Fic: Lies, Damned Lies, and Darcy (Thor)

[sophia_sol]

OH HEY LOOK, you get two fics from me in one night! Although this one was cowritten, with sentientcitizen. You can see the original (vastly inferior) version that we wrote here back when I posted that wee Darcy-and-Loki ficlet. It'd be interesting, I think, to do a comparison of the original and the final to see just HOW MUCH we ended up changing (hint: kind of a lot!)

You will notice that nobody in this fic ever uses the term "thank you". This is because we had an IMPASSIONED debate on the subject of whether or not there ought to be a hyphen between the two words. Because this is a topic of great importance, obviously! (And at one point the impassioned debate became a DEATHMATCH. Which never turns out well for me, because Essie's stronger than I am...)

Title: Lies, Damned Lies, and Darcy
Fandom: Thor
Rating: PG
Words: 3539
Summary: Darcy, meet Loki. Whatever happens next, it sure as hell won’t be boring.

You can read this fic:
-On AO3
-On Essie's journal

Comments

[tei]

DDDD: YOU CANNOT DEATHMATCH, THE UNIVERSE NEEDS BOTH OF YOU

[sophia_sol]

BUT WE HAD TO DEATHMATCH! HYPHENS ARE A MATTER OF LIFE-OR-DEATH IMPORTANCE, DIDN'T YOU KNOW? THE UNIVERSE COULDN'T HANDLE AN INCORRECT HYPHEN EITHER. At least Essie was kind enough to not allow it to go to the death after she wrestled me into submission? :D

[tei]

I BEG YOUR PARDON BUT I MUST DISAGREE

IN FACT, HYPHENS ARE A MATTER OF LIFE OR DEATH IMPORTANCE

[sophia_sol]

I'M SORRY BUT IT SOUNDS TO ME LIKE YOU ARE AGREEING: HYPHENS=LIFE OR DEATH IMPORTANCE. YES.

[pellucere.livejournal.com]

This is because we had an IMPASSIONED debate on the subject of whether or not there ought to be a hyphen between the two words.

I am putting myself firmly in the camp of WHY WOULD YOU PUT A HYPHEN THERE

because 'thank' is a verb

and you don't hyphenate things like "screw you" or "do you"


PEDANTRY

[sophia-sol.livejournal.com]

THANK YOU.

FOR BEING ON MY SIDE.

Because I am right.

PEDANTRY IS IMPORTANT.

[sentientcitizen]

BECAUSE OF FLOW ISSUES OK

CONTEXT IS IMPORTANT

[sophia-sol.livejournal.com]

BUT

NO

YOU ARE WRONG

AND ALWAYS HAVE BEEN WRONG

(AND NOW I HAVE LES MIZ STUCK IN MY HEAD)

[sentientcitizen]

I AM A STYLE CHOICE.

NO WORSE THAN ANY STYLE CHOICE.

YOU ARE FREE, AND THERE ARE NO CONDITIONS, NO BARGAINS OOOOOOOR PETITTTTTTTTTIONS...!

[sophia-sol.livejournal.com]

BUT IT IS A WRONG STYLE CHOICE

BECAUSE YOU ARE WRONG

THERE IS NOTHING THAT I BLAME YOU FOOOOOR, YOU'VE DONE YOUR DUTY, NOTHING MORE!

AND QUOTING THAT LINE MAKES IT SOUND LIKE I FORGIVE YOU FOR YOUR INCORRECT STYLE CHOICE, BUT YOU WOULD BE WRONG

[michelel72.livejournal.com]

I thought that was a Commonwealth-or-possibly-just-Colonies English (hyphenated) versus American English (non-hyphenated) thing, myself. Which is to say that if I'm doing beta for a fic using American spellings, I ruthlessly strike the hyphen; but if the author is using non-AmE spellings, I leave it alone if I encounter it.

(I agree with pellucere that it doesn't make any sense to hyphenate it, but I try not to be imperialist. heh.)

Of course, I can never figure out which rules Canadians will choose to follow in any given instance .... :)

[sophia-sol.livejournal.com]

From what I can tell, I think it's a part of speech thing, not a part of the world thing.

So if the sentence is: All I wanted was a thank-you in return for my help
then it gets a hyphen.
But if it's: He said, "Thank you," in return for my help
then it doesn't.

And yeah, figuring out where Canadians stand on the linguistic divide is always a fun one! And sometimes we don't stand ANYWHERE and actually can't make up our minds between the two options, which just leaves everything confused. Like, I still have no idea which place uses "grey" versus "gray"....

[michelel72.livejournal.com]

I'd more likely phrase it as All I wanted was a "thank you" in return for my help, but your version makes sense.

(My bigger peeve is folks using "setup" as a verb. Grr!)

As for the color, I'm told that gray is the American spelling and grey is the English one, but I defy that, because I think grey is prettier. So there!

[sophia-sol.livejournal.com]

Your version of that sentence also makes sense! And I like it better, too, I'm just acknowledging that there are certain circumstances where a hyphen would in fact be acceptable. :D

(ooh, that WOULD be annoying. I have....um. A LOT of language-use related peeves. I shouldn't even get started.)

Hee! As a Canadian I can choose whichever one I like better, and interestingly enough I'm pretty sure I've always gone for "grey". Which, when I can't decide between two versions of a word, I generally go for the English one over the American one, out of -- I don't even know. But it makes me happy that I've been liking the English one in this situation!

[curuchamion.livejournal.com]

By and large, I think American professionally-published stuff uses "gray" and British stuff uses "grey" - but I see them as two different colors ("gray" is more gunmetal, "grey" is more silvery), so I use both. OTOH, I am a terribly opinionated American formed by piles of British kidlit, so what do I know? ;-)

[sophia-sol.livejournal.com]

That is FASCINATING that you see them as two different colours! It would never have crossed my mind to distinguish them in that way.

And yeah, British kidlit has definitely been formative in a lot of my language use, I think....