#lalakate

[secretsantaandsmores]

lala-kate's wish list

THINGS I’D LIKE: Anything!  Art, gif, fic, manips, whatever you create, I’ll enjoy it if it’s OQ/Hood-Mills family. :D 

WHAT I CAN DO: I’m a writer

WHAT I CAN’T DO: I can’t do manips or gifs at all. I can sketch, but not well enough to gift someone with art. 

ANYTHING YOU DON’T WANT? Nothing that involves violence towards children or extreme kink. I also would rather see them as adults, not teenagers or co-eds. 

SEND ANON MESSAGES TO ME? Yes 

[misscrawfords]

wah-pah replied to your post:

Fic Writer’s Self Rec Questions! It’s 101 Days of...

Thank you for replying. :) Since I’m making my way through your fics chronologically, I haven’t read them all yet, but I shall. I’ve been enjoying CP so much.

You’re brave to attempt them all! But your reviews of CP mean so much - I’m really glad you’re enjoying it so far. :)

lala-kate replied to your post:

Fic Writer’s Self Rec Questions! It’s 101 Days of...

You know how much I love “Consolation Prize”!!! One of my favs!

I’m delighted you think so. Thank you for commenting. :)

palindrome310 replied to your post:

Fic Writer’s Self Rec Questions! It’s 101 Days of...

Your S04 rewrite is the AU for me. Also, I’m fond of Snow Falls, it made cry like a baby.

Oh the S04 rewrite! Yes, I liked that... Wish I’d actually written it! I still wonder about Anna and Bates’ plot in S06 and the one I gave them! (I prefer mine. :P) Sorry about making you cry. :/

[misscrawfords]

lala-kate replied to your post:

Downton And I

You’re such a joy, my friend. I’m honored to be listed here even though we haven’t spoken in a while. Sending hugs and toasts to you today!!!!

I knoooow. I miss talking to you. Maybe Downton returning will do the trick. *hugs and toasts to you in return*

[bedeliasbae]

when you get this, you must publicly post something nice about at least 5 different people you follow, then copy and paste this in each of their ask boxes. Check my blog to see what I said about you!

So, I did one of these, but I know that I forgot some people, so there won't be five, but I did 6 last time, the link for that is here.

and-you-will-like-it: I have an email thread between us from a while back, and she just built my confidence when I felt like crap. I'll always remember that. Absolutely lovely.

lala-kate: Wonderful writer, and so kind and talented, love her so much. Just love.

countess-of-terrific-fun: I'm just doing this because Shelley hasn't deleted the blog. I AM 5005% IN LOVE WITH SHELLEY. We send each other birthday and Christmas cards and just love love love. She's also my beta and she can turn anything that doesn't make sense into something so eloquent. I could go on for years about how fabulous Shelley is (and my family are witnesses to this fact).

[misscrawfords]

What’s the best writing advice you’ve ever come across? What’s the worst writing advice you’ve ever come across? If you could choose one of your fics to be filmed, which would you choose? And I'm sending lovely writing thoughts your way, :)

Oooh great questions!

The best writing advice I ever came across was from Rudyard Kipling and it was essentially that if you want to read something, write it. I can’t find the direct quote but I’m sure it was Kipling. It really got through to me - if there’s a story out there that I want to read, I should write it! Doesn’t matter if it’s not what other people seem to be clamouring for or what publishers are telling the world sells. If it’s a story I want to read and I wish was written and it’s not out there, write it! And, chances are, if I want to read it, someone else out there probably will want to read it too...

The worst advice is anyone who tries to tell me how to write! I hate those smug “writing advice” posts that get passed round on the internet. The ones that try to tell me that unless I am writing solidly with no distractions for two hours every day then I’m a failure and I’m not doing it properly. Well, excuse you. Perhaps if you’re a professional writer who can do this, then fine. But it’s incredibly damaging IMO to those of us who aren’t. I get in from school and all I want to do is collapse in front of The Simpsons, eat my dinner, cry and then do more work before sliding into bed. I can’t write two hours a day without distractions. Even if I managed to give the time to that, I don’t have the mental space to be able to do that. And reading that kind of sanctimonious, smug, patronising crap from authors who are lucky enough to be giving interviews on “how to write” just adds a load of guilt and failure to an already stressed life. You know what? I wish I could write for two hours a day without distractions! But I can’t and I hate it and that advice is just a load of crap. (Also, that advice doesn’t work for everyone even in the best situations. My most productive time writing wise was during my masters when I posted a chapter of either Consolation Prize or University Challenge every. single. Monday as well as regularly posting RPs co-written with Claire. And I did most of it on Sunday and Sunday night. I binge wrote. And it worked fine for me. So yeah.)

I’d film Consolation Prize. It would be a Merchant Ivory film in the style of A Room with a View and have a glorious soundtrack, be shot on location in Yorkshire and Italy and be very, very, very pretty and the visuals would be done in such a way as to reinforce the content and themes of the story. So lots of red for Mary when dealing with Sciarpa, dark colours for Matthew’s gloom during the autumn at Downton, the parallels between Matthew’s dream and different episodes of the show and then its foreshadowing to scenes later in the story. With a clever director it could work really well!

And thank you. :)

I’m starting by catching up on neglected RP posts (London Life I’m coming for yoouuuuu!) but then I need to start on my Mary/Blake secret santa which I’m very much looking forward to!

[misscrawfords]

Next. :)

I have two fics that require updating so you get two second sentences! :)

1. “Maybe I won’t ruin a marriage this time but there are plenty of other mistakes I could make.” She sighed. “It feels too soon. Is it too soon?”

2. Finally, still looking down at his desk, he spoke heavily into the silence. “I have never been more disappointed in any member of my family than I am now in you, Sybil.”

[misscrawfords]

Sending my prompt in early for Mary/Blake: modern AU Either uni or high school reunion. :D

The unfamiliar man was staring at her chest. Fortunately for him he raised his eyes quickly.

“Lady Mary Crawley, Kensington Girls’, 2009, I’ve found you!”

“I wasn’t aware you were looking for me,” Mary could not help replying, quirking an eyebrow. Her own eyes dipped to his name badge. Charles Blake, Regent’s School, 2009. No wonder he looked vaguely familiar, they were in the same year. She had known several of the more well connected boys from Regent’s, but she did not remember Charles specifically.

“No,” he said, “Well, I don’t know you but I was told to look out for you by a mutual friend.”

“Oh?”

“Evelyn Napier – you know him from university I think, right? I work with him.”

“Oh!” said Mary again, this time with a smile. “Yes, he’s one of my best friends and married to another. Are you in the same department at Whitehall?”

“I see.” Mary glanced at him, giving him the once over and unable to hide the growing look of amusement as she did so.

“What is it?”

“I really shouldn’t tell you. It’ll get Evelyn into trouble.”

Charles shrugged. “I’m not here in an official capacity. Unless there’s an unexpected outbreak of swine flu in the Ken Girls gym of course, but that would really wreck my evening so I’m crossing my fingers there won’t be.”

He grinned charmingly at her and she found a smile tugged out of her in response.

“One would like to hope not. I was just remembering what Evelyn calls you, now that I have connected you to his boss.”

“Do tell!”

“That bloody Blake was something that I have heard before.” She looked at him intensely, gauging his reaction. She really did not want to get Evelyn into trouble.

He only raised his eyebrows and took a swig of wine. “Alliterative. I like it. Not very original though.”

“You mean you’ve been called that bloody Blake before?”

“Maybe once or twice. Sometimes even to my face.”

“You astonish me!” She took a sip from her own glass, eyeing him over the rim. His eyes were laughing at her and it made him look unnervingly attractive.

“So, Mary – oh, look, do I have to call you Lady Mary? You do have it on your name badge.”

“That’s who I am.”

“Seems a bit high school to insist on it.”

She skewered him with a direct glare. “We are in high school.”

He did not back down but only took her in, a bit too shrewdly for comfort. “And you still feel the need to boast of your status.” Her gaze flickered a moment and he shrugged, lessening the tension. “I don’t blame you. The old boys from Regent’s take one look at me and are confused, and literally none of your girls have a clue who I am. I was invisible at school.”

Mary’s eyes flickered over his face, taking in the laughter lines, the thick, dark hair, the bright eyes, the smart suit and the way Charles Blake carried himself with absolute confidence.

“I find that hard to believe.”

He laughed. “True though, but don’t worry, I’ve got over it since then. Just to prove it to you, Mary, we did a play together. Bet you don’t remember!”

Mary stared at him. “No, I don’t.” The two neighbouring schools often put on dramatic productions together and she had been in several but she had no memory of Charles Blake in any of them. “What was it?”

“Pygmalion. Lower sixth. You were Eliza… and I kept the spotlight on your face.”

She blinked. “That! I never knew who the techies were.”

“Nobody ever does; it’s the curse of our existence and yet without us nobody would be able to see or hear you. Though perhaps in this particular case, that might not have been such a bad thing…”

“What is that supposed to mean?” Mary narrowed her eyes at him. He had her completely enthralled and she hated it… and was also rather enjoying herself. Far more than she had expected when Sybil had persuaded her to go to the reunion and had even volunteered to take Maddy and Alex for the evening, giving her no excuse to stay at home. She had actually thought it would be terrible and it had been, in parts. But this, this was much better than anything she had imagined.

“Tom Vickers – he was doing sound – and I spent most of the first half of each show throwing Doritos at the screen and cringing because your Cockney accent was so bad. I was never so happy to see Eliza learn to speak properly as when you were playing her.”

“My aunt died of influenza, so they said,” she intoned, dead-pan. “But it’s my belief they done the old woman in.” Once upon a time she had admitted of no criticism of her accent but it was sixteen years ago now and she was prepared to admit just how terrible it really had been.

“The posh accent wasn’t the problem!”

“Cheer up, captain, and buy a flower off a poor girl. Any better?”

He cringed. “Worse. So what do you do – and please don’t say acting!”

Mary laughed but considered how to answer. Fifteen years ago, there would only have been one possible answer: to say that she was Lady Mary Crawley of Downton Abbey, that her father was Earl of Grantham, that one day her son would be Earl of Grantham in his face. Why else did she have her title on her name badge? All of that was still true and she even had the son to prove it – she might even become Countess of Grantham in her own right one day if the legislation currently being debated in parliament became law, but it hurt her heart to think of being countess in that context. However, that attitude belonged to a naïve school girl who thought she lived in a fantasy world where titles and status still mattered. It was 2024 and she was no longer that girl.

“I’m a drama producer with Channel 3,” she said eventually. “And I have two small children which keeps me busy as well.”

“I’m sure you manage it all beautifully,” he replied with a smile. “Evelyn is your son’s godfather, isn’t he? I think I’ve heard him mention him.”

“Alex? Yes, he is.” Mary looked at him in surprise and curiosity. She was fiddling with her wedding ring, twisting it round her finger in anticipation of the obvious next question, but he had not asked it. Perhaps Alex was not the only person Evelyn had mentioned.

A slightly awkward silence fell between them and both sipped their wine in tandem to cover it. Across the room, Mary identified odd people she had not seen in many years. She saw Bekki clutching a glass of water, her dress reaching almost to her ankles, her sleeves down to her wrists and her hair covered under a colourful headscarf. And yet when Mary had last seen her, she had been knocking back shots in a bikini. Funny how people changed over time. After all, she had changed too and it seemed so had Charles. Bekki’s chin was stuck out defiantly as if to dare people to comment as she moved around the room. Perhaps she should talk to her. There was an interesting story there. Elsewhere, she spotted Georgie and caught her eye and smiled, raising her glass to her. She had already talked to her that evening and found to her surprise that she had enjoyed catching up. Georgie, unlike most of their contemporaries, had aged well and seemed unconditionally happy with her life though she had put on a good deal of weight, thought Mary critically.

Georgie was beckoning her over and Mary turned to her companion. “I should talk to my friend. We haven’t seen each other in many years.”

“A good friend then,” Charles commented drily.

“She’s nicer than I remember,” she replied with a half smile.

“Aren’t we all?”

She paused then and looked at him properly. “Yes,” she said with consideration. “I think we are.”

“Then…”

“What?”

Charles laughed suddenly and with self-deprecation, pulling out a card from the inside breast pocket of his jacket. “I’d like to give you my number.”

He held it out to her but she hesitated, even though she felt a flutter of interest at what he was suggesting. She twisted her head away and sighed. “Weren’t you listening when I mentioned the two small children?”

“Yes. So will you take it?”

“Charles, I’m flattered, I really am, but I didn’t come to my school reunion to get a date.”

“Consider it an unexpected plus then. I’m not leaving till you take the card.”

She raised her eyebrows but took the card anyway. “Fine. It doesn’t mean I’ll call.”

“No,” he smiled at her, his laughter lines crinkling again. “But you might.”

Before she could reply, he nodded a goodbye smile and melted away into the crowd and Mary was left holding his card between finger and thumb and staring after him. She tilted her head and watched him go. He was confident, she would give him that, she considered with a mixture of surprise and pleasure.

She slipped his card into her handbag.

[misscrawfords]

4, 14? (unpopular opinions)

4. A hobby you “don’t get”. (Also asked by lala-kate.)

Hmm. At the end of the day I believe strongly that people have a right to whatever interests them (within reason - if your interest is paedophilia or murder or whatever, possibly not!) even if other people don’t get it. So I’m not all that bothered by other people’s hobbies.

However I guess one thing that I wish wasn’t as prevalent as it is and I don’t really understand is football obsession. I get having an interest in football as one might about any sport - I’ve been to a football match, even, and it was awesome. (It was in Italy though and their fans aren’t as awful as ours are and it was a David trumps Goliath moment where my friends and I were on David’s side so it was a pretty great match to watch all round.) So by all means have an interest in football but… Paying the stars so much money just seems wrong. The culture of football stars and WAGs I find pretty depressing. Why do people worship these stars?! And then in Britain at any rate, football seems to be an excuse for appalling behaviour in public - drunkenness, rioting, swearing, selfish use of public space on trains, in parks, in pubs - often very frightening and on some occasions leading to violence. I absolutely hate it. I also resent how football is considered so much more accessible to the “common man” than so-called “high culture” like opera, and yet if you look at tickets to see both they’re very often no cheaper. It’s a kind of anti-intellectual, inverse snobbery, lads culture that I really hate. And why should people be assumed to be interested in it? Wow, there’s a football game. Who gives a damn? Why should I be inconvenienced and be forced to have football mania shoved in my face just because two teams are kicking a ball back and forth? Thank god there’s very little sporting fanaticism on tumblr. It’s just so bloody boring. “Go [team name]!” I. DO. NOT. CARE. GO. AWAY.

Again, nothing against the game of football or people who enjoy watching football and following their team in a normal way but I absolutely despise the culture surrounding it. 

14. A hobby you have/find interesting that other people bother you over/make fun of.

If people bother me about my interests then I remove myself from their presence so they can stop. :P

But seriously, I’m pretty open about the fact that I write fanfic and I do online RPing. I don’t shout it from the roofs but I don’t shy away from it either if it comes up. I’m not ashamed and I’m perfectly ready (perhaps too ready, some might say) to defend what I do and why it’s valuable. A few people I’ve met casually have expressed doubt over the value of some of these things but nobody whose opinion I’ve cared for. If my friends bother me over my interests or make fun of me, well, they’re free to stop being my friends! :)