Aelfgyfu

Yes, I know it's not Sunday, but Sunday was even worse than today (if you watch US news, you know what I mean), and I didn't have the heart to share anything funny. Today, I feel I can share.

Sunday was Pentecost in many Christian churches. Red is the color of Pentecost. Catholic churches in my state reopened for Pentecost, although we're still dispensed, meaning we are not required to go. In normal times, Catholics are required to attend Sunday mass plus certain holy day masses ("holy days of obligation," they're called) unless ill or traveling (and urged to try to attend if traveling). So not a lot of people went. I stayed home and watched mass on a live stream.

Saturday night, though, I put it all together. Only the priest and deacon have to wear the liturgical color for the day, but a lot of lay people (including me) enjoy doing so for special days such as Pentecost. "My gosh," I told Brilliant Husband. "We're reopening the churches tomorrow—and they're going to be full of Red Shirts." (I just hope it wasn't prophetic. And I wore a red dress to attend mass from home.)

I also remembered, as I do every year, that time many years ago when my home parish had a celebration of Pentecost. After mass, there were goodies, including a cake. Someone called someone else and told them what to have the bakery put on the cake: three crowns, for the Trinity.

Only something got lost somewhere along the way. We had a Happy Birthday cake for the Church decorated with three clowns. There were a number of mystified people, but the cake was good (and my mom knew the story and told us).

Apparently this Honest Trailer for the first Star Trek reboot was released before Star Trek: Into Darkness came out, but I only got around to it this morning. It points out nearly every darned thing that bothered me about that movie (but in funny ways instead of ranting like I did). Big fans of the reboot might be offended. Fans of the original series might be offended. Fans of J.J. Abrams might be offended. Fans of Star Wars might be offended. Watch at your own risk.

And don't try to eat or drink while watching.

See this entry by bentleywg for a little bit of misinformation accidentally spread by German news.

From executrix, who posted here, on astrogirl2's LJ. She originally found it at http://tiger.coe/missouri.edu/~peace/Blakes7/STvsB7, but that link is broken. I have cut and pasted from the entry (and fixed a couple of typos) so that I can share with others (and will always be able to find it myself!)

( Star Trek vs Blake's 7: )

Actually, Paul Krugman is frequently humorous, but I thought this pithy entry would be of particular delight to some fen.

Dinner interrupted before I could do this part (idea from sg_fignewton of my year-in-fic overview, so I posted what I had and saved the favorite excerpts from each of last year's stories for this entry.

My favorite bits may not correspond to the best parts of the stories. I also tend to be very fond of my closings, which aren't really appropriate for this meme, particularly if you haven't read one or more of the stories! I tried not to include anything that would spoil a story.

( Excerpt from 'Fresh Scars' )

( Excerpt from 'Sunrise over Eden' )

( Excerpt from 'Zephyr' )

( Excerpt from 'Vale, amice'—SPOILERS for 'Threads' and previous episodes. )

Time for the year-end recap. I'm a little disappointed at my fic writing in 2009, but I had a lot of real life going on, including a lot of academic writing, that made it hard to keep up. I'm doing a sort of mash-up of at least two different versions of the year-end roundup, taken from aurora_novarum and sg_fignewton.

( My stories and my answers to some questions )

Read the Trek movie scene originally written for William Shatner to play older Kirk. (Then you may want to join me in a sigh of relief that they didn't use it, for reasons I'll share if anyone cares.)

Interesting: from Newsweek: "Why Glee's Losers and Mean Girls Are So True to Life". Actually, I find few of the characters more than passingly realistic (Kurt and Mercedes have been my faves for a while, but Kurt's dad is threatening to overtake both the kids for just being so darned real!). I have to remind myself sometimes that I'm not watching for plot (heaven forbid!) or even character (I can't like many of these people much at all), but for singing! and dancing! Those make me happy.

Just passing on some interesting tidbits:

An interview with Alexander Siddig; thanks to hestia8.

A Whedon tidbit from beanpot, with a pithy comment.

From gatechic: Michael Shanks will appear as Hawkman on Smallville.

Title: "Sunrise over Eden"
Author's name:
Author's website: Aelfgyfu's Mead Hall
Fandom: Deep Space 9
Main character: Amsha Bashir
Rating: G
Word Count: 2,000
Warnings Spoilers for "Doctor Bashir, I Presume?" and previous episodes
Summary: Amsha welcomes her son for his first visit since she moved to New Zealand.

Notes: My prompt was "Amsha Bashir: prison widow." The idea that I got when I first read that prompt changed quite a bit after I watched the episode again. I hope the prompter is not too disappointed.
Thanks to dudethemath and loriel_eris for reading and commenting on drafts! They made the story better than it was. Remaining faults are my own.
Written for and first posted at matrithon; now cross-posted to my LJ and DW account.

( Sunrise over Eden )