"I think I will cause problems On Purpose,"

 appears to be what my neighbors were thinking to themselves yesterday!

Personal Life Update: 

In a DIY project in the attic involving pulling up floorboards and insulation (why? We are having professionals come to the building for this in a week!), the upstairs neighbors in my building managed to dislodge an elderly pipe. They could see one end!

But, you see, the other was still attached to the water main. 

So I got text in church that was like, SO SORRY, CAUSED FLOOD, SO SORRY. And me and the Husbeast rushed back to the house to put down towels and sop up the muddy rusty water that had come pouring down from the attic thru the top of our hall closet. You know, where the water pipes and electric lines were run up thru the old chimney, and the fastest escape route from the attic for water that had been stuck in an old rusty pipe for years. 

The damage is minimal, happily. The neighbors got the main water cut off turned off for the house so the amount of water involved was relatively small for a broken pipe, and relatively confined. They got an emergency plumber in to figure out where they could shut it off more locally after a couple of hours, so we are all back to normal except for the storage space. We also go lucky on the amount of lots items - the closet held bathroom supplies and cleaning tools as well as some medicine cabinet overflow, and we had most of it still in ziploc bags from the move. So, while we lost a fair few things, a good deal of it was protected and can just be dried out. The interior structure of the closet is still damp, but we have a pair of fans running thru-out the day and it appears to be drying out reasonably well. 

But it was a day that was devoted to cleaning up other people's messes when I was already fairly drained from a week of family events, my sister's all-too-brief visit (when will I see her next? I DON'T KNOW, D:), the Husbeast being ill and hearing that his company was going to be doing layoffs (not in his department), and then THIS MESS. 

So, have some RECS:
 

Personality quiz: What is Your Daemon Quiz?  
Link: https://app.ex.co/stories/laurenb90/what-is-your-daemon 
Fandom: His Dark Materials by Phillip Pullman 
Why I love it: So, back in 1995, The Golden Compass by Phillip Pullman was a book I was slightly fascinated by, and when the first movie adaptation came out in 2007, there was a flurry of online fascination with the element of the book that fascinated me: daemons. A daemon (fyi) is like an Animal Companion (Luxury Model) in the universe for Pullman's book series, where everyone has an intelligent talking animal that attends them everywhere and serves as a metaphor for who they are as a person - in some ways, a daemon is an external extension of the human soul. There were a HUGE number of quizzes, most of them very bad. THIS ONE, however, is so good that it has made me literally nod and go YUP for the result of everyone I have known to take it. Make sure you take the second, shorter subquiz to get the most customized result. I got a goose, DANG, it fits, and this is just timely enough with the Untitled Goose Game (Woo, you have unlocked the secret BONUS REC, this game is addictively fun). It caused my mother to go, Hm, I don't think that's right! when she got her result, and man, did that result really fucking fit her. 

Fic: A Year In Toussaint by astolat
Link: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10941903
Fandom: Witcher (games, predates the tv show)
Pairing: Geralt of Rivia/Emhyr var Emreis
Author's Summary: Geralt had no damn idea what to do with a vineyard when Anna Henrietta gave him Corvo Bianco, but he figured it couldn’t be that bad.

Why I love it: So, I have not played the Witcher Games! But this is based off an expansion to Witch 3: Wild Hunt, called Blood and Wine, where Geralt fights vampires in fantasy!Tuscany. In this, Geralt semi-retires, becomes a stupidly successful wine producer to his great dismay, and gets very very bored. Then the Witcher's version of Caesar moves into the neighborhood to retire... As a person who did not play the games, this is a delight, and you don't really need to know too much about it beyond the TV show's background information about the world.

Fic: Soldier's Heart by Alex51324 (part 2 of the Halo Effect series) - in progress
Link: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21947791
Series Link: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1435963
Fandom: Downton Abbey
Pairing: Thomas Barrow/OMC
Author's Summary: (For the series, actually, since it doesn't really make sense without part 1): The Halo Effect is the tendency for a positive impression in one area to produce a more generous or optimistic interpretation of ambiguous information in other areas.When Thomas rescues Lady Mary from the nefarious attentions of Turkish houseguest Kemal Pamuk, his employers and coworkers begin to see him differently...and Things Get Better. A Season One AU diverging from canon in Episode 3, The One Where The Turkish Gentleman Dies in Mary's Bed. Part 2: Soldier's Heart, is a WWI focused off-shoot of the first work and involves original characters who are introduced in part one.

Why I love it: SO, Alex51324 is one of those authors I adore and I will read everything they ever write in any fandom. The only reason I have not yet done this, is so that I have something to read ahead of me on dark and dismal days. Their focus on in Downton Abbey is on Thomas Barrow, as the cynical asshole protagonist with a wounded heart, is so well grounded in canon and in careful, gentle steps towards a slightly different story that I cannot help but read and re-read my favorites ( I think I have already recc'd Thomas and the Society of Sentinels, which is also an AU) . Soldier's Heart is an epicly long fic, which is currently being edited and posted (aka, it's already complete, I believe, so I feel okay about recc'ing it not as a WIP)  - it focuses on Thomas Barrow in WWI, pining after a sweetheart and eventually suffering tragedy and going to war. It's very well written and feels very pragmatic, and if you like Thomas Barrow and think Canon Did Him Wrong, well, it's the fic for you.  (I have not seen the movie! I don't know how he comes out there!)