Dear Yuletide Author,

Thank you so much for taking on this endeavor! This is my first time participating in Yuletide, so I am generally excited and can't wait to see what happens.

In a general sense, I'm pretty easy to please. As I wrote in the descriptions of all of my fandoms, slash would be nice but I like gen fic too. If possible, please avoid het fic for all of the fandoms, except possibly Merlin. I admit to being picky about my OTPs and some of the fandoms are rather incompatible with het fic. Other than that, I like happy fanfiction with my main character triumphing at the end of the day, so please no deathfic, non-con, dubcon, etc.


RPF - Generation Kill
If possible, I would love Alexander Skarsgard/Stark Sands because I think it's been a long time coming, but I think the fic I would like most of all is the one that shows how similar Stark and the real Nate Fick are. Other than that, I wouldn't say I'm very picky, and just general horsing around on set would thrill me as well!

RPF - Merlin
I just think that Bradley James and Colin Morgan are too hilarious not to put in a fanfic together. As always, I would like something happy, and if there's slash then that's great. If you'd rather write friendship fic, then I would also be greatly amused. Who doesn't love their on set antics, after all?

Sommersturm
This fandom made me happy just by being on the list. You can't really go wrong here as long as you stick with Tobi and a happy ending. I put Achim down, but it doesn't have to be slash with him (considering the movie kind of rules it out). I would like it if they could be friends down the road, or even if they ran into each other and talked about how they had changed. I guess I really seem to be angling for future fic of this, but this fandom is so rare, I really just want to see fanfic about it.

Homer - The Iliad and the Odyssey
I am a huge Classics geek, and Iliad is totally my greatest love. More importantly, Patroclus is my favorite lover, and I would love any fanfic centered around him that didn't involve him dying. Even if the fanfic shows how he works in an inferior role to Achilles, I would love it dearly (partly because I like Achilles as well). If Hector and Paris get thrown in, I would be delighted. If not, please feel free to just write Hector and Paris on their own. You can really split this up into the Greek and the Trojan camps, because I know it's difficult to incorporate everyone. I know it's going to be difficult/weird trying to write a "happy" story about an epic war poem, but please grab poetic license and go with it. Interpret the characters as you wish, and I'm sure I'll love it.

Again, thank you so much for your hard work!

iBear

The Counterinsurgency Manual to Health Care

The original counterinsurgency manual was written by Eliot Cohen, Lt. Col. Conrad Crane, (Ret.) Lt. Col. Jan Horvath, and Lt. Col. John Nagl—all of the US Army. It was the brainchild of General Petraeus and generally directed toward the wars in the Middle East. However, many counterinsurgency (COIN) principles also apply to the health care system in America, namely a new focus on the people and their perspective. There has been so much discussion on health care insurance options, and everyone focuses on costs—costs to the government, to the patients, to the employers, to the insurance companies, and so on. People forget that health care is a service for people, by people, and that when it comes to another person’s life, money should not come first.

Legitimacy as the Main Objective

If health care is a service for people, by people, then the service must have legitimacy in the eyes of the patients and doctors. In many areas of the world, doctors are respected for what they do, and they rightfully feel proud for their accomplishments. In America, health care and the medical field is almost a joke.

Patients constantly complain about health care costs and the impersonality of treatment. Doctors are trained to spend no more than fifteen minutes with their patients, which may rapidly shorten in crowded emergency rooms. Insurance companies confessed in front of Congress that they invented reasons to withdraw health care coverage from people who had fully paid their premiums simply because they had developed a chronic condition, and they also said they would not stop. Furthermore, the threat of a lawsuit is embarrassingly real, resulting in high malpractice insurance costs and unhappy, burnt out doctors. Even people with decent HMO health care may suffer, because HMOs work on a network of doctors and hospitals. If a person in urgent need of health care happens to transported to a hospital outside of their HMO’s network, they either have to be transferred to another hospital that is in that network or be forced to pay full costs.

Patients are right to be dissatisfied with their health care, and doctors are right to be unhappy with how they are being treated. Without addressing their issues or at least changing their perceptions, the health care system continues to be a target for ridicule and something no one can trust. Change needs to happen, and it can start with a few key principles at its heart.

• Mandatory health care insurance. To change the public perception, the public has to be participating in the system. Requiring everyone to have health care insurance is not only morally correct, but it is also necessary to improve their opinions.

• A low level of corruption. Insurance companies must not revoke coverage, doctors must not burden their patients with procedures and medicines just to make money, and patients everywhere must have access to an equally high quality of medical care.

• Diversity. People should be free to choose the health care policies that suit them and also to choose from a wide selection of highly trained physicians—not just ones who are in the same network as their insurer.

• Support from major institutions. Health care reform will always need support from the employers who offer health care insurance, the hospitals, and the insurance companies themselves. However, and despite the strong protests of many, it will also need the support of the government to succeed. If all of the cogs in the system do not work in unison, reform will not be accomplished.

Unity of Effort

The health care system consists of more than just the insurance companies. Patients, primary care physicians, specialists, hospitals, employers, and the government all play a part in the system. So, if reform on the level of insurance companies and the government cannot solve the problem, then the change must reach into the individual level with physicians and patients. A new focus on this level would greatly increase health care while not necessarily raising costs. Research has shown that regions where people depend mainly on primary care physicians spend less money on health care than regions where people have numerous specialists caring for them.

An easy way to improve health care without raising costs would be improving primary care and family medicine. Primary care physicians, despite constant threat of lawsuits, heavy workloads, and the extensive knowledge they must draw from, make substantially less money compared to specialists (At least three times less). For this reason, many promising doctors pass up on primary care to specialize, and so family medicine gets the dregs of the medical school graduates. For this reason, patients do not get the best care possible at the beginning of their health care experiences—primary care physicians are always the frontline—and either must accept their circumstances while their estimation of health care continually decreases or struggle to pay for better specialists who also fail to treat the patient effectively because there is no central family doctor to coordinate the numerous tests that may come from multiple specialists.

A raise in salary for primary care physicians will draw more people into the field, and as treatment improves, so will people’s estimations of their physicians. While trite, most doctors enter the field in order to help their patients, and having their respect, admiration, and trust will make up for any other salary gaps.

Also, a raise in salary does not necessarily mean the patients will pay more money. If everyone had health insurance and a good family doctor, there would be less people crowding the emergency rooms for care they cannot afford later. ERs will stop going bankrupt from these people’s debts, and the system would pay for itself.

As I am currently thinking over my plans for the future, I wanted this written out somewhere so that I could always go back and look at it.

( Where Are All the People who Feel the Same Way? )

Resources for Graphics (Brushes/Gradients/Textures):

( A list of names! )

...And probably a lot more that I didn't keep track of. If someone notices a resource missing from this post, please comment!

Untitled, Liam's Introduction Part II

( Time to fast forward: )

Untitled Liam's Part I

( Now rewind: )

Untitled, Tom's Introduction II

( Then, fast forward: )

The untitled work of doom?

( Some time in the future, this happened: )

Haha, I am finally back at home!

( TL;DR? )

There are many pictures, but I'm sure no one is interested (God, are there a LOT of pictures), so. I will wrap this up by saying, and I already offered Becky, I will happily auction off my second cousins if anyone is interested. ♥

This will be short, as it is really hard to type using a PDA, but.

Everything is going well here. Toronto is beautiful, and I appreciate the weather. We just went to Niagara falls, and that was lovely if only because of the pictures I got to take. Couldn't do much in the casino, though.

I can't wait until Montreal. I really want to see the Plains of Abraham and McGill (Wilson's alma mater?)

Until I get to an actual computer, I will just add that I saw the most charming family. British father (Oxford grad, since his son asked) and French mother. Both sons had the British accent (socute) AND could speak French. <3

Talk to y'all soon?

First entry in a while?

Poetry Slam, categories: Sonnet, Nature, Free Choice 1, 2, and 3.


( Sonnet: Death in Love )


( Nature: Ripples in the Sky )


( Free Choice 1: Difference in Normality )


( Free Choice 2: Let's Move On, Shall We? )


( Free Choice 3: Sanctuary )

DEAR BECKY, I AM SORRY BEYOND WORDS FOR MISSING YOU. I do badly with knowing how the raw is going to turn out, anyways, but EPISODE EIGHT FANGIRLING, SO SORRY.

To make up for it, have a random, obscure Guren-Masahiro drabble from OTHER PEOPLE'S POINT OF VIEW. (And which flips off the canon spectacularly)

( In which I make shit up. )

Grammar mistakes are all because it's like one in the morning, OKAY.

It's almost Christmas time--well, not really, but I need time to prepare. I don't suppose anyone who actually checks their friendslist regularly would want something specific? It'll probably be a drabble. I'll only draw you something if you've been bad this year. D:

I have an idea for mostly everyone, but Chasey? What would you like? I can think of a few things, but I just can't decide. And of course, if anyone else wants something specific, feel free to specify? If not, I'll just throw crack at you.

... And because it's fun.

Ask my characters anything. They will reply in character and as honestly as they can.

... Haha, off to write my NaNoWriMo. Anyone have any inputs on how Paradise would act? That's capital P as in a place.

So, uh. How has everyone been? Chasey? I know I hardly ever IM you anymore, *WIMP* but I hope you're well?

Momo, if you manage to get to a computer, HELLO ARE YOU STILL ALIVE? D:

Becky, I'll talk to you later today!

Tsubaki-hime, tell me your work hasn't buried you?

And, since I was really inspired after my friend ranted Gaiman at me, I decided to seriously screw up the Yakuza. For great justice and kiddy porn? ... Uh. Still, Mahjong symbolism and bad Chinese ---> Japanese names. ♥

And NaNoWriMo is totally starting in less than six hours. Someone hold me?



( Peerless Kingdom )

... I don't know if I've had so much fun writing fanfiction before. Catalyst with a little cameo from my characters (You really don't have to know anything about them), and if I totally screwed this up, Becky, I will hurt MYSELF.

Blowing Bubbles By the Railroad Tracks – Tuyen/Sorin

( ...So much fun. )

Next one: The Stillness of Now - Lanh/Aurel.

Since I have been reading so much fanfiction lately, I thought I would actually write some. Of course, I fail at writing the regular anime/manga/TV series/book fanfiction.

So what did I do instead? Ask Becky if I could kill her characterization instead. Hope you enjoy it?

Decided to do a series of them based on 20aus, so yes, Alternate Universes. I'll also probably be switching around pairings.

First one?

Two Feet Beneath Water – Tuyen/Lanh

( Pretty normal. )

Next one? Blowing Bubbles by the Railroad Tracks - Tuyen/Sorin.

Random Drabble: As I have not been writing lately, what is WRONG with me?

Prompt given by friend: Random Washington and Lafayette interaction? Er.

... I need new icons.

( I think my tenses are off by dramatic amounts. )

Okay, this? Is totally telling MY OWN CANON to screw off. But I love writing abstract BF(F)-ness and I'M A SUCKER FOR SAP, I ADMIT IT.

( And I will not spend my time digging graves... )