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markcampbells · 3 years

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thirty questions

@the-blind-assassin-12 tagged me; thanks, Alyssa :) and tagging @malionnes because she’s one of the only ones who reads these all the way through.

Name/nickname: Tracy. I go by Trai because I always went by it in the Internet stranger-danger days (more adrogynous) and because I went through a period of being ~~unique~~ where I wanted to spell my name with an i instead. I dropped that, but Trai stuck with my middle and high school friends, though there’s only one of those left who calls me that regularly. I never insisted on it to my college friends so they all call me Tracy, though one of them and I call each other “twin” as a mutual endearment since our interests are extremely similar. If I’m introducing myself or referring to myself in an online context, like here on Tumblr, it’s pretty much always by Trai.

Gender: Female

Star sign: Capricorn. Which gets left out of astrology memes a lot, I feel like? Anyway.

Height: Uh, I always say 5′3″ and just assume that’s true, so... that.

Time: 1:55 PM

Birthday: January 3rd. So my 30th is coming up in 2021, aka Plague Year Part II.

Favorite bands: The Killers and Florence + the Machine. I should listen to more Tegan and Sara and Of Monsters and Men because I like particular albums of theirs but haven’t gone into their wider discographies.

Favorite solo artists: I’m regrettably not current on all these, but present and past favorites include Michelle Branch, Vanessa Carlton, Ingrid Michaelson, KT Tunstall, Jason Mraz, Alanis Morissette, Nelly Furtado, and Anna Nalick.

Song stuck in my head: Earlier I read a book title that had the word Yellow in it and ended up with “The Yellow Rose of Texas,” so that’s... not particularly helpful.

Last movie: The Prom. My movie watching has been extremely thin on the ground last year since my attention hasn’t been up for it. In recent months (going back to August) a handful of others I watched were Water Lilies, Kajillionaire, The Boys in the Band, and Howard.

Last show: Six Feet Under, which I’m watching for the first time. I’m almost at the end of Season 1 and I honestly love it. It isn’t really a surprise to me that I do--I like black comedy, I unfortunately had a lot of death in my family in my formative years so my mom and I have always had a sense of humor about that kind of thing (plus she grew up over a funeral home herself), and I was always interested in it knowing Michael C. Hall’s character and his partner were significant for gay representation on TV--but it is always a pleasant find to find a TV show you genuinely enjoy watching.

When did I create this blog: April 2nd, 2010. Back in my day we got the damn Tumbeasts error message AND WE HATED IT.

What do I post: Well, it used to be more consistent when I had more consistent interests, but now it’s kind of a mess. I used to love posting more about what I was reading, but haven’t done that much lately. Period drama/Jane Austen can be a strong presence, and in recent years my attachment to Star Trek has grown. Doom Patrol and Legends of Tomorrow during their seasons tend to be strong fixtures. Matt Bomer and Chris Pine show up when they’ve got projects going (David Tennant used to feature more in the old days but I’ve strayed from his fandom). Queer art and queer culture.

Last thing googled: “will ferrell owen wilson.” I went into the break room to wash my hands after the end of my shift and a movie was playing on MTV that I didn’t recognize from the off. I think it was Wedding Crashers, which I saw back when it came out and then never again, so I’m not sure. I tend to be curious about what movie is playing on TV if I don’t recognize it.

Other blogs: @pinesexualmckirk is where I’m attempting to put my more niche Star Trek posting (and is acting as a repository for the McKirk fanfics I want to read eventually). I have started literally two writing sideblogs that I convinced myself I was going to use someday (@ashes-and-silverware for original and @intellect-and-romance for fanfic) but never have because I keep being annoying on main, I guess? I don’t write fanfic anymore so the second one is probably a dead fish, but I always tell myself maybe someday I’ll get the original one going.

Do I get asks: Mostly from Cait, but I will always welcome more. Back in the old days I actually used to get an impressive amount of asks about Doctor Who and One Tree Hill.

Why I chose my url: Mark is my original character created in conjunction with Cait, and for a while we had our URLs paired as the couple. I kept mine because I like it sort of being a reference for just us, LOL. I used to be tutorgirlx3 and haley--james after Haley of One Tree Hill, but over time I felt as I drifted away from the show/fandom it wasn’t a great fit.

Following: 721. I try to cull occasionally, but haven’t in a while.

Followers: 1,927, and to be quite honest I do not deserve that many and I’m almost certain the vast majority of those are dead blogs. Those old days of Doctor Who and One Tree Hill built up my follower base in a way I never really deserved (I never posted all that much original content). A lot of people from those days aren’t around anymore, so that’s why I think a lot of the blogs are dead, but I appreciate the number regardless; thank you all.

Average hours of sleep: Probably around seven or eight. I really try to get that much when I can, partly because being a 4 AM shift worker means my sleep is weirder than everyone else’s and I feel like I need more of it.

Lucky number: 3

Instruments: I tried learning guitar for a while but to be honest I never had the discipline to practice it.

What am I wearing: Old Navy pajama shorts with cats playing with Christmas lights, and I’m trying to decide if I’m going to change my top. I have either a black Doom Patrol t-shirt or a purple tank top that says Reality Is For People Who Can’t Handle Victorian Feminist Literature that I wear around the house a lot.

Dream job: It used to be editor, but I no longer want to use my degree in that way because I’ve heard too many horror stories from people about working in publishing killing their desire to read for pleasure. At this point, with as many years in retail behind me as I have, literally anything with a desk would be fine with me.

Dream trip: England. I want to see all the literary houses and bookstores I didn’t get to see the first time around.

Favorite food: Sweet, brownies. Other than that, dill pickles, probably chicken tenders, and honestly I love steak and cheese chimichangas.

Nationality: American

Favorite song (at the moment): Some of the last few I’ve liked enough to buy have been “Someone You Loved” and “Before You Go” by Lewis Capaldi and “Diamonds” by Sam Smith. Eternally, it’s “The Chain” by Ingrid Michaelson.

Last book read: I reread Fun Home by Alison Bechdel, which is one of my favorites. My concentration has been really fucking suffering this year so me finishing anything is monumental, but currently I’m trying to get through (prepare yourselves): Who is Vera Kelly? by Rosalie Knecht, The Color Purple by Alice Walker, Her Body and Other Parties by Carmen Maria Machado, How to Write an Autobiographical Novel by Alexander Chee, and Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf. (Yes, I’m a disaster pan and every book on that list is queer.)

Top three fictional universes I’d like to live in: .Um, Star Trek if I could just be in the fun part and not the dangerous part. Something lowkey and queer and with a bookstore like Alison Bechdel’s Dykes to Watch Out For. Night Vale if I didn’t have to be an intern at the radio station.

#about me #thanks alyssa!

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nosleepuntilvacation · 5 years

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3, 7, 22, 23, 48, 50!

This post ended up being really long, so… answers below the cut!

3. In your opinion, what’s your best fic?

So far, I’m really proud of how The Most Glamorous Puzzle of All is turning out; it’s giving me exercises in character development, and I can write in a lot of different styles depending on the prompts and what I choose to do with them. As the summary for that fic mentions, chapters can be anywhere between silly, angsty, and fluffy. Also, I’m having fun seeing how these two work together, both as friends and as a couple - and hey, it’s Papyton fluff, and it’s really hard to go wrong with that, in my opinion!

As for my oneshots, I really like a lot of them, but I can’t help but feel proud of With You in My Sights for condensing the development of the relationship into six brief scenes and still having it come out with nice pacing (at least in my opinion).

(I’m also quite proud of some of my NSFW fics, but given that they’re… well, NSFW, I’d rather not discuss them on this blog, since I’m trying to keep it family-friendly over here. I do have a NSFW sideblog, but so far, all I’ve done over there is publish links to my fics with the occasional text post about one of them.)

7. What’s the fic you most want to continue (unfinished or no)?

I know I want to see Glamorous Puzzle completed with all 100 chapters, but I also really want to publish more chapters for my pro wrestling AU Contendertale; I have lots of worldbuilding planned for that fic, and it’s gonna be really cool! (At least, I hope…) Also, I hope to publish more chapters to my Undertale/Mother 1 crossover Sing a Melody of Determination someday, though I think I may need to rewrite that one a little; back when I wrote it, I was still open to referring to Frisk and Chara with non-canon pronouns, but now that I’ve changed my mind about that and started referring to them exclusively with their canonical they/them pronouns, I think I should edit the story accordingly before I continue. I do have lots of cool plans for that fic, too…

(Also, I should get off my lazy behind and finally finish the final chapter of Frisk and Asriel’s Special Day; I’ve already written most of it, but I just have a little more that I need to finish.)

Heck, maybe someday, if I ever return to the Digimon fandom, I could finally finish my fic Heroes Wear Green; I may need to do a little tweaking here and there, but I had so many awesome plans for that story, and I don’t want them to go to waste (but at the same time, I’m reluctant to hand any of my stories off to anyone else). That being said, given that I’m not anywhere near as much into Digimon as I used to be, it might not happen anytime soon; besides, I still have all those cool Undertale stories to finish.

22. Has there ever been anyone who’s made you freak out because they read your work and followed/favorited/reviewed?

Well, for starters, several months ago when I published a little story about Mettaton going stargazing with Papyrus and asking him a certain question, the very same person who sent this ask left a nice review for that fic; given that I’d read a number of his fluff pieces and liked them (though I was kinda shy about leaving kudos or reviews at the time), as well as him being a popular Papyton writer, my thought process was pretty much “wait, you think my stories are good? Wowie!” In general, whenever a popular Papyton author leaves a nice review on my work, it gives me a “whoa!” feeling because their work probably inspired mine, even if only in the slightest of ways.

23. What’s the nicest review you’ve ever gotten?

It’s hard for me to pick just one, so here are just a few of my favorites (note: some of these are just excerpts from longer reviews):

you had me at “tooth-rotting fluff” in the tags. I love this stuff, it feels utterly soul-cleansing. -review for The Joys of Sleeping In (look familiar?)

[…]And I always look forward to reading this book, every time I see there’s a new chapter, I must admit, I squeal a bit xD-review for chapter 42 of Glamorous Puzzle

[…]“Who the hell am I?

I AM hell” I swear to God that was the greatest thing I’ve ever read! -review for chapter 43 of Glamorous Puzzle, from the same reviewer directly above, referring to a quote in that chapter that I was hoping people would like, since I’m proud of that quote as well.

[…]I can’t believe I missed so many good NoSleepUntilVacation stories! I need to catch up![…] -review for A Cool Day for a Cool Dude; this one made me feel like “whoa, my work is that good?”

There were a couple of other ones for one of my NSFW stories, and while both are too long to be posted here, they both warmed my heart to a huge degree (hint: one of them should look quite familiar to the person who sent this ask!)

48. Does anyone you know from outside of fandom know you write fanfic? Are they involved in the same fandom too?

I prefer to keep my fanfic life and my IRL life separate, since there are people in my life who I would prefer didn’t know about this hobby of mine, for various reasons. Since a lot of what I write involves a slightly niche pairing, and some of it is NSFW, and the vast majority of my writings are Undertale (a controversial topic in several circles), I’m kinda nervous about bringing it up. I have met some Undertale fans in real life, though, but given that they were my classmates in team projects, we didn’t really talk about Undertale as much as we talked about the assignments we were doing.

50. Has writing fanfic had a significant impact on your life? Would you say it’s entirely positive?

The thing about writing fanfic (for me at least) was that I had to write quite a few duds before I struck gold. And back in my earliest days, I wrote a lot of duds; it’s for this reason that I often feel unsure about ever returning to the Digimon fandom, since a lot of what I wrote was mediocre at best and disgraceful at worst (characters in-name-only, lots of lolrandom humor, the heroes looking like total dorks because I was in a phase of liking the villains the best - all while removing the traits that made them villains, etc.) and it was only around the time shortly before I left the fandom that I really started to take my writing seriously. It may be hard for me to think of some of the characters (both heroes and villains) without thinking of how I horribly mangled everything about them for some cheap attempts at “comedy”.

So that’s the negative side of my fanfic writing; now onto the positive! Since starting this hobby, I’ve slowly become more confident in expressing myself, and I’m believing in my own writing skills more and more. Also, knowing that a story of mine could be the thing to brighten someone’s day (as shown in some of the reviews I quoted above) is always a good motivator. Especially since a lot of what I write is close to my heart; it’s stuff that I would like to read myself. Another big thing is that, when I was younger, I was hoping to become a good artist so I could animate cartoons; I never quite got the hang of the intricacies of drawing, but I’ve noticed that my writing has definitely gotten better, so I’ve realized that maybe, just maybe, this is where my true talent lies.

And, of course, I’ve made a lot of friends (and, at one point, even found love) through both reading and writing fanfiction, and while not all of those friendships have lasted (sadly, the romantic relationship didn’t last, either), the people I’ve met because of this hobby are still very special to my heart. I think it’s safe to say that I owe a lot of my friendships, directly or indirectly, to my fanfic writing; given that, when I first started out, I was - in real life - the shy, easily-startled girl who got bullied a lot, it was much easier for me to let my guard down around people who didn’t know my IRL identity. Even though my situation has gotten better since then, I still find it easier to make friends online than in real life, since I’m more likely to find people who share common interests, like Undertale or favorite bands… or fanfiction!

#Thanks for asking!#disbian #spiny speaks #here's a tip #write first and italicize later #otherwise every new line will automatically italicize #even if you don't want it to #i learned that the hard way

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