A.

I'm still alive! Here are three quick things:

(1) Remember when I wouldn't shut up about The Way Home, the humble little drama that nobody watched and that was the only thing I put into my eyeballs this year until Legend of Zang Hai*? Remember the RPF ship it spawned, briefly mentioned (with pictures) in this post?

Anyway, the actors did a brand livestream last month, in which they mostly played couple games and talked about the skincare on offer for about two minutes total, and one of the gifts they received from the brand was a beach vacation FOR TWO anywhere in the world. Also, they live together. From this massive sigh, I think we can safely assume that Zhang Kangle does most of the cooking and cleaning. (Also, when asked for something that recently made them happy, Ma Boquan said they went on a walk late one night, with very few people around, and it made him feel very content. Then later he posted this video of Zhang Kangle doing a cartwheel on the deserted sidewalk.)

So like. You tell me. What this is.

--
* Enjoyable, very pretty, writing a bit uneven, DMBJ easter eggs very fun, warning for some gruesome bits, 8 stars



(2) I'll be in Singapore and Hong Kong later this year! Flights are booked, hotels are booked, I wish it was November already! I haven't had an overseas vacation since, uh, 2019. 😬 Not looking forward to the flights, but oh, the food and the fandom friends and the change of scenery! 😍



(3) Three years ago, I made a daily Zhu Yilong calendar for myself, which turned out to be a lot more work than expected, but resulted in something very nice (I think) and endlessly reusable. I mean, until the corners get too scuffed, or the colors fade, or something. It looks like this (brand new vs. in use, plus some inside pages):

Four pictures

I mentioned to marycrawford that I was trying to make an updated version, with new pictures and only using photoshoots and no drama/movie characters or events mixed in, and she said she'd be interested in buying one once it was done. It's not done yet (365 pictures is SO MANY), but if you're also interested, here's my offer.

I use this company to print the calendar, which usually costs $75, although they frequently have sales (usually around US holidays) where things are 15% or 20% off. If interested, let me know, and I can ping you when a) it's done, and b) there's a sale going on. Then I can just ship it to your address. Obviously I make no money from this.


And that's all for now. Hi! <3

» Part 1

( Much more navel-gazing! )

(2021 | 2022 | 2023)

2024 was not a super productive writing year for me, until I dragged myself out of my tiny little comfort zone by watching a new show*! (that wasn't a tomb show!) gasp! and then watching another show** right after that! And then! ANOTHER SHOW***! Oh my god. Entirely unheard of.

* 云襄传 | The Ingenious One
** 追风者 | War of Faith
*** 归棹 | The Way Home

So since all of that happened in November and December, I'm including stuff I wrote during my Christmas break, even though some of these were posted in January. (One hasn't been revealed yet, so it'll go into the 2025 batch.) All in all, I wrote 12,000 words across 6 works over the past month, most of them for War of Faith. Didn't get much else done, but hey!

( All the fanworks! )

Yes, hello, I'm still riding the high of this tiny, fervent fandom, and I have committed a few more acts of fanfiction. Here's everything in chronological order, for housekeeping purposes:

to reduce a fraction to its simplest form
» Shenlai, 3550 words, rated E
» omegaverse! heat! knotting!
» Shen Tunan is the omega because I thought that would be neat

数一数二
» Wang Yang RPF, 2000 words, gen
» Magnoliagate thoughts on Scream Night
» a certain farmboy has a little cameo <3

in another life
» Shenlai, 1000 words, rated T
» set in a universe in which Shen Tunan has been a communist spy all along
» otherwise everything is just like in canon


And a few recs! I really enjoyed these (all Shenlai):

✨ Exchange Value, by achray (~7,300 words, M)
✨ Battlefield Dance, by planet_B612 (~1,800 words, T)
✨ shattering the waves, by planet_B612 (~5,800 words, T)
✨ when a god falls, by planet_B612 (~11,000 words, E)
✨ of a feather , by snickettes (~5,700 words, M)

The rambling conclusion to my rambling mid-series reactions, now with even more spoilers!

Do I recommend this? Yes. If you like age-gap hoyay, and don't mind some violence* and a truly stupendous amount of CCP propaganda**, this is the drama for you. If you don't like age-gap hoyay, I don't think you want to engage with this.



Anyway, I don't think I'm overselling it when I say it's a love story.

( Spoilers, including characters deaths. This got way too long. )

(Concept and title entirely stolen from grayswandir, with love.)

My god, what a show. I've been live-reacting to the episodes in a Discord channel that was specifically created for me to yell about War of Faith, thank you lunarriviera, and also in a few skeets, but now I guess the time has come for a DW post as well.

( Some spoilers )

As mentioned before, I'm trying to import my DMBJ watch threads from Twitter before the whole place implodes, which is an entirely manual process and requires a LOT of copy-pasting. And fiddly formatting. And finding the gifs I used in the tweets and uploading them here. And etc. But I'd hate to see these go, so here we are.

For some reason I decided to start with Ultimate Note, which is the longest and most image-heavy, but on the upside, the rest shouldn't take as long? It's really mostly for myself, but if you're interested, here's the Ultimate Note thread.

Only 6 more to go! \o/

Inspired by mekare, who was inspired by goss calling all of us to rekindle community in these trying times.

Share a good thing from today, yesterday or even last week!

- the baked goods drawer in my freezer (I recommend this)
- this quiet little BTS video of Zhang Kangle <3 on the set of his latest project
- bingeing The Ingenious One instead of scrolling YouTube

Hugs for all of you. <3

I wrote a Tibetan Sea Flower fic! And also Sand Sea fic, sort of, just due to the way they adapted Tibetan Sea Flower. As I said in my spoilery review, Zhang Luyi was just very, very good at pining and longing and yearning. It compelled me. When I brainstormed fic ideas with lunarriviera, I said at some point that Wu Xie basically spent ten years falling in love with a ghost, after they parted as friends* and Wu Xie subsequently lost all his marbles.

(* "Parted" as in, one friend nerve-pinched the other into unconsciousness so he wouldn't make a scene, but you know. Who among us.)

So then I literally wrote that. (And sam helped me with all the Sand Sea lore. <3)

» how to fall in love with a ghost

Words: 5,000
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Wu Xie/Zhang Qiling, Wang Pangzi & Wu Xie & Zhang Qiling
Additional Tags: Friendship, Pining, Getting Together
Summary: Xiaoge has gone behind the Bronze Gate. Wu Xie is handling it well.

When I started writing, I thought that maybe it would be Zhu Yilong's Wu Xie in my head, or maybe Qin Hao, but then by the end it was just fully Zhang Luyi, going very quietly insane with love. That's how compelling he was. Dammit. (Although that scene in the shop was 100% Qin Hao. I could picture it quite clearly.)

---

I briefly considered signing up for Yuletide, which I haven't done since 2010, but then the thought of coming up with fandoms to request and details to put in a letter was too overwhelming. So I'm just gonna attempt some treats for the fandoms I was considering! Also looking forward to fandomtrees to make some non-fic gifts, hopefully.

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Lastly, Wang Yang is fully back from his self-imposed (?) radio silence after the big Magnolia Awards kerfuffle! I have lost all track of his event appearances and brand relationships (apparently he's hawking supplements with his Stand or Fall co-star now?), so here are just some recent-ish highlights:

- photoshoot for the Mid-Autumn Festival Gala where he sang a duet with someone
- photoshoot for TOD's (and a tiny little BTS clip)
- whatever this is 🙃