All about YOU

[birdsofshore]

I love talking with you all here each week / day / hour / insert own level of addiction, but I often think I don't even know basic stuff about your LJ , like what your username means, what your icons are, etc etc. Come and tell me everything.

Why did you pick your username, and what does it mean? What's your default icon, and does it have any significance? If it's a famous person, please don't assume I will know who it is - I never know who anyone is unless I have the hots for them. What about those other things we can personalise on LJ - the quotes or messages at the top of your journal, and that odd little thing I've never worked out how to change, for instance who_la_hoop's says "I can see your house from here", which always makes me laugh. Do you have special art or graphics on your header? What are they all about?

I will start you off. My username is from a poster that I have in my living room, which says "Birds of shore & sea", with, er, drawings of different birds. Of shore, and, indeed, of sea. "Birdsofshoreandsea" is more characters than LJ allows, and besides, the shorebirds are the ones I like the best.

My picture is probably self-evident, but it's a curlew, which is my absolute favourite bird. I live quite near to plenty of these glorious creatures and they make me very thrilled and happy whenever I see one. They're just so ludicrous and beaky. They look like they shouldn't exist, and they seem to have really fabulous personalities. I can watch them for hours, just mooching about and digging for worms. They also have subtly beautiful plumage and the most wonderful song. I'm not actually OBSESSED with birds in real life, but I can verge on HIGHLY ENTHUSIASTIC about birds on any given occasion, so apologies if you just glazed over there.

The quotes on my journal are from one of my favourite books, The Hotel New Hampshire by John Irving. "You've got to get obsessed and stay obsessed" and "Keep passing the open windows" are pieces of advice from the book on how to survive whatever life throws at you. If you haven't read it, it's a big, insane, sexy, sweet, funny, tragic romp of a book and please don't tell me if you don't like it, because I have adored it since I was about 15 and bought it to impress a boy I fancied who worked in a bookshop (my rec for Frequent Patronage will be along any day now, by the way). Fandom is definitely part of my plan to remain sane and to 'keep passing the open windows' (in other words, to avoid falling into depression and self-harm), so both quotes seemed apt when I was picking my layout.

I have only got a standard LJ header thing - it was the one that seemed least offensive when I looked through. I'd love fancy graphics or some beautiful art up there, but OMG, how hard to choose, plus, if I'm being honest, I don't have a clue how to do such things DD:

Please come and do all the sharing. I really, really want to know.

p.s. A very big thank you to whoever nominated me at HPfanficpoll thingy, if you are on my flist. I was very flattered indeed that you liked my fics, and touched that you took the time ♥

Comments

[torino10154]

I'm going to try again. *inhales, exhales*

My username is for the city of Torino in northern Italy where my husband was born, the numbers are the zip code for his part of town. Besides FIATs, they are known for Lavazza espresso, Gianduia chocolate, and hosting the 2006 Winter Olympics.

My default icon is one that I made of Tom Riddle, Severus Snape, and Harry Potter and references this line in Deathly Hallows: Hogwarts was the first and best home he had ever known. He and Voldemort and Snape, the abandoned boys, had all found home here… Basically a reminder how three people with certain similar circumstances could all end up differently. Voldemort on one end, Harry on the other, with Severus in the middle.

My journal title/subtitle come from the Rolling Stones song, "Shattered". The subtitle is one of the lines. "Laughter, joy, and loneliness and sex and sex and sex and sex" which I think is HIGHLY appropriate for my journal. I'd change the title, perhaps, but I hate the idea of the title and lyrics mismatching.

I have three quotes on my profile page:

"Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from religious conviction." -Blaise Pascal

Sometimes it is necessary to touch bottom in order to know which way is up; to go a long distance down the wrong road before you know the right way. -The Ground Beneath Her Feet Salman Rushdie

“I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with sense, reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use.” -Galileo Galilei

The first and last are clearly about religion and I think it's also clear I am not a fan. LOL The middle one is a reminder that sometimes you make mistakes but you can always find your way again even after you've reached rock bottom.

I also have banners from various fests, a meme about prejudice, and two gifs of Keith Richards #1 drinking straight from a bottle of whisky and #2 smoking a cigar. That probably tells people all they need to know.

I used to have a photo header (it was actually Torino with the snow-capped Alps in the back ETA: this pic) but that layout didn't have tags on it so now I have matching ones on LJ/IJ though my DW is different.

Oh, and last thing. On my sticky post, I have a quote from my good friend, sdkshelly. "First of all, don't compare yourself to others. That way lies madness." I look to it when I am feeling "not good enough" or down on myself in some way and am reminded we're all different, have different skills and motivations. If I am having fun, that's good enough.

[birdsofshore]

Oh, this is great. Thank you so much for retyping it all *adores it*

I am just loving the way this encourages poking around other people's journals. It's like a museum tour with one of those audio guides, LOL! You're looking at familiar things and saying "ahhhh, I SEE!"

Keith Richards drinking a bottle of whiskey, and smoking a cigar. All we need to know. *nods* :DDDD