stonepicnicking_okapi | Entries tagged with fannish 50

I debated what the last item on this list should be but day before yesterday I added a postcard of fireworks to my new planner and that decided me.

I love fireworks. I know many of my DW friends don't, but for me, they are a happy childhood memory, one of few I can look back on without pain, shame, or disgust. I lived in a place where they were legal and sold year-round and we shot them off as a family for every holiday. When I still had contact with the Trump side of my extended family, I would buy $100s of dollars of fireworks at places in Tennessee and take them to Mississippi and shoot them off for the holidays. Today, I have a tiny box of 6 sparklers for New Years' Eve. A long way from the old days, but I still put the stems between my teeth :) If you aren't about to lose a finger or an eye, you're doing it wrong.

So I wrote a double drabble set in my BBC Sherlock Waffle House/firework stand AU. The fireworks ficlet was Snap-Crackle-Boom and the Waffle House AU was Scattered, Smothered and Covered

Title: Still scattered, smother, and covered
Fandom: BBC Sherlock
Rating: Gen
Length: 200
Summary: John is reading a newspaper article about a fireworks accident. Sherlock is making hashbrowns, diner-style.

( Read more... )

That's it. I will not be doing this again, but I am happy and relieved I finished.

The List

Fannish 50: 2024: #1: Jeeves & Wooster
Fannish 50: 2024: #2: Libraries
Fannish 50: 2024: #3: Facial Sheet Masks
Fannish 50: 2024: #4: Venom
Fannish 50: 2024: #5: jhope of BTS
Fannish 50: 2024: #6: the art of Edward Gorey
Fannish 50: 2024: #7: The works of Edgar Allan Poe
Fannish 50: 2024: #8: SUGA of BTS
Fannish 50: 2024: #9: Miss Marple - Agatha Christie
Fannish 50: 2024: #10: Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll
Fannish 50: 2024: #11: Honkaku & shin honkaku detective fiction
Fannish 50: 2024: #12: Audiobooks
Fannish 50: 2024: #13: Holiday blend coffee
Fannish 50: 2024: #14: Jazz
Fannish 50: 2024: #15: Jigsaw puzzles
Fannish 50: 2024: #16: Sherlock Holmes
Fannish 50: 2024: #17: Poetry
Fannish 50: 2024: #18: Chocolate
Fannish 50: 2024: #19: Detective Matthew Venn series - Ann Cleeves
Fannish 50: 2024: #20: Tarot
Fannish 50: 2024: #21: Poirot - Agatha Christie
Fannish 50: 2024: #22: The ocean
Fannish 50: 2024: #23: Hardboiled detectives/noir
Fannish 50: 2024: #24: Tea
Fannish 50: 2024: #25: Bees & honey
Fannish 50: 2024: #26: Campion - Margery Allingham
Fannish 50: 2024: #27: The language of flowers
Fannish 50: 2024: #28: The moon
Fannish 50: 2024: #29: Gervase Fen detective series - Edmund Crispin
Fannish 50: 2024: #30: James Bond
Fannish 50: 2024: #31: Jungkook of BTS
Fannish 50: 2024: #32: Inspector Alleyn series - Ngaio Marsh
Fannish 50: 2024: #33: Collage materials
Fannish 50: 2024: #34: RM of BTS
Fannish 50: 2024: #35: Nanette Hayes mysteries - Charlotte Carter
Fannish 50: 2024: #36: Lord Peter Wimsey - Dorothy L. Sayers
Fannish 50: 2024: #37: Inspector Littlejohn series - George Bellairs
Fannish 50: 2024: #38: Jimin of BTS
Fannish 50: 2024: #39: Autumn
Fannish 50: 2024: #40: Halloween
Fannish 50: 2024: #41: Ghost stories of MR James
Fannish 50: 2024: #42: Christmas
Fannish 50: 2024: #43: Jin of BTS
Fannish 50: 2024: #44: Advent calendars
Fannish 50: 2024: #45: Snoopy
Fannish 50: 2024: #46: Inspector Rebus detective series- Ian Rankin
Fannish 50: 2024: #47: Scary movies
Fannish 50: 2024: #48: V of BTS
Fannish 50: 2024: #49: Short stories
Fannish 50: 2024: #50: Fireworks

...I'm almost there!

I like short stories. I admire authors who excel at the format. I suppose most of my ficcing could be construed as short stories. In my humble opinion, I own the finest collection of Christmas murder mystery short story anthologies in English. But, like John in my ficlet, this Christmas I didn't read any :(

Title: A quiet read interrupted
Fandom: BBC Sherlock
Characters: Sherlock & John
Rating: Gen
Length: 200
Prompt: bitter
Summary: John wants a quiet afternoon to read.

( Read more... )

( The list )

Today is V day in the BTS fandom, the birthday of Kim Taehyung. My favorite solo song of his (in fact the only one I like) is Singularity.

Watch on YouTube

V has a deep voice and an interest in jazz. Also many of his songs have 'winter' as a theme. He had a pet Pomeranian who was much beloved by ARMYs who recently died. I made him a torch singer who solves a riddle in this fic (and there are murders).

Torch singer (1000 words) by okapi
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: 방탄소년단 | Bangtan Boys | BTS
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Jeon Jungkook/Kim Taehyung | V
Characters: Kim Taehyung | V, Jeon Jungkook, Original Characters, Yeontan | Kim Taehyung's Dog (BTS)
Additional Tags: Alternate Universe, Bartender Jeon Jungkook, Singer Kim Taehyung | V, Alternate Universe - Bar/Pub, Song: Singularity (BTS), Inspired by Singularity (BTS)
Summary:

torch sing·er [torch singer]
noun
1. a singer who sings sad or sentimental love songs:
"a young torch singer with a deliciously earthy tone"

Happy V day.

And he's a very handsome man. He's currently serving in the military and has gotten rather beefy (compared to pre-enlistment).

This will be Fannish 50: #48

I like horror movies. I have borrowed plots from different horror movies for fic through the years. I prefer older films or the first of the franchise. This Christmastide I watched:

1. Jack Frost (1997). I enjoyed this. It was so camp, so ridiculous, so cheesy. I recommend it if you want a laugh. So the van carrying a serial killer and a van carrying Secret Stuff collide on a snowy night and the serial killer becomes a snowman. And (spoiler) there is a scene of the sheriff and the serial killing snowman wrestling in a truck bed filled with antifreeze. Crack-tastic.

2. Black Christmas (1974). I will probably watch this again. There are some cringe moments (the Margo Kidder character is an ugly drunk) but there were elements of it that are still pretty awesome. A killer haunts a sorority house at Christmas. And it's the origin of the phrase 'the call's coming from inside the house.'

3. Silent Night Deadly Night (1984). This was the first horror movie I ever saw and the only part I remembered was the best part (in my opinion). The killer grabs a half naked girl and impales her on the antlers of mounted deer. My uncle has/had A LOT of mounted animals around his house (deer, turkey, and other antelope, kudu, and horned animals he shot in Africa) so that made that part very memorable to a young okapi. But in general it's just sad. A traumatized orphan is abused by nuns and grows up and is forced by an employer to trigger himself at Christmas and goes on a spree with an axe. It was just sad (except for the chick impaled on the antlers).

4. Silent Night Bloody Night (1972). This is a bit contrived but very atmospheric. If you watch it at night with the lights out, you could probably scare the shit out of yourself. A man dies and leaves a house where a lot of tragedy has occurred, and a developer comes to town 15 years later to sell the house. And a killer is on the loose. There is a lot here about 'crazy people' i.e. people committed to mental institutions getting loose and being extremely organized and violent. That rankles. But it was scary in a retro way.

I really like the idea of BBC Sherlock getting an evil advent calendar from Moriarty.

Title: The psychopath's advent calendar, Day 1
Rating: Teen for implied violence/dark themes
Length: 500
Fandom: BBC Sherlock
Prompt: Listen
Summary: Sherlock receives a sinister Christmas gift from Jim Moriarty (inspired by Black Christmas).

( Read more... )

( The list )

I like the Inspector Rebus series by Ian Rankin. I didn't set out to do it but I am slowly going through the series in chronological order. I am on #16 which is called Naming the Dead from 2006. Rebus is Scottish. He's your stereotypical 'doesnt-play-by-the-rules' cop. He has an archenemy mafia-type boss named Cafferty. He has a sidekick female cop. He makes a lot of Questionable Life choices. He slept with a cop who became his boss. He has an ex wife and a lot of ex-lovers (doctors, artists, hotel managers, all kind of women) and a grown daughter who is in wheelchair from a hit-and-run related to one of his cases. There are a lot of references to classic rock music, and Rebus likes the Rolling Stones. He drinks too much. He is always on probation or being sent to remote police stations as punishment for refusing to submit to the chain of command. I wrote a triple drabble using these two Stones songs. "Winter" is a melancholy tune but very much a Rebus kind of song, and "Cosmic Christmas" is a weird hidden track, and Rebus would probably know obscure things like that. I always think of him as comfort reading. Not enlightening or especially sensitive. Sort of high handed with the good vs evil and that kind of thing but like "Law & Order" reruns, comforting. There is/are TV versions of Rebus but I haven't seen them. I prefer to keep him as he is in my mind.

Watch on YouTube

Title: Christmas at the Ox
Fandom: Inspector Rebus series - Ian Rankin
Rating: Gen
Length: 300
Summary: Rebus is at the Oxford bar on Christmas Day. He gets his Christmas wish.

( Read more... )

The early books and the later ones are widely available but some of the ones in the middle were hard to find so I bought them used online and made a collage with some of the pages. This is Edinburgh.

So this will be #46 for Fannish 50.

( The list )

I like Snoopy (and Woodstock). I have a Snoopy and Woodstock T-shirt. I wear it when I am feeling soft. I don't have any other fannish clothes. This is it.

I had a 3D Snoopy jigsaw puzzle with him dressed as a detective [uniting 3 of my loves very nicely], but lamentably it was so poorly constructed, I binned it a few months after I had to glue it together. It fell off a shelf (onto carpet) and burst into pieces. It was so fiddly it tried my patience to the snapping point.

I tried to get some Snoopy Christmas stickers but the ones I saw a few weeks ago at Target were GONE! So I ended up going down to the Hallmark store and getting a Snoopy kit to send a letter to Santa to make this collage. It came with a couple of coloring pages and two envelopes. I re-watched Charlie Brown Christmas and I realized I really just like Snoopy and Woodstock. Schroder is okay, too.

And to make it murder-y, here is my drabble for today's prompt (North Pole) on

fffc.

Title: Packing for the North Pole
Rating: Gen
Length: 100
Fandom: Charlie Brown/Snoopy
Characters: Linus and Charlie Brown
Summary: Charlie Brown is packing.

( Read more... )

( The list )

I am pushing hard to get to the finish line by the end of December!!

I like Advent calendars and advent calendar-themed challenges.

Fic

Two multi-fandom comms I am participating in this month which have daily prompts and an advent calendar type graphic are.

1.

adventdrabbles. There is a tree. The prompts are images (with text descriptor).
2.

fffc has a Winter Calendar of text prompts

To make it murder, I had Sherlock gifted an anonymous advent calendar. Those who know me can imagine who this is from and what dark things it might contain. This is for

drabblezone prompt 426: see if I care.

Title: Arrival of an advent calendar
Fandom: BBC Sherlock
Rating: Gen
Length: 300
Characters: John, Sherlock, Mrs. Hudson
Summary: Just prior to John's temporary absence from 221B, Sherlock receives an interesting anonymous gift.

( Read more... )

Crafting

Also inspired by a video on the Treasure Books Youtube channel, I made an advent calendar for

bethctg. This is Super Secret Craft Project #2 and she's going through it now. I used one of Minor's old binders from school and covered it and trimmed it. I made most of the envelopes and some of the things inside (little notebooks, bookmarks, Xmas tags) but a lot of the things inside are stickers collected from various places and bought on etsy. There are big envelopes for the first day, the last day (Xmas day) and yesterday (Jin's birthday because my friend is Jin-biased). So the themes were Silver and Gold (Jin and Xmas), Mocha and Ink (chocolate/coffee and books) and I tried to include a representative of each of the four categories in each day.

Links

I haven't gotten very far but

luvbarryfefe posted this and I like it. It's personal care (deep breaths, drink water, etc) or social (share a recipe) tasks to do every day of December. Advent of Joy.

https://adventofjoy.com/

( The list )

4 Dec is the birthday of BTS' oldest member Jin (real name: Kim Seokjin). He goes by the nickname 'Worldwide Handsome.'

I could've done 3 different spreads, but each had a different vibe so I went with this which matched the vibe of the fic below.

In thinking about Jin as a detective, I decided to make him a gentleman thief in the manner of Raffles and cast BTS' youngest member Jungkook as Bunny.

To Catch a Thief's Heart (3204 words) by okapi
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: 방탄소년단 | Bangtan Boys | BTS
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Jeon Jungkook/Kim Seokjin | Jin
Characters: Jeon Jungkook, Kim Seokjin | Jin, Min Yoongi | Suga, Min Yoonji
Additional Tags: Alternate Universe, Seokjin is a retired jewel thief, Jungkook is his sidekick, Yoongi is the man from Scotland Yard, Case Fic, Fluff, Alternate Universe - Edwardian, Theft, Murder, Jewelry
Summary:

The morning after a theft of gems and a murder at a masked ball, an inspector from Scotland Yard calls on a retired jewel thief and his sidekick.

Seokjin/Jungkook. Edwardian AU. Fluff.

( The list )

I love Christmas. [I usually call it Xmas because unlike the bumper stickers I prefer to keep the Christ out of Christmas, but I don't mind the word or the idea or any of it.]

I like the carols. I like the images. I like the decorations and gift giving and baking. I like the films and TV specials. All of it.

This is the first spread I've done in a while. I think it turned out very well.

And, of course, Christmas can absolutely be murder. This is a drabble I did for

adventdrabbles.

Title: Christmas is Murder
Fandom: BBC Sherlock
Length: 100
Rating: Gen
Prompt: Day 3: Christmas self-care
Characters: Jim Moriarty (criminal mastermind) & Sebastian Moran (sidekick sniper)
Summary: Jim's got an idea.

( Read more... )

( The list )

I really enjoy MR James' ghost stories. They are of a time and place and quality, but for me, they are always spooky, always eerie, always entertaining, no matter how many times I read them (or listen to them). James was a Cambridge medieval scholar and his stories have to do with scholars finding relics, old books, on their travels or having weird things happen to them.

I have had an audiobook version of Ghost Stories of an Antiquary narrated by Stephen Crichow and David Timson on repeat for most of the month, and there is a Youtube channel who does a very good job of them too. That's Classic Ghost Stories Podcast with Tony Walker. And the MR James playlist is here.

I really tried to channel his subtle style in my Spook Me offerings even though they are not in those fandoms. I have written a story in a MR James fandom, specifically, "Casting the Runes."

I just posted a MR James triple drabble which mentions one of James' most famous stories, "The Mezzotint."

Title: An indifferent mezzotint
Fandom: BBC Sherlock
Rating: Gen
Length: 300
Prompt: fatuous
Notes: references to MR James story "The Mezzotint"
Summary: Sherlock gets some unusual anonymous gifts on Hallowe'en night.

( Read more... )

And turns no more his head (900 words) by okapi
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Casting the Runes - M. R. James
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Edward Dunning/Henry Harrington
Characters: Edward Dunning, Henry Harrington
Additional Tags: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Hand Jobs, Oral Sex, Kinktober 2019, Intercrural Sex
Summary:

Three scenes between Edward Dunning & Henry Harrington of M. R. James' short story "Casting the Runes."

( The list )

I love Halloween. I love the colors and imagery and fun and food. It's my favorite holiday. I send out cards. Here's the last batch.

And a murder on Hallowe'en night for BBC Sherlock & John for

sweetandshort.

Title: Delays are not denials (Hallowe'en Night)
Fandom: BBC Sherlock
Rating: Gen
Length: 300
Characters: Sherlock & John
Prompt: surprise
Summary: Sherlock & John got to a Hallowe'en festival.

( Read more... )

( The list )

I love autumn! My favorite season.

I like the cooler weather and Halloween and the color of the leaves. I don't have many autumn-themed stickers left. So I shall have to offer the collage I posted before and my latest jigsaw.

And it was a challenge to figure out how autumn could be part of a murder. But I think I managed it. For

sweetandshort:

Title: A Killing Autumn
Fandom: BBC Sherlock
Rating: Gen
Length: 500
Prompt: enemies
Summary: Sherlock explains how autumn murdered a man.

( Read more... )

( The list )

Today is Jimin's birthday (13 Oct). He's still serving in the Korean military. I can't really see Jimin as a detective. Nevertheless, I did a double drabble. This is part of my Jin's Dad Jokes series (so expect a dad joke or pun or two). Also for

sweetandshort 10 out of 20 prompt: detective.

Title: Detective Mochi
Fandom: BTS
Rating: Gen
Characters Jimin and Jin
Length: 200
prompt: detective
Summary: Someone murdered Jimin's sneakers. Detective Mochi and Sidekick WWH on the case.

( Read more... )

One of my very favorite BTS collages I've done. With RM's, probably the top 2.

( The list )

Inspector Littlejohn isn't Holmes. He isn't Wimsey or Campion. He isn't Alleyn, either. But George Bellairs has written some decent mysteries featuring this detective. Every now and then we get some quirk (he knows a lot about lady's handbags, though it's never stated why) mentioned but mostly it's straightforward police cases when a man from the Yard is called in to help out the locals in an English village. Bellairs does not have ECR Lorac's flair for writing scenery and putting you in the place, but he was (in real life) a bank manager for his entire career so the financial part of the crimes is meticulous and sound. Once in a while there is something cringy like slapping a hysterical witness, but it's not as often as Ol' Aggie can be when she's on her hobby horse. I just finished Death of a Busybody where a gossipy spinster drowns in a cesspool. Here's a ficlet that resulted from some lines in that case. For

sweetandshort 10 out of 20 challenge.

Title: Reflections at a funeral
Fandom: Inspector Littlejohn series - George Bellairs
Rating: Gen
Length: 500
Prompt: funeral
Summary: Inspector Littlejohn pays his respects.

( Read more... )

death of a busybody

( The list )

I can't believe I'm at #36 and I haven't mentioned Lord Peter. I just finished listening to a decent version of The Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club on Youtube to get the feel of him so I could write this little story. Not a murder, as it turns out. For

sweetandshort September 10 out of 20 challenge.

Title: A story on a ghastly night
Fandom: Lord Peter Wimsey mysteries - Dorothy L. Sayers
Rating: Gen
Length: 500
Characters: Lord Peter Wimsey & Charles Parker
Prompt: night
Summary: Inspector Parker tells a story.

( Read more... )

And this is the collage which makes me think of Lord Peter:

( The list )

As far as I know, there are only 3 in the Nanette Hayes mystery series by Charlottle Carter and I've just finished the third Drumsticks. Nanette is an African American street saxophonist in New York City. She also had studied French. The mysteries usually involve people she knows, her family. Her mom sends her to Paris (Nanette has studied French) to help her aunt in the 2nd book. She has a best friend who is a stripper. There are a lot of references to jazz songs and different parts of New York City. And Nan picks up boyfriends and lovers (a few okay but mostly bad eggs). They are enjoyable mysteries, and Nan suffers the perils of most amateur sleuths, sparring with the police, being roughed up by Bad Guys.

I did a ficlet for

sweetandshort and I took the cover of book #2 Coq Au Vin and did a Parisian themed collage on the other side. I was going to make it into a postcard but it's a bit too big for that, I think.

Title: Autumn in New York
Prompt: Orange
Rating: Gen
Length: 400
Fandom: Nanette Hayes mysteries - Charlotte Carter
Summary: Nanette gets a note dropped in her saxophone case.

( Read more... )

( The list )

There is still 13 minutes left of RM's birthday in Korea. I didn't have to try to make him a detective--I already have! He's the art cop in my soap opera and I posted a special chapter today. Here is the art collage I made last year:

And here is a pretty duet he did with Parkjiyoon

Watch on YouTube

( The list )

I am fannish about collage materials. I have been learning about new tools from Youtube videos and one of them is called a bonefolder. Here is a BBC Sherlock drabble for

100words.

Title: Down to Earth
Fandom: BBC Sherlock
Rating: Gen
Notes: Dark humor, implied murder

( Read more... )

My box from last year. It's the same size now, but it's got another tier underneath now.

( The list )

I enjoy the Inspector Alleyn series by Ngaio Marsh (books only, I've not see the TV adaptations). I haven't read all of them, but I have read most of the early ones, those are the ones I prefer. I enjoy reading the stories set in her native New Zealand. Colour Scheme has an especially ingenious murder device. Much like Harriet Vane, I like Troy (who becomes Alleyn's wife) in herself, as an artist, much more than as 'wife of the detective.' I like reading about the way Marsh, who was also an artist, writes about her artistic process. I could do without the moralizing. And it's always struck me as odd that the sticking point in Alleyn & Troy is getting together is that Troy doesn't believe in capital punishment, and Alleyn as a detective sends people to the gallows. It always strikes me as a bizarre hurdle. I don't enjoy the ones with their son Ricky. I DNF one I tried recently (Spinsters in Jeopardy). I am just not a fan of Mom Pain as a major plot point and Ricky gets kidnapped in that one. Also the drug trade/drug crime is a difficult one for a traditional Golden Age of Crime writer to pull off. It never seems realistic. And there's always a tendency to moralize. One of the best parts of Alleyn is his friendship with Inspector Fox so I wrote a ficlet for

vocab_drabbles which covers an 'Untold Case' mentioned in Artists in Crime.

Title: Fox's Arson Case
Fandom: Inspector Alleyn - Ngaio Marsh
Rating: Gen
Word Count: 550
Prompt: epistolary
Characters/Pairings: Fox & Alleyn
Warnings: None
Summary: At the beginning of Artists in Crime, Alleyn writes: Fox has written regularly. He seems to have done damn well over that arson case. So this is a letter from Fox to Alleyn about the arson case.

( Read more... )

( The list )

Today (1 SEPT) is Jungkook's birthday.

I honestly can't see Jungkook as a detective, not a cerebral one or a hardboiled one. But I have a Namkook hybrid AU where Jungkook is a rabbit hybrid gardener and Namjoon is a dragon hybrid schoolteacher. So I did a ficlet of Jungkook figuring out that one of Namjoon's students is responsible for the demise of Jungkook's garden gnome: The Curious Case of the Gnome in the Night.

And the collage I did last year is still good.