Wednesday, March 14, 2007

Vaca!!!

Well, I’m on Spring Break this week. Wooh! I’ve been relaxing and doing some stuff that I’ve been meaning to do for a while. Also, I’ve started watching Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle again from the beginning. That show always makes be giggle. Plus, it has absolutely fabulous music. When I first started watching the series, I ran out and bought the 2 CDs that were out at the time right away. I love them *squeal* I especially enjoy the fact that the character themes are actual character themes. Some anime claim that certain songs are character themes but they don’t actually play them during important moments for that character in the show. Tsubasa is the opposite. You have to figure out the themes for yourself by watching the show. It’s not that hard ^_^ I love the themes for Fai and Kurogane because they fit so well. Fai’s is very light, airy and somewhat suspicious, perfect for the character’s happy, wily, and shady personality. Kurogane’s always makes me think of Pirates of the Caribbean, which is great, because that character immediately reminded me of a surly pirate ^_^ (even though he’s really a ninja/samurai/whatever). All in all, I love Tsubasa! Yay for vacations! See! Wily magician… And… someone else thought he should be a pirate, too ^_^ -Quotation of the Day- “...They are the species known of as the "Red-Neck Hunter". They, along with their cousin species, the "Hick Hunter", obtain special licenses in order to merrily scamper through the forests shooting animate things with guns and bows respectively. These species' are quite fascinating, but beware, for if you spend too much time studing them and learning their culture, you may find yourself becoming addicted to such ethnic dishes as venison chili, wild turkey, and rabbit stew, as well as spending inordinate amounts of time at shooting ranges.” -Me-

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Saturday, March 3, 2007

Tra La La...

Time for the very scattered and unpredictable roboartemis update! In recent anime news, I’ve gotten into Trinity Blood via Cartoon Network and the Internet, since I am an increasingly poor college student who doesn’t have time to actively hunt out obscure new series’ right now. I have come to the decision that I like the manga art better than the anime art, because everyone is too… I guess angular is the word I’m looking for. Anyway, good stuff, for all that it’s very similar to Trigun in many respects (you know, biblical references, evil brothers, lost technology, goofy yet dangerous heros, etc.) On the Naruto front, I am very pleased with the debut of the Naruto Shippuden series, although I kind of wish that they had animated the Kakashi Gaiden storyline, too T_T I’m sure it will come in time. Possibly when the new series needs some filler. In manga news, I nearly died with joy when I read the news update stating that the Spiral: Suiri no Kizuna manga is finally going to be published in English. My background picture is pleased. I can’t wait! I want my funny, angsty, mysterious story NOW! *sigh* Oh well. I guess I’ll just have to wait. -Quotations of the Day- (yes, you all get a bunch this time ^_^) Carter: "I went back to check some of my own personal files, and they'd been classified. These are my files!" Blake: *jokingly* "It's not my fault that there are things about yourself that you're just not cleared to know." Carter: "Yeah, I'd hate to stumble across something that if I told me I'd have to kill me." -Eureka- Carter: "I figured it all out, I know what you're up to." Jason: "In regards to?" Carter: "I know you have a device that can create a worm hole or, ah, bend time or make you invisible, a worm-holing-time-bending-invisibling device that shields you from the mind." Stark: "Yes, he said 'invisibling.'" -Eureka- (ah, I love this show ^_^) “It seems strange,” said he, as he watched the Tin Woodman work, “that my left leg should be the most elegant and substantial part of me.” “That proves you are unusual,” returned the Scarecrow, “and I am convinced that the only people worthy of consideration in this world are the unusual ones. For the common folks are like the leaves of a tree, and live and die unnoticed.” -The Marvelous Land of Oz by L. Frank Baum-

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Tuesday, February 20, 2007

   Manic Tuesday

Happy Day After President's Day! Here's a treat ^_^ Gotta love the 90's

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Sunday, February 4, 2007

A Fowl Post

Alright, it’s time for another one of roboartemis’s literary gushes. I ran to the library today and checked out Artemis Fowl: The Lost Colony, the 5th book in the Artemis Fowl series by Eoin (pronounced “Owen”) Colfer. Colfer is an excellent author of suspenseful, thrilling fantasy, so obviously he’s not American ^_^ (in fact, he’s Irish). For those of you unfamiliar with the series, it follows the various schemes and adventures of Artemis Fowl II, a genius criminal mastermind of the extremely rich persuasion. Oh, and he’s only 12 years old (at the beginning of the series anyway). In the first novel, we enter the universe of this series in the opening stages of what is to become Artemis’s first of many magical capers. With a mind set that only a child could posses, he decides to help boost the family fortunes by stealing gold from fairies. Of course, fairies are not exactly the traditional folk of European legend. They (dwarfs, sprites, pixies, centaurs, folk-lore style elves, etc) live in a society full of highly advanced technology that allows them to stay hidden from humankind, who drove them underground ten thousand years ago. Most fairy races do, however, possess magic as well. One of the greatest parts of this series is Colfer’s liberal doses of humor and puns. For example, the fairy police force is called the Lower Elements Police, or LEP for short, and one of the main characters is a member of the LEPrecon squad (she also makes mention of how the squad uniforms several hundred years ago used to involve green knickerbockers ^_^). And there is a fairy psychologist by the name of Dr. J. Argon (double ^_^). The books are also sprinkled with delightful one-liners. Very giggle-worthy. And of course, you can’t help but root for the arrogant and apparently almost amoral anti-hero Artemis (although that fact that he shares the name of my favorite Greek goddess probably has something to do with it ^_^). As enjoyable, and probably vindicated, as the fairy characters are, their condescending view of humanity makes you want them to suffer from a proverbial sucker-punch. Of course, all this humor would be wasted if Colfer’s characters and situations didn’t live-up to it, but he does indeed know his craft. By the 5th book, the universe was so well established that I at one point though to myself, “You know, it would be so likely for [blank] to happen,” and later on, it did. After that I thought, “It would be very much in character for Artemis if [same blank] was really a trick,” and it was. Not to say that the books are entirely predictable. Usually it’s only small things. The kinds of things that help you realize that Colfer has a certain style, and that his characters have personality. A lot of parts are rather Ocean’s Eleven/Italian Job-esque, where you don’t know all the pieces to the puzzle until everything falls into place (and preferably a place full of delightful puns ^_^). -Quotations of the day- “Artemis Fowl Senior had bought a cargo ship, stocked it with 250 thousand cans of cola, and set course for Murmansk in Northern Russia, where he had arranged a business deal that could prove profitable for decades to come. Unfortunately, the Russian Mafiya decided they did not want an Irish tycoon cutting himself a slice of their market, and sank the Fowl Star in the Bay of Kola.” “Artemis avoided other teenagers and resented being sent to school, preferring to spend his time plotting his next crime. So, even though his involvement with the goblin uprising during this year was to be traumatic, terrifying, and dangerous, it was probably the best thing that could have happened to him. At least he spent some time outdoors, and got to meet some new people. It’s a pity most of them were trying to kill him.” “When would people learn that a mind such as his could not be dissected? He himself had read more psychology textbooks than the counselor. He had even contributed an article to The Psychologists’ Journal, under the pseudonym Dr. F. Roy Dean Schlippe.” -Artemis Fowl: The Arctic Incident- “Artemis focused on the important things he had left behind, and realized that they were all people. Mother, Father, Butler, Foaly, and Mulch. Possessions that he had believed important now meant nothing. Except maybe his collection of Impressionist art.” -Artemis Fowl: The Lost Colony-(as I said, puns and one-liners ^_^)

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Wednesday, January 31, 2007

   Bah!

My 3-D design teacher has given us a project that hurts my very soul, for we must destroy a book in order to complete it. The bibliophile in me weeps profusely. We have to use a book as the base for a sculpture that depicts a scene or character from said book. This involves gluing the pages together and drilling holes into it. Unfortunately for me, the only way I’ll be able to do this is to find a copy of a book I already have. I went on a mission to some thrift stores and I found some nice books for myself as well as a copy of “The Secret Garden”, a book I already own. I though my trip was therefore a success and I went home quite pleased. Of course, as soon as I returned home, I made the dire mistake of opening the book and I discovered that it was very beautifully illustrated, and the front cover had an inscription dated from 1990. Apparently it was a gift to a child. So now I cannot bring myself to drill holes into it. I had to go to a regular bookstore and purchase another copy of the same book, because I still had my heart set on using that theme for my sculpture *sigh* I think I am now legally insane or something. I blame homework. -Quotation of the Day- Professor: “Does anyone know why newspapers use the informal form?” Student: “Because there’s no need to be polite?” Professor: “Exactly, because you don’t know who’s reading. It could be Martha Stewart, it could be Martha Stewart’s parole officer, you just don’t know.” -My Japanese class-

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Friday, January 26, 2007

   Art And Japanese

Well, I’ve decided this week that I absolutely love my Japanese class. I wish all my classes were that amusing and informative. That has to be one of the coolest things about having a professor who’s a linguist; you learn all kinds of useless yet entertaining facts about English, and any other random language that can prove a point. Like when we were going over categorizing verbs, our professor made a passing comment about how the class of English verbs that end in –ed in the past tense were formed originally by adding –did to the end to make them past tense. So the verb “looked” used to be pronounced and spelled “lookdid”. Fun stuff. Also, there was an amusing moment in class on Wednesday when he was teaching us how to ask “What is [blank] in Japanese?” He was pointing out that if you accidentally drop one small part, it would change your question to “Is [blank] a Japanese word?” He was using a face mask someone had brought as an example, and he basically said, “If you drop “de nan” from the sentence, you will be asking if ‘face mask’ is a Japanese word, and people will probably look at you funny” followed by something in Japanese which involved the word “baka”. He then turned to Tameyori-sensei (our TA who is Japanese), and asked, “‘Face mask’ wa nihongo de nan desu ka?” (What is ‘face mask’ in Japanese?) since he didn’t know and she said “‘Fesumasuke’ desu” which is just ‘face mask’ pronounced with Japanese syllables. We all got a kick out of that one; because of course our professor would accidentally pick an example where the English word really WAS a Japanese word also. Hehehe. On a fun note, I decided to buy the collected poems of W.H. Auden the other day, because I think he was really cool. I have this sort of personal philosophy that everyone has a least two special authors, one that feels like listening to yourself, and another that feels like listening to your friends. For me those two are Emerson and Auden. I’m sure that theory will mutate over time, but for now I believe it. In other news, my art classes are all trying to kill me, but that’s nothing new. I get to read two chapters in Art History this weekend, read two chapters in photography, finish a self portrait, do ten sketchbook pages (back to front) of drawings of bottles, and make a 20-22 inch wire sculpture of a human figure in motion that represents an Existentialist philosophy or thought (I picked Nihilism ^_^). Although I could probably do all that (excluding the reading) on Friday, so I’m basically just whining because I’m tired ^_^ Alas, that is my cue to depart, so I shall leave. Later. -Quotations of the Day- “‘Chair’ wa nihongo de nan desu ka? ‘Isu’ desu. So now we know ‘chair’ is ‘isu’. But be careful, don’t say ‘risu’, because ‘risu’ means ‘squirrel’, and if you ask me to pass you a squirrel, I will laugh at you.” -my Japanese professor- “In the eyes of every author, I fancy, his own past work falls into four classes. First, the pure rubbish which he regrets ever having conceived; second - for him the most painful – the good ideas which his incompetence or impatience prevented from coming to much (The Orators seems to me such a case of the fair notion fatally injured); third, the pieces he has nothing against except their lack of importance; these must inevitably form the bulk of any collection since, were he to limit it to the fourth class alone, to those poems for which he is honestly grateful, his volume would be too depressingly slim.” -W.H. Auden, 1944- “My life is not an apology, but a life. It is for itself, and not for a spectacle. I much prefer that it should be of a lower strain, so it be genuine and equal, than that it should be glittering and unsteady. I wish it to be sound and sweet, and not to need diet and bleeding. My life should be unique; it should be an alms, a battle, a conquest, a medicine. I ask primary evidence that you are a man, and refuse this appeal from the man to his actions. I know that for myself it makes no difference whether I do or forbear those actions which are reckoned excellent. I cannot consent to pay for a privilege where I have intrinsic right. Few and mean as my gifts may be, I actually am, and do not need for my own assurance or the assurance of my fellows any secondary testimony.” -“Self-Reliance” by Ralph Waldo Emerson- “Again, it makes me wince when I see how ready I was to treat -or and -aw as homophones. It is true that in the Oxonian dialect I speak they are, but that isn’t really an adequate excuse. I also find that my ear will no longer tolerate rhyming a voiced S with an unvoiced. I have had to leave a few such rhymes because I cannot at the moment see a way to get rid of them, but I promise not to do it again.” -W.H. Auden, 1965-

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Sunday, January 21, 2007

   Meh

Ah, the joys of the college student’s weekend. Today (Saturday) I went in to work at 9:30 and worked my butt off pulling books for people and restocking shelves until 2:45. We were uber busy due to the fact that the classes where I work start on Monday. My feet hurt. After that lovely shift, I then went on a short trip to pick-up some of the art supplies I still need for school and came home to work on my Drawing homework. Apparently I’m stupid enough to want to stand on my feet for 3 and half hours. But then again, about half of my homework (time wise) is now done. Eh, I call it a draw ^_^ In other news, I shall tell the story of what I did last weekend. Since it was the last weekend of break for myself, as well as my friend Harimanne (her real name’s Marianne, but she got the nickname from our friend in sophomore year of high school and it stuck ^_^), we, along with our friend Keebs and her ever-present boyfriend, decided to rent a bunch of movies Friday night. We rented the old version of The Wicker Man, this incredibly cheesy and dumb horror flick called (and I kid you not) Witches of the Caribbean, and also Art School Confidential (mainly because Harimanne is a music major and wanted to see how things compare in art, because, as everyone knows, those two majors are twin sisters when it comes to the “living in a cardboard box” and “Do you want fries with that?” jokes). We watched the witches one first, and we alternated between laughing our asses off and being disgusted. The plot was really jumpy and at times nonsensical, but we got some laughs, so the movie served it’s purpose. After that we watched Art School Confidential, and both Harimanne and I thought it was fantastic. It’s basically a dark comedy about a guy in art school. I loved the scene where they were doing the first class critique ^_^ Harimanne and I compared notes on critiquing art and music, and we decided that art and music majors are equally pretentious and vague when they can’t think of anything constructive to say about the piece. There was much learned all around ^_^ Oh, and we never did get around to watching The Wicker Man. It got too late T_T On Saturday, Keebs decided we should watch some more movies, so we got Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby, Murder in Greenwich, and The Watcher in the Woods (a Disney classic, despite being a sci-fi thriller with bad acting). We only watched the last two of those, because it got too late to watch Talladega Nights. Also, if that wasn’t enough, I had promised Keebs a few weeks earlier that we would have a movie night on Sunday, and that crazy chick still held me to that promise, so we rented The Illusionist and Thank You For Smoking, only two this time, in order to make room to watch Talladega. The second one turned out to be ok, and funny in parts, but not all it was cracked-up to be and Talladega was stupid funny, as expected. The Illusionist, however, was an absolutely fantastic movie. Unfortunately, it’s one of those movies that can’t really be talked about without ruining the story. The main plus of the movie, though, was the fact that it was able to take some rather tired movie elements and use them well. I mean, there’s the whole “romance between people who are from different classes” thing, but unlike other movies, it isn’t something that’s constantly beaten into the viewer. I think it was only mentioned about twice the whole time. And the romance story itself is rather unconventional, due to the largely unexpected and shocking plot twist about half-way through the movie. Also, since the movie is set in Vienna around the turn of the 1900’s, they filmed the flashback scenes in a style that reminds me of old movies, and the overall color impression I got from the movie reminded me of sepia-toned photographs. It was neat. Anyway, I’m off to do some more homework now, so later ^_^ -Quotation of the Day- “Mother and daughter Girl Scout team selling cookies, found the door open, saw the blood, called the cops.” “There’s gotta be a merit badge for that, right?” -CSI: Miami-

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Friday, January 19, 2007

   Checking In

Sorry for wandering off again. My classes started up again this week. I wanted to cry, but oh well. The good news is, when I went to my first day of classes, I was afraid that Drawing was going to be my least favorite, but I think I’m over it now that we’ve really started doing projects. However, I’m really not looking forward to keeping several Drawing and 3-D Foundation sketchbooks. I’m going to have to doodle my little butt off this semester. Of course, on the bright side, that’s way better than having to research my little butt off like I would be doing if I was still a poli sci major. I’m glad that minor foray into hell is over and done with. I’m still rather tired, what with my return to the college educational system and the coinciding extra hours at work (one of the joys of working in a college while simultaneously attending one), so I’m going to cut this short. I shall leave you with funny art teacher quotations. -Quotations of the Day- “One of the funniest things to watch is a photography student who normally uses a plastic developing tank and reels go into a panic because they have to use steel ones.” (hehe, plastic reels are apparently much easier to load than steel ones) “There’s just one thing you have to be careful of. The store is run by Hasidic Jews, and they observe these really random holidays. They don’t process orders, ship them or anything. Just BAM! Gone for 5, 6 days. And they could really care less if you need photography paper.” -My Photography Professor- “This is just great. Group assignments bringing students together. I know people are bonding when I hear ‘Do you want me to smack you!’ across the classroom.” -My 3-D Foundations Professor-

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Sunday, January 7, 2007

   Sometimes You Feel Like A Rant, Sometimes You Don't

You know, for some reason I just haven’t felt like updating recently. I think it’s my natural laziness that’s done it ^_^ Eh, it is that time of year, after all. No school, and I only have a part-time job, so I’m just enjoying the relaxed pace. Groovy. In fact, I’ve been gone so long, I didn’t even get to mention what I got for Christmas *gasps* Let’s see, well, I got a card for my computer that lets me watch and record TV, since we have a cable internet connection (sweet!). I also got The Fray CD How to Save a Life, the complete recordings of Robert Johnson (double sweet in all it’s 30’s blues), a bag of dark chocolate truffles, a teapot, a collection of all the Little Nemo comics is a huge hardback book, a handheld label maker, and a whole lot of Borders gift cards (I’ve already spent all of them, too ^_^). Definitely an awesome Christmas. On New Years, I made an appearance at my Grandmother’s for dinner, after which I went over to my friend’s house for her party, where we all stayed up late playing video games ^_^ As for more recent events, today I randomly decided to watch Howl’s Moving Castle, just because I could, and probably because I am still, deep down, just a little depressed at the crappiness of the Eragon movie. I mean, I know the book isn’t perfect, or even destined to be all that well famous a few decades from now, since it tends to traffic in all the fantasy clichés that afflict most American fantasy, but it was still thousands of times better than that damn movie. I need to watch movies like Howl’s Moving Castle to remind me that all hope is not lost. That somehow, even when a movie adaptation of a book removes or revises major plot points in a story, it still doesn’t have to suck (in contrast to Eragon, which actually keep a great many major plot points, but still managed to #@$* everything up around them). Anyway, as I was watching the movie today, my introspective nature kicked in again, and helped to remind me why Diana Wynne Jones is such a kick-ass writer. I mean, she can create some of the best characters. They usually all have some tremendous flaws and yet you still love them anyway. For example, in the book Sophie is nosy, bossy, and constantly does things without thinking them all the way through. Michael (“Markl”), who’s actually a teenager in the book, is a bit of a push-over and tends to freeze up in a crisis. Of course, neither of them is as hilariously flawed as Howl himself. He’s selfish, cowardly, egotistical, and falls in love with pretty girls at the drop of a hat, only to lose interest in them as soon as they start to like him. Oh, and he’s Welsh *hahaha* (All joking aside, he really is. In the book, the black panel on the door isn’t some kind of warp portal; it actually leads to a parallel world that’s supposed to be our own. Jones is big on parallel dimensions). It’s all very funny. Of course, some of the worst character flaws are resolved in the story, but her characters are still very realistic in that for all that they change, they still stay exactly the same (i.e. in the sequel, Howl calls his own fairly newborn son ugly, after which Sophie promptly yells at him). Anyway, enough rambling about Diana Wynne Jones and her witty British humour. In anime news, YouTube seems to have done some more clearing out of copyrighted material, and I can no longer find the episodes of Spiral there anymore. It’s not that bad. I was only looking for them to see if they had been deleted, since I’ve already watched the whole series. Oh well, c’est la vie. What tends to surprise me, though, is the fact that there are still several American shows that haven’t been touched. I can still find several episodes of Supernatural on YouTube. Hmmm, perplexing. I guess WGN hasn’t complained yet. Anyway, I’m off to go frolic or something. Later. -Quotation of the Day- "'Mrs. Fairfax is a family friend,' said Sophie, 'How was I to know you would be there too?' 'You have an instinct, Sophie, that's how,' said Howl. 'Nothing is safe from you. If I were to court a girl who lived on an iceberg in the middle of an ocean, sooner or later - probably sooner - I'd look up to see you swooping overhead on a broomstick. In fact, by now I'd be disappointed in you if I didn’t see you.' 'Are you off to the iceberg today?' Sophie retorted." -Howl's Moving Castle- (I know I’ve used this quotation before, but I love it)

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Tuesday, December 19, 2006

Fun Discoveries and American Failings

*girlish squeal* Ok, you think I’d be used to dealing with that stomach flipping, mind-hijacking excitement that comes with finding a good story by now, (especially considering the fact that I’ve been reading almost continuously since the second grade) but I’m not. Although I have to say that I’m kind of glad that it doesn’t fade. It makes me feel like I’m 10 years old and reading Dealing with Dragons again, or 14 years old and discovering the first Harry Potter. And let’s not forget the discovery of Fruits Basket at 18. Hmm, my list seems to made of four year intervals. Odd. Anyway, the pattern is broken, for I have discovered… Inverloch! I don’t know how many of you have read it, or even heard of it, but it’s a manga (both online and in print) of the fantasy persuasion. The creator is a chick named Sarah Ellerton from Australia. I’ve gotten all caught up in the story, and the art is completely gorgeous! I always love good CG art. Elves, I know you would love this series. There’s even an elfin guy with silver hair and gold eyes *elbows suggestively* Of course, he doesn’t show up in person until the fourth volume, but you get some nice flashes of him beforehand ^_^ Alas, this new discovery has made it even more painfully clear that my favorite fantasy authors are more frequently British (Jonathan Stroud, J.K. Rowling, Dianna Wynne Jones, J.R.R. Tolkien, etc.), Australian (Isobelle Carmody, Garth Nix, etc.), Japanese (way too many manga-ka to list) and occasionally from other random countries (such as Isabel Allende, who was raised in Chile). I must admit that I am starting to despair at the current American situation. Come on people! Get creative! I expect more from you! We share a large part of cultural history with the British and Australians, so step up to the plate already. Sheesh! I need to go simultaneously sulk and bask in creative joy now. Later. -Quotations of the Day- Lei'ella: "Wait! Where do you think you are going?" Varden: "Oh, you know. Looting, pillaging, stealing, murdering. Terrorising the innocent populace. That sort of thing." Lei'ella: "Oh." -Inverloch, Vol 3- (hehe, they're so cute ^_^) Varden: "Wow, I killed your fiance. I think I feel kind of guilty." Lei'elle: "Don't be silly. I hated him for what he did." Varden: "Nope. It's gone now." -Inverloch, Vol 4- (I repeat, so cute ^_^) -Pictures of the Day- This is Inverloch’s main character, Acheron. The fuzzy guy, that is. He’s groovy. And this is pretty much blatant eye candy for my female Otaku friends ^_^

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