it's the pigment of your imagination *ba-dum chhh*
Any child of a teacher has probably at one time or another been roped into helping the parent by grading papers. This goes double for any child graduating with an English degree.
My mom teaches fourth grade, and ever since the first fall break freshman year of college, my "chore" in the house is to help her grade papers. Mostly grading papers doesn't bother me, because it gets me out of doing things like dishes. But lately I don't get to grade the easy things, like the "color in the circle" pretests we used to have to do. No, I get the inventive projects. Like the "design your own animal and write a two page review of it."
Sounds like fun, right? Especially since the kids actually did get to make their own animals out of clay and whatever materials they had (one hacked apart an Eeyore doll to do so. It made me a little sad). Some are really clever. But most, oh dear, I fear for the future.
I'm trying very hard to not be mean, because these kids are only in fourth grade, and god knows I was not smart at that age either. But omggggg snow "loepards" do not live in the desert with their friends, the gray wolf D: An animal that is the size of a sheep would not eat 100 pounds of food a day, and we're not even talking about what kind of environment could sustain a population like that. My favorite so far is the bird that has stick-legs, so if it's attacked, it can flop over on its back and appear like sticks to its predators. Rather clever, but it's too bad the bird's a fluorescent pink and green, and that is a trait of the "species". Kind of might give it away a bit.
Also, it's breathes, dammit, not breaths. Breath is a noun, breathes is the verb, get it riiiiight anjkfnfndm It's probably one of my more bizarre pet peeves, but there you have it.
I hate telling people I graduated with an English major, because their next reaction is to ask, "Do you want to teach?" I just smile in an slightly unhinged way and laugh hysterically in the inside.
Discworld has been hopping with news, though, which makes me wish desperately I lived in England and had access to Sky One. Jeremy Irons is going to play the Patrician in the upcoming Colour of Magic, and they're going to make Going Postal the next movie. A huge jump, going from the first book in the series to one of the newest, but whatever. It would be fun to see Moist on film, and he better be one charismatic actor.
The website's got the trailer up, but it's rather buggy, so it's also on YouTube. And you know what else is on YouTube?
WHY HAVEN'T I THOUGHT TO LOOK FOR THIS BEFORE.
Reaper Man intro
Dunno if there is a whole movie, but it's kind of fun. Albert looks like crap, though.
Wyrd Sisters 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15
"Gytha, a witch doesn't know the meaning of the word 'failure'."
"Esme?"
"What?"
"It means 'lack of success'."
Soul Music is also up if anyone wants to look for it. I might link it later on, I'm just being rather lazy right now.
Of course, all this DW fangirling reminds me I have icons to make. That are incredibly overdue ;_; Question though. For text-based icons, is it better to just do a solid-color-backgroung-white/black-text? I know a lot of people like that but they seem so booooring but I like adding textures/pictures to mine. *points to icon* Too cluttered? Not as attractive as the simple and succinct solid background?
Been working on the list of animes I need to see too. Spoilers, yo.
Like a total over-enthusiastic dumbass I started on Mononoke first (even after I had people explain that Mononoke follows Ayakashi (not to be confused with the anime of the same name but about some virus and not horror stories). So first, a straightforward explanation for those who have never heard of this. If you have, kindly skip the next paragraph.
Ayakashi is 12 episodes broken into three arcs. The last arc, the Bakaneko or Ghost/Goblin Cat Arc, is what leads into Mononoke. Mononoke deals with the same Medicine Seller that is featured in the Bakaneko arc. The first parts of Ayakashi, however, are two other separate stories, one dealing with a kabuki play based on the life of a woman betrayed by her ronin husband, and one detailing a tragic love story between a human and a Lost God. Mononoke deals with the Medicine Seller's life in Edo as he travels around and defeats various mononoke for his own reasons. I haven't gotten far enough in the series to know what those reasons are, if they ever state them, but the series is rife with references to Japanese mythology, especially the various demons. I still haven't located a decent Japanese mythology book, but I recognized a couple of figures from (of all things) playing Okami. And they say you can't learn things from a video game.
You don't actually have to watch Ayakashi to understand the general premise of Mononoke (and I should know, because that's exactly what I did. Six episodes in I'm thinking to myself, Wasn't there another part I should be watching? :T). In the second case, there is a passing reference to the Bakaneko case, but nothing comes from it other than an "Hey, I know you, you solved such-and-such and possibly killed the family involved!"
We all know how addicted Kristy is to seiyuu and cross-referencing their various roles. In the first Ayakashi story, Hiroaki Hirata is effectively the bad guy: he quite possibly steals from his lord, kills his father-in-law, casts aside his wife after she has a child because she's become weaker and agrees to marry another woman (who has disfigured his first wife with a poison) while telling their servant to either rape the first wife or kill her. I didn't know whether to laugh or cry, because I kept imagining Sanji, especially in the second episode. Oh dear. Two of the seiyuu from Zombie Loan show up in this as well (Takahiro Sakurai, who I'm quickly falling in love with as well, and Houko Kuwashima) and my favorite ever (Kappei Yamaguchi ♥) is in the second story, along with Masaya Onosaka, who, remember, did the voice of Isaac in Baccano! and Spandam XD They're a fairly fun pair of demons, the comedy relief/moral delivering by-standers.
Ayakashi: In terms of storytelling, the first arc drags. It's only four episodes long and it feels like seven. I get that it's deeply tragic and devastating for all involved, and almost entirely due to the weakness of human beings. I do like the idea that the curse is not from the people but from the retelling of the story itself, and that by watching the play/reading the story we keep the belief of the curse alive. It's kind of like the idea that history is what people repeat; whether it's the truth may not come into it at all. But if the intention of the story was to make you feel cursed for watching the anime, it sort of fell flat, because I felt it was more of an interesting take on a living curse than a scary story.
The second arc isn't something I would remotely classify as horror. Instead it's a tragic love story, complete with doomed lovers, a jilted wife, interfering older relatives and all those strident love declarations. Just with 100% more supernatural beings in the forms of the Princess and her entourage of Lost Gods, beings who I guess accidentally left the realm of the gods and now have to live a half-life imitating humanity. I'd go into more detail, if you want, but really, you're not missing much in terms of this story.
Two main problems. At one point the soon-to-be jilted wife finds a comb that previously belonged to the princess, she gets all suspicious about it, and later pleads with the lord to destroy the Lost Gods' castle because her hubby's in love with one of them. If I found a random pretty comb in a box in my house, I would assume it was a present for me that my husband hadn't given to me yet, not that it belonged to some mysterious god-being. Especially since I don't think the girl ever saw the princess with the comb to begin with. So that was kind of weak. Also, when the guy goes to the castle before the huge fight, his whole talk with the princess is about whether she should kill him (since his life is now forfeit for returning to her). Not, you know, about the thousands of men about to storm the castle and what we can do to stop them. >:O
I liked the second story better because it was more entertaining, in a shoujo-kind of way. The animation was a little better (though that's not saying much), although character design still sucked. And the two demon bandits are hysterical fun, and actually try to protect the human from the Lost Gods twice in the story. So I like them. The rest can go hang :D
Bakeneko Arc/Mononoke: THE THIRD ARC IS WHERE IT'S AT. The animation is that cool paper-effect you've probably seen on icons everywhere. And the story, omgggg is amazing. If I had the last three episodes, I would upload them for everyone, because seriously, even if you don't watch Mononoke, you should watch the Bakeneko arc. It's scary and tragic and the seiyuu are amazing and the animation is beautiful, especially the end fight. I was just mildly pissed that the good arc was only three episodes long, while the two iffy arcs got four :| But I guess the upshot is that the good arc got a following series~~ so that's all that matters :D
The Medicine Seller stories are almost supernatural mysteries, without the chance to solve the case before the "detective" or, in this case, exorcist. Who may or may not be somewhat of a mononoke himself (pointed ears, man. And that whole transformation thing when the sword's unsheathed). In order to slay a mononoke, the Medicine Seller has to unsheathe this very special sword, one that he's not even supposed to be carrying since he's in the lowest class. To unsheathe the sword, however, he's got to know three things about the mononoke: its form, its truth and its regret. And that's what takes up most of the episodes. The set-up is often quite fast before spooky things start happening, and there's almost always this slight twist that you don't expect. Mind-trippy in places, exquisite story-telling so far, it's hands-down one of the most entertaining series I've seen.
Also, I love the closing-door effect to signal time-passing/end of a scene. Okay, so I love a lot of the series.
Veoh's got the Ayakashi episodes, so go watch episodes 9, 10 and 11. Do eeeeeeet. Don't bother with the others, unless you're anal like I am and have to watch almost everything of a series :| And then proceed directly to Mononoke. You won't be disappointed.
Next up will probably be Ergo Proxy with a side of Ghost Hound, as I plan on going back to animated icons soon. Gah, I haven't made a decent animated icon dump in years. Should be interesting to see how long it will take me XD :B
My mom teaches fourth grade, and ever since the first fall break freshman year of college, my "chore" in the house is to help her grade papers. Mostly grading papers doesn't bother me, because it gets me out of doing things like dishes. But lately I don't get to grade the easy things, like the "color in the circle" pretests we used to have to do. No, I get the inventive projects. Like the "design your own animal and write a two page review of it."
Sounds like fun, right? Especially since the kids actually did get to make their own animals out of clay and whatever materials they had (one hacked apart an Eeyore doll to do so. It made me a little sad). Some are really clever. But most, oh dear, I fear for the future.
I'm trying very hard to not be mean, because these kids are only in fourth grade, and god knows I was not smart at that age either. But omggggg snow "loepards" do not live in the desert with their friends, the gray wolf D: An animal that is the size of a sheep would not eat 100 pounds of food a day, and we're not even talking about what kind of environment could sustain a population like that. My favorite so far is the bird that has stick-legs, so if it's attacked, it can flop over on its back and appear like sticks to its predators. Rather clever, but it's too bad the bird's a fluorescent pink and green, and that is a trait of the "species". Kind of might give it away a bit.
Also, it's breathes, dammit, not breaths. Breath is a noun, breathes is the verb, get it riiiiight anjkfnfndm It's probably one of my more bizarre pet peeves, but there you have it.
I hate telling people I graduated with an English major, because their next reaction is to ask, "Do you want to teach?" I just smile in an slightly unhinged way and laugh hysterically in the inside.
Discworld has been hopping with news, though, which makes me wish desperately I lived in England and had access to Sky One. Jeremy Irons is going to play the Patrician in the upcoming Colour of Magic, and they're going to make Going Postal the next movie. A huge jump, going from the first book in the series to one of the newest, but whatever. It would be fun to see Moist on film, and he better be one charismatic actor.
The website's got the trailer up, but it's rather buggy, so it's also on YouTube. And you know what else is on YouTube?
WHY HAVEN'T I THOUGHT TO LOOK FOR THIS BEFORE.
Reaper Man intro
Dunno if there is a whole movie, but it's kind of fun. Albert looks like crap, though.
Click to viewWyrd Sisters 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15
"Gytha, a witch doesn't know the meaning of the word 'failure'."
"Esme?"
"What?"
"It means 'lack of success'."
Soul Music is also up if anyone wants to look for it. I might link it later on, I'm just being rather lazy right now.
Of course, all this DW fangirling reminds me I have icons to make. That are incredibly overdue ;_; Question though. For text-based icons, is it better to just do a solid-color-backgroung-white/black-text? I know a lot of people like that but they seem so booooring but I like adding textures/pictures to mine. *points to icon* Too cluttered? Not as attractive as the simple and succinct solid background?
Been working on the list of animes I need to see too. Spoilers, yo.
Like a total over-enthusiastic dumbass I started on Mononoke first (even after I had people explain that Mononoke follows Ayakashi (not to be confused with the anime of the same name but about some virus and not horror stories). So first, a straightforward explanation for those who have never heard of this. If you have, kindly skip the next paragraph.
Ayakashi is 12 episodes broken into three arcs. The last arc, the Bakaneko or Ghost/Goblin Cat Arc, is what leads into Mononoke. Mononoke deals with the same Medicine Seller that is featured in the Bakaneko arc. The first parts of Ayakashi, however, are two other separate stories, one dealing with a kabuki play based on the life of a woman betrayed by her ronin husband, and one detailing a tragic love story between a human and a Lost God. Mononoke deals with the Medicine Seller's life in Edo as he travels around and defeats various mononoke for his own reasons. I haven't gotten far enough in the series to know what those reasons are, if they ever state them, but the series is rife with references to Japanese mythology, especially the various demons. I still haven't located a decent Japanese mythology book, but I recognized a couple of figures from (of all things) playing Okami. And they say you can't learn things from a video game.
You don't actually have to watch Ayakashi to understand the general premise of Mononoke (and I should know, because that's exactly what I did. Six episodes in I'm thinking to myself, Wasn't there another part I should be watching? :T). In the second case, there is a passing reference to the Bakaneko case, but nothing comes from it other than an "Hey, I know you, you solved such-and-such and possibly killed the family involved!"
We all know how addicted Kristy is to seiyuu and cross-referencing their various roles. In the first Ayakashi story, Hiroaki Hirata is effectively the bad guy: he quite possibly steals from his lord, kills his father-in-law, casts aside his wife after she has a child because she's become weaker and agrees to marry another woman (who has disfigured his first wife with a poison) while telling their servant to either rape the first wife or kill her. I didn't know whether to laugh or cry, because I kept imagining Sanji, especially in the second episode. Oh dear. Two of the seiyuu from Zombie Loan show up in this as well (Takahiro Sakurai, who I'm quickly falling in love with as well, and Houko Kuwashima) and my favorite ever (Kappei Yamaguchi ♥) is in the second story, along with Masaya Onosaka, who, remember, did the voice of Isaac in Baccano! and Spandam XD They're a fairly fun pair of demons, the comedy relief/moral delivering by-standers.
Ayakashi: In terms of storytelling, the first arc drags. It's only four episodes long and it feels like seven. I get that it's deeply tragic and devastating for all involved, and almost entirely due to the weakness of human beings. I do like the idea that the curse is not from the people but from the retelling of the story itself, and that by watching the play/reading the story we keep the belief of the curse alive. It's kind of like the idea that history is what people repeat; whether it's the truth may not come into it at all. But if the intention of the story was to make you feel cursed for watching the anime, it sort of fell flat, because I felt it was more of an interesting take on a living curse than a scary story.
The second arc isn't something I would remotely classify as horror. Instead it's a tragic love story, complete with doomed lovers, a jilted wife, interfering older relatives and all those strident love declarations. Just with 100% more supernatural beings in the forms of the Princess and her entourage of Lost Gods, beings who I guess accidentally left the realm of the gods and now have to live a half-life imitating humanity. I'd go into more detail, if you want, but really, you're not missing much in terms of this story.
Two main problems. At one point the soon-to-be jilted wife finds a comb that previously belonged to the princess, she gets all suspicious about it, and later pleads with the lord to destroy the Lost Gods' castle because her hubby's in love with one of them. If I found a random pretty comb in a box in my house, I would assume it was a present for me that my husband hadn't given to me yet, not that it belonged to some mysterious god-being. Especially since I don't think the girl ever saw the princess with the comb to begin with. So that was kind of weak. Also, when the guy goes to the castle before the huge fight, his whole talk with the princess is about whether she should kill him (since his life is now forfeit for returning to her). Not, you know, about the thousands of men about to storm the castle and what we can do to stop them. >:O
I liked the second story better because it was more entertaining, in a shoujo-kind of way. The animation was a little better (though that's not saying much), although character design still sucked. And the two demon bandits are hysterical fun, and actually try to protect the human from the Lost Gods twice in the story. So I like them. The rest can go hang :D
Bakeneko Arc/Mononoke: THE THIRD ARC IS WHERE IT'S AT. The animation is that cool paper-effect you've probably seen on icons everywhere. And the story, omgggg is amazing. If I had the last three episodes, I would upload them for everyone, because seriously, even if you don't watch Mononoke, you should watch the Bakeneko arc. It's scary and tragic and the seiyuu are amazing and the animation is beautiful, especially the end fight. I was just mildly pissed that the good arc was only three episodes long, while the two iffy arcs got four :| But I guess the upshot is that the good arc got a following series~~ so that's all that matters :D
The Medicine Seller stories are almost supernatural mysteries, without the chance to solve the case before the "detective" or, in this case, exorcist. Who may or may not be somewhat of a mononoke himself (pointed ears, man. And that whole transformation thing when the sword's unsheathed). In order to slay a mononoke, the Medicine Seller has to unsheathe this very special sword, one that he's not even supposed to be carrying since he's in the lowest class. To unsheathe the sword, however, he's got to know three things about the mononoke: its form, its truth and its regret. And that's what takes up most of the episodes. The set-up is often quite fast before spooky things start happening, and there's almost always this slight twist that you don't expect. Mind-trippy in places, exquisite story-telling so far, it's hands-down one of the most entertaining series I've seen.
Also, I love the closing-door effect to signal time-passing/end of a scene. Okay, so I love a lot of the series.
Veoh's got the Ayakashi episodes, so go watch episodes 9, 10 and 11. Do eeeeeeet. Don't bother with the others, unless you're anal like I am and have to watch almost everything of a series :| And then proceed directly to Mononoke. You won't be disappointed.
Next up will probably be Ergo Proxy with a side of Ghost Hound, as I plan on going back to animated icons soon. Gah, I haven't made a decent animated icon dump in years. Should be interesting to see how long it will take me XD :B