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Back from writerconuk!

Am totally exhausted but it was worth it as was all the stress and tears that came about whilst organising it. Everyone had a wonderful time and it was just great to see so many smiling faces at the end of the weekend. I'm thrilled to bits.

Proper post to come about the event as a whole later but first I have a couple of little jobs to do and then I think I shall collapse ;)

Smallville FTW!

Trust some good news to come out while I was away

( Spoilers for Season 7 Episode 5 )

Help?

Yes, the IT Technician is asking for computer help again *hangs head in shame*

The folder with all my icons in appears to be busted. Every time I try and open it it freezes and then closes. This is with explorer or if I browse to it using Photobucket. I can browse to individual files inside the folder, I just can't open the folder itself.

Any ideas?

Things I have tried:

Making sure the permissions were correct
Running virus scan just on that folder
Re-naming the folder

Edit: Copying it to a new location seems to have done the trick *backs up before the damn thing breaks again*

Thanks acme54

My time at writerconuk

I have had an extremely productive weekend as well as having lots of fun

I spent my time on the reception desk writing my CLFF Wave 22 fic (What? It was a writercon and I was writing! :-P)

I wrote a drabble for speakr2customrs drabble panel

I made an icon using tips gained from bogwitch's icon tutorial panel -

And I even found time to play some Sims during the free time (more on that later)

I also need to give extra virtual hugs to bogwitch and hesadevil by making my goodie bag extra special by sticking Smallville stuff in it instead of Buffy stuff. I now have a lovely Clark pen, a Lex keyring and a poster which has Spuffy on one side and Clark on the other

I was a very happy Hils and it was so sweet of you guys to think of me like that *more hugs*

Then I won a Smallville promo pic with James and Tom in the raffle so that made me even happier

The thing that I really loved about this even that although we were all there as Jossverse fans the actual talks could be applied to any fandom. I learned something from every single one so that was great

We kicked off with kazzy_cee talking about accessibility and making fic easy to read. This journal, fandomcorner and Death-Marked Love are all bad because two of them use white text on a black background and the other is black text on white. Still, at least I don't use green. LOL.

peasant_ did a wonderful talk on ways to overcome writer's block. I'm quite lucky really in that beyond getting stuck on plot points occasionally I've never really suffered from it. What this did make me realise is how reliant on feedback/comments I am which really I shouldn't be. I should be writing for myself not for other people.

I am one of those people who tends to avoid writing fight scenes wherever possible as I don't know how to describe them properly. So speakr2customrs talk on that made me realise just how many different ways can be used to attack someone and that the characters involved can usually direct the way a fight will play out. I need to work a fight scene into a fic now so I can practise

xanpet2000 did a fascinating talk on how to advance plot when you're stuck. I had no idea that plots have a structure to them and I found the notes she gave us really useful for those times when I do get stuck. Will definitely be referring back to them at a later date

In the drabble talk done by speakr2customrs I learned that the placing of the words is just as important as the number and that the last line is the one with all the impact.

bogwitch's talk on making icons was great because it taught me something that has bothered me for years. I'd always thought there was no way to save icons with all the layers still in place so I could go back and edit later. Turns out all I needed to do was save it as a .psp file. D'oh!

We ended on a hilarious talk on giving feedback (where is all the pr0n?!) with obviously some serious elements too on ways of giving good and constructive feedback

Then today we had the raffle *covets pretty Tom and James pic*, the swapmeet where I got rid of ALL my Buffy books (save The Lost Slayer which I kept because it is awesome) and inherited some comics. YAY!

We held our AGM and it was decided to run another similar event next year so I hope as many of you as possible will come. As I said, even if you're not in the Buffy fandom there is still lots to get out of it.

And to end there are a few pics of me in action and a couple of vids. If you want to see all the photos have a look at writerconuk

( Piccies )

Me! Me! Me!

If I can get together the money for the flights I am going to this!

Who wants to go to Metropolis?

2 Buffy vids

kazzy_cee played a wonderful Buffy vid on the first night of the con so I thought I'd share

And she's just posted another one to writerconuk

Sims update

This is my last post, I promise!

Things are very complicated in Cloe and Lois's house. Sam and Dean have moved in and Lois and Dean got married (very discreetly. Lois didn't even get a wedding dress. Wah!). Lois is now pregnant. These sims don't waste any time! All this happened in the couple of hours I played last night before bed. LOL.

Chloe has joined the army. I have no idea why but she decided she wanted to. Clark has got an after school job working as a scientist. Maybe he's channelling Lex.

Chloe and Sam and all snuggly and kissy but haven't slept together yet. One of Chloe's fears is having another baby and neither of them seem to want to get married so I guess they'll just have to carry on as they are

So now we have Lois, Chloe, Sam, Dean and Clark all under one roof with a baby on the way. It's a good job they live in Michael and Tom's former mansion!

I might have Lois and Dean get their own place. It's wee bit too crowded.

Oh, and Drusilla has just moved into the neighbourhood. I think I might have Lex turn up next. I've wanted to write some Drex (I think I just invented a new ship) for a while. Not in a permanent way but I think Dru could mesmerise Lex into being with her for a while before Clark comes along and saves him

Yeah, I'm weird.

( Sims caps )

Oh dear...

I can't access my domain host for Death-Marked Love and I've got an e mail address to contact them about it. It's entirely possible they're closing down or something so I'd advise you to save any fics you want from there now while you can. Some of them I lost the original files when my old PC died.

Whilst I will be setting up a new site soonish it will be for my own fics only rather than to archive other people's stuff

When I set up Death-Marked Love there weren't the archive sites out there that there are now and most people were just posting to Yahoogroups. I basically created the website to host my own fics and those I'd enjoyed.

I'll be kind of sad if it goes but I never update it any more as there are plenty of fic archive sites out there that are much better than mine.

If it goes it goes I guess

Testing the waters

jacqui_hw has been inspired by writerconuk

Is anyone interested in the possibility of a Supernatural/Smallville UK based meetup which would happen some time next year?