-05-09T20:03:37Z

My husband just came downstairs, walked into my room, and said, "F&#$ you!"

Apparently, he cannot get Dugga Doo out of his head.

(And yes, I did intend for this post's title to rhyme with the previous one's.)

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Dugga Doo!

2026-05-09T18:10:20Z

My husband is currently doing a run in "Kingdom of Loathing" (a totally weird webgame that he's been playing for over two decades now; I played it as well and loved it, but didn't care to invest the time that it needs to be played well and stopped playing it after about four years) and he sent me an item description over Slack, with this exchange:

Him: Gabagool is not the most delicious member of the salumi-like meat family, but it is the most fun to say.
Me: That is so true. Sounds like a Doctor Who monster.

And then I thought for a moment about why it sounded like a DW monster, and I realized I was thinking about the Interstellar Song Contest's performer Dugga Doo. So, of course, I pulled up the video on YouTube.

And THEN I remembered Gallifrey One. You see, at the end of every Gally, the penultimate event is "The Year in Review", which is an hour-long video montage of things that happened during the past year -- usually clips of news events and interviews and such with the actors that played the Doctor or the companions.

This year, however, started with the entire Dugga Doo video, which everyone loved and we were all singing along. And then the video said:

"And now! One full hour of Dugga Doo!"

Best "Year in Review" ever!!

(No, it really wasn't a full hour of Dugga Doo. But it was hilarious.)

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"You Should Never Meet Your Fans"

2026-05-07T18:19:25Z

Title: "You Should Never Meet Your Fans"
Fandom(s): Doctor Who
Characters: Fifteenth Doctor, Belinda Chandra
Rating: G
Genre: General
Word Count: 234

Summary: (From "Lux") The Doctor discovers that his life is a TV show and chats with his fans about it.

Read it on AO3.

Author's Notes: Nothing to really say about this. Was just thinking about how this scene must have appeared very different from the Doctor's point of view than from our point of view. I do love trying to picture things from other characters' points of view and discovering that it may be very different than what we, as viewers, think.

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I just don't know what to think

2026-05-05T20:36:55Z

Mother's Day is coming up, so my husband and I were talking this morning about ordering something to send to his mother, and he told me something that I still can't get over.

Mom-in-law loves decorative items. I'd say tchotchkes, but it's more than just cheap little things. Her house is filled with all kinds of things, from crystal vases to Faberge eggs (not real ones, just enameled eggs), a collection of ceramic houses from Europe, glass perfume bottles, and much more. She also loves cats, so her TV room is decorated entirely with cat figurines, prints, cross-stitches, throw pillows, etc.

Note, all of this stuff was store-bought or received as gifts. MIL is not a creative type, preferring to spend her time reading, gardening, and watching TV. Most of the handmade items, like the cross-stitch cats and the framed drawings and paintings, came from her sister (who is a huge creative -- her Christmas cards are always handmade and beautiful) or her aunt.

Most of the gifts we send her are either decorative items or jewelry (she loves her jewelry), but last October, when we got home from visiting her, I suggested that I make a sparkly diamond art cat for her to put up in her TV room and send it to her for Christmas, in addition to the usual gift. My husband thought it was a great idea, so I ordered the kit (this one in specific) and spent a few hours (three or four sessions of one to two hours apiece) to make it. I sent it off, and then my husband ordered an enamel egg off Amazon for her real gift.

So today, as we were talking about what to get for Mother's Day, my husband told me that MIL, when she'd called to thank us for it, had said that the diamond art cat was pretty but she was upset that I had made it for her instead of sending her the kit for her to put together herself. Then, she received the egg a couple of days later and was happy with that.

And I'm still just going "What???" about it. Frankly, I'm insulted. She actually values the kit itself more than she appreciates the time and effort I put into making something for her.

And who looks at something that someone's made for them and thinks, "They shouldn't have done that. They should have let me do it." It reminded me of a beaded box that her sister made and sent us for Christmas about ten years ago. It was gorgeous, but I didn't think, "I could do that myself -- she should have just sent us the beads and instructions." What I actually did was put the box in the display case and then go buy a book on beaded boxes to learn how to do it myself.

Anyway, my husband has decided to send her a diamond art kit for Mother's Day. And you know, I bet she will never put it together. As I said, she's not a creative type, and the only creative endeavor we've ever seen her attempt -- adult coloring books -- she abandoned after an hour and sent the book and the pencils to me.

Urgh, I'm more upset about this than I really should be. I should go off and practice for the DWFO. But I'll tell you what I won't be doing, ever: making another thing for my MIL.

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DWFO rambling

2026-05-03T23:33:02Z

I've finally buckled down and started to practice my DWFO part in earnest. I've been poking at it for the last couple of months, but now I'm actually devoting some time to it.

It might sound like I'm not taking it seriously by not practicing until now (it's due the middle of next month), but honestly, this is a clarinet part and it is just not that difficult (a good middle-schooler could play it). Clarinets are not all that important in an orchestra, and most of the time, they just provide background. Now, if I played violin, I'd have been practicing every day for the past two months, because their parts are complex.

The clarinet part does have a couple of difficult bits. The first is a passage in C#, which has seven sharps. I know that doesn't mean much to most people, so all you need to understand is that band music rarely has music in which clarinets have even four sharps. Orchestral music is written differently and often has many sharps. The bottom line is that I am not used to reading music with that many sharps, so it's difficult to remember them, and thus I'm sometimes hitting wrong notes. So, I've marked up my music to remind myself which notes should be sharp, and that's solved the problem.

The second is a passage where the clarinet switches back and forth between notes on the beat and afterbeats. Again, that doesn't mean much to most people, and I really can't think of an analogy outside of music. Anyway, it's only a short passage (eight measures, maybe?) but it really messes up my timing, so I've been concentrating on that, out of the entire piece.

We were given a click track, which is an MP3 of the music with the beat laid over it, so that we can hear the beat (which is what the conductor would be doing if we had one) as well as what the rest of the orchestra is doing, and it really is almost as good as playing with the group in person (except I'm playing it off my phone and it's not loud enough -- I can't find my Bluetooth speaker). When I make my recording, I'll be listening to the click track on headphones, so that I stay in time with the rest of the orchestra but the click track won't be heard on the recording.

I did have to buy a studio mic (and the DWFO provided specs on what that mic needed to be able to do). I did buy one of the cheapest I could find, but it should serve. I just hooked it up to my computer yesterday and used it on a Google Meet call and at least it works. I'll be practicing with it later this month to prep for the actual recording.

And slightly related (well, it's about music), I've decided to rejoin the local "marching" band (in quotes because it's less about marching and more about concert music). I used to be a regular there back before the pandemic, but the old conductor (my friend Tim) retired from it and the new conductor, Daniel, extended the season from just the summer to the rest of the year, and I just wasn't interesting in committing to that. It's still that way, but I decided I wanted a second music night and I missed that band. So, this year, I'll be doing clarinet for concert and sax for marching. So far it's been fun, but we'll see if I'm exhausted by it come September. :)

Also another reason, I know Daniel now and have great respect for him as a musician and a teacher, so I wanted the opportunity to play for and learn from him again. And he's changed the direction of the band away from Tim's old-timey music and towards jazz and more modern pop/rock, which is more interesting to me.

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"Gunge"

2026-04-24T17:58:28Z

Title: "Gunge"
Fandom(s): Doctor Who
Characters: Tenth Doctor, Martha Jones
Rating: G
Genre: General
Word Count: 296

Summary: The Doctor and Martha work to prevent ~~a calamity of epic proportions~~ ... ~~widespread bio-disaster~~ ... All right, all right, it's just going to be really gross, okay?

Read it on AO3.

Author's Notes: So here's the deal. I've been working on a story, and it's 1730 words of pure dross so far. Then I was looking back at another story of mine and thought, "I should write *this* idea instead," but you know, that's going to take two weeks.

Then I remembered I'd written this earlier this month, as just a practice adaptation of another fic I saw, and I thought, "Hey, I can clean that up in ten minutes and get it posted!"

So yeah, this is just crap that I'm posting to not miss a month. Just keep scrolling down your feed and forget this ever happened.

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