The Hotel Fairy

I forgot to write about the one other strangely amusing part of WorldCON.

Naomi and I had a room fairy--and I don't mean the FABULOUS kind. 

When I first arrived, I set some stuff down on the bed--my program guide, badge, and... my glasses.  I have a tendency to take my glasses off a lot because I can actually see really well in the middle-range.  I need bifocals for reading and distance correction, specifically for driving.  But, when I'm walking around the house (or hotel room) or working on my computer, I see perfectly without them.  Hence, the glasses hit the matress.

I went to the bathroom and my glasses DISAPPEARED.

Luckily, Shawn packs for me, so not ony did I have a first aid kit (you think I'm joking?), but she also packed my spare pair of glasses.  Since I had to run off to some event or other, I put those on, figuring that FOR SURE my glasses would show up at some point.

When I told Naomi about this, I think she thought I was a little crazy, until the hairbrush incident.  She was getting ready to go out to a party and stopped to brush her hair.  I watched her set it down on her suitcase.  She went to the bathroom and then couldn't find the hairbrush anywhere.  So, I said to her, "I think we have a room fairy.  Offer silver."  So, she made a great production of offering a quarter to the room fairies and she dug through her suitcase ONE MORE TIME, and, lo and behold, the hairbrush appeared.

Now, back to my glasses.... being the kind of laissez faire personality that I am, I kind of didn't worry about finding my glasses until it was time to pack.  Then, Naomi and I did a full and complete search of the room.  We moved chairs, looked under beds, and nearly turned everything out.  Finally, in frustration, we offered silver again.  I left a quarter on the bed (housekeeping had already come), and told Naomi to let me know if the fairies ever returned my glasses.

They did.  Shortly after I boarded the train home, I got a text.  The glasses had reappeared under the bed near the headboard.  Considering that I'd left them in the middle of the bed, that's a plausible but weird place for them to have been discovered. 

I'm telling you, room fairies.

Naomi was surprised that the fairies didn't actually take the silver.  But, in my imaginary world, it was the offer that counted both times.  Trade is always acceptable to the fair folk, particularly for something shiny, right?

More Fan Art

So, the problem with art, like writing, is that sometimes the good one gets away.  There are some characters I CAN NOT DRAW no matter how many times I try.  I struggle with Byakuya.  His cold beauty eludes me.  However, I wrote a scene in which a couple of images of him kept sticking in my brain, so I gave it a go.

I'm not happy with these, thus they remain sketches.  Also, I have to apologize for the quality of the photo.  The camera I usually use is off for "First Day of Fourth Grade" pictures, so I had to try us the iPad's camera feature to somewhat dubious affect. 


Here is Byakuya and Yachiru as they sit on the bridge at the Kuchiki estate discussing the fact that Byakuya's life has been rather friendless and sad. I kind of like Byakuya here, and his expression.  Yachiru looks too old, alas.  She's surprisingly difficult to draw, though I think I got her hair.  (She's wearing kitty ears, and doesn't come with them.  This is a reference to a Bleach omake in which she is clearly stealing the carp from the Kuchiki estate dressed in a kitty costume.)

Below is a later moment when she talks him into trying to go to a party.



I'd really wanted to include Byakuya's muddy feet, because that figures so strongly into the story (which, btw, you can read at: http://archiveofourown.org/works/501531.)  But, apparently I suck at getting the whole body onto the page.  Ah well. I think sometimes it's good to share our failures as well.  I hope you enjoy seeing these attempts.

WTF! Still alive??

Okay, my Bleach peeps, does this NOT look like Byakuya is still alive??  Eyes are open.  Okay, so spitting blood, but, honestly, looks more conscious than Renji in later section of same page.  Because if this is meant to look like the empty gaze of the dead, I'm not sure Kubo-sensei captured that.  And why juxapose with Kyouraku who is alive but blinded???? 

Of course, I'm grasping at straws.   My f*cking OTP is at stake here, people.

Also, as note on my fan fiction completely unrelated to anything of worth, I wish I could go back and add a TINY detail to the Hanami romance sections of my Byakuya/Renji, and that is... now that I'm growing my hair out (which I consider as annoying as I imagine Renji who always has his tied back must also), I think it would have been hillarious (and accurate) to have Byakuya randomly reaching out occasionally to untuck the hair from behind Renji's ears. I find myself doing this, despite knowing I look like a dork.  And, Renji is wearing his hair down for an entire weekend.  It must have driven him a lot more insane than I wrote.