oanja

Hi! I've noticed people making these now that people might be coming back to journal fandom (for the time being) and I thought it would be a good idea to make one too.

I'm a Finnish woman, early 30's, I got my Master's degree in December 2018. I have a full time job I'm not particularly excited about and always wondering if I'm in the right line of work.

I have a cat (Maine Coon) called Taika and a Dog (Lagotto Romagnolo) called Leia ( cut for photo )

I'm single and maybe demisexual or somewhere on the Ace spectrum, I'm bisexual (and yes that includes more than two genders)

My life situation is a bit weird in that I keep moving all the freaking time! I don't think I've lived anywhere for more than a year since 2016 and since then I've moved four times and I'm about to move again this month. I keep changing jobs and all of them have been in different cities, which makes moving a real pain. We'll see how long I'll stay in this next apartment...

I read mainly fantasy with some scifi and historical mixed in. I like the idea of reading published romance, but I find I'm very picky these days so I haven't found many romance books I've genuinely enjoyed or finished. (this is pretty funny because when I was like 11-15 I used to read a shit ton of Harlequin romances and the like).

I've been in fandom since I was 19, so 13 years now, I've written some fic, but mostly I have been a lurker. I used to roleplay quite a bit in my early 20's when I had time for such things *sigh*

When fandom moved to tumblr I kind of became an even more passive fandom participant, as I found tumblr bizarre for having conversations or for making fandom friends, I did write quite a bit of Hockey rps at the time, but I didn't really get to know any other fans, except a few people on twitter, whom I still follow there.

My forever fandoms are Stargate Atlantis and Star Trek (tos and the new movies). I'm really glad I got to see a few of the massive fandoms that used to exist before it all got super fractured.

( cut for gaming )

Hmm what else? I started an urban fantasy novel in last year's nano and won, with maybe about 25% of the story still unwritten. I should get back to writing that, because I think it would be very cool to actually write and finish an actual book manuscript, even if it never goes anywhere. I have other ideas for original (fantasy) fiction, but I haven't really managed to write anything this year (except my thesis which was 42k so I'm pretty proud of that!)

I knit (socks mostly) and sow (cosplay stuff) sometimes, but I'm not very good at it and I keep starting and getting distracted by a new project and abandoning the old one, which is bad for ever finishing anything.

This got long and brambly, which is like peak me, or whatever the kids say these days... :P Anyway, hi and welcome! feel free to subscibe to my my journal, I hardly ever post anything locked and when I do it's just personal whining. I will most likely follow back if it looks like we have similar interests.

Edit for 2019: Have a new job now, which I like a lot more than the one I wrote about originally. Have moved yet again, but I think I will stay in this town for a few years *fingers crossed*

I have become totally addicted to Youtube, even more than I've previously been. (I just binge watched like 5 hours worth of Jenna Marbles videos) I think I should just cancel all my streaming services, it's not like I watch anything on there anymore...

I got into d&d during 2019, which has been great. I've also found out that I might actually prefer to DM instead of play (might be my control issues showing a bit...)

I also got into BTS this December, so that's a super new fandom for me. I'm very excited to have a new fandom again.

I'm a bit behind the wordcount. I have 19,633 words and I should have 21,671, but all in all I'm pretty proud of myself. Getting into the habit of writing at least something every day has been good for me. At least now I know I can still do it. So I'll keep trucking along. I also ended up changing my project after a few days. I found that the historical fantasy thing needs much more thought and research to really work as a nano project. So instead I started writing a hockey romance novel :D

The strange fringe effect of it has been to make me want to get back to watching hockey. I haven't really followed the NHL in the past two seasons and I hear both the Caps and Bruins are doing pretty well (also my goblin team the Leafs)

Also in D&D news, I just got ghosted by a DM, which has now happened twice. Basically I had been playing in their game and then suddenly the DM just vanished. In the first case the DM just abandoned the discord channel and never replied to messages before we even got to our first session, but this new one was weirder because we were 4 sessions in, then they said they had to cancel for the week and then today I just noticed that they had deleted the whole discord server. I guess I might have just been booted out, but it's hard to see why that would have happened. Either way, weird.

Two months since I started the new job and it's still pretty nice. Things have gotten a lot more busy, but I like it much better than my previous jobs.

I bought the humble bundle for all the art programs and spend the afternoon installing them. I hope I'll get back to drawing a bit more. I haven't really had a proper art program to use, except an ancient version of photoshop from like 2005. I'm not actually any good at it and with digital art it's all wonky because you can't just look at what your hand is doing, but you need to draw and watch your screen... very complicated. I'm kind of tempted to spend money on some other stuff as well but I managed to stop myself... :'D Good thing too, because I realized I hadn't paid rent yet this month and now my band account balance looks a lot less cushy. I did spend some money paying off more of my credit card dept. I still have too much after the Rome trip in May, which I haven't paid off + everything else I've gotten since, but the other card only has like 200€ on it anymore, which is a relief and I can pay that off later this month and get to the other card after that.

As I'm on the topic of money, I tried to do some math to see how expensive it would be to go to Worldcon 2020 in New Zealand. The flights weren't as bad as I had thought, it was like 1100€ return trip, but when you add to that accommodation and the event tickets + spending money it would be closer to 2500€ trip and no freaking way do I have that kind of money to spend on a holiday!

Especially because I'm thinking of applying for a Advanced Solution-Focused Practitioner training program next spring. The program takes almost two years and costs over 3k all together, so I need to save up for that. It's basically short term therapy/counseling thing, and I feel like I really need it for this new job. It's also useful later if I want to apply for psychotherapy training programs. I can apply for that in two years (need the right kind of job experience first), so it kind of lines up pretty well. It's another expensive program, but I guess it's not so bad considering I didn't have to pay anything for university before this... Also I'm hoping the prices might go down, there has been talk that there aren't enough therapists around and the cost of the training is definitely part of the problem.

It's kind of funny how interested I've become in psychology and counseling in the past year, when back in university I didn't do any psychology courses even though I could have until my last year. (hindsight 20/20). It's also made me wonder if I should get therapy for myself now, but then again you need to do therapy during the psychotherapy training and I don't want to spend the money twice! -_-

I'm thinking I should try to do nanowrimo again this year. I haven't been writing much of anything all year and I feel like the format actually worked well for me the one time I actually finished it. I have a few romance novels plotted out, now I just need to write some words down, which is always the hardest part.

I'm still doing a lot of d&d, I might have a problem... I'm only playing in two games (and I'm thinking I might drop the other game. Tomb of Annihilation just isn't for me, there's so much of just traveling and nothing happening + the plot seems almost non-existent somehow?) The other games starts on Monday. I'm a bit worried about the other players, they are all really young and one player seems obsessed with his drunken master monk being drunk all the time and that seems like a recipe for disaster. I ended up making a new paladin (conquest this time) because paladin was great and this campaign should do to high levels and I'm curious to see how that would be like.

I would really like to play Descend into Avernus, but haven't had luck finding a game yet. (I basically need it to be on a Sunday or Wednesday)

So two games seems like a reasonable amount right? Well the problem is that I'm also DM'ing three games right now... :D Oops? They are all premade modules, so it's less work for me, but there's still prep I need to do. I'm doing Waterdeep Dragon Heist, Dragon of Icespire Peak and then a GM Guild's Module called Call from the Deep. I just like the power too much I think, which I'm not gonna examine more right now xD I am totally a benevolent god though, I think I might be too nice sometimes, but then again I'm still learning the ropes and it feels bad to kill the players, so I've been avoiding that (mitigating damage or splitting the attacks among more than one player most of the time)

Oh and last weekend I went to see arilyn9 and her bf looked at my PC to see how I could upgrade it. As I knew already my graphics card (or driver, I'm not sure what it's called in English) and most of the other components are super old now and I should put about 600-700€ to get new things. Urgh, why does everything cost so much money? I have two graphics cards in mind, one would be cheaper, under 300 but if I put a 150 more I could get a significantly better one, which would then last longer, which would save money in the long run. I'll have to think about it some more. I get paid on the 20th so I have time to figure out how much I want to spend.

Just generally I feel pretty good, I feel like I have a lot of creative energy, which I think was rekindled by d&d, so that's been nice. Work is good, the pets are doing good. One thing I'd like to change would be to somehow get one more irl friend I could hang out with. Hanging out with people online is pretty good for my need to socialize in general, but right now I only have one irl friend, which seems precarious. I went back to find out when messy_kisses died and I totally missed the anniversary, it was on the 17th of September and now I feel guilty about that too, I thought it was in October. I can't believe it's been over a year now. :(

Well that's a cheery note to end the entry on.

So I've been meaning to start DMing a new D&D campaign soonish and I was wondering if someone on my circle would be interested in joining? It would be one of the official D&D module adventures (I own Waterdeep Dragonheist and Lost Mines of Phandelver, but I'd be open to buying one of the other ones, if people have preferences)
It would obviously be online game with voice on discord and the game on roll20. It will most likely be on a Saturday and start around 6-7pm GTM+3 which would make it around noon in America. I'd like to do a weekly game, but if it's too often for people it could be every other week.
New players definitely welcome!

Also I saw this quiz on someones journal and nabbed it. I was super happy with what I got, and looking at my answers and what other options I could have gotten was super interesting too. :D



( D&D character quiz )


ps. I should really get a D&D icon, I keep posting about it so often these days

So I got offered those two school counsilor jobs (I don't think it's quite the right job title, that matches my job description 100%,  but it's close enough) and I picked the permanent position, even though the one year job would have been in my favourite city, so it smarts not to take it.

I've used most of my time today organizing the move and all kinds of small things I need to get into order before things are settled, but now it should be all ready to go. The moving company is coming on the 2nd of July and I have a couple of options for apartments lined up.  I really hope I end up liking this job, because I REALLY want to stop moving constantly (if I could live in one place for 2 years... idk sounds so unrealistic even to write it down. Maybe I should aim for a year to start. :D)

The moving company is really expencive (even though I picked the cheapest option, there were two companies that had outrageous prices!) but at least this way I don't have to carry all my stuff myself or drive the moving van, or take care of returning it after I've moved. I think that piece of mind and saving all that time and effort will be worth it.

I get to have July off and start the new job on the 1st of August, which is also nice, because I already had 2 weeks off in my current job this May, so I have 6 weeks vacation this summer!!! :O

The plan I had about reading 3 books each month this summer is not going great... I've yet to read anything. >:(

I have been playing a lot of D&D though, which continues to be fun! I just wish I was more quick witted so I could roleplay better, but I hope that's something I'll get better at with practice.

Oh and Good Omens was great! I was worried about the actors when they were announced and they looked so stupid in the still images that were shown before the show aired (and I still don't know why they went with those hair colors...) but when in action, the actors were adorable and super in love and it was all good. <3

I kind of disappeared for March, from the way I was posting this month :'D There's no real reason beyond that I've been binge watching Critical Role and finally caught up yesterday and now there's no more show to watch (and of course they have next week off so there really is no show to watch) I've been thinking about going back to watch the first campaign, but haven't gotten the urge yet. It's so old you guys (jester voice)

Also the D&D game I had to apply for has had two sessions so far. I've had tons of fun!!! I'm playing an elf paladin who worships the goddess of love (he's basically a hippy dibby male model, who just wants to keep everyone safe) haha~ I also ship two of the other characters, a halfling sorcerer and a kobold rogue, their banter is just too good. (I've not shared this with the players, because that might make it awkward for them, which is the last thing I want)

Work has been fine. I think I'll stay here for another year, if nothing super good appears. This job is really easy, I'm not going to get a better job at the same thing I do anywhere else. I am going to keep a lookout for hospital jobs though, because that would be good for my plans to eventually become a therapist.

I'm also thinking about applying to study psychology. It's a really competitive and popular subject to study so I doubt I would get in, but it's not like it hurts to try. If I were to get in I think there's a good chance I could get part time work in my current occupation, so I wouldn't be as broke as a student. IDK, I just have this feeling like I'm not in the quite right line of work and it's nagging on me pretty often.

Because I spent basically all of my free time for the past two weeks watching Critical role, I'm behind on Star Trek and the Magicians. Maybe I will watch those this weekend (I have tomorrow off work, and I'm going to go visit my mom back home. 3 days off work, so goooood!)

I really want to play it... the problem is that it seems really hard to find a group. I was looking at roll20 and each notice for games looking for players had like 20-50 applications! :O

I'm DM'ing two games right now, but I feel like I would be a better GM if I actually got to play as well :D Both my games are in Finnish and I would like to play in English for some reason... I think mostly just to not have to translate everything *sigh*

Anyway, it's Friday! Aaah the weekend finally (even though I had Monday off work, I feel like I really need these two days off work again.

Leia is back with me (mom brought her last weekend) and I think she's been doing okay here while I'm at work. At least none of the neighbors have come to complain or left notes in the mailbox. I stopped by a pet store today on my way back from work and went kind of overboard with getting her new treats and bones and activity toys, but I do feel bad for leaving her alone for such long periods of time while I'm at work so I think she needs some rewards for being such a good girl.

It seems I could have been trying out the Anthem demo all weekend, but only noticed now... Well maybe I can still try it out at least a bit.

It does not look like a game I'm going to pay for, shooters have never been games I like, not to mention that you need to play with other people in this one... whew, not a combo I'm going to enjoy.  I could barely play the Mass Effect games on the easiest setting, so I'm not holding any high hopes for my shooting ability in this one

Also the reason I play Bioware games is the story and the characters and there's been nothing out there to indicate either of these things play a big role in the game.

From what I've seen it sounds closer to Warframe or Destiny than anything else

Edit. Downloaded it, but got the never ending launch screen bug or whatever, so I actually never got into the proper game... haha, great start Bioware, I'm sure things are fine... (I saw on twitter that a lot of people have been having trouble with the game not launching the missions, so I'm not alone with that) also the animation of the npc's looked like Andromeda to me, which is not promising (but my PC is not powerful enough to show it on high resolutions, so maybe it looks better for others) It also makes me wonder why that is an accaptable reason? I mean yeah my PC also can't run Odyssey on ultra graphics, but it the people still look pretty good, so what's up with that Bioware?

I finally turned in my Master's Thesis this monday. I'm not expecting to get a super good grade for it, as I kind of ran out of time and energy and motivation to make it good, but at least now I'm that close to finally graduating! Whoo~

Then as a reward for myself I bought the new Assassin's Creed game and I love Kassandra, she's the best. I mean just look at her! Also now I want to much Wonder Woman Kassandra fanfic and I bet it doesn't exist at all... *sad face*



But this has turned into a bit of a distraction, so I haven't written anything for nano... oops

Moar photos! This time a tiny bit spoilerish about the romance options

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