Trabia Garden

Single best sentence in the written records I keep of my dreams: Dreamt that Boris Johnson kneed me in the stomach. How do I not remember this?


I don't own a PSP, so I haven't played either of the Dissidia Final Fantasy fighting games. However, because I am very interested by the prospect of characters from different Final Fantasy games interacting, I've been watching some of the pre-battle quotes on YouTube.

Whilst I love most of Yuna's lines - encouraging the heroes, showing her resolve when facing villains - I have a few issues with the portrayal and perceptions of Squall.

Squall to Cloud: Another lost soul, like me...

Awful. No. Squall doesn't romanticise his isolation; he just sees it as necessary. (The portrayal of Cloud is a different issue, best addressed by someone more familiar with the character than I; I never felt I could entirely get to grips with the cast of VII, largely because of the poor translation.)

Squall to Squall: There can only be one Squall.

I don't like this one because, in my eyes, Squall keeps a fair amount of self-loathing under his skin. 'There can only be one Squall' implies arrogance, whereas I think Squall feels on some level that it would be better if there were no Squalls.

In Duodecim, Squall's quote when fighting himself is, 'If you are me, then you understand,' which I prefer. Squall has always been fighting himself; when there are physically two of him, of course they're going to fight.

Kuja to Squall: I'll crush your confidence.

Squall is not a confident person. He is sure of his own ability in battle; he is a seething mass of insecurity in basically everything else. I don't like this line because Kuja strikes me as fairly perceptive, capable of picking out and needling at the things that really bother someone; I think he'd be able to see through Squall's front, and having him fall for the front implies to me that the scriptwriters have also fallen for it. Speaking of which:

Squall to Cloud of Darkness: I have no fear.

Utterly, utterly, utterly untrue. This line's sort of excusable, though, because Squall does like to tell himself that he's not afraid.

Tidus to Squall: What's on your mind? Spill it!

I do like this one, mostly because it makes me think of how hilarious it would be if Squall and Tidus spent any real amount of time together. They would not get along at all, although it wouldn't be for lack of trying on Tidus' part.

Yuna to Squall: Don't you want to be with the others?
Squall to Yuna: Can't you fight alone?

And these are perfect; don't change a thing. Squall and Yuna have always been opposites on this point: Squall views relying on others as a sign of weakness, whereas Yuna believes that her friends are the source of her strength. What would happen if, in some strange collision of the VIII and X worlds, Garden assigned Squall to be Yuna's guardian?

Squall to Vaan: ...you're hard to deal with.

ALSO PERFECT. Poor Vaan.

Kefka to Kefka: Ooh, who's that handsome devil?

This quote has nothing to do with Squall, obviously, but I am including it because it is the best.

Also brilliant: Vaan asks Ultimecia how old she is. VAAN. And I never finished Final Fantasy V, but Bartz has some great quotes: 'Would it kill you to smile sometimes?' (when fighting Squall), and 'Light, give me strength! ...or whatever.'

I suppose part of my issue with Squall in Dissidia might just be that I don't really like Doug Erholtz as his voice actor, but I suppose that was inevitable; because I'm English, I tend to imagine that non-voiced characters from worlds other than ours are speaking with some form of English accent, and of course they'll almost always be voiced by Americans if they later appear in voiced works. Ah, well.

There are only three episodes of 10 O'Clock Live left! I'm going to miss it when it finishes, even though it doesn't have nearly enough interaction between the presenters. It was very wobbly indeed when it started out, but I think it's really found its feet, and the past few episodes have been great.

The problem with 10 O'Clock Live is that it shouldn't be live. In theory, it means the presenters can react on-air to any major events that might occur, but on the occasion on which that did happen - the passing of the Libyan no-fly zone resolution - they couldn't really react, in part because it was live and therefore they didn't have time to gather proper information and in part because the presenters are given so little time to discuss things unscripted.

The reason the presenters don't have time for discussion is because Channel 4 want to limit the risk of something going wrong on live television as far as possible; they can't put themselves in the position of not knowing what their presenters are going to be doing, and they can't risk dead air, so the vast majority of 10 O'Clock Live consists of the presenters performing pre-written pieces. This is a waste of liveness, Channel 4! Either make more room for spontaneous discussion or turn the programme into 10 O'Clock Prerecorded, in which you can keep the things that work, edit out the things that don't and allow debates/fabulous shouting matches to run their course, rather than cutting them short before we get to see whether John Prescott (who has never looked better than he did on Thursday night) is going to punch that arsehole from News of the World.

(THAT ARSEHOLE FROM NEWS OF THE WORLD. 'On Tuesday [Sienna Miller]'s prancing around in front of a camera; why on Wednesday should she complain about it because she happens to get caught by a pap who's maybe listened in to her messages to see where she's gonna go?' THIS IS A VERBATIM QUOTE. If you're happy being in front of a camera on your own terms, what right do you have to complain when people listen in on your private conversations? I MEAN, THAT'S JUST UNREASONABLE. 'Privacy's a place where bad people do bad things.' Saying that hacking celebrities' answering machines is just equivalent to listening to your boyfriend's messages to find out what he's been up to, BECAUSE WE ALL KNOW THAT THAT'S ENTIRELY MORALLY SOUND. It was great to see Prescott, with the entire audience behind him, bearing down on News of the World Arsehole like a great big wave of righteousness.)

The other reason 10 O'Clock Live shouldn't be live: sometimes they'll get a very enthusiastic audience, which is unbearable because Brooker and Mitchell have no idea what to do when they're applauded in the middle of a piece. They just sit there, looking uncomfortable. IT'S LIVE, AUDIENCE; APPLAUDING SLOWS EVERYTHING DOWN. Although the presenters do seem to have become a bit better at handling unwanted applause in recent weeks.

(Another annoying thing about the audience: they don't laugh at funny things Lauren Laverne says, and then they crack up when Brooker rephrases them to clarify. I SEE YOU, AUDIENCE, REFUSING TO ACKNOWLEDGE THAT THE FEMALE PRESENTER CAN BE FUNNY. Part of 10 O'Clock Live's improvement can be attributed to the fact that she's now being allowed to do actual humorous segments, whereas before there was a sense of 'oh noooo, we can't give her jokes', presumably because the same material would be much better received delivered by another of the presenters because the audience are sexist idiots.)

Also, although this is just a personal reason, I find live television really uncomfortable to watch because of the constant threat that the presenters might seriously cock things up. This is a potential that might amuse me in other programmes, but when I like the presenters I just get very embarrassed on their behalf.

Although it does mean that Charlie Brooker occasionally interrupts political discussion to point out that a fly has just landed on his nose, which is rather delightful.


For those who don't watch 10 O'Clock Live, have a performance from a 1976 episode of Top of the Pops. It's pretty incredible. (On Mother's Day, my mum decided to have a 1970s-themed evening and we watched the entire episode containing the linked performance. I enjoyed the fact that, during another performance, the entire audience were standing completely still except for one girl dancing away in the background. Oh, seventies television.)

Finally, in news irrelevant to everyone but me, my tongue feels as if a family of Borrowers are trying to convert it into a bungalow. Ow ow ow ow ow.

Thank you very much for the virtual lemur, kind anonymous person!


I've never really watched Big Brother, but I thought I'd check out the 'first twenty-four hours in the house' episode last night, as this is apparently to be the final series, and I was bored, and, all right, I have no self-respect. (I'm not a football fan, and apparently at this time of year one's televisual options are limited to the World Cup and Big Bloody Brother. Sigh.)

On the whole, though, the housemates seem to be decent, likeable people! Is that supposed to happen? Has cultural osmosis been lying to me all these years? I'm not planning to watch the entire thing (someone please intervene if I don't stop), but it exceeded my expectations, faith-in-humanity-wise.

(Although Ben Poshvoice and John James Australiadude unsettlingly resemble both each other and slimy Conservative MP for Richmond Park Zac Goldsmith. They kept sitting next to each other. I ended up thinking of them as the 'Goldsmith Twins'.)

Is there a Big Brother fandom with fic? I DON'T WANT TO JOIN IT; I'M JUST WONDERING. Because it's just occurred to me that Dead Set is a concept that could be applied to every series of Big Brother: 'how do this year's housemates cope when there's a zombie outbreak in the outside world?'

I'm not going to write it. I'm just saying.

Oh, my goodness, why am I making an entry about Big Brother? This is appalling.


Speaking of disreputable media: I have stumbled across a dramatic reading of a notorious work of Legend of Zelda fanfiction. To be more accurate: I have stumbled across a DRAMATIC reading of a notorious work of Legend of Zelda fanfiction.

Now, I feel a bit bad about linking to this. There are two types of really bad fanfiction: there's the fanfiction that's obviously been deliberately written to be as bad as possible, which is fine to poke fun at because then everyone's having a laugh, author included. But then there's the bad fanfiction that's obviously heartfelt: in this case, a lengthy, poorly-written but completely earnest work of Mary Sue fantasy. I often find these weirdly endearing, and, whilst I might laugh at them in private, I try not to mock them too publicly, because it could be very embarrassing for the author if she ever found my comments. Also, they're often by fairly new or young fanfiction writers, and it would be a shame to discourage them; I imagine most of us cringe slightly when we look back at our early writing.

This was written about eight years ago, though, I believe, so perhaps the author will have some distance from it now, and in any case once your fic has reached such a level of notoriety that people are doing DRAMATIC readings of it I suppose a link to the reading can't make things much worse.

Also, the reading is hilarious. Navi in particular makes me crack up every time she speaks.

Here is the playlist! You don't need to be especially familiar with the Legend of Zelda to enjoy it; I've never owned a Zelda game. I want this reader and BRIAN BLESSED to work on a joint project.

(Riona and housemate Rachael have returned from a trip to the supermarket. Riona checks the Internet.)
Riona: Rachael!
Rachael: What?
Riona: While we were out, David Cameron became Prime Minister.
Rachael: Oh, God! This is what happens when you leave the house!


Had to crack up at Charlie Brooker's response on Twitter: LEAST SEXY PRIME MINISTER EVER

It's not the outcome for which I was hoping, and Cameron still terrifies me, but I do find it hilarious that the media have been portraying our political turmoil as a massive Cameron/Clegg slashfic (this manip was on the BBC website, apparently). And, as was pointed out on the Alternative Election Night, a Conservative government means these are going to be a great few years for satire (a Conservative-Lib Dem coalition probably even more so. Are Cameron and Clegg going to be living together at Downing Street, thus making the running of this country into a ridiculous sitcom? I do hope so). Every cloud has a hilarious lining!

(Here is a video on the BBC site of Clegg arriving at Number 10. Is it just me, or is Cameron's body language incredibly, creepily possessive?)


Anyway, you already knew that David Cameron was Prime Minister. To continue the entry's theme of 'Things You Already Knew': SO IT TURNS OUT THAT I WAS IN THE ROOM WHEN CHARLIE BROOKER WET HIMSELF ON LIVE TELEVISION. I can't believe he actually wrote about that in a column. That's amazing. It would have been a great fact for Would I Lie To You?

Also, in case you're interested but somehow missed it, the first episode of Charlie Brooker's new Radio Four panel show, So Wrong It's Right, aired yesterday. The panel were David Mitchell, Victoria Coren and Rufus Hound; you can listen to it here if you're in the UK. My favourite part, predictably, is about seventeen minutes in, when Mitchell gets shirty with Brooker for calling him 'smartypants' and then comes up with an entire bitter reality TV premise in response to it; this was recorded over a year ago, so I'm delighted Mitchell and Brooker had chemistry even then. I want Mitchell, Brooker and Coren to be on everything together. (They're all on tomorrow's episode of You Have Been Watching, incidentally: ten o'clock on Channel Four.)


Bit of advertising now: draegonhawke is looking for players for a panfandom roleplay, beyondtherift! It's been around for a while, but a number of players have recently moved on, leaving vacancies for characters from fandoms including Doctor Who, Torchwood, Life on Mars and Buffy. If you're looking for plotty roleplaying and won't be too disconcerted by the fact that the characters already there have undergone development over the course of the game, you could check it out.

Today, on the telephone:

Riona's Brother: Has Dad voted yet?
Riona: Er, I don't know.
Riona's Brother: When he gets home, if he hasn't voted, maybe you could... break his ankles?

Ours is a politically divided household.


I've had the right to vote in a general election for almost four years, but today was the first opportunity I had to exercise that right. How exciting! I find the idea that any country considers me responsible enough to have a say in its running terrifying, frankly, but you have only yourself to blame, Representation of the People Act 1969. It's between the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats in my constituency; I've voted Lib Dem.

For the information of anyone who wants silly, fannish discussion of the election and UK politics in general, by the way: wanttobeatree and theoret have created uk_lolitics. They're planning to have an election party post tonight. Have you ever wondered what Pokémon David Cameron would have? Now there is a place to ask!

Tentative assignments:

- I can see Cameron with a Mr Mime, largely based on the fact that both the man and the Pokémon sort of unsettle me. I don't know whether it's his face or his manner of speaking or his body language, but something about David Cameron is reminiscent of Derren Brown without the charisma, and that freaks me out tremendously. I do not want Derren Brown in a position of political power. Doctor Who has shown us what would happen in that scenario, and it doesn't end well. (Mr Mime's Psychic type is also relevant here, of course.)

- Brown has a Pidgey. Gordon Brown could well be making the most reasonable points in the world, but I cannot pay attention to anything he says. It's bizarre. Gordon Brown is essentially invisible to me; I was still forgetting Tony Blair was no longer Prime Minister a year and a half after Brown succeeded him. It's as if the man walks around surrounded by a perception filter. It makes sense to assign him a rather unremarkable Pokémon that shows up so often you eventually barely notice it.

- Clegg has a Taillow: a tiny but gutsy bird Pokémon that will take on much larger foes.

And that is probably as intelligent as my political commentary is going to get, oh dear.

Apparently, someone has now thrown a shoe at the Chinese Prime Minister. My first reaction was 'oh, that's original'; my second was an overwhelming urge to buy fluffy slippers with tiger faces or something similar and hurl them at politicians. Not necessarily politicians I disagree with; just politicians. Perhaps it could even be a slipper-throwing of support. I want everyone to do this. I want throwing cute slippers to become a sort of political Rickrolling. (I am not actually encouraging you to do this, however, because I would hate to hear that you had been arrested for throwing slippers with rabbit ears at a head of state.)

SEE, I CAN STILL TALK ABOUT THINGS THAT AREN'T DERREN BROWN.

Speaking of things that are Derren Brown, however: ahahaha, the card-flip in the fifth episode of Trick or Treat. He is such a bad person! There'd just been two episodes of Derren being lovely, so I suppose it makes sense that he was going to be really, really evil in this one. He is a living reversible Trick-or-Treat card.

Also, I love that the poor guy called the police. You'd think that would happen more often in these things. I think my favourite parts of these episodes are the parts where Derren creepily introduces himself. (You may actually be able to watch this if you are not in the UK; as I am in the UK and therefore not allowed to watch it (grr, YouTube), I can't check whether it's the correct clip, but it seems to be. Can anyone confirm?)


Here, because I felt it logically followed, is a picture of Derren Brown and Mewtwo:




As always, this is an invitation for you to fill the comments with more manips of Pokémon in unexpected places. Or manips involving Derren Brown. Or, of course, manips unexpectedly involving Pokémon with Derren Brown. They do not have to be well done!

To the three persons from my English Language course who came up to me on the train platform and allowed me to join their conversation: you won't see this, but I was feeling terribly lonely after the seminar, and you are the reason I wasn't in tears on my journey back from campus today. Thank you so much; you have no idea how much you helped me.


To America: I hope you have been voting for Obama. He plays the ukulele. And he's probably got some policies and things, but, seriously, you need a president who can play the ukulele. Don't deny it. (Everyone I passed today was discussing the election. Everyone. There's not nearly so much interest when it's time to elect a party for our country.)


To self: I CANNOT BELIEVE YOU BOOKED A PLACE AT A SUPERNATURAL CONVENTION. YOU ARE SUCH A DORK. AND IT'S GOING TO DRAG YOU UP TO BIRMINGHAM RIGHT IN THE MIDDLE OF YOUR EXAMS. AND YOU FORGOT TO FILL IN YOUR ADDRESS, SO YOU MAY NOT EVEN GET THE CONFIRMATION LETTER WITH THE DETAILS YOU NEED. WAY TO GO. (I've e-mailed the guy in charge, so with any luck I have not ruined my chances of meeting wanttobeatree and sazzlette eeeeeeeeee. APPARENTLY THERE ARE GOING TO BE SOME ACTORS OR SOMETHING TOO, BUT wanttobeatree AND sazzlette ARE THE IMPORTANT PART.)


To everyone on my flist: ahahaha, I love that you're all falling for High School Musical. (Pretty much all of the posts on my friendspage lately have been about either High School Musical or the American election. I FEEL A TRULY HORRIFYING CROSSOVER COMING ON.)

BY THE WAY, JAMES MARSDEN AND JOHN BARROWMAN ARE THE SAME PERSON. I can't believe I haven't heard anyone suggesting this theory FACT FACT FACT before. THEIR SMILES ARE THE SAME. THEIR LAUGHS ARE THE SAME. IT IS FRIGHTENING.

It is moments like this when I become sad that I know almost nothing about actors, because otherwise I would be able to write... well, I don't know, something. Now that I think about it, The Adventures of John Barrowman and James Marsden (Who Are, By The Way, A Single Entity, So It's Really Just The Adventures Of John Marsden Or Something) doesn't seem quite as thrilling and epic an idea as when it was first conceived. Possibly it would be slightly more thrilling and epic if time-travel were involved. JAMES MARSDEN GOES BACK IN TIME TO MEET HIS PAST SELF AND TELLS SAID PAST SELF THAT NO, OF COURSE HE'S A DIFFERENT PERSON, HIS NAME IS 'JOHN'. The resulting events play out much like the 'Captain Jack Harkness' episode of Torchwood. Genius.

Of course, it wouldn't be a very original fanfic, as that is quite obviously what has happened in real life.

(Other secretly-the-same-people: John Simm and Jonty of the Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain. James Sunderland (what is it about names beginning with 'J'?) and Robert Chase. thebaconfat and squeemu. dracothelizard and Top Gear Dog. Pyramid Head and draegonhawke. FEEL FREE TO CONTRIBUTE YOUR OWN THEORIES.

A few months ago, draegonhawke sent me a letter theorising that Barack Obama may be the Master, on the grounds that he had the smile and that she found herself liking him despite not quite being certain of his policies. As I find myself wanting him to win the US elections despite knowing practically nothing about him, I think I may have to agree.)