$100 haggle-free payment for a high-quality ChasexWuya fanart picture (for use in an upcoming fanfiction project, though you will be properly credited). $25 down, $25 upon completion of the final sketch, and $50 upon completion of the coloring. See me, if you're interested.

AIM: VexingHexes
email: vexing_hexes@gmail.com

I just finished the most freaking awesome book ever (well....excluding American Gods, as I don't think anything will ever come close to surpassing it in my Awesomeness List).

Ill Wind - Rachel Caine. If you enjoy the contemporary fantasy scene (and I very thoroughly do), do NOT pass this one up. Though, it is part of a series....so be sure you have the time to devote.

It's similar to Laurell K.'s Anita Blake stuff, but I personally think it's a lot better. Less nasty sex (but just enough to keep a girl happy), more juicy plot details. Brilliant and 100% pure wit. Our Protagonist had me cracking up, more than once. She's way spunkier than Anita. Way more.

In short, read it. I'll probably write a review later in the week. But no promises.

Status on the fanfiction project: coming along quite nicely. Daniel's doing the prologue art, and it looks fantastic. I've also roped him into an agreement to do at least one piece of artwork for each chapter. I've re-written most of the prologue, but it's still a bit choppy. Work in progress, of course. I'm kind of dreading the fresh start, with the brand new plot. I like this story much better, true, but I have Project Starting Anxiety. Starting is always the hardest part.

I'm warming up to writing prompts, lately. If you can find one with a smidgen of depth (instead of, you know, 'tarding out with something silly and bland), they can really help to get the juices flowing. I haven't held much faith in them until now. We'll see how this new relationship works out.

Aaand being that it's almost 3:30 in the morning, my happy little ass needs to find its way to bed. Have a peachy keen day.

Athiests these days are getting pushier and more annoying than their distant I'll-convert-you-if-it's-the-last-thing-I-do Christian cousins.

You religious/anti-religious fanatics make me sick.

There are better things to care about / devote your time to than criticizing the politics of other peoples' belief systems. And, you know, it takes a ridiculously pompous individual to presume to judge other peoples' religious beliefs (or lack thereof) anyway.

Think what you think. Discuss what you think. Believe what you will.

And to those who seem to get off on parading their doctrines around as if they're the only ones worth accepting....

Well, fuck you guys. Seriously.

Lack of inspiration, once again. Well...motivation is probably more accurate.

Here, I did a writing prompt that didn't suck. It actually had some substance....and I feel warmed up, rather than annoyed.


I ought to work on something worthwhile. Let's see if it happens.

I'm irritated.

And I'm trying to force myself into an angsty mood, for motivational purposes; my current project is angsty, and I'm feeling a sharp lack of inspiration.

With Daniel's help, I became the tattooed priestess earlier. Pictures will follow.

Tonight has been spent working on a rather risque XS fic.

It's slowly becoming an epic....

And consuming my thoughts, in a fashion similar to the internet's consumption of my time.

In fact, it could go something like this:

The internet:My time::This fanfiction project:My thoughts.

Looks correct.

Yeah, so I didn't go to bed. I'm going to fall asleep on my desk at work, more than likely. Gotta love that boring monotony.

Love. Loathe. w/e

Daniel is finally considering taking an apprenticeship with a tattoo artist. I've been trying to convince him to go for it for awhile now; as many sharpie-rendered tattoos he's given me, and as spectacular an artist he is, I think he'd do well. It's a trade to learn, just like anything else. He's got the artisanship down, so it's only the technical aspects he'd have to undertake. A willing student can learn anything.

Except, it seems, how to obey his wife when she demands he create Xiaolin Showdown fanart with his mad art skillz that she [being the visually artistic weaking that she is] does not possess.

I really should learn to do that whole art thing. But alas....I don't devote nearly as much time as I should to my literary pursuits. Imagine what meager attentions they'd receive if I got it in my head to become a visual artist. Hahaha. Lawd.

Time for work, I guess. I'm a slave to the grind.

I have to work tomorrow, at 8:45 am. And alas, it's 3:36...and I'm still awake.

Writing a fanfiction upon request, no less.

What a nerdzilla.

( My Interests Collage! )

A few of mine were screwed up a bit. But that's forgivable.

I have an unbecoming habit of sleeping all day and...randomly milling about all night. This morning [around 7-ish], I was feeling a bit under the weather. So naturally, I popped a few benedryl to help me sleep.

Aaaand they knocked me out for a solid 13 hours. Yes; I slept until about 8 pm.

When I ventured out of my cozy little arrangement to find out WHY Daniel hadn't woken me up when he got home [roughly 4 hours prior, if the scheduling were normal], I found him asleep in front of his computer.

We proceeded to Kroger, for such amenities as cat food, frozen french fries, jasmine rice, and Simply Asia instant lunches. Upon return, we argued a bit [a standard practice in this household, lately], fed the chainsaw [or cat, to the uninformed], and he wandered off to bed.

I went in there at 11, laid down and tried to sleep....and made my way back in here two hours later, after the effort had been exhausted. I've been productively spending this time reading Japanese fairytales, completing cryptograms, and printing buddhism resources for my sacred texts notebook.

Sounds like a blast, doesn't it?

This weekend, if scheduling of all parties permits, I'm dragging Daniel [and possibly Britt and my mom] to the Fort Worth botanical gardens. We've never been out there...but I came to the website the other day while looking for information on Japanese gardens, only to find that they've got an absolutely gorgeous one there. $5 for adults, if memory serves; half the cost of  the art museum. And since it's not part of downtown Fort Worth, it may even be a less painful drive than navigating the streets of downtown Dallas. According to mapquest, it's pretty much a straight shot down I-30. Though, it will be a pretty long drive. But oh well. It will be worth it.

Especially if I can nudge a little inspiration to the surface [for my Japanese historical fiction project, which really needs to be assigned a name already. Geez]. My inspiration, and subsequently motivation, are fleeting lately.

I hate being lazy and making up excuses all the time. But I'll get around to altering that. Later.

Currently playing: Primal.

Verdict: Kinda cool.

What the hell? Every time I type an apostrophe, Firefox brings up the "find on this page" window thingy. Is there no non-POS web browser out there?

I have a lead on a decent job, provided by a friend of a friend. I'm trying not to get my hopes up, since the last couple of good leads fell through...but it's happening, against my will. Things have just been so drab lately, with money being low and my job being ridiculously uneventful, so t's hard not to be hopeful about this opportunity. In any case, whatever will be will be, I guess. I'm trying to kick my worrisome tendencies. [The progress of such is debatable.]

Other than that, there's very little going on with me right now. I have a bio on Cicero that I need to finish reading, but have [somehow] gotten absorbed in genre fiction again. I'll probably go ahead and read the second book in that Dragon Below series before anything else [before I forget what happened in the first one, haha!]

The death of my laptop has REALLY put a damper on my writing, too. The plans I had for the 16th century Japan historical fiction project are mostly gone; if I hadn't printed out part of the summary in its beginning stages, then they would be completely gone. But the story has been muchly revised since that summary and all of the data I'd gathered over the past couple of weeks [.txt files, bookmarked webpages, et cetera] is gone, as well. In other words, I've got to start over from scratch, more or less. Which, when you have nagging commitment issues, is an intimidating prospect.

I think the primary reason it pisses me off so much is because I was seriously getting into that project. It's been awhile since I've had a project engross me so. And now? It's gone. It's hard not to take something like that personally, even knowing that it was just a fluke accident.

Oh well. Enough of my ranting, for now.

Tazo: you are my one and only true love.

I will never stray from your tealy goodness.

Book review time! I finished it yesterday afternoon, but lacked motivation to review it. So, here we go. Note: This review is spoiler free.

Title: The Binding Stone [The Dragon Below - Book 1]
Author: Don Bassingthwaite
Genre: Fantasy
Publication Date: August 2005
Publisher: Wizards of the Coast [Eberron series]

Synopsis (from back):
In Eberron, there are terrors older than the nations of men.

A chance rescue brings bitter rivals together. With a mysterious ally, the two warriors embark on a mission of vengeance, but the enemy waiting for them in the depths of the Shadow Marches is far more sinister than any they've faced before.

In the dark places of the wild, the secrets of the dragon below are better left undisturbed.

Synopsis (mine):
Two warriors, who share a convoluted history, are forced into a partnership when a woman of dubious origin causes an attack on a nearby city . Conflict ensues for the trio, all at the hands of a mysterious congregation known as the "Bonetree" Hunters. The fight for survival grows ever more intense as their enemies grow in number. At the heart of it all: a magical crystal that houses a powerful spirit, and the beautiful woman who carries it.

Story/Concept:
Bassingthwaite has a lot of innovative ideas in this one; he really shakes up the standard fantasy novel formula with an array of creative details and a set of entertaining characters. The world of Eberron is a complex one, and this book presents its quirks very effectively.  I didn't always find the character personalities consistent from one point to the next, but the overall characterization is good and the inconsistency isn't too distracting. The characters interact well with each other, the relationships growing and changing over the course of the story. In fact, I think my biggest qualm with the story relates to its campyness; even the dark scenes have a lighthearted air to them. Still, I couldn't put it down. Minimal flaws in this department. 8.5

Quality of writing:
Unfortunately, this novel fell into the namedropping trap. Anytime a character speaks to another, they use that character's name. "What do you think, Tiff?" "Well Tiff, I don't know." "Hrm. Tiff, why don't you know?" It's not uncommon, but I find it distracting and unrealistic. It gives the dialogue a cardboard quality. The editing isn't so great, either. Midway through, I was seriously half-tempted to whip out my trusty blue highligter and get to work. In a couple of frustrating instances, the wrong character's name is used (which was only evident to me after a little good, old-fashioned *re-read...."what?"*-ing). But on the other hand, there are some impressive descriptive passages as well. In a nutshell: the writing is good overall, but the dialogue is definitely not up to par. 6


Depth/Believability:
I addressed the believability briefly in the first two sections. For the most part, this book is pretty reliant on the power of coincidence. Which, to be fair, is not necessarily a negative quality....depending on how the writer handles it. Although I've read books that were much worse about the campy, coincidental aspects, I also think it could have been handled more effectively in this one. As for depth; well, there isn't much. The type of story (heavily plot-based) didn't really permit it, and so I'm letting it slide. I do, however, hope to find more character exploration in the two future installments. 5.5

Re-read value:
The scoring here is tentative, since this is part of a trilogy. I may not want to read it again once the whole thing reaches its conclusion. But for right now, I'd say the re-read value is pretty good. In spite of the editing issues and the campyness, I enjoyed this book. 8

Tilt:
Worth reading, but flawed. If you're easily irritated by unrealistic dialogue, then stay away. If you can handle unrealistic dialogue and are looking for something that breaks the mold a bit, then this book will do you well. 9

FINAL SCORE: 37 (out of 50).

Now I think I'm going to go take a nap. Haha....at 10:30 am.

Stupid sleep. If I weren't exhausted, I'd be getting things accomplished. But nooo....

[insert further grumbling]

Another analyzation of my....overall psyche, as of late. Nothing new. But it's possible that I've made some progress this time. We solitary creatures prefer to transcribe our mental turmoil in black and white. Thus.

So the lapse into discontent [this time] arrived at my door after viewing some tidbits of writing from back in the day. [Note 1: "Back in the day" = early 2004. Note 2: These tidbits have been long forgotten. They're occupying space in a machine that was virtually worthless when I bought it from the manager at Bell's for $20, and is even more worthless now that Windows 98 has become virtually extinct. This is, also, excluding the small fact that the cd rom drive doesn't function, and never has.]

The profundity behind my own words staggered me a bit, I'm amazed to say. I definitely have a tendency to forget what I write [and read. Hence, I am able to enjoy the same book many many times over. Hooray memory. You know, Buddhists hold the concept of good memory in high regard. Mine's not up to par, so far.] But this? I can't think of how to articulately convey the fact that what I read was insanely awesome....and I can't believe that I ever wrote it. Conversely, I also can't believe that I ever stopped writing in the first place.

Which led to the inevitable question: why DID I stop writing in the first place?

Which led to the inevitable answer to the inevitable question: I have no idea.

Which led to a somewhat non-inevitable follow-up question: why don't I have any idea?

Which, as things currently stand, I've yet to answer.

It became worthy to me, at that time, to note the fact that I remember very little about that stage of my life. Or, for that matter, much of my life up until this point. I seem to live in an endless cycle of LIVE and FORGET, every aspect of my being undergoing constant metamorphosis. I'm not the same person I was 2 years ago. Which is understandable. But upon reflection, I don't feel like I'm the same person from one week to the next, either.

In other words, I'm realizing that this whole essence of instability is nothing new. In fact, I think the problem [read: the absolute, divine, primary problem] in this whole grand equation is that stability is being forced upon me. It's telling that my most productive times were marked by the ability to enjoy my instability, to thrive in the wavering of factors that surrounded me [not that I always enjoyed it at the time. My adolescence was marked by periods of ragged depression, very often]. And now that my life has reached a point where I'm supposed to be "settling down" [a result of circumstances and not age, mind you], I'm having a hard time coming to terms with it. 

I think my need for instability is what has caused my marriage to deteriorate. I think the unconventionality, and the faceless aspect of having an online relationship is what kept us together in the first place. And now that those factors have been altered, and we've been steeped in the reality of the routine, our natures are clashing against each other. He wants things to be the same forever. I don't. I have commitment issues, and everyone knows it. Do I ever finish anything I start? Aside from high school, not really. Books, games, writing projects, relationships, hobbies, diets, subjects of interest....everything I indulge in is marked by the fact that it's a fleeting pleasure. 

I'm defined by my transience; here one minute, gone the next. This is the conclusion that I've arrived at.

Here we are at the climax of the presentation. Are you ready?

So?

To be quite honest, I don't know. I'm still digesting so much of these revelations, I'm not sure how I feel about them. It's strange sometimes. Self-discovery, I mean. You're always left with an "I don't understand. Why did I never realize any of this before?" feeling when you come to a conclusion about the politics of yourself. I am, at least.

The punchline of it all is that I still don't know where to go from here. 

I want back the life of a changeling. I want out of this binding contract called a marriage. I want out of this binding contract called a lease. I want away from this vile, routine creature called Garden Ridge. I want to change my hair color again. I want to change my name. I want to forsake my havens and adopt new ones; new friends and enemies alike, new personalities with which I can jive and clash, waltz and war. I want to change my email address. I want to change my screen name. I want to change it all. But it's not because I don't like what I have.

The need for instability is, apparently, just a part of my mechanics.

I slept almost all day today, and I'm still tired....

Look what I found, browsing around the net for Keiji x Okuni fanfics:

http://www.godawful.net/index.htm

A site dedicated to "reviewing" bad fanfics.

Since, you know, writing a fanfiction is akin to proclaiming yourself a 5-star author.

And I'm not sure that these "review" writers have any business throwing stones; ill-nature, unoriginality, and redundancy being showcased as if they're synonymous with "wit"? That's a literary felony in itself, my friends. Their reviews are about as witty (and likewise as entertaining) as a broken lamp.

As for their tactical approach to criticism? Pointing out grammatical flaws in an unpublished piece of writing (which was, more than likely, written by an 11-14 year old kid) is hardly earth-shattering. For their sakes, I hope that this logical methodology doesn't extend into their off-the-internet lives, as well; I wouldn't take too kindly to an individual who felt the need to extend unwanted commentary toward every "y'all" I might happen to speak.

Hmm.

Alas, in spite of it all, I do hope someone gave them a cookie. There'd be no justice, otherwise.

Hrm, well...I've been trying to free myself from bad karma lately.

And for the record, it's been a pain in the ass.

.__.

I've gotten essentially nothing accomplished in the past two days. A little disheartening, when you consider the fact that I made "getting things accomplished" the absolute only entry on my To Do List.

Maybe my expectations were a tad too broad? =|

Oh well.

In other news, my amazon.com wishlist is steadily growing larger...aaaand my search for a bearable job with a reasonable payscale has yielded no results.

Seriously, this moneyless youth is riding on my last nerve. Not that I'm some kind of greedy little bitch or something; but being that I'm not an idiot, you'd think the job market would be a little kinder.

Granted, I do need to get my happy ass into college....but I currently lack motivation. I'm sure I'll be there within the next two years. Or maybe not. Who cares?

Meh, I won't start on that tangent. No one wants to hear it, including me.

Xiaolin Showdown is coming out on dvd! Paint me a shade of OMG YAY! =D

Well, I'm departing. Vivi, who is sleeping on my chest with her head perfectly positioned to block the computer screen, evidently wants me to get off of this machine. Cats do reputedly have a sixth sense, so I think I'm going to obey.