(no subject)

[opusculasedfera]

So, I was writing a gushy post about how adorable Tripp and John were last night, what with Tripp's birthday, and his surprise cake, and his totally baffling attempt to talk about some random staff members while some different staff members waved a cake in his face and tried to make him blow out candles, and John looked on fondly forever. But I was also watching tonight's game, and Tripp started telling adorable stories about the Canes' Cup run, and how he wept when they won, and it reminded me all over again me exactly why I like him so much. He's not just a font of baffling and adorable flirting/bizarre stories/Czech fetishes. He's also so good at being a serious homer without actually being gross about it. He can make it abundantly clear that he is cheering for the Canes without saying anything bad about the other team! And he can WEEP AT THEIR CUP WIN, and also acknowledge on camera that they did actually commit that penalty, the refs are being fair, he just wishes they wouldn't do those things.

Not that I don't also ship Tripp and John a lot, because I REALLY DO, and they've clearly worked some shit out because John ~no longer says good night in the elevator on road trips~ (literally something they said during a broadcast) and there's been a lot of flirting, but ugh, they're so good at their jobs, and it just makes me happy.

(...and now my DW can match my twitter, where I'm pretty sure fully half my tweets are Tripp related. He's just so great!)


Also, people should come talk to me about fics that should exist because all mine are slightly stalled and I want something to think about. What things do you want to pop into existence? Not that I promise to write anything, but we can commiserate together.

Comments

[opusculasedfera]

Eeee, yay for cuddling! That sounds super adorable.

It's so difficult with hockey because there are so many things happening that make me want h/c, but it's not satisfying enough when the real hurt just continues on and on and it gets sad.

You will have to explain about Sheppard, I don't know enough things about the Wild?

[bestliar]

Yeah, writing about Zach Parise getting cuddled and not thinking about his poor foot will not make his foot better or the Wild stop losing or anything, it just means that I'm thinking about the fact that he's hurt, instead of a world where he's a spy or whatever.

James Sheppard was a first round draft pick for the Wild. They rushed him into the NHL, and then he really struggled for a bunch of seasons, and looked like a total bust. Then he got hurt over the summer, and busted his knee really bad, and lost a whole season, and before he returned the Wild traded him to the Sharks, and he still wasn't hurt, and spent more time recovering. The first time he played in two years was in the AHL during the lockout, then he wound up with the Sharks once the NHL season started, in a fourth line role. Basically he was this really talented youngster who was put in a situation where he wasn't able to succeed, and he struggled, but he had a really positive outlook through all of it, and Russo blogged about how accountable for his mistakes he was, and he just really wanted to play hockey! And then he got hurt, and missed so much time, but he never gave up! He's playing hockey, in the NHL, in a totally different role than he thought he'd wind up in, but he managed!

And that's a super lovely story, and it doesn't need a romance subplot or anything, and I think that trying to write it would make me really emotional. Watching the clip of the first time he talked to the press after messing up his knee legit made me tear up. (it was like two in the morning, but still, very many emotions).

[opusculasedfera]

Spies sound much better. *nods* And I feel like hockey makes writing h/c especially awkward because it's so likely that the news in a week won't be good, it'll be that they were hiding the real severity of it all along, which can make already written h/c that was taking the minor version at face value feel trite. (Not that there's anything wrong with writing fic where minor things are fixed with cuddles! Just that it feels weird when it's revealed that actually, it needed to be fixed with surgery.)

Awww, that's lovely. I don't quite know what you'd write about it except I guess the long rehab? But I would be interested to see what someone did with that narrative, because there's definitely a lot of chewy stuff in there.

[bestliar]

yep. I knew Suter was playing hurt last spring, and I wrote h/c. I had no clue it was BROKEN RIBS. Ugh, idiot.

I would just love the whole story told in detail, from being a young player with so much potential, to being really battered by failing to meet expectations, and then totally sidelined by injury. He said that when he was injured he learned a lot about himself, and that could be fascinating. And then coming away from that and reinventing himself and finding a place where he fits and can do what he loves. Ugh. It's just a great narrative. Like, I want fic, but I would also take some really meaty deep journalism, I just want this story to get picked apart.

[opusculasedfera]

It would help a lot if hockey players would stop being SUPER DUMB. >:(

It is a great narrative, but oh man, so hard to write. It's so much internal struggle and it's all so explicitly about him being apart from things and not folded into team, and I don't know, it would be interesting and different, but also difficult.