What I am going to do is the following

An empty podium stands in the front of the room where everyone is waiting for notification about what is going to happen to our beloved fandom. A door in the back opens and in walks a simple woman surrounded by two very famous members of said fandom: Eric Northman and Godric.  The impressive vampires stand to each side of the podium to provide their support. The woman takes her place behind the podium and is nervously shuffling and straightening of her note cards.

*cough cough, deep breath*

“Testing….Testing… Can everyone hear me? Anyone still here? Heck, I’m continuing anyway. Okay, I am not an eloquent writer like some of the amazing women in this fandom. I don’t even have the ability to proof read my own posts often not finding the mistakes until days after it was posted so I will depend on someone else for that. *You know who you are I will be contacting you later* But here is what you in the fandom will need to know: My name is Robin, on Facebook I go by Robin Amanda, and in the fanfiction world some know me as 4padfoot *gosh I love that Sirius character* and others know me as the wordpresswhisperer.”

The lady pauses to take a breath before continuing. “Everyone know who I am now? Good.  Now, here are ways of getting in contact with me as I am the admin to the You Want Blood Awards site.  The first way is via my email address. *Please don’t sign me up for any spam emails and no that is not how you get even with an ex. I didn’t do that, (snickering), I am a techie and sometimes we are an evil group.* I am stepping out on a limb here and trusting you all: wordpresswhisperer@gmail.com.  Here is the award site email that we set up last year: youwantbloodawards@gmail.com.  You can also message me on Facebook as Robin Amanda.  From this day forward you will contact me regarding any issues with the Awards or the Awards site. It will be that simple.  Also, I am redesigning the site with its reveal scheduled for the 29th of this month. *How many days is that away? “Seven,” Eric obligingly answers… YIKES!  Ok, time to speed this up*

The kind lady pauses momentarily to shuffle through the notes in her hands as Godric and Eric take a comforting step closer as she begins addressing the audience:

“Now, I have been thru a lot this week both online and offline, and I know that everyone hates drama. Believe me no one hates it more that I do.

“I am not going to point fingers or take any sides except the side of the fandom. My decision involved a venting session with my mother *yes, I am best friends with my mother who can still help me see reason sometimes and not just hurt feelings* at Texas Roadhouse yesterday. Then a specific comment hit me hard in the face that stated it simply with: WWED? What would Eric do?

That…started me thinking. The reply to that made me smile for the first time in a couple days: He’d laugh at our back and forth – then probably drain us all. ”

*I personally don’t wanna be drained but wait – it’s Eric…can I be his progeny in the end?  If so sign me up! Oh, I am so torn now*

“Back on task where was I?  Oh, yeah… Then I saw a Supernatural video *maybe more than once I had to show it to my friends*

 

 

 

and I was laughing and smiling again because this is supposed to be our escape… This is supposed to be our fun time away from evil work bosses, screaming kids, spouses *ha I don’t have that to worry about*, bills – a fun time to read and imagine what Eric would do if, and the authors in this fandom have so many wonderful if stories out there.

“We need to support our fandom because I don’t want the sparkly vampires to win please never let that happen. *”Godric, we may have to do something about that,” Eric says as he covers his laugh with a cough. I still heard that!* Yes, we are like siblings and we fight sometimes but we always come back stronger. Today I am stronger and I am stepping up and standing in front of everyone who is reading this *glup, quit glaring at your monitors, phones and ipads I can feel the eyeballs on me* saying that this is what I am going to do. To that end, I asked myself how I can fix things so that most (not all because I know I can’t please everyone and I am not even going to try to kill myself to get that accomplished) of the people will be happy, and I asked myself about what I enjoy doing. I love SVM/TB fiction.  To anyone who has gotten one of my reviews they know how I am – I don’t just leave a “Hey, love your story” comment.  I sometimes leave 1700 words on a single chapter and have characters of my own! I also love to design websites. That is what I do for my “real” job and it is what I do in my spare time when I am not reading fanfiction and real fiction.

“So, here is my plan. I am going to take over all parts of this site.  From the first step to the last, I am going to re-design the site. There will be three sections all under the You Want Blood Awards website: The You Want Blood Awards, The New Blood Awards, and Contests and Links.

“The You Want Blood Awards (which will run from April to May) — will be for writers who have been writing in the SVM/TB fandom for longer than two years. This will allow the veteran authors to be in their own grouping without new authors trying to compete against them.

“The New Blood Awards (which will run from June – July) – will be for writers who are new to the fandom (under two years).  Hopefully this will draw new writers to our fandom to get New Blood in here. I will be posting a lot of stuff in the future in on this section of the site *scribbles notes to myself* so be prepared.

“Contests and Links (on-going) – this will be for other people to contact me *look above for the address as I will not have time to go find them because I have 6 websites that I am heavily involved in maintaining in my spare time, I work a full time job, and then I do read this stuff called fanficiton you should join me it is amazing some is even better than the originals* I will post Contest descriptions and Links to all nominees for you to be able to find new amazing authors or find old favorites that you thought were gone forever.

“Now, I am not quite sure how the New Blood Awards will work yet.  I have notes that I will hash it out with people I trust, and if I get in over my head I will ask for help. This, however, is mainly to inform everyone that I don’t want the SVM/TB fandom, which one commenter said “was on life support” *snicker*, to have the plug pulled.

“As I am a numbers person, here’s the skinny:

“What I have seen is that this site has had 42,146 views.  From the beginning of May we average 580 views a day. Our best ever day was 2,317 views. This tells me that we have readers, that we have people who want to be recognized when they tell us, “Hey I love that story” or “Oh, I love that author”.

“So to everyone who is still listening to me ramble *I do that a lot, ask my friends* do sit up and take notice. I thought long and hard on whether or not to finish this award season. Did I want to leave the writers hanging? Did I want to let it die a painful death on life support? Did I want the SVM/TB fandom to be remembered for pettiness? The answers to these were no…no…and Hell NO!!!!! So, here is what is going to happen, your defibrillator shock to the heart, so to speak.  CLEAR!!

“I will open the polls back up from Saturday 5/23/2015 at noon EST *sorry that is where I live so everything will be set by the Eastern Time Zone* to Sunday 5/24/2015 at noon. That will allow 24 hours for people to get their votes in on this year’s awards because I am not going to allow the “life-support death” to happen. You will be allowed to vote once in that 24 hour period. I have tweaked the polls already. Now I am not Gyllene who is able to make over 600 banners at a time (which she did last year singlehandedly) so I will figure out how I will get banners to this year’s winners promptly. Again,  the dates to remember are: May 23rd – May 24th,and May 29th!!  So the only thing I ask in conclusion please share this with as many as you can so that the notice is given to as many as possible.”

As the nice lady turns to leave the room, that beloved voice we all want to hear cuts across the room.

“Wait, I have something to say.”

In the resulting silence, the tall blond Viking steps up to the podium.

“Now that this has all been settled, I am making a request to each and every one of you. Whether you are a writer, a reader, or a stalker,” he pauses to look into the crowd, “Yes, Charissa, I know you are one of my stalkers,” he says to the lady as he looks straight at her to the delighted chuckles of the crowd.

Straightening up, he continues, “I want every one of you to go forward now and have a chat with your muses or look up your favorite writer and leave them a review that says Eric sent me to say that I love your stories, and I do. Find a new author to the fandom them and leave the same review. You have until the weekend is over. Bring this fandom back before we, the characters, fade into the nothingness of a lost fandom. Because, and I will say this only once: if the sparkly assed vampires win, I WILL NOT BE HAPPY. That is all you need to know.  Good night!”

The crowd disperses quickly.