goshikkuyosei

The Fuck You sampler hasn't sold after all.
The woman who bought it texted me to tell me all her bils had come in at once and she couldn't afford it.
What's really sucky is that I probably could have sold it during the exhibition if she hadn't already said she'd buy it.

I blame suttles

It's thursday morning and there's a big yellow bulldozer outside.
Should I be worried about Vogons?

Does anyone have a spare PC that they want to try Windows 7 on? I downloaded the release candidate, but my old PC's motherboard is too fried to make it work.

Mimic Spiders! They hide among us (as ants), to devour their prey (also ants). But it's only a matter of time before they master shapes like cats, dogs, and unsocial neighbors.

Upgrade Complete is a fun little flash game with an excellent upgrade system. The ending isn't that great, but you can buy an upgrade for that too.

Stellarium is a fun little program that makes me wish I knew more of astronomy. I should dust off that telescope in the basement. More likely is that I'll finally install some of those other stellar exploration programs.

I'm pretty impressed at this MacGyver'd radio build in a Japanese POW camp.

It was never my best idea to read the Eldritch Abominations article right before bed. Most surprising was the fact that all of the Ducktales cannon takes places within the dream of a massive octopus that lives in a sunken city. Even stranger: all Disney characters are elements of this undulating monstrosity's mind, from fear to heroism. So, next time you're watching Ducktales, remember that Unca Scrooge is in fact the manifestation of a Lovecraftian beastie's Greed.

Also, this thing. It's a sea angel. I pray that sky angels do not feed the same way.

Watching some Futu Resh Orts, or Future Shorts, or whatever. This one is like if Threadless Tee's came to life.


This was cute, even if the ending was a little unsettling. It's not so bad if you assume they are both mutes.


This trailer is way closer to the movie I want to see.


From the looks of this commercial, it looks like the TMNT 25th Anniversary movie is going to feature a crossover between the '88 and '03 series. Awesomely bizarre. I've also been making a bunch of posts about the old Archie TMNT comic (the one that got really dark) and the unpublished finale over at Scans Daily.

So since I started watching Battlestar Galactica a couple of months ago (or whenever) I've pretty much watched each disk the day I get it, or the next day at the outside.  But I've been sitting on the second disk of the fourth season for a few days now without watching it, and I probably won't watch it today.  Admittedly, I haven't been reading much recently either - most of my free time energy is going into writing.

( Spoilers Ahoy )

The A-Z of Awesomeness reminds me a lot of the book Animalia, only with more nerdy pop culture.

Three new dinosaurs found in Queensland, including "Australia's Velociraptor," a nifty beast named "Banjo."

Noir of the Week is a blog featuring just that, a feature on a new Noir film every week. It reminds me a little bit of the backmatter in Brubaker's Criminal, but far more frequent.

23 ways for a comic artists to survive and thrive in any economy is chock full of good advice. I'm not so sure about the "thriving" part, but "surviving" isn't bad either.

Kurt Busiek, of Astro City, Marvels, and a general "man on the street's superhero" man, now has his ownblog. He's been posting some fun things from the long ago indie past.

Mark Waid tells about the time he came closest to Misery, when he was invited by a couple of fans to a sign at a comic store. Only there was no store.

Colleen Doran's been blogging about her bad experiences with Very Bad Publishers. Worth reading for anyone who works freelance and doesn't want to get swindled, stalked, or sued. EDIT: Had to add in this bit:
"I’ll never forget the day she barked “All you care about is money!” at me. Actually, she did that a lot. Well, you care about money a good deal when you are drawing slash porn for your editor so you can get a sandwich. At least I don’t have to worry about them being used as blackmail material. Nowadays, yaoi art will get you a book contract."

Dr. Petra Boynton reports back from WCSJ event with 8 problems that scientific journalism faces.

NCBI ROFL is a blog that finds some of the absolute best of scientific journals. Like pieces on bellybutton lint.

This yacht looks like a cyber-whale from the future when Steve Jobs starts making iWhales. You know, for kids. The little interior pool is pretty sweet. It also just reminded me a little of the Portal gun.

Handy-dandy organization and optimization of heavy metal genres by Leonard Pierce. I must study some of these.

Here's a strange bit from an Ayn Rand interview where she talks about her favorite show: Charlie's Angels. Oddly enough, it makes perfect sense.

Did I mention how much I love Radiolab?

So, as the title may suggest, I have been participating in my college's end of year exhibition. This is not my last one of the course, since I'm a part-timer and have another year to go, I'm due to have another one to go.
I displayed my bunnies, my samplers, my angels and a couple of other things. It has gone well. One bunny was sold even before the exhibition was begun - a pink version of the purple and yellow one, first of the psychobunny series.
And on opening night? I SOLD SOMETHING ELSE.

( Remember this? )

It's been amazing fun watching people looking at the samplers and realising, belatedly, what the words are. I think when I make some more for next time - and there was loads of interest, so I definitely will - I'll call them 'Look Twice' instead of 'Subversive Samplers'.

The entire exhibition has been a riot, and there's been so many amazing things. Someone did a book of embroidered pages, like a garden notebook - I have to try that. There was also an interactive exhibit where you could customize a potato. I made mine into a flapper, with a feather boa and a garter belt.
Because it was fun.

So I finished reading the third book in the Sherwood Smith series I was talking about. Sometimes I feel like I should be drawing up a chart for all of the political houses and persons and relationships, but all in all I very much enjoy the characters.

Also, I ship people who think that punching each other in the face constitutes foreplay. "HE WAS STRESSED. SO I MADE HIM HIT ME. AND WE SCUFFLED. AND THEN HAD SEX." "..." ":D" ":/ ?"

Hey dudes, I have a question if anyone can answer. I miss writing stories and I want to start up again, but I was wondering how people start out writing short stories? I've written longer works but nothing that is really shortish and standalone. Like...are there techniques for starting out that you like to use or whatnot? I miss creating things.:)

So, if anyone has any ideas on how you start something like this, it'd be much appreciated. Thanks!

My mother is a Major in the United States Army, specifically the Nurse Corps. She is being deployed to the Middle East for a year come October. Why she is now somehow struck with the need to watch a movie about the funerals of soldiers who die in Iraq totally escapes me and also gives me a minor heart attack. I mean, damn it, woman. :/

Thankfully, my brother is a service mechanic in the Air Force, which means he doesn't really get deployed. Or gets sissy deployments.

Also, before this, we watched a movie about people getting blown up.

Mom cries when she watches Dumbo. And she likes it. I'm distressed at how upset Up made me.

I do realize that I've gotten bad at, more or less, being alive on the internet. This is down to a number of factors, including the fact that less semester (last academic year in general) stressed me to the point of well. Migraines a go-go, mostly, and off the cuff, froth-mouthed rants that my poor suite mates had to witness.

As far as the summer is concerned? Filling out Fulbright and Grad school applications, and studying to take the GRE. Ugh, math. Right now, other than Fulbright, the MA possibilities are centered around The University of Hawaii and Cornell University, with more research to be conducted on schools in Washington and Oregon.

Really gunning for either Hawaii or Japan, but. We'll see what we shall see! Going to get my MA in Asian Studies, and pursue, one hopes, either museum or translation work. Maybe I'll get certified to teach some other time, and once I have the free time and money...then I can think about getting my MA in English. Because I've been told my work is up to that level, and encouraged to continue my studies, but what does one do with an MA in English is the eternal question. And I love Asian Studies just as well, so!

Other things in my life:

1. I'm in Arizona visiting my brother, and it is just too damn hot here. I feel constantly tired and wrung out, like a Victorian lady having the vapors. Ugh. Sticky.

2. My lady love ever becomes more lovable.

3. The aforementioned and I are going to be using July as our own personal nanowrimo, in an attempt to get the first draft of our first...book, I suppose you'd call it, done. I'm already twenty six pages in, and it feels good.

4. I miss my kitties. ):

Like how summer-y my avatar isn't? haahaa

 

Item Information

You say:

I am worth: 58,781,856 Gold

Estimated with known marketplace values on 30 June 2009
(Including current gold amount of 2,389,422)
Exclusions: Oni Set, Oni Set, Oni Set, 2009 Gaia Anniversary Sash - 2004 Edition, All game items, Items in storage, Items in your house
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Its been a long time since I've checked my worth, Nov 2006 - I checked. ^__^  Back then I was only worth about 12 mill. Its amazing how much my items have gone up in value. o__0 I'm a bit shocked at how much my items are worth now. The scary part is, I'm not even rich on Gaia. I'm more like Gaia middle class. XD

DO NOT PRESS THE BIG RED BUTTON.

The Intersection of Race and Steampunk is a discussion that I'm surprised I haven't seen before. Although the Steampunk movement is "happy-go-lucky" compared to a great number of other memetic youth movements, it does still base itself around "let's dress up like 19th century imperialists." This offers several other lenses through which to view the subgenre, which is quite clever.

There's several new theories on dreams, but I kind of like the idea that they are evolved as a way to train for survival. It's an interesting idea, one that has a lot of story-writing potential.

Pictures from an abandoned brain laboratory. Who just abandons...brains?

Spheres!

I cannot believe it took us this long to get to awesome space station windows. Seriously.

13 yea-old kid trades his iPod for a Walkman. Makes biting observations that make me feel old.

Almost forgot about No More Kings.


That would be...Bollywood He-Man? Stole from Randy.


Remember those Cebu prisoners doing Thriller? Well, they were sad about last week.

Subject: loos'd her slender dress, theres little tom dacre, who cried when his head

Body: all alone, who may or may not catch
the morning ride, the noonday halt, she bowd over the weeping infant, and her life exhal'd


Subject: runs in blood down palace walls he wheels about burning

Body: and it grew both day and night,
why, well: you see--if the truth must appear-- and the angel told tom, if he'd be a good boy,

happy pride weekend.
don't party too much

(Walton, Anderson, Monette, Griffith, Valente, Singer)

CV: An extended meal can tell a lot about a culture. Sex likewise is an easy in for exposition.

JW: When world creating, think about who touches whom – when do people touch? Hug?

JS: How easy is import/export in your culture? What sort of trade is there?

TNH: Start with fuel to determine what kind of cooking is possible.

Audience Comment: Think about what the socially accepted drugs are.

Audience Comment: Also what euphemisms are used, and which words people will not say.

SM: Read lots of sex scenes, figure out what happens a lot, and don't do that!

JW: Often sex in books defaults to Western norms or is lifted wholesale from another culture.

I found this panel interesting because it covered one topic I've messed around with a fair bit in my writing, and two things I pretty much ignore. I get the point about food and fashion, but if one isn't especially interested in the subjects, it feels kind of forced. In terms of world building I'm more interested in history, trade, wars, politics, family and sexuality than I am about food and fashion. After the panel on family I made a point to look at each of my characters and their family, and see if I'd allowed their upbringing to influence who they are. I concluded that I've done a fairly decent job of that part, and of not assuming that all characters have the same family, or no family at all.

Likewise, sexuality is something I've been interested in as a jumping off point for fiction. I just reread the two stories I mentioned in the previous post on fan fiction. They need work. Oh boy do they need work. It's actually work I might want to do, though. Seven years later I still find the idea of gender very interesting, and I still struggle with pronouns while writing alternate gender characters. In the case of those short stories, I think the character would ultimately think of himself as a “he,” having been raised male, but I knew I couldn't do that for the androgynous race in “Light in the Groves.” The rough draft used “zie/hir” and the current draft “it.” I'm still not sure about that one.

Related to this, I usually have at least one homosexual or bisexual character in my stories.  Sometimes it feels kind of unimportant and unexamined, but that might be because I've usually run in circles in which there's usually a few people who are homosexual and it usually IS fairly unimportant.  I mean, if I'm hanging out in a bar, I'm not hanging out with my gay friend, I'm hanging out with my friend who, among other things, is gay.  A lot of times it just isn't all that important.  That's not to say that sexuality isn't important in building characters, just that it doesn't need to be the defining characteristic all the time.  There's a character in Light who's homosexual, but I'm not sure I'll ever actually say it because it just isn't pertinent to the immediate story.  It affects how I write the character, but I don't see that it's necessary for the reader to know, and it might just be distracting if I dropped it in.

It was this panel that went a half hour late and resulted in my missing the bus, leading to the angsty-ass "fail" post I wrote that night.  I said I wanted to write about why it wasn't really a fail so I guess here's a bit of it.  The thing is, I was exhausted at that point in the evening.  There really wasn't much I could do to avoid getting upset, because I was right on the edge after two days in a very stressful social situation and missing the bus just put me over the edge.  I decided that I should ask someone for a ride because otherwise I would have been being stupid or something.  The thing is, I should have recognized that I was already upset and just given myself permission to take the cab.

So the fail wasn't taking the cab, the fail was trying to force myself into being a person that I just couldn't be at that point.  It's good for me to push myself out of my comfort zone, but not when I'm already a wreck.  I'm an introvert.  I have a tough time walking up to strangers and introducing myself.  I like to spend many of my evenings alone.  And that's okay.  I can keep working on the things that need work while being happy with my life.

 (Notkin, Bujold, Gwin, Brown, Brust)

This was a highly entertaining panel. Lois McMasterson Bujold started the panel off by sharing a Star Trek FanZine she'd helped create in the 1960s or 70s, then telling a story about how she went through a period recently where the only thing she was reading was Lord of the Rings fan fiction. The moderator (Notkin I think) said that the discussion was not about the ethical aspects of fan fiction, which did help direct the conversation, although I thought that other discussion would have been interesting as well.

Either Gwin or Brown was a really awesome addition to the panel, as she was a medievalist who had studied the evolution of the Arthurian legends and how derivative fiction worked before modern copyright. I think that the overwhelming agreement on the panel was that, in general, modern copyright laws are overly constricting and that fan fic has a much worse reputation than it really deserves. Someone suggested a system where one could sell licenses to intellectual property that I thought was a really interesting idea, unfortunately I didn't write it down to I've forgotten what the jist of it was.

DN: Fan Fic used to mean fiction about fans, or original fiction written by fans. Fiction is only of the only fields with a distinct line (publication for pay) where you count as a professional.

The idea of writing fiction ABOUT fans is just really odd. Actually it's the idea of a fandom where everyone (or a good chunk of people) actually know each other is what's really odd. I suppose that reflects the transition from conventions being the backbone of fandom to it being primarily internet based. I wish I'd taken better notes during this discussion, because I know there was some talk about the internet.

LMB: Fan fic can be used to critique the canon, answer the interesting questions.

Audience Comment: In contrast to fan fic being disrespected, professional artists are expected to copy the masters in order to learn.

LMB: Fan fic can be a way to learn the craft, but only to a certain point.

Story time! The very first things I ever wrote, aside from random stories for school, were X-Men fan fiction (I can't believe those are still online - they're not quite as bad as I'd have thought, but yeah, I didn't know how to edit worth a damn back then), which I wrote through junior high and the first couple of years of college. I created an original character that was absolutely an author stand-in (though not quite, I hope, a Mary-Sue) and took the universe off in a direction that I thought made more sense than the comics were doing. Two of my favorite stories ("He's Unsure about Himself" and "A Tiger is a Tiger") were almost entirely original characters in that setting.  What amused me later on was that the direction I thought made sense (the school being a real school, with lots of students of different levels of ability rather than just the small X-Men Jr. teams the comics were doing at the time) was the direction the comics themselves ended up going in about a decade later. I laughed.  

I definitely recognize the point that there is only so much one can learn writing fan fic unless you consciously push yourself to fill in those gaps. You're starting off with a real boost, with the universe, characters, themes, even tone already in place. I enjoyed the challenge of creating characters within the universe, and in my reading tended towards the stories that improved upon the canon, filling in plot holes and such things. My favorite fan fic of all time was probably a series of novels by Minisinoo who I stopped following when she switched the Harry Potter (and good god, she's doing Twilight now? God I honestly would want to give it a try). She started with the X-Men movie universe and completely re-worked it until it was much, much better than it had been starting off.

The end of the discussion sort of deteriorated into various people sharing the names of the most bizarre or hilarious crossover fictions they knew. It was very funny, though grumpy Megan would generally have liked more conversation.

Another panel I liked a lot, almost entirely a “how to write well” lecture with very little audience participation. In this case, I was good with that.

(T. Nielsen Hayden, Monette, Bujold, Walton, Valente, Dean)

TNH: Difference between SFF and other genres is the expository burden of explaining the context in which the story exists. Historical fantasy has a similar burden.

JW: It's the glory, not the burden! As a reader, I have more tolerance for crappy SFF than that set in the modern world.

PP: Exposition is an infinitely flexible tool, which can be used for time, structure, and characterization.

SM: Good exposition is there only when the reader wants it. Bad exposition stops the story.

JW: It's okay just to straight up tell the reader things.

LMB: If it's not pertinent to the story at hand, leave it out.

TNH: A natural point for exposition is starting with where things have changed. Then people will naturally discuss both the past and the future.

ML: Good exposition is like a little kid who learned something new: I explain because I like you.

TNH: You don't want the reader to get into an argument with the writer because then the reader falls out of the story.

CV: Make it do double duty: don't just tell about the world, but also advance plot or character.

JW/LMJ: Why we have to write stories in order: because that way you don't screw up the exposition. You don't know what you're going to need in terms of explanations until you need it.

LMB: An exception being when there are multiple PoVs.

JW: The danger of a series is if you realize you need something earlier but you've already published that part of the story.

TNH: You have to sit down and figure out a lot about the world, then leave a lot of it out.

JW: Keep in mind that you have to be consistent with what your PoV knows.

JW: The Tiffany Problem: Tiffany is a 12^th century French/British name, but it's so associated with the 20^th century you can't use it in a historical/SFF story. When you know something that is correct but contradicts popular knowledge.

CV: The artistic life of the fantasy world is a fantastic way to explain about a world.

JW: All names are a great opportunity for exposition.

I really enjoy world-building (although some thing like language drive me bonkers), but figuring out how what to insert into a story and what to leave out is the real trick. As LMB said, you want to leave out everything that isn't pertinent to the story, but you still want to have a vivid world. CV's advice on making exposition serve double duty, especially to serve characterization, was the most useful for me.

I will also say that I could listen to Jo Walton read the phone book, because that woman has a fabulous voice and was generally deeply entertaining (and smart!).

Too many Cosbys. TOO MANY COSBYS. What have you wrought, Emmy and Nedroid? WHAT HAVE YOU WROUGHT!?!

Russian luxury yacht now offering passengers the chance to tag and bag their pirates. This seems like a terrible idea on so many levels. Mostly because it'll be rich Russians blasting the shit out of American fishing boats.

China's CCTV claims that "Google Porn" causes "memory loss, absent-mindedness". Seriously, China? That's your excuse to roll out web censorship software? Some of the comments here are choice.

Thailand painting elephands like panda. Pandaphants? As Gabe said, wouldn't you love to life someplace where elephants are so boring that they have to dress them up like pandas?

"Stoned Wallabies make crop circles." Best headline this year, or best headline ever? I have this sneaking suspicion that these circles were the result of wayward UFOs, but at this point the Area 51 brainwashing is some complete that the MIBs decided to have a little fun with the cover story.

Space shuttle research shows the 1908 Tunguska explosion was caused by a comet, which I will buy, IF by "comet" they mean "Tesla's death ray."

Holy spheres, Zubbles are actually coming out! I've been waiting for these since I first heard of them. I wrote a paper on the creator during my breif time as a business major. Mefi link here.

Happy Thursday? Seriously, This is a really rad Amnesty International ad.

A woman and her capybara, the interview. This actually makes me want to get a capybara a whole lot. It's like a giant hamster! And I'll name it Speak!

Killing the Enemy, and his Family too. Aggie sent me this. Should I be worried?

A grading of all 1980's Saxophone solos. I think the joke is that the highest ranking is a "B". LIES. There's one A.

How to Raise a Dragon is the latest in short artsy indie games. It's actually quite fun to make up your own narrative.

Alan Cumming in Spider-Man musical? Jawsome.

A friend of a friend has both Farah Fawcett and Michael Jackson in their celebrity deadpool. They won by default. Other links: Internet almost broke, Collection of videos, DJ retrospective mix (actually from last year), and an article from 1984 on what we'd think of him in 2009.

And now you know how tetris blocks are made.

TETRIS CF #1 from WooDUS on Vimeo.

Wine for the Confused is available on Hulu, but I can sum it up: John Cleese says drink what you wanna drink, don't be a tool.

MTV is finally streaming The MAXX. Hey remember when MTV took chances? Yeah.

I skipped the Children's & YA panel because I wrote up something at lunch on Saturday (which yes, I did eat alone, but as it was the only meal I ate alone I don't feel so bad). It's still on my AlphaSmart so I'll post it later.

(Meacham, Barnhill, Lingen, Notkin, Furr, Gordon)

Another panel that I really liked. This was more focused on what authors do wrong rather than what one can do right, and gave me a lot of ideas on ways to go with my writing and things to pay attention to. This panel also acknowledged the roots of fantasy literature in the fairy tale, which is a subject I find very interesting. I would have loved a panel tracing how mythology translated into fairy tale and then into fantasy. I think that might be more a college class, though.

BM: There has been a change in how fantasy addresses family. The fairy tale has the horrible family, more recently the focus has been on building one's own family.

DN: Fantasy has great potential to examine family structure.

ML: Is the “traditional family” a myth?

DN: The phrase “nuclear family” shows how recent that concept it.

ML: The default seems to be the blank slate regarding the family.

KB: Families are messy, so the blank slate is easier.

There was some interesting cultural stuff going on in this discussion. The panelists were making a real attempt to address the assumptions that are made in fiction, but were running into some of those assumptions that people make in life, such as assuming that one's own experience is the normal one, and not being clear enough what one means when they say “our culture” and that kind of thing. I know eventually one just has to try their best to be specific about what you're saying and hope that everyone listening knows that any assumptions are well intended.

Which leads into something else I was thinking about but wasn't mentioned in any of the panels, that being the Race Fail kerfuffle that blew up on various writers' blogs in January and February of this year over race in SFF. If I'm not mistaken the whole thing started on the LJ belonging to the writing partner of one of the Fourth Street panelists, and I think the part where it went from debate to flame war was when two of the fourth street panelists stepped in and tried to stick up for her.

The whole thing was a mess and probably a good example of how good intentions go bad on the internet, but it's also an interesting discussion. It did not come up, however. I mentioned this to someone on Sunday and they pointed out that pretty much everyone at the convention was white. Interestingly, about half the attendees were female, and the panelists were predominantly female. I'm not sure where I'm going with that, just thought it was interesting.