Dammit, Marvel, I don't need to accrue vast amounts of Loki feelings right now. I had so nearly decided not to take the Norse papers next year, but now I think I might have to, because how great is Loki? I mean, yeah, he's awful and obnoxious and there's that bit where the end of the world is kind of all his fault, but he's also a shape-shifter who happily uses 'female' magic, has a procreative approach to problem solving, and a tendency to do things for kicks. And I love him.

So, in light of the above, I didn't exactly need Thor to go do a fantastic job of making him complicated and messed up and the sort of character where my standard response to anything he does is, 'Oh, you little shit! How are you so awful? ... C'mere and let me give you a hug.'

...

Loki'd.

While my internet was broken, I managed so much excellent reading. So much. I have fallen absolutely for the Mosca Mye books and I do not care what anyone says, I will always like well-written adventure stories with female protagonists and understated social commentary, whether they're found in the children's section or no. Mosca is so great. 

And I finally, finally got round to reading Ink and Steel, which I've been meaning to read for going on about a year now. I didn't know I wanted historical fiction with Shakespeare and Marlowe and Morgan le Fay to exist, but it does and it's incredibly good and ow, my heart. Also, the author knows how to use thee/thy/thou etc and has characters tell others not to thee them because up yours, which makes me so happy. Also, messing about with folk tales and mythology and the power of stories, all of which I eat up with a spoon. 

I wonder how quickly my family would disown me if I joined the Historical Maritime Society? Because I have always, always wanted to try historical re-enactment, and also ships! Or boats, at least.

In the course of about twenty minutes, the weather has gone: lovely sunshine -> rampaging blizzard -> lovely sunshine -> driving rain - >a bit drizzly and grey. So I think I might postpone my walk for another day and instead go sit in the café that overlooks the harbour and try to salvage from memory the fic I was writing, a tragic victim of my laptop's 'restarting for your own good' thing.

Help. Why am I writing Hornblower and Maria's wedding night? I really, decidedly do not ship them, so why did this seem like a good idea? Oh yes, because in my head, TV!Hornblower is incredibly ace and no one else sees it, and so I must write meta thinly disguised as fic to work out my never-ending asexual frustration. That's why. 

(No but really. Does anyone else see him as being possibly ace? Not in the books, I grant, but possibly-maybe in the TV version? No?) 

If anyone would like to see some photos I've taken of Iceland, may I direct your attention to my imaginatively named new Tumblr, Photos of Iceland?

Looking through the ASNAC papers at the moment and wondering how they expect me to just pick six. So far my list goes:

1. Palaeography and codicology
2. Medieval Welsh language and literature
3. The Brettonic-speaking peoples from the fourth century to the twelfth
4. Old English language and literature
5. Help.
6. ALL THE PAPERS.

Because that still leaves Irish history, literature and language, English history, Scandinavian history, literature and language, and Insular Latin literature and language. (Not to mention the papers you can borrow from other subjects.) How do I choooose?

FIRM OFFER FROM CAMBRIDGE! FUCK YEAH, I'M READING ANGLO-SAXON NEXT YEAR! ONLY CAPSLOCK CAN FULLY EXPRESS MY JOY! 

Oh Radio 4 I have missed you. Let me hold you tight and never let you go. Er. Yes. Apparently you can get BBC radio everywhere in the world. Although sadly not TV. But it's OK, my parents have promised to post me DVDs when Doctor Who starts. I bet they forget the Christmas Special, but that's practically tradition in our family.

Apparently there's to be a talk on Siegfried Sassoon and his poetry at the Imperial War Museum tomorrow, which I only found out about an hour or so ago. So definitely too late to buy tickets in advance, bu-ut there should be tickets on the door (right?), and I can get to it easily, and I really, really do like Sassoon's poetry, and there are meant to be New and Unpublished Poems presented(!), so I'm planning to turn up and hope there are tickets left, train fare be damned.