Wednesday, June 21, 2006

  Sorry I haven’t submitted my original pic of Mahoro yet (check out the previous post if you haven’t already). I’ll be submitting it either later today or tomorrow. =D

I got my summer-reading the other day. >=( Ugh, stupid crap has always gotta’ ruin my summer. And I was under the impression that we wouldn’t have any this year! They didn’t tell us anything in school!
Meh, anyway, the two books are absolute monsters. First up is “The Things They Carried” by Tim O’Brien, a first hand account of a soldier’s experience in Vietnam. So, I might just enjoy that one.
Second one is “Catch-22”, a book about Lord knows what. This one’s even bigger than the first one! ToT
There’s no way I’ll be able to read both of these this summer without going insane. But I guess it’s just as well, because I really wasn’t planning to. If I’ve learned anything in my first 2 years of high school, it’s that summer-reading doesn’t matter. They give you one flimsy test at the beginning of the year, and then they have to start with that year’s in-class reading. I’m not gonna’ bust my ass reading these two giants for nothing, that’s for sure.
Anybody else read either of these 2 books?

Oh, something I forgot to mention on my previous post was that I went to Barne’s & Noble’s solo on Monday afternoon.
Not much happened there, and for the most part I didn’t really get much reading done (lousy B&N’s and their crap-tacular stock updates….). However, about halfway through my stay there, I found and started reading the most hilarious book I’ve read in a long while. Interestingly enough, it was a book I heard mentioned by several of my Sci-Vis classmates on our last day of class a week or so ago.
Tell me, have any of you heard about this recently released book called “The Alphabet of Manliness”? As you could guess by the title, it was friggen’ hilarious. =D
Seriously folks, I was stifling my laughter trying to get folks to stop staring at me as I read through it.
“The Alphabet of Manliness” is a satirical work; a book with illustrated diagrams and comments on the various elements of manliness, ordered alphabetically. Naturally, it was a pretty dirty read (“A is for Ass-kicking, B is for Boners, C is for Chick-fight, D is for Taking a Dump”, etc.).
The author is apparently a guy named “Maddox”. Has anybody here heard of him? All I know is that he wears a black barrette and a goatee, and that’s about it. Any information on this celebrity would be greatly appreciated.
And since some of you have probably heard of this book, let me just say that you shouldn’t be offended. Sure, taken word for word the book would be a sexist, ignorant piece of trash; but the author doesn’t mean a word of it. If he did, than he’d be homeless, jobless, carless, wifeless, as well as murdered by now. He writes what he writes because it’s funny, not ‘cause it’s true, and the ignorance is part of the humor. It’d be ridiculous to assume the book is a statement of any kind, so don’t let illusions of a political agenda scare you away. =P
Anywho, I highly suggest checking it out if you need some stupid humor to brighten your day, though I’m not sure how many of you ladies might like it; not because I fear you might take it seriously, but because you really couldn’t relate to a lot of it (half to humor is that some of the things he writes about has us guys going “Yeah, I had an experience like that”).

Here’s today’s Art-Feature:
“Valentine’s Day Commission” by Ivynajs:


Some of you may remember IJS from when I featured another piece of her work; “April: Kirby’s Birthday Party”, back on the Friday before last (the night I was studying for my Chemistry & Spanish Exams).
Well, I recently went back and dug a little deeper into her gallery, and to put it rather bluntly….she’s a twisted mother-fucker. Let’s leave it at that.
I’m a part of an art community, so naturally I’ve encountered tons of twisted mother-fuckers in my experience, just as I’m sure you all have. But honestly, out of all of them, this woman might be the most twisted mother-fucker I’ve ever met. Never would have guessed it by looking at these two pieces I’ve shown you, ne?
Of course, it’s a pretty close race between her and some of the other “Artists” I’ve met, so it’s hard to judge who the absolute worst is (perhaps we need some sort of “Twisted Mother-Fucker Comparison Challenge” to figure this out….).
It’s a shame too, because she’s extremely talented. In addition to that, I’m a fan of Kirby, so it was particularly ball-wrenching for me to have seen the kind of stuff she does.

However, twisted mother-fuckers aside, this is an extremely cute and well done piece.
Being a Valentine’s pic (duh =P ), this piece is heavy on the cute-factor, and portrays a joking and innocent event of mild romance.
For those who don’t know, the fairy on the left is Ribbon; a native resident of the planet Ripple Star. Ribbon became friends with Kirby when he helped her recover and save the fragments of the Magic Crystal from the invading Dark Matter, who’d use its power to become unstoppable (this all occurred in the game Kirby 64: The Crystal Shards).
Since that adventure, Ribbon’s developed a light crush on our pink and bouncy hero (don’t ask how Kirby of all characters could be involved in romance, being unable to talk and barely able to think. It’s just a cute puppy kind of crush). Here the artist portrays a scene pertaining to that crush, as well as a comparison between Ribbon and Kirby’s thinking-capacity and interest level. XD
For Kirby artwork vibrant colors are a must, and the artist took advantage of that aspect.
The background color was chosen perfectly as to contrast with Ribbon & Kirby’s color-schemes (Pinks, reds, etc.). This makes Ribbon & Kirby look bolder and stand-out from the background. Doing so makes the purple background look just as it should, which is like….well, a background.
The main figures, as well as the less detailed figures illustrating each thought-cloud are both immensely cute, as is another necessity for Kirby artwork. Realistic romance aside, you’ve gotta’ have ice-water in your veins if that chibi illustration of Kirby giving Ribbon a *chu!* doesn’t make you go “Awwwwwwwwww….<3”.
Of course, Kirby doesn’t yet comprehend such actions, and by his thought-cloud you can obviously tell what he’s interested in. XD
Kirby’s face is OK, but the look on Ribbon’s face is far more expressive and detailed. Plus, Ribbon’s tiny stature doesn’t make it easy to draw an authentic expression on her face without it looking goofy.

Cute beyond cute, this piece has earned the honored spot of being placed in my screen-saver, and hopefully it’ll be placed in your slide-show, too! ;D
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