The Soap Box

My FFXIII has arrived!!!!!!!!!!!!
Pardon me while I become even more of a recluse for who-knows-how-long as I immerse myself in the world of Final Fantasy XIII.

Ah, it's good to be a Japanese.

Current Mood: woo-hoo!

Happy Birthday!
I believe it's already the 13th over there, so happy birthday,

kye_kestrel !!! I'll e-mail you later.

Saying " hi," I suppose. Oh, & live GLAY.
Wireless hasn't been working at home so I've been even less frequently online than usual. Using phone to go online royal pain in ass, and typing is even worse Since I can't tolerate typos...

Just wanted to explain lack of comments to people I normally would to, and also wanted to share something kinda cool - went to see Glay perform @ the Fillmore earlier this week. Was interesting experience seeing Japanese group perform.

Current Mood: hot

Life goes on
Funeral one weekend, wedding the next. Proof that life goes on, whether we want it to or not. No matter how significant we think we are, life can go on without us.

...Not sure whether I'm depressed or reassured.

But I suppose that with 2012 coming, there might actually not be a guarantee that life goes on...?

Current Mood: pensive

following directions...
If there is one person or more on your friends list who makes your world a better place just because they exist, and who you would not have met (in real life or not) without the Internet, then post this same sentence in your journal.

this so utterly sucks
So the other day, I tried to sit and focus on Hunt, but... man, I just couldn't do it. I just can't find the motivation. I'm beginning to seriously fear that I won't be able to finish it. Maybe I just need to "feel the love" again. If anyone knows some good HxH fics that feature Kurapika, please let me know.

Completely unrelated, I'm currently watching "Man vs. Food" as I type, and there's a chef slicing bull testicles. Yes, you read that right. The guy's chopping balls.

Oh, joy.

Current Mood: foggy

thanks to anonymous reviews, and new obsession
I just wanted to take a moment now to thank the recent anonymous reviews I'd received for Hunt. Hopefully each of you will see this.

Also, I've been dragged into yet another world courtesy of

kye_kestrel and a few real world friends. Took a few weeks, but I've made it all the way to current (both manga and anime) episodes of Bleach. And, I must say, holy crap, what a ridiculously high percentage of hotness and hunky maleness! I've always had a thing for the haori-hakama look, and I love the whole sword-fighting thing, so, yeah, what's there not to love? I'm madly in love with Ichigo (what an awesome big bro!), Renji (that hair and those tattoos!), and Toushirou (I like little geniuses); I'm totally delighted by Urahara (if you read Japanese, the way he talks is awesome) and Kyouraku (he's just hilarious); I'm intrigued by the creepy hotness that is Gin; and while not a major presence, Hisagi is all hotness, too (I think I have a thing for tattoos).

And, as with every manga/anime I've gotten into, damnit, the English translations don't do any justice to the original writing, so it's really a shame not everyone understands Japanese. Some of the translations (and not just Bleach) that I've seen not only lose nuances, but are completely mistaken and change the meaning completely! Ugh. One of my major pet peeves...

Anyway, should stop before this becomes a full-blown rant. Maybe I'll go groom one of the cats...

Current Mood: sick

stupid! stupid! stupid!
I just re-posted chapters 5 and 6 of Hunt due to a few minor errors I found. Not grammatical errors... So, yeah, they HAD to be fixed. Can't believe I'd missed them when writing, but now I'm going to go over the remaining chapters with a fine-toothed comb.

Man, I hope I hadn't left any other inconsistencies.

...So glad I'm able to do this. I can just imagine my absolute horror if Hunt was actually published in book form and I'd found the errors after it was too late... But then, I suppose there'd be a professional editor with the comb in that case, actually getting paid to find the stupid things authors accidentally do.

Anyway... I'm rather annoyed with myself at the moment.

Current Mood: annoyed

I HAVE UPDATED, DAMNIT!!!
And, yes, it deserves all-caps, with how it'd been like pulling teeth. DAMN YOU, TOGASHI (yes, that deserves all-caps, too)! But I told myself that enough was enough - just stop stalling, commit, and write the damned thing.

Anyway, here be the link to chapter 14 for The Hunt for the Intangible. www.fanfiction.net/s/2024480/14/Hunt_for_the_Intangible

Current Mood: accomplished

Check out the mood icon
Wow, I didn't think I'd ever select the "happy" kitty. Especially since I've had my typical day-long headache thanks to the gross air out there, and the man had put me in a not-so-good mood earlier this evening. But, I just got today's mail, and in it was a package from

kye_kestrel ! She sent me some cool jewelry and a cute little Moleskin in a great color (red!), and I think they're all totally awesome (ugh, do I sound like a teeny bopper?). But what had me really smiling was the lovely letter she sent me. She always writes me the best letters that make me feel great, even after a day of feeling crummy.

People shouldn't rely entirely on the Internet. A real, handwritten letter is a wonderful (if dying) art form.

Thank you,

kye_kestrel ! Absolutely love ya!!!

Current Mood: happy

y'all are killing the planet and me
I have been miserable with allergies this week. Even more so than usual, I mean. I was thinking that maybe it was due to the unseasonable warmth causing things to bloom, and that's why I've been sniffling and sneezing and dribbling like a waterfall. However, today being a Saturday, I'm actually home and looking out the window at our view (we're situated up on a hill, allowing us to normally see for tens of miles), I see what the real cause is. Yes, it is probably related to the warmth (although I'm not too familiar with such things), but it's not pollen - it's SMOG!

No exaggeration - the air is heavy and brownish-grey out there!!! It's settled thickly over the cities below us, and I can't see across the Bay at all.

Actually, I can't really see the water right now, either.

I'm really sensitive to things in the air (I once got sick passing through the heavily industrial area near the Yokohama port), so, yeah, if the air has been like this all week, then I would of course be miserable, even working indoors...

Ugh. What are we doing the the planet?

Finally got that side fic posted
The one I'd said I'd write awhile back, to commemorate the 200th review for Hunt for the Intangible. As "promised," it's about Nobunaga in a gardening shop. I love torturing Nobunaga. He's really not that bad a guy. ...Well, except for the guiltless killing thing, none of the Genei Ryodan are really that bad...

Anyway, it's up on my ff.net, but here it be, too.

( Flowers For...? )



    It's been awhile since I've written a whole story focused on humor, and it's really not my cup of tea since I generally prefer to just drop hints of it here and there, but, well, enjoy anyway.
    And whadaya know? You can teach an old dog new tricks. I think I might have a minutely better understanding of this lj cut thing now. This one, at least, shouldn't look as messy as the last (but I don't think I'm motivated enough to go back and fix my last entry).
    Oh, and I'm currently losing time to PS3's "Little Big Planet." It's absolutely brilliant!

GW fic up!
Well, I finally got around to finishing another of my simmering-unfinished-on-the-back-burner fics. It's a GW fic, which I'd like to dedicate to Sunhawk, the one who got me into the GW world with her wonderful fics.

Anyway, not my best work, but I just wanted it finished once and for all, so here is ( Of Secrets and Resolve )

It's also up on my fanfiction.net account. I'm seriously not a computer person, so there might be some formatting issues here, and if that's the case, read it at ff.net instead.

{edit} Oh, holy hell, it does look a serious mess. Yeah, just go read it at ff.net instead.

Current Mood: uncertain

Dude, where the hell's Kurapika?
I have been neglecting Hunt for the Intangible, largely because my interest in HxH is rather low these days with the damned, never-ending Chimera ant episode. Come on, Togashi, I need a serious dose of Kurapika. When is he coming back?

So, instead of thinking about and working on Hunt, I've been cranking out a FFVII fic in the spirit of the writing of Yuugou Hakusho (you know, the okay-I-really-need-to-get-a-few-things-explained-in-my-head reason for writing of fic -- see my ff profile for details). I've already got more pages cranked out than I have for Hunt combined, but I can't justify posting anything yet since unlike with Hunt, I don't quite have a destination hashed completely out. Or, rather, I know several ways I might want to end it, but the path immediately before the conclusion is actually still more like a fall into a chasm... Plus, I'm still not sure I want to start the way I did. Ugh, indecision, indecision... but I don't want to release a first chapter with "facts" that I might later want to change.

So, yeah, anyway, that's what the Mistress is up to these days.

Current Mood: ennui
Current Music: the neighbor's damned annoying yapping dog

Indy's alien is actually Jenova
Did anyone else think that crystal alien was like Jenova? I mean, multiple skeletons all coming back together when the final missing head was returned? Sound like Reunion?

Current Mood: drained

people suck
I have been having a really shitty week. All because some people are self-righteous, narrow-minded, delusional bitches. Absolutely shitty week - had me close to tears.

Man, this year has really been crappy, now that I'm to reflecting on it. And it's only April!!! Don't know if I'll survive the rest of the year...

Current Mood: pissed off

countdown to 200
Wow, so it looks like I'm coming up on 200 reviews for Hunt for the Intangible. Rather amazing. So I decided I should probably commemorate this in some way. I first thought of writing a side fic once it hits 200, but then I thought it might be fun (and less work for me in my perpetually busy state) to include the 200th reviewer in the fic. You know, as the name of a minor (very minor, mind you!) character. Of course, that would mean that the reviewer would actually have to leave a usable name, not a bunch of letters or numbers or "anonymous." Though I guess I could call the character "Nonny" if the last were the case.

Anyway, what think you? Character name? Side fic? Or a combo of both?

...of course, choosing one of the latter two means that the cows will probably come home before I get to the writing of it...

Current Mood: lethargic

Rats! (and it's the Year of the Rat, isn't it)
For no reason other then to see the date "immortalized," I'd intended to make a journal entry last Friday. Yeah, on February 29. Completely forgot to actually do it, though. Rats, would've been cool to see the date attached to an entry, since it's not coming around again for another 4 years...

I knew a guy in college who was born on that day, and we celebrated his "5th" birthday there with a party. Complete with gag gifts of toys for children "age 5 and up."

The whole extra day thing is rather annoying, though. Yes, we want to be in harmony with the solar year, but then, why not adjust the actual year, instead of adding a day every four years. This means that we are really only "synchronous" one day every four years. The remaining 1460 days, we are just a bit skewed.

...That might explain why humans are so crazy.

Of course, times and days are all just arbitrary designations made by us crazy humans, so it really is, in the grand scheme of things, irrelevant.

Current Mood: contemplative

Chapter 13 is up
I was surprisingly productive this week, cranking out a chapter in a few days. From scratch. Way long ago (woah, 3 1/2 years ago!), I had hashed out and cranked out a large part of Hunt for the Intangible, so for the past few chapters, I had mostly been editing and adding to chapter bits that I'd written initially. But chapter 13 is brand spankin' new, folks, because as I'd been saying, the characters had kinda changed the direction my fic was going. Now, let's just see if I can still get to that conclusion that I'd already written way back when.

With this chapter, Hunt has finally hit the 50,000 word mark. No wonder I can't seem to ever "win" during Nanowrimo - Hunt took me years to hit the required word count !

So, here it be. Chapter 13.

Oh, and Happy Valentine's Day, and all that jazz. On this day in in 1929, mobsters killed mobsters in a flower shop.

Current Mood: cynical

Expected, but no less painful
The last remaining family dog had to be put down yesterday. I'd been expecting it, because he was no longer able to function on his own at all. He couldn't walk without assistance (and hadn't been able to for months), was unable to get up to use the bathroom and had to be wiped clean, and had finally stopped eating this past weekend. Yes, I'd been expecting it, but that doesn't mean it doesn't hurt. I spent most of last night in tears and was reminded again of the horrible truth of having pets - you will almost inevitably outlive them all and have to deal with the pain of their deaths that come too soon.

I kept assaulting my cats with hugs and kisses last night, and they were very cooperative, quite possibly sensing my mood (as they are such brilliant cats).

Current Mood: depressed

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