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[cblj_backup]

Top 5 Non-canon Ways to Kill Off Harry Potter Characters
1. Rocks fall. Everyone dies. :D (hey, who came up with that, anyway?)
2. Sat upon by Hagrid.
3. Auto-erotic asphyxiation gone wrong (I fancy this one for Draco).
4. Eaten by Remus Lupin.
5. Deadly drapery Pirahnas.

Top Five Fan Fiction Stories I'd Like to Read
I have to preface this by saying that I don't actually read much fanfic. If I think of a story I want to read, generally I try to write it. So most of these are in fandoms where I don't know enough to write.
1. An AU Batman where he really does have like a whole family of Robins like they theorise about in Gotham Confidental.
2. In that theme, a Batman where Wayne finally gives way to a newer, younger Batman but not as stupid as that cartoon about it was.
3. HP fic that follows Tom Riddle between when he leaves Hogwarts and when he goes after Harry Potter, including his sojourn as a much-loved agent of Borgin and Burkes. Bonus for Tom/Minerva.
4. Stephen King fanfic in general, but specifically not Dark Tower. I like Dark Tower, but it has more than its fair share of the SKfic out there.
5. Good Omens fic focusing on Crowley and Aziraphael in other time periods.

Top 5 Reasons To Carry Around A Frog
1. Handy snack!
2. Good way to clear out a room or subway car.
3. Toads are just too big.
4. Croaking is a very soothing noise.
5. No flies on me.

Top 5 Reasons Esme Weatherwax is better than Agnes Nutter
1. Never burned at the stake.
2. Hence, presumably still alive.
3. Prophecies are always concise and well-timed: ie, "In the next ten minutes you will experience severe pain in your kneecaps."
4. Accurate, but not nice.
5. Builds character.

Top 5 Reason Agnes Nutter is better than Esme Weatherwax
1. Nice AND Accurate.
2. Procreated.
3. Not alive to pick on you.
4. Takes descendants' hijinks with good taste.
5. Published author.

Top 5 Crossovers I'd Like To See
1. Good Omens/Constantine. OH YOU KNOW YOU WANNA SEE IT TOO. *looks pointedly at Spider*
2. House/NCIS (still workin' on it)
4. HP/Discworld, but FUNNY.
4. Massive CSI figurative-clusterfuck which conclusively proves Grissom to be way cooler and more badass than Gary Sinise or David Caruso.
5. You know, I'm not a big crossover fan, come to look on it.

Top 5 Pieces of Classical Music
1. Hoedown, Aaron Copeland
2. Peter and the Wolf, Prokofiev (thanks, [info]la_rainette)
3. Bolero, Ravel
4. Pomp and Circumstance, Edward Elgar (thanks, [info]ak_alterego)
5. Canon in D, Pachelbel (thanks, [info]woelfle)

Top 5 Ways to Make a Good First Impression
1. Wash your hair.
2. Wear clean clothing.
3. Make eye contact.
4. Speak frankly but not cruelly.
5. Be kind to people you dislike.

Top 5 Ways to Put Out a Fire
1. Smothering.
2. Water.
3. Stop! Drop! Rooooooooooll!
4. Fuel removal.
5. But We didn't start the fire! It's been always burning since the world's been turning!

Top 5 TV "Trainwrecks" I Can't Believe I Watch/ed
1. Empire. Wow, way to rape history in the ass, there.
2. Star Trek: The Next Generation. I'm sorry to slag it because it was like my first fandom, but jesus, I watch it now and cringe.
3. CSI Miami. I CANNOT LOOK AWAY. I don't know why.
4. The final season of ER that had Dr. Green in it. A slow slide into mediocrity.
5. America's Next Top Model. It's such a funny trainwreck!

Top 5 Things I'd Rather Do Than Peel Off My Own Fingernails
I sort of assume that it's top five unpleasant things.
1. Take a long walk off a short pier.
2. Watch "Saw" again.
3. Sing karaoke.
4. Speak in public.
5. Drink Gatorade.

Top 5 Dishes I Would Like To Cook
(aka Top 5 Favorite Foods To Make/Bake/Cook/Create, since this one came up twice)
1. Cathy's amazing Croissant recipe
2. Grilled portobello sandwiches
3. Stuffed roasted chicken
4. Scratch mac'n'cheese
5. Yorkshire Puddings

Top 5 Things Learnt from Fanfiction that would Scare Strangers
1. Several torture techniques too gristly to recount.
2. The definition of the word "felching".
3. What chan is.
4. The fact that chan is common enough to need a specific word to describe it.
5. What colour a boiled brain is.

Top 5 Poems
1. Ozymandias, Percy Bysse Shelley
2. The Lovesong of J Alfred Prufrock, TS Eliot
3. Love the Wild Swan, Robinson Jeffers
4. Flammonde, Edwin Arlington Robinson
5. The Canterbury Tales, Geoffrey Chaucer (sorta cheating, I know)

Top 5 Harry Potter Fandom Pairings
1. Remus/Tonks
2. Remus/Sirius
3. Tonks/Snape
4. Tom Riddle/Minerva McGonagall
5. Harry/Ginny

Top 5 Ways Bernard Gets On My Nerves
1. Existing.
2. Not tidying after himself.
3. Using his AS as an excuse not to make an effort.
4. Doing his homework and then FORGETTING TO TURN IT IN.
5. Refusing to take his maintenance medication because "I don't feel sick".

Top 5 Historical Figures
1. Augustus Caesar
2. Alexander the Great
3. Thomas the Apostle
4. Mahatma Gandhi
5. Arthur Conan Doyle

Top 5 Pleasures in Life
1. Writing
2. Reading
3. Theatre
4. Cooking
5. Maskmaking

Top 5 Theatres Worldwide I'd Like To Attend
1. The Athenaea in Greece, the year the Oresteia was performed. I want to meet Aeschylus.
2. The first Moscow performance of The Sea Gull. Even if it was in Russian -- I want to listen for that legendary "Minute of Silence" before the audience applauded.
3. Any Native American mystery play before the arrival of Europeans.
4. The first performance of Hamlet. Or any play where Will Shakespeare had a performing role.
5. Opening night of The Larramie Project's premiere.

Top 5 Things People Should Know About Me
1. I'm shy.
2. I'm poor.
3. Writing is my escape.
4. I'm a dramaturg.
5. I was born under a wand'rin star.

Top 5 Cities I Would Like To Live In
1. Boston
2. Toronto
3. London
4. Paris
5. Rome

Top 5 Plays I'd Like To 'Turg
1. Any paying gig. No, seriously. I can make any show fun to work on as a Dramaturg -- I just want to be paid.
2. Iphegenia at Aulis, Euripides
3. Antigone, either version
4. Coriolanus, William Shakespeare
5. Heartbreak House, George Bernard Shaw

Top Five Countries I'd Like To Go To
I decided to tack on "Which I haven't yet visited"
1. Is Cambodia where Angkor Wat is?
2. Egypt
3. Italy
4. Australia
5. France

Top 5 Novels I Never Ever Want to See Again In My Life Upon Pain of Mutilation, Incineration, and then Defenestration
1. Beloved, by Toni Morrison
2. Hunger of Memory, by Richard Rodriguez
3. Lord of the Rings, by JRR Tolkien
4. Black Boy, by Richard Wright
5. I have to confess that I would be able to make five if I could include more Toni Morrison, but I limited myself to one book by an author and....well, I tend not to finish books I don't like, and thus don't remember them.

Top 5 Books Crowley or Aziraphale Would Read
I'll let you figure out who would read which :D
1. Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen
2. The Murders in the Rue Morgue, Edgar Allen Poe
3. Notes on the Collecting of Incunabulae, Lord Peter Wimsey
4. The Anarchist's Handbook, George Bernard Shaw
5. Tartuffe, Moliere (cheating...but still)
6. East of Eden, John Steinbeck
7. The Green Knight, Author Unknown
8. Good Omens, Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett
9. The Magician's Nephew, CS Lewis
10. The Collected Poems of Lord Byron

Top 5 Opening Lines in Literature
All my books are packed, so I'm just going to list the books with the top opening lines, as I can recall.
1. Cry, The Beloved Country, by Alan Paton
2. Whose Body, by Dorothy L Sayers
3. The Magician's Nephew, by CS Lewis
4. A Scandal In Bohemia, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
5. Macbeth, by William Shakespeare

Top 5 Best Written Plays of the Last Century
1. Major Barbara, George Bernard Shaw
2. Fences, August Wilson
3. Oh What A Lovely War, Joann Woodward
4. The Larramie Project, Moises Kaufmann & Co.
5. Threepenny Opera, Bertolt Brecht

Top 5 Episodes of Any TV Shows, Ever
1. Babylon 5's season-four finale.
2. Three Stories (the "Omg House Backstory" episode), House MD
3. Humbug (the circus freak episode), The X-Files
4. Series Finale of Star Trek Voyager
5. The Inukshuk episode of Due South

Top 5 Historical Events I Would Like To Have Seen
1. The death of Julius Caesar
2. The gentling of Bucephalus
3. The coronation of King Arthur
4. The flight at Kitty Hawk
5. The "Dialogue of Thespis", if it ever even happened.

Top 5 Fics Not Written By Sam and Top 5 Other Fanfic Writers You Like To Read
To be honest, I don't read enough fic to answer the first one. The fic I have read and enjoyed I haven't got bookmarked, so it's all "That one about Tonks" or "The thing with Bill and Remus". Sorry. On the score of the second one, I have many friends whose fic is good but not to my tastes, and many others who would probably rather not have their names mentioned. So I must decline to answer.

Top 5 Names for a Baby Boy
1. Well, I'm fond of Sam...
2. Alexander
3. William
4. Richard (lots of kings, huh?)
5. Apollo :D

Top Five reasons CC's Sirius fell in love with Harry
I'd like to point out that all three of us are gagging a bit at this :D
1. He's Harry.
2. He's smart.
3. He and Sirius both understand not living up to expectations.
4. He's game for pranking.
5. He's hot, have you SEEN HIM?

Top 5 Reasons I Love/Write Remus So Much
1. He's like me -- poor, not the most socially skilled, a teacher
2. He's complex.
3. He's a werewolf, which gives him an allegorical layer
4. He's survived so much tragedy, and how he copes fascinates me.
5. He's popular in fandom, so people like to read about him.

Top 5 Biggest WTFs I've Encountered
1. A student with a fractured penis.
2. The woman who accused me of thinking evil thoughts on the bus
3. *points to f-of list*
4. Watchful Entity
5. The word "eukanuba". Where the hell does that name come from?

Top 5 Things I Do While Waiting For A Haircut
1. Peoplewatch
2. Read
3. Write (in my notebook)
4. Try to pick out which person I want to cut my hair
5. Contemplate lunch.

Top 5 Things Remus Lupin Does While Waiting For A Haircut
1. Peoplewatch
2. Covertly charm-fix bad haircuts of others
3. Stare at the shampoo as if he might actually buy something
4. Lose/re-find his discount coupon
5. Try to figure out how to say he wants his hair to look exactly like last time.

Top 5 Random Facts I Like To Tell People
1. There is a theory that artists make art mainly to give people something to look at which isn't themselves.
2. Playwrights die either very young or very old. George Bernard Shaw was 94 when he died and even then it was only because he fell down the stairs.
3. The Winchester Mystery House has windows ground to the prescription of its owner's eyeglasses so she wouldn't have to wear glasses when she stood at her front windows.
4. Ice wine is made from frozen grapes.
5. Geoffrey Chaucer wrote a "lost work" called The Book Of The Leone

Top 5 Snarkiest Most House-y House Lines
This is a hard one, since I don't have most House episodes on tape and my memory sucks.
1. House and Wilson arguing about House's borrowing money.
2. House and Cuddy arguing about whether he deserves to lose his job.
3. House pointing out that Cameron is still hung over from METHAMPHETAMENES.
4. House telling Cuddy that he and Wilson are gay lovers.
5. "Everybody lies."

Top 5 Movie/Television Explosions
I'm not a big...explosion fan. So really these are the only five I could think of.
1. The attack of the Ents in The Two Towers
2. The Death Star
3. The exploding Klingon moon in Star Trek...VI?
4. The "clean bomb" that turned out all the lights in Ocean's Eleven
5. The exploding spaceship in Independence Day

Top 5 Memes
1. The "one word to say what you want" meme
2. Any non-lame sorting meme
3. The "let's fuck with Gmail's sidebar" meme
4. Snaps Cup, for others -- I never participate but it's fun to see
5. I think Post Secret counts as a sort of meme, and I love it to death.

Top 5 Rules That Need To Be Broken
1. No outside food in movies.
2. No walking on the grass.
3. No dessert before dinner.
4. No shoes, no service.
5. No shooting people who talk in the theatre.

Top 5 Ways For A Stranger To Get My Attention On LJ
1. Say something that really intrigues me.
2. Ask a question that makes me think.
3. Have a really interesting icon.
4. Converse sensibly with someone who is being....not.
5. Wank. (Well, nobody said it had to be positive attention)

Top 5 "Top 5" Lists I've Just Done
1. Top 5 Non-canon Ways to Kill Off Harry Potter Characters
2. Top 5 Reasons To Carry Around A Frog
3. Top 5 Theatres Worldwide I'd Like To Attend
4. Top Five books Crowley or Aziraphale would read.
5. Top Five Best Written Plays of the Last Century

Top 5 Displacement Activities
1. Cooking
2. Laundry
3. Fanfic
4. Drinking :D
5. Cinema

Top 5 Movie Soundtracks
This is tough because while Cinema does rate in displacement activities, I don't really care one way or another about movies and I care even less about their soundtracks.
1. The Lion King.
2. Swing Kids.
3. Chicago (cheating, I know)
4. Prisoner of Azkaban
5. Hum Dil de Chukah Sanam (bollywood)

Top 5 Things I Haven't Done Yet But Wish I Had
1. Worked as a dramaturge in professional theatre.
2. Held a full-time, non-summer-employment job.
3. Had a novel published.
4. Owned a siamese cat.
5. Lived in Seattle.

Top 5 Things I'm Happy I Haven't Done And Don't Plan To Do
1. Joined a fight club.
2. Eaten sashimi.
3. Worked in fast food service.
4. Hired a hooker.
5. Lived in El Paso.

Comment conservation:

[info]florahart
Sam, you kill me. Handy Snack! Heeeeeee.

[info]la_rainette
(Pssst. Prokoviev wrote Peter and the Wolf. Tchaikovsky wrote "Gramcracker", as Tadpole calls Nutcracker :D.)

[info]byandby
Canon in D, Pachabel - my favorite piece of classical music. Thank you for the list! I've not read any of them. I live in Pittsburgh (though not originally from the city) and have never read August Wilson. I should as it may shed more light onto the Hill district and help to give me a more positive view on the place. Joann Woodward's play looks really interesting. Humbug (the circus freak episode), The X-Files - Totally agree. Best X-Files episode ever.

[info]garlandgraves
"Flammonde" wins, as does E.A. Robinson generally. Actually I am so overfond of sticking his poetry on my stories as epigraphs that, now, when you google some of his poems, my fanfiction is the first thing to come up. I really need to break myself of this habit.

[info]wonapalei
The word "eukanuba". Where the hell does that name come from?
This item reminds me irresistibly of the bit in Clouds of Witness where Peter demands that Charles spell ipecacuanha and refuses to believe it when he does. :D

[info]watersword
They're such *dorks*, and I cringe for each of them that they made the movie, but I have a secret, unholy love for Swing Kids. Of course, I am a total RSL fangirl, and am actually kind of bitter about his switch to TV. It was nice being a fangirl to someone no one knew about. But 'House' is so good I can forgive.

[info]gryfindormia
There are some movies that are so horrible it's excusable to love them, but not Swing Kids. All logic is saying to me that it's overall a film not really worth investing any amount of emotional energy over, but I can't stop myself.

[info]copperbadge
To be honest, I just plain like Swing Kids as a story. I think it's a neat plot, and you learn a lot about what went on in Germany during the war, and how the Nazis brainwashed all those HJ kids. I mean, it's no Europa Europa, but it's not a bad film all in all.

[info]emiweebee
Siamese! They're so pretty. But so noisy! I catsit a Siamese, and it's so unnerving; I keep looking at her and saying, "WHAT?", because I'm convinced something's wrong/she needs something, and she's just talking. All. The. Time.

[info]gershwhen
What no "Paint Your Wagon"? And you were so good with the lyrics.... I'm totally surprised.

Hand me down that can o' beans. Hand me down that can o' beans. Hand me down that can o' beans, I'm throwing it away..."

[info]copperbadge
I didn't even think of Paint Your Wagon! Totally should be in the list.

Out the window go the beans, out the window go the beans, out the window go the beans, I've had a lucky day. MAAAAARY MA MA MA MAAAARY...

[info]goseaward
You know, I just have to ask...were you invited to join a fight club? Or is that a random observation?

[info]copperbadge
Random observation. I don't understand the appeal, other than some kind of weird ultramachismo....