Thursday: Markings

Mar. 11th, 2026 09:30 pm
simplyn2deep: (Default)
[personal profile] simplyn2deep posting in [community profile] comment_fic
If you are available to host, we could really use your help. You can sign up here.

The following dates are available for hosting:
March 17 & 19
March 31 & April 2
April 7 & 9
April 14 & 16
April 21 & 23
April 28 & 30

I am aware that interest has waned in both hosting locations. If posts are not done, then that more than likely means no one signed up to host for the week...and it is what it is.

Now for why you're probably here. Hello, everyone. I’m [personal profile] simplyn2deep, and today is my last day of hosting for the week.

Today’s theme is Markings. These can be physical, symbolic, temporary, or permanent, anything that leaves a visible trace. Think tattoos, scars, birthmarks, paint, ink, magical marks, bruises, or even something drawn in the sand.

Just a few rules:
No more than five prompts in a row.
No more than three prompts in the same fandom.
Use the character's full name and fandom's full name for ease in adding to the Lonely Prompts spreadsheet.
No spoilers in prompts for a month after airing, or use the spoiler cut option found here.
If your fill contains spoilers, warn and leave plenty of space, or use the above-mentioned spoiler cut.

Prompts should be formatted as follows: [Use the character's full names and fandom's full name]
Fandom, Character +/ Character, Prompt

Some examples to get the ball rolling...
+ Teen Wolf, (pre) Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski, Derek discovers Stiles has a mark meant only for his mate.
+ Hawaii Five-0, Steve McGarrett + Danny Williams, Danny asks about the scars Steve never talks about.
+ Teen Wolf, Erica Reyes/Boyd (Vernon Boyd III), Erica paints a symbol on Boyd before a dangerous mission.

We are now using AO3 to bookmark filled prompts. If you fill a prompt and post it to AO3 please add it to the Bite Sized Bits of Fic from 2026 collection. See further notes on this new option here.

Not feeling any of today’s prompts? You can use LJ’s advanced search options to limit keyword results to only comments in this community. Fret not, DW members; we are working on a way to search through old entries for prompts for you! As of right now, the best way to search for a lonely prompt on DW is to search the community’s archive, which can be found [[HERE]].

While the use of LJ's advanced search and DW’s archive are options, bookmarking the links of prompts you like might work better for searching in the future.

As a friendly reminder about our schedule, Lonely Prompts and sharing completed fills are encouraged on Sundays, while new themes and prompts are posted on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Saturdays are a free-for-all day. We'll share our posts on DW and LJ for everyone's convenience. Keep an eye out for notifications!

If you have a Dreamwidth account and would feel more comfortable participating there, please feel free to do so…and spread the word! [community profile] comment_fic


tag=markings

RIP (Read In Progress) Wednesday

Mar. 11th, 2026 10:00 pm
silversea: Asian woman reading (Reading)
[personal profile] silversea posting in [community profile] booknook
It's still Wednesday here! Are you making any progress in your reading?

Prompt 2784: Off Center

Mar. 11th, 2026 10:19 pm
immortalje: Typwriter with hands typing (Default)
[personal profile] immortalje posting in [community profile] dailyicons

Today's prompt is: off center



• You have 2 days time to submit an icon for this prompt (in other words, until prompt 2786 gets posted)!
• Prompt 2782 has been closed.
• If you have any questions regarding the prompt, feel free to ask in a comment.
• To submit an icon you simply reply to this post with the following information:
Icon:
Claim: (only necessary if it's a specific claim)
Status: (e.g. #1/10 - number of icon completed/table size)

Pre-formatted
oursin: Photograph of small impressionistic metal figurine seated reading a book (Reader)
[personal profile] oursin

What I read

Finished Death in the Palace - was not sure at first about the introduction of the actual Marx Brothers into the cast, but felt this had meta-textual resonance as there was something very Marxiste about the whole making-a-movie shenanigans (especially when it's this dreadful costume epic) + murder mystery going on.

Then went straight on to Cat Sebastian, Star Shipped, which was fine but perhaps didn't quite reach the high bar set by After Hours at Dooryard Books among her recent history/contemporary set works.

Returned to TonyInterrupter, which had perhaps lost some momentum from the hiatus, but nonetheless, I may try more Nicola Barker at some time.

Georgette Heyer, Regency Buck (1935) came up as a Kobo deal, and I realised it had not featured in the Heyer re-read binge a few years ago. Gosh, it shows a certain early style, what? with the massive amount of Mi Research, I Show U It, re prize-fights, phaeton-racing to Brighton, the interiors of the Royal Pavilion, the members of the House of Hanover (how right Mme C- was in advising to keep well away, no?). Also, this cannot be, can it, the first outing of the Apparently Dangerous Alpha Male vs the Civil and Sympathetic Beta Male who turns out to be a conniving sleaze? (not unique to Heyer.)

Also finished the book for review.

On the go

Also picked up as a Kobo deal, Fern Riddell, Victoria's Secret: The Private Passion of a Queen (2025). I have considered the author, as a historian of Victorian sexuality, sound on the vibrator question, if perhaps a bit too much in the 'Victorians were cool sexy beasts really' camp (It's All More Complicated), but I was interested to see where this would go. It's very good on the way things are with the Royal Archives, for which 'gatekeeping' seems too loose a term. But I'm still not entirely persuaded. It's a bit repetitive. Okay, it's quite good on the tensions within the actual Royal family (though can it really be that Kaiser Bill-to-be had Oedipus issues?). But still have a way to go.

Up next

Maybe the latest Literary Review. Otherwise, dunno.

It may be an amiable egg

Mar. 11th, 2026 08:19 pm
cimorene: Illustration of a woman shushing and a masked harlequin leaning close to hear (gossip)
[personal profile] cimorene
"A nice fried egg, sir."

"And what, pray, do you mean by nice? It may be an amiable egg. It may be a civil, well-meaning egg. But if you think it is fit for human consumption, adjust that impression."

—PG Wodehouse,"Mulliner's Buck-U-Uppo"
runpunkrun: girl in school uniform fixes her hair in a public restroom (just say when)
[personal profile] runpunkrun posting in [community profile] fancake
Fandom: Stranger Things
Pairings/Characters: Steve Harrington & Dustin Henderson
Rating: G
Length: 2,489 words
Creator Link: [archiveofourown.org profile] insignificant457
Theme: Siblings, Gen

Summary: "See, the problem is this: in the past few weeks there's been a distressing increase in the thickness and darkness of the peach fuzz on his upper lip, to the point that it's becoming noticeable and also gross. He should be happy about it, really, because it's a sign of manhood, isn't it?"

Sometimes, not having a dad around really, really sucks. But recently acquiring a big brother does have its perks.

Reccer's Notes: As the author says, "They're brothers your honor." I love the way Steve and Dustin adopted each other in the show, and this fic feels like it could be a missing scene. The voices are spot on, and the vibes are good.

Fanwork Link: Problems of a Follicular Nature
sartorias: (Default)
[personal profile] sartorias
One thing that one has to accept with Dickens is that his heroines will be long-suffering, and that men will decide what's good for them, for which they will be grateful.

Given that, I think this the best of his books.

It has the fewest Victorian-plot coincidences, and it has the most and best swathes of bitingly funny satire of soi-disant high society. How the Lammle marriage comes about, and how each of them, in becoming a couple, brings the other down from spoken moral rectitude to the barest pretense of it is as horrific in a quiet way as all the rantings, drownings, and so on.

Bradley Headstone is a remarkably believable depiction of the stalker boyfriend who can't seem to stop himself from sinking into obsession--and violence. Eugene Wrayburn is a fascinating, witty guy for an idle dog.

There are some bits of brilliance--the depiction of the riverside society; Mr. Boffins' educational plan; the Veneering parties.

There were signs of actual personality on Bella's part (when we meet her, she is mourning over being forced to wear black because the guy she was engaged to--whom she had never met--had drowned, which pretty much has finished her socially. Why shouldn't she mourn?) even if the machinations behind her romance are quite wince-worthy.

Dickens also tries to make up for comfortably unexamined antisemitism, and the subsidiary characters are wonderfully memorable.

Altogether it's a real page-turner. Glad I reread it.

March: Pusekätzchen

Mar. 11th, 2026 04:24 pm
bookscorpion: This is Chelifer cancroides, a book scorpion. Not a real scorpion, but an arachnid called a pseudoscorpion for obvious reasons. (Default)
[personal profile] bookscorpion posting in [community profile] common_nature
I went out for a little walk this morning and found the first willow catkins - Pusekätzchen! They are an important flower for bees at this time of year, not just for honey bees but for solitary bees, bumblebees and solitary wasps.

catkins
Read more... )

Freedom of speech

Mar. 11th, 2026 02:18 pm
liv: cartoon of me with long plait, teapot and purple outfit (Default)
[personal profile] liv
There's been a rant I have been meaning to turn into an essay for a while, but Ken White (Popehat) has done it better, so I direct you to his really well-written and referenced (though US-centric) article: The Fashionable Notion of 'Free Speech Culture' Is Justifying State Censorship, Ironically. Criticism. Is. Not. Censorship, and “Free speech culture” has a natural tendency to discount the speech rights and interests of people who criticize speech.

This is important in Europe too, not just in the US, because it's a deliberate, specific Russian infowar tactic to promote far right events at UK universities and claim censorship if anyone objects. A network based at [Cambridge] University and backed by Thiel, which it said was using the issue of free speech to “normalise white nationalism on UK campuses”. Neither Putin nor Thiel has anyone's freedom at heart, and they're all too successful at distracting people with a toddler-like notion of "freedom" where you get to say the naughty words without being told off.

shorter version of my original opinion, building on White's piece )

Reading Wednesday

Mar. 11th, 2026 07:41 am
sabotabby: (books!)
[personal profile] sabotabby
 Just finished: Lullabies For Little Criminals by Heather O'Neill. Naturally, this was great, and surprisingly uplifting at the end. I don't have a lot to add after last week—if you haven't read it, I highly recommend it.

Currently reading: Indigenous Ingenuity: A Celebration of Traditional North American Knowledge by Deidre Havrelock and Edward Kay. This is a kids' book about technologies and traditional knowledge systems used by pre-contact Indigenous peoples. I'm reading it for work but it's been on my radar for awhile. It's quite good and informative, if you can get past three things that I find cringe: 1) the kind of writing for children that includes lines like "Do you think you would enjoy being creative?", 2) a certain exuberant reiteration of "gosh, weren't Indigenous people SMART and RESOURCEFUL" as if they're not that now, and if we need to be constantly reassured, and 3) it's pretty American-centric, though it does mention Nations on the land currently known as Canada as well. But very useful overall, and the problems I find with it are largely centred around my own dislike of how books for children are written and fairly significant but subtle framing between the US and Canada as to how we talk about Indigenous civilizations and sovereignty.

The Orphan of Zhao

Mar. 11th, 2026 11:03 am
rmc28: (cuihc)
[personal profile] rmc28

This is an 800 year old play based on events 2,500 years ago in China, the first Chinese play to be translated into any European language (about 300 years ago). The Royal Shakespeare Company commissioned James Fenton to adapt it for a production about 13 years ago, and a student theatre group are putting that adaptation on at the ADC in Cambridge this week.

I went to see it last night with Charles, and also Olivia, one of my friends from Womens Blues. (We then found two of my Huskies teammates in the audience so it became an accidental hockey social.) We saw a little first-night talk beforehand from the director and some of the actors, about why they chose this play and some of their favourite lines and aspects of the characters they play. The play itself was very good, very gripping, a revenge tragedy with a very high body count and an ending I didn't quite expect.

The kind of evening that makes me remember how much I like living in this weird little city in the fens.

(and, in further "wow I love living in walking distance of the ADC" news, here's what I'm hoping to get to between now and early May:

  • Into The Woods (famous musical)
  • Olympus Unscripted (improv show on greek myths theme)
  • Chekov's Four Farces (what it says on the tin)
  • Next to Normal (musical about mental illness)
  • The Ferryman (play about the Irish Troubles)
  • Medea (musical adaptation of Euripedes play)

)

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