eternal summertime sadness!fic = complete

🌊✨just desperately trying to finish 8+-year-long WIPs

this was one of my tumblr sidebars back in the 2010s! 🥲✨ in honor of frosted sea glass!

eternal summertime sadness fic = complete ✨

IT IS DONE.

even though frosted sea glass was actually lower on my “to write” list (behind finishing the snow globe two-shot for @aicosu and doing another chapter update for that one night), i was able to crank out TWO chapters (roughly 15-16k words) in like a matter of days this past week… and finish the thing once and for all. 💙🩵🌊✨

frosted sea glass was completed on august 10, 2023. 💪✨ roughly 8 years after it was first posted (to answer a tumblr prompt)!

i took the day off from writing yesterday (friday) to grab lunch with a friend/former co-worker from japan, who’d moved back to the states last october, and we spent the whole day out, so i didn’t add anything to the word counter. instead, i just basked in the satisfying glow of the specific vibe that can only come from completing an 8+-year-old WIP 😎🪭✨

up next —

my next project will be to finish and post part ii of snow globe and to post another chapter of that one night, especially in honor of the semester starting up in just a few weeks! 😉☕️✨

(also, i cannot believe it but pumpkin spice lattes are already available???
blasphemous.
i don’t even want to smell a PSL until >50% of my tree leaves are multi-colored and the air is less than 60°F, please)

dissertation —

i’m not allowed to collect any data for my dissertation until after my proposal defense (which is currently scheduled for november-ish), and i’m still waiting on a round of feedback of the most recent paper i wrote (from which my dissertation is launching), so i don’t have anything critical for my dissertation process just yet! in the meantime, i’m still putting together my academic committee and staying apprised of the literature, but most of my focus is on seeing all my colleagues and friends and cohort again as everyone returns from summer-baby-sabbatical and kicks off autumn!

i’m so grateful to be in disserland. 😭 i only have to commute to campus once every two-ish weeks for most of the semester! otherwise i have the flexibility to work entirely from home, entirely on my research. 🥲🥲🥲 what a dream. 🩵✨

at the center —

ALSO. starting to gear up for the major re-read and completion of at the center!

someone responded to my tumblr post inquiry for potential betas, and we have tentatively set some prelim plans for later in the fall about beta-ing future chapters, particularly for consistency, plot points + hints + foreshadowing, etc.! i have a whole spreadsheet with all the interwoven links, and i will very much appreciate having another set of eyes to help manage it. GRACIAS, GRACE. ✨

back in the early 00s, i had like a team of three betas. 🤣🥲 (I HOPE THEY LOG BACK INTO TUMBLR/AO3 AGAIN SOON. i think we all collectively took years-long hiatuses from tumblr. 💕)

abigail (@dragonsinparis) is also a forever-beta, but she is also doing very cool things, like working toward getting her novel published!! 🤞✨ GO ABIGAIL GO.

“cleaning” day —

today (saturday) is a cleaning day, both mentally and physically. i’d like to continue transferring some stuff from my fic-only tumblr (@therentyoupayfanfiction) to this site… even though i got my account back, i’m still not comfortable with tumblr… i feel like i could lose everything with no warning again in just, like, a split second. 😅

today, i’d like to:

• post something! a drabble? a ton chapter?

• write at least like 500 words…

• reply to all the fsg-chapter 12 comments on ao3! 🌊🩵✨

happy writing! 💙🩵✨

a tumblr miracle?? + we love data✨

silver lining of tumblr deleting all my data —> opportunity to collect my own (✨fancier✨) data (but also tumblr restored my data?????)

TUMBLR RESTORATION??

first and foremost, in an unexpected twist of fate: tumblr emailed me yesterday and declared that my account was restored!!! behold!!

@therentyoupay

of course, i am ecstatic and grateful beyond all measure.

of course, i trust tumblr 0%.

a good reminder, i think, to put your eggs in multiple basket-websites. 🥲🥲🥲🤞 i will continue to use my tumblr account for community, but i will still gradually move my fic, my fic fanart, and other important keepsakes here. with all the social media sites imploding right now… WHO KNOWS.

but i have always been inspired by my favorite early 2000s fic authors who created their own websites (e.g., http://forthwrites.com/) to house their fanfics and, eventually, to share news and sales of their original fic. ✨✨

WORD COUNTER & PRODUCTIVITY TRACKER

plus, i am really sinking into some of the opportunities that squarespace has to offer… LIKE GRAPHS.

also, as i mentioned in my previous post (🌊 beach day = mermaid!au writing session??), i did, indeed, END UP MAKING A WRITING TRACKER for this year, based on the record-breaking year i had in ✨2015✨. thank goodness that post was not lost to the abyss forever.

check out my 2023-2024 word count tracker!! link above on the navi bar ♡

part of me very badly wanted to make some fancy ones in python, but i have learned through experience that squarespace often can’t handle many embedded code bits at once. besides, it’s a nice accountability check-in to come to the website each day and update the graph directly!!!!!

MULTI-CHAP WIP RISES FROM THE WAVES

on that note, GUESS WHAT I FINISHED YESTERDAY

CORRECT

my eternal summertime sadness fic has risen from the sand

the waves

the cape cod ROCKS AND DUNES

i am finally in the FINAL STAGES OF EDITING AND PROOFREADING ✨ update and COMPLETION coming to ao3 soon!!!

BANNERSSSS

i also made this banner (above) when my tumblr account was trapped in the void and i couldn’t find the fic fanart i usually used for chapter updates! 🥲 (i found it now!!)

i really would love to make a banner for each of my stories, but at this point, i just need to be writing them first, not just playing with banners 😂😂😂 i will only make one once i update that fic, THAT WILL BE MY PLAN.

thank you all for visiting and periodically checking out the new changes to this site!! it (1) protects my work from two-thirds of my life omg but also (2) allows for a fun creative outlet (and organizational outlet lbr) that scratches a part of my brain not already being satisfied from writing fic and writing my dissertation!! ✨ we love a happy brain-scratch trifecta

happy writing, all! 💕

🌊 beach day = mermaid!au writing session??

this pattern is what i have been telling myself for years but 😂

i’ve always said that my writing is very seasonally-driven (seasons of climate, seasons of life), which i still think is very true.

one of the reasons why i have so many very nearly finished WIPs is because i only write certain stories with certain vibes when i can tap into that headspace. and there is no better time to write “mysterious angsty star-crossed summertime sadness mermaid!au” fic than the end of summer. 🌊✨

we were supposed to go to the beach yesterday but the night before that is when i realized that my tumblr account had been lost. 😅😅😅 i ended up staying up pretty late to salvage as much as i could, so yesterday’s day trip got postponed. 😂😅 today’s beach adventure was much much needed (and not only for frosted sea glass vibes and motivation, lol).

i’ll try to squeeze in at least one more beach day before i return to campus for the fall semester, which is in just a few weeks!! i’m so grateful to finally have reached the dissertation stage, as it means that i can primarily work from home. i’m also so fortunate that my colleagues and advisors are so understanding and accommodating of my commute and are allowing me to only come to campus only once every other week or so. 👏✨

already, i can feel ✨2015✨ vibes, in which i had worked three teaching jobs and did my master’s degree part-time while working—and to give myself breaks from all the academic reading and writing, i wrote like 150k words of fic. 😂 (primarily in the form of jelsa one-shots, lmao)

it’s a very specific creative headspace and I HAVE FELT ALL WEEK, existential tumblr crisis aside. 😂🫠🫠🫠

one of the pages that i’m saddest about losing in the tumblr debacle is the ✨2015✨ record-keeping of my writing productivity, fandom- and academia-wise. 🥲🥲🥲🥲 in its honor, and to optimize this ✨2015✨ headspace, i will make a special tracker here, to acknowledge the words i’ve written this year (2023-2024), starting from this month, august.

it would be lovely for everything to come full circle: all the fics i started writing in order to take a break from working on my master’s thesis (e.g., at the center) and my bachelor’s degree (e.g., that one night), getting finished and wrapped up by the time i complete my doctoral program and defend my dissertation. 😂🤞✨ it would help clear the way for me to start publishing original fiction and non-fiction—starting with my dissertation research!!

in the meantime, will i update the summertime sadness mermaid!au or the wintertime sadness mountain!au next? 😂😂😂😂 WE SHALL SEE.

as for my tumblr drama: still no word yet from tumblr support. 🥲🤞 i remain cautiously optimistic while also giving up all hope lol. i’ll e-mail them every 3 days until i hear a response. 😅😅😅😅🙏🙏🙏

thanks for your continued support everybody!! sun and sand (and chardonnay) helped mitigate the sting of Tumblr Termination™ 🥲🙏✨💕💕💕💕💕💕

happy writing!! 💕✨