Gratitude Project 2010

So, six years ago today, estaratshirai started The Gratitude Project. The assignment is to post something one is grateful for each day from Lammas (8/1) through Mabon (9/21). The same thing can be posted twice, but only if one is grateful for it for a different reason (e.g. grateful for one's friends because they are supportive one day and because they are fun to be with another). Ideally, this actually means posting every day, but as usual, I'm playing catch-up already. I could argue that by some reckonings, today is actually Lammas, or next week or something, but 8/1-9/21 works as well as any other dating, and even if I fudged the start date, I'd still be playing catch-up eventually anyway. *g*

So, for yesterday, I'm grateful for the Hellenic Temple of Apollon, Zeus, and Pan. Yes, that's slightly ironic, given that the GP is based on the Wiccan Wheel of the Year and Hellenismos is a quite different branch of Paganism. However, we had a lovely Healing Festival yesterday that was much needed and very energizing and refreshing.

Today, I'm much more prosaically grateful for simply having the day off to catch up on my sleep debt and various things that were let slide over the past few days.

Oh, and if you're looking at the tags and scratching your head, here's the logic: in 2004, I simply used the "gratitude" tag. In 2005, when the project was taken up again, I decided I'd better be more specific. Since then, I tag the first and last posts of the project with both the overall "gratitude" tag, making it easier to track back to the early stuff, and all posts of a given project with "gratitude##" for the year to make it easier to find the stuff for a given year. Yes, I am that anal, why do you ask?

Fic recs: Don't Think You Knew You Were in This Song by azn_jack_fiend & Sun-Kissed by remuslives23

Title: Don't Think You Knew You Were in This Song
Author: azn_jack_fiend
Fandoms/Spoilers: Doctor Who until S5. All of Torchwood including Children of Earth.
Characters/Pairings: Mickey/Martha, Jack, the Jones family
Rating: PG-13 for language, some sexual suggestiveness
Summary: Mickey and Jack meet again after the events of Children of Earth. Mickey considers how his life has changed since their first meeting, how far he's travelled since then, and wonders what he'll say to Jack. In between, he remembers a long, strange dinner party with the Jones family.
Why you should read it: I'd never really given much thought to the parallels between Mickey's and Jack's lives, nor to the fact that Mickey is the last human on Earth who knew Jack when he was mortal, if only briefly. azn_jack_fiend gave this some thought and not only came up with a fic that shows great insight into both characters, it makes some sense out of the canon gap of "Martha's engaged to Tom but now she's married to Mickey."

Title: Sun-Kissed
Author: remuslives23
Fandom/Spoilers: Torchwood through Exit Wounds
Rating: G
Summary: 'There have been far too few smiles recently. Far too few moments like this where the rift is quiet, and Gwen is with Rhys, and they manage to emerge from under the ground to enjoy the very things they are working so damn hard to save.'
Why you should read it: The imagery and language in this convey layers of insight into both Jack and Ianto as well as touching on more universal themes of finding hope and moving forward.

Signal boost: short story competition

There's a short story competition for Sex, Wales, and Anarchy, and they've just extended their deadline to August 10. They're looking for stories featuring any or all of sex, Wales, and anarchy, up to 8,000 words, winning story to be read at SWA by Gareth David-Lloyd, plus prize money to be determined by submission fees of £5/story. More details at the link above.

I wish I could come up with something to submit, but while almost everything I've written for the past year has been set in Wales and has a fair amount of sex, I'm pretty sure they're looking for ofic. ;-)

If you, on the other hand, can come up with something that fits, by all means, submit!