The Turtle Jourtle

During my Lookback Fic Bingo game, covering years 1978 to 1985, I read 20 fics. Of those, the three I would most recommend today are:

Dead Bluff by Linda S. Maclaren (Mackie) and Gina Martin (The Professionals; 22,900 words; gen)
Tiger by the Tail by Lillian Shepherd (The Professionals; 21,111 words; gen)
A Time of Certain Solace by Eileen Roy (The Man from U.N.C.L.E. x M*A*S*H; 4,992 words; gen)

All gen! 0_0

(Above: Nena performs music for the partial decade 1978-1985.)

Okay. The past few days have been pretty bad mentally, and I've really been struggling to do these write-ups. Giving it another try.



It's 1980. Queen is on the radio. Here in the USA, the year's top film is The Empire Strikes Back. New terms coined include: differently abled, dis, ecotourism, electronica, high five, killing field, NIMBY, Usenet, voicemail, and yuppie.

For 1980, I read three fics: one Professionals fic, one Sherlock Holmes x Star Trek crossover, and one Man from U.N.C.L.E. x M*A*S*H crossover.

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I'm excited about the new art technique I've come up with. I used it today to make the MFU fan art below.


For this technique, I made a rough photo manipulation, then traced it using a digital pen and tablet. Next, I deleted the manip, leaving only the tracings. Finally, I applied some virtual ink washes, also with the digital pen. (I added a couple of fictions not in the manip, too, notably Illya's right sleeve.)

This technique has two main advantages. First, it allows me to create finished images from photo manipulations without the endless color adjustment and attempts to match the noise and blur of different components. Besides being time consuming, those things tend to be hit-and-miss in their success. Second, it allows me to create something with a human touch despite my limited drawing skills. (I can draw a bit, but not well enough to create likenesses of the characters.)

It's also an interesting process. There is some artistry in choosing which lines to trace and how, what ink washes to use, etc. Not to mention the already creative process of making the kind of many-layer manips I have often produced.

I'm looking forward to exploring the applications of this technique.

I had a really good time writing my longish Professionals fic The Wind and the Rain. Pretty much the only parts of the process I didn't like were the parts where I wasn't feeling well enough to work on it. Now I want to write more fanfic. In particular, I'd like to write another Man from U.N.C.L.E. fic. (I posted a short one in 2021.) To do that, though, I need to refamiliarize myself with the show; it's been a long time since I watched it regularly.

That need gave me the idea to do a rewatch of the entire Man from U.N.C.L.E.. All 105 episodes feels like a lot to work through, though, if my main goal is to get to a point where I can write some fic. Also, I don't think it's controversial to say that some MFU episodes just aren't very good. Thus, I'm thinking of restricting myself to the list that I generated some time ago by asking other fans to name their favorite few episodes. (The list was part of my eventually abandoned project to run a regular social MFU watch.) I ended up with 51 episodes, which appear below in filming order.

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At this point, I started feeling sad that I would be watching so much MFU and no Professionals. The number of Pros episodes is also in the 50s, so I could have chosen a few more MFU episodes and maybe weeded out a few from Pros—*cough* Blackout *cough*—then alternated them. MFU is still the show I'm trying to bone up on, though, so I decided maybe I'd do a similar highlights tour of Pros. I was able to find a list I'd made a long time ago after asking LJ Pros fans for their favorite episodes. It contained 22 entries, and appears below, again in filming order.

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Then it occurred to me that if I chose one more MFU episode and three more Pros ones, I could watch two MFU followed by one Pros twenty-five times, then two more MFU at the end. Accordingly, I picked the following supplements:

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And there you are: a detailed plan for what, if I proceed with it, I'm going to call The Little Rewatch (in contrast to a Great Rewatch). I'm not going to set any kind of timetable for this, since consistency is very much not my strong suit. (That's what happened to the social MFU watch, sadly.) As I go along, though, I will probably post some informal thoughts on what I watch. I'm not sure yet whether they should be in my journal or in the appropriate fandom comms.

Let me know what you think. I know I've got a bit of a tendency to try to organize everything, but it's been making me happy in the case of my fanfic reading games, so this seems worth a try. This post itself has cheered me up on a bad night.

This Friday and Saturday I attended another virtual Bistocon. There were panels, games, vid shows, and episode watches followed by discussion. A good time was had by all.

I led the rec panel this year, choosing the theme "the Lads through time" and asking participants to share recs in a number of time-related categories. When I prepared my own recs before the con, I allowed myself to choose up to five per category, so that I would have back-ups in case someone else recced one or more of the stories I had chosen. You can find my selections below. Some I brought up during the panel and others not. (All fics are slash unless otherwise noted.)


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It's 1983. Michael Jackson is on the radio again. Here in the USA, the year's top film is Return of the Jedi. New terms coined include: 12-step, AIDS virus, beta test, breakdance, cell phone, cyberpunk, designer drug, empowered, gender nonconforming, green screen, information superhighway, liposuction, mosh, and nuclear winter.

For 1983, I read two Professionals fics. I had a couple more selected, but one of them turned out just not to be my thing, and the other persistently annoyed me until I gave up on it.

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It's 1984. Michael Jackson is on the radio. Here in the USA, the year's top film is Beverly Hills Cop. New terms coined include: bi-curious, death metal, desktop publishing, genetically modified organism, glass ceiling, moonwalk, plug and play, power walk, spin doctor, and wack.

For 1984, I read two Professionals fics and one Professionals x Starsky and Hutch crossover.

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I enjoyed the first step of my Old and New Project, but I couldn't resist another year-by-year game. So here is the first post of Lookback Fic Bingo. I may end up alternating the two.



It's 1985. Katrina and the Waves are on the radio. Here in the USA, the year's top film is Back to the Future. New terms coined include: attachment parenting, AZT, beatboxing, biodiversity, intifada, IP address, latte, mixtape, n-word, and trendoid.

For 1985, I read three Professionals fics.

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During the final 9 rounds of my Lifetime Fic Bingo game, 2016 to 2024, I read 46 fics. Of those, the five that I would most recommend today are:

The Craven Hive by OldShrewsburyian (Sherlock Holmes; 35,627 words; gen)
The Moon and Planets by LaurytheLatrator (Sherlock Holmes; 33,924 words; femslash)
True by JoJo (The Professionals; 13,366 words; slash)
Out of Reach by cornishcat (The Professionals; 23,187 words; slash)
High Water by unbelievable2 (The Sentinel; 9,633 words; slash)

(Above: Lil Baby performs music for the partial decade 2016-2024.)

All recommended fics:

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Despite having only one round left, I haven't been making very rapid progress on Lifetime Fic Bingo over the past couple of weeks. My mental health has been bad, and my concentration has suffered. What I have been doing, to my surprise, is coming up with an idea for a long Professionals fic and making it concrete to the tune of six pages of notes and a 2,500 word outline. All this inspiration came too late for me to sign up on time for this year's Big Bang, but the kind BB mods have just welcomed me as a late entrant. So here we go. A rough draft by July 1st shouldn't be too much of a problem, right? Right?